Buildings that Tell a Story

… Solomon, my son, get to know the God of your ancestors. Worship and serve him with your whole heart and with a willing mind…. If you seek him, you will find him. But if you forsake him, he will reject you forever.  So take this seriously. The Lord has chosen you to build a Temple as his sanctuary. Be strong, and do the work. – I Chronicles 28:9-10

I’ve been carrying with me since last Christmas a gift card to Borders.  Since the closest big bookstore to me is one of their competitors, the card has gone unused for too long.  So, I found myself in one of their stores recently and I determined, then and there, to use it before I walked out the door.   I bought a book called, Architecture and Happiness by Alain de Botton.  It’s not the sort of book I would normally spend my money on – a seventeen dollar paperback.  But it looked interesting enough and it was, so to speak, free.  Turns out it is a good book.

It’s about the buildings we construct, use, and live in and what they say about us and what they say to us.   He argues against the sterile, utilitarian view that our buildings are, at bottom, merely shelters from the weather.  The best buildings, he says, are human statements of what we believe in and, perhaps even more to the point, what we hope to become.  Our happiness and our buildings are not unrelated.

He tells the story of a rainy day in London when he popped into a McDonald’s to escape the downpour.  It was a fairly lifeless place, full of business people eating by themselves in a room awash in fluorescent lighting and the hissing sound of cooking French fries in the background.  He had been there for a few moments when a group of noisy Finnish teenagers arrived and began to “sing ardently” and give one another piggy back rides, to the confusion of the restaurant staff and the precipitation of his quick departure.  When he went outside, he looked and saw across the street “the imposing Byzantine forms of Westminster Cathedral” to which he walked and entered.

Inside the cathedral were candles, mosaics, the Stations of the Cross and the smell of incense and “sounds of murmured prayer.”   There hung above the altar a thirty foot high crucifix flanked by Jesus and Mary.  He describes the moment:  The facile din of the outer world had given way to awe and silence.  Children stood close to their parents and looked around with an air of puzzled reverence….  The anonymity of the street had here been subsumed by a peculiar kind of intimacy….  The stonework threw into relief all that was compromised and dull, and kindled a yearning for one to live up to its perfections.  (109)

Then he added, Under the influence of the marble, the mosaics, the darkness and the incense, it seemed entirely probable that Jesus was the son of God and had walked across the Sea of Galilee.  In the presence of alabaster statues…it was no longer surprising to think that an angel might at any moment choose to descend through the layers of dense London cumulus…and make an announcement in Latin about a forthcoming celestial event. (111)

Winston Churchill, an amateur architect himself, (and whom de Botton, interestingly, never quotes) once wrote “We shape our buildings; thereafter, they shape us.”   It’s not an unbiblical idea.  Even David told his son, Solomon:  “Get to know the God of your ancestors… Build a temple, be strong and do the work.”  -KDS

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On the Occasion of My Daughter’s Wedding

Meditation for the Wedding of Elizabeth Stonebraker and Brian Weaver
June 14, 2008

We love because He first loved us. — I John 4:19

I stand here as both one who is familiar with standing behind pulpits and as the father of the bride.  To deliver a message in a public worship gathering – which is what I have done nearly every Sunday morning for the last thirty years – is still a humbling experience for me.

However, to be the father of a daughter and deliver her to the care and future of a young man on her wedding day is not without its emotional freight, either.

My daughter Elizabeth asked me if I would say something today as I did for her sister’s wedding several years ago. I am glad to do so and I will not take long.  I appreciate the advice Franklin Delano Roosevelt gave to promising public speakers:  “Be brief.  Be sincere.  Be seated.”

But giving my daughter to anyone – even a young man with the excellent qualities of Brian Weaver – is not quite the same as giving a sermon.  Other preachers in this assembly may know what I am talking about.   When a sermon turns out to be something less than what one hoped, there is always next Sunday, a chance at redemption.

There are, however, a limited number of daughters for me.  For better or for worse, this is all I’ve got.  When I give this one away, I have no others; she’s the last in a line of two.  I’m not sure I could go through it again, anyway.  It’s no easy task to give away those things you love the most.  And my daughters are, after my wife, those things closest to my heart.

I do want to say before I say anything more how very happy I am that Liz and Brian found each other.  To Brian’s family, let me say without hesitation that both Pam and I are deeply thankful to you that you raised such a fine young man for our daughter.  I hope you feel the same way about her.

They have been together for the past couple of years and, from what I have seen, they act, often, as wise married couples do after many years.  They treat each other with respect, ignore each other when necessary, enjoy doing together many of the same things, and seem to be friends.

They have their own dogs, too, which according to one writer is good practice for marriage life.  Will Stanton once said, “Getting a dog is like getting married.  It teaches you to be less self-centered, to accept sudden, surprising outbursts of affection, and not to be upset by a few scratches on your car.”

The wisdom that goes into successful relationships is not anything that comes naturally, of course.  We Christians believe that what comes naturally is usually nothing but self-serving behavior.  Selfishness is always destructive to relationships and however it plays itself out, it needs to be checked and eventually discarded.  Love, on the other hand, is learned behavior.

What is more, true love is not quickly learned.  “Love seems the swiftest, but is the slowest of all growths,” said Mark Twain.  “No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century.”

If we have learned anything at all about love, it is only because someone has shown us what it looks like.  The most significant teacher of love is, of course, God.  As the New Testament says, “We love because He first loved us.” (I Jn 4:19)   Or to put it another way, anything we know about love, we get it from God.  This is the big story of the scriptures and the promise of the gospel.

But if God is the first teacher of love, it is always a lesson that is mediated through flesh and blood.  Love is never disembodied; it is always incarnate.  We learn about love from those who love us.   We teach about love when we love others.   As the New Testament also says, “By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (Jn 13.35)

Weddings in the popular mind are celebrations of romance.  While I would be the last person to dismiss romance as an insignificant experience for any of us, it is well to keep in mind that the Christian wedding is about not primarily romance, but the virtues of promise keeping.  Romantic love is temporary and emotional.  And while it brings us together, biologically speaking, it is not what keeps us together, spiritually speaking.

What keeps us together as husband and wife is the promise to stay together even at those times when we do not have especially warm, romantic feelings for the other person.  This will happen – Brian and Elizabeth – I assure you.  There will be times in the days to come when you will not want to be married to each other.  I hope not too many, but it happens to the best of us.  I’m just warning you.

But you are making a promise today not to let your feelings, which are always temporary, overcome the gravity of your vows.

When those occasions arise when you would rather not be in the same room with your spouse, you still have to keep your word.  You may want to take the dogs for a walk, for instance.  It’s one way of keeping your promise.  It’s also therapeutic since the dogs always love you no matter what – a godly trait, if I may say so.

Long-married couples can appreciate what Joyce Brothers once said about her own marriage:  “My husband and I have never considered divorce.  Murder sometimes, but never divorce.”

When we keep a promise in the face of difficulties, what we are also doing is giving God the opportunity to help us become more mature people, better people, than we were before whatever it was that bothered us.

There is no maturity in impatience, in mean-spiritedness, in running away at the first sign of trouble.  There is a great deal of personal maturity when people work through difficulties – together and separately – and discover their own set of tools in the creative business of a marriage relationship.

Alfred Adler, the psychologist who began his career with Sigmund Freud and later broke away to start his own school of therapy, once stated, “We only regard those unions as real examples of love and real marriages in which a fixed and unalterable decision has been taken. If men or women contemplate an escape, they do not collect all their powers for the task. In none of the serious and important tasks of life do we arrange such a ‘getaway.’ We cannot love and be limited.”

Marriage is one of God’s great gifts to most of us so we can become better, more mature, more interesting individuals than what we would be all by ourselves.  There is a softening of individual quirks that takes place in a committed, lifelong relationship.  Far from being a limiting, constrictive institution, marriage is the freedom to discover who we truly are and what we can truly become.

It is also a wonderful opportunity to experience a joy that is better than mere happiness.   It is a joy that comes with the knowledge that one is doing God’s will and becoming God’s person. This gift is what we celebrate today with you.

What we are happy about is that God gave you one another to travel this adventure together.  You are two people who are created in God’s image and who, in your commitments, give to yourselves and to God the chance to make you into people who are even more delightful than you are now.

I was serious when I said that you both already exhibit admirable personal qualities in your love for each other.  Everybody who is in the church right now is very, very happy for you.  And we want nothing but God’s best for you in all your life together.   It is up to you, as individuals, now to deliver yourselves to each other as loving, faithful partners in the adventure of true love.

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Plans for the Year Ahead

Communion Meditation
January 4, 2009
Text: Ephesians 1:3-13

His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to
himself through Jesus Christ. And this gave him great pleasure. – Ephesians 1:5

My daughter, Elizabeth, asked us several months ago if we would like to go on vacation with her and her husband’s family this coming summer.  They usually go to the beach in North Carolina.  Pam and I like beach vacations so it wasn’t hard to say yes.  But, as you probably know, if you want to go to the Outer Banks in the middle of the summer, you have to make plans in the winter.  Nice beach houses go fast.  So we have.  As of this past week, we have reserved a nice four bedroom house for August right on the ocean.  We are looking forward to it, needless to say.

Perhaps you, too, are making plans for the coming year: plans for vacation, plans to remodel the house, plans to attend your high school reunion, whatever.  As the old saw goes, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.”  January is as good a time as any, and better than most, to think about what you want to do this year.

The Bible, of course, cautions us to hold onto our plans lightly.  Whatever we think we are going to do in the future always has to be qualified with the words, “if the Lord wills.”

The Apostle James wrote, How do you know what will happen tomorrow?  For your life is like the morning fog – it’s here a little while, and then it’s gone. What you ought to say is, “If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that.” Otherwise you will be boasting about your own plans, and all such boasting is evil.  (4:14-16)

So we make plans because it’s the responsible thing to do.  But we do so with a reasonable and faithful caution.  We recognize that God may have some plans for us that just might override our own.

Did you know that God has plans for you and me for this coming year, too?  Whatever we want to do before the year is out, God has in mind some things he wants to accomplish in us and for us. Our scripture lesson for this morning, from Ephesians 1, is all about the plans which God has for those who place their trust in him.

The Apostle Paul says God has had plans for us that date all the way back to the beginning of creation. From long before any of us were born, God’s purpose for us was to be brought into his heavenly family.  Paul wrote, Long ago, even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. (4-5)

Paul wrote these words to his Ephesian friends because they were evidently wondering what place they, as Gentiles, had in God’s universal purpose for the world.  Everyone knew that the Jews were the chosen people.  Anyone who has read the scriptures knows that Israel has always had a special place in God’s heart.  But what about everyone else?  “What does God have in mind for us Gentiles?” they asked.

This gave Paul the opportunity to explain that, in Christ, everyone is to be considered chosen.  The people of Israel were chosen to bear witness to God and God’s holiness, of course.  But that was only a first step.  Now that Christ has come into the world, Paul says, even Gentiles can know the plans of God.

And what are these plans of God?  Listen again to the Apostle: God’s secret plan has now been revealed to us; it is a plan centered on Christ, designed long ago according to his good pleasure.  And this is his plan: At the right time he will bring everything together under the authority of Christ – everything in heaven and on earth.  (9-10)

God’s plans are to bring us together under the authority of Christ.  God wants Jew and Gentile, male and female, Jew and Greek, Democrat and Republican, husband and wife, to find security and hope in the sovereignty of Christ.  God has in mind for the whole world to live under his gracious and loving care.  From the very beginning of creation, when you and I were just a twinkle in God’s eye, God had in mind that we should live together, not in strife and contention, but in love and peace with Christ as our only authority.

It is good to keep these things of God in mind.

We face a year full of unknowns.  We have new leadership in Washington and many of us wonder how this will play itself out here at home and on the world’s stage.  Our economy is troubled and many of us worry about our finances.  Some of us have family concerns. Others of us have job anxieties.  We resolve to improve our health and eat better foods and exercise more.  We determine to save more and spend less.  We want to be more generous in our giving and more liberal with our time to our church and to causes we believe in.  We make plans to go to the beach and enjoy the blessings of family and friends.

It is no bad thing to make plans to improve our lot in life, as we are able to do so.  But everything we plan is to be held with an easy grip.  We make our plans knowing that God has plans, too, plans that might or night not include what we have planned for 2009.  The good news is that whatever this year holds for us, God still holds each of us in the palm of his hand.  He created us out of his love and he purposes each of us to come to know him better than we do now and to love one another more and more.

As Paul wrote …for he chose us from the beginning, and all things happen just as he decided long ago.  (11)

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When Not to Talk about Jesus

Don’t talk about this to anyone.  Go show yourself to the priest and offer the appropriate sacrifices of thanksgiving. — Mark 1:44

Mark’s gospel tells the story of Jesus having healed a leper in Capernaum. (1:40-45) So, in spite of the apparent contagion of the disease, Jesus touched the man and cured him.  “Be clean!” Jesus said.  Then with a strong warning, Jesus added, “Don’t talk about this to anyone.  Go show yourself to the priest and offer the appropriate sacrifices of thanksgiving.” (v. 44)

However, Mark says, the man did exactly the opposite.  He spoke “freely” to everyone about his healing.  The result was that “…Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in lonely places.” (v.43)

Seven chapters later in the Gospel, Jesus asked his disciples what they have heard from other people about him.  The disciples said that some believed he was John the Baptist, others thought he was the second coming of Elijah, still others said he was one of the prophets.  Then, when Jesus asked his disciples who they thought he was, Peter was the first to say that he believed he was the Messiah.  But like Jesus said to the leper of Mark chapter one, he “warned them not to tell anyone about him.” (v.30)

Are there times when it is better not to talk about Jesus?  There are occasions, to be sure, when it is fitting to share our faith with others, or to give our personal testimony of what Christ has done for us.  Jesus’ last words to his friends, also called the “Great Commission” (Mt. 28:19), were to “go into the world and make disciples” through teaching and baptizing.  Clearly Jesus did not expect his followers to keep their faith to themselves all the time.

But why did he tell the healed leper to keep quiet?  Why did he tell his disciples not to share their faith about his being the Messiah?  The reason may be found in Mark’s explanation of what happened when the leper did not keep quiet:  “Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in lonely places.”

Apparently what the leper said about Jesus was not how Jesus wanted to be presented to the world.  As compassionate as Jesus was, he did not want to be known primarily as a miracle worker.  And the disciples’ confession of him as Messiah?  It’s not hard to see that the word “messiah” was just too loaded with (sometimes contradictory) popular meanings that Jesus preferred they not use the word at all.

What Jesus evidently wanted was the freedom to meet men and women on his own terms in their own place.  Jesus desired to be the savior to every person he met.  But he didn’t want to have to  wade through the second-hand distortions of what other people said he was.

Which begs the question: Are there times when we get in the way of others coming to know the real Jesus because of our undisciplined enthusiasm to tell them who we think he is?  Or what we think he can do for them?  Do we minimize Jesus to the limits of our own needs, experiences, and understanding?  Sure, Jesus wants us to be his presence in the world.  But he doesn’t need undisciplined, myopic carnival barkers to tell his story.  What he wants are people who have been around him long enough to know him in his fullness – and then (and only then?) to be able to present the full and complete Jesus to the world.   -KDS

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Praise for Those Who Give Us Wisdom

Communion Meditation for
February 1, 2009
Text: 2 Timothy 3:10-17

You have been taught the holy Scriptures from childhood, and they have given you the wisdom to receive the salvation that comes by trusting in Christ Jesus. – 2 Timothy 3:15

My brother gave me a book for Christmas, The Guide for Guys.  It’s a how-to book.  It has short chapters on how to build a fire, how to deliver a speech, how to survive a bear attack, etc.  The subtitle of the book is “An Extremely Useful Manual for Old Boys and Young Men.”   I am not sure if my brother thinks I am an old boy or a young man, because I am neither.  He may think I’m not very skilled in some basic things about life and wants to help me out.  But whatever his reason, it has been a fun book to read and even learn a few things from.

There are a lot of books in the stores just like it.  You may remember several years ago “Life’s Little Instruction Manual” that seemed to start the trend.  If I remember right, it was written by a man who first wrote down simple instructions about everyday things for his young son to know as he grew up. When the man’s friends found out what he was doing, they said he should publish it.  He did and the book caught on like wildfire.

The present interest in instruction books is probably due to the feeling that we live in a time in which the wisdom of our elders is not being passed down generation to generation like it used to be.  I suppose there are a dozen theories why this is so.  But the one that makes the most sense to me is that our culture, in large measure, is critical and skeptical of things that are not new.  There seems to be an automatic knee-jerk reaction to old ideas, old ways, traditions and institutions.

But the resistance to old ideas often throws out the baby with the bath water.  We’ve also lost the wisdom that came with the preservation of traditions.

In the New York Times this past week, David Brooks wrote about a book he read recently and especially liked.   The book was Hugh Heclo’s On Thinking Institutionally.  Brooks began by quoting from a Harvard University report on the purpose of higher education.  Among other things the faculty at Harvard said:  “The aim of a liberal education is to unsettle presuppositions, to defamiliarize the familiar, to reveal what is going on beneath and behind appearances, to disorient young people and to help them to find ways to reorient themselves.”  That’s what the Harvard faculty thinks college ought to do with its students.

David Brooks quoted the report as an illustration of how our modern culture has become resistant, and sometimes hostile, to pre-existing arrangements.  The purpose of being an educated person, according to Harvard, is to question everything you’ve ever been taught.  (One is tempted to ask if that also includes what is taught at Harvard, but that is another issue.)

The individualism that is rampant in modern life emphasizes personal inquiry, personal self-discovery, and personal happiness.  And while doing so, it is also dismissive of anything that isn’t brand new and shiny.

Heclo suggests a better way.  He calls it “institutional thinking.”  In fact, he says that for most of history, civilizations have been built upon a respect for certain institutions as a way of learning how to behave, how to be successful, and how to get along with other people.

Institutions include family, school, and marriage but also embrace professions and crafts.  Brooks summarizes, “Each of these institutions comes with certain rules and obligations that tell us how to do what we’re supposed to do.  Journalism imposes habits that help reporters keep a mental distance from those they cover.  Scientists have obligations to the community of researchers.  In the process of absorbing the rules of the institutions we inhabit, we become who we are.”

Then he quotes Heclo again:  “The institutionalist has a deep reverence for those who came before and built up the rules that he has temporarily taken delivery of.  In taking delivery, institutionalists see themselves as debtors who owe something, not creditors to whom something is owed.”

I thought about those ideas this past week as I was working with our scripture text for today.

In 2 Timothy, the Apostle Paul has written to his young charge, Timothy, about his job as a pastor to his church.  Paul told him that, as a pastor, he must remain faithful to the things has been taught.  That is to say, Timothy is obligated as a Christian teacher and preacher to guard the faith of the church which was given to him, not to change it to suit anyone’s preference – either his or the people he talks to – and to live a Christ-like life as a matter of integrity.

There are treacherous people in the world, Paul says earlier in the chapter, which will question the truth of the gospel.  “You must stay away from people like that,” Paul warns.  These people will be “boastful and proud, scoffing at God … [t]hey will consider nothing sacred.  They will act as if they are religious, but they [will not be] godly people.”  They are “forever following new teachings, but…never understand the truth.”

The Apostle says that the antidote to that spiritual danger is to learn from one’s elders what the truth really is.  Your elders in the faith have taught you the scriptures, he wrote to Timothy.  You can trust the scriptures because you trust the people who taught them to you.  So be thankful for your elders.  They have given you a great gift.  They have taught you what is true.

The prophet Jeremiah said almost the same thing six hundred years before Paul.  He preached to the Israelites on the eve of the destruction of Jerusalem and the exile into Babylon.  Jeremiah could see what was coming and he tried his very best to change the people’s sinful ways.  The people had largely forgotten God and his commandments and had taken to worshiping idols.  Judah’s leaders had stopped trusting in God for protection. Instead, they placed their trust in military might and in political alliances.

All this whoring after the things of the world – gods and powers which have no power at all – will lead to nothing good, Jeremiah said.  Repent and trust in the God of your fathers before it’s too late.

What should the people do?  Here is Jeremiah’s advice:  “Stand in the ways and see, and ask for the old paths, where the good way is, and walk in it; Then you will find rest for your souls.”  (6:16)

Old ways are not always the best ways, of course.  Sometimes new things come along and they really are better.  Every time I buy a new car, it’s always better than the one I had before.  It rides nicer, lasts longer, and has more features.

But the things you buy and the things you live by are not at all the same.  The things you live by – the great truths about life and relationships and civilization – the Ten Commandments and the gospel of Christ – these things have been true for a long time.  We chase after the glittering promises and the shiny new gods of the world always to our disadvantage.

What will keep us from being tempted by the flashy new ideas and things of the world?  How can we discern what is eternal from what is momentary?  Well, we could do worse than take the advice of Paul who told Timothy:  [R]emain faithful to the things you have been taught. You know they are true, for you know you can trust those who taught you.  You have been taught the holy Scriptures from childhood, and they have given you the wisdom to receive the salvation that comes by trusting in Christ Jesus.  It is God’s way of preparing us in every way, fully equipped for every good thing God wants us to do. (3:14-15, 17)

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Slow Faith, Strong Love

“Woman, why are you crying?” the angels asked her.  “They have taken my Lord away,” she said, “and I don’t know where they have put him.” At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus. – John 20:13-14

One of the most touching stories in the gospels took place on the first Easter morning when Jesus walked out of his tomb.  John’s gospel tells about Mary Magdalene who was the first person to arrive at the burial site after a weekend of grief.

Upon  finding the tomb open and empty all she did was mutter through her tears – first to the disciples, then to the angels, and finally to Jesus himself (whom she  thought was the gardener):  “They have taken my Lord away and I don’t know where they have put him.”   Finally, Jesus spoke her name aloud, “Mary!”  It was then that she recognized him and understood why the tomb was as it was.

It’s hard for me to read that story and not be moved.  I know what it’s like to have lost someone I loved and wished it had never happened.   I have stood alone at a gravesite, the ground still rough and grassless, and wanted that person again standing next to me, talking to me, all the while knowing it wasn’t going to happen.  I know what it’s like to be so overcome with grief that even if angels had spoken to me, even if Jesus had spoken to me, I would not have recognized who they were or what they were saying.

I am slow to criticize Mary and the disciples for not believing right away in the resurrection.

I’ve heard preachers sermonize about the disciples’ sluggish faith, often with mild self-righteousness, too, as if they would have believed had they been there.  I’ve read commentators who point out all the previous occasions when Jesus told his disciples about his being raised from the dead implying, “How could they forget this?”  They pass judgment on Mary for looking IN towards the tomb instead of OUT the other way.  They gently rebuke her for allowing her emotions to blind her faith.  They say the disciples didn’t find Jesus because they were looking for a dead Jesus.

Whatever.

I only know that the grief I have known in my life had nothing at all to do with what I believed about the resurrection.  I have cried big, fat tears because I loved somebody.  And they were gone.  I think Mary’s tears said something about her love for Jesus.   And I find it hard to imagine Jesus being critical of her love, either.

Of course, Mary finally did come around.  Jesus spoke her name and she knew who it was.   The disciples came around, too.  It took one of them – Thomas – sticking his finger inside Jesus’ scarred hands and side to believe for sure.   (Which is another story of which I am fond, by the way.  Jesus was pretty patient with his friends coming to believe all that he said about life overcoming death.  He seemed to appreciate the extra time some people need to come to faith.)

So I am glad the story was told as it was.  Easter is as much about love as it is faith and maybe more, because Jesus loved Mary, too.  He stood behind her until her faith in him caught up to her love for him.  And then when she heard her name spoken, it was love all over again.   – KDS

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New Years’ Resolutions: Maybe You Could Try Harder

New Year’s Eve is like every other night; there is no pause in the march of the universe, no breathless moment of silence among created things that the passage of another twelve months may be noted; and yet no man has quite the same thoughts this evening that come with the coming of darkness on other nights.  ~H. W Mabie

On a recent visit with my 3 year old grandson, he gave me a package to open as I sat on the sofa in his parents’ living room.  In the package was a toy car which he wanted to play with.  The packaging was very sturdy, however and I had difficulty opening it.  I said, “Ben, I can’t get the car out.  It’s stuck.”  He responded without hesitation, “Maybe you could try harder.”

I learned later that my grandson was mouthing his own parents’ encouragement to him not to give up easily on a task when it first seems hard to do.

We look upon the dawn of a new year as a chance to put behind us the disappointments and sorrows of the past.  We give ourselves permission on January 1 to try again, to do better, to reach farther, to love more deeply.  It’s not such a bad thing to be optimistic and determined in the pursuit of good, especially in the chase of good character.   As the Apostle wrote in both Galatians and 2 Thessalonians, “Be not weary in well doing.”

New Years’ Resolutions are fodder for critics as we all know.  Our resolutions often have short shelf lives and it is upon our failures that the detractor likes to dwell.  As one wag pessimistically said, a New Year’s resolution is “something that goes in one year and out the other.”

Yes, we have all made promises in the past to be better people and have come up short.  But our failures do not have to define who we are or who we hope to become.  By grace, we all have the opportunity to try again and try harder.

It’s tempting to listen too closely to our critics especially when they are clever in their words.  They can sound so smart, so worldly-wise.  We listen to their skepticism and the temptation is strong to give up trying before we start.  I might suggest that a particularly good resolution for this coming year is to ignore our critics more regularly than we do now.  Call it a resolution for keeping our resolutions.

So let us resolve to try again in whatever we wish to do – and to keep on trying regardless of what anyone else might say.  Let us not grow weary in well doing.  Let us resolve to be unswayed by the critics around us.

Theodore Roosevelt once wrote:   Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure… than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat. – KDS

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Lent: It’s Not About You

Give your gifts in secret, and your Father, who knows all secrets, will reward you. – Matthew 6:4 (NIV)

The 2008 season of Lent, which will be upon us this year as early as ever it can be, begins on February 6 with Ash Wednesday.  Lent has long been recognized as a time of spiritual preparation for the commemorations of Holy Week and Easter.

Its forty day length corresponds to the forty days which Jesus spent in the wilderness praying and resisting the temptations of the Devil (Matthew 4:1-11).  In the early church, the forty days before Easter were given to educating those who wanted to become members of the church and be baptized on Easter morning.  Even for those who were already church members, Lent was a time to recall one’s own baptismal profession and promises.

Lent continues to be a time for the Christian disciple to focus on his or her life with God.   It calls for personal evaluation of one’s habits, especially in matters of prayer, generosity, and self-denial.  In Matthew 6:1-18, right in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus taught about those three disciplines.

About giving to the needy, Jesus said that when you do it (there is no hint that this itself is optional), you’d better not do it with the hope that someone else will see you and think you’re a great person for doing so.  Self-importance is not something God encourages.  “Give your gifts in secret and your Father, who knows all secrets, will reward you.” (v. 4)

About prayer, Jesus says that those who call attention to themselves when they pray, parading as particularly spiritual people, will not be recognized by God.  If they want public attention, Jesus says, they had better be happy with what they get, because that’s all they’re going to get!  “…pray to your Father secretly, then your Father who knows all secrets, will reward you.” (6) Oh, and don’t babble on and on, either.

About self-denial, Jesus says that no one ought to know you’re doing it.  Don’t look haggard, don’t look tired.  Clean yourself up and look respectable.  Like giving and prayer, self-denial is something that no one ought to know about except you and God.  If you do it for show in this world, don’t expect God to give you any reward in the next.  Let “no one suspect you are fasting, except your Father [who] will reward you.”

The reason for all these reminders to live prayerfully, generously, and selflessly – and quietly – is that the purpose of life is to glorify God.  We discipline our lives not so we can be known as disciplined people, but so that God and his work can be evident in our conversations, our business deals, and our personal relationships.  Success, spiritually speaking, is when people don’t notice you at all, but they see God in the way you talk and in the way you behave.

It’s not about you, it’s always about God. – KDS

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Who Is the Greatest?

At that time, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”  He called a little child and had him stand among them.  And he said, “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.  Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” – Matthew 18:1-4  (NIV)

Americans like greatness.  We like to think of ourselves as a great country.    President Lyndon Johnson liked to talk about “The Great Society.”   One of the most popular business books recently was Jim Collins’s, From Good to Great.   And Muhammad Ali wasn’t just a good boxer, he was “The Greatest.”

In America, it’s often not enough to be simply good at something if you want to be noticed.  You have to be great.  You have to be the biggest, the fastest, the smartest, or the best.  Yeah, we Americans admire greatness.

But we’re not the first or the only ones who aspire to being great.  People of all times and places have wanted to be great.  History tells of Alexander the Great, Herod the Great,  and Charles the Great, among many others who wanted to be known to history as great people.

Even the disciples of Jesus had this thing about greatness.  “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” they once asked him.   Jesus had been talking to them about the kingdom of God and how, someday, God was going to establish his heavenly kingdom.

Doubtless, the disciples were thinking about greatness in terms of what the world considered great.   They wanted to know who was going to have the most power in God’s kingdom, who would have the most influence.  They wanted to know because they wanted to be first in line for the job openings.

Then Jesus said one of the most amazing things in his ministry.  He took hold of a little child and said that greatness in the kingdom is a lot like how children are.  They are small, trusting, and eager to please.  Jesus used the word “humble” when he explained kingdom greatness.

We know that the disciples usually had trouble understanding Jesus’ lessons.  They probably didn’t get this one right away, either.  They weren’t thinking about greatness as something smaller or less powerful.  Greatness in the world is about being bigger and stronger than everybody else.  But in the Kingdom of God, it’s about being small so God can be big.  In the kingdom, it’s God who matters.

Jesus wants us to know that in the Kingdom, things are measured differently than they are in the world.  God wants big hearts, big love, big service — big humility — before he wants anything else that’s big out of us.   He wants our lives to point to the greatness of God.

John the Baptist said it well:  “I must decrease so he can increase.”   John knew what Jesus was talking about.

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What God Is Doing Right Now

Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes. – Matthew 6:34 —(The Message)

One of the men who has been in our Bible Study classes for the last two years at the Mansfield prison is waiting for a decision from the parole board. Parole boards interview prisoners to decide if they can be released early, assuming a minimum amount of the sentence has been served. Parole boards can be slow in giving a decision.

For a man who has a chance of release the delays can be frustrating. My prisoner friend admitted to me his own frustration. But he also told me that one of the other men in our class – an older, wiser brother in the faith – reminded him of what Jesus said to Pilate when Pilate was contemplating what to do with him. “Don’t you realize that I have the power to release you or to crucify you?” said Pilate. To which Jesus said, “You would have no power over me at all unless it were given to you from above.” (John 19:11)

The point taken for my friend was that he should leave the matter in God’s hands since it is God who gives even the parole board the power to do what it does. So, whatever the board decides, my friend reluctantly but willingly concluded, God has a plan for his life inside or outside the walls of prison. Trust in God’s timing.

You don’t have to be in prison to want to know what the future holds. It’s a temptation common to all of us. This is why Jesus said to the crowds in Galilee those now-famous words: “So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.” (Matthew 6:34, NIV) Jesus knew something about our nature which we often resist in admitting: we are not good multi-taskers. One day at a time is all we can and are supposed to handle.

I especially like how Eugene Peterson translates that verse in his version, The Message:  “Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.”

“Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now….”  Isn’t that a great line? In fact, it’s the essence of Christian spiritual formation. Wha God is doing in the present moment is what the disciple of Jesus ought to be looking for and paying attention to.

Following Jesus isn’t worrying about the future any more than it is about regretting the past. It’s all about what God is doing right now. So what is God doing right now in your life? That’s the really important question. Because whatever it is, it’s what he wants you and me to pay attention to.  – KDS

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