“To one there is given through the Spirit a message of wisdom, to another a message of
knowledge by means of the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, to another miraculous powers, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues.” I Corinthians 12:8 – 10 In this time of preparation, for that is what we are choosing to call this time of separation, we are examining the gifts of the Spirit and taking inventory of what gifts we have present in our congregation. Paula Kimbrell and Kathy Hendrix are working together with Reverend Chase to come up with a way to inventory our gifts. Over the next few months, you will begin to receive emails and notices asking for your input. This activity is something that we are praying over and taking our time to develop so that we may best learn what gifts are already present in our community of believers. In Corinthians, Paul tells the church that, though some are given particular gifts, all the gifts are given to unify the body. As we take inventory of our gifts let us bear in mind always that these gifts are avenues to serve God. It is not our will that we have in mind when we witness to others, but the will of God and even more when we practice the gifts, we have received, it is for God’s glory. As we rest in this moment of “pause”, let us get ourselves ready. Take this time of separation and limited activity to prepare your hearts for the service ahead of us. Although the pandemic is a terrible moment in our lives, it has afforded us time. Time to step back from the pandemonium of the ‘rush a day’ world we had been living in and to breath. We have been given a great gift in this moment of history to stop and get it right. To prepare and build ourselves for the new thing God has waiting for us. Again, we repeat Isaiah 43:19, “I am doing a new thing….” Take this moment and brush the dust off your talents. Take this moment to rest and prepare for the great thing the Lord is doing. Now is the moment for us to reach deep inside and find the faith which we have all professed. Now is the moment to be refreshed at the well of His Word and Good News. In the coming weeks and months, we will begin to build upon the promise of our Savior. We will begin to see mountains move, miracles fall like rain and healing, true spiritual healing begin. Take this moment. Breath in deeply the power of the Spirit. Fill your hearts with the passion of Christ. The gifts are ours and we are blessed by the Spirit. Let us find our strength and build the future that God has ordained for His people. Prepare your hearts through prayer, reading of scripture (particularly I Corinthians 12) and communion with our Lord, Jesus Christ. The Master is at the wheel, we, the clay, are nearly ready. Let us be molded into His will beginning today. Kathy Hendrix
0 Comments
And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,
“See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” --Revelation 21:3-4 NRSV Once upon a time, I was a doctoral student in New Testament at Emory University. I ended up leaving the program to pursue a career as a local church pastor, but my time in a Ph.D. program has enabled me the privilege of teaching undergraduate courses on the Bible. One semester is only enough time to skim the surface of the Bible as a whole, and inevitably there was never enough time to adequately cover the book of Revelation at the end of the semester. So, I tried to stress a few key ideas.
There is so much more to say about Revelation, but I felt like if students at least knew these seven things, then that was better than nothing. (Not much better, but still better.) Number 4 on the list has caused many problems for Christians down through the centuries. There is a never-ending list of failed predictions about the timing of Jesus’ second coming. Pretty much any time Christians had a spat (or a war) with anyone, they were convinced their enemy was the “antichrist” (a word actually not present in the book of Revelation). Yet, Revelation, Daniel and all the other apocalyptic stuff in the Bible was never meant to be read like a horoscope or the “prophecies” of Nostradamus. They were written for crises (real or perceived) in their writers’ times to offer hope to believers and to “reveal” the spiritual dimensions of the troubles they and their communities were experiencing. My worst nightmare is probably getting stuck on a plane sitting next to somebody who wants to talk about Revelation. Most of what American Christians do with the writing is just plain nuts. The average TV preacher babbling about Revelation has more in common with fruitcake conspiracy theories about the Illuminati killing JFK than they do the Bible. The apocalyptic stuff in the Bible at times feels to me like more trouble than it's worth, but I would never want to throw it out, because of one thing: hope. 2020 has been an insane year—a worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, violence by police setting off nationwide demonstrations, an economic downturn with tens of thousands of people out of work and weren’t “murder hornets” supposed to be a thing? Or was that last year? Who can keep track anymore? It’s easy to see why many people have said 2020 is “apocalyptic” in the more recent sense of the word, as in a cataclysmic end of the world. Yet, I have appreciated writers who have used “apocalyptic” in the sense of its Biblical meaning to describe 2020, as in the trials of this year have revealed a lot to us which was previously hidden. Baptist writer Joshua Sharp writes, “COVID-19 has laid bare the weakness, fear and sinfulness of humanity in a powerful way. Some could argue these realities were not previously ‘hidden.’ Fair enough. But the COVID-19 crisis is shining a bright light upon them and forcing us to face the facts.” As people fight in store aisles about whether or not to wear masks, we can take a look at ourselves and choose a better way, one of Christian concern for the health of our neighbors. Catholic writer Mary Pezzulo writes about how the video of George Floyd being asphyxiated by a cop’s knee on his throat was an “apocalypse/revelation” for white Americans. For many white people, George Floyd’s killing made real to them what black Americans had been saying for a very long time. Pezzulo says, “[Our] country is having a revelation. Things are being revealed that some of us knew very well, but that the rest of us couldn’t see. Veils and masks are being pulled off.” The world as many white Americans had been raised to understand it was revealed as a false view of reality. Racism is not just a thing of the past but remains an ever present force at work in our culture. You may be asking at this point, “Didn’t you mention hope a minute ago?” Yes, I did. Just as the crises of their times provoked revelations about reality, so do the crises of our time and every time. Yet, just as the bizarre apocalyptic language and symbols of scripture depict violence and destruction, they also assure their audience that appearances to the contrary God is still in control of the world. Behind the scenes, God is at work bringing about the goodness God desires for us and all creation. God is not thwarted by the forces of destruction which seem unstoppable to us. The “apocalypses” of 2020 have revealed the failures of politicians around the world to respond to disease, the racism that exists in the structures of our society, and the illusion of control most of us had about our careers and finances. Yet, God is at work and therefore we can still have hope. God is at work in the scientists striving to discover a vaccine and the healthcare workers caring for the diseased. God is at work in the activists and reformers envisioning a less racist America. God is at work in the generosity of ordinary people who share what they have with their unemployed and underpaid neighbors. God is at work in all these ways and so many more places that may not be evident to us. 2020 may be the end of the world as we know it, but with God’s help a new and better world is being born. Grace and Peace, Rev. Chase Peeples “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where
thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. --Matthew 6:19-21 NRSV In 2014, I took a Holy Land tour of Israel and Palestine. It was a dream come true for me to see sites I had read about in the Bible all my life. One of the sites that left a lasting impression on me is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, built, according to tradition, on the site of Jesus' crucifixion and the tomb in which he was buried. It is considered one of the holiest sites in Christianity, and pilgrims visit it from all over the world. What stood out to me, however, was not its holiness but rather the chaos of all the different sects of Christianity mashed up together. Bloody battles have been fought down through the centuries over what denomination has control of the site. The violence even continues into recent years as one group fights another over small parts of the complex. Various parts of the site are controlled by the Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Armenian Apostolic Church, Coptic Orthodox Church, syriac Orthodox Church and Ethiopian Orthdox Church. Over the last 15 years or so violent fistfights have broken out between groups when one "trespassed" on another's section of the church. Two of the denominations fought more recently over a section of the roof. Disputes dating back decades, even centuries, govern which Christian group is responsible for maintaining which part of the site. Even the most mundane tasks prove contentious. While there, our guide pointed out to us that there were no trash cans in the entire complex, because the various denominations couldn't agree upon who was responsible for emptying them. The intransigence of the battling Christians has gone on for centuries. In the 12th century, the Muslim general Saladin conquered Jerusalem but was unable to solve the conflict over the site. He gave the key to the church to a Muslim family to serve as an impartial party (one group or another kept locking others out). To this day, members of the same Muslim family open the church each morning. Perhaps the greatest example of the stalemate among Christian groups at this holiest site in Christianity is a ladder leaning up against the side of the church on an upper level. (I thought I had a picture of it but couldn't find it. Google "ladder church of the holy sepulchre" and you'll find pictures of it.) Nobody knows who left the ladder there, but the earliest evidence of it dates back to the early 1700's! To this day, nobody has moved it for fear of upsetting one or more of the other groups laying claim to the site. Alone it sets down through the decades and centuries as a symbol of the hard-heartedness of Christians. The story of the ladder nobody can move sounds ridiculous when the fighting over it takes place between orthodox priests of Christian denominations of which we American Protestants are not familiar. Yet, when I replace the exotic location and characters with typically dressed Americans in an average Protestant church the dynamics seem familiar. A seemingly immutable fact of church life exists in the form of disputes among church members over their church buildings and who lays claim to what part of it. Unofficial and unelected individuals or groups become de facto arbiters of taste when it comes to decorating. "Landmines" lay waiting for anyone who dares disturb a certain classroom, chapel or section of the building declared sacred by a matriarch or patriarch of the congregation. Often the nastiest disputes arise about the things least related to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I grew up loving going to church. At church, this skinny, undersized rather nerdy kid was loved and declared special. At church my talents were appreciated and my gifts recognized. I was taught about a loving God and shown love by church people. Yet, at the same time I bore witness to people bearing the name Christ being god-awful to one another, often filled with rage over things that seemed trivial to me. In the many years since, not much has changed. I still have plenty of stories of love and plenty of stories of nasty fights. I have learned that most of these disputes over church buildings and the things in them aren't really about the building and the stuff but rather about people feeling a need for control, people afraid of death and their own impermanence and people finding their self worth and identity in mere objects. Given the emotional toll small changes may take on churchgoers, is it any wonder why it is so difficult to achieve truly significant changes in congregations. Change involves, well, change, and most of us come to church for a break from the neverending changes in our culture. Yet, the price of bitterly refusing to cede control of the parts of the church we lay claim to is we have a lot of immovable ladders laying around. Junk piles up in store rooms in our buildings, but also spiritual junk piles up in our lives. Churches are often the last places to change when it comes to racism, sexism, income inequality, equality of LGBTQ people and more, because change is difficult and costly. Is it any wonder that younger generations have left their parents and grandparents churches behind in search of spiritual places without so many "ladders" in the way? One wonders where we got the idea that following Jesus would be easy? Why did we start holding onto things that matter so little in light of eternity? Jesus told us clearly to "lay up your treasures in heaven" and "take up your cross and follow me," but we act as if Jesus commanded us to settle down and defend our favorite parts of our churches to our dying breath. This isn't a new problem. The place Christianity claims Jesus suffered, died, was buried and rose again is a sprawling building complex filled with various Christian groups ready to literally fight one another at any moment. I feel pretty confident that none of this is what Jesus had in mind. Grace and Peace, Chase As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes
on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life. --1 Timothy 6:17-19 ESV Each morning my email inbox is filled with emails from news sources offering lists of articles. I browse through them over breakfast checking the headlines and occasionally clicking on them for more information. I usually avoid “listicles” in favor of actual journalism. “Listicles,” in case you’ve been ignoring the internet for the last decade, pretend to be a news article (hence the -icle in the word) but really are only a list someone has arbitrarily compiled, for example “The 10 Greatest Celebrity Breakups of All-Time!”). Sites love them, because listicles get people to click on their site (they charge advertisers per click) and they don’t have to pay for an actual journalist. Like I said, I try to avoid them, but sometimes I can’t resist. This morning I gave in to temptation and clicked on a listicle titled “7 of the Weirdest Things People are Buying During the Pandemic.” Don’t ask me why. I just did. It turns out the 7 Weirdest Things weren’t very surprising—well, one of them was—roller skates. That one surprised me, but the other six weren’t very “weird” at all: RV’s, yeast (for breadmaking), bidets (remember the toilet paper shortage?), sweat pants, scented candles and guns. Look, I’m doing my best to make it through this monotonous pandemic just like everybody else. Who am I to judge anybody for doing whatever it takes to deal with this crazy time? Things like sweat pants, bidets, yeast and scented candles sound like coping mechanisms for people stuck at home. RV sales have been in the news because fewer people want to risk getting COVID-19 traveling by plane or staying in a hotel. Even guns don’t surprise me; this is America after all. I have lots of questions, such as, “don’t most people who are into guns already have plenty of guns and ammo already?” “Exactly how many more guns and how much more ammo do you need?” “COVID-19 is bad, but are we really talking about total societal collapse?” Wait, don’t answer that. I shouldn’t make too much of a listicle like this. Somebody being paid by the word probably generated it in a random manner. This isn’t hard journalism. Yet, it did make me think about what am I spending my money on right now? If folks are fortunate enough to still have jobs during this economic crisis, what are they spending their money on. As I said, far be it from me to judge folks for seeking some material comforts/coping mechanisms during this stressful time, but the Amazon vans and FedEx trucks racing up and down my street seem to imply there is a lot of purchasing going on these days. I think it’s fair to assume much of what’s being bought aren’t necessities. I’m wondering if in my own life I’ve relied too much on the endorphin rush that comes with hitting “Buy Now” and neglected the joy which comes from giving to others in need? There’s a lot of need right now. Maybe they exist out there on the interwebs, but I haven’t seen many listicles of the top things people are giving away or the top charities people are giving to during the pandemic. A crisis like the one we are going through can reveal a lot about our own character, values and beliefs. It is perhaps when we most feel like circling the wagons that we most need to reach out with generosity. Maybe this time offers us the opportunity to reassess our whole approach to buying more and more stuff, what the writer of 2 Timothy calls setting our “hopes on the uncertainty of riches.” Maybe the uncertainty of these times can inspire us to turn our focus to God “who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.” After all, often when we give in to the constant itch to buy more stuff we don’t need, we are merely using a materialistic solution to address a spiritual need. Deep down what we want is to “take hold of that which is truly life.” The paradox of following Jesus is that the more we give away the more we end up with that truly matters. The more we give up the stuff that masquerades as “life” the more we discover what true life really feels like. Grace and Peace, Chase P.S. If you are looking for an opportunity to be generous, check out the Facebook Group PHCC’s own Carrie Stewart has started called “Operation Teacher’s Toolbox KC.” It allows you to see wishlists by area school teachers who are stocking their classrooms for the first day of the school year. We all know how difficult this year will be, and most of these items are ones teachers pay for out of their own pocket. It’s a great way to support and encourage your children’s and grandchildren’s teachers. Since we belong to the day, let’s stay sober, wearing faithfulness and love as a piece of armor
that protects our body and the hope of salvation as a helmet. --1 Thessalonians 5:8 CEB Talitha Arnold, a United Church of Christ minister in Santa Fe, NM, writes about hope and the ways it has been described. "Hope is the thing with feathers," wrote Emily Dickinson, "that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops at all." "Hope is a muscle" wrote the author of a book about a girls basketball team. Hope is a helmet, said the Apostle Paul. Always the realist, Paul encouraged the early Christians of Thessalonica to put on "a helmet of hope of salvation." It's a great metaphor. Hope is often under siege, whether in Paul's time or ours. One glance at the daily news makes hope seem naive and those who hold hope appear foolish. We often need the protection a helmet affords to keep hope alive. During these days of COVID-19, we need some steel-plated hope to keep despair at bay. In recent days I have been asked to pray for a family given 30 days to find a new home, an unemployed man unable to pay his rent due to the decrease in unemployment benefits, a good friend’s father who is on a ventilator due to COVID-19, and someone’s mother who has dementia in a memory care unit which so far has not allowed caregivers to visit. I keep praying for all these folks and more. So far, arrows of despair and frustration keep pinging off my “helmet of hope,” but they hit hard enough I feel like a bell getting rung. I like the image of a “helmet of hope,” because it implies hope is more than empty wishes. It speaks of a certain kind of inner strength and determination necessary to face despair and keep going. Krista Tippett has one of my favorite lines about hope in her book Speaking of Faith: Why Religion Matters and How to Talk About It: The spiritual geniuses of the ages and of the everyday don’t let despair have the last word. Nor do they close their eyes to its pictures or deny the enormity of its facts. They say, “Yes, and…” And they wake up the next day, and the day after that, to act and live accordingly. I love the idea of saying “yes, and. . .” to all the daily news of despair. That simple practice reminds us that the daily struggles and traumas in this life are real, but they are not all there is to reality. Beauty, community and love are also real. Sure, sometimes things are bad, really bad and it takes work to hold onto hope, but we are not talking about mere wishes or even optimism alone. We are talking about living out of the truth that despair does not get the last word. Paul uses the image of hope as a helmet, but he describes it in a particular way “hope of salvation as a helmet.” We have to be careful that we don’t spiritualize hope once we see the word “salvation’ next to it. Again, Talitha Arnold has good words on this verse of scripture: Paul says it is the "hope of salvation." Yes, it's the saving grace of Jesus Christ, but it's also the hope that saves us from despair and discouragement, be it about our world or ourselves. Hope for salvation from death once this life ends is no small thing, but it’s not the only thing. Ultimately as Christians we have hope, because we trust in God and that makes all the difference in the here and now. God isn’t a cosmic vending machine that dispenses answers to our real-world problems after we insert the correct change or the right words in a prayer. Instead, God is the energy that we grab onto which pulls us out of bed each day to do what must be done and to do all we can to face our struggles. We are empowered to keep at it, because we trust we are not left to our own devices. God is at work along with us as we face whatever difficulties come. Most of all, that steel-plated hope that we wear like a helmet to guard our minds from despair is an internal transformation that enables to face whatever external trouble comes our way. Joan Chittister writes: Hope is not a matter of waiting for things outside of us to get better. It is about getting better inside about what is going on outside. In these days of COVID-19, where the usual difficulties in life grow exponentially greater, may you keep your “helmet of hope” on tight as you rise each day to do what must be done. Grace and Peace, Chase “Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you. In the name of Jesus Christ of
Nazareth, walk.” Acts 3:6 When called to Jesus, we bring our hearts, minds and bodies. These are the things of true value that we have, the only things that are undeniably ours. We can “earn” many other possessions, like money, homes, vehicles and so on, but all we truly are born with are our hearts, minds and bodies and it is these that we surrender to Christ when we proclaim Him Lord of our lives. Before Jesus, Peter and John were fishermen. We don’t know how successful they were or how much “stuff” they had accumulated prior to following Jesus. We only know that when they answered His call to follow Him, they “left everything” behind. While there are many sermons on the dropping of everything to follow, let’s focus for the moment on the reality of what they had. Aside from their “profession” what did these men truly possess? What did they have that Jesus required of them? Only themselves. Over the last few weeks, we have been looking at the gifts of the Spirit. These gifts: wisdom, knowledge, understanding, counsel, fortitude, piety and the fear of the Lord are not some magical powers that we suddenly acquire when the Spirit moves in us. Rather they are aspects we learn to use and grow through our walk with the Spirit. All of us were born with the heart and mind capable of wisdom, knowledge, understanding and counsel. We each have the capacity of courage, strength of character and mind. When we dedicate ourselves to our God, we devote ourselves to His commandments, we have a healthy respect for Him and gladly obey. The gift of the Spirit is that each of these characteristics grows and makes us bolder. We no longer walk alone, but we walk in the Spirit of Christ. We must not be afraid to exercise these gifts for our community. During this time of separation, when health fears keep so many of us away from the church building, there is no bar to our sharing of heart and mind. During this time of building for our vision of Bold Hospitality, we can take action that will prepare the way for when we can meet again. We can use our minds to pray for wisdom for our leaders. Wisdom in developing partnerships and wisdom in the paths to meet our community needs. We can counsel one another in how to prevail through this difficult time. We can offer knowledge on how to contact organizations that may make good partners as we reach out to our community. In our time of devotions and our prayer closets we can vigorously seek out God’s will and that the opportunities to serve our community will become visible to us. Ultimately, in our placing God first, we will become a people filled with compassion for our neighbors and we will reach lives in ways we never considered before. We are in the process of building. We are in the process of becoming. Even in our separation, we are coming together in the Spirit. Listen, God is saying: “19See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?” Isaiah 43:19 Open your minds and hearts to hear His word. Exercise your gifts so that He will be lifted up. Kathy Hendrix Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.
--Psalm 150:6 NIV If you’ve gone to church for any length of time, some of the language can become a little too familiar. The words can lose their meaning. Phrases and ideas heard repeatedly in scripture readings, praise songs and hymns sort of become like a favorite pop song, commercial jingle or Christmas song. One is so familiar with the words, their significance no longer sinks in. It helps me to hear my tradition with fresh ears when I hear truth in another religious tradition. Whether I’m reading something by a person of another faith or I’m getting to talk to someone of a different faith in person, I usually find not only am I learning to appreciate the faith of another tradition but I understand my own better. This has especially been the case in reading the writings of the Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh. For example, he writes: People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle. The Western world’s values of viewing the Creation of God merely as something to be used up for our own gratification has developed with the blessing of a Christianity that views the “material world” as inferior to the world of the spirit. It is embedded in the heart of free market capitalism and exported around the globe. Yet, this Buddhist monk’s recognition of the miracle that exists in all creation reminds me to consider the parts of Christianity and the Hebrew Bible that recognize the earth not as ours to use like a tissue we wad up and throw away, but as God’s creation that we participate in but do not own. “The earth is the Lord’s” declares scripture, but the present ecological crisis shows how we humans act in godless ways refusing to recognize the earth belongs to God not us. Thich Nhat Hanh also writes about the miracle that is an ordinary loaf of bread: When I hold a piece of bread, I look at it, and sometimes I smile at it. The piece of bread is an ambassador of the cosmos offering nourishment and support. Looking deeply into the piece of bread, I see the sunshine, the clouds, the great earth. Without the sunshine, no wheat can grow. Without the clouds, there is no rain for the wheat to grow. Without the great earth, nothing can grow. That is why the piece of bread that I hold in my hand is a wonder of life. It is there for all of us. I buy my food at a supermarket, and it’s easy to forget everything involved in a “simple” loaf of bread. There is the miracle of life itself and all the things in an ecosystem required for grain to grow. There are the farmers who harvest grain, the people in bakeries who produce it, the people who transport it, the “essential workers” who stock it. Especially in these times of pandemic, where people literally risk their lives to put bread on store shelves, I ignore everything and everyone who has been involved in the bread making it to me at the peril of my own soul. As politicians debate the level of unemployment benefits, most of whom have never been hungry a day in their lives, I consider the low hourly wages of most of the people who produce the food I eat. Many of the people who produce food for my family are paid wages that leave them below the poverty line and without medical benefits. Each bite of a sandwich I take connects me to countless people and to creation itself. It also reminds me of my ethical responsibility to the earth and to other people. Most of all, Thich Nhat Hanh speaks of mindfulness that starts with paying attention to our breathing: Enlightenment is always there. Small enlightenment will bring great enlightenment. If you breathe in and are aware that you are alive—that you can touch the miracle of being alive—then that is a kind of enlightenment. Even though I believe in God’s grace, I don’t often live like it. I hurry around trying to prove myself and act as if accomplishing more is that same thing as living in a significant way. My prayers are hurried and harried instead of moments to connect with God who is present everywhere and in every moment. Christian theologian Theilhard de Chardin wrote this about the “breath of all creation:” All living creatures are sustained by this life-giving rhythm, and we are dependent on plants, trees, and other vegetation to transform the carbon dioxide we exhale into the oxygen we need to thrive. Our breath connects us with the “breath” of every living thing. We are a part of the network of God’s creation. We are not beings operating in a vacuum, separate from everyone and everything else. We are a part of God’s living community. Millenia ago, the Hebrew writers of the Psalms expressed the same truth when they sang Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. Sometimes the truth of God sneaks up on us via someone of another religion so that we might rediscover the truth of our own. Grace and Peace, Rev. Chase Peeples Glory to God, who is able to do far beyond all that we could ask or imagine by his power at
work within us; glory to him in the church and in Christ Jesus for all generations, forever and always. Amen. --Ephesians 3:20-21 CEB At the end of the third chapter in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians, the author offers a prayer for the audience of the letter. The prayer gains in force and scope, as if the author gets carried away, and ends with a crescendo of a declaration that God “is able to do far beyond all that we could ask or imagine by his power at work within us.” Those are strong words. Are they true? In some sense, my almost 20 years in full-time ministry and the ten years prior in education and part-time ministry have all been a wager that words like the ones at the end of Ephesians 3 are true. In my career, I’ve largely found evidence to the contrary. Church fights, hypocrisy, poor leadership, focus on the wrong priorities, and churches that function as social clubs rather than faith communities have at times made me cynical. Perhaps, the most dispiriting part of being a minister is seeing church people, for some reason, supporting an institution while at the same time refusing to believe it will accomplish anything of importance. The low expectations of church folks always astound me. I often wonder why people so fearful of shrinking budgets and pining for the glory days of old even bother to show up at church. It’s no wonder most of our culture has moved on. Who wants to be a part of a group so determined to fail? Yet, I believe in God, so I can’t let go of promises like the ones in Ephesians 3. Deep down I believe that God is aching to “do far beyond all that we could ask or imagine by his power at work with in us.” I imagine God unmoved by our collective shrugs still looking for an opening to pour that power into us in order to do more than we ever think possible. I’ve had glimpses of this kind of outbreak of power along the way—moments when people got carried away with their generosity and belief that they were making a difference in the world. Those few glimpses give me hope that I’ll find a group of so-called believers who actually believe God can do something amazing through them. When I talk with leaders of a congregation, I like to ask them about the history of their churches. In many cases, there is little to tell regarding membership numbers or the various ministers who served there. Yet, sometimes churches tell amazing stories of generosity and grace. One church started an after-school program in a housing project after MLK was assassinated that continues to this day and has grown to help kids raised in that project break out of generational poverty. Another church was active during the HIV/AIDS crisis and helped start their city’s first hospice for people with the disease. Another church welcomed in a refugee community and began holding multi-lingual worship services so their American-born members and the refugees could worship together as one church. Those stories exist if you look for them. No matter what the churches look like in the present, somewhere back in their DNA, God did something “beyond what we could ask or imagine.” Park Hill Christian Church has some good spiritual DNA. There’s no denying that in the past people in this church got a little carried away by God’s “power at work within us.” There are stories of generosity given to people in need and ministries that started small with an idea but blossomed into something big. It’s all there in your DNA. Two weeks ago, I visited S.P.E.A.C. (Southern Platte Emergency Assistance Center) in the lower level of Parkville Presbyterian Church. I was greatly impressed with its operation and reach. Then I learned that S.P.E.A.C began here at PHCC in Meade Hall. It changed location because it outgrew our space! I heard about the inspiring work of Helen Wright and how PHCC volunteers have served at the food pantry every week and on the board for 31 years! That’s a pretty amazing story—and it’s not your only one. My question for PHCC is do you only believe that God worked back then through PHCC or is God capable of working in some kind of similar way here in the present as well? It’s the same God you’ve been worshipping all this time. God didn’t change. What’s keeping you from letting God’s “power at work within us” raise some holy havoc now? After our 40 Days of Prayer and Purpose, the church board approved the idea of Bold Hospitality, sharing our building and resources with the wider community to dramatically represent the way Christ welcomes’ all to share in God’s blessings. Jill Watson, our board chairperson, has already asked for you, the people of PHCC, to begin thinking and praying about needs in our community and the groups at work trying to meet with them. If they need space to meet or carry out their work, PHCC has plenty to share. Who can we partner with—in the same way we partnered with other churches and non-profits to found S.P.E.A.C to make a real difference in the Northland. Do you really believe that God has already given you everything you need to do similarly amazing things again? If not, why not? If you think about it, you’ve already done this kind of thing in the past—S.P.E.A.C. is a great example—all you have to do is actually raise your expectations and trust that God “is able to do far beyond all that we could ask or imagine by his power at work within us.” Grace and Peace, Rev. Chase Peeples The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it,
the world, and those who live in it; --Psalm 24;1 NRSV Most teenagers rebel against their parents by rejecting their parents’ values. Kids of liberal parents try on free market libertarianism. Kids with NRA members for parents sign petitions for gun control. You get the point. I was a weird kid. My form of teenage rebellion was to take my parents’ religion and become so hardcore about it that they worried about me. Let me tell you, when your father is a Southern Baptist minister, you’ve got to take things to extremes to outdo him when it comes to religion. I sought to out-Christian my Christian parents. I would have had a lot more fun, I think, if I had gone the other way. I feel the need to offer a disclaimer here that as Southern Baptists go, my parents weren’t so extreme. No, they didn’t drink alcohol and yes, they went to church all the time, but they didn’t hold to fundamentalist beliefs about God. My parents usually voted Democratic and they supported women’s rights and racial equality. They were by no means radicals, but they were pretty much mainstream for middle class white people. Nonetheless, I fell in with friends in high school who were involved with Youth for Christ, a parachurch organization based in Kansas City. Think Young Life but with a whole lot of sexual shaming, talk about the Second Coming and a strict dualism which didn’t offer middle ground on anything. It was the last thing, the dualism, dividing things up between sacred and secular, Christian and pagan, good and evil that for some reason really appealed to me. In the decades since, therapists have pointed out to me that I tend to fall into the trap of either/or thinking or looking only at extremes. In the short term, such thinking is a handy way to make sense of the world, but in the long run it causes a lot of psychological trouble, because life rarely is so simple. So, I jumped in with both feet into the job of dividing the world into sacred and profane. Secular rock-n-roll was evil, but if they were a part of so-called “Contemporary Christian Music” then it was good. I can remember being really confused by the Irish rock band U2, because three out of the four band members were Christian and so were a lot of their lyrics, but they were on a secular record label. Plus, one year the members of U2 showed up drunk for the Grammys and were a bad Christian witness to my mind. Only later would I come to learn that Christians in Ireland didn’t share the views of teetotaling American evangelicals. Today, U2 remains my favorite band ever (I’ve seen them in concert eight times!), but when I was a teen they confounded my categories of good and evil. I hung out in Christian bookstores devouring the blossoming genre of Christian fiction and lingered over the chotchkes made in China with a Bible verse stamped on them. In my mind, the presence of scripture transformed a crappy bit of plastic into a priceless treasure. The same principle applied to politics, celebrities and even ordinary people. If they quoted a Bible verse or thanked Jesus for helping them win a Super Bowl, that made them good, but if they failed to publicly acknowledge Christ they must be bad. Years later I watched an episode of the animated TV show King of the Hill that addressed my teenage thinking. In it, the central character in the show Hank Hill deals with his son who has begun attending a hipster youth group. When the teens attend a Christian rock concert, Hank tells their youth minister, “Can’t you see you’re not making Christianity better, you’re just making rock n’ roll worse.” So much of what I had labelled Christian and therefore good was merely a bad knock off of secular fads and marketing. Sort of like the cheap crap in the Christian book store, just because somebody or something mentioned Jesus or a Bible verse didn’t make it holy. Perhaps the worst part of the dualistic thinking I held was how very limited I unknowingly understood God to be. By understanding God was present only in the products of the evangelical subculture, I missed out on seeing God everywhere else. My God was very small and utterly predictable. That’s a far cry from the God revealed in scripture who tends to show up in exactly the last place religious people expect (think a manger in Bethlehem or a cross in Jerusalem). When we allow God to be God, there is no telling where and how God might reveal the Divine to us. Things religious people might consider evil, secular or profane might turn out to be messengers of God. If Psalm 24:1 is correct, “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it;” then God can show up anywhere and everywhere. There are folks in our culture gaining power and making money telling believers what is Christian and what is not. Their God looks more like Uncle Sam or a tech billionaire than Jesus of Nazareth. The real question, I guess, is whether or not we are open to seeing God wherever God shows up or if we have closed our minds off to a God who is larger than our preconceived notions. Frederick Buechner has this to say about religious books: There are poetry books and poetic books—the first a book with poems in it, the second a book that may or may not have poems in it, but that is in some sense a poem itself. In much the same way there are religion books and religious books. A religion book is a book with religion in it in the everyday sense of religious ideas, symbols, attitudes, and—if it takes the form of fiction—with characters and settings that have overtly religious associations and implications. There are good religion books like The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne or Wise Blood by Flannery O'Connor, and there are miserable ones like most of what is called "Christian" fiction. A religion book is a canvas. A religious book is a transparency. With a religious book it is less what we see in it than what we see through it that matters. I’d expand Buechner’s idea beyond books into pretty much everything in creation. If something acts as a “transparency” and allows us to “see through it” to God’s love, peace and justice, then it is “religious.” A book, film, YouTube video, meme, TedTalk, sunset, laughing child, the sound of waves on the beach, a crackling fire, the noises a loved one makes arriving home, birdsong in the morning and so much more allow us to “see through them” and to glimpse the Divine gazing back at us with love. If we waste our time deciding between Christian and non-Christian, sacred and secular, we will miss out on much of what God wishes us to experience. Grace and Peace, Chase We know that God works all things together for good for the ones who love God
--Romans 8:28 CEB Things are a bit uneasy around my house these days. My two teenagers are “totally over” the boredom of the pandemic. I never thought they would get tired of video games and YouTube, but even those addictive narcotics have lost their power. They are ready to go back to school, to see their friends, to not be at home and to be away from their parents. Yet, our school system has yet to release an official plan of what will happen when school starts. No matter what plans they make, a likely COVID-19 outbreak at their schools will result in students working remotely from home again. I can already hear the disappointed groans of my teens. I’m hearing a lot of disappointed groans as fall nears. Groans from parents disappointed their kids who are entering college won’t have the normal college experience, even though they are paying through the nose for one. Groans from restaurants and businesses looking at more months of economic uncertainty instead of recovery. Groans of senior adults trapped at home or in their retirement communities. Groans of those fortunate to still have jobs who face an endless parade of ZOOM meetings and struggles to work from home. Most of all, there are the groans of people without access to affordable health care facing the fear of getting sick and the groans of “essential workers” who must risk their lives in underpaying jobs to forestall eviction or worse. Does God hear our groans? Whether we are disappointed teenagers or family members fearing a loved one’s death from COVID-19? Why does God allow the suffering to continue? A few weeks ago, I preached on Romans 8 and shared it is my one of my favorite scriptures because of the hope it offers. I shared my take on Romans 8:28 which is starkly different from interpretations that boil the verse down to “everything happens for a reason.” Sometimes there is a reason for suffering. In the present pandemic, there are lots of reasons things are not getting better, such as a misguided sense of “freedom” which entails individual choice rather than collective responsibility, failure of elected leaders to take unpopular but necessary measures, bureaucratic mismanagement and a healthcare system that puts profits above the common good. Sometimes there are no reasons that we can discern. In the current pandemic, it remains a mystery why some are susceptible to COVID-19 and others are asymptomatic carriers of it. Other times suffering comes because of chaos that by its nature is random and unpredictable. The current hurricane’s unpredictable path illustrates the point. I don’t believe God is behind every action for good and bad. The Bible is quite clear that the rain falls on the righteous and unrighteous alike, and often the wicked prosper while good people suffer. Plus, given the scale of suffering some people endure, if I believe God caused it, then I would question God’s morality. Why God allows suffering remains a mystery. Any reason I’ve heard for it (usually involving some appeal to free will) feels irrelevant in the moment a person experiences suffering. Instead, I interpret Romans 8:28 to mean
Sometimes the good that comes out of bad makes up for the pain, but other times the bad remains bad and we learn wisdom from it. Either way God is at work among the suffering to bring out the best outcome possible under the circumstances, even though God alone may know what all the circumstances are. Despite the promises of TV preachers, God never promises our lives will be free of disappointment and suffering. God does promise to be with us during it, even if we can’t sense God’s presence. God also promises to keep working to bring good out of the bad in our lives. These two promises can give us hope as we face an unknown future with COVID-19. Joan Chittister writes, When tragedy strikes, when trouble comes, when life disappoints us — as it surely will — we stand at the crossroads between hope and despair. To go the way of despair colors the way we look at things, makes us suspicious of the future, makes us negative about the present. It leads us to ignore the very possibilities that could save us, or worse, leads us to want to hurt as we have been hurt ourselves. When I say that I am in despair, I am really saying that I have given up on God. Despair says that I am God and if I can't do anything about this situation, then nothing and nobody can. To go the way of hope, on the other hand, takes life on its own terms, knows that whatever happens God lives in it, and expects that, whatever its twists and turns, it will ultimately yield its good to those who live it consciously, to those who live it to the hilt. God does hear our groans, big and small, and God is at work to bring all the possible good out of our current circumstances living with the realities of COVID-19. Trust God, even if you’re having trouble sensing God’s presence. Stick with hope until we are through this time of disappointment. Grace and Peace, Chase |
AuthorWe're Park Hill Christian Church in KC MO. We seek to follow Jesus by praising God, loving those we meet and serving the vulnerable. Archives
June 2021
Categories |