Friday, October 23, 2009

If I had a million dollars…

Hitting shuffle on my IPOD is always a journey through my own musical history – flooding my mind with the very personal memories that are attached to each song and artist. One of my favorite songs is by a band called the Bare Naked Ladies (try explaining that to youth parents!). The song is "If I had a million dollars" – a comedic piece that reveals the irony of wealth's inability to transform our character, and even less to satisfy the deepest longings of our heart…or at least that's the way I hear it.

"If I had a million dollars, we wouldn't have to walk to the store…we'd take a limousine 'cause it costs more…If I had a million dollars, I'd buy your love."

As a youth minister I would often ask students the question, 'what would you do if you had a million dollars?' Responses ranged from the pious to the obscene – somewhere between chocolate-filled swimming pools and private bikini beach islands I was often reminded that even a million dollars was a pittance in comparison to the infinite relief left by a consumptive imagination. Of course there were always random interjections of a slightly more optimistic note – 'I'd give some to the poor…after I bought a small house…in the country club…and, oh yeah, a Hummer.'

Of course, my desire was to teach youth the importance of giving – especially to those in need. Once, I devised a game around this issue. I divided the group into three types of 'players' – buyers, sellers and the destitute. The sellers had various wares to offer. Some sold homes from the very affordable to the Biltmore-esque. Others sold cars or clothing of varying prices – some even sold healthcare. The buyers were given a plentiful supply of cash – more than enough to live well with some to spare. The needy were homeless, sick, lonely, hungry, indebted, etc. I had given the 'needy' special cards with hearts on them to give out to whoever met their specified need. I clearly stated that the object of the game, at least for the buyers, was to obtain as many 'hearts' as possible, but, of course, purchases from the sellers were a matter of free choice. Within ten minutes the buyers and sellers were deadlocked in trading Hummers and Dream-homes for ever escalating prices, while the sick and destitute stood idly by. Only one buyer aspired to the objective – she purchased a small home, a cheap car, and then proceeded to go broke giving all that she had to those in need. In the end I was able to drive home the point. The 'needy' experienced, in a small way, the feeling of helplessness as the wealthy traded for power and position while they were left for dead – diseased and disenfranchised. Likewise, the buyers and sellers got a candid glimpse of their own impulses as well.

If the individual Christian's dilemma to focus finances on 'neighbor love' is an obvious challenge (as I well know), then might we imagine the problem is magnified in local Christian assemblies (i.e., "churches")? What if your church had a million dollars – or $4MM, or $30MM, or even $70MM? What would it do with that money? I'd give you three guesses, but you've probably already thought it or spoke it aloud – 'build something!' Whether it be a playground, a family life center, a cafe-gym-atorium, or a new technologically advanced church campus, it seems that the equation of 'church plus money' always equals a building.

If individual believers with the available means will generally seek a bigger home, a newer car or the finest amenities, why not the corporate church as well? Newer facilities and cutting edge technology equate to a perception of success in the western world...so too with the American church. The church that is building is the church that is growing in numbers and programs – whereby, again, the calculus will equate to more buildings, numbers and programs.

As a young seminary student (I am now an old seminary student, apparently), and first-time youth minister working with students from less than middle-class backgrounds, I became alarmed at the contradiction between the popular trend of churches to build for success against the innumerable needs of the 'beaten, broken and the damned' that seemed ignored in such projects (regardless of the lip-service given). Did a Jesus born in poor Nazareth, who left even the minimal comforts of his own home, preach a message of 'build it, and they will come?' Do Jesus' words 'that I be lifted up so that all may come to me' initiate a construction ministry?

A front page article on the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's website a couple of years ago detailed the grand opening of a metro church's $30 million dollar facility. $30MM won't get what it used to, but it will get you 2500 seats, 5 large high-def video screens, well appointed 'living rooms' for group discussions, a 'green room' for 'performers' and staff, a state of the art sound system, and a full-service Starbucks cafĂ© (on-site!) for starters. I am aware of that whole 'pull the log out of your own eye' thing Jesus said, so I won't push the picture I'm painting much further. Just one quote from the church's CFO (no joke!) in response to 'why such a building?' – "to…help make the Bible more relevant."

It is certainly not the largest or most expensive evangelical construction venture, particularly amidst Atlanta's booming 'franchise' church market. But, how high-def videos, audio adrenaline and $4 lattes are relevant to Jesus' Kingdom message makes for an interesting counterquestion: Should Matthew 25:35 be revised? - "For I was bored and you showed me a riveting video, I was thirsty and you sold me a frappacino?"

Quite contrarily, the Jesus of the gospels presents a model of loving service to others, especially in times of need (like the ones we're experiencing today). This is not an 'addendum to,' but as the fulfillment of the Christian life. Interestingly, in John 6 Jesus disperses the crowds that followed him because they were clamoring to consume the entertainment of his miracles – deeds of healing. Rather, he asked them to consume him, his way of living and loving others, instead.

An apropos story is that of the 'rich young ruler' – left walking sadly away from Jesus, unwilling to give his great wealth in service to the great needs of the poor surrounding him. It is here that we find an analogy for too many modern churches. The reality is that Jesus' message is not 'relevant,' does not align with pop culture values nor political agendas, and requires much of the believer in service and love towards others instead of self. The 'church' must walk sadly away from its deity, clinging only to its sorely skewed dogma – thus, recreating Jesus in its own image, one where wealth is maintained and status is to be sought instead of forsaken.

So, what if our church had a million dollars – or four, or thirty? The songwriter says he'd buy love. I guess, in a way, that's what the church is doing – attracting a crowd with its bricks and branding. Unfortunately, as we learn from Jesus, love can't be bought…it can only be given away.

"As he was leaving the temple, one of his disciples said to him, "Look, Teacher! What massive stones! What magnificent buildings!" "Do you see all these great buildings?" replied Jesus. "Not one stone here will be left on another; every one will be thrown down." – Mark 13:1-2 (NIV)


 

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Good Samaritan…Helluva Christian

I began writing this after hearing of the SBC's expulsion of Broadway Baptist (TX) this summer. You can read more at a fine blog by one of my former preaching profs (http://cfj-connectivity.blogspot.com/). I couldn't help but think of the irony – or maybe not – of a church called "Broadway" being excluded for not following the SBC's "narrow" way. I can only imagine the polemic sermons that ensued during the following Sundays – 'broad way' versus 'narrow way'…it's just too easy. But I digress. The point is…that we're missing the point.

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It's a funny thing about the narrow way of Jesus – there's something dangerously broad about it. If you've read the New Testament gospels you'll recall that it was the Pharisees who were often contrasted with Jesus in the gospels. The Pharisees were the keepers of the 'narrow way.' They set rules, kept boundaries and determined who should be in and out – who was 'clean' and who was 'unclean.' One of Jesus' greatest successes was in providing endless irritation to the Pharisees – "why don't your disciples wash their hands?, why do you eat with sinners?, why do you work on the Sabbath?, why are you letting that woman touch you?, etc.

The story of the 'Good Samaritan' (Luke 10) provides an excellent case in point – the 'narrow way' is strangely broad.

I've never been able to get away from the story of the 'Good Samaritan' (our textual editors implied that all other Samaritans were evil, I guess). The story, whether Jesus actually told it or not, is obviously a seminal explanation of Jesus' Gospel for Luke. The story is rife with the synoptic gospels' (Matt, Mark, Luke) theme of reversal – the victimized Jewish pilgrim is ignored by the supposed righteous priests and Levites. Their rules about cleanliness wouldn't allow them to offer mercy or assistance (note – "their" rules), or to even come across to the other side and recognize the wounded traveler. The hero in the story turns out to be one who is 'unclean' as well. The Samaritan was the wrong race, held to the wrong religion and came from the wrong part of town. From the perspective of Jesus' first-century collectivist audience, Samaritans were steaming piles of defecation marring the Palestinian landscape (or something to that effect). Yet the 'unclean' Samaritan immediately recognizes the 'unclean' wounded traveler and responds with compassion. The Samaritan takes action, takes personal interest (offering the care a family member would), and takes responsibility with his own financial resources.

The scribe wanted to know – how do I inherit eternal life? And who is my neighbor? Note that Jesus doesn't offer a list of rules, doesn't respond with a set of doctrine and theology, and certainly doesn't tell anyone here to believe in him [as lightning strikes me dead]. Jesus simply tells him what it looks like. The story of the Samaritan is like Jesus saying, "You want to know how to have eternal life? Love your neighbor! And if you want to know what that looks like, let me tell you a story…"

A story that gives answers for a lot of questions…

So what does salvation look like? One unclean person embracing another. The big picture of Jesus' life in the gospels reveals the narrow way – the strangely and rarely taken path – a radically inclusive and loving embrace of others.

What does the kingdom of God look like? What does a kingdom-bound person look like? According to Jesus, a non-believing, marginalized minority apparently.

The example Jesus gives for a loving neighbor, the kind of person who will inherit the kingdom of God, is a Samaritan. Precisely the kind of person his Jewish questioners would have seen as entirely outside of God's love…and certainly outside any sort of shared afterlife in God's presence. They were impure, ethnically mixed; they worshipped at the wrong place and in the wrong way; their theologies, philosophies and ideologies about life were flatly wrong.

Yet, Jesus made the 'good Samaritan' an icon of grace, a model of the kind of believer God was looking for. Isn't that strange? The symbol of neighbor love – the symbol of salvation – is one unclean man caring for the wounds of another. There are no propositions, no sacraments to perform, no doctrines to agree with, and no magic prayers.

In an ever more exclusivist religious era, Jesus' story of the 'good Samaritan' flies in the face of common conceptions of the 'narrow way.' Apparently the narrow way is not a narrow theology, but a unique and rare way of life – one that can be lived by Jews, Christians…and, even Samaritans.

The narrow way for Jesus seems to have a broad application. Yet, isn't that the strange message of the synoptic Gospels? One that constantly reverses the order of our expectations. It is the story of a welcoming Divinity, one who includes the excluded, embraces the outcast and breaks social and cultural mechanisms for the cause of unconditional love. The narrow way is awfully broad, and full of an incalculable amount of grace – a reality to which I am increasingly grateful. - DCN

"Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?" The expert in the law replied, "The one who had mercy on him." Jesus told him, "Go and do likewise." – Luke 10:36-37 NIV

Sunday, June 14, 2009

God at work?

The following is a piece I wrote nearly two years ago…I post it now because within it I broach (if only at surface level) many of the foundational questions asked by the 'Gospel for the Disillusioned.' Why do we live and die? Is God transcendent or immanent? Is God good – and what do we mean by that? What is the source of evil? – along with a general questioning of traditional dogmas and truisms that serve only to keep us from asking hard questions. Mostly the piece is a personal expression of loss. An integral person in mine and my family's life died in June two years ago…he is in our constant memory…

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The other morning my two-year old son, playing with a jigsaw puzzle, looked up at his mother and asked, "Papa at work?" "Yes…Papa's at work," she said before she had to quickly leave the room to shed tears in private.

Papa's 'been at work' for several months. A heart-attack in May ripped away the most amazing and benevolent man we had ever known from our lives. It's an all too common story – rather, I guess, it might be 'the' story. We will all die. Our physical bodies are on an unavoidable collision course with metaphysical questions – Why do we die? Why so young? Why so tragically? Why are we still here? Where is God in all of this?

Unfortunately, there are far more answers – and people willing to offer them – than questions. It seems everyone else has it figured out. Those grieving in your hometown today will be confronted with every imaginable explanation from well-meaning family, friends and spiritual types. Poems will be read, theological visions will be shared, scriptures will be ripped from their context and the Divine will be disfigured. Far too often the grieving will hear stories of 'God's will' and 'There's a good reason for everything.' Mourners will be told to trust that God had a good reason for 'taking' their loved one.

Really? Does Jesus have so much free-time now that he's taken up the micro-management of heart attacks, mass murders, hate crimes, genocides and natural disasters? Orchestrating deaths like a symphony for some climactic future blessing? Only in the sublime intoxication of the American middle-class malaise could we believe such a disgusting conception is helpful – and somehow 'spiritual.' Does God really work all things for 'the good?' (Rom 8:28) Whose good? For what good? The widow's life will certainly not be qualitatively better now that her husband is gone. The children who starve as orphans in Western and Southern Africa because their parents have been slaughtered by warlords or decimated by HIV – are they experiencing good?

Yet the answers come (God forbid our minds wander or question such 'sound doctrine'). And it seems that most of the answers are designed to get the one grieving to…stop grieving. And it appears that is what most people desire for the grieving. Pain is the last thing we want to experience – and we certainly don't want it imposed on us by others. Sadness is somehow a sign of spiritual weakness – and we don't want the disease to infect us as well. So we mask fear with answers…to avoid having to ask our own tough questions.

A pastor friend recently shared with me his concern that one of his teenage congregants was 'bitter' at the sudden passing of her father. I wondered to myself, "Why would she not be bitter?" Her father is dead! For good or bad – saint or deadbeat (and he was) – the loss of a parent is unimaginably painful. But, "don't be bitter," they tell her. "God's in control of it all," they tell her. Well, why did God kill her father with cancer then? I don't think a scripture quotation or some well-contrived theological paradigm is going to sweeten the situation. What answer could solve her dilemma? What metaphor could remove the spike from her heart or the bricks from her stomach? What spiritual simile – rehearsed as it may be – could lighten a load heavy enough to sink the Titanic?

Tragically, we're all taking part in the 'death parade' known as human existence – and eventually the 'float' of someone we love is going to pass by. Meanwhile we must watch – the only question is what our vantage point will be? It may be more comfortable to stay at home, to recline in our living rooms and commentate on the quality of each presentation as it passes left to right across the screen – being able to see the 'big picture.' But, parades were meant to be experienced in person. Sometimes it rains, sometimes it's hot, and sometimes you can't see past the hat that lady is wearing, but there's nothing like a good parade. The thing is, the closer you get to the experience, the less you know what's going on. Who's next? Where is that band from? Wonder if they'll have candy? When is Santa Clause coming? …Is that the end?

Questions aren't bad. They reveal intimacy and relationship. They reveal a depth of human experience that can't be explained away with semantics and dogmas. Painful spiritual questions are a part of the healing process – much more so than duplicitous and thoughtless answers. There's no need to defend God when the grieving, who has a front row seat for the 'parade,' asks tough questions. There's no need to wipe all the tears away – or deflect their attention. They're watching the parade…and their favorite float is slowly passing out of view. Crying, screaming or laughing – let them watch until there are no more questions to ask.

So, if my wife cries every time she sees his picture, if her mother calls out to God for mercy from her bedside at night, if I turn the station when an Elvis song comes on, and if we frankly don't feel like going to church on Sunday – just know it's our way of looking to the sky, and, in what must seem like the voice of a child to the Divine, asking, "God at work?"

"My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?" A familiar question from a familiar figure – and one well worth asking in this all too troubling journey we call life…and death. – DCN, Fall 2007

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Genesis…again

The Hebrew Bible begins with the words "In the beginning…" – my Hebrew is a little rusty (let's be honest, it was always rusty), but I think the literal translation is "At the head of things…" At birth, if things go well, it is the head that enters into the world first. At the beginning of one's life, his head emerges from the comfort of a warm womb into the blaring lights and commotion of a delivery room. For a few brief seconds it is a rude and alarming welcome. Then, bloody, wet and shivering she is placed on the bosom of her mother. There a new comfort is found – it is a place of provision and protection…or at least it should be.

As my second son's head entered the world – permeating the room with his cries before the rest of his body had emerged – I was immediately hit with a wave of emotion. I fought back tears as he was rested on his mother's bosom. I fought back tears as I watched him make the first movements with his arms and legs – and trying to open those beautiful blue eyes. I fought back tears as I held him for the first time – so small, even at a robust 8 lbs. and 5 oz. – and heard those first baby noises, and felt the first touches from those baby hands and feet.

Over the first few days of his life I have found myself fighting back tears and emotions left and right. One of our first visitors brought their one-year old son. As I watched him laugh and clap with the unfettered joy of a human being who still lives in Eden, I was reminded of the wonderful innocence with which we come into the world. Later as I watched my first-born, almost four years old, hold his new baby brother for the first time I was impressed with his willingness to welcome a stranger into his life. And as my father gazed deeply into the face of this newborn I recalled the power of a blessing that is passed from one generation to the next.

Something about this new birth had the power to peel away the calloused layers covering my humanity. Suddenly I have found a renewed sensitivity to others – something that has been lacking in the disillusioned malaise of my recent history. I've found myself reawakened to the sacred – maybe finally beginning to put the jagged pieces of a broken faith back together, though the picture emerging appears quite different…more abstract than paint-by-numbers.

Maybe the revival of sensitivity is due to 'something in the air' – quite literally. Because with every new birth comes new life. And maybe, because with every new birth of humanity, God comes into the world anew – a life imbued with the divine image, lungs filled with the breath of God. As the baby emerges head first, and breathes, his exhale is a fresh wind of God to be inhaled by those in its presence.

And the baby herself is a tangible reminder – that God is love…selfless love. With every new garment, with every diaper change, with every feeding, with every sleepless night, with every doctor bill paid, with every change to 'our' routine, we are given a new opportunity to love without reciprocation – to love selflessly. We are given an opportunity to selflessly serve another – and to learn the value of serving others. We learn again the value of taking in a stranger, of clothing the naked, of feeding the hungry, of caring for the sick, of embracing the lonely, of advocating for the disadvantaged.

'At the head of things' I am reminded that life is intrinsically valuable. And that underneath the soiled clothes of our humanity, each of us, laid bare, has within us the potentiality of the divine…and only selfless service one to another has the power to bring it out. Breathe deeply new parents – it is the 'breath of life.'

[The Divine] breathed the breath of life into the [human's] nostrils, and the [human] became a living person – Genesis 2:7b (NLT with liberties)