Greetings from Zababdeh

First Presbyterian Church of Sarasota just completed a trip to the Holy Land, which included time in Zababdeh (our surrogate Palestinian “home town”). They were kind enough to post a video of some of our friends there recording a personal greeting to me and Elizabeth:

A Tale of Two Movies

Watching movies is one of my favorite activities. Today I had the rare pleasure of getting to watch two (usually that only happens when I’m dog-sick and stuck in bed). They provided a bizarre counterpoint for each other.

The first was the upcoming adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. Now, the last one out of the gates on this was No Country for Old Men, what I consider to be an almost pitch-perfect movie. Add to that Viggo Mortensen and Robert Duvall, two of my favorite actors, and I was pumped. The kicker: free passes for pastors, followed by a theological discussion of the movie led by a “noted theologian.” Sold!

The movie was bleak – I expected that. And that was hard to watch. But it just wasn’t that good. The Coen Brothers nailed No Country’s pacing with the painfully drawn-out vista shots and the almost wordless dialogue. Here, there was some good cinematography, but it felt like they were trying to get through it too fast. I know it’s unfair to compare relatively new-comer directors to the Coen Brothers, but this really didn’t live up to the challenge at all. For a free movie, though, intriguing.

The noted theologian was Reg Grant, a professor at Dallas Theological Seminary. It was not that long ago that places like Dallas would have urged faithful Christians to run the other direction from such movies, so I am encouraged to see the evangelical mainstream willing to engage secular culture, not deny it out of hand. But what followed in discussion was frustrating. The film was full of Biblical and philosophical allusions, much like No Country. However, the discussion seemed to be hell-bent (pardon the expression) on shoe-horning the film into a Christian allegory. The relationship of the Father and the Son, the pronouncement that the Son is “the one,” the only man in the film named is “Eli,” sparse conversations about God and angels, all of that adds up to a lot of fodder for conversation. But to somehow assume that McCarthy’s nihilistic worldview could be bent into a crypto-Catholic “hope in Christ” morality tale? Not quite…

I was reminded of the Ralph Wood article comparing the theologies of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, entitled Lewis & Tolkien in Tension. In it, Wood describes how Lewis’ literature has no purpose if the allegorical interpretation is not there. In other words, if you don’t get that Aslan is Jesus, then The Chronicles of Narnia aren’t going to be of much use. Tolkien, on the other hand, seemed to prefer the uniqueness of Christ and therefore refused to have any Christ-figure in his masterworks. The themes of Scripture, however, are there: betrayal, trust, faith, transcendence, temptation, humility, etc. Allegorical, no. Rich, yes.

It was reading Wood’s article that helped me understand the deep flaw I’ve never been able to articulate with dispensational readings of Revelation. A vision of the future? Yes. One in which the Whore of Babylon/seven seals/four horses means a specific person/entity/nation/enemy? Probably not.

And yet, that’s exactly what this audience was trying to do with The Road, find the Christ-figure and how to use this as a preaching tool. One audience member went so far as to say that the end offers the possibility of hope in Christ and the “new heaven and new earth.” First of all, there’s a big difference between hope and optimism; hope is a lot more than “glass half full.” You can have a bleak future and still have eschatological and soteriological hope. And second, folks, if the future looks anything like McCarthy’s vision, then there is no cause for hopetimism.

Enough about the film I didn’t enjoy. The second film was with guys who went on our OPC Men’s Retreat in October. We watched Into the Wild, the story of Chris McCandless, the Emory student whose misanthropy causes him to abandon all for the solitude of an Alaskan winter only to discover the truth that “Happiness is real only when shared.”

Sean Penn’s directorial eye was exactly what The Road needed. The drawn out shots of mountains, whether bleak or beautiful, were well-executed. And there was enough fodder for theological/philosophical discussion, albeit in non-allegorical terms: loneliness, woundedness, community, limitation, success, dependence, independence, forgiveness, enlightenment, you name it. And if that weren’t enough, there’s far more religious conversation that actually occurs within the movie. From vague discussions about God to prominent quotes from Tolstoy (himself an intriguing Christian writer), McCandless’ own search seems to have these eternal questions in mind. And the way Penn shapes the narrative only highlights these ideas.

And so for now, the balcony is closed. We’ll see you next week at the movies.

(having watched the preview again, did we get a truncated version today? ‘cuz half of the scenes in the preview were not in what we saw)

Getting Back on Track: Going for It

I Samuel 2
Mark 13:1-8

We have come to the end of the sermon series we began in September of Getting Back on Track. Through that sermon series, we have been talking about how it is the life knocks us off and how often it is that we find ourselves on unsteady footing. There are things that we can do, and things that we can remember, that might help us to get back on track. We’re ending today with an introduction to the series we are going to begin next week as we look forward to Advent and the upcoming Christmas season.

This is a really weird text. It reminds me, in an odd way, of the story Tug McGraw and Willie Stargell. Tug McGraw started out as a pitcher for the Mets and then moved on to the Phillies where he was most well known for being a relief pitcher. One of the batters he often faced was Willie Stargell, the great Pirate slugger. The Phillies and the Pirates, especially in the late seventies, were battling back and forth for the pennant, so McGraw and Stargell would often end up facing each other in these close games. Tug McGraw was once asked, “How do you settle yourself down in those relief situations?” He responded by saying, “get up there, and I’d look at Willie Stargell, and then, I’d think, ‘You know the sun is going to expand in a couple thousand years, and earth will be destroyed, so it doesn’t really matter what Willie Stargell does right now with the bases loaded and two outs.’” So he would calm down and he would pitch. Now that’s perspective.

There is a helpful way that this might illustrate our text in which Jesus is talking about cataclysmic, chaotic thingsk about the end coming and destruction and wars and violence and persecution. But I think it’s important to read this text with little bit of caution. It’s my conviction that within the Church (broadly defined) that there is an affliction to read these kind of passages, and indeed all of the prophecies of Scripture, allegorically. In other words, to take these as predictions of specific events to come. Preachers take texts like this and try and figure out which wars and rumors of wars Jesus is talking about. Nation will rise against nation? Well, that must be Iran against Israel! Earthquakes? There was one in Iran. There’s this desire to figure out which of these signs Jesus s describing is being fulfilled right now. I think that’s a dangerous way to read prophecy.

For one thing, if you look at all of these descriptions that Jesus gives of wars, or rumors of wars, of nation rising up against nation, of earthquakes and famines, of people of faith being persecuted for their beliefs, can we really name of time in history when this has not been true? It is certainly true in our time and place, but it is was no less true during World War Two, or in the nineteenth century, or in the seventeenth century, or even in Jesus’ times. These conditions are descriptions of a permanent human condition of chaos and violence. And secondly, it’s important to remember that we are people as Christians who believe that the Old Testament prophecies about the Messiah were fulfilled in Jesus. The sun did not fall from the skies; the seas were not turned to blood; and yet, we believe that Jesus is the Messiah, despite the specifics of what Old Testament prophets might have said.

This is an odd text. It is all taking place in Jerusalem, in the heart of the religious and national identity of the Jewish people. Jesus is in the Temple, and then they head up to the Mount of Olives. The disciples are marveling at these incredible structures. Jesus says, “These are not all that great. They’re going to crumble.” And it paints this picture which is not allegory. It’s not meant to be read with this one-to-one correspondence (who’s the nation, where’s the earthquake, etc.), but rather it paints a picture of context, of life, of experience.

When I was younger, I was a big fan of Greek mythology. I loved to read the stories. Reading this story, I couldn’t help but think about the ancient oracles. I was reminded of the story of Perseus. The oracle about Perseus came to his grandfather King Acricius, that his grandson was going to kill him. So the King, trying to avoid this prophecy, locks his only daughter in a basement dungeon. Zeus decided that the daughter, Danae, was beautiful, and came to her. And Perseus was born nine months later, to put it delicately. King Acricius, keeping this prophecy in mind, takes the daughter and the grandson and puts them in a chest, locks it, and sends it to Sea. It lands on another beach, and both mother and child survive. Perseus goes on to be this great Greek hero, and the grandfather never knows anything about any of this. Many, many years later, Perseus is competing in an Olympic games, throwing a discus. The wind catches it, and guess who it hits?

If prophecy is true, and these are the kinds of things that are to come, there may not be much we can do about them. Jesus is facing betrayal, trial, crucifixion. This is all coming within a matter of days, within a matter of a few verses here. But he doesn’t turn from the situation. He decides to head into Jerusalem anyway. Now this text is very difficult to interpret. Is this just a word to the disciples? Is Jesus just speaking to those four disciples who have approached him, asking him for signs? Because these are things that are going to happen to them. They will be brought before councils and synagogues. They will be put to death. They will be persecuted. If it’s only to them, then this is merely history. Is the word to all that follow, including us? Then this is fearsome.

Christianity is not, in the mold of Greek mythology, a fatalistic faith. But I do wonder, if these things are to be, is there anything we can do about them happening?

It’s because of the difficulty of these texts that the allegorical interpretation can be so enticing. But I want to propose to you that there might be a different way of treating these texts. I may be underselling this, but I think that I can summarize Jesus’ description here in a few simple words: “Life is tough.” Especially the life of the faithful. Life is difficult. It is not easy. Chaos comes. Life is unpredictable. There are wars. There are rumors of wars. Countries are in conflict. Being faithful will not always lead to being successful in the way the world defines it. Relationships can be severed. Families can be torn apart.

But: God is still at work. If it were not so, I don’t think Jesus would have headed into Jerusalem. From where he sat on the Mount of Olives, knowing what was to come, would he have gone into Jerusalem if he didn’t know that God could be trusted? So maybe this text is encouraging us to be faithful, but not reckless. Trust that God is at work and know that Jesus has already triumphed. It’s only a few verses before the story gets a lot worse, especially for Jesus. He is betrayed by one of his closest disciples. He is taken into a trial before Pontius Pilate. He is crucified, he dies, he is buried. But then, if you think this story is weird, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. The tomb is empty. Jesus is raised. Death is defeated. Jesus has triumphed.

This, to me, is the very thing that undergirds our faith. We do the things that we do, we do actions that we consider merciful and gracious, not because we want to avoid the things that are coming; not because we think that if we are good enough we will get into heaven. Instead, we do these things because this has already been accomplished. Jesus has accomplished forgiveness for us. Jesus has triumphed on our behalf. And when we know that, when we know enough to trust that, then our response is gratitude. It is giving generously of ourselves, recognizing that God is always at work.

This story may apply to you in very different ways. I’ve been struggling with it, both personally and pastorally, trying to find some way that it connects to life. It struck me that there are some ways where this whole conversation about God being a work, even when the foundations of the earth are shaking, might have something to say to us as a church in the midst of a stewardship campaign. I’m always hesitant to talk about money in church, recognizing that your generosity pays my salary. So take my words with a grain of salt.

I do think that it fits within this conversation. Over the past few years, and indeed, throughout our history, we have struggled with money as a church for a long time. From what I have experienced, I commend you what I have seen to be Session leadership on this issue. Your elders do not take their financial responsibility for this church lightly. Instead, they wrestle with him. And I also want to commend you, and all those who have come before, for your generosity and your stewardship of our gifts. It is because of all of these things that we are able to have the conversations as leadership of the church that we’re having now. We have been, and I expect that we will be, in a short-term debt-spending mode. We’re spending more than we’re taking in. It is my conviction that we’re not doing this with abandon; we’re not doing this recklessly; but we’re doing it with a deep sense of faith and gratitude and trust that God is at work.

The fundamental reason that we’re doing this is that our fellowship is a precious one. I’ve heard from many of you about why you come week after week, why you are involved, why you give of yourself to this place and to this community. This place is an amazing gift to the broader community. And it is my conviction that our community can continue to be a vessel of grace for those who seek to know God, for those who’ve been taught about God in harmful ways, for those who have never heard of God in the first place. The bottom line, no matter what might come, is that the heart of our text is good news. This good news comes to us, to all those who are struggling with life and what we can see. Because this morning as we read this text, just beyond, in the verses to come, is what we cannot see: the promise of life everlasting. The promise that God is that God is with us no matter what. The promise that Jesus has already triumphed and accomplished it all. What is left to us is the possibility to respond in gratitude and in thanksgiving. May we do so this day and always. Amen.

Reflection on Fort Hood

As I drove around town last Friday, I flipped through the right wing section of the radio dial to see how folks were analyzing the shootings at Fort Hood. To a one, there was a general indictment of Islam, of Muslims, of Arabs. I didn’t stick around long enough to hear whether or not the shootings in Orlando was an indictment of engineers.

Any time rampant violence makes its way to the head of the newsroom, I am reminded of Jesus’ response to those looking to find easy answers to the death of those whom Pilate killed while making their sacrifices in the Temple. Rather than offering a quick analysis – e.g. those who were killed were deserving because they were sinful, Pilate is just a rotten S.O.B., let’s avenge their deaths, etc. – Jesus suggests that these moments are ones that call people of faith to repentance. Every time we hear of such bloodletting, or even witness it for ourselves, the Christian’s first reaction should be to engage in self-reflection on how we stand in our relationships – with God, and with others.

I mentioned all this during announcements this morning at church, convinced that OPC is not a congregation that needs a reminder that the shootings and Fort Hood don’t say so much about a religion or a national origin as they do about a common humanity that binds us all. But listening to right wing radio two days ago, there are a lot of folks out there who are deeply infected by the confidence that such moments are not ones of intensive self-reflection, but ones that prop up our already existing stereotypes.

It reminded me that when I was in Chicago, we got word that the Oklahoma Federal Building was hit by major bombing. Sunday came, and we still didn’t know who the perpetrators were. The pastor spoke to the congregation, saying that we need to be careful not to presume guilt of one kind or another before we have the facts. He was lambasted by several members, convinced that this was clearly the work of Muslim extremists. We later, of course, learned that this was not the case.

When I first heard that Major Hasan, the suspected killer, was an American of Palestinian Muslim origin, I wasn’t surprised. But I wouldn’t have been surprised, either, if I heard that he was an American Christian, an Israeli Jew. In fact, no combination of ancestry or religion (or lack of) would have surprised me. The thing that convicts me most about being a Christian is that we are, all of us, sinners in the face of God’s perfect grace. We all do things we shouldn’t; and we all don’t do things we should. I’m reminded of Sufjan Stevens’ haunting song “John Wayne Gacy Jr.” in which he sings of the chilling mass murders and then follows with the verse:

And in my best behavior, I am really just like him.
Look beneath the floorboards for the secrets I have hid.

Maybe it’s not the religious aspect that draws attention in this case; instead, it’s the idea that “one of our own,” an army man, would do this to his fellow soldiers. Can Christians really be surprised that betrayal is a human trait, either, as it stands at the center of our story?

Pray for the victims at Fort Hood, yes. And pray for the shooter, Maj. Hasan. Jesus would expect no less.

Healing Service

1 Kings 17:10-16
John 11:32-44

The John text is the same one we read this morning in worship. In the context of a service for healing and wholeness, it has a different flavor to it, especially after hearing that story of Elijah meeting the widow of Zarephath, this Gentile woman who was supposed to be outside the bounds of grace. Elijah goes to her, this poor woman who has run out of food and even oil, and he performs this miracle where the oil never runs out. Oil was not only a staple in cooking, it was also used in the anointing of priests. It was used sacrificially and in healing. There’s something in that story that reminds us that God’s mercy, God’s love, God’s healing never runs out.

Lazarus had been dead four days by the time Jesus came on the scene and raised him from the dead. There’s something about these stories that is prone to misinterpretation. When we look at these stories of Jesus healing, we might be tempted to think that if only we had enough faith we might be healed and fixed. I’m pretty sure that everyone has had experiences of being with people who are deeply faithful and still get sick and still die. God does not send cancer because we do not believe in Jesus enough. God gives creation just enough freedom and these things happen. The reminder is that God is always with us through it all.

A couple of years ago, I realized that I had taken this the sense of creation’s freedom to heart so much that I had almost given up on the idea of God doing miraculous things. It was as though I were hedging my prayers. What I realized was, and it was in stories like the story of Lazarus, that there was something to be said for prayer that was bold, that asked for the impossible, there in the midst of the ICU in the hospital, and at home in the midst of broken relationships, to ask for God to be a work in miraculous ways. The foundation at the foot of all that remains trust in God, that God would be there no matter what.

It reminds me of a story a chaplain friend of mine shared me. One of the first families he visited when he was a chaplain were in the ICU, gathered around their loved one. And their prayer was fervent: “God, we know you’re going to heal her, and we just give you praise and we know that she is going to get up and walk again.” My friend beginning to think about what will happen when this doesn’t come be. Is their faith going to be shaken? Is it going to be destroyed? And it became clear that she was not going to make it. And when she died, their prayer became one of thanksgiving: “Thank you, God, that her suffering has ended.” They prayed boldly, and no matter what, they knew that God was at work. They trusted that healing, true healing, wholeness, is bigger than life and death, and that God would be at work no matter what.

There’s something else about this story of Lazarus that is remarkable. Jesus calls out to Lazarus and he comes out, but he’s still bound up in those grave clothes. Jesus turns him over to the crowd, and says, “You unbind him and let him go.” There’s a reason we’re all here tonight together. Maybe tonight is the first step of healing for some of you. But maybe you need more than just one person. Maybe you need to know that you’re not alone in the midst of this. Jesus has commanded us to unbind one another. That’s what it means to share in our meal together, to gather in this community, in this communion. The strangest we proclaim in the midst of this feast is that Jesus is broken, and that is what heals us. It is as though our own brokenness becomes one with Jesus’ brokenness, that our need for healing is taken up into Jesus himself on the cross, is buried with him in the tomb, and is raised with him.

Getting Back on Track: When It’s Hopeless

Psalm 24
John 11:32-44

Over the past few months, we’ve gone with this topic of Getting Back on Track. We have used the journey of faith, this metaphor of progression (or so we assume), of following along with the footsteps of Jesus. But the journey of faith does not necessarily always move forward. The question is: what we do when we’re knocked back? What do we do when the path is gone, when we can’t see the way before us? Our worship has included music from South Africa. How long did the people there have to sing the songs like “Freedom is coming, oh yes, I know,” all the while wondering if it really was?

If you’re looking for a sermon the easy answers, you will be sorely disappointed. This text is a challenging one and it is also one that points to the complexity of life that we already know in our own experiences, how the journey of faith has its twists, turns, detours, and steps back. There is a key point in the text that comes up again and again: Jesus is upset in this text. Maybe he knows the way this story is going to end, but the writer makes the point of saying that Jesus was “greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved”; “Jesus began to weep”; Jesus, again, “was greatly disturbed”. If Jesus gets knocked back, how can we expect that the same wouldn’t happen to us?

What do we do what it feels hopeless? What do we do what we’re faced with death of ourselves or loved ones? What do we do when we hear news of an illness that is incurable, of a relationship that we’re in and we treasure, and yet it’s impossibly fractured? What do we do when stress piles up on us, when debt makes us feel like we’re drowning, when the responsibilities we carry on our shoulders crush us? What do we do when we are in the midst of imprisonment, or in the face of apartheid or injustice?

There’s something in this lesson for all of us, the story of the raising of Lazarus from the dead in the town of Bethany. Bethany is to the East of Jerusalem, up on a hill overlooking Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives. It is the same place that Jesus sends the disciples to get that donkey to go down on Palm Sunday into Jerusalem. Today the town of Bethany is known in Arabic as Al-Azaria, named after Lazarus, this famous resident of the town.

The first that may jump out is that this story has parallels with the resurrection story, which appears several chapters later in John’s gospel. We have a death that’s at the center of the story. We have a stone that is rolled up against a cave tomb. But there’s a huge difference. Jesus does not give Lazarus resurrection; he gives him revivification. He brings him back to life. Yes, Lazarus died, and Jesus raised him. But Lazarus remains mortal. He is raised from the dead to go on to die another day. Why did Jesus do this? It fits very well into the “signs and wonders” of the miracle stories of the New Testament. This is a revelation of the Messianic age, to say, “I’m the one that you’ve been waiting for. And the proof of it is this: Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead.”

But when Jesus dies and is raised, Jesus is changed. When he encounters the disciples on the road to Emmaeus, they don’t even recognize him. They are telling Jesus about Jesus and what happened to Jesus and they don’t even know it’s Jesus. He has been transformed by being resurrected. And he does not raise from the dead to die other day; he ascends into heaven.

My question is: How often are our prayers, in the midst of feeling hopeless, for revivification and reanimation? Not resurrection, but having back what we used to have? Think of the Israelites in the wilderness. They have been freed from slavery and they are there in the desert with God providing for their needs. They say, “We had it better back in Egypt.” For them, new life means returning back to the way it was because it’s better than the way things are. What they missed is that they’re being led into a land of promise.

When we yearn for an economic turnaround in our society, do we want to go back to the way it was? Really? Or have we recognized how flawed our system is, and that there might be better ways of being in economic relationship with one another? If responsibilities are weighing us down, do we simply want the strength to carry them, or does that run the risk of helping us fool ourselves into thinking that we are independent and can carry in the first place? If the stress is on us, do we simply want the stress to go away, or do we recognize that life is a series of stresses that come and go, and if they leave they will surely come again?

The trick that this story introduces to us is that we have to remember that the life of faith in Christ isn’t as simple as, “I want it, I ask for it, I get it.” The life of faith is not one of asking for what you want and then opening your mailbox and finding there. God is not a puppet master. Life is complicated, painful, difficult. My hunch is that each one of us knows exactly what I mean in some personal way. It could be recently or in the distant past. But we know that life is not perfect. The good news is that God is with us. Jesus weeps with us.

What would it mean for us to pray for resurrection instead? What would it mean for us to pray for new life in Christ in whatever that hopelessness is that we find? What would be the difference between living in order to die other day instead of opening ourselves to transformation to point that we are unrecognizable, changed by life in Christ? That, to me, is the difference between optimism and hope. Optimism feels like going back to those times that were really good. Hope is what holds us fast in the midst of the kind of situation that South Africans faced under Apartheid: “Freedom is coming. Oh, yes, I know! I may not be able to see it. I may not believe it with my mind. But my heart and my faith teaches me that it’s true.” And when Apartheid ends, we have just a taste of the truth that we already know.

It reminds me of the woman who was asked what her favorite verse of Scripture was, and she said, “It came to pass.” In another words, life moved on. Things changed. Or another way of putting it: even the snail made it onto the ark.

Hope implies trust in God. When it’s hopeless, hope reminds us that we serve a God who is trustworthy. It is not always going to be easy. But it is always going to be true that God is with us, that Jesus weeps with us, that the Spirit surrounds us and uplifts us. Freedom is coming. Oh, yes, I know. Amen.

Getting Back on Track: Finding Perspective Again (for the First Time)

Psalm 34:1-8
Mark 10:46-52

There are times that we see what we want to see.

I’m reminded of the Halloween story of the mad scientist doing an experiment on frogs. He puts a frog down on a mat next to a measuring tape. He bends down over the frog, and he says, “Jump! Jump!” The frog jumps 20 feet. He takes out his notebook and writes, “Frog with four legs jumps 20 feet.” He picks up the frog and takes a scalpel (Halloween story, ya’ll; not for the faint of heart), and he cuts off one of the frog legs and puts him back down on the mat. He says, “Jump! Jump!” The frog jumps 15 feet. He writes down, “Frog, 3 legs, 15 feet.” He takes the frog again, cuts off another one of the frog’s legs, and puts him back on the mat. “Jump! Jump!” the frog jumps 10 feet. He writes, “Frog, 2 legs, 10 feet.” He takes the frog again, cuts off one more leg. He’s down to one leg. “Jump! Jump!” The frog jumps 5 feet. He writes in his notebook “Frog, 1 leg, 5 feet.” He takes the frog again, cuts off the last leg, puts him back on the mat, and says, “Jump! Jump!” Nothing. “Jump! Jump!” Takes out his notebook, and writes, “Frog, no legs, deaf.”

Sometimes when the evidence is before us, we interpret it as we would like.

We have been the spending the last month and a half or so looking at the travels of Jesus. We have been following the footsteps of Jesus in these stories and trying to get back on track in our own lives. Today, we are in Jericho, right next to the Jordan river. It is in the middle of the desert. But Jericho itself is a kind of oasis. So as Jesus and the disciples are moving from the Galilee down toward Jerusalem, they would stop in Jericho at this oasis, before taking the ascent up into the city of Jerusalem.

Today we are focusing on the idea of perspective. We began with perspective. How is it that we take a step back from where we are and get a sense of our context. We’re a little over half way through, which seems like a good time to stop again to try and get perspective because we often see what we want to see.

What better character in the Scriptures to teach us about sight than blind Bartimaeus. Here he is, this beggar, on the outskirts of Jericho, sitting by the road as Jesus and the disciples are walking by. He calls out to Jesus with an amazing statement of faith: “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me.” Here is this blind beggar, this outcast of society, forced to beg in order to make ends meet. And yet, he somehow recognizes who Jesus is. The crowd tried to quiet him. “Jesus is important. He doesn’t have time for people like you.” Bartimaeus response is to shout all the louder: “Son of David, have mercy on me!”

But as soon as Jesus hears him, he turns the crowd. He says, “Call him her.” And the crowd says, “Oh, take heart! He wants to see you!” They have just been shutting him up and now they want to put him in the center of attention. And as heals him, he says that he went his way following Jesus as he and the disciples went on their to Jerusalem.

The irony of Bartimaeus is that he was blind; but he saw better than anybody else in that story. Nobody in the crowd recognized Jesus for who he was. Nobody in the crowd thought that Jesus would waste his time on a blind beggar. But Bartimaeus called out, called him Son of David, and asked for the impossible: to regain his sight.

There are times in our life when we need that moment to get perspective, when we need to see again as if for the first time, when we realize ourselves that we are blinded and need that divine opening of our eyes to see the world around us and to see our situation. And there are times when in order to get perspective we need to retreat, to get away. We talked about this before. If you don’t have, in the rhythm of your life, regular time to get away, to spend time with yourself away, to reflect and get that perspective, whether it’s daily or weekly or monthly or annually, some time to reconnect with what it is that’s important to you.

But there are times when getting perspective means actually getting closer to God, prayer, discipline…The spiritual life is often like exercise. We may have the best intentions and we don’t always follow through. But ultimately we know that we need to get in that discipline of being in regular prayer, Bible Study, in classes, discussions, retreat, time alone with God. But the question is how do we do that?

It strikes me that there are two different groups that we might fit into and are there in this gospel lesson. The first group is a group of one: Bartimaeus. Everything’s been stripped away. He can’t see. He can’t make a living for himself. He is begging and is dependent upon the kindness of strangers in order to make his daily living. He knows exactly what he needs for healing. He can’t see and he needs to see; and so he calls out to Jesus. It’s very obvious the kind of person Bartimaeus represents. There are times in our own lives when we might feel a synergy with Bartimaeus, that everything we have has been taken away, and we’re starting over, and we know exactly what it is that we think we need.

There’s this other group: the crowds. They think they’ve got it right. They think they know what they’re doing. They are already following this Jesus and trying to keep the wrong people away. And they are fickle, flipping on the Bartimaeus issue when the wind changes.

Both groups need perspective. For Bartimaeus, it’s obvious. In order to get perspective, he simply needs to see. The crowds, however, need perspective because they’re the ones that think they’ve got their act together and it takes Jesus to point out what they’ve been missing all along.

Do either of these groups resonate with you? Do they describe you and your need for perspective? Maybe you’re more like Bartimaeus, knowing exactly what it is that you need. Maybe all has been stripped away and what you need is the encouragement, the boldness of Bartimaeus to go out and to ask for it. If that speaks to you, then my encouragement is to go and find that oasis, that Jericho in your own life: a place like your own backyard, or somewhere far away like the mountains; a time of day, maybe early in the morning or late at night is when you can be alone, where you feel most able to seek God. Ask for what it is that you think you need and Jesus will hear.

Or maybe you’re part of the crowd, thinking you’ve got it all together. Or maybe everybody else thinks you’ve got it together, but you know the truth about yourself. If that’s the case, then maybe it’s time to let our minds be changed, to listen again to Jesus, and hear that voice that might speak to us in a new way and help us to see things that we have never seen before about ourselves, about those on the margins, about the world around us. One of my favorite quotes is from Bob Pierce, the founder of World Vision International: “Let your heart be broken with the things that break the heart of God.” Maybe that’s the very thing that we need: to have the heart of God in our own lives, a heart that might break so we might see those blind beggars by the side of the road.

But more importantly, no matter who we are in this story, no matter where we see ourselves, maybe it’s time for all of us to admit the truth: we are the blind beggar. D.T. Niles, famous theologian, says that the best definition of evangelism is one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread. Friends, we’re just beggars. No matter how much we think we might have, all that we really have, and all that we really need, comes from the one who blesses us, the God who creates us, and calls us, and redeems us.

If we are in a place where we need to see again, as if for the first time, if we have been blinded, then it is God who brings the healing and will show us where to find that bread we need.

There’s this thing about perspective. When I read this lesson, story I am struck by the fact that, for Bartimaeus, there’s a singular moment where everything changed. One day he was blind, he came to Jesus, and the next day he saw. There is this earth shattering moments where suddenly his life is changed. I don’t know about you, but I can’t think of a moment of my life that has been like that. Maybe you have had that, which probably means that you have been broken so badly that the transformation is this outrageous blessing.

But maybe it’s more like moving a house. Around the corner, there’s a house being moved. The house was very old, and in order to protect the integrity of the foundations and to keep it from crumbling, they had to move it six inches at a time. On a day to day basis, it was difficult to noticed that the house had moved at all. But after a while, you might think, “Wasn’t that house next to the road, that one that’s back there in the woods?”

Maybe those moments in your life are more like that house. We might not be able to see on a day-to-day basis. But as we look back with that perspective, we can see how far it is that God has brought us.

I want to encourage you to be bold, to seek God – whatever that means to you. Tell God what it is that you need. The truth may be that when we ask for what we need it may really be what we want. God knows what we truly need. My fellow beggars, it is God who will give us that bread that will fill us and make us whole.

Special thanks to my good friend Issa in Gaza for the frog joke. He tells it much better than I ever could. Please say a prayer for Gaza today.

Getting Back on Track: Knowing When to Let Go

Hebrews 4:12-16
Mark 10:17-31

Over the past few weeks and over the next few weeks we are following the travels of Jesus through the Holy Land as he makes his way from the Galilee toward Jerusalem. Today we are in the region across the Jordan River. The idea as we make these travels together is that perhaps by following Jesus in his footsteps that we ourselves might be able to get back on track in our own lives. We’ve touched on many aspects of this idea, of getting back on track, of finding our footing again with the way that life knocks us off balance. Today we’re looking at the idea of knowing when to let go.

I want to suggest the possibility that there are things to which we cling, that we hold to desperately, that get in our way of following Jesus.

In the film Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, Harrison Ford is on his quest for the Holy Grail.

It has been about twenty years since the film came out, but there are still a lot of scenes that say something about to the life of faith.

***spoiler alert*** (it has been 20 years…)

In the final scene in the movie, they are riding through the desert looking for the Holy Grail, the cup Jesus shared at the Last Supper with the disciples. Indiana Jones is the one that picks it out because he knows that its this simple one made by a carpenter, not the fancy gold one his Nazi competitors think it is. Once they have discovered the Grail, then the earth begins to shake and begins to break and give way. As the Grail falls off a ledge, Elsa, who has been his love interest up to this point and then turns out to be a Nazi collaborator, she wants the Grail and falls off the ledge reaching for it, and it’s just out of her grasp. Indiana Jones is holding onto her hand and she’s reaching and reaching until he can’t hold on anymore and finally she slips and falls into the abyss. Immediately after that scene, Indiana Jones tries the same thing. But his father manages to pull him back from the brink and lets go of the Grail so that he might live. For Elsa it was her refusal to let go that was her demise. For Indiana Jones, it was his ability to let go that saved his life.

In the story of the rich young ruler, the rule kneels before Jesus. He submits before Jesus, calling him a “Good Teacher.” Jesus rebukes him, because “No one is good but God.” The man learns from that and addresses him appropriately the next time. But he didn’t learn quite enough. Jesus tells him, “Here’s what you need to do in order to inherit eternal life, to enter the kingdom of God, to participate in the desires of God and the way that God wants the world to be, which is on its way. You have to follow the Commandments. You know what they are. There’s the ten in the famous list from Mount Sinai. There are the more than 600 throughout the Hebrew Bible.”

And the man says, “I got those. Check. I’ve been doing that since I was little kid. I’ve got that straight.”

At which point Jesus says, “There’s one thing you lack: sell everything that you own, give it to the poor, and then come and follow me.” And we read that the man went away grieved, dejected, downhearted, because he had many possessions.

Is there a broader lesson for all of us in this? I want to be careful, because there’s something contextual about it all; Jesus is speaking to this one man for whom his wealth is a barrier to following Jesus. But I also don’t want let us off the hook too easy. This leads us to ask ourselves, “Is it possible that what we possess, the riches that we might have, get in our way of following Jesus?” It’s in this story that Jesus gives that incredible, impossible, ridiculous example of the camel going through the eye of a needle. You may have heard in Sunday School that it wasn’t really a camel and it’s not really the eye of a needle, but rather a gate in Jerusalem that was called the “eye of the needle,” and the only way to get through that gate was to kneel down; so it’s not really about this impossibility of physics, of a dromedary getting through the eye of a needle; instead, it’s more about humility: submitting before God and entering God’s presence. Unfortunately, that isn’t true. There is no such gate in Jerusalem. We’re not let off that easy.

So then, what does that word “rich” really mean? What does it mean to be rich, to possess enough to be called “rich”? The disciples wrestle with this. They recognize the frank reality of it, responding, “Nobody can enter heaven. If you raise the bar that high, then nobody can get in.” I did some number checking this morning. My salary is a matter of public record. If you’re curious, you can go look it up. The congregation has to vote on it every year. You know what it is that I make. I wanted to compare my salary with what it means to be rich. In the United States, my salary is above average. It is right about in the middle. Is that rich? Is that middle class? That might be a matter of debate. Globally, however, I’m in the top 0.78%. I better practice my needle threading.

I think the truth is that a lot of us are like that rich young man. We may have submitted to Jesus, as he did, kneeling before him. We may have joined a church, or been baptized, or have taken on a leadership role, or have gone into professional ministry. But the question is: “Are we really following Jesus?” Have we really taken up our cross and followed him?”

What is the one thing that we lack? what is that one thing that Jesus would name in us that would send us away grieving? What is it that you hold to that keeps you from holding onto God? It could be wealth. It could be something else. Maybe you have an anger or a resentment about a situation in your life that you just can’t let go of. You want to hold onto it. Maybe there’s an old wound that just won’t heal that keeps you from following Jesus. Maybe it’s a drive for success, all things at all costs. Maybe you ask yourself a series of “What ifs” and If onlys”, all these questions, that act like a rocking chair: they give us something to do, but they don’t get us anywhere. Maybe you know right now that are not following Jesus fully, maybe you know that you are holding on to something, but you’re going to get around to it later when the time is right and things calm down.

I was struck by something else in this text and the idea in our theme this morning of “Letting Go.” Elizabeth and I were a fortune enough to get to go to the U2 concert this past Tuesday. Since then, we’ve been listening all week to our U2 albums and have been reconnecting with the meaning of the songs. There are incredible spiritual and Biblical themes in Bono’s lyrics. There’s one song that I’ve heard before, but didn’t really recognize it until this week. It’s from the album War, and it’s called “Drowning Man.” Bono sings:

“Take my hand. You know I’ll be there. I’ll cross the sky for your love. These winds and tides won’t drag you away. Hold on and hold on tightly. Hold on and don’t let go of my love.”

At first glance, it’s simply a love song. Somebody is drowning and someone is reaching out. But as the lyrics unfold and Bono begins to quote Scripture,

“Rise up with wings like eagles. You’ll run and won’t grow weary”,

we know that the love song is from God to someone who feels like they’re drowning.

Does that feel like it describes you? Are you drowning? Do you even know it? Or do you in fact know it but can’t admit it? Is there something in your moral center that is bugging you that you just can’t bring yourself to look at? Is there something that you are holding onto that makes it more and more difficult for God to take hold of your hand? Let go. Let go. And let God take hold. Let go so that Christ can embrace you fully. Let go so the Spirit can lift you up with wings like eagles! Is there one thing that you lack? Is there one thing that sends you away from following Jesus again and again, grieving your own inability to unclench your fist? Maybe you can’t do it. Maybe it’s impossible. But with God, all things are possible.

Prayer:
Lord God, there are times that we hold our hands together so tightly that not even light can get in. We cling desperately to the things that we think make for life. Help us to remember that it is you hold us in the palm of your hand; it is your light which heals us and strengthens us. Help us to let go of possessions, ideas, pains that keep us from opening our hand to you. We pray all of this in the name of Christ our Lord. Amen.

In Memoriam: Tim Cox (1960-2009)

I consider myself blessed to have known Tim, but as we put his service together, I discovered that I didn’t know a great deal about him. And then I realized something. Every time I would go to visit him at Atlanta Cancer Care, the conversation would begin about his condition: the latest news from the doctors, the details and difficulties of travel. But it was never long before Tim had successfully turned the conversation to be about me. And the more I’ve learned about Tim over the past few days, the more I see that I was not unique. There were times that this selflessness could frustrate his family, since others could jump ahead in the line, but as I heard them talk about it, I know that they know it as a gift that was uniquely his.

A few years ago, when violent storms were bearing down on the Caribbean, Tim was getting frantic calls about boarding up houses in preparation for the torrential rains. And he went out there taking care of them all. He left his own home to the very end. And when the apartment building where Tim and his wife Sandra lived lost its roof in a storm, Tim called the landlord to get it repaired. After a day or so of waiting, Tim went up and fixed it himself. I’m sure he knew he could do a better job than anyone else of that repair. And I may be off track here, but I wonder if he also worried about troubling the landlord with something he could just take care of himself.

There are so many stories to share, and there will be time to do that today and in the days to come. But the image that jumps out at me from the many stories I’ve heard this past week was how Tim worked as a supervisor of his roofers. He not only oversaw their work; he also got up there with them, getting his hands dirty. He loved the manual labor, surely. It was something he knew how to do extremely well, by all accounts. But he also had a knack for mentoring, coaching, teaching someone how to do something by doing it with them. And on this day, when we have this moment where tears and laughter mingle, where we cry at Tim’s absence, where we smile at memories of his presence, where we are grateful that his suffering that has ended, it seems altogether fitting and appropriate to lift up this aspect of Tim’s way of being.

You see, I’m convinced that we can recognize in Tim, the mentor, a glimpse of the God, the comforter, whom we worship. It is this same God who, the Scriptures tell us, is with us no matter how far to the ends of the earth we might go. It is this same God who renews our strength, with wings of eagles, when we are weak. It is this same God whose mercy and love are so strong and enduring that nothing, not even life or death itself, can separate us from God. It is the same God, of whom Paul writes simply in Philippians, who “is near.” And it is that same God who, in the person of Christ, comes alongside of us, showing us how it might be done, teaching us, encouraging us.

I got to know Tim over the past few years when he began to come to Atlanta for his treatments. From time to time, I would sit with him on a Friday morning, chat and pray with him. Every now and then, he would stay over the weekend and come to worship at OPC. I often asked his parents how he was doing, and they would bring me up to speed. But the way I really knew how things were going was through Sandra’s faithful updating of Tim’s CaringBridge website. As weird as it might sound, it was there on the web, through Sandra’s descriptions, photographs, requests for prayer, words of thanks and gratitude, through the ups and downs, I saw something truly remarkable; divine, even.

There are thirty-seven pages of entries; more than a hundred different people signing the guestbook, usually a multitude of times, on behalf of spouses and other family members. And in that cyberworld, I saw evidence of this loving, nurturing, teaching, encouraging God at work: Sandra alongside Tim through it all; family that surrounded him and walked with him; friends who accompanied him on flights and doctors’ visits; nurses and techs and doctors who treated him with compassion and respect; people signing internet guestbooks, offering encouragement, support, prayers, hopes, tears, laughter. Through you all, God was there every step of the way. And through them all, God is still with you all every step of the way.

God is with us, even, and especially, now; and God is with Tim, even, and especially, now.

Creepy Prayer

Yesterday morning, after the alarm went off, I lay in bed and said a brief prayer: “Lord, please send ten visitors to worship this morning.” At 11:00, I looked around the sanctuary and counted – eleven. I must admit it freaked me out a little bit.

I don’t think prayer is like getting your three wishes from the genie where you have to be careful what you ask for. I’m enough of a Presbyterian to believe that God will do as God sees fit and that I’m in no position to force God’s hand. That being said, I also want to be sure God knows what I want. It’s why I pray for healing even in the most desperate of circumstances; it may not be what happens, but it sure is what the family wants at that moment. And God is big enough to handle us speaking frankly.

What if I had prayed for ten visitors and there had only been nine? Or five? Or two? Or none? I don’t know what that might mean. If there hadn’t been any, my guess is that I would still know that God heard my prayer; but I would probably begin to think that all this talk about growth at OPC was simply not in the cards.

But to pray for ten and to get eleven? That sends me down a different path. Could it be a matter of pure chance? Absolutely. At times I’m enough of a skeptic to put that possibility first (or a close second). But yesterday, I felt it differently. To me it was a confirmation of our desire to have an even greater impact on our wider community.

And that “extra” one? Well, as Nigel Tufnel says, “It’s one louder, isn’t it?” Maybe it’s a nudge to expect blessings to be greater than we might ever imagine…