Jesus

Why I Stand With the Catholic Church

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   In recent weeks the President of the United States and his Administration announced that all employers would be required to provide health coverage that included coverage for birth control and abortifacients regardless of the employer’s religious affiliation.  What this means is that religious institutions will be required by law to provide the means to do something that the parent religion considers to be a violation of conscience.  The federal government has told the Catholic Church that its hospitals, its adoption services, and its other outreach branches, as well as Methodist Hospitals, Baptist Hospitals and Jewish  and Muslim charity and community centers, that they must all provide this benefit to their employees regardless of whether or not this is a violation of the teachings of their religion.  I want to be clear, I am not a Catholic but this is serious stuff and it is important for all of us regardless of religion.
   I have heard friends say that the complaints against the government are just a power play by entrenched male power interests in the church to oppose necessary health provisions for women but I don’t think so.  It was the Catholic Church (and a few other churches) who built charity hospitals to provide care to the poor when medical care was something only the wealthy could afford (did you ever wonder why so many hospitals have Saint something in their name or end in Methodist, Baptist, or Catholic Hospital?)  It was the Catholic Church who built one of the biggest AIDS clinics in San Francisco when many hospitals were afraid to treat AIDS patients.  The caring and compassion of the church, particularly in the field of medicine, has been repeatedly demonstrated.  
   What’s more, the consistency of the Catholic Church is well established.  As a Protestant, I do not have a problem with birth control but draw the line at abortion and abortifacients because we believe that a child in the womb, a fertilized egg implanted and growing in the uterus, is a life.  Somehow, those of Protestant faith believe that a fertilized egg is not necessarily a life, but once it has ‘taken root’ it becomes a life.   This is a pretty fine line.  The Catholic Church doesn’t try to split hairs and it never has, they believe that a fertilized egg is a human being, period.  The position of the Catholic Church has never changed on this and although I do not agree, I have great respect for the consistency of their argument.  Life is life.
   For the government to say that the Catholic Church (and all other churches) must provide benefits that it believes are morally unconscionable is, to me, a clear violation of the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.  What if the government re-instituted the draft to support the military?  In such a draft, undoubtedly, persons would be drafted that, for religious or moral reasons, choose not to carry a gun or to be placed in a situation where they might be required to kill another human being.  For that reason, our nation has allowed these persons to become conscientious objectors, and we allow them to serve their country in another capacity.  One of my uncles served in the Korean Conflict as a medic for that reason.  If our government is allowed to force people of faith to provide birth control and abortion inducing drugs against their will, is it any stretch at all to imagine that conscientious objectors could be forced to carry a gun into combat?  Can American Indians be prohibited from ceremonies that require the use of peyote?  Could Muslims be prevented from making daily prayers during the workday?  The principle is exactly the same.  If religious objections are overruled for one, they can be overruled for anyone.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. 
– U.S. Constitution, 1st Amendment, Article 3.
   If the government is permitted to prevent Catholics and others from exercising their religion, and their conscience, in this way, what other Constitutional rights will it find “inconvenient” tomorrow? 
I am not a Catholic and though I respect the Catholic Church I often do not agree with it.  My position on birth control is different than the one held by the Catholic Church.  Even so, I think they are right and the government is wrong.  I stand in support.  Will you?

September 11, 2001 – 10 years later

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Help us overcome, Lord, this evil which has descended
Help us understand, Lord, why so many lives too soon have ended

Help us heal, Lord, as we recover from the pain
Help us cope, Lord, show us sunshine after the rain

We put our trust in you, Lord, as you watch us from on high
Help us grieve, Lord, and hold us while we cry

Written by Jim Lane
Fair Oaks, CA , September 2001

This morning in church we remembered.  Many in our congregation could remember exactly where they were and what they were doing on the day that Pearl Harbor was attacked and the same applies to the days that John F. Kennedy was assassinated, Ronald Reagan was shot, and Challenger exploded.  Likewise we remember where we were ten years ago today during the events of September 11, 2001.  Although  we will likely never forget, I pray that God will continue to bring healing to all those who were wounded both physically, mentally and spiritually.  Similarly, I pray that we will learn the right lessons of September 11th.  There are many messages but I pray that we hear the messages taught to us in scripture, messages of love, forgiveness, healing and hope and not the messages that we sometimes hear that play to our baser instincts to hate, destroy and seek revenge and retribution.

This morning’s worship service began by reading together from the Psalms and remembering that we find strength in God’s tower and not in towers of our own making.  The opening prayer was the one I have included above.  It was written by a fellow rocketry hobbyist and an online friend, Jim Lane in 2001 after the events of September 11th.  It sums up many of the feelings that we had then and feelings that have resurfaced this week as we remember.  I include it here with his kind permission.  Thank you Jim.

My message this morning was a story of remembrance but also a reminder that the thing that makes followers of Jesus Christ different is our calling to love and forgive our enemies.  This is not an easy thing, in fact, it may well be one of the hardest things that we can do but Jesus tells us that our own forgiveness depends upon it.

Sunday’s message, September 11, 2011 – a service of remembrance and reminder.

20/20 Blindness

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    This week at the suggestion of several church leaders, I joined the Barnesville Kiwanis club.  I’ve attended as a guest before, have met several members and several others belong to our congregation.  At this week’s meeting I met Donald Lynn.  Many people in Barnesville know Donald and most everyone has seen him around town with Bobby his guide dog.  Donald has impaired vision but he gets around pretty well and does most things that you and I do.  At the Kiwanis meeting on Monday, Donald was telling us about a recent experience that had bothered him.  It seems that a Chinese restaurant near Wal-Mart in Cambridge (Ohio) had refused him service and asked him to leave because of his guide dog.  Besides that fact that this is probably illegal under the Americans with Disabilities Act and other legislation, most of us at the meeting found this action to be offensive.   
    In the Gospel of John (Chapter 9) Jesus heals a man who was blind since birth and the leaders of the synagogue cannot believe that the healing really happened.  They deny that this man, who can clearly see, is the same man that they had seen for years begging at the gates to the Temple.  When the man’s own parents testify that this is the same man, the leaders then deny that it was Jesus who did the healing.  In John’s story we are told that the church leaders are the ones who are truly blind.  It seems strange that in two thousand years we are still hearing the same story.  For all of our modernity and sophistication it seems that not much has changed.
    Donald Lynn may be a man with impaired vision, but it is pretty obvious that someone else suffers from a far worse sort of blindness.

Seeing God in the World Around You

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Where have you seen God at work in your world this week?   
    I try to remember to ask this question each week during our worship service in order to help each of us (myself included) to be more aware and to really look for what God is doing all around us.  Our God is not a passive God who sits in heaven and watches events unfold here on earth.  Instead, he is a God who loves us and is constantly busy shaping people and events in order to accomplish his will.  I was reminded of that this past week.
    Recently, I was invited to speak and participate at a Walk to Emmaus weekend retreat.  While the retreat (this past weekend) lasted from Thursday until Sunday afternoon, I was unable to be there for all of it because of a funeral and other church and family obligations.  Even so, it was chillingly evident (chilling evident – in this case means that it made a shiver run up and down my spine) that God had a plan.  The Walk to Emmaus is a ministry with which Patti and I have been involved for many years.  Nearly every time that Patti and I have participated in these events, we have seen times when God has placed very specific people in specific places for a specific reason.    This weekend God was able to use me in this way.
    The Walk to Emmaus is a three day retreat where the “pilgrims” journey closer in their relationship to Christ (there isn’t much real walking – except to lunch).  On this journey they hear sixteen talks about a variety of basic Christian teachings.  This weekend, the talk that I gave was on Friday morning and as such was among the first few talks that the pilgrims heard.  Typically, this early in the weekend, the pilgrims don’t know each other very well, they don’t know the speakers very well, they are still unsure what to expect and as a result are still pretty cautious in their attitudes and reactions.  Still, God placed me at the right place at the right time. 
    In my talk, I told a part of my life story.  I told a bit about how God had led me from a career in engineering to serving in full-time ministry.  I told how God spoke to Patti and me and let us know that he had other plans for our lives.  After I was finished, I was approached by a man who was amazed at the things that I had said, not because my experience was unique or amazing but because, as he put it, “It sounded as if you were reading my life story.”  In their table discussion afterward, he had wept and asked the other men at his table how I had known so much about his life.   
Obviously, I didn’t.   
    This particular retreat was originally scheduled for last fall and the talk that I gave was supposed to be delivered by Rev. Ed Eberhart from the Barnesville First Christian Church.  Since there were not enough people registered, the entire event was postponed.  When the new dates were announced, Pastor Ed discovered that he had a conflict and so, at the last minute, the director of the weekend went looking for a replacement on short notice… and found me.
    This is how God works.  Months before I had any idea what I would be doing in March, God had a plan.  God shaped the events of last weekend so that two men, total strangers, would meet, and in the process an entire roomful of men would discover that God loves and cares for each of us with a love beyond measure.  What’s more, God shaped the events of last weekend so that one man could rediscover God’s love and find healing and hope.
    God is always at work in the world around us.  We will see Him if we will only take the time to look.

Where have you seen God at work in your world this week? 

A Deeper New Year

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As we approach the New Year, many in our culture have a tradition of making resolutions.  We make a list of things that we hope to do better or ways in which we hope to improve ourselves.  We resolve to lose weight, go back to school, read that book we always meant to read, exercise more and host of other things.  As we approach this New Year however, I hope you will consider one thing more.
As we enter this New Year, I hope you will join me in deepening our relationship with Jesus.  That may be a new idea for some, you may not really grasp what I am trying to say, and that’s okay, I’ll explain.  Jesus desires to be friends with us at the deepest levels of our heart, he is said to be the friend that sticks closer than a brother and we are, in fact, adopted as brothers and sisters of Jesus.  Too often, our relationship with Jesus looks more like that of a casual acquaintance.  We know who they are, we recognize them on the street and we nod and wave when we see them.  The problem is that Jesus wants more than that.  Jesus wants us to know him, really know him so that we can be “closer than a brother.” 
How well do you know your best friend?  You spend time with them.  You spend a lot of time with them.  You can finish each other’s sentences.  You know what food they like, what makes them happy, or sad, or angry.  Without calling them to ask, you can often tell others just what they will think about a certain subject or how they will react to a particular situation.  Jesus wants us to know him like that.  He doesn’t just want us to know who he is in the way we know a casual acquaintance, but he wants us to have a real, deep, meaningful relationship with him.
But how do we do that?  Obviously, building a relationship like that isn’t something that happens overnight.  You didn’t get to know all about your best friend in a single day, a month, or even a year but spent time, regularly, building your friendship together.  Building your relationship with Jesus will be the same.  It will take time and it will take some commitment.  This year I hope that you will join me in making a commitment to building and deepening your relationship with Jesus.  Spend time in church but also make time to pray, to read the Bible, or attend a Bible study.  Do any or all of these things, do something more than you have done before, and you will begin to know Jesus better.
Jesus wants to be more than the acquaintance that you wave at in church once a week. 
  
         He wants more.    
                      He wants your relationship to go deeper.   
                                         Will you join me in this grand adventure?

The distance Between "Cannot" and "Will not"

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   On Sunday I made reference to an excellent blog by Scott Linscott who argues that the lack of a deep spiritual life in our children has a lot to do with the choices that we made (and are making) as we raised them.  (see the original blog here http://scottlinscott.wordpress.com/2010/03/10/your-kids-an-all-star-wow-someday-hell-be-average-like-the-rest-of-us/  and my sermon here http://www.scribd.com/doc/38170459/Love-Misplaced-2010-09-26)  I left a comment on Linscott’s blog and let him know that I had borrowed from him (and yes, I gave him credit).  Since then I have been following the conversation that he is having with other readers who are leaving their comments.  One focus has been the way in which busy professionals find balance between a demanding and time-consuming career and time spent in their church and with their families.  I completely understand.  I faced that same challenge both in a secular career and now in ministry.  What intrigues me is how often, as human beings, we are able to rationalize the difference between “Cannot” and “Will Not.”  “Cannot” means we have no choice, “Will not” implies that we have chosen. 
   Several busy people argued that their jobs demand 60 hour work weeks and since God has given them these careers then their dedication was a measure of their devotion.  An example given was the medical resident who is working 100 hours a week.  In order to pursue a career as a doctor they have given up time for a social life, dating, family, church and nearly everything else.  Others pointed out friends and church members that were medical professionals.  They noted how these folk made time to spend in church, to volunteer and to go on mission trips.  What I see is a difference between “Cannot” and “Will not.”  Residents and Interns don’t really get a choice.  Their schools, hospitals and others decide what is required in order to, eventually, gain the title of Doctor.  If they don’t do what is required they will not ever attain the goal that they are pursuing but the sacrifice is intended to be temporary.  Regardless of how much a career paid, I doubt that many would choose it if celibacy and 100 hour work weeks were expected for life.  
   At some point, how we spend our time becomes a choice.  It is at that point that we all must choose whether we want to choose long hours at work or to use those hours for recreation or family or church.  This is point at which everyone will eventually arrive.  When we arrive at this moment, whether we are aware of it or not, we must make a choice.  Some choose to spend more time at work and others choose to spend it elsewhere. For each choice there is a cost.  If we work more, we may advance more quickly, get more raises, perks and bonuses.  Working less may mean that we sacrifice these things.  Working less may also mean that we are able to spend more time with friends and family and have more time to volunteer, attend church and other spiritual activities.  Each choice comes at a price.
   As I have watched friends, colleagues and church members make these choices I have often seen the line between “Cannot” and “Will not” get pretty blurry.  I have had farmers tell me that they had to be in the fields on Sunday because of a recent stretch of bad weather.  I have heard other farmers, in the same community, insist that it wasn’t necessary.  There are two differences: priorities and trust.  While some saw a break in the weather as a gift from God, others saw it as a test of faith.  One group went into the fields to work and the others trusted that God was in control and would balance the scales at harvest time if they made God a priority.
However we want to rationalize it, for each of us there is a gap between “Cannot” and “Will not” but, however we choose, God wants us to make him our first priority.  In Matthew 22:37 Jesus teaches that the greatest commandment of the law is to ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’  We find a very similar verse in Proverbs 3:5 with a very important twist.  
“Trust in the LORD with all your heart…  
…and lean not on your own understanding.”  
   I know that doctors and funeral home directors (and many others) need to work when they are called.  My point is that each of us needs to be aware of when our priorities are shifting.  We need to be aware of when we begin to trust money, power or our own ability more than we trust God.  God asks that we put him first and not to ‘lean on our own understanding.’  
   Putting God first can be expensive and it can be painful but God asks that we trust him to span the distance between “Cannot” and “Will not.” 

Why the Church should be on the Internet

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    I was recently asked to speak at a men’s prayer breakfast and address what I felt was the future of ministry.  In my short meditation (we did want time to eat breakfast after all) I shared a few words about why I felt that the future of ministry was on the Internet.  Since this helps to explain why I invest my time and energy posting sermons online, worrying about office connectivity, podcasts and blogs, I thought that it was worth posting here.  In this way, the folks who read this blog (which admittedly isn’t a lot) can understand a little better who I am and why I do what I do.
    First of all, I admit that I’m a geek.  I was the kid in school who was smallish, bookish, played in the band and tried the chess club for a while.  I did eventually grow a few inches and put on a few pounds during college and ten years in the Army Reserve but with a degree in electrical engineering, my fondness for computers and electronic and science related toys remains obvious.  Regardless, there are a few facts (statistics) that we all need to confront.
    Ninety-Eight percent of all homes in the United States have a television but the television people are seeing a noticeable decline in television ratings as more and more of their audience members are leaving to spend time on the Internet or watch movies delivered in the mail or over the internet.  Today, 35 percent of all adults in the US have a profile on Facebook, MySpace or LinkedIn.  This is already a lot of people but also understand that this number has quadrupled in only three years.  Nearly 90 percent of students access the Internet every single day and spend an average of 28 hours per week doing it.  Of these, 65 percent (students aged 12-17) will log on to social networks such as Facebook and MySpace.  While the younger age groups use social networking more and older Americans tend to use it less, these numbers are growing across the board.  (See more of these statistics here: http://en.kioskea.net/news/11805-social-network-use-by-adult-americans-on-the-rise-survey)
    Obviously, scripture doesn’t say anything specifically about television or the Internet but it does have something to say about where and how we do ministry.  Jesus met the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4) and her entire village came to faith.  Jesus met her where she lived because a Samaritan would have never been welcome in the Jewish Temple, the church of its day.  In Acts 2, we read about the day of Pentecost when the Spirit of God came down from heaven and entered into the followers of Jesus Christ.  What they did next is instructive.  Instead of remaining where they were and celebrating the great gift that had been given to them, every one of them, both men and women, left the place where they had gathered and went out into the streets to tell others about  Jesus.  Because this happened on Jewish feast day, the streets were full of people from across the known world.  
    Throughout the span of the New Testament, Jesus and his followers preach the good news in synagogues, in marketplaces, in the temple courts, in the street and in the countryside.  In Acts 17, Paul meets the men of Athens where they have gathered to discuss philosophy.  In each case, Jesus and his followers demonstrate by their example that the good news should be taken to where the people are and not wait for unbelievers to come to them.  Two hundred years ago, John Wesley (the founder of Methodism) broke from the tradition of the Church of England and dared to preach outside the four walls of the church.  Wesley felt that the church had abandoned many who no longer felt comfortable or welcome in the church and so he went out and preached in the open air in parks, near coal mines, and anyplace where he could find people who were interested in hearing the words of God.  The preaching of Wesley and his followers resulted in many thousands coming to Christ and was instrumental in launching the Great Awakening.   
    The common thread remains that the Gospel message was taken out of the church and out to where the people were.  Today, the public gathering place is electronic.  For our society, the place where people gather is no longer the synagogues, the markets and the temple courts but on the Internet.  
    If we are to be true to the example of Jesus and his followers, we need to be there too.

Would Jesus be burning the Koran?

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So what do you think of Rev. Terry Jones?  
     Jones is the pastor of the Dove Outreach Center (a church of around 50 members) near Gainesville, Florida.  This is the guy that wants to hold a book burning party and as mundane an idea as that may seem, he doesn’t want to burn pornography or even evil Rock-n-Roll lyrics.  Instead, his church has been in the news for organizing what they call “International Burn-a-Koran Day.”  This has caused a furor in the U.S. and around the world.  General Petraeus, the commander of NATO and U.S. forces in Afghanistan, has asked that this not proceed because of the risk that it will add to those who are fighting in parts of the world where Islam is the predominant religion.  President Obama has asked that this not proceed and Defense Secretary Robert Gates has made a personal call to ask that this event be cancelled.  So far, Rev. Jones has only conceded to “postpone” the event.
Admittedly, there are a host of political and practical reasons for stopping this.  Under our constitution such activity is undoubtedly legal, but this media furor has left me asking a different question, “What’s the point?”  I understand that, theologically, the Dove Outreach Center subscribes to a Pentecostal view which sees the world in a spiritual war between good and evil.  What I don’t understand is what they hoped to accomplish by burning a pile of Islamic holy books.  If their intent was to anger Muslims around the world then it worked.  If their intent was to gain notoriety for their small church, then I suppose their plan worked but I wonder if this is the kind of attention that they intended.  In particular though, I wonder how staging “International Burn-a-Koran Day” was supposed to gain ground in this spiritual war between good and evil.
    Paul said that “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” (Ephesians 6:12) it seems obvious that “you can catch more flies with honey than you can with vinegar” but beyond that, insulting pagan believers is not what has been modeled for us as followers of Jesus Christ.  Paul didn’t tell the idol worshipping Athenians that they were stupid nor did he try to destroy any of their statuary.  Instead, he complimented them on their religiosity and then told them about the one true God.  Jesus didn’t curse sinners and disparage their false religions, instead he loved them, invited them in and shared meals with tax collectors, prostitutes and others considered by their society (and their church) to be outcasts and untouchable.   Jesus had compassion on these people even though doing so came at a significant cost to himself.  In fact, Jesus condemned the church of his day because of their lack of compassion for others.
    As far as I can see, the battle plan for spiritual warfare that Jesus left for his followers was both counter-cultural and counter intuitive.  Jesus said, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matthew 5: 44)  Jesus built relationships with lost people by showing them mercy and my being kind, loving and compassionate.  Paul won a hearing for the good news of Jesus Christ by being civil and by demonstrating respect for those with whom he disagreed.  The way I see it, our battle is with evil, not with Muslims or anyone else.  We are at war with Satan, but not with people.  The path to victory laid out by Jesus is not the path of hatred but a path of love, mercy, kindness, compassion and respect.
    There are a host of political and practical reasons why Rev. Jones and his church should reconsider “International Burn-a-Koran Day” but far beyond any of those reasons lays this one:
I just don’t see Jesus in it anywhere.

You Can Change the World

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As I noted in an earlier post, I recently attended a surprise retirement party for my high school band director, Mr. John Rodgers. During that event we were given the opportunity to make a few remarks or to share our remembrances from our days in the Kenmore High School marching band. I remember many things. I remember the insane shaving cream fights that we had at band camp (and I still remember how to modify a can of shaving cream to shoot 20 feet). I remember selling oranges to earn enough money to go to Disney World for their tenth anniversary (though I honestly recall very little of the trip itself). I remember many events but I also remember that the band room was like a home away from home for a lot of us. We showed up as soon as we could convince someone to unlock the place and were often there in the afternoons well after school was over as well as many hours of class in-between.

For me, John Rodgers and our choir director Georgia Thomas were trusted adults who modeled leadership, passion for music, respect, humility and many other things. At our party, I noted that though there were perhaps a hundred of us gathered that evening, our numbers are indeed far more than that, we are indeed legion. Each year that I was in band we had something close to one hundred musicians carrying instruments along with many more majorettes, rifle girls, and flags (and Bill Dobbs, fellow Baritone player, as our Cardinal mascot). Over the years that John Rodgers was at Kenmore he invested himself in the lives of many hundreds of students, perhaps thousands. As we gathered that evening it was apparent that time had not stood still, we are all older, many of us have married and have children and now many of our children are inheriting our love of music.

As I shared, I concluded that in his own humble way, John Rodgers accomplished what people in science and politics and every other discipline dream of doing, he changed the world. John Rodgers changed the world but so did Georgia Thomas and so do teachers around the world every single day. We all remember these people because they changed us, they modeled life for us, they inspired us and they ignited a passion within us whether it was for music, or literature, or history or whatever.

I cannot ever thank John Rodgers or Georgia Thomas or Bill Muse, or any of my teachers enough for the gifts that they gave me…

…but there is something that I can do.

In the lives of every human being we are given the opportunity to invest in the lives of others. We are all given the chance to invest in something that reaches beyond the boundaries of today or this week’s paycheck. If we are to honor the people that invested their lives in us then we must answer the call to invest in others.

For me, I was compelled, over time, to teach others about the unimaginable gift of Jesus Christ and to expend my energies helping others spiritually as well as in other ways. For you it may not be John Rodgers, but today I ask that you remember who it was that influenced and inspired you. Maybe it was a teacher, a pastor, a coach, a university professor or it could be a parent, a grandparent, a police officer or even a janitor. Whoever it was for you, I hope that you will use that memory to drive you to invest in another generation.

If you’re a teacher, you can allow that memory to reinvigorate you and to rekindle your passion, but even if you’re not in a career where this is easy there are still lots of options. Choose someone who can benefit from your accumulated knowledge and experience and offer to mentor them. Instead of criticizing their youth and inexperience, take the time to teach them a better way (and listen for what they have to offer you as well). Volunteer in your community. Every ball field needs volunteer coaches and referees. Every scout troop that I’ve ever seen can always use anyone with a spare hour or two. Churches and synagogues and schools and soup kitchens everywhere need compassionate volunteers with a heart to serve others. Whatever it is, find a way to give back (or pay forward) the amazing gifts that you’ve been given. You can make a difference. You can make the world a better place.

Get out there and change the world.