Too busy to worship?

We do a lot around here. Volunteers are always buzzing around this place, and even more are actively engaged in their own ministry all around the community. 

But nothing is more important than worship. And no week is more significant than Holy Week. 

This week we gather to hear the story of faith -- the whole story, not just part of it. Not just the good stuff, but the tough stuff, too. We hear about brokenness and wrong decisions and terribly painful sin and separation. Then, on Easter, we hear about new beginnings and second chances and another lease on life. We hear it all. And we worship a God who wants to tell us the whole truth, the whole story. Not just part of it. 

I've met plenty of folks who have given up on worship. They don't get anything out of it, or they feel they can worship while kayaking on a lake better than singing old hymns in a stodgy church. I get it ... sort of. 

Here's the problem: God didn't ask us to worship for his sake, but for ours. He invites us to step away from our consumer mentality and consider that worship isn't about us or our preferences. Worship reminds us that Christianity isn't a solo sport, a one person band. Worship is about being in community with God and with God's people. And when we decide that we don't need the church, we're effectively eliminating half of our faith ... which means half of the story.

Who wants to hear and know only half the story? 

A lot of folks are struggling with the discipline of regular worship. If that's you, may I invite you to give it another chance? As you do, ask God to give you the blessing of proper focus -- a focus on God. Ask God to remove your worries and opinions and all those things that get in the way of true worship. And set your heart on a spirit of gladness, that your worship might reflect the beauty of Psalm 100: "Shout to the Lord all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness, and come before him with joyful song. Enter his gates with thanksgiving, and his courts with praise, for the Lord is good and his mercy extends forever; his mercy endures for all generations. 

I look forward to seeing you in worship, friends. Happy Easter!

Waiting at the DMV

As I write this note, I’m sitting in the DMV office waiting to renew my driver’s license. 45 minutes in, I’m trying to find ways to occupy my time.

Within this 8 x 12 waiting area sit 19 people from all walks of life, each of us consumed by our own thoughts, living in our own little universe. One lady I recognize from the CDC. Otherwise, I don’t know a soul. No one is talking. Most are staring straight ahead. One older gentleman is asleep. Others are looking into their phones, lost in the pages of Facebook or Instagram. I’m pretty sure they have no clue I’m writing about them. 

In Luke’s gospel, Jesus approaches Jerusalem on a day we call Palm Sunday. The closer he gets, the louder the crowds become, crowds that just a few months earlier had been silent, lost in their own world of personal, daily concerns. When the Pharisees told Jesus to quiet the crowds, he said “If they keep quiet, the stones would begin to shout.”

What do we need to shout about today? What deserves our utmost attention?

Let’s not leave the gospel in the hands of stones. God needs us to stand up and shout! ..... although, admittedly, this lady sitting next to me might get a little nervous if I do.

What can we learn from each other?

I bet you and I disagree over gun control. In fact, I guarantee it.

Whether you’re a gun rights advocate or a gun removal activist, there likely are nuances in your position that would cause me to disagree with you. The same is true with most topics of conversation, especially the controversial ones. Immigration? Probably. Gay rights? Likely. The new tax code? Almost certainly.

But guess what? I’m not right about everything. I know that’s hard to believe (no comment, Krista!), but it’s true. As it turns out, I don’t have the corner on absolute truth, unless we’re talking about Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

Which is precisely why we need to be in conversation. I need to hear your opinion, and you need to hear mine. We need to do more than talk at each other and dare to listen to one another.

It’s not rocket science. And yet, well, why are we so bad at it these days?

I learned something in middle school that was critically important to me. I was at a youth gathering at Camp Kinard, although I can’t remember much more than that. We were doing the time-honored Trust Fall, when participants turn their backs to the group, close their eyes, and fall backwards into the arms of friends — trusting that they’ll be caught.

Trust is the key word.

The Trust Fall activity was old hat, one of those activities youth leaders rely on when they’ve run out of ideas.

But this time, one of the adults — I’ll never remember who — said something like this: “We’ll never learn to listen to one another unless we learn to trust one another.” Trust isn’t the ending point. Learning to trust one another is but a starting point that leads to better listening, which leads to better understanding, which sometimes leads to compromise, which almost always leads to peace.

We seem to live in an age when everyone wants their opinions heard, but no one wants to hear the opinions of others. Bizarre, isn’t it? We need to rediscover the art of listening ... which starts by daring to trust.

The NRA has a lot to learn from students in Parkland, Florida ... and the rising tide of gun control activists have something to learn from the NRA. So let’s stop the political maneuvering. Let’s stop sacrificing truth for the sake of protecting political turf.

Let’s dare to have conversations that matter in a spirit of trust and respect. Let’s open our ears so that the Spirit might open our hearts and minds. We just might learn something from each other.

“Encourage one another, and build each other up,” Paul writes to the confused and somewhat misguided church in Thessalonica. It’s good advice for us today, don’t you think? 

Another shooting

This is getting crazy. Parkland represents the 17^th school shooting in 2018 alone, a statistic that’s on the rise in significant and frightening ways.

As if by script, responses from politicians have been predictable and represent very little nuance. The NRA has yet to issue an official response, but I’d be surprised if it reaches beyond the standard response to school tragedies and mass shootings: “We need more, not fewer guns.”

Which is a curious response, it seems to me. Already there are over 325 million guns registered (note, “registered”) by private citizens in the US, more than twice as many per capita than any other country in the world. Even more shocking, 36 countries have reported a school shooting since 2000. The US reports twice as many as all other countries combined.

We need more guns?

We’ve been debating this issue for years, no doubt, and if you’ve been around me very often you know how I feel. I didn’t grow up in a family system that enjoyed the use of firearms, although I’ve often envied friends who did, especially given the bond it often generates between father and son. And though I’ve never had a gun in my home, I’ve been around gun enthusiasts all of my life, especially in the Shenandoah Valley, where we lived for 13 years – a region that syncs school calendars with the beginning of hunting season.

Bottom line: I don’t have a problem with guns. In fact, I think it’s a rather fascinating part of our social fabric.

But isn’t it time we started talking about what’s gone wrong? Isn’t it time we had an honest, gutsy conversation about gun regulation without fear of retribution or attack?

Perhaps – perhaps – that’s what’s happening these days. It’s far too early to say, but the Parkland shooting has stirred up more than emotion. It’s stirred up a hive of high school activists who are saying “enough is enough.” Just nine days removed from the Parkland shooting, high schoolers have stormed Washington, Tallahassee, and the majority of our nation’s capitals. Even President Trump said, “It’s time to listen.”

My prayer is that good folks on both sides of the issue will use this tragedy to do just that: listen to one another. We’ve heard enough opinions. We’ve drawn too many lines in the sand. We’ve already spent too much campaign money. It’s time to listen.

And as we listen, let’s pray for spiritual freedom – that minds on both sides might be open to new insight. That our hearts might be enlarged to consider new possibilities.

That’s precisely what happened during the great suffrage and civil rights movements in the United States. It’s precisely what guided the Peaceful Revolution to a united Germany.

It’s what we need right now. Let’s not wait for yet another mass shooting. Let’s do the hard work of listening to one another. 

U2, the Grammys, and learning how to breathe

Krista and I watched the Grammy Awards last Sunday night, our annual opportunity to catch up on a contemporary music scene that is slowly slipping away from us.

It’s always a fun event — loaded with amazing performances, emotional challenges, and over-thetop grandstanding. This Grammys went a bit overboard we thought, becoming more of a political commercial than musical entertainment. Not a surprise, given a celebrity culture that loves to award itself — how many awards shows can there be? — and pretend, for one night at least, that they are more prophet then performer.

In any case, we were blown away by U2's contribution. I'm a biased U2 fan, I'll admit, but this performance was incredible. Staged on a barge in New York's harbor with the Statue of Liberty in the background, the band challenged us to rethink the whole immigration debate. U2 doesn't take a traditional approach to anything, and that was certainly the case here. The performance was powerful musically and substantively. 

Immediately following, someone on the Grammys stage made a quick and all-too-obvious political statement, and then we were off to a commercial — within seconds of U2’s performance — only to return to the next political rant from some rather unknown (to me) performer/prophet.

I was frustrated, but I couldn’t put my finger on why until the next morning in our staff meeting. We were talking about the Grammy’s when Angel, our communications assistant, said, “They didn’t give the song time to breathe. They were so quick to move to the next topic.”

So true. I needed time for the song/performance to sink in. I was challenged, and, let’s be honest, I didn’t necessarily agree with everything Bono was trying to get across — but I wasn’t given the chance to breathe, think, soak it in, reflect.

… which is a problem these days, don’t you think? Our fast-paced society produces so many fast-paced opinions that we’re hardly given the chance to think. It’s a crisis, in my opinion. A crisis of thoughtful reflection. We simply don’t take the time to breathe.

In my first year of pastoral ministry, I was required — which was a good thing because I probably wouldn’t have gone otherwise — to attend a retreat on Spiritual Reflection. Day 2 of the retreat was to be a silent day. No talking. No conversation. No casual reading. We were to spend the time in theological contemplation and prayer. Sounds brutal, doesn’t it?

But I learned something: that without time set aside for reflection, we’re not giving our souls and spirits time to breathe.

When I was a camper at Lutheridge, a pastor-chaplain asked us, “What do you listen to when you go to bed at night?” I used to listen to the Cincinnati Reds baseball network or a replay of Casey Kasem’s American Top 40. We all had something that we listened to.

He suggested that we turn it all off and listen to nothing. “Your day is loaded with sound. Enjoy the sound of silence.” (I’m making up that quote, by the way, but he certainly said something like that.)

Later in life, I’ve interpreted his comment as one that reaches beyond the “sound of silence,” into the realm of theological reflection. “Create time,” he may as well have been saying, “for creative reflection in your life. Think more deeply about things. Don’t rely only on the opinions or thoughts of others; take time to think for yourself.”

I must admit that I worry about our addiction to a social media empire that pulls us away from quiet, reflection, and a deeper level of thinking. I worry about a news industry that invites us to tune in only to opinions we already agree with.

I worry that we don’t take time to breathe.

Perhaps that’s where the church comes in. Worship is many things, but it’s certainly a time set aside to breathe. A place where we invite the Holy Spirit to encounter us, challenge us, and walk alongside us.

After his resurrection, Jesus tracked down his confused disciples and did a curious thing: “He breathed on them” (John 20:22). He knew they needed it.

So do we.

Last minute shopping

Please don't tell Krista, but I haven't finished my Christmas shopping yet. I'm close, but there's always that last idea ....

There have been many "favorite" gifts over the years. I remember a particular GI Joe jeep I got as a kid, complete with search light and 106 mm tripod mounted recoiless rifle with four rounds of ammo. Pretty darn cool.

My kids get frustrated with me because I can't ever think of suggestions for gifts. It's not that I don't care -- I mean, who doesn't like receiving gifts? -- but I'm not one to keep a running list of ideas. My brain's not big enough for that, i guess.

Yesterday I received a gift that was particularly meaningful -- a pillow commemorating a worship service we led last year at Cherry Hill Church in Davie County. Every time I look at the pillow, I'll venture back to that very special, candlelit night in that tiny little historic church. It's a gift that keeps on giving.

If I had to choose a favorite, I'd probably say that the best gift of all was the simplest of all -- a letter Krista wrote to me last year. It's not a gift one displays or calls attention to. It's not a gift I'll wear or consume. But every time I read it, I'll connect with years of memories, joys, challenges, and blessings. It's a gift that bears within it the sacrifice of love and endurance, that reminds me of a relationship that, in and of itself, is the best gift of all.

I doubt God spent days and nights wondering what to give us that first Christmas. He simply gave from his heart: the gift of himself that bears within it the sacrifice of love and endurance, a gift loaded down with hope and promise and joy. It's the greatest gift of all.

May you feel blessed by that very same gift this Christmas.

And if you see me out shopping for that one last present, be sure to say hi. :)

Jerusalem, politics, and Christianity: not a good combination

Almost anything President Trump says these days will be met with a mixture of outrage and glowing support. That was definitely the case in this week’s announcement supporting Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, eventually moving the US embassy there from Tel Aviv.

Trump’s announcement follows through with a bipartisan bill passed by Congress in 1995 that instructs the president to begin construction of an American embassy in Jerusalem. President Clinton allowed the bill to become law without signing it, but presidents ever sense have delayed action … until Trump’s announcement.

Why the controversy? It’s complicated, but there’s reason for Christians to pay attention.

Israeli soldiers outside of the Muslim Dome of the Rock
following the 1967 Six Day War

A brief history. When Britain seized control from the Ottoman Empire in 1917, it brought an end to 400 years of Muslim control of Jerusalem. Until the state of Israel was created in 1948, Jerusalem was considered an international city, respecting the historic ties of three major world religions, Christianity, Islam, and Judaism. During the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, Israel claimed the city’s western half, claiming the eastern half after the next Arab-Israeli war, in 1967. East Jerusalem had a population that was then entirely Palestinian, but Israel claimed it as its undivided capital and began constructing settlements that have brought thousands of Jews there. The settlements have been widely condemned by the international community, including the United States, and have been a major reason why diplomats have consistently said that the city’s status must be determined in negotiations, not unilateral action. 

Until now, most embassies have been located in Tel Aviv, in hopes that a peaceful solution over Jerusalem will be negotiated. Trump’s announcement is unmistakably unilateral, frustrating Palestinians, the Arab community, and leaders around the world.

A Christian response? It’s not uncommon for the one with the loudest voice to get heard. The loudest voice in the Christian community these days is coming from those who believe that American support of Israel is prophetic, a kind of support that will ultimately lead to Christ’s return. Leading the charge are folks like Pat Robertson and John Hagee and their massive broadcast empires. The late Tim LaHaye popularized the movement through his Left Behind books, which made him a multi-millionaire.

In a nutshell, they interpret the Old Testament – especially prophecies in Ezekiel – as a call for the return of Jews to Israel, a return that would lead to the rebuilding of the Temple and spark a series of cataclysmic events that would culminate in a Battle of Armageddon, humanity’s last great war, after which Christ would return for a 1,000-year reign. Formally it’s called Dispensational Pre-millennialism (DP). And it would all begin in Jerusalem.

Problems and more problems. There are several problems with this approach:

1. Dispensational Pre-millennialism is a relatively new idea, popping up in the writings of John Nelson Darby in the 1820s. Darby, who never studied theology, embraced an errant translation of 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17 regarding the rapture and developed his theory of the end times. The errant translation – from Jerome’s Vulgate in the 5^th century – has been corrected by the church and does not appear in any “authorized” translation since … until Cyrus Scofield embraced Darby’s theory and included it in his study Bible in 1909. The Scofield Bible was the first “study Bible” of its kind and became very popular among a growing movement of fundamentalists and Pentecostals. The theory became even more popular with the publication of Hal Lindsay’s The Late Great Planet Earth (1970) and LaHaye’s Left Behind books (1995-2007) and movies dramatizing the rapture. Of note, Liberty University, Bob Jones University, and Dallas Theological Seminary, three very popular evangelical schools, along with the Mormon church, have been strong advocates of Dispensational Pre-millennialism (DP). They claim that the DP theory follows a literal translation of Scripture, but at best it’s a pick-and-choose literalism that drives their conclusions.
2. Despite its commercial popularity, DP theory is widely dismissed by most theological streams of thought, and Darby’s line of thinking isn’t found in any of the works of the Protestant reformers, Luther, Calvin, or Wesley. The Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, and Orthodox churches reject the theory, as well, which effectively means that the vast majority of the world’s Christians don’t see eye-to-eye with Darby or Robertson or LaHaye, et al, regarding the end times.
3. DP assumes that God’s promise about the earth’s future is rooted in death and destruction, rather than a covenant relationship that never ends. No doubt, God promises judgement and a new heaven and earth, but that doesn’t mean that God will destroy the earth that he loves. Some will point to signs of destruction in Revelation, but astute readers of scripture will notice that details of the “end times” are rich and varied. Even Jesus warns us against trying to figure out the details (Matthew 24:36) and makes no reference to the restoration of land inheritance (i.e., Israel). His only reference to the rebuilding of the Temple was regarding his own sacrifice on the cross – when “the Temple will be torn down and rebuilt in three days” -- implying that his sacrifice was sufficient for all.
4. What to do with Ezekiel’s prophecy that Jews must return to Israel, at which time there will be a radical new beginning, infused by the Holy Spirit? Most Christian scholars conclude that Ezekiel was referencing the return of Jews from exile in Babylon and that the Holy Spirit’s infusion – breathing life into “dry bones” – occurred at Pentecost.

 What does this all have to do with Jerusalem. A lot, as it turns out.

The evangelical community maintains a decidedly one-sided, pro-Israel position because of Dispensational Pre-millennialism. Evangelical leaders are strong advocates of efforts to return Jews to Israel and the establishment of Jerusalem as the recognized capital. Stripping Palestinians of East Jerusalem and building Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank are consistent with DP theory in order to hurry along the return of the Messiah. Once Jews have returned – no clue how we’ll measure that one – I suppose DP advocates will begin holding God’s feet to the fire in order to move along the end-times train.

Is the president a Dispensationalist? Of course not … but he surely understands the evangelical community’s strong political support. 81 percent of evangelicals voted for Trump in the last election. There’s no way he comes close to winning without their vote. And their message is clear: American support of Israel is necessary if we are to honor Old Testament prophecy and thereby hurry along the Messiah’s return. It doesn’t matter that the vast majority of theologians and Christian churches around the world think otherwise; the loudest voices with the deepest pockets have the president’s ear, and that’s who he has chosen to listen to. Period.

It almost goes without saying that many American Jews are celebrating President Trump’s decision, as well, especially Zionist Jews who claim that Jerusalem has been the eternal, undivided capital of Israel since the time of King David. Palestinians agree that it’s a capital, but a capital for ancient Palestine, not present-day Israel.

What about Palestinian Christians? There is a voice in this conversation that continues to get  overlooked: the Christian community in Palestine. Once a strong presence in Israel, especially in places like Bethlehem, Palestinian Christians are being marginalized and oppressed, many choosing to leave the area altogether. Not long ago, Bethlehem and Nazareth were majority Christian cities. Today, the cities are less than 15 percent Christian.

What do they have to say about President Trump’s decision? In a chillingly symbolic statement, Christians in Bethlehem turned off the lights to the Christmas tree outside the Church of the Nativity, the traditional birthplace of Jesus. In a joint letter to the president, the recognized leaders of the various Palestinian Christian communities wrote that the decision “will yield increased hatred, conflict, violence, and suffering in Jerusalem and the Holy Land and cause irreparable harm.” 

Munib Younan, Lutheran bishop of Jordan and the Holy Land, writes that the decision "abandons the manger for the sake of the empire." Pope Francis called for the status quo, and Anglican priests insisted that the decision would have “profound ramifications on the peace process.”

In a statement quoted in the Washington Post, Mitri Raheb, a Lutheran pastor in Bethlehem,writes that “the Palestinian people are once again being sacrificed at the altar for imperial politics.”

Those are all harsh words, but it’s incredible that American politicians rarely seek out the opinion of the Christian community in Palestine. For years they have been overlooked, oppressed, and forsaken. Their land has been stolen, homes destroyed, and economy suppressed while American politicians and, let’s be clear, the evangelical community look the other way.

The Holy Land deserves better than that. The 2,000-year-old Christian community in Palestine deserves better than that.

Quite frankly, the Jerusalem decision was not necessary, except that it intentionally stokes political fires in Palestine in order for the president to gain political and financial support at home.

That’s no way to form foreign policy. And it’s no way to treat our sisters and brothers in the land of Christ’s birth.