Introverts guide to surviving General Assembly

The event opened with a meet and greet. You know, a cocktail party without the cocktails. I'm pictured bottom left talking with colleagues Wendy Keys and Robin Craig.

General Assembly is the governing body of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Presbyterians come from around the world to worship, pray, study and create the rules that govern our denomination. But when thousands gather, it can be fun AND overwhelming. This post appeared on the Synod of the Trinity site.

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ADVENT REFLECTIONS

1 Thessalonians 5:1-11

For God did not call us to impurity but in holiness. 

I'm not hurting any body! 

In this part of his pastoral letter to the Thessalonians, Paul isn't telling the new Christians what to believe, but how to live out their faith. They, like us, are living in the in-between time, after Jesus’ resurrection but before his second coming. Paul is urging the Thessalonians to live Godly lives in response to the grace that God has given them. They are to abstain from lustful, passionate and exploitive relationships. They are to honor the bodies of the people around them and not use others for their own pleasure.

Not exploiting people is harder than it might first appear. While many of us would never engage in sexual fertility rites like the pagan worshippers in Thessalonica, exploitation of other people's bodies still exists. Recent headlines about sexual assault are a testament to the way women’s (and some men’s) bodies are taken advantage of even today. Human trafficking is still an issue during the Superbowl.

It can be easy for many of us to think that we are quite different from the Thessalonians or those who make unwanted sexual advances or hire prostitutes, but many of us are complicit in the same sin, just to a different degree. We may feel like we have a moral high ground if we have heteronormative, culturally appropriate, mutually fulfilling sexual relationships. We are pretty sure we aren't hurting any body. 

But the truth is, even the most chaste, faithful or respectful among us depends on other people’s bodies. In order to make the everyday things we buy and use affordable, we end up exploiting the bodies of other people. Our grapes and tomatoes and t-shirts and shoes came at a cost to someone else's body. And while it's not the horrible violation of sexual abuse, the exploitative nature of our economy is not holy.

The people who harvest our food, make our clothes or (even closer to home) care for our children are working for our benefit. Their bodies go and do what ours cannot, for whatever reason. Too often hese workers earn less than a living wage, work in questionable conditions and face the painful side effects of their jobs on their bodies without health insurance. If they are overseas, the conditions may be even worse. 

It's easy to be self-righteous knowing that we are kind and respectful to the people we encounter. But how we depend upon and treat the bodies we don't see in our everyday economic choices is something many of us need to think and pray about. Myself included.

Photo credit: Broadus Mattison 

Creative Commons www.flickr.com

ADVENT REFLECTIONS

1 Thessalonians 2:13-20

How do we wait? 

For you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus that are in Judea.

Many practicing Christians know that Advent is a time of waiting. In the four weeks before Christmas we remember the promises of God in the past and look forward to Christ coming again. We are waiting, yes. But, I wonder, are we longing for God while we wait? Do we feel like we need Jesus to show up again to usher in God’s peace? Or have thousands of years of waiting numbed us to the promises? Has the long wait turned us into Christians who sit politely in pews like we are at an airport gate instead of creating a community that is out in the world imitating Christ?

Paul applauds the new Christians in Thessalonica for being imitators of the Judean churches and choosing the Jesus Way, despite persecution. In their faith and their actions, they have set themselves apart from the status quo with their passion for Christ. They keep the faith in the face of suffering.

For many of us today, our faith is no longer a matter of life and death, but one of commitments. When we commit our lives to Christ in the United States in 2017, what most of us really mean is we commit our thoughts, our time and our money for a few hours a week. We are not really committing our bodies. For many of us there is no danger in proclaiming or acting upon our faith. I thank God for that freedom.

But, sometimes I wonder if it dulls our commitment. The Jesus Way spread like fire in the crucible of the Roman Empire. At its heart Christianity is a faith built upon the love of God in Christ and the hope of God's peace or Shalom. Christianity was formed in opposition to the exploitation and injustice of God’s beloved people.

We worship a God who promises to heal the broken hearted and bind up their wounds. The God who proclaims freedom for the captives and release to the prisoners (Isaiah 61:1 and Luke 4:18) — the literally captive and imprisoned, not just the spiritually wounded and captive. We worship a God who promises to never leave us or forsake us, even in death. That faith created martyrs who were no longer afraid to die. Martyrs who imitated every aspect of Christ. 

Perhaps this Advent should be a time of active waiting instead of passive reflection. A time when we demonstate the promises of God, live out the actions of Jesus and imitate the faith of the Thessalonians.

Photo credit: el Neato creative commons license

ADVENT REFLECTIONS

1 Thessalonians2:1-12

Finding our spiritual family

We were like infants among you, like a nurse tenderly caring for her own children. So deeply do we care for you that we are determined to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves.

Growing up, I read and re-read the book Are You My Mother? Something about the newly born bird searching for its mother captured my imagination. The bird comes out of its shell while Mom is out getting food. Confused, the bird goes around asking various animals and things the same question, Are you my mother?

The bird asks a hen and a dog and a cow but they are not his (or her?) mother.  The bird sees a car and a plane and calls out the question. Finally he hops onto the teeth of a digger and is terrified with the shovel starts taking him up into the air. The digger drops the tiny bird back into the nest where he finally finds his mother and snuggles in with her.

In this part of Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, he highlights the gentle, familial love he has for the people of that church. He uses family images to highlight intimacy they have. He calls them brothers and sisters; he confesses his vulnerability by calling himself an infant among them. Mixing his metaphors he refers himself as a wet nurse caring for children as well as a father urging his children to lead good lives.

Throughout the Epistles Paul refers to himself and the Apostles as lactating women offering spiritual milk, fatherly guides and loving siblings to emphasize that in Christ we are one family. This  doesn’t mean that the families don't have their share of dysfunction. Paul’s letters to different communities show us that each Christian community has it’s own idiosyncrasies and vices. 

Like the little bird, sometimes it takes a while to find our true spiritual home. We may visit different communities and wonder how we might fit. We ask ourselves: Are these the people with whom I can be all that I am? Can I be the vulnerable child, the gentle mother, the guiding father with these people?

Just like Paul, we are all complex people who sometimes act like children or mothers or fathers or something in between depending on the day.

It is my hope that each person can find a community of people like Paul and the Thessalonians. People who long to see each other. People who are eager to spend time together. People who we can call our glory and joy. People about whom we will boast when Jesus comes. People with whom we share not just the gospel, but our very, varied selves.

ADVENT REFLECTIONS:

ADVENT REFLECTIONS:

God Chooses You

1 Thessalonians 1:1-10

For we know, brothers and sisters beloved by God, that he has chosen you, because our message of the gospel came to you not in word only, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction.

Sometimes it seems like God’s word comes out of the unlikeliest mouths — and sometimes the people speaking it don’t even know it! I can’t count the number of times have I heard something that profoundly influences my faith in an ordinary, non-churchy conversation. God is present everywhere. This was something that the Apostle Paul understood as he spread the Good News of Jesus Christ to the "churchy" and "non-churchy," to Jews and Pagans alike.

The Thessalonians were not Jewish, but they were people of faith. To share the gospel with them Paul communicates very broadly. No mention of Jewish or Christian rituals or laws, no special words or stories from Torah. When Paul writes to these new converts, he just shares the promise that they are God’s beloved. He reminds them that they didn’t choose God. God chose them and gifted them with the power of conviction and the Holy Spirit. Paul kept it simple. 

Too many times we can let our words get in the way of sharing our faith. We get excited by Biblical history and complex concepts. We use jargon  and big words to try to explain our faith like the people in this video:

Paul was a master communicator. He knew when to talk about history and reference scripture to prove his points. But he also knew that big words and emphasis on perfect theology can get in the way of conveying something so simple: You are God’s beloved. God chooses you. 

ADVENT REFLECTIONS:

 Why Bother? 

2 Peter 3

flikr: Erin Leigh McConnell

But, in accordance with his promise, we wait for new heavens and a new earth, where righteousness is at home.

I can remember lying in my dark bedroom as a 13-year old with a knot in the pit of my stomach. The

realization that the world was so much more complex than my own life hit me hard. The news began to mean something. Words like Cold War, first strike, nuclear annihilation meant huge parts of the world could suffer. Hearing about trickle down economics made me realize some people were OK with favoring the rich.

My Sunday school faith was failing me in the face of the world outside of church and family. Nothing I learned in those comfortable rooms with a half-smiling, hippie Jesus seemed to apply to the real world. Who would think that a nuclear war was a good idea for any reason? Why do powerful people only act in their self interest? Where was the light in the darkness? Where was God?

I'm certainly not alone in my political and spiriutal coming of age moment. Teens coming of age today in the midst of news of nuclear tests in North Korea and trickle down economics v.2 are hearing many of the same headlines. None of it is new. The writer of 2 Peter 3 is addressing people who are wondering about the state of the world. Thousands of years ago, they wanted to know why bad things were happening and where was God in all of it?

We experience this disconnect between what is and what could be because we sense that the world should be a more fair and equitable place. We’ve been given an intuitive understanding of God’s Shalom or peace and justice. We know enough about the Bible to picture what that should look like. 

The space between our current reality and God's Shalom is vast — and has been for most of human history. This can create feelings of despair when we witness ongoing evil and exploitation, words that mean acting with unchecked self-interest. We may be tempted to say, Why bother? and decide to indulge our own passions of greed, lust, anger or derision.

But, this passage reminds to be God's people even when it seems like the world around us is going to hell. We don’t join the “scoffers” and mock and jeer other people. Nor should we get “carried away with the error of the lawless" and decide to take what we need and live only for ourselves. Rather, we proclaim the Jesus agenda.

• Each day we get up and pray for the world to be a better place, including prayers for our enemies.
• Each day we get up and love the people God puts in front of us, even if they are Samaritans or Muslims or refugees.
• Each day we get up and participate in the Kingdom of God that is present around us by loving God and our neighbors.

 We have to take it on faith that God’s goodness will prevail. We follow Jesus even when it feels like it's against our own self-interest. Advent reminds us that we may not be able to see it yet, but God's Shalom is, indeed, coming.

Straight Talk with Amos

Amos 7: 7-9

This is what he showed me: the Lord was standing beside a wall built with a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand. And the LORD said to me, "Amos, what do you see?" And I said, "A plumb line." Then the Lord said, "See, I am setting a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel; I will never again pass them by; the high places of Isaac shall be made desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste, and I will rise against the house of Jeroboam with the sword."

Luke 10: 25- 37

25Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. "Teacher," he said, "what must I do to inherit eternal life?" 26He said to him, "What is written in the law? What do you read there?" 27He answered, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself." 28And he said to him, "You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live."

29But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, "And who is my neighbor?" 30Jesus replied, "A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead. 31Now by chance a priest was going down that road; and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side. 32So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33But a Samaritan while traveling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. 34He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. 35The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, 'Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.' 36Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?" 37He said, "The one who showed him mercy." Jesus said to him, "Go and do likewise."

God’s prophets are a mighty odd group of people. They upheld the word of the lord and bad-mouthed the religion that everyone was practicing. They spoke for the poor people and against the rich. They pointed fingers and they were NOT well-liked.

Elijah was called the troubler of Israel.

Amos was thrown out of the country.

Hosea was called a fool.

Jeremiah got thrown in a cistern.

And tradition says Isaiah got sawed in half. 

It’s amazing that these profoundly unpopular people show up in our holy book. One of the things we don’t think about when we read the Bible is that it’s self-correcting. It contains both the Law of God and the exploits of the patriarchs and kings. But it also contains the critics who worked to keep Israel on track with God. The prophets insulted kings, predicted disasters, and shouted curses and woes.

Today we love Moses, Elijah, Isaiah and the other prophets, but their peers didn’t. So why are they in this great book? 

Probably because people have been making the same mistakes over and over and over again. The prophets' words are as relevant today as they were in the Old Testament.

So the next few weeks we’ll explore what the Lord says through this group with the sermon series: Say What?

We begin with some straight talk from Amos.

Literally.

Amos has a vision of God speaking to him with a plumb line—a tool that is used to make sure a wall is straight.  The prophets are known for using props to get our attention—like a plumb line or basket of fruit or some bread baked over cow dung.

Amos and the plumb line remind us that God has standards for us to meet. Amos tells the people around him that God is holding a plumb line up to their crooked generation. He’s telling them they don’t measure up to God’s standards.

Amos shakes his finger at Israel and says your walls are falling down. Your foundations are bad and you will suffer because of it. He, and most of the prophets, have two basic messages.

Message #1 You have been unfaithful to God.

The king in Amos’ time made two golden bulls at shrines used for worship. Remember how bad it is to make golden calves? The Israelites had already been there and done that when they were waiting for Moses to come down the mountain. You’d think they would have learned that lesson then. But no. They did it again.

Does anyone else have that problem? You make a mistake and swear to do better and then a few days or week later you find yourself doing the same thing. Yeah. Me, too.

Message # 2 You are not loving your neighbors.

God says of Israel (through Amos):  

They sell the innocent for silver,

    and the needy for a pair of sandals.

They trample on the heads of the poor

    as on the dust of the ground

    and deny justice to the oppressed.

Father and son use the same girl

    and so profane my holy name.

They lie down beside every altar

    on garments taken in pledge.

In the house of their god

    they drink wine taken as fines.

Yikes! The people of Israel didn’t see how far they strayed because many of them were busy building nice houses and living an easy life. They worked all week. Had a nice glass or two  of wine with dinner Friday night, went to worship on Saturday morning and started it all over again on Sunday.

But God says, Stop—look!

Don’t you see you that you are serving yourselves?

Don’t you notice some people are oppressed?

Aren’t you helping the poor?

Don’t you see the injustice?

Beware, God is telling them through Amos and the plumb line, your crookedness will pull you down. Your walls will crumble.

And crumble they did. Israel was overtaken in war.  Their leaders were taken captive and moved them out of Israel. Their wonderful homes and walls and even God’s Temple came crumbling down.

Amos was right.

I don’t know about you but I feel like I’m seeing the walls of our society crumbling this summer. We have video footage of people being killed in Orlando, Baton Rouge, Minnesota and Dallas. Because so many people have smart phones and the internet we are witnessing the horror firsthand. We are given a new vision.

I have to wonder, Is there something kind of prophetic about this?

We can record and expose things in our society that haven’t been seen in the media before. Our phones and cameras are shining a light on occurrences that might never have made the news otherwise. 

We, here in small town in Western Pennsylvania, can be witnesses to a traffic stop in Minnesota that leads to the death of a black man. We can read text messages from people about to die in a nightclub. We can watch as people and police officers scramble for their lives in Dallas. We can see news from cars and nightclubs and police body cameras. And it hard to be a witness. 

Today there is no question we mourn for those who were killed in this week’s violence. But I suspect many of us may also mourn the loss of a more innocent worldview.  Today we mourn the loss of the way things were before we all became instant witnesses to crimes committed around the world. Suddenly, our small town and our small lives are caught up in something bigger.

For so many of us our society looked straight and true for so long. And new it feels crooked or unstable. But, I wonder: Are we seeing new problems? Or are we finally witnessing problems that have been there all along? Problems that most of us here have been sheltered from because we’re not black or gay or a police officer.

In the Gospel of Luke (12:2-3) Jesus says, “There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known.  What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs.”

Things are coming to light through our cell phones and other technology. We can’t unsee the events of the past few weeks. We can’t unknow the problems in the broader world. We can’t deny that things are off-center. And that makes us defensive. We want to protect our worldview. 

The prophet Amos pointed out the way Israel was off-center. That’s why he got thrown out of town. People didn't want to know what he saw. But he told them anyway.  His message is important, then and now. Amos and other prophets remind us that to truly love God, we have to love our neighbors. That means:

There is no room for racism in our hearts or in our culture.

There’s no room for vengeance in our hearts or in our culture.

Nor is there room for indifference in our hearts or in our culture. 

We are to heed the call of the prophets: Love God and love neighbors.  So how do we do this? 

Jesus shows us what this love looks like in the Good Samaritan parable. Remember Samaritans and Jews were enemies. They didn’t touch or talk to one another.

But, Jesus says the righteous man in the parable was not one of the Jewish leaders, as we would expect. The priest and Levite both tried to unsee the injured man and walked right past him. It’s the Samaritan who was willing to see and act.

We can’t ignore the people who are bleeding in our streets, whether they are black or white or dressed in blue. Whether they are addicts, homeless or mentally ill. We, too, are called to see.

And when we see, we are called to stop what we are doing and tend to the wounded around us. The Good Samaritan didn’t just call 911. He touched, he carried and he even paid the bill for the man—this enemy—so that the wounded man could recover. Not only did the Samaritan see the injured man, he saw him through his healing.

  

In the parable, Jesus shows us that ministry is inconvenient and expensive. A life of faith costs us something.

Today, I think being faithful may cost us our worldview.

We need to listen to the prophets, receive their criticism and confess the ways that we might be participating in creating an unjust society, even here in our little town. We need to hold up God’s plumb line to make sure it’s straight—in our hearts, in our church, in our community, and in our country. And if it’s not, we need to be willing to admit that something is crooked and tear it down. Only then can we try again to build it straight.

And really, we’ve been rebuilding churches and our societies for centuries. Maybe I’m an optimist, but I think that with God's help each time we do it, we put those bricks up a little straighter and stronger. With Christ as our plumb line we get a little closer to God’s truth. Theodore Parker once said the arc of history bends toward justice. God’s justice and truth is coming. We aren’t there yet, but we are being called to participate in what God is building today.

I can’t unsee the violence of this summer. I can’t unknow the things that I’m learning about our society and myself. But I can choose a side.

I choose God’s side, even though it’s the costly side to be on. I choose the side where people are not shot for the color of their skin or the uniform that they wear. I choose the side where traffic violations are equally enforced and those who are working to keep the peace don’t need to fear for their lives. I choose to participate in the merciful, healing, and justice-oriented work that Jesus started.

And first that means tearing down the way I think of myself and seeing the ways that I’ve contributed to the crooked wall. It means confessing that I've been unintentionally racist. It means understanding that I've benefitted from the color of my skin and the circumstances of my birth. It means admitting to the hardest thing of all: I like my life and it frightens me to think about what God might need to change in me. 

It’s inconvenient. It’s costly. But in the end, it’s what all of us are called to do.