Monday, June 30, 2008

Jonah's Covenant Surprise


I read the book of Jonah the other day and as often happens in reading I found something that caught me off guard. In Jonah 4, Jonah describes God in language that is pretty typical (and wonderful): Jonah 4:2 He prayed to the LORD, “O LORD, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity." The word "love" in this passage is the Hebrew "hesed"--the word that typically describes God's covenant love for Israel. Jonah applies it to the people of Nineveh (which was by all accounts one of the most wicked cities and nations of the day). How is it that the wonders of God's covenant along with his compassion, slow to anger etc. get connected to a nation that is not Israel? What's the covenant that might bind God to the people of Nineveh? Added to this there is at the end of this chapter the implication made by God that he planted and made the people of Nineveh grow. All of this brings to mind at least two things. First, the covenant that God has with Nineveh may well be the covenant of Noah, where he promises not to destroy the world with the flood again (can we compare destroying Nineveh to a kind of minor flood?). The covenant of Noah has some stipulations that were being broken by the people of Nineveh (known for its blood thirsty armies and injustice), but when they confess their evil God relents-for they are not living in covenant faithfulness. The second thing: God makes it clear on more than one occasion in the Old Testament that while he has called Israel out as his own people, that the other nations too have been established by him and he has a heart for them. Behind the scenes, even in the Old Testament we see a God who is establishing a worldwide kingdom.

Friday, June 27, 2008

Interesting Church History

In doing some research for a message I came across a historian who held that one of the ways the church messed up the Roman empire was by caring. He writes, "[The church ] detracted from loyalty to the Roman State on an everyday level. The Church cared for the sick, old, infirm, orphans, etc, filling a gap left by the Empire. This brought more focus on the Church which, again, lessened the importance of the Empire." Paul writes the Galatian Christians and says, 9Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. 10Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers. Galatians 6 It's kind of a kick to know that when Christians simply show a heart of compassion, as God calls them to do, that it can challenge an empire with armies and wealth and power. Perhaps what the church needs in the U.S. is a goodness revolution.

Thursday, June 26, 2008

A Parent knows Better


The Talmud says:
Until a child is one year old it is incapable of sin.

This may seem like a nice sentiment, but I can't imagine that the Rabbi who wrote this actually had kids. Parents who have hung out with their kids know that they have more than enough sin response in them--even before that first birthday.

A bit of insight from Dallas Willard

Dallas Willard in his book Renovation of the Heart, writes, “When we are lost to God, we are lost to ourselves: we do not know where we are or how to get to where we want to go. We may know we are lost or we may not. Many a driver is lost long before he knows it---although rarely before his wife knows it. Many are lost before God but do not know it. They sincerely believe that they know where they are, where they are going and how to get there; but in fact they do not, and they often find out too late.

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

Obedience


Sunday morning I used the poem "Obedience" by Sietze Buning in my message. Since that time I have been struck by how absolutely foreign this poem is to our experience. The idea of letting crops be destroyed rather than skipping worship makes little sense to most of us. We would find all kinds of reasons to harvest the crops. But more than that, the idea that gathering for worship is a central activity for us is also somewhat strange. We find all kinds of reasons not to go to worship from going to the cottage, to being on vacation, to some event our kids are a part of. When it is rather convenient and there isn't something that trumps it, we go to worship. Many of us go to worship regularly--but I wonder if that's because there isn't too much that trumps worship on Sunday mornings. If there were.... I wonder if one of the reasons fewer and fewer of us come to evening worship is because there all kinds of things that trump that worship time. We speak of busy lives and so we need time with our family (could worship be family time?). In the summer there is the beach that calls to us. In the winter there are those bad roads and great football games--plus we may well have already gone to worship on Sunday morning and isn't one time a Sunday more than enough?
In all of this I sympathize with the struggle to get to worship and other (sometimes easier, more appealing things) things taking the place of worship. I've had it more than once on Sunday evening that it sounds so much better to stay home, not leave my comfortable chair. Oddly though, when I get there (when I'm not leading worship) I discover that most of the time having been at worship seems like a far better use of time than what I was doing.
All that being said, here's Buning's poem for reflection

Were my parents right or wrong not to mow the ripe oats that Sunday morning with the rainstorm threatening?
I reminded them that the Sabbath was made for man and of the ox fallen into the pit. Without an oats crop, I argued, the cattle would need to survive on town-bought oats and then it wouldn't pay to keep them. Isn't selling cattle at a loss like an ox in a pit?
My parents did not argue. We went to church. We sang the usual psalms louder than usual-- we, and the others whose harvests were at stake:
"Jerusalem, where blessing waits, Our feet are standing in thy gates."
"God be merciful to me; On thy grace I rest my plea."
Dominie's spur-of-the-moment concession: "He rides on the clouds, the wings of the storm; The lightning and wind his missions perform."
Dominie made no concessions on sermon length: "Five Good Reasons for Infant Baptism," Though we heard little of it, for more floods came and more winds blew and beat upon that House than we had figured on, even, more lighting and thunder and hail the size of pullet eggs. Falling branches snapped the electric wires.
We sang the closing psalm without the organ and in the dark:
"Ye seed from Abraham descended, God's covenant love is never ended."
Afterward we rode by our oats field, flattened.
"We still will mow it," Dad said. "Ten bushels to the acre, maybe, what would have been fifty if I had mowed right after milking and if the whole family had shocked. We could have had it weatherproof before the storm."
Later at dinner Dad said, "God was testing us. I'm glad we went." "Those psalms never gave me such a lift as this morning," Mother said, "I wouldn't have missed it." And even I thought but did not say, How guilty we would feel now if we had saved the harvest. The one time Dad asked me why I live in a Black neighborhood, I reminded him of that Sunday morning. Immediately he understood."
Fathers often fail to pass on to sons their harvest customs for harvesting grain or real estate or anything. No matter, so long as fathers pass on to sons another more important pattern defined as absolutely as muddlers like us can manage: obedience.

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Who sinned? Part Deux


When I got to the office this morning I was informed that because of a snafu between TDS and ATT that our phones were disconnected. Imagine that, it's not a repair problem or some such thing, we've just been dumped out of the system. A couple of quick phone calls (cell phone calls, that is) by the efficient admin staff at EverGreen resulted in word that typically it takes 6 weeks to put things back to rights--but for us they would try to do better. By this afternoon ATT had come by to hook up two of our 6 lines and our phone guys had come make the final connections between the incoming signal and our phone system--but, oops, for some reason there is no dial tone coming from the street to the building (in other words, a repair problem). ATT doesn't know why there is no dial tone, they have high hopes that maybe by Monday we will be up and running with phones. Meanwhile, we have decided to bypass the systems all together and get an emergency back up cell phone for the office. It's our hope to have all calls forwarded to that phone when our systems go down.

In something of a blessed irony, while we have no phones our T-1 internet line remains up and running. So we are not completely cut off.

Praise

I think we delight to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation.
C.S. Lewis

Monday, June 9, 2008

Moving Day

Today we sign the papers to sell our present house and to buy the new one. Moving day is Friday. The adventure begins (actually, the packing has been going on for a number of weeks--maybe a better statement is "the heavy lifting begins).

Friday, June 6, 2008

Who Sinned?


In John 5 Jesus is getting ready to heal a man and his disciples asked "who sinned so that this man was born blind--himself or his parents?". In the office today, taking this quote completely out of context and destroying all fidelity to the Biblical text, we asked the same question, "who sinned?" This past week we have been without internet, fax, and phones for more than 24 hours during a time when we needed them for one of our biggest registrations of the year (Arts Camp). Finally our phones came back up but our internet crashed on more than--shall we say 5 occasions. Then as we were joyfully all back up and running this morning the power to the area around EverGreen went out--so also our phones, internet, and fax, plus all internal ability to use our network for printing etc.

So who sinned so that we are experiencing this 21st century technological blindness? Was it you?

Hope is for Sissies


In a recent episode of the show "House" the main character tells a patient that hope is for sissies. Those words became the theme for our next series based on the book of 1 Peter. 1 Peter is filled with words of hope for a people who are facing trials and dangers for doing the things that we take for granted like gathering for worship and telling others about our faith. As we make our way through the book we will explore whether House's words are reality or foolishness.

This Sunday our text is
1 Peter 1.1-9 Our service starts out with that bit of video from "House" where he tells a patient that hope is for sissies. Next comes the songs of the day
Sing to the King; Holines, and Jesus Paid it all.

We continue our worship with prayer and the giving of our gifts. A drama comes just before the message entitled, "We've got time". The message for this week is "Hope is for sissies: a living hope". We'll close with prayer and a final song, "No Sacrifice".


Thursday, June 5, 2008

Dealing with the Pain of $4.00 a Gallon


I came across a sure fire way to increase mpg by up to 30%. Sadly it involves what most of us can't imagine doing--driving slower. A recent article from the San Franscico Chronicle puts it out there for us:

...cars get the best mileage between 45 and 55 mph, Monahan said. As speeds creep higher, fuel efficiency drops. For every mile per hour over 60 mph, she said, fuel economy drops by an average of around 1 percent.

"Going 65 is really lowering your fuel efficiency," she said. "And it gets worse at 75."

How much you stand to save depends on a lot of factors. With gas at $4 a gallon, a person who drives 400 miles a week and a vehicle getting 20 mpg would save $18.74 a week by slowing down from 75 to 55 mph, extrapolating from the government's most recent figures on the subject. Even a more moderate deceleration - from 70 to 60 mph - would save that driver $11.74 a week..

The results are striking. Slowing from 70 to 60 mph improved average fuel efficiency by 17.2 percent. A big slowdown - from 75 to 55 mph - improved fuel efficiency by a whopping 30.6 percent.


Just thought you'd like to know.

Wednesday, June 4, 2008

Thoughts that make you go, "hmm..."

"...we are not happier. ...we are just cleaner, more attractive sad people than we used to be."

Peggy Noonan commenting on our lives compared to those who lived in the middle ages.

Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Really?

Over the years I've heard the argument that basically goes something like this, "If you were born in an ______________ then you would be a person of that particular religion." You can fill in the blank with whatever you desire (such as "an Islalmic home", "a Latter Day Saints home", "a Christian home"). The basic idea of the argument is that we are people of a particular faith by chance. On the surface this is a perfectly rational argument. From a Biblical perspective however, it is a specious one. Over and over again the Bible points out that God is a God of covenant putting people in families of faith so that they are led toward faith. People don't end up in families by "chance" rather they are there by God's design. The book of Malachi says that God brings covenant parents together because he is seeking godly offspring (Malachi 2.15). From a Biblical perspective I could not have ended up in another family, I am where God wants me to be.