Excuses, Excuses

PastorPartridge Sermon


 “I could never be a _______ because I once heard about a really stupid _______.”
    This kind of statement is all too common on social media.  It has been said about almost every possible group.  I have heard it said about Republicans, Democrats, pro-lifers, pro-choicers, Christians, Atheists, and everything in-between.
But those aren’t arguments, they’re excuses.
And it is unfair to everyone.
    Sure, it’s funny to point at the Republican that didn’t know that Tehran is the capitol of Iran.  Or the Democrat who thought the island of Guam would capsize if we sent too many Marines there.  But it isn’t really fair to say that these people represent all Republicans or all Democrats.
And the same is true for Christianity.
    I admit that sometimes Christians say really dumb things.  There are some Christian leaders who make me cringe almost every time they open their mouths.
But that seems to be true of people from any large group.
    I have heard people with Masters and Doctorate degrees say dumb things but that doesn’t mean that education is stupid.  We shouldn’t give up on education because we once met an educated person that did, or said, something dumb.
    Just because someone in Hollywood made a bad movie (and there have been some really awful ones) is no reason to give up on movies forever.
    Just because we saw a stupid driver on the highway (and there are plenty) is no reason to give up on driving. 
    Our opinions about education, politics, morality, religion, or anything else, should be built on the truth and on the merits of their arguments, not simply on whether or not we once heard one of “those people” say something stupid.
    If you want an excuse to stay away from a political party, or church, or anything else, that’s up to you. But don’t say that it’s because a few people said, or did, something dumb.
Don’t judge an entire group by the actions of a few.
Because that would just be stupid.

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Good News, Bad news

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    This week I got a card in the mail reminding me that it is time to make an appointment with John, the audiologist that programs my cochlear implant.  It hardly seems like six months since I have seen him.  Once again, I am uncertain how things will go.  On the one hand, because whatever changes are happening in my head are incredibly gradual, I don’t really notice that much has changed.  And yet, other people tell me that they can tell that I am hearing better.
    One of the few places that I notice a difference is in meetings.  Whether it is in a small meeting, or in youth group, or in a large room like the fellowship hall, I notice that I can hear more than I used to.  Not that long ago, I could barely make out anything in our youth meetings and almost nothing at all in a big room like the fellowship hall, but lately I can hear enough to keep up with some of the conversations.  I still am not where I would like to be, but I can tell that things are better than they were.
At least until last week.
    Right around Ash Wednesday, I noticed that it was suddenly harder to understand the people around me and discovered that my hearing aid was acting up.  No problem.  Since receiving a cochlear implant, I have two hearing aids and only one ear to wear them in, so I have a spare.  In fact, at one of my last visits my regular audiologist, Walt, reprogrammed them both to fit my right ear.  So when my hearing aid went on the fritz, I just switched over to the spare.  Things were kind of busy at work so I figured that I would just make an appointment after things calmed down a little.
That worked for two weeks.
    But after two weeks, my spare hearing aid quit.  I emailed Walt on a Thursday and got an appointment the very next Monday.  One hearing aid didn’t work at all and the other works as long as the ear mold isn’t attached.  Even Walt thought that was pretty weird.  In any case, both of them have been sent back to the factory.  That means that the only things that I am currently hearing are coming through my cochlear implant.
And that is my good news, bad news thing divides.
    The bad news is that I really can’t hear anything on my right side without hearing aids.  But the good news is that since I have an implant I can still hear something.  If I didn’t have the implant and both hearing aids quit, I would be in deep weeds.
    The other good news, and really sort awesome, is that even hearing only through my implant, I am doing fairly well.  I can hear reasonably well in most situations and have even been listening to the radio (a little) in the car.  Of course, any place with a lot of ambient noise is almost impossible, and conversation around the dinner table at home is pretty difficult to follow, but I am relatively functional.
Six months ago, I’m not certain that I could have done this well on my implant alone.
So I guess I’m a little excited to see John and have my implant reprogrammed again.
Who knows how much better things might get?

 

 

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Six Ways to Get Unfollowed on Twitter

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    People follow one another on Twitter (and unfollow) for a lot of reasons, but in my book, these six things will get you unfollowed pretty quickly.

1)      Post too many times a day –  My general rule of thumb is that most people can post five times a day.  Even ten is acceptable if you have something really good to say, or if there is some special event that you are live tweeting.  But once you start crowding my feed, you are a target.
2)      Post too many times in a row – Some people post five or ten tweets in a row.  Sometimes it is a bunch of separate things all sent at once, and other times someone strings a long post into five or ten tweets.  If you want to blog, write a blog.  Either way, if you do it very often, I’m probably not going to follow you.
3)      Post too many pictures – I know everyone says that pictures attract attention, but if all you do is post a bunch of pictures, posters or memes on my feed, I’m probably not going to follow you.
4)      Post Off topic – I generally follow people because I am interested in what they post.  I completely understand that we are all human and a little “human interest” is fine.  The occasional post about your kids, or your nice dinner is okay, but if you say that your posts are about science, religion, business or whatever, and spend most of your time posting about something else, your days on my list might be numbered.
5)      Post ads – I understand that many of us are on social media to promote our place of business, books, or even ourselves.  But if all I ever see are ads instead of useful content, I’m probably not going to follow you.
6)      Post “click-bait” – We all have a variety of interests and occasionally we find interesting things that we want to share, but if the majority of your posts are links to “click-bait” advertising that looks like “Wow! Look at this Crazy Stuff!”  I’m probably not going to follow you.

    
I’m sure that  missed a few.

What have people done that made you unfollow them?



I tweet primarily about church, faith and religion, but also science, technology, the space program and the human condition.  And of course, a few about my kids.  Follow me @PastorPartridge

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Immigration: A Christian Dilemma

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    Should we build a wall at the border, or should we let everyone through?  As I scroll through my social media feeds, I see posts by friends that seem to support both extremes.  Some say that, as a matter of security, out nation must seal the border.  Others say that as a matter of Christian compassion, we must care for the foreigners among us and allow them in. 
So what should a faithful Christian believe?
Is there a “right” answer?
Honestly, I don’t know. 
    What I do know, is that both extremes miss the mark.  I recognize that both “sides” are represented by people of faith who believe in the message of the gospel.  But at the same time, each group ignores vital and valid points that are made by the other.
    In the interests of full disclosure, I am the product of an immigrant family.  My grandparents came here from Germany, as did my Mother-in-law.  Our family is certainly sympathetic to the cause of immigrants.  But even so, I understand that the discussion pulls us in different directions.
Here are some points of discussion worth considering:
1)      As followers of God, we are called to be the voice for the voiceless (Proverbs 31:8) as well as to care for the foreigners among us (Exodus 22, Jeremiah 22, Ezekiel 22, Zechariah 7)
2)      There are limited resources with which to care for them and a limited number of volunteers who can provide care.
3)     Border crossings that avoid official checkpoints, cross deserts and other  inhospitable territory.  As a result, men, women and children die crossing the border.
4)      Unscrupulous people, who are hired to guide others across the border, often abandon their charges or sell them into various forms of human trafficking.
5)      Whenever the chance of success is higher, or the rewards for success become greater, more people attempt to cross the border.
6)      Is it fair, or just, to those who are following the law and applying for proper documentation, to allow undocumented immigrants to flow across the border?
7)      Is it fair, or just, for native born citizens to compete for employment against undocumented migrants?
8)      There are valid local and national security concerns related to some of the people who are crossing the border.  Is it justice to put others at risk by allowing known criminals into the country without a background check?
   Clearly, we are called to be compassionate and to care for the foreigners among us, but the most compassionate, caring, and just thing to do may not be found at either extreme.  Building walls and returning undocumented migrants results in injustice, but opening the floodgates and allowing everyone in creates a different kind of injustice.  Making it easier to cross the border will increase the number of people who die crossing it.  And the failure to regulate who is crossing, will drive migrants into the hands of human traffickers. 
    When the waiting list for legal documentation can drag on for years, how are those applicants harmed by migrants who are given such documentation after crossing the border in the dark of night?
    We have seen similar waves of immigration.  There were waves of Irish, Germans, Czechs, Chinese, Vietnamese, and others.  Perhaps with this wave of immigrants from Central America, we might reconsider an old idea.  What if we built a new “Ellis Island” on our border with Mexico?  It would be a place where migrants would be welcomed, cared for, and kept safe, but also a place where they could be documented, we could conduct background checks, and verify that they met other requirements. 
    At Ellis Island, migrants were tested for disease, and were required to provide documentation that they had employment and a place to live in their new country.  While most migrants passed through Ellis Island in a day or two, my grandfather was detained for a week because the man who was supposed to verify his employment was delayed.  He was finally approved for entry after that man sent a telegram which verified his status.
Once again, I don’t know what the answer is.  Most likely, there is no single answer.

But each extreme carries us toward injustice. 
Justice and compassion demand that we try to find a way between these conflicting demands. 

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Snipers and Burning Pilots – God Weeps

PastorPartridge Sermon


    Lately there has been a great deal of publicity and social media chatter about the movie, American Sniper.  Of course everyone is also talking about the Jordanian pilot, Lt. Muath al-Kaseasbeh, who was burned to death by ISIS fighters. 
I struggle with these things.
    I spent ten years in the Army Reserve.  For years I collected and read books on military history and one of the books that I liked was about the Marine sniper, Carlos Hathcock, who was the “most lethal” sniper during the Vietnam war and whose record held until Chris Kyle broke it.  I have always admired the courage and fortitude of men like Carlos Hathcock.  At the same time, seeing a helpless, caged man burned to death (I haven’t actually seen it.  I just can’t bring myself to watch a man die) stirs an incredible anger in me. 
A part of me wants revenge.
    But as much as we have made heroes out of men like Carlos Hathcock and Chris Kyle, and martyrs out of men like Lt. Muath al-Kaseasbeh, we ought to stop and think about what God wants.
We know how these things make us feel.
But how does God feel?
    While it is true that our God is a god of Justice, and while it is true that God has sent armies to destroy evil and to avenge wrongdoing, God is also a god of compassion, mercy and love.  In cases like these, clearly, we find that there is tension between the world that exists and what God wants.
    But even if, in the darkest sense, we assume that God desires for evil to be destroyed and that, at least by our definition, ISIS is that evil, what do we know about God? 
I do not pretend to know the mind of God.
God did not speak to me from Mount Sinai.
    It is not my place to declare that God wants to kill or destroy ISIS regardless of their violence and evil.  If we have learned anything from history, we should know that it is not the place of human beings to go to war under the assumption that we have been “sent by God” or that we are doing the “will of God.” 
Unless God speaks to me in a clear and audible voice, I am not likely to change my opinion on that.
But I think that the message of scripture tells us quite clearly how God feels.
God weeps.
    God loves the people of his creation.  God loves the Jews, and the Christians, Buddhists, Atheists, Muslims, and everyone else. 
God claims all of us as his children.
    And God desires for every one of his children to come to him.  That, after all, is the message of scripture and especially the message of Jesus and the New Testament. 
    God loves us so much that he was willing to sacrifice the most valuable thing he had, his own son, in order to rescue us.  God loves humanity so much that he was willing to set aside his God-ness, come to earth in human flesh, and suffer and die as one of us, all so that we might have the chance to live forever in his home.
    And so I honestly don’t know how God feels about Chris Kyle or Lt. Muath al-Kaseasbeh except that he must feel like any other parent who watches their children fight.  God loved Chris Kyle, and Lt. Muath al-Kaseasbeh, and the men they killed, and the men that killed them. 
    Every one of them, whether they were Americans, Jordanians, ISIS fighters, Christians or Muslims, were his beloved children.
And with us, God watched them die.
    And so, although I cannot say whether God sent Chris Kyle to impose some kind of “divine judgment,” I do know something else that is certain.
Just as any parent who watches a child die, when God watches the horror that is war…
God weeps.

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Twelve Toxic Attitudes that Kill Churches

PastorPartridge Sermon

    I have witnessed ugliness in the church.  Both as a layperson and as a pastor, I have witnessed attitudes so unhealthy that they become toxic to the health of the church.  Most often these attitudes are limited to a handful of people, but occasionally these attitudes become a part of the church culture.  How much damage is done by these attitudes depends upon how many are present and how many people adopt them.   
Like any poison, the more there is, the sicker the patient is likely to become.
I want churches to be healthy. 
    My hope is that this list will spur a conversation within the church so that we can move toward health.
1)      We don’t want to be challenged – We don’t want to hear about how God is calling us to ministry, or to missions.  We don’t want to be told that we should pray more, or read the Bible, or study.  Challenging sermons tell us that we can do better, and that makes us feel like we aren’t good enough.
2)      We don’t want training – Whenever someone mentions training we know that they want us to do something new.  If we are trained, we will be expected to do more.  Asking us to get training means that you think we aren’t doing enough.  Honestly, we don’t want to do anything that we aren’t already doing.
3)      We don’t want to hear about “evangelism” or “outreach.”  – We’re all friends here, we’re comfortable with the way things are and we really don’t want to meet new people who might want to change things.  We don’t want to go door to door, or pass out tracts, or witness to our friends, family or coworkers.  We know what the Bible says we should do, but that would make us uncomfortable.
 
4)      We don’t want to change – Change makes us uncomfortable.  We don’t want to build anything, we don’t want to remodel the classrooms, or move to a bigger (or smaller) building.  We don’t even want to change the order of worship or try different music. 
5)      We don’t to be too “spiritual” – We don’t want to live differently, talk differently, act differently or memorize scripture.  We fit in the way we are and we don’t want our neighbors and friends to think that we’re “Jesus freaks” or zealots, or radicals or anything.
6)      We don’t want new technology – We don’t use the Internet so we don’t really care if the church uses a webpage, Facebook, Twitter, or any of that online stuff.  We don’t want flat screens or projectors in the sanctuary.  If it doesn’t benefit us, the pastor and staff don’t really need to waste their time on it.
 
7)      We don’t really want new members – We say that we want to grow because we know that we’re supposed to, but we don’t.  If new people come, they’ll have new ideas and want to do things differently.  We would love to have new people who are just like us, but we don’t really want anyone who is different because they might want to change things.
8)      We don’t really want to go deeper – We know that our pastor wants us to spend time in prayer, read the Bible and attend Sunday school or Bible study.  He calls this “going deeper” but we’re afraid that if we learn too much, God will ask us to change.
9)      We don’t want to feel bad about ourselves – We don’t want the pastor to talk about money, or giving (and certainly not tithing) because it sounds like we aren’t giving enough.  We don’t want to hear what the Bible says because we’re afraid that we won’t measure up.  We don’t want to hear about how rich we are, or how poor people live because we might be expected to do something to help.  In general, we don’t want to hear anything that might make us feel like we aren’t what God wants us to be, or that we could do better, because we don’t want to feel bad about ourselves.
 
10)   We expect the pastor and staff to do what we tell them – The pastor is not our leader, teacher or coach.  To us, the pastor is just another employee.  We don’t have to do what they ask, but we expect them to do exactly what we tell them to do, to preach what we tell them, and not to preach what we tell them. 
11)   Church growth is not our responsibility – We pay the pastor to do things like visitation, evangelism, and outreach so we don’t have to.  Growing the church is their job, not ours.
12)   We want a chaplain instead of a pastor – We want someone to tell us that we’re okay just the way we are.  We want someone who will tell us that we are good people.  We don’t want to take care of others; we want someone to take care of us.  We want someone who will be there when we’re sick, make us feel good on Sunday, pray over our covered dish dinners and, when the time comes, conduct our funerals and… close our church.
What do you think?
Have you seen these attitudes in your church?
Are there others that should be added to the list?

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What is the Difference Between Islam and Terrorists?

PastorPartridge Sermon

In light of the murder of journalists in Paris this week, I came across this excellent article on understanding the relationship that radical Islam has to mainstream Islamic teaching (thanks to my friend Dr. Allen Bevere).  It is well written and extremely informative.  Before you form an opinion on radical juhadists you really need to read this.

Challenging Radical Islam

An explanation of Islam’s relation to terrorism and violence

by John A. Azumah
 January 2015

     The world is being subjected to horrific images of religious violence. The Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria records its beheadings. Boko Haram in Nigeria parades hundreds of kidnapped schoolgirls. Al-Shabaab in Somalia attacks a shopping mall in Nairobi. These barbaric acts can make us feel helpless, fearful, angry, and even guilty, because there seems to be little we can do to stop them. Meanwhile, commentators traipse from one television channel to the other, presenting their analyses. Some condemn IS and Boko Haram but assure viewers that their acts have nothing to do with true Islam. Others opine that IS and Boko Haram do represent Islam’s true face. Neither perspective is helpful. Both distort the nature of Islam and its relation to terrorism and violence.

     Evangelical views on Islam understandably hardened after 9/11. Ted Haggard, past president of the National Evangelical Association, said, “The Christian God encourages freedom, love, forgiveness, prosperity and health. The Muslim god appears to value…

(Click here to read the full text)

What Happens When We Die?

PastorPartridge Sermon


Question:What happens when we die?  Do we go to heaven right away or is it something else?
Short answer: We don’t know exactly.
Longer answer:
    Many people believe that Paul in 2 Corinthians 5:6-9, by saying “Absent from the body and present with the Lord” is suggesting that we are, in fact, immediately transported to heaven.  But if you read the entire passage in context the argument is something less than convincing.  This is especially true when we read 1 Corinthians 15:51-53 where Paul says, “51 Listen, I tell you a mystery: We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed— 52 in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. 53 For the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable, and the mortal with immortality. “ Which certainly sounds like whatever happens, waits for the second coming and the day of judgment.
    On the third hand, we have Revelation 6:9-10 at the opening of the seals during the Great Tribulation and John says, “When he opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained. 10 They called out in a loud voice, “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?”
    So here, before the second coming, are the souls of the martyrs are in heaven under the altar of God.  Where is everyone else?  I don’t know.  But scripture never mentions any kind of “in between” existence other than life on earth and life in heaven.  This picture in Revelation describes only the *souls* of the martyrs and not the martyrs themselves so they seem to be existing without bodies.
    On the fourth hand, James 2:26 says that ““the body without the spirit is dead.” So if we’re dead, then the spirit has left, so where did it go?  Ecclesiastes 12:7 says that at death “the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.”  And in 1 Thessalonians 4:14 Paul says, “For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.”  Which indicates that the souls of the dead live with Christ and  return with him on the day of judgment.
    On the fifth hand, Jesus spoke of Moses, and Elijah and Abraham in the first person as if they were people that he knew, who were alive and able to carry on a discussion, not as people who were in any way “asleep” of somehow “in between.”
    Also of interest is Jude 1:9 that hints that the archangel Michael was guarding Moses body/soul from Satan as he was carried to heaven and there are other references of angels “carrying” the souls of the departed to heaven.
    In the end, there are two schools of thought. First that upon death we fall into some sort of “soul sleep” or “slumber” during which time we have no perception of the passage of time until that moment when Christ returns, we hear the trumpet, and meet him in the sky.  To me, the evidence of scripture would seem to be strongly against this.  The second is that we return to God immediately upon our death, but whatever body we have is not the body that will be given to us on Resurrection day.  On that day, we are told, that we will be like Jesus with a body that is clearly different (and yet similar) from our earthly bodies.  Bodies that will be without pain and suffering and which will be immortal and imperishable.
    Scripture does not, in any one place, provide a clear picture of what happens.  I can find no evidence at all of “soul sleep” or any sort of delay until Judgment Day.   For me, all of the evidence points to us going to heaven immediately.   How exactly that happens might be a little fuzzy, but I trust Jesus enough to trust him with the details. 
 Note: I invited our church and my online readers to write down any questions that they had about faith, the church, or life in general.  This is a part of that series.
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Will You Help to Rescue a Generation?

PastorPartridge Sermon


I want to ask for your help.
    I have been thinking about an idea for ten years but, particularly with the death of my father, I just can’t put it off any more.
My parents grew up during the Great Depression.
    As I grew up, I heard a lot of stories from them, and from my grandparents, about how they survived.  Both Patti and I learned how to save for a rainy day, and how to get by when you don’t have much. Those lessons helped us to get through two years of unemployment and the first few years in ministry when our budget was stretched beyond the breaking point.
    Because many of you have learned those same lessons, during the Great Depression, during your own lives, or by surviving your own struggles, I would like to assemble your tips, advice, and stories into something that, together, we can share with our children, our grandchildren, our friends from Perry Helping Perry, and anybody else that could use some help and wisdom to get them through the lean times.
    To provide you with some ideas and provide a little organization, here are some basic categories of that you might think about: 
·         Saving for a rainy day
·         Kitchen tips (cheap meals, money saving tips, or whatever)
·         Cars (buying, selling, repairs, etc.)
·         In the Laundry Room
·         Clothes (children and adults)
·         Sewing and mending
·         Gardening/canning/freezing
·         Personal care (shampoo, shaving, haircuts, or whatever you think of)
·         In the Garage: Tools, Repairs, etc.
·         Vacation
·         Date nights or dinner out (how to save a buck)
·         Gift giving, Christmas, Birthdays, etc.
·         Needs/Wants/Necessities
·         Personal Stories
    I know that I am certainly missing a few things, but this is just to get you thinking.  I hope that you will write down some of the lessons that you learned from your parents, lessons that you learned from the “school of hard knocks,” and any tips, or pieces of wisdom, that you would like to pass along to your children or anyone else who is struggling to get by.
    Patti and I were able to get through that difficult period of our lives because of the lessons that our parents taught and modeled for us.  But many young people today did not have the advantage of having such good teachers.  
That wisdom lives in people like you.
    I hope that you will share your tips, tricks, tidbits of wisdom, and even your stories about how you survived those lean times and the times when there was more month than money. 
Your wisdom could make a huge difference in someone’s life.
Won’t you please help?

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Six Degrees of Social Media Separation

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    In the last few decades, there has been much talk about “Six Degrees of Separation,” which is the idea that any person in the world can be introduced to any other person in the world, by being introduced through our networks of friends.  Statisticians have demonstrated that anyone in the US can be introduced to almost anyone else in the US by going through only two or three friends.  But as often as we hear such things, it is still amazing when it happens “in real life.”
    This week I received a private message on Facebook from a woman I never met.  And that was the beginning (or possibly the end) of an unusual series of connections through my life and through social media.  To understand the connections that led to this message, let me go back in time to high school.
    After my eighth grade year, my parents moved to the south side of Akron, Ohio.  At our new church I met Keith and Jamie Weaver, who would, within the next few years, depart for Kenya, East Africa as missionaries through Africa Inland Missionwhere they would serve for twenty five years.  After I graduated from college and began working in Cleveland, I was back at that same church and reconnected with Keith and Jamie during their occasional visits home. 
    When the time came for them to consider a return to the states, our church realized that no one (other than their children) had ever had the opportunity to visit them in Kenya.  Two women, Sandi, and my wife, Patti, volunteered and along with our missions committee, we decided that we would raise the funds to send them. 
    While Patti and Sandi were in Kenya visiting Keith and Jamie, they met Steve and Nancy Peifer.  Nancy was the librarian at Rift Valley Academy; Steve was the guidance counselor and also ran a feeding program at local Kenyan schools (Kenya Kids Can).
    With that as background, we return to the funeral preparations for my father.  As soon as it was available, I posted his obituary on my Facebook page and many friends, including Steve Peifer, posted their condolences. 
    The next day I had a private message.  The woman who sent that message acknowledged that we had never met. She had seen my name pop up when Steve had written on the link to my father’s obituary and it had seemed familiar.  She followed the link, read the obituary, realized who my father was, printed it, and showed it to her parents.
    What we discovered was that our fathers had sung together in college, he had been the best man in my parent’s wedding and my father had been the best man in theirs.  Our parents had exchanged letters and cards, but over the years had lost touch with one another.  She sent me a current photo of her parents to give to my mother, and I sent a current address so that they could send their condolences and reconnect.  My Mom was a little stunned when I handed her the photo and explained who it was.
    I know that we live in a connected world, but it was still exciting to see old friends reconnect because of two children on the Internet, two missionaries to Africa, an obituary, and social media.

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