So What's an unConference?

If you follow along on our Presbytery's Facebook page or Twitter feed you'll have noticed that I spent the first part of last week at what was called UNCO14.  I wrote about that a bit in this space last Monday, but, now that I've experienced it, I'd like to share some more.

Rather than being focused on one particular speaker or one particular theme, an unConference is simply a gathering of folks from across the country who come together with a passion for Christ and for the Church to talk about issues that are of burning importance.  It is a time to share dreams, to express fears, to envision new things, to discover new resources, to draw upon the experiences of folks from around the Church.  And there were not just Presbyterians there!  Folks from the United Church of Christ, the United Methodist Church, the American Baptist Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, and the Episcopal Church attended... as well as an independent, charismatic pastor who is leading a new church development with her husband, and a Unitarian Universalist pastor.  It was a rich and diverse mix.

When we gathered together, we worshiped, and then we were invited to go and write on a large piece of paper whatever it was that was most pressing for us that we'd like to explore with others.  The result looked like this...

The group's conveners then suggested how some of those topics might be grouped together for discussion, and we spent most of the next two days in small groups exploring new ways to be, and to do, Church.  It was exciting to be in a place that encouraged the free-flow of dreams and conversations.  Over the five years that UNCO's have been being held, a total of twenty new ministries have been started!

This time got me wondering about our own Presbytery.  What would it look like if we gathered for an unMeeting?  We've decided to limit our formal, stated meetings to two a year, with the hopes that other gatherings would spring up.  That hasn't happened yet, but what about doing something like this?  What would it feel like to gather together with no set docket, no motions to make and second, no business to do?  What might the Holy Spirit birth within us if we simply gathered to dream and envision, to pray with and support one another, to explore new ways in which Christ might be calling us to share the Gospel?  And if we did something like this, what would you write on the paper; what would you most like to explore with others?

Those of us who are ordained to the ministries of the Church have vowed to serve the people with "energy, intelligence, imagination, and love."  All of us have dreams about what we'd like to experience in the Church.  Would you be willing to share your dream with others and explore where God might be leading us all?  It's worth considering, don't you think?

Busy-ness and praying?

St. Paul called us to "pray always," or "pray without ceasing."  The Orthodox tradition of the Jesus Prayer as a guide for praying continually is helpful, but I don't always remember to use that.  (If you are not familiar with that particular spiritual tradition among our Orthodox brothers and sisters, and if you'd like to know more, just holler; I'd love to talk with folks about that.)  So living into an attitude of prayer is something that I continue to find myself needing more and more.  It's ironic, isn't it, to think that finding/making time for prayer is something that a "Church person" needs to do more of?  And yet I confess it freely... knowing that I am most assuredly not alone in this need.

Whether working in and for the Church, or working somewhere else, or going to school, or living into retirement, most all of us have busy lives filled with too many things, too many appointment, too many worries, too many distractions from the spiritual life.  In his wonderful and challenging book, The Contemplative Pastor, Eugene Peterson wrote these words.  Now, he was writing to pastors, but I think it applies to most all of us.

"It takes time to develop a life of prayer: set-aside, disciplined, deliberate time. It isn't accomplished on the run... I know I can't be busy and pray at the same time.  I can be active and pray; I can work and pray; but I cannot be busy and pray.  I cannot be inwardly rushed, distracted, or dispersed.  In order to pray I have to be paying more attention to God than to what people are saying to me; to God than to my clamoring ego."

I'm going to be working again to make the time to pray... even, or perhaps especially, as I work.  Work and prayer are not mutually exclusive; quite the contrary.  The key, I believe, is being consciously aware of God's presence within us, working through us, in the lives of others we meet, in the splendor of creation.  Care to join in this endeavor?

Just imagine...

Several years ago I attended a two-day seminar led by Dr. John McClure, who now is the Charles G. Finney Professor of Preaching and Worship at Vanderbilt University Divinity School.  He talked with us about his then-recently published book, Roundtable Preaching: Where Preaching and Leadership Meet.  In that book he proposes a unique way to make sermon writing a collaborative effort between pastor and members of the congregation.  It is a fascinating idea, and one that I utilized for a couple of years with a rotating group of members of the church I served at the time as pastor.  One of the unique methods he describes is working together to look at a biblical passage and try to envision the broader picture of the passage:

·      whose voices do we hear?

·      whose voices are not lifted up in the passage?

·      who might have been standing on the edges of the scene?

·      what might they have been thinking or saying?

·      what might we say if we were there?

It was a wonderful and powerful prescription that helps one really delve into a biblical story.  It never failed to help me find new insights about a passage.

Especially this week - which we in the Church have come to recognize as an especially Holy Week - what do we see, really see, in the events of Jesus' Passion?

·      What did Jesus and the disciples do the afternoon and evening after the entry into Jerusalem?

·      What kinds of things did they talk about?

·      How thick was the tension in conversations on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and the hours before they gathered for the Passover meal?

·      What side talks were going on during that meal?

·      What would we have been doing on that Friday?

·      How much despair would we have felt on Saturday?

·      And would we have believed the women who came with their improbable, preposterous news of early Sunday morning?

This is the high drama week of the liturgical year, because the events of this week were quite literally about life and death.  Let us be faithful in walking with Jesus and the disciples this week... and let us do so with our minds, our hearts, our spirits, our imaginations, and our faith wide open to all that happens.

Where are our Easter practices?

Today is the second day in the seven-week-long season of Easter in the life of the Church. Although every Sunday is a "little Easter" (which is why there are Sundays in Lent, not Sundays of Lent), this is the beginning of the longest special season of the liturgical year. In her book, To Dance with God: Family Ritual and Community Celebration, Gertrude Mueller Nelson shares a story about something her family did each Monday after Easter.

"So it is right and proper that we celebrate the days of Easter with joy.  I will admit to having kept my children out of school on Easter Monday for years.  The school holidays before Easter were steeped in preparations and anticipation.  Now we needed time for rejoicing. I think the children liked that Monday holiday especially; it was so unlike us to take a 'well day' off work and school.

"When the children were small we would plan to meet another family or two, usually by the marsh waters near our home. That was the favorite Easter Monday picnic place... Always we got wet. We learned about the traditions of getting wet on Easter Monday first from a favorite children's book which we have read and reread for years especially at Eastertime. The Good Master by Kate Seredy tells of an Hungarian family, and the accounts of their Easter celebrations caught our interest.  On Easter Monday, the young boys of Hungarian villages went from house to house, and wherever young girls lived, they came up to the door, recited a blessing and then splashed the girls with water. The girls in turn invited them in and everyone feasted on Easter specialities, and the girls gave the boys some of their carefully painted eggs to take home.  On Easter Tuesday they replayed the whole game in reverse."

The days before Easter are, indeed, filled with "preparations and anticipation," aren't they?  They are days of retelling the ancient stories, days of drama, days of mixed emotions, days that seem to drag out until Easter morning.  But what about the days (and weeks) after Easter? Do you have any special traditions that you observe? We don't... and it makes me wonder why?  After all, we Christians believe that everything has changed because of the Easter message!  Why wouldn't we have our own traditions to continue the wonder, joy, and celebrations?

¡Cristo ha resucitado!

Christos anesti!

Christus ist auferstanden!

Le Christ est ressuscité!

Cristo ressuscitou!

Tá méadú tagtha ar Críost!

Christ is Risen!

Spanish, Greek, German, French, Portuguese, Irish, or English... It makes no difference. The meaning is the same, and the world was forever changed by its truth.  Let's find some ways to continue the celebration!

Sabbath Thoughts

When I was serving as the pastor of a congregation, I worked very hard to take my day off every week.  Over the years, Friday became the day that seemed to work best for this.  To be sure, the occasional wedding rehearsal or funeral would push into that day off, but otherwise I tried to keep that day sacrosanct.

Several years ago, however, someone asked a question that still causes me to pause and consider.  A group of us teaching elders were talking about taking our day off each week, when one of our group looked at us and said, "Well, I take Thursday as my day off, and Friday as my sabbath."  She said that so matter-of-factly that it took me a while to have the implications of her words sink in for me.  I realized then that a "day off" is not necessarily the same as "sabbath."

Theologian and rabbi, Abraham Heschel, in his old (1951) book, The Sabbath, Its Meaning for Modern Man (sic), offered these words about the sabbath:

"The meaning of the Sabbath is to celebrate time rather than space.  Six days a week we live under the tyranny of things of space; on the Sabbath we try to become attuned to holiness in time.  It is a day on which we are called upon to share in what is eternal in time, to turn from the results of creation to the mystery of creation; from the world of creation to the creation of the world..."

These weeks of Easter in the Church's life remind us that in the Resurrection of Jesus, God broke the normal patterns for time and space.  What better time might we be offered than to use these Easter weeks to reflect on how we spend our time in the midst of our busy lives in an overly-frenetic world?  What does it really mean to observe some time each week (each day?) as Sabbath time?

As I indicated, I still struggle with this.  Perhaps you do, too.  May the Lord of the Sabbath help us find ways to hallow the times in our lives.

Heaven, Hell, Questions

I remember years and years ago engaging in those kinds of debates that have been going on for as long as the Church has been around:

·      Will everyone go to heaven?

·      Is there really a hell?

·      Will people who don't believe in Jesus get to heaven?

·      If God is love, how could anyone be sent to hell?

You know the debates?  I thought you might.  And I think those kinds of questions are important ones to think through, to wrestle with, to consider, to discuss with others.  When we do that, we focus and clarify our own beliefs about God, about love, about grace, about forgiveness, about eternity.  That's important - even vital - to do.

However, of course, we never will fully answer those questions.  Why?  Well, they are questions about eternity, and we're still on this side of the proverbial "veil." And also, we're not God!  It is God who is both Judge and Redeemer, Creator and Savior, Comforter and Lord.  And I'm normally content to leave all such questions to the competent and gracious care of the Almighty!

So no, I don't know definitively about all the implications of what it means to say, for example, that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life (John 14:6).  But what I do know is that Jesus is the Way, Truth, and Life for me... and I have my hands full trying to be the person God created me to be, the person whom Jesus loved and for whom Jesus died and rose, the person whom the Spirit called at my baptism and strengthens me each day.  I can't bother spending my time worrying about everyone else's journey through life; I can only be faithful myself, and reach out in love, witness, compassion, and service to others about how Christ has affected my life.

I love how W.H. Auden wrote about this in his Collected Poems (ed. by Edward Mendelson, Random House, 1976):

"He is the Way.

Follow Him through the Land of Unlikeness,

You will see rare beasts and have unique adventures.

He is the Truth.

Seek Him in the Kingdom of Anxiety;

You will come to a great city that has expected your return for years.

He is the Life!

Love Him in the World of the Flesh;

And at your marriage all its occasions shall dance for joy."

What I know is that Jesus Christ is Lord of the world.  What I know is that Jesus Christ is my Lord, too.  And what I know is that Jesus Christ still lives, which our journey through these continuing weeks of Easter reminds us.  So I still sing for joy at the Easter acclamation:  Christ is Risen!  He is risen, indeed!  Alleluia!

Lent and the cross

A little over two weeks ago I traveled to Union Theological Seminary in New York City to participate in the Synod of the Northeast's "Summit on Race."  During the morning session, we had the opportunity to listen to a lecture by Dr. James Cone. Cone became well known - and quite controversial - with the publication in 1969 of his first book, Black Theology and Black Power.  Although he views that book as pivotal for him, he feels that his most recent book is the most important book he has written.  He believes that he has been working on this book all of his life, and it took him 20 drafts to get it to its final form.  His book, which participants in the Summit read beforehand, is entitled The Cross and The Lynching Tree.  His contention is that Christians, especially white Christians in this country, cannot look at Jesus hanging on the cross without seeing the parallels with all of the black Americans who were hung on trees from the Civil War well into the 20th century.

Cone believes that the true power of the Christian gospel is its unambiguous call of liberation from oppression.  Until we can see the cross and the lynching tree together, until we can identify Christ with the re-crucified black body hanging from the lynching tree, there can be no deliverance from the brutal legacy of slavery and white supremacy.  Just as the German people have had to work hard to come to grips with what happened during the rise of the Nazis, just as both black and white South Africans have had to work hard to come to grips with what happened during apartheid, so our country will never be healed from the legacy of slavery and lynchings until we work hard ourselves to acknowledge this terrible heritage and to address continuing vestiges of racism in this country.  (For example, there are more black people in prison in this country today than there were slaves in 1850!)

There were nearly 5,000 African American men, women, and children who were lynched since the time of the Civil War.  Many descendants of those people still wrestle with the implications of what happened to their family members.  And it is in the cross that so many African Americans have found hope and salvation.  After all, the cross inverts the dominant value system, demonstrating that hope comes by way of defeat, that suffering and death do not have the last word.  The cross is God's defeat of power, of white power, of powerless love that snatches victory out of defeat.

We are in the middle of Lent.  The cross is our focus.  So what do we see when we see the cross?  It has been too easy for us to turn the cross into an ornate carving hanging in our sanctuaries.  It has been too easy for us to turn the cross into beautiful pieces of jewelry.  But if that's all we see, we miss the message and we sell short the power - and the challenge - of the cross of Jesus.  The cross stands tall in our world, shouting to all who would hear that the powers of this world are defeated... that the powers of domination are overcome by this symbol of weakness... that the powers of oppression are shattered by this symbol of suffering... that the power of sin in our lives is vanquished by the love that calls us, claims us, and envelopes us from the cross.

So what do you see when you look at the cross of Jesus Christ our Lord?

Thoughts Along the Journey: Lenten Spiritual Disciplines

Thoughts Along the Journey: Lenten Spiritual Disciplines: The Church traditionally has invited us to engage in three different spiritual disciplines during this ongoing season ...

Lenten Spiritual Disciplines

The Church traditionally has invited us to engage in three different spiritual disciplines during this ongoing season of Lent:  prayer, giving, and fasting.  My wife, Caroline, reminded me of a piece that she received years ago from a pastor, giving his perspective on fasting and feasting during Lent.  He wrote it in the form of a prayer, and I'd share it with you here for your own reflections.

In this season of Lent, there are opportunities for us to look again at who we are, to make changes in our lives, because we are reminded that you are able to resurrect us into a new life, and our part in that is to let go of the old things, the old ways, the habits that are so unlovely. We are called this season to fast from those things and we listen to your Spirit as you tell us in the language of love that we should...

fast from worry and feast on divine order, by trusting in you God;

fast from complaining, and feast on appreciation

fast on the negatives in life, and feast on the affirmations.

Help us to fast from unrelenting pressures, and feast on unceasing prayer;

to fast from hostility and feast on nonresistance,

to fast from bitterness and  feast on forgiveness.

Help us God to fast from self-concern and to feast on compassion for others,

to fast from the shadows of sorrow and to feast on the sunlight of serenity.

Remind us, God, to fast from idle gossip, and to feast instead on purposeful silence,

To fast from judging others, and feast on the Christ within them.

During this season we want to fast from the emphasis on differences,

and feast on the unity in life,

to fast from apparent darkness, and feast on the reality of light,

to fast from thoughts of illness, and feast on the healing power of you, God,

to fast from words that pollute, and feast on phrases that purify.

Help us to fast from discontent, and to feast on gratitude

During this season, and for all seasons,

we want to fast from anger and feast on optimism,

to fast from personal anxiety, and feast on eternal  truth,

to fast from discouragement and feast on hope,

to fast from all the facts in this world that depress us,

and feast on those truths that uplift us.

Dear God in this season, help us to fast from all the thoughts that tell us we are less than who we really are, and to feast on the truth of your love that calls us as your beloved children.

And in this season, as in all the seasons to come, God, we ask you to help us to fast from fear, and to feast on love.

A Prayer on Mother's Day

Years ago, a colleague, the Rev. Georgiana Kugle, shared with our lectionary study group a prayer that she had found, and said that she used it in worship each Mother's Day.  I found it so meaningful that I have used it since.  I will not be leading worship this Sunday, but I thought I'd share it here.  (Inspired by this, I wrote a similar prayer that I have used on Father's Day.  I'll share that when that day approaches.)

A Prayer on Mother’s Day

Most Holy and Eternal God, your love is from everlasting to everlasting.  We put our faith and our hope in you.

This day we approach you mindful of the world in which we live.  In this country and in many others, mothers are being remembered and celebrated, families being honored and recognized.  Our prayer today is for the joys and sorrows this day brings.

For those who have mothers they dearly love, may we take time today to appreciate the gifts and graces that have come to us through her.

For those whose mother is dearly loved but no longer living, may we take time to remember the gifts and graces that have come to us through her.

For those who have recently lost or who are facing the imminent loss of their own dear mothers, may they find comfort in their grief, hope in their despair, courage in the love they have received.

We give thanks, gracious God, for these good mothers who gave us birth.  We give thanks for the families who have and who do sustain and support us in our living, and who love us no matter what!

We pray, compassionate God, for those whose mother has been a source of hurt and pain, for all those for whom one or more members of their family has caused them to suffer.  May they find refuge in your love.  May their wounds be healed.  May they find in you, in us, and in others the nurturing, sustaining love that is needed for their growth and well-being.

We give thanks to you, O God, for all those who, responding to the difficult lives of others, have stepped in to become surrogate mothers; for those who, in the absence of our own mothers, for whatever reason, have stepped into our lives providing the guidance and stability, the nurture and the love needed.

We remember single mothers and fathers who struggle to be both parents to their children – to provide all the emotional, physical and spiritual needs without the constant support of a spouse. May they find the strength, the courage and wisdom for their task.

Look now, loving God, upon all those who are mothers – biologically or by the role they play in the lives of others.  May they remember what precious treasures children are.

We join all mothers everywhere in praying that their children may be a joy and a blessing.

We pray for those mothers who have been hurt, disillusioned, or disappointed in their role as mother.

We pray for those who have been denied a longed-for chance at motherhood, and for those whose years of mothering have been cut short by the loss of a child.  We turn to you, most holy God, knowing and trusting that you offer consolation that seems impossible.  May these receive comfort for their soul, and peace and hope for living, that their gifts may not be denied to others.

Hear our prayers this day, O God, and give to us such assurance of your love that your love may spill forth from us into the lives of others; through Jesus Christ our Lord we pray.  Amen.

(A Mother’s Day Prayer composed by the Rev. M. Gayle MacDonald for use in worship.  Shared with a lectionary group by the Rev. Georgiana Kugle, Omaha, Nebraska.)