120826 Enough Already

People who have been in church for a little while are familiar with a parable Jesus told about a wealthy man who went away on a trip.  In his absence, he entrusted three of his servants with different amounts of his money (probably based on their tenure or ability?).  Two of the servants – both of whom were entrusted with the most money – were faithful to invest the money wisely, got a great return, and were celebrated by their employer when he got back form his trip.  The last servant – who received the least – simply buried the money for safekeeping, and gave it back to his employer when he returned, along with some really lame excuses for why he didn’t do anything with the portfolio.  Instead of being celebrated, he was chastised and kicked to the curb.

I have taught on this text many times over the years.  Guess where all the attention gets focused?  Never on the two guys who got it right.  Everybody wants to know about the guy who didn’t do squat with what he had been entrusted.  This is fair, of course, since it was a cautionary tale to begin with.  But does the response tell us something about human nature?  And what does the parable tell us about Jesus?

I think at our base level we are motivated out of fear: what must I do to simply survive?  Our thoughts turn primitive, limited, and generally centered on self-preservation.  The third guy entrusted with the smallest amount of the Master's treasure follows suit.  Operating out of fear, he buries the loot.  He is not his own, mind you - he is what we might think of as an indentured servant.  You know, like Barry Zito.  The Master has paid a great deal for him, hoping he will be a good investment.  I digress...

The irony is, of course, that the servant was wrong about his Master's character from the beginning.  Nothing about him indicated that he was ever really his Master's to begin with, other than the paperwork.  Ironic because he ended up experiencing the very condemnation of apathy from the Master which he had projected all the while.  He thought him to be cruel and cold, and indeed that is what he ended up experiencing.  In truth, upon closer inspection, we discover that the third servant - by his own choices - had thrown himself out of the company of the Master long before he returned from the trip.  Was he ever really "in" in the first place?  Did he ever really experience the Master, the one who celebrates his children?  No.  The servant had been living in outer darkness while resting in the courtyard of the Master.  He failed to live in the presence of life.

We do the same.  We very easily relegate God to a passing thought or a Sunday thing or a repository of forgiveness when we need it.  We are all capable of low-balling God when it comes to keeping peace with the Almighty.  Show up at church enough.  Give enough money.  Serve enough time.  Pray enough.  Be nice enough.  Enough living, however, does not really lead to enough.  Enough is the lowest bar.  The undercurrent which leads to enough living is fear of God based on a lack of relationship with God.  When we fear God, we wonder about enough a lot.

The above is not the dream.  We are not invited to merely enough; the life Jesus offers is marked by abundance.  Not lots of money, good health, because those things do not really make life life, right?  The abundance is a quality, a joy, a meaningfulness, a life of impact - a life that we look back on and celebrate the fact that we got way more return for the Master than one life could if a person simply played it safe and buried their talent in the ground.

The dream is pictured in the first two servants, who knew they were safe in the Master's household, and that they were in the Master's care.  Their perspective was one of confidence, knowing that being given the treasure communicated significant trust by the Master.  They were respected.  And so they risked.  Using everything they had at their disposal, they invested what had been entrusted to them.  They were not reckless or selfish or stupid.  They were thoughtful and responsible, knowing this is what they were called to do.  Their motive wasn't for their own gain, either - it was for the Master's household, of which they were a part.  When the Master returned, and rewarded them with more of himself, they celebrated, but probably realized they had been with him all the while.

Which type of servant are you?  Are you like the first two, who live confidently in the household of the Master?  Or are you doing just enough to keep the Master happy?  One of these is experiencing relationship with God.  The other is avoiding it.

In 2 Corinthians 9, Paul instructs the church on how they should think about financial giving, but it extends to all parts of our lives.  He was calling for an offering for the poor, and to make sure it was ready, he sent some guys ahead of him to help people think it through.  Paul did not encourage people to ask the question, what is enough to make God happy?  He asked them to think it through carefully, and give with joy, absent of guilt.

That's refreshing.  And correct.

Could it be that the reason many people don't like to go to church is because they feel like there is pressure to give their money?  Could it be that the reason they feel this pressure is because it is real?  Tithing ten percent is lifted up as the goal - less than that is stealing from God.  The widow who only had half a cent is lifted up as an example - who doesn't feel like a loser next to her?  Even the above parable is lifted up as a you-better-or-else story from Jesus.  But I think all of this is off-key.

I offer you this challenge: if you are living by the enough principle, stop.  Stop giving.  Stop serving.  Stop coming to church.  Stop praying.  Stop asking for forgiveness.  Stop every part of your faith practice that is motivated by the enough mentality.  I want you to stop because you are making a fool of yourself, and I care too much about you to see you continue another moment with your zipper down and tissue on your shoe.

While you are stopped, ask yourself about your motive for anything you do regarding your faith.  Is it fear?  The you probably feel and act like the third servant.  You already feel distant from God, right?

If you are stuck in enough, and you'd like to live more like the first and second servant, devote some time to reading the Gospels in the Bible - Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.  Get to know Jesus again.  Imagine yourself walking with him, seeing him interact, hearing him teach.  See if he is the kind of person worth following.  God is always inviting us to follow.  As you are able to follow, follow.  Then consider Paul's instruction about what giving our lives looks like.  He notes that there is a payoff - blessing.  But we don't receive the blessing by pursuing the blessing.  We receive it when we are the blessing.  When we bank on God's love for us.  When we balance our lives the way Jesus lived.

May you stop doing enough.  May you instead find yourself in relationship with God who never thinks along the lines of enough, but rather wants you to soar.  May you hear the Master say "Well done! Enter my fellowship!", and realize that you've been there the whole time.

120819 Eat Carrots

Take a couple of minutes and respond to the following questions...

1.What do you think are the top five things people worry about?

2.What do you think are the top ways people handle their worry?

3.On a scale of 1-5, how much worry (or stress) are you living with right now?

4.On a scale of 1-5, how stressed out do you feel?

5.What do you worry about most right now?

6.On a scale of 1-5, how close do you feel to your deepest friends?

7.How do you maintain closeness in your deepest friendships?

8.On a scale of 1-5, how close do you feel to God in this season of your life?  Why?

Now take another moment and read what Jesus had to say about the above: Matthew 6:19-34 (New Living Translation)

I remember going to church camp during my high school years.  I'm pretty proud of that.  But even more astounding than simply remembering something from 25 years ago is a campfire song we used to sing that referred to what Jesus said in the above passage.  "Seek first the Kingdom of God" stuck with me.  It's a lovely idea.  I wonder what it means?

Of course, it we look at the context of what Jesus said we see that he was giving a long talk - one of his most famous - about what it means to live the way God wants a person to live.  He contrasted the Kingdom life with the general public, and wasn't too shy about taking shots at the religious leaders of his day, who infamously missed the mark.  Be a good, loving, forgiving, faithful, humble person, basically.

Is that it?  Is that what it means to seek first the Kingdom of God?  Perhaps there is more.

In the aforementioned text, Jesus made a weird comment about eyes and light.  The consensus among the scientific world of Jesus' day held that our eyes didn't simply receive light  like a camera lens, but that our eyes actually projected light out into the world, intermingling with the light of the sun so that we could see where we are going.  Sort of like flashlights, I suppose.  So when Jesus talks about light and darkness, he is talking about paying attention to our vision.  His words are actually pretty strong, saying that if our light is actually darkness, we are living in a very deep darkness.  He is talking about how we see the world, and what our vision does to alter our perception of reality and ultimately the Kingdom around us.

I am a fan of popcorn.  My family uses one of the Stir-Crazy beauties that hit the shelves in the early 1980's.  We use some pretty high-grade olive oil, and dash some sea salt on mountain of freshly popped corn in the bowl while the steam is still rising.  Can you smell it?  It's really good.  But we're not sharing, so you're out of luck.

Studies have been done regarding people's popcorn eating habits.  You've probably heard of some of them.  Decades ago, movie theater managers were trying to increase their revenue from concessions, and they tried to get people to go for a 2-for-1 deal on bags of popcorn for a special price.  But they didn't sell very well.  They researched it, and found out that people didn't want to appear to be pigs, eating two bags of popcorn, so they wouldn't buy it.  And then was born the popcorn tub that people could "share."  My wife knows very well what "sharing" in this context means...

Tubs of popcorn sold like crazy, even though they were getting the same amount they would have (or more) had they opted for two bags.  The bottom line was going up and to the right.  The world was good for the theaters, as the patrons pigged out on their popcorn.

Within a decade or so, for a variety of reasons, people began to care less and less about appearing piggish, which opened the door for new opportunities in the food industry.  Movie theaters made bigger tubs of popcorn.  Drink sizes were increased dramatically.  Remember when fast food medium drinks were what smalls are today?  Meal deals emerged, largely to get people to buy soda drinks, where the profit margin was huge.  Americans know a good deal when we see one, and so we went for it in large numbers.

Portion sizes also changed dramatically in the 1980's forward.  Bigger plates with bigger values meant bigger turnouts at restaurants.  Several studies have been done showing that people eat more if the plate is larger, compared to being served food on smaller plates with the level of satiety.  Popcorn is no exception.  Bigger tubs of corn simply translate into people eating more popcorn.  There was even a study done where people were served huge tubs of stale popcorn as they watched a movie at a theater.  Surely people would not eat stale popcorn, right?  In fact, they ate plenty.

These largely market-driven changed have, of course, has resulted in poorer health for more and more people in our country.

No problem.  We'll just exercise more.

Nope.

Okay, we'll announce that a person only need exercise for 30 minutes a day to see significant improvement in health.  Easy!

Nope.

Fine, we'll announce that a study shows that a person doesn't even need to do all 30 minutes at once to see benefits - 5 minutes here, 10 there, and eventually we make 30.  Really easy!

Nope.

It turns out that, on the whole, we enjoy increasing portions and value, are comfortable with the ill-affects on our health (for now, at least), and are not terribly motivated to do much about it in the way of portion control or exercise.  Even though it means that a record number of people are or are at risk of becoming diabetic, which will likely shorten one's length of life and very probably decrease quality of life until the end.  Oh, and the annual costs of treatment will be in the hundreds of billions of dollars, which means healthcare premiums are going to rise right along with the size of our fountain drinks.  By the way, this trend in no way reflects the Way of the Kingdom - it may be American, but it ain't Christian.

I rant for a reason: this tells us something about human tendencies.  About you.  About me.  We are prone to get tossed around by the prevailing cultural currents that may not be driven by our best interests or the interests of the human race in general.  Even with plenty of data, studies, news briefs, magazine articles and blogs shouting to the masses that there is a serious problem, we turn a deaf ear and blind eye.  

Even though our lives are at stake.

If we struggle to pay attention to the constant health alerts that have been bombarding us for decades now, how much more will we struggle seeking first the Kingdom of God when it only hits our radar every so often?

I don't think many people will experience better health until they take the alerts seriously and make a daily effort to improve their health.  And I am certain the same is true when it comes to experiencing the life Jesus offers.  We won't do it because we won't see it.  We get caught into the groove of the market's waves and we can't get out.  Worse, we may think everything looks fine or "not that bad", which means we're living in greater darkness than we think.

Seeking the Kingdom first is a vision thing.  It is a decision to pay attention even though there is little cultural support for its pursuit, discussion, or implementation.  Seeking the Kingdom first doesn't mean neglecting everything else, thinking that God is going to pull off the manna from heaven trick again; it does mean, however, that we are consciously, intentionally, mindfully, and humbly choosing to walk daily with God.  Its a decision to pay attention to our vision, really.  It's a choice to eat carrots to insure we're getting enough light in.

I think some magical things happen when we seek the Kingdom first.  I think we're much more tuned into God's frequency, much more capable to sense God's vibe, and much more inclined to recognize God's work around us.  I think when we don't intentionally seek God first, we miss out a lot of the time.  As long as we don't seek the Kingdom first, there is a great likelihood that we will do a poor job stewarding our time, talent, and treasure.  We'll see it get eaten up by moth-like endeavors, rusty from being driven hard and put away wet, and broke from using our resources on cheap junk that we'll be replacing soon (or hoarding at the expense of people who just need a meal for the day).  I think when we choose to seek the Kingdom first, we also experience greater peace and calm instead of anxiety, worry, and fear.

How are you doing seeking first the Kingdom of God?  How is it impacting the way you steward the big three areas of your life: your time, your talent, and your treasure?

120812 Loren, Pete, and Biblical Divorce

The famously Christian CEO of a fast food restaurant was in the news recently. Do not want to step into what raised a huge reaction, but rather another part of his interview:

“We are a family-owned business, a family-led business, and we are married to our first wives,”

The obvious implication being that those of us who are not still married to our first spouses are at least a rung down the ladder from those that are.

Many of you reading this have in the past been made to feel like a second class Christian because you have been divorced. Where did this judgment come from?

The New Testament records Jesus speaking about divorce in four places: Matt. 5:32, Matt. 19:9, Mark 10:11, Luke 16:18. We will focus on Matt. 19:9, but if you study the others you will see that this one pretty much covers all the ground.

⁹ And I tell you this, whoever divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery—unless his wife has been unfaithful.”

Divorce & remarriage = adultery. (Except when the spouse has already broken the marriage vows through unfaithfulness.) That seems pretty obvious through a plain reading of the text.

Bible scholar Mimi Haddad uses a rock climbing analogy about interpreting scripture. To paraphrase, she says our instinct in both climbing, and reading the bible, is to cling tightly to the surface, expecting a more secure grip. The problem is you cannot see where you have come from or where to get the next hand or foothold. To move ahead you need to react counter intuitively and lean away from the rock to get a broader perspective. If you do this you will also discover that your hand and footholds gain a better purchase.
So let’s getter a better perspective by expanding the text and pushing away from it a little:

19 When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went down to the region of Judea east of the Jordan River. ² Large crowds followed him there, and he healed their sick.
³ Some Pharisees came and tried to trap him with this question: “Should a man be allowed to divorce his wife for just any reason?”
⁴ “Haven’t you read the Scriptures?” Jesus replied. “They record that from the beginning ‘God made them male and female.” ⁵ And he said, “‘This explains why a man leaves his father and mother and is joined to his wife, and the two are united into one.⁶ Since they are no longer two but one, let no one split apart what God has joined together.”
⁷ “Then why did Moses say in the law that a man could give his wife a written notice of divorce and send her away?” they asked.
⁸ Jesus replied, “Moses permitted divorce only as a concession to your hard hearts, but it was not what God had originally intended. ⁹ And I tell you this, whoever divorces his wife and marries someone else commits adultery—unless his wife has been unfaithful.”

Jesus was responding to the Pharisees who wanted to trap Him. They were trying to force Him to drive a wedge between two schools of thought on divorce. The Shammai school permitted divorce only for unchastity, while the Hillel school allowed for “any reason.” Jesus characteristically bypassed their trap and went to the heart of the matter, telling them while Moses permitted divorce, it was never God’s intention that a one flesh bond should be broken and hence was in the most literal sense, adultery. Also keep in mind the teaching Jesus gave on lust being a form of adultery in Matt. 5.

Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees I think should be seen as a reminder that we have all fallen short of God’s perfect intentions for us. Hiding behind self-serving legalisms only introduces another layer of unrighteousness. It is only by confessing our inability to keep the law that we can step up and receive God’s grace.

Divorced people join a very large group as second rung Christians. Look around and see that we are all adulterers, murderers, and liars. Failing to recognize that and pointing out the failings of others just indicates how blinded you are by the log in your own eye.

For more references on divorce and remarriage see:
“And Marries Another: Divorce and Remarriage in the Teaching of the New Testament” by Craig Keener. (a scholarly approach)
“Grace and Divorce: God's Healing Gift to Those Whose Marriages Fall Short” by Les Carter (from a Christian counselor)
“Divorce, Remarriage and the Law of Love” a sermon by Greg Boyd, Woodland Hills Church
http://whchurch.org/sermons-media/sermon/divorce-remarriage-and-the-law-of-love

120805 Sabbath

Pop Quiz.  Without cheating, take one minute and write down as many of the Ten Commandments as you can recall.  Now, open your Bible to Exodus 20 and see how you fared.  While I think most people can remember the ones involving murder, stealing, and infidelity, my hunch is that “keeping the Sabbath holy”, among others, might not be as quick to recall.

Times have changed.  When I was a kid growing up in a small town in Kansas, Sundays were very sleepy.  Churches, restaurants,  and a few gas stations were about the only things open.  Most everything else stayed closed on Sunday.  Student sports were never scheduled on Sunday.  Everybody knew why, too: it was a day set apart for church, family, and rest.  Slowly and surely, things changed.  By the time I was in Middle School, stores were open.  Student sports started to creep into Sundays in the 1990’s.  Now, Sunday is just another day.  Churchgoers are decreasing in number every year, and are a definite minority in the United States.

I think this is a problem.  Not just for the Church, but for the population in general.

First and foremost, keeping the Sabbath was and is a Jewish thing.  As far as scholars can tell, no other culture or religion instituted this ordinance before the Jews.  They practiced rest on the seventh day of the week because that’s what they understood God did in the creation story.  Six days of creating, one day of restful re-creating.  At times, the Jewish people practiced this command so literally that it cost them their freedom – enemies figured out that they all took Saturdays off, which presented an excellent opportunity for attack.  Attack they did; victory was theirs – no Jews dared fight back and break the command.  Eventually, fleeing for one’s life was allowed on the Sabbath.  By the times Jesus hit the radar, the rabbis had created a long list of things you could and could not do on the Sabbath.  Many of the rules were ridiculous, and Jesus broke them, much to the chagrin of the religious leaders of his day. 

Our relationship with rest (let alone Sabbath) in our Western culture is a paradox.  We know we need it, but there is pressure, I think, to avoid it.  I think our culture rewards people who forego rest for more work.  We don’t like to hear that we need 7-8 hours of sleep.  We are sure we can make it on less.  But if you work out, you know that lack of rest leads to disaster.  Our muscles need time to recuperate.  If we keep pushing ourselves, we will eventually find ourselves injured and unable to perform even simple exercises.  We know our bodies need rest.  But do we realize that rest impacts our entire state of being?

Studies have shown that meditation makes a significant difference in our ability to handle stress by stimulating our body’s parasympathetic response.  This affects our chemical and metabolic functions.  Just 15 minutes a day of sitting and deep breathing can make a big difference.  Lots happens when we stop and do nothing.  We notice things we hadn’t before.  We hear things, feel things, think things.  There is a world-famous ten day course of silence you can try in India (and now other parts of the world).  For ten days you cannot speak.  You follow the direction of the leaders.  The first day is focused on sitting in silence, focusing on your breathing.  More specifically, contemplating your nostrils – which one you favor more, etc.  Ten days.  Michael Finkel gave this a try.  After ten days, his initial reaction was that is was an awful experience.  Upon further reflection, however, he notes it as one of the most profound experiences of his life.

Is this what the Sabbath was all about?  Were the Jews perpetuating this command because the simple non-act of rest affected their parasympathetic response?  Is this why we need to re-incorporate this command today?

Taking a day to simply rest is a great idea, period.  Everybody needs it.  Deny it and you will pay a hefty price.  But Sabbath is not simply about rest; it is about re-creating.  And to do that requires the input of the Creator.

The writer of Hebrews gives us a beautiful interpretation of what Sabbath-keeping is really all about.  In Hebrews 4, the writer talks about entering God’s rest, which has as its prerequisite obedience to God.  Israel had failed at this, and missed out on the rest.  But to those who follow, the rest is available.  The “rest” is current-alluding-to-future.  It is now, but is a foretaste of the future.  We experience God now, which is just a hint of our experience to come after life in this realm is over.  Experiencing God needs to be fostered.  It needs to be intentional.  For ancient and contemporary Jews, coming together for worship and teaching was a critical component of keeping the Sabbath.  It was more than a day off.  It was time set aside for God to speak into their lives.  It set them apart as God’s people.

So, Sabbath is not just about the absence of work.  It is not just about resting, be it on a hike or on the golf course or on a recliner.  Sabbath keeping takes it to the next level by integrating communal worship and teaching about the Way of God.  Neglect that, and you may benefit from the R&R, but you will not be any more like the Jesus who leads you to life abundant.

Are you thinking about murdering anybody this week?  Stealing form anyone?  Committing adultery?  Probably not.  Hopefully not!  How about neglecting the Sabbath?  God included it in his Top Ten list.  It is that significant.  Israel learned the hard way that neglecting the Sabbath leads to generational apathy toward the Way of God which leads to vulnerability as a people and as a nation.  It led to their demise.  When we do not foster our relationship with God, we cannot expect to experience a life impacted by the presence of God.

The Church in Western culture is a frog in the kettle.  If you drop a frog in a kettle of boiling water, it will immediately jump out.  If you put a frog in temperate water and very slowly heat the water, it will just sit there until it boils to death.  It doesn’t know it’s dying.  When we personally neglect the keeping of the Sabbath, and then consequently model that choice for those we influence the most (our children and culture), we set ourselves up for trouble.  When we crowd our lives with so many commitments that we can’t make Sunday (in our case) a day of rest, we are in trouble.  But when we neglect to come together to reconnect with God and be reminded and stretched to think more deeply about God, we may be in bigger trouble.  We don’t grow closer to God.  We therefore become less effective as agents of God’s Kingdom in the world.  Fewer people are introduced to the life-transforming Good News of Jesus.  Less life happens in spite of longer living. 

Learn from our history.  Consider why the Sabbath made the Top Ten.  Choose wisely how you will spend your days.