Sharing

The other day a sister shared a deep concern with me.  I shared that I too had gone through something similar. I could see that my sharing did not please her.  It was only afterwards that I understood that what she wanted was not to know that I could relate, but that I had heard and having heard would lift her up to the Lord.

The Wild Goose

The Celts often referred to God as the Wild Goose.  I have often felt this to be an appealing image.  the idea behind it was that there was an aspect of God which was always unexpected and wild in a good sense.  We see this a lot in the prophets, especially for me in Isaiah 20.  Here God commanded Isaiah to preach naked for three years.  the first time that I really understood what was going on in this passage, I thought, "God, what were you thinking."  It shook my sensibilities.  Here was God commanding public nudity.  Now, there are those who will try to explain it away in an attempt to make it meet our sense of decency, but I think that the passage is pretty clear.

How often we have tried to tame God, either making him into some type of Santa Clause, or other bearded old man.  Sometimes, especially in our worship, we sentimentalize him, making him more like a Precious Moments figurine.  We do not like a God with hard edges.  We want a fuzzy, warm God.

However, I think that the Celts were comforted by this image.  They say God as ever being able to surprise them by his goodness.  They saw him as a creative force.  They saw in this image a God that was beyond our completely figuring out.

God has revealed himself, but that revelation is limited to what we can take in.  There are parts of God which will forever be beyond our comprehension.

Why Call Me?

I remember looking at the magazine that is put out by my alumni association.  I remember reading about all of he great things that others have done.  Some make movies.  Some are IT successes.  Some are powerful leaders of industry.  Most of them are great people.  It is humbling.  It is too easy to make comparisons and ask what I have done with my life.

Have you ever wondered why God called you.  I know I have.  There are many more people in the  world with many more talents than I have.  There are many more in the world who have done a better job of managing their lives.  My life is now half-way through and it seems that I am just getting started.  I have not made waves.  I have not made my mark and perhaps never will.

In 1 Corinthians, Paul said that not many wise, or powerful or upper crust are called. Perhaps too many of us feel like we fit this description.  For every superstar, there are thousands who are just trying to get by.  But we are the ones that God has mostly called.  It doesn't make sense.  It is not what I would have done, but then I am not God.  Not even close.  All I can do is lay myself at God's feet to use.  But God has a mysterious way of taking those of us who are not great, not powerful and not important and doing great, powerful and important things.  The odd thing is that we may never  notice it.  We are just following God day-by-day and somewhere along the way in an almost "slight of hand" way, God works his wonders. Then, one day,if we are attentive,  we may turn around to see that behind us lay a trail of gospel works like little rose petals strewn along the path of our life.  It still may not make sense to us, but it is amazing.

Taking it to God

In our society, we are tempted to think that money is the solution to far too many of our problems.  I remember as a student, then for several years after, I struggled to meet my most basic needs.  I remember thinking that if I only made this much money, then all of my needs would be met.  Well, now I make that amount of money and the demands on my resources have grown as well.  Some of this is due to increasing responsibility.  Others are because of other life changes (I am now in seminary).  Still other demands on  my earnings are simply due to poor decisions.

 Lately, I have been trying to learn the discipline of putting my needs before God.  Instead of saying to myself, "if only I had the money I could do such and such,"  I am trying to put my needs first before God to see how he may want to address the situation.  In many ways, he was supplied true needs in other ways than a shopping trip.  Other times, he has not.  I have often found that if I wait on God, things have a way of coming my way.  I even was once sold a perfectly good car for $20, when my older car was nearing its end.

I still occasionally make bad decisions, but I am learning.   I am also beginning to feel less stressed by those unexpected needs that seem to catch us by surprise.  This is not an excuse to use God as our cosmic sugar daddy.  It is, however taking true needs and desires before the God of the universe trusting that he is generous God who is genuinely concerned with our well-being.

All Put Together or (Im)perfectionism part II

when I was in high school, I had as a classmate a young woman who got up in the morning hours before her family so that even her family would not see her without her makeup on.  This reminds me of how much time and energy that we as Christians put in to giving the appearance that spiritually we are "put together."  We know all the best answers to the questions.  We know how to look pious. Looking from the outside, one might think that we have it all together, but it is just makeup.

I recently read a book by a recovering alcoholic.  I like being around recovering alcoholics.  They have already come to the end of themselves.  They have already failed, and they have owned up to it.  The author talked at great lengths about how much we depend on the grace of God in our lives.  He said that it is okay to be imperfect, struggling, even a failure, because that is often where we meet God's grace.

The other day, I saw a commercial for a morning talk show where the theme was that everyone on the show wore no makeup.  I don't know much about women, but I know that to be on national television without makeup must take a big dose of courage.  Perhaps we need to be more like that in our lives.  I'm not suggesting that we all start divulging our deepest secrets, but perhaps we can be a little more honest with others and with ourselves.  Perhaps we need to be more like the Apostle Paul who wrote that he gloried in his weakness because in his weakens, God's strength is shown.

(Im)perfectionsim

I have to admit that I struggle with perfectionism.  Perhaps it is because I am a first-born, or perhaps it is because my father tended to be critical at times.  Perfectionism is one of the most depressing vices, because a perfectionist is guaranteed always to fail miserably.  Furthermore, out of all the people on earth, I must be one of the least likely to ever be perfect.  In fact, even by everyday standards, I have had more failures in my life than successes.  Some may even say that I am the poster boy for getting stuck on the lower rungs of the proverbial ladder.

The other day, I gave a rather difficult sermon.  I prayed before during and after.  I approached my study and meditation on the passage with a sincere desire to follow the leadership of Christ.  I knew that it would not necessarily be a popular topic.  The week after giving it, I found myself second guessing it. Were my  motive pure enough? Did I say the right things in the right way?  I then remember something that my father said when I was young.  My father was an associate pastor and music pastor at most of the churches that I ever attended until college.  He one day told me that when he sang in church, he sometimes did not know if he sang for God or simply because he loved to sing.  He said that in the end he had to trust the grace of God and that God knew his heart.  I will probably never preach a perfect sermon with a perfect heart, but that is not what God asks.  God asks that I put my less than perfect gifts at his feet and allow him to shape them according to his purpose. Through the power of God,  even my miserable attempts to reach the heights of mediocre accomplishments can be powerful tools in the hands of God.  This give me hope.

 

Homily on Luke 7: 36-50 Part 2

            The Pharisee did not understand.  How could Jesus let this woman touch him?  Did he not know who she was? Jesus seeing his confusion told a parable. In this parable, there are two people who owe money.  The text gives the debt in terms of the ancient coinage the denarius.  I saw one of these the other day.  It is a rather small coin.  It was what soldiers would have been paid for a day’s wage.  In the terms of today, one of the men in this parable owed about two months’ worth of wages, and the other owed about two years’ worth of wages.  Think of this in terms of credit card debt.  If one owed two months’ worth of wages in credit card debt would be difficult to pay off, but it could be done.  Imagine what it would be like if someone owed two years’ worth of wages on a high interest credit card.  Imagine the constant calls from creditors.  Imagine trying to pay it off, but feeling like you are making no progress.  It feels like the debt will always be there and there is nothing that you can do about it.  Imagine if some corporate raider came to you and said that he is forgiving the debt, no questions asked.  This would be totally out of character.  You would be immensely grateful.

            After telling this story, Jesus asked which would be more grateful, the one who owed little or the one that owed a lot.  I think that we would agree with the Pharisee that the one who owed two years wages would be more grateful for having his debt dismissed.  But this was a trick question.

            One of my favorite stories from the early desert fathers, the very first monks in the 3^rd and 4^th centuries is about a group of monks who came to Abbot Moses.  Abbot Moses was a great spiritual teacher.  On day, several monks came to Abbot Moses complaining about the sins of another monk.  The monks demanded that the abbot should punish the wayward brother.  The wise abbot asked for some time to think about this request.  He returned to his little room, shut the door and remained there for a good while.  Finally he cane running out with a long rope tied to is waist and dragging for many feet behind him.  The monks called out Abbot Moses, what are you doing.  He replied, I am coming to you as fast as I can, but my sins are trailing behind me.

            This reminds me of a popular story from the life of G.K. Chesterton.  Chesterton was a famous writer who died in the early 20^th century.  He was immensely popular during his day and was a huge influence on C. S. Lewis.  According to the story a reporter for the London Times wrote an article reflecting on some of the problems of his time.  He ended his article with the statement, “What’s wrong with the world?”  Chesterton wrote the editor, “Dear editor, what’s wrong with the world? I am. Faithfully yours, G.K. Chesterton.”

            What Chesterton and Abbot Moses both realized is that the real sin problem is with us.  The answer to the trick question is that there are no debtors who only owe a little: in other words there are no little sinners.  St Augustine, commenting on this passage said, “You love but little, because you really think that you are only forgiven of a little.  It’s not because little really is forgiven you, but because you think that what you have been forgiven of is only a little.”^[1]We all have more sin in us than we realize.  In fact, I think that most of us walk around in oblivion to this fact.   C. S. Lewis once wrote that it is easy to be good when things are going our way.  Augustine continues to say that the reason that we have not committed as many sins as we could have is that the place and time were just not right to allow the sin to ripen.

Some may find themselves  saying, “I know that I have sins but they are not really that bad.”  Let’s face it; it is all too easy to grow comfortable with our own sins.  This next story is a little embarrassing, but it illustrates this point well.   When I was a young man just out of college, I lived in the back corner of a large apartment complex.  The dumpster for my complex was in the front nearly a quarter of a mile away.  I hated schlepping the garbage all that way, so I often procrastinated. Occasionally, I waited a day too long, and my apartment became rather odoriferous.  That is a polite way of saying that it stank.  Usually, I would take it out at that moment, but I often found that if I didn't the next day it didn't smell anymore.  At least not until a friend walked in. Fortunately, I have learned to become a little better housekeeper.  In many ways it is the same with our sins.  What may be a minor inconvenience to us may be intolerable to another.  In reality, it is even our smallest sins that are responsible for the torturous death of Christ.  We all stand guilty of crucifying Jesus.

To be continued

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^[1] Augustine of Hippo. (1888). Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament R. G. MacMullen, Trans.). In P. Schaff (Ed.), A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series, Volume VI: Saint Augustin: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels (P. Schaff, Ed.) (417). New York: Christian Literature Company.