conjectural navel gazing; jesus in lint form

praying with the celts

It's my day off...time for a little selfcare as they say. So, I shall venture out into the world to meet with some folk to talk about ministry and life in Chicago. I think that's what we're talking about. We'll see what happens! I'll spend some time playing in the old neighborhood and then come home to spend the rest of the day with my wife. She has the day off...the first day off in quite some time. The theater has been keeping her very busy.

In related news, I am starting an online course this week in Celtic Spirituality. The Seminary of the Southwest has some interesting online options and this one appealed to me. I'll pick up a couple CEU's but more importantly, I'll have a community of prayer and study to hang with for a little while. With all of the gigs that One of the Girls have been lining up, I have had the Celts on my mind. I've been reacquainting myself with some of the Northumbria Community and Iona liturgies as well. You will likely see more of this material here for the next several weeks.

So, the band is playing at the Irish American Heritage Center this Saturday evening. Jeanne T. Arrigo will open the evening at 9:00pm. The Girls will follow and play until the kick us out. I'm really excited to be playing at the IAHC again. Bring on the Irish!

getting it together for the scouts

Then Jesus said to Simon, "Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people." When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.
~ Luke 5:10-11

Preaching without notes, as so many of my colleagues will tell you, takes more time and not less. No matter how often I repeat this truth to myself, I am always amazed and just how much time it takes. I can crank out a usable manuscript in a few hours. To get the sermon together so that I can wander about and talk with people takes a couple of days of concentration, study, and most of all, prayer. This sermon is no different.

I want to talk once more about why we proclaim. I've been talking about proclamation at church for the last couple of Sundays. I think it's good to talk about talking...especially in a time when talking about religion is so contentious. The passage from Isaiah reminds us just how dangerous it can be to speak of God's love in a world bent on violence and hatred. But Isaiah responds anyway...and in the affirmative at that.

Jesus, in Luke's Gospel this morning is working through something else entirely. I get the prophetic call that Jesus issues to Peter (the foundation of the church is the prophetic call of Isaiah), but the important piece in this is the fishing metaphor to me. Have the fishermen forgotten how to fish? Have the prophets forgotten how to prophesy? Jesus will spend his life (lose his life, really) showing us what it means to be a prophet. So, what makes it possible to forget how to fish? What makes us forget how to prophesy?

I'm sure there is a very long list. We'll find out today.

In the end, however, for the Christian, it is the person of Christ who catches the fish and who catches the people. It is only by being the Body of Christ that the prophetic Word can be heard in the world. It is only through Christ that we who claim to be his Body can do anything at all.

friday videopost: scout sunday

...on that first day.

My soul's Healer,
Keep me at even,
Keep me at morning,
Keep me at noon,
On rough course faring,
Help and safeguard
My means this night.
I am tired, astray, and stumbling,
Shield me from snare and sin.

In the beginning of all things was a Voice...an uttered Word so potent that it was alive, aware, creative, and free. It spoke itself into being and we who are the echo of that voice came to life in the same moment. Light was born. Trees grew. Creatures crawled on the land, flew through the air, and swam in the seas. A single voice. A unison Word.

Of course, as you know, something happened. We tell the stories of decisions made by a man and a woman. We tell stories of human sacrifice or the original man. We even have a story about a turtle and how all the world is upon its back. We have these stories because in our heart of hearts we think that just maybe something went wrong. We've thought this for a long time. There's too much noise now, too much chaos. How can this possibly be unity?

Did we forget how to speak? Or did we forget how to listen? Were we punished or was it some terrible accident. It is impossible to know now. Time does what it does and say what you will about time, we are not who our forebears were nor will those who follow us centuries away be who we now are. But we know the Voice spoke a Word.

And here I sit wondering as the sun sets if I will ever do more than long for that Voice. I wonder if I'll hear it somehow one day. Maybe. I pray for it. I ask for it. I listen for it and I even have the audacious job of speaking for that original Word (Has there ever been a better definition for foolishness?). I live knowing it's there. In my heart of hearts I know this. The echo is still there...a lingering shimmer of that first impulse, that first vibration through the air. But it's only the barest echo, a subtle vibration and no longer a Word...but the subtle memory of it knit in me.

So it is this memory I hold up as the day closes and the night folds itself around me. It is in this Spirit that I offer up my evening prayer and beg your forgiveness if I have failed you in some way today. Tomorrow we'll begin again and I shall hope to hear, to feel, to sense, the Voice and the Word spoken on that first day.

seersucker, leadership, and privilege

Now is the cool of the day
Now is the cool of the day
This earth is a garden,
the garden of my Lord
And he walks in his garden
In the cool of the day.
~ Jean Ritchie

When I was younger, I wanted to be one of those guys who wore seersucker suits. Not a dandy, per se, but someone comfortable enough in their own skin that they could wear something so playful. I also know that seersucker speaks of the Old South. Lord knows that association comes with serious baggage, and yet...I admire the culture that has a strain of laziness in it. Every rung of society knew how to sit and let the heat of the day dictate what would or would not happen. And the gentlemen would wear seersucker. One must look good when doing nothing.

Seersucker spoke (and may still speak) of privilege. It says that leaders sit and do little. It says that leaders are playful and even a little eccentric. Is there a place for such leadership in the world we live in? I cannot say, but I have been wondering lately. What is it that seersucker can teach us? Sabbath? Perhaps, but that's a little too easy. Maybe it's a reminder that we need to know when to sit. Maybe it can remind us that the heat of the day is not to be denied or ignored. We do so at our peril.

One of the first jobs I had was as a farm hand. That may be an exaggeration. I painted fence when I could. I helped a local farmer get up hay. I put in some barbed wire fence for my girlfriend's father. I even mucked stalls upon occasion. I did not live on a farm but many of my neighbors did and when I needed some extra pocket money I knew where to turn.

In the summers we would start early. Very early. The humidity and the heat would drive us inside by eleven or so. Then we were done until the next day. It was that simple. What did we do with the rest of the day? We sat and talked. We drank tea or a cola. I read a lot in the summers. Sure, there was air conditioning in our homes, but that wasn't going to help me put in the barbed wire fence. Now I live and work in the Chicago area. No one stops for weather here. Ever. It's a moral imperative in the same way that stopping for the weather was a moral imperative in Virginia.

Leadership, they say, is best understood by example. Speak all you like. Research all you like. But at some point the doing has to begin. So, is there a place for the seersucker? Is there a place for saying "It's hot out here, kids. Come inside for a bit and sit a spell. Would you like tea?"

I look at the world around me. I check my own internal anxiety barometer. I have been working in the heat of the day. I need the cool of the day. I need to be able to call my people inside where it's cool and offer them a place to sit and something that will refresh their souls...But I am not sure that I know the difference between the heat and the cool anymore. Maybe there is simply no way to escape the heat.

And so I swelter and try to look good.

a poem

THE HAPPY MAN
G.K. Chesterton

To teach the grey earth like a child,
To bid the heavens repent,
I only ask from Fate the gift
Of one man well content.

Him will I find: though when in vain
I search the feast and mart,
The fading flowers of liberty,
The painted masks of art.

I only find him at the last,
On one old hill where nod
Golgotha’s ghastly trinity–
Three persons and one god.

roller derby birthday

the year of turning 40

t has been a very challenging and full week here at Chateau Ouilmette. Nothing bad has happened, but it has been challenging. It has been review week at the church. Yes, my performance eval came through and like every performance eval there is good and not so good. Parker Palmer writes of "growing edges." It's a good term to hold on to. I discovered many growing edges this week. I also turned 40 this week.

On Wednesday I turned 40. As my wife has a show to rehearse and I have a church to run, we postponed the formal celebrations to last night. Last night we went to the roller derby. Yes, the Windy City Rollers are tremendous. I am a fan. Huge fan. Love it. My Hell's Belles did not fare well. The Double Crossers schooled my team or rolling rookies in the fine points of derbishness. Now, the second bout between The Fury and the Manic Attackers was fierce. I know a few of the skaters on The Fury (Leslie is a great pastry chef.). It was fast and furious. The ladies were tough and we had a great time. Sadly, The Fury lost but we will (and they will) be back! I think I need to get a tee shirt.

Trish organized an event and about 20 friends showed up. I got to participate in one of the little events they have between rounds. It was a race. I'll post a video about it. Unreal. The night was unreal and I came home a tired but happy man.

We're calling this The Year of Turning 40. It's going to be wild.

sermon: the next thing you know

Last week, if you recall, I asked you two questions. The first question I asked was how you understand the word “proclamation.” There were some interesting answers. Thank you for your responses. It’s a challenging word.

I also asked you if you ever stood before the mirror on Sunday mornings as you prepared for church and said to yourself “God has a word for you to give God’s people today.” Apparently, none of us have done that. It’s a curious exercise, but I wanted us to start thinking about what we have to offer one another in “thought, word, and deed” as the scriptures say. Do you have a word to proclaim this morning?

You see, last week we heard the first half of this story from the Gospel of Luke. Jesus has a word for the church. Jesus is in his home church and…well, everything is great at first but suddenly Jesus seems to turn on the people…his own people. It would seem he did the first century equivalent of looking in the mirror and asking if there was a Word for the People of God.

The gentle son becomes the challenging prophet. In a moment of Divine Snarkiness he even maps out their argument for them. “I’ll say this and you’ll say that. So, I’ll say this and you’ll say this other thing…” It’s not something that a respectful and lauded child of a community usually does. Yet here is the Prophet Jesus challenging his own people. Here Luke is setting up the whole story. Jesus will proclaim and Jesus will be rejected.

Jesus is the Messiah. But he’s not here to rescue the Jewish people per se. He’s here to be the Messiah for everyone. He’s not Joseph’s son. He’s God’s son and God’s love is for all. God’s salvation is for all. And though you are loved and special and Chosen by God as you are God’s People, he says, the revelation of God’s love is not for you alone. It never has been.

So, they do what any self-respecting home church would do and they try to kill one of their own children.

I have a lot of images in my head to try to understand what this is about. Maybe it’s a purity issue. Would God save the Gentiles? They aren’t clean! But then scripture reminds us that God will love whom God chooses to love. God will heal whom God chooses to heal and that opens up a whole other can of worms about why them and not us and then why does Jesus have to remind us of this and didn’t I teach that kid in Sunday School and why won’t Mary step in and stop him. This is just embarrassing! And HOW DARE HE SCOLD US AND MOCK US AND CORRET US AND I THOUGHT WE WERE SAFE HERE IN WORSHIP!

We don’t like to be told we’re doing it wrong. We especially don’t like to be told this by one of our own children. Not in worship. Not like this.

What kind of person would do this?

Now the word of the LORD came to me saying, "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations."

Then I said, "Ah, Lord GOD! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy."

But the LORD said to me, "Do not say, 'I am only a boy'; for you shall go to all to whom I send you, and you shall speak whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you, says the LORD."

Then the LORD put out his hand and touched my mouth; and the LORD said to me, "Now I have put my words in your mouth. See, today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up and to pull down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant."

And though you won’t like it because it shakes up everything you know, this is the Love of God set loose in the world. This is the result of the work of the People of God who have come together and are prepared to Love the world. This is the sign of a Messiah who knows that he’s asking the impossible, but with God all things are possible.

God’s Love will reorder things. God’s love will reorder communities, peoples, nations, and kingdoms…but first…first we have to hear this truth. We have to struggle with this truth and recognize that we are not safe from this Love simply because we are here on Sunday mornings. We have to come to terms with it and with its messenger. We have to come to terms with Jesus.

There is no place safe from God’s Love. There is no place where we can go and hide out from Jesus. Though, if there’s anything true in this story, we may just try to anyway. But that’s not the end of the story, is it?

Jesus walks through them. He’ll be back. But first he’ll take the Word to the world. He’s the Prophet of The God of Love and there are people who need healing and release. There are the oppressed to free. There are the sick to heal. And though rejection will come, there are those who are ready for this Word. And they will join together. They will walk with Jesus. And if we too walk with Jesus…

What if we march with the people of Englewood and help them collect the guns?
What if we return to the Gulf Coast that still reels from hurricane Katrina?
What if we welcome refugees from Haiti into our homes?
What if we join with other congregations, other faith communities and stand in solidarity with the Muslim that is derided because of her faith in the name of “national security”?
What if we do all this in the name of Christ?

We need to go where God is.

We have not been given a word to be horded. We have been given a word to be shared. And I think we’re ready to share it. I think we’re ready to hear the truth and proclaim the truth and to walk with the Truth who is Jesus walking in the world to Share God’s Love. I do.

We’re ready to be healed. We’re ready to heal.

We have all we need. We have the Word of God and the Prophetic call of Jesus. We have the Gospel of Christ. All we need to do is proclaim it…

The kind of healing God offers is not for the select or the elect. It is for everyone. It’s not a selfish reconciliation. Christ loves the whole world. No exceptions. God desires the healing of all of creation. No exceptions. And though times may change, we are ready. We are prepared. We are still called to Share.

Amen.

last week's sermon

How do you understand the word “proclamation?” (You can leave your definition in the comments if you like. I asked the congregation and it created a fun discourse.)

St. Francis of Assisi is famous for saying: Preach the Gospel at all times. When necessary, use words.

I am afraid that many of us…especially we liberals…have taken this quotation as permission to avoid hard conversations. We have used it to avoid speaking about our faith. We have used it to avoid talking about Jesus at all. We all have our reasons. Some of them may even be good.

Maybe we don’t want to be confused with Pat Robertson. Maybe we don’t want to upset anyone or make anyone uncomfortable…because that makes us uncomfortable. We are afraid. So, we don’t speak.

Certainly, we try to DO the things God would have us do. That’s laudable. Truly. But I also think we’re all off balance now. We’ve forgotten that St. Francis was a preacher. A preacher! He was famous for preaching…even to animals. He spoke of Jesus. He spoke of Jesus as the fruition of God’s promises and how God loves us.. He spoke of Jesus’ charity and how he lived with the outcast…he lived among the outcast. The words of St. Francis were sweet like Christ’s…and they were about Christ. Thus, his words were challenging.

What's ironic is that that many of us might not remember what St Francis did: He shared what he had…he stepped down from his place of privilege and shared everything he had. He stepped away from a sense of possessiveness and lived a posture of sharing all.

Everything he had also belonged to everyone in need.

He built a church. He helped the poor. He brought people together into community. When he had to, he also challenged his own Church when they would not follow the words of Christ that we heard in this morning’s Gospel passage. He saw the divisions, the dissension that Paul mentions in 1 Corinthians, that divisiveness created by misused wealth and power and he called his own to task.

St. Francis and St. Paul caught the vision of Christ and they proclaimed it.

Paul is incredibly challenging this morning.

The Gospel, according to Paul, may be impossible to proclaim when there is division in the community. The efficacy of the proclamation of the Life, Ministry, and Resurrection of Jesus is hindered when there is division in the ranks.

This is not theological division. Not like we think about it today.

Paul is speaking to the Corinthians. They are letting their understanding of status quo get in the way. They are trying to rank the Gifts of the Spirit. They are trying to keep the low, the poor, in their place and make sure that the wealthy have their accustomed place of honor. Paul, however, understands what Jesus is after and says that diversity of gifts is to be honored. The gifts we bring are essential to being a healthy community. The differences are positives! The hand is not the foot is not the eye is not the ear is not…And this is a good thing.

But here they go again ranking people. Here they go again keeping the poor in their place. Even now in the church we do this. It’s something we have always struggled with. We forget that all have gifts to give. Out of fear we sometimes horde. We sometimes forget to share. We forget that we have enough to share. We forget the very words of Jesus.

‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.’

Things are reversed now. God is here. The God of Love wants us to reverse the pecking order that would keep the poor, the injured, the broken, the hurt, the have-nots, the outcasts (whoever they may be) down. He wants those of us in places of worldly privilege and strength to step down, to lower ourselves. This is an act of love.

…the members of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and those members of the body that we think less honorable we clothe with greater honor, and our less respectable members are treated with greater respect; whereas our more respectable members do not need this. But God has so arranged the body, giving the greater honor to the inferior member, that there may be no dissension within the body, but the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it.

Think about Haiti – Is there a better time than now to Proclaim God’s Gospel? To stand with Christ, as Christ, and say and do these things? What can we live without so that the people of Haiti can rebuild in such a way that they can have homes that can withstand the storms and the earthquakes? What can we live without so that the poor in our own communities can thrive? Sometimes to share what we have means to live without. Does it not?

What do we need to say? What do we need to do? How can we proclaim the Year of the Lord’s Favor today? Let us proclaim the Jubilee, the Year of the Lord’s Favor and forgave all debts and release those wrongfully imprisoned. Perhaps we’ll come to a new understanding of national security, home ownership…or international debt…or even The American Dream.

We are to “strive for the greater gifts” and to live like and proclaim Christ. We need to strike that balance as a community of faith.

Next week we’re going to return to this same story from the Gospel and we’re going to talk together about what happens to Jesus after he stands in his “home church” and proclaims this radical truth (their own truth, by the way). For this week, I hope that you will find ways to talk about Faith…to talk about God in Jesus…to seek that balance speaking and doing in your own life.