Asking Good Questions

18 Now John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting; and people came and said to him, “Why do John’s disciples and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” 19 Jesus said to them, “The wedding guests cannot fast while the bridegroom is with them, can they? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. 20 The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast on that day.  21 “No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old cloak; otherwise, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. 22 And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and the wine is lost, and so are the skins; but one puts new wine into fresh wineskins.  23 One sabbath he was going through the grainfields; and as they made their way his disciples began to pluck heads of grain. 24 The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is not lawful on the sabbath?” 25 And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did when he and his companions were hungry and in need of food? 26 He entered the house of God, when Abiathar was high priest, and ate the bread of the Presence, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and he gave some to his companions.” 27 Then he said to them, “The sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the sabbath; 28 so the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath.”  Mark 2:18-28

Faith and questioning go together like hand/glove.  Faith and questioning dance with each other in amazing ways.  But sometimes the glove doesn't fit or toes get stepped on.  I love questions, but it is our pesky, insensate need to find the solution once and for all.  But good questions don't always have answers.  And sometimes our questions themselves need to be examined.  There is the age-old question, Why?  Why this suffering?  Why this pain?  This cancer?  This illness?  This family dysfunction?  And most of the time the responses to that work better in a blog post than a doctor's office.  In the end, we don't know.  We can throw out words like "God's plan" or "Mystery" or even "Just have faith"...but that really helps the person who is saying the words more than the one hearing them.  When someone asks a question usually they have some thoughts on responses...they might just be waiting to see if you will allow space.  The problem with trying to justify suffering is it does two things.  First, we try to let God off the hook.  The Psalmist never did.  They scream and yell...hoot and shout...shake their fist, head and walk away.  I don't know why we think God needs our defense.  Second, we continue to prop up the sense that faith is some insurance policy against bad things happening to good people.  And the real challenge is that while we ask "Why" in the face of struggles, I rarely ask why my family loves me unconditionally or why I have a roof over my head and food on my table.  If I ask why in bad times, what about the why of good times?  Partly because life is not a balance sheet or an accounting problem.

We need to ask questions...and we need to ask good questions.  the Pharisees today ask a question mainly to justify their understandings/way of life.  To be clear, we still do this in politics, in the church, around the office, and in our families.  We feel threatened when someone lives/thinks/acts differently.  Jesus' response reminds us that we are constantly changing.  And when we try to take an old wineskin or even a NEW piece of cloth and use it indeterminately that can have consequences.  We see this in the world today.  We see this in trying to deal with terrorism...which is a war...but is different.  We see in this trying to face issues of immigration, which we have always struggled with as a country, and yet it is different.  Every problem has historical roots and new branches springing forth.  Every questions is grounded in our lives and yet has new growing/tension points.  

When the Pharisees ask about picking grain, you can tell they are just trying to find some place to trip and trick Jesus.  When the church keeps asking, where are the young people?  Why doesn't everyone love Bach on the organ?  Why would YOU come join US?  We are asking important questions.  BUT maybe there are better questions.  Maybe a better question is how can we meet people today where they are...especially those who say they are spiritual and not religious.  Can we listen to what that means?  Maybe we can try to listen to some music in other ways and ask why a person finds that type meaningful?  Maybe we can see the young folks who are coming to church...and realize it is hurtful to say/imply that they are not enough.

Questions reveal the unfolding paradox and tension, which is what Mark is up to in his gospels... see my previous posts.  Questions start poking around to see if we can figure out why.  And often our initial questions are good...but there are other ones too.  Just as the questions we asked in 1st grade are good...but by 6th grade we hope the questions have changed.  Not because we solved all our 1st grade queries...but with new experiences our questions change.

So...what questions are you asking right now about life?  Faith?  Understanding?

What responses do you have?

Who can you engage in dialogue so that new experiences, insights and ideas might keep us asking good questions?

May there be more than a trace of God's grace as we do this!

Blessings ~  

Healing

When he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home. 2 So many gathered around that there was no longer room for them, not even in front of the door; and he was speaking the word to them. 3 Then some people came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. 4 And when they could not bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him; and after having dug through it, they let down the mat on which the paralytic lay. 5 When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” 6 Now some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, 7 “Why does this fellow speak in this way? It is blasphemy! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” 8 At once Jesus perceived in his spirit that they were discussing these questions among themselves; and he said to them, “Why do you raise such questions in your hearts? 9 Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and take your mat and walk’? 10 But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he said to the paralytic— 11 “I say to you, stand up, take your mat and go to your home.” 12 And he stood up, and immediately took the mat and went out before all of them; so that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”  Mar 2:1-12

So far, Mark has offered us an introduction to Jesus who is Messiah/Christ and Son of God.  Who is both the One who will challenge the religious and political authorities of the day.  The One who calls us to repent, brings us back into a relationship with God at the center.  The One who says that the realm and reign of God is right here...right now...right inside each of us.  Mark talks about the tension of life, because even though Jesus is here, life still is broken.  Even though there is a new order, the old order is oppresses.  Even though there is new life, the old life still lingers on.  Even though we are more than a week into a new year, the problems of 2015 managed to stick around and are now trying to tempt you with that chocolate bar that is not on your diet!  So, Mark says, we live in the midst of tension.

As chapter one concludes and you turn to chapter two, you read several stories of healing.  Healing a man at church; healing Simon's mother-in-law at her home; healing a leper; healing many others.  Healing.  In the midst of tension, we long for healing.  In the midst of pain/suffering, we long for relief.  In the midst of hurt that occupies our life and impacts everything, we long for peace (shalom that will embrace everything!).  As a pastor, I am challenged by Jesus' healing rather than doing more pastoral-y things.  The gospel doesn't say, Jesus was baptized and preached the best sermon ever.  The gospel doesn't say, Jesus proclaimed the realm/reign of God was near and attended a committee meeting.  The gospel doesn't say, Jesus declared good news...in a blog!  Jesus went and met people where they were at.

Increasingly, I believe Jeff Jones is correct, the question for the church is not how do we bring people in...but how do we go out?  How do I go out?  Get out of the office/study and into the homes of people who are hurting.  I am challenged that only one of the healing stories takes place in a religious space.  But there is ONE...so perhaps that is to say there is a place for church.  But it is not the only place where healing happens.

Experience tells us this.  Healing happens over dinning room tables, in coffee shops, in hospital or hospice rooms, in parks, in the rain, snow, and sunshine.  Healing...which is different than a CURE.  A cure is about treating an illness.  Healing is about making us whole...healing and shalom (peace which embraces both the brokenness and blessedness of life) are related.  Healing and shalom can hang out, even when the cancer continues.  Healing and shalom can hang out, even when when there is no cure.  And a cure does not necessarily mean healing.  I know people who have received transplants and keep on doing that which caused the illness in the first place.  I have seen extended hospital stays where the person is better physically, but not emotionally or spiritually.  Healing and cure are different, even though there are many similarities.

Which leads to Scripture reading your life right now...

Where do you need healing?  Cure?  Is it the same?
Who are the friends who would help you carry the mat?  Many people say that illness tells them who their friends really are.
Who is willing to go the extra mile...climb the roof...and help you?  I always laugh at what that poor homeowner said when he called his insurance agent.  "I am sorry," the Allstate agent says, "You are not covered for people DIGGING through your roof.  I don't care if it WAS an act of God."

I pray you will ponder the healing and cure in these days.  I pray you will let this Scripture read your life...and there will be MORE than a trace of grace.

Blessings ~

Baptism

In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10 And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11 And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved;with you I am well pleased.  12 And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13 He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.  14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15 and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”  16 As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea—for they were fishermen. 17 And Jesus said to them, “Follow me and I will make you fish for people.” 18 And immediately they left their nets and followed him. 19 As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets. 20 Immediately he called them; and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, and followed him.  Mark 1:10-20

My baptism took place when I was twelve years old at Eden United Church of Christ in Cedar Rapids, IA.  I remember the sun streaming in through the stained glass window.  I remember I wore a corduroy jacket with patches on the elbows...very stylish.  I remember my aunt and uncle stood up with me.  I don't know why my parents waited to have me baptized...but I am thankful that they did.  Baptism is one of those moments that takes a few seconds...and lasts a life time.  As Barth said, "We are always and forever beginners."  I don't think we ever "figure" out the faith as though it is a mathematical equation to be solved.  At moments we have insights and ideas that seem so brilliant, only abandon those thoughts a few years later.  

What I love about Mark is his willingness to set the life of faith in tension.  Each verse above has a built in yin and yang sense to it.  

Mark tells us the heavens are TORN open...and then...a dove claims Jesus as beloved.

Mark tell us there was wilderness and temptation....and then....angels wait on Jesus.

Mark tell us John was arrested....and then...Jesus comes proclaiming Good news.

Mark tell us in the midst of an ordinary day while fishing...and then...Jesus calls us to be disciples.

There is a built in tension within these verse that tugs at us back and forth, which is one way to describe life.  This truth might lead us to ask Scripture to read our lives by pondering prayerfully:

What is torn open right now in your life...and where do you still feel beloved?

What is wilderness or tempting you right now...and where do you need to be attended to by someone else?

What feels trapped, arrested...and where is there still good news?

In our compartmentalized way of viewing the world, we often don't always allow for such tensions.  Immigrants are all bad, politicians declare.  We need more bombs...even though we have enough to blow up the world multiple times over.  It is the worse ever....except when women could not vote (or run for president), we justified slavery, we declare people communists, we hid under desks in fear of Cuba, we were in an arms race with the Soviet Union, AIDS was killing people left and right.  It is true that those who do not hold onto history will repeat it.  And we often fail to learn from the past.

But then again...we are starting to say that we need a different view on immigration.  We start to say that perhaps violence begets violence.  We start to see people as people regardless of gender, race, religion, or sexual orientation.  We stop thinking we can bomb for peace.  We start to question what is sustainable in a world/creation groaning for relief?

Notice that Jesus doesn't swoop in like a superhero to solve all the problems.  He doesn't wear a "S" on his chest.  He doesn't say, "Elect me and everything will be chocolate rivers and pony rides."  He says follow.  Follow down the path that will lead to a cross and resurrection which is perhaps one of the most paradoxical, tension filled truths at the heart of the faith...but more on that in a future post. 

For today, I invite you to ponder prayerfully where you sense tension...where you feel tugged this way or that.  And as you do may you find not only the bad news...but the good news and more than a trace of God's grace.

Blessings ~ 

Gospel of Mark

The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. As it is written in the prophet Isaiah,

“See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way; the voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight,’” John the baptizer appeared in the wilderness, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins.  And people from the whole Judean countryside and all the people of Jerusalem were going out to him, and were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.  Now John was clothed with camel’s hair, with a leather belt around his waist, and he ate locusts and wild honey.  He proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals.  I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” Mark 1:1-8

With a new year, begins a new set of posts focusing on the Gospel of Mark. Mark is the earliest gospel, the shortest gospel, and Mark selects each word carefully.  Unlike Matthew and Luke, Mark does not mention a word about Jesus' birth.  No angels singing, no shepherds or wise ones coming to the manger, not even a single word uttered about how Jesus came to earth.  Instead, Mark starts off with what in the original language would have been an incomplete, grammatically incorrect, sentence.  Beginning!  Good News!  Jesus!  the Christ! Son of God!  Each word carries weight.  Each word invites us to dwell deeply.  Beginning echoes back to Genesis 1, when God began (present tense...rather than past tense) to create all that is.  Good news is an amplification of the word gospel or evangelion in Greek.  Right there, Mark has set side by side the tension of what he is up to.  You see, gospel does not just describe what you read in the New Testament.  Evangelion, good news, is what Caesar declared to bring when he came marking with his global military superpower into your town conquering you.  Evagnelion, good news, now you belong to Rome.  Bad news...taxes to pay for said global military superpower, who by the way takes control away from your life.  Mark is theologically saying, remember God was there from the very beginning.  God is still here, even when the boot of the Roman empire is oppressing you.  

To declare good news into that kind of a situation is a paradox...a mystery that on the surface makes no sense...but the more you explore...the more you realize the truth laying just beneath.  Good news is what God has, is, and will always be up to in the world.  Even in the midst of continued violence.  Even in the midst of fear.  Even in the midst of pain, brokenness, and death.  You see, good news is about more than what we can explain intellectually.  Good news...God news...is about more than just politics and power.  Good news...God news...is about more than what we see, touch, taste, and feel.  God's good news changes everything, even when on the outside it appears that nothing has changed, inside we know life to be different.

The difference is about the Christ (or Messiah) and the Son of God (which is what people called Caesar).  The good news...God news...will turn upside down everything.  And in our texting, tweeting, microwaving, instant society, we say, "Okay then God...let's see it...NOW!"  But the good news Mark is going to tell us about takes time.  Mark stretches back to Isaiah, when the prophet in a time of exile of foreign rule, boot on your neck, conquered, bleak moment (just as people during Jesus' time felt); Isaiah declared there was another path.  A path that was not might makes right.  A path that was not fear driven.  A path that was not tax drive.  A path that was not about conquering or military complex.  A whole new path...that some might say we still don't full realize or travel.  That is the path way toward the One who is the Messiah (who confronts the religious brokenness) and the Son of God (who confronts the human brokenness).  

And then, we get the arrival of John...who bursts on the scene with a strange diet and even stranger message.  Repent...which is not about guilt.  Repent is about getting on the road to God...hear how that echos Isaiah?  Repent means pay attention to here and now because it matters.  We've turned repentance into a golden ticket for another, future life.  But repentance means living a life where this present moment, the choices we make right now, matter.  As Rob Bell says, 'How you do anything is how you do everything...everything is spiritual'.  We need to remember that a community of faith is not a self-congratulatory, self-indulge, self-centered place for us to remind us we are God's chosen.  A community of faith is to challenge us to keep on the path...and pick us up when we stumble.  A community of faith holds us accountable with love...just as John does...but not under the guise that we can buy our way through our offerings back into God's grace.  Grace is.  Grace beckons.  Grace calls out.  We respond to the best of our ability here and now.  And then the next day.  And then the day after that.

I am always amazing that eight verse of Mark...and the above only scratched the surface.  I also want to invite you to let Scripture READ your life.  

What path are you on as you start a new year?  Where are you heading?  What road signs are around you?

 How does the baptismal claim of God upon your life challenge or change where your life is right now?

I pray that in the coming posts you will sense MORE than a trace of God's grace.  May these posts continue to help re-orient our lives toward the One who does make all the difference.

Blessings ~ 

Spiritual Compass

This Advent season, I have been focusing on how to orient my life toward hope, peace, love, and joy.  Like the four directions on a compass (north, south, east, and west), these four words can guide our lives not only to the stable where the One who has eternity dancing in his eyes lay away in a manger, these words can guide our lives everyday.  There have been two thoughts I keep returning to with this image.  First is that there is a difference between a compass and a GPS.  My GPS tells me exactly where to go and how to get there.  It has a set path it wants me to take (sometimes for very good reasons because of traffic!)  The other day, I varied the path my GPS was guiding me.  I kept going on one road I knew would also get me to my destination.  The GPS tried three times to get me to take a U-Turn...I thought Siri sounded a bit annoyed each time I ignored and kept going my way.  Now, I love my GPS, it has gotten me back on my path more times that I can count.  But, sometimes I don't want the exact path, I want the general direction.  That is where a compass comes in very handy.  It won't tell me which roads are "right" or "wrong"....just tells me if I am heading in direction I wish to go.  As a quick exit ramp...I think some churches function more today like GPS rather than compasses.  They want to tell you exactly what to believe, how to believe, how to act.  And that can be true regardless of whether the church congregates under the banner of "Evangelical" or "Progressive" or "Emergent".  Those words assume certain paths are better than others.  But that is another post.  

The first question is how do I orient my life toward hope, peace, love, and joy?  Are there actions that set my heart, mind, soul and whole self in that direction?  Are there actions that distract or distance me for that?  It is intentional that John the Baptist's sermon is, "Repent," which means turn around, get on another pathway, one that might lead you and connect you to God.  

The second question is how do I define these words?  Definitions matter because they give us insight into our thinking and understanding.  Definitions are fluid.  I understood love one way when I first met my wife, another when our children were born, and another as I see partners care for a loved one who is aging.  These words of hope, peace, joy, and love are elastic and can embrace us where we are...at the same time bind us together.

For me, hope is standing between what is (reality I see on the news) and what can be (God's promise and presence still moving in our midst).  To lean too much toward the violence and brokenness and political pandering of the world would point me in the direction of cynicism.  And getting too focused on the spiritual life can also be a form of escapism.  God calls us to be present in this world at this time.  And hope can feel in small supply when we watch the evening news.  But it is not only up to us to hold that sacred space between the what is and what can be...for it is here where I believe God is moving and awakening our thoughts. 

I hope you might write your own definition of hope this week.  Light a candle, call it hope, watch the flame flicker before your eyes and be in steeped in the sacred.  I pray you will sense more than a trace of God's grace as you orient your life toward hope in these December days as we approach Christmas.

Grace and peace    

Church Seasons: Post Script

While I truly love the mystery of Christmas and Easter, I find meaning for the church in Pentecost, I enjoy the seasons of preparation in Advent and Lent, by about May every year, we have been through the major Church Event...especially when you consider that Christmas in December is really in a NEW CHURCH CALENDAR year (even as it is the dwindling days of our usual way of telling time).  This means that for well over half the year, six months, we are in what the church calendar calls, "ordinary".  This means God does God's usual work in the midst of the mundane, ordinary, every day.  While we love the music of Christmas and the trumpets of Easter; while I enjoy the preparation of Advent and Lent, the church seasons proclaim that most of the time God shows up not in special Sundays, but normal, every day life.  That is a profound theological statement that is preached to us by the liturgical, church seasons.  We need to be reminded of that daily.  Of course, usually these ordinary, normal days are not exactly when the church is packed.  But, that is okay too.  What God longs for is relationship in the ordinary, not just the beauty and pageantry of the most sacred days.  I think about weddings, those are great events and life changing...but marriages are lived in the ordinary when the dishes are piling up and you are just trying to get dinner on the table.  I think about starting new jobs, the excitement and energy...but careers are lived in the ordinary day to day of completing assignment.  First date...the same...relationships are lived in the ordinary and every day.

So, after we live half a year jammed packed with special events, we live the second half in the ordinary.

What might that say to us?

This is where I find my life taking shape and form.  I find God in the ordinary.  In dinners shared as a family.  In preparing lunch for my kids for school.  In texts exchanged with my wife.  Which is also where we might look for the hope, peace, joy, and love of Advent to be found as we enter into December.  Maybe it is not in pyrotechnics and magical moments.  Maybe hope moves quietly and in the still small silence.  Same with peace, sitting in darkness listening to carols.  Same with love, a hug at just the right time.  Same with joy, in simply unwrapping a present given with love.

The ordinary becomes extraordinary is true not only in church seasons, but also throughout scripture.  In the end, that is really where we sense the traces of God's grace.

Blessings ~

Church Seasons: Pentecost

So far, we have waited/anticipated/prepared for Christ's birth in Advent and Christmas.  We celebrated God's in-breaking and incarnation at Christmas.  We observed Epiphany, the Wise One's bringing gifts and being saturated in the light of God's presence.  We look at the time in-between Epiphany and Lent as another moment God moves in our midst.  We explored Ash Wednesday, Lent, Holy Week, and Easter as diving deep into God's promise to meet us, even in moments of desertion and betrayal and death.  We looked at the day after, how it takes time for the promise of resurrection to take hold.  There are actually fifty days after Easter.  For a time LONGER than Lent we try to find ways for the empty tomb to take hold fully of our lives.  And then, we arrive at Pentecost, fifty days after Easter.  Usually Pentecost is seen as the birthday of the church.  The story is that as the disciples met in the upper room day after day trying to wrap their minds, hearts, souls, and lives around the promise of Resurrection eventually the Spirit stirred.  Just as the Spirit stirred over the chaos in creation.  Just as the Spirit led the people wandering through the wilderness.  Just as the Spirit stirred the day Jesus was baptized in the Jordan.  The Spirit swirls in amazing ways and the people of God again caught wind of the new things God is doing in our midst.

One beautiful part of the church seasons is the rhythm of sensing God in different ways.  Another mysterious part is the ways past, present, and future all culminate, collapse and collide in any and all of the above seasons.  You see, we celebrate Christmas not only as an event back then in our history, but as a present reality of Emmanuel, God with us NOW.  We look for the star light of Epiphany both as an event that happened and is happening.  We see the trials of Lent both as something Jesus went through and we go through in our lives with Christ.  Time is bendy within the church seasons.  We need these seasons to keep us open to that Pentecost spirit of new life breathing in every Sunday.  

So, we have gone through these seasons: Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, In-Between, Ash Wednesday, Lent, Holy Week, Easter, the Day after, and now Pentecost, where do you find yourself?  Is there a season you connect deeply within your own soul?

I pray that you have found the reflections on seasons meaningful.  BUT more importantly, I pray that as we have just started on another cycle of the church seasons with the First Sunday of Advent today, you will participate in the seasons this year.  I find more than a trace of God's grace in these church seasons.  I find a routine and rhythm that helps me make sense of my life.  May God's love move in your midst and you will sense God stirring in life giving ways.

Blessings ~