Apophatica

Everyone has “that” guy in their class.  I say guy, because it usually is a male.  He is there in every single class.  He may be a different person, but he’s always there.  You know who I mean.  That guy who always has to make a comment about something.  It is as if he just likes to hear the sound of his own voice or has no filter to keep his mouth shut.  He will ask a question that he already knows (or thinks he knows) the answer to.  Then, when the teacher gives the answer, he will invariably commend the teacher for his or her answer and add his own opinion.  I’m tempted to insert a sample dialogue here, but just think of any class you have been in and you will remember “that” guy – unless you are that guy, that is . . . 🙂

Jesus encounters this guy in Mark 12:28-34 in the form of a scribe who is perhaps testing Jesus or just wanting to give himself an opportunity to show off his knowledge.  “Which commandment is the greatest of all?”  After Jesus explains that the greatest commandment to be trumped by no other is loving God and then loving your neighbor, the scribe fulfills his role nicely and commends Jesus for his astutely erudite answer.  But then, Jesus throws the curve ball.  Jesus very well could have been complimenting the scribe here, but I think he was making a point – “You are not far from the Kingdom of God.”  Well said grasshopper, but you’re still a little short.  Close, but no cigar.  Just like those who Jesus had encountered in the previous couple chapters in Mark, there was something lacking.  Something kept the inquirer from having it all figured out.

Before every season, that famed coach who used to lead some team up north, what’s his name again?  Oh yeah, Vince Lombardi would hold up a football and say to the team, “This is a football.”  That’s it.  Plain and simple.  He was talking to a team of players who had practically been born with a football in their hands.  These guys had played football since they were old enough to stand on their own two feet and Lombardi was telling them something so obvious that it could have been insulting.  But that is the point.  Lombardi wanted this team to understand that it is the obvious things that win games.  It is the simple fundamentals that get you to glory.  Head to the outside when you tackle.  When you block, it’s middle, inside, linebacker.  When you are playing corner, your responsibilities are to defend the receiver, then contain the outside, then go to the middle for the tackle.  And so on.

This same penchant for missing the obvious is what Jesus was talking about to the scribe.  He in essence stood in front of this man and pointed at himself and said, “This is love.”  It wasn’t good enough that the scribe understood intellectually what the commandments were.  He actually had to do them.  But Jesus was saying something even more profound than this.  He was saying that if you embody love to those around you, the kingdom of God will be right here!  We spend a lot of time with our heads tilted to the sky waiting for Jesus to come back and make everything better.  But we miss the obvious. When Jesus stood right here on this earth he told us, love one another and embody that love and the kingdom will already be here.

This Sunday we celebrate All Saint’s Day.  It is said that St. Nicholas was a great example of what it looked like to embody love.  In the time that St. Nicholas lived in the fourth and fifth centuries, it was common for the father of a daughter to pay a dowry to a suitor so that he would marry his daughter.  The higher the dowry, the more likely the daughter find a husband.  If a daughter did not find a husband, she would have to be sent in to slavery. One story says that there was a man who had three daughters.  The man was very distraught every day when the third daughter finally reached marrying age because none of his daughters were married and being a poor cobbler, he did not make enough money making and selling shoes to come up with a dowry for one daughter, let alone all three.  It is said that St. Nicholas, then the Bishop of this area of Turkey, secretly left three bags of gold in the shoes of this old cobbler so that his daughters would have a dowry and not be sent into slavery.  He placed these bags of gold anonymously expecting nothing in return.  He just did it because he had love for other people.

Is this story true?  Did it really happen?  I don’t think it matters.  We are smart enough to know that acts of selfless love can bring a little bit of heaven right here on earth.  The only problem is . . . where are the saints?  Who do we turn to as the world around us sometimes seems to be falling apart?  Where are these saints who will make the Kingdom of God appear before us?  See the reflection in your computer monitor as you read this?  See the face looking back at you?  Yep, you get my point.  Let’s go out and be saints to those around us because we have a love that is so deep and so strong that it oozes from our pores and we can’t contain it.  I guess there is still hope for this world . . .

When growing up in the United Methodist Church, I heard numerous liturgies every Sunday.  I thought these liturgies were not only boring, but had nothing to do with me.  These were the antiquated words of long-dead patristic leaders who had no idea about what I needed or how my prayers should be worded.  After I left the church for a number of years, I came back with a new theology and a new appreciation for liturgy.  It was ironic that, although my theology had become more progressive, my appreciation for liturgy and ritual was heightened.  I had grown to see liturgy as the words of a community who had similar needs and an occasional common lack of words for prayer.

For me, liturgy has become a way of creating sacred space amidst the ordinary.  Since we do not know exactly what God is or what God’s essence is, we are left to our imaginative devices.  One image I have of God is a deep dark lake that sometimes engulfs us, sometimes fills us, and sometimes is near us.  Liturgy then, as I see it, is like blowing on the surface of that body of water with the hope that the ripples will spread and have a positive effect, all the way longing for even a single drop to come up and touch us.

God being the mystery that God is, it is sometimes difficult to know what to say to such a God.  It is hard to know how to craft a liturgy that speaks to such a God and experience that God.  Living in an age of post-Christendom where many people do not feel that going to church is a necessity and deny the trinitarian theology of their youth, how can we still help people experience God through liturgy?  I think that we have the need for a progressive liturgy that touches people even today.  Many churches, such as the large non-denominational evangelical churches, have done away with liturgy and come to see it as irrelevant for people today.  I disagree.  I think that we should write a liturgy that reflects our beliefs, therefore helping us to experience God in honesty and depth.  Stay tuned for some of those liturgies . . .

We have a theology pub that gets together once a month to enjoy good beer or tea (whichever the preference) and talk about theology.  Anyone who comes to the group must have the understanding that we are not proselytizing or criticizing others for their beliefs.  Rather, we are engaging in conversation as respectful people who genuinely want to learn from one another.  Unfortunately, there has been one who could not bring herself to do this and attacked the group for entertaining any other views than her theology.  For the most part though, we have been able to have great discussions with the understanding that we cannot always agree with one another, but we will always respect one another.

We do not have to look far to find areas where a little compassion could go a long way.  Fatherless children, families living on the street, kids without food to eat, and the list goes on.  Who is better equipped than the church to help these people and who has more of a directive to help these people than the church?  I seem to recall Jesus saying something about loving our neighbors, clothing the naked, freedom for the oppressed, and doing for the “least of these”.  Unfortunately, too many pastors are more focused on having the “right” theology than doing what Jesus did.  What would it look like if we just got over ourselves and face the fact that we will never agree on everything, but that’s ok?  What could we accomplish together if we set aside our pride and desire to be right for the sake of doing what Jesus did instead of asserting our ownership over who Jesus was?  Maybe I’m too much of an idealist . . .  What say you?

A few days ago, as my youngest son was heading in to the house after helping with some fall cleaning outside, he stopped and was staring at something. There was a dead bird lying on the ground in front of our neighbor’s house.  He asked my wife to bring him a pair of gloves.  She told him to just leave the bird alone because he had no idea how it died or what kind of diseases it may have.  He kept persisting and said that he really needed a pair of gloves so that he could give it a proper burial.  Great kid, right?  He’s got such a warm and caring heart.  She asked him why he was so insistent on burying the bird.  He proceeded to explain to her that, if he was kind enough to bury the bird and give it a small headstone and maybe say a few words over it that the bird might come back down the road as a person and give him something in return and make him rich.  This is a popular theme in Japanese fairy tales when a poor, usually older couple who can barely make ends meet, help an injured animal that eventually dies and later comes back to give them riches. When she started telling me this story I thought, “Awww, that’s my boy.”  By the time she was done, I was like, “Yep, that’s my boy.”

Everybody aspires to something.  I can’t imagine that there are many people who just go through life completely aimlessly with no particular rhyme nor reason.  Most of us grow up wanting to be great in our own way and the most common vision of greatness comes in the form of leadership.  CEO, president, general, whatever the organization, few people aspire to stay at the bottom of the totem pole.  But why is this?  What’s their motivation for wanting to get to the top?  Undoubtedly, some start with a noble vision of affecting change for the good of humanity, but I would venture to say that for the majority of folks aspiring for the C-suite, it is just a matter of pride.

The clergy/priesthood is no exception in this regard.  Priests ordained in great cathedrals likely aspire to be cardinals some day and even in many protestant churches, men and women dream of some day being bishop.  Even in some non-denominational churches pastors will plant a church with the goal of some day being the next Joel Osteen or Bill Hybels.  Oftentimes, while a few token efforts are made, there is a complete disregard for the needs of people.  At worst (and yes, this happens, too), pastors of some mega churches will feed on the needs of the hurting and oppressed to help them build their ecclesiastical empires.  There is a pervading mindset in any area or industry of, “What’s in it for me?” and unfortunately, the church is not above this.  Sometimes another’s pain or loss is used by people to their own advantage. Even Jesus’ own disciples are not above being overly concerned for numero uno.

In Mark 10, Jesus and the disciples are heading in to Jerusalem and I picture a sort of child-like excitement on the part of the disciples almost like going up the yellow brick road to Oz.  “We’re going to Jerusalem, woo hoo!”  But Jesus corrects them and says, “You do realize that this is no vacation.  When we get there I’m going to be handed over to the authorities, mocked, spit at, tortured, and killed, but on the third day I will rise.”  And then this is the best part, James and John say, “Wow, that’s a bummer.  Yeah, that’s really rough.  Oh hey, by the way, we want you to do something for us.”  “And what would that be?”  “Well, we were thinking, you know, you could do us a solid and let us sit on either side of you in your glory.”  The very people hand picked by Jesus shrug off the fact that he is about to be killed and focus instead on what they can get out of the situation.

Jesus of course has a comeback because throughout the gospels, people can’t seem to take the hint that you just don’t ask Jesus questions because he will never fail to be a buzzkill.  “Can you drink the cup that I drink?”  We can see the way Jesus evolves in the gospels by the way he asks the question.  In Matthew, when James and John’s mother ask Jesus to let them be at his right and left, he asks them if they can drink the cup that he is about to drink.  In Mark, it is the cup that Jesus already drinks.  It’s easy then to read the Matthew version and see this as Jesus talking about his crucifixion and death.  I think Mark is more accurate, however.  Jesus tells James and John that these seats at his right and left are reserved for those who deserve them and he cannot just give them away at random.  Those who occupy those seats will deserve them because they drink the cup that Jesus drinks – devoting themselves as servants for the good of other humans.  The rulers that they are used to – the Gentile Roman rulers – rub it in and treat their subordinates like dirt.  But you, if you want to be great, if you want to consider yourselves my people, you will serve others with no thought of praise or notoriety.

This is a great example of servant leadership.  Jesus shows the disciples that to be a great leader, you have to have something worth leading for.  Not personal fame.  Not your own prosperity.  Instead, to be a great leader, you have to be a servant who is willing to set your own ambitions and pride aside for the good of others.

In 1891 a young Indian man graduated law school in England and moved back to his home country.  Not being able to get work, he moved to South Africa and was on track to become a rather successful attorney.  During one of his cases he attempted to get it settled out of court and was successful in doing so.  This case would change the course of the young man’s life because he said he had learned the true practice of law because he had seen the better side of human nature and the good that lies within the human heart.  He decided to dedicate his life to solving major problems by appealing to the good side of human nature and bringing about peace amidst conflict without fighting in a practice that came to be known as non-violent resistance.

He moved back to India which was under British occupation and rule.  After many years, his servant-like leadership proved successful when the British finally gave up and  in 1947 left India.  This man chose to give up the fame and wealth that lay certain in front of him.  He could have pursued politics and potentially amassed an army to try driving out the British.  Instead, he chose to be like the least of these and led from the trenches.  The result was victory without bloodshed.  Well, almost.  This great servant leader was assassinated a year later when trying to use the same tactics to bring about peace between the Hindus and the Muslims.  On the day of his death, for the first time ever for a non-political figure, nations around the world lowered their flags to half mast for the man who was known as Mahatma, meaning “great soul.”  He had taught the world what it looked like to be a true leader.  Having never owned a great corporate empire nor governed a great nation, Mahatma Gandhi had found something worth leading for – the well-being of the human race.

I see that same spirit at IUCC.  This is why I’m proud to be here.  I am NOT in the business of putting down other churches and other denominations because beyond a doubt, there are some churches in all denominations that are doing wonderful things for the people in God’s great creation.  What I AM in the business of doing though is looking around at this congregation and smiling with pride because we are a church that serves God’s people, not because there is necessarily something in it for us, but because we live by the example that Jesus set and because it’s just the right thing to do.

Religion is a frustrating thing.  Sometimes it can be like Ground Hog Day when the day is really bad.  Sometimes, though, it can be a beautiful thing.  I think it is up to us which experience we take away from it.  At the apex of the Christian religion is a God that is taught about, learned about, read about, but not always experienced.  This God is placed within a particular intellectual framework depending upon the practitioner.  Events that transpire and objects that are encountered outside of the allowable realm of God’s work or character are perceived as ordinary, mundane, or at the extreme – cruel.  For example, if our theology holds that God rules the universe from a place above the clouds and has complete control over everything that happens in the temporal realm, then that God is responsible for even the “bad stuff” that happens to us and those around us.  If we see God as this amazing and magnificent personage that only works in big ways, then we will miss the Divine when it is in something ordinary like the sun shining through the trees or a towering mountain.

In Peter Rollins’ book, Orthodox Heretic, he has a familiar parable with an interesting twist.  In The Prodigal Father, one late night, the sons realize that their father is gone.  They live in a great mansion and the father is a very rich man.  Much like the original parable, the oldest son remains on the estate and is a very bitter man.  The youngest son leaves with his inheritance to spend and drown away his sorrows for his missing father and comes back empty handed to find that his father is still gone.  As I read that story, it occurred to me that father may very well have been nearby and never in fact have left.  What if the father changed from his Armani suit, Burberry cufflinks, Fendi necktie, and Ferragamo shoes into overalls and worked the property as a hired hand? This would mean that the father was right there with them all the while, but because they perceived their rich powerful father to be one certain way, they could not even recognize him when he was in a different form.  This is not to paint God as a father figure, but merely to say that we do the same with God.  I believe that God appears to us every day, but we fail to see God because we cannot conceive of the Divine being in the ordinary.

A friend of mine who we’ll call Dave was leaving his church where he is a pastoral intern when a homeless man walked in the door and asked if there were any funds available.  The man explained that he had to take a train to the nearest naval base.  It did not occur to Dave that the man may have been speaking of the Great Lakes Naval Base, but the man’s story sounded fishy to him, so he sent the man on his way explaining that he did not have any money to give and did not have access any church money.  Dave got in his car and headed for home when the car stalled out at the stop light around the corner from the church.  He panicked because he was in the middle of traffic in downtown Oak Park and had people honking at him to get out of the way.  He opened the hood and not being able to find the cause of the problem was highly anxious when he saw a hand from the corner of his eye reach under the hood and make an adjustment to one of the spark plugs.  Dave looked up and saw the homeless man that he had just turned away.  The man gave him a nod and then proceeded to get into the driver’s seat of my friend’s car.  Dave was thinking that his car was being stolen when the man turned the ignition and the car started right up.  The man got out of the car and walked away.  Dumbstruck, Dave got in his car and drove home.  Did God from his perch on high pull some divine strings and make this happen?  I am not convinced that this is the case.  I think, rather, that God was in the event.  I think the event was not the result of God doing something, but instead a manifestation of Godself.

We spend so much time seeking God, but fail to see God in the ordinary humdrum of daily life because these experiences do not fit our concept of God and how the Divine works.  What if we could see God in a baby’s touch, or in the stars in the sky, or a ray of sunlight through the trees?  Think of great composers who hear music in their heads and then pen that music later to be performed.  Where does this music come from?  Is the performance of this music not a manifestation of the Divine?  If this is hard to imagine, listen to this, or this, or this.  Have you ever seen the sun rise over the Rockies or Mount Moran reflected in Lake Bradley?  Have you ever seen a baby smile up at its father or mother and grasp their finger in its tiny hand?  If we can start seeing God in these seemingly ordinary and mundane things, God will not seem so far away, but will fill the space around us and in us like having a shade lifted from our eyes revealing the sacred world around us.

In his book Telling Secrets, Frederick Buechner talks about his father’s suicide and how under no circumstances was it to be talked about.  Mentioning that his father even existed was verboten not only with “outsiders”, but also within the family.  When he finally did mention it in a book that he wrote, his mother read him the riot act and refused to speak with him for telling the family secrets.  Many families have painful stories, but as Buechner opines, I also think it is healthy to talk about them, or at the very least, acknowledge that they exist.

Each of us is the culmination of all of our stories.  All of the people who have had an impact on our lives contribute in some way to who we are as their stories intersect with ours.  This narrative of existence forms us and whether we admit it or not, shapes the way we see the world.  These stories may be negative or positive, but if we acknowledge them and realize the role the play in our lives, then we can harness the power in them for our own good.

These stories do not just happen at the individual level, but also at the community or cultural level.  One great example is the Exodus story.  Scholars argue over whether or not the Exodus even as recorded in the Bible actually happened or if it did, when it happened.  To me, the facticity of the event does not have any bearing on whether or not it is real.  Even if we are to call the Exodus a myth, I believe it is as a wise person once said – a myth is not something that is untrue, it is something that is so true that it happens every day.  Let’s explore the Exodus story and see.

Do you remember when the Israelites were taken into slavery into Egypt?  If you said “yes”, then you’re thinking of perhaps the Babylonians or the Assyrians because it never happened.  The Israelites under Joseph’s direction went willingly to Egypt because of a famine in the land in which they were living.  After Joseph died, the Israelites were taken as slaves and they ended up being in Egypt for 430 years.  Eventually, Moses was called by God to free the Israelites from their bonds of slavery and lead them in to the promised land.  Negotiation with the pharaoh didn’t go so well and so, after the plagues, the Israelites high-tailed it across the Red Sea (or the Sea of Reeds) and in to the desert.  Then, the went happily ever after in to the promised land, right?  Nope.  They wandered in the desert for 40 years and Moses never did see the promised land.  The Israelites grumbled and moaned about their food and their lodging and argued with God at every chance they got.  They even complained that they would rather be back in Egypt where they could eat.  Finally, because Moses had disobeyed God (remember the whole staff and water from the rock thing?), Joshua was chosen as Moses’ successor.  Things didn’t get much better after that for another 400 years or so, but we’ll leave that for another day.

So, what’s this got to do with us?  Well, isn’t this the story of our lives?  Regardless of whether or not this story actually happened, it still happens and is happening right now.  Have we ever willingly “left home”, so to speak because we thought the grass was greener on the other side and then become enslaved when we realized it wasn’t?  Have we ever, after a difficult battle, tried to go home but just spun our wheels in the same situation or habits?   I’m pretty sure that the answer is “yes” in one way or another.  Some of us are still in the desert.

So, how do we find our ways back home?  For some of us it is as easy as realizing that we are home and embracing the stories in our lives instead of running from them – even the ugly ones.  For others, it begins with trusting that the stories are good and at the very least truly are a part of who we are.  Regardless of where we are at – still in Egypt, wandering in the desert, or back home – there is much to be gained from acknowledging our stories and accepting them as a part of our lives.  Just a thought . . .

Ah, ’tis that time of year again.  The air is cool and crisp, leaves are falling on the ground, and the winter clothes that have been in hibernation since April are making a reappearance.  What’s that you say?  What season do I speak of?  Autumn?  Yom Kippur?  No!  Football season, of course!  It’s only the most frustrating time of the year.  Regardless of the team we root for (Da Bears!) ahem, sorry, we all go through the same process.  Our QB is supposed to be better than over and has worked out his kinks in the offseason.  Our running back is in top shape and ready for another big year.  We have picked up some key receivers and a stud of a linebacker and we can’t be beat!  Until the first game or two, that is.  Then the frustration begins and we wonder why we are contributing to an industry that pays people hundreds of millions of dollars just to drive us crazy.

As most of you know, my sons are also playing football.  Neither one of them are having a very good year.  My oldest is on a team loaded with talent and great coaching, but for some reason just can’t seem to get things going.  Almost every game begins with the same expectation and ends with the same disappointment.  It’s easy to say “it’s just a game”, but when you have a pony in the race, so to speak . . . .

How many other things are there in life that we allow to have control over us?  How many “teams” do we root for that may give us temporary elation, but most of the time just break our hearts?  They may not immediately come to mind, but if we really think about it, there are plenty of cases where we give control to someone else in our lives.  What if we had that much excitement and devotion over being the church?  What if we got as pumped up when helping a person in need as we do when we see the team coming running out on to the field?  Ah yes, good ‘ole priorities.  Sure, the person we help may disappoint us in the end, too, but at least we are doing what we have been called to.

So, should we quit watching sports and stop rooting for our favorite teams?  No way!  Let’s just remember that in the end, it really is “just a game.”  Ok, time to bust out my Urlacher jersey and ready the Pepto-Bismol!

In his book, Telling Secrets, Frederick Buechner aptly says that when Peter said he didn’t know Jesus, he was right.  He said “It was a denial, but it was also the truth.  Peter really did not know who Jesus was, did not really know, and neither do any of us really know who Jesus is either.  Beyond all we can find to say about him and believe about him, he remains always beyond our grasp, except maybe once in a while the hem of his garment.”

Many preachers will tell you that unless you have a “personal relationship” with Jesus or “know” Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, you are doomed to the fires of hell.  This is a pretty tall order to fill.  If we are honest with ourselves, we will admit that most of us do not even know ourselves, let alone Jesus.

As human beings we are wandering nomads.   Most of our identity consists of who we perceive others wanting us to be.  I have recently been consolidating email addresses.  When I realize how many email addresses I had at the time and over the years, it is baffling.  Many of them were from businesses that I “had” (many never much got past the website and advertisement stage) and the rest were accounts that were the name of my aspiring profession at the time.  For example, bengoshi79 (lawyer in Japanese) or kaikei79 (accounting in Japanese).  Yep, you can say I was a regular chameleon.

It takes a lot if time, solitude, meditation, and most of all – honesty, to figure out who we are.  Somewhere deep in our souls there is a place that has clearly written who we are and who we are called to be.  When we try to go in a different direction, we feel the pangs of dissonance because somehow we know that is not who we are.  When we do heed that still small voice, however, we experience that peace that passes all understanding.

I have a Japanese saying held by a magnet on my whiteboard.  It says basically, take who you want to be and subtract it by who you are now.  The difference is the work you still have left to do.  I’d say that pretty much sums things up.  First, we have to find that place inside where the truth resides.  Then, we have to be honest about how much work and of what sort we have to do.  Sometimes we just have to scrap it all and start over.  The good thing is that all of our experiences and the narrative that we have created throughout our life will be useful as we become our true selves.

Oh yeah, and knowing Jesus?  Well, if the only way to know ourselves is to be ourselves, then maybe the only way to know Jesus is to be as much like him as possible.  Maybe with each touch of his hem we can get a little more understanding and move ourselves toward that likeness.  After all, to know ourselves, is to know the one whom we are to strive to become the most like.

When I was growing up, we didn’t have, as they say, a pot to pee in or a window to throw it out of.  My mom tried for the most part, but didn’t make much money and not having my dad around meant that there was little to go around.  In our house, the doors were falling off their hinges, there were holes in the walls, and even a gaping hole in the kitchen floor that was a one-way ticket to the dirt-floored basement below.  Down in the basement there was a wall dug out and since there was a bank behind our house, I thought more than one person must have tried digging in to the bank vault.

Needless to say, I made a vow with myself never to be poor.  So, when I was 12, I started working for my grandfather greasing the zerks on his excavating equipment, measuring grade with the laser, and driving the pickup to job sites while he drove the grader or the turnapole.  Unfortunately, he died that same year, so I began bussing tables and occasionally waiting at the local restaurant.  It was in Ripley’s Believe it or Not for being the only restaurant in the world completely surrounded by railroad tracks.  It burned down when I was 16 and by then I had wheels so I tried the obligatory two week stint working at Mickey-D’s, but I wasn’t really into that.  So, by my senior year, I was working third shift at a truck stop.  I would go to my grandma’s in the morning after work for breakfast and then head up the street to school.  I would get out at 3, do my extracurriculars, meet my girlfriend for a bit, do my homework, and get about 3 hours of sleep before I had to get up and make the 10 mile drive to work.

When I moved to Japan, I had no idea about “brand” goods. Wally World was always good enough for me.  I noticed how other kids would be wearing Gap and Eddie Bauer clothes, but it didn’t get to me too much.  But when I got to Japan, my mother-in-law would buy me Ralph Lauren, Fendi, Coach, Brooks Brothers, and boy was I hooked!  There was no such thing as mediocrity, I had to have the best!  I went to law school, got my MBA, started businesses and started making as much as I could.  Of course when it came time to buy a car, it had to be a Cadillac.  I didn’t so much as allow anyone to sneeze in that car!  But for some reason, I never was happy.  I knew in the back of my mind as I had since I was about 17 that I was supposed to be heading for ministry, but I wanted to make money instead.  Boy, is life different now!

You know how sometimes a goofy thought gets in your head that makes you laugh?  I have this vision of a great way to teach my kids about money and anxiety.  If they assume that the person with the nice Jaguar has no worries, I want to tell them, “Watch this” as I walk up to the car at the gas station holding my key up and tell the driver, “I want to show my kids something.  Don’t worry, I won’t scratch too deep.  I just want to show them that there is a nice thick coat of paint under this top one”  And watch the driver either go ballistic or faint!

As I look back on who I was back then, I can’t help but laugh.  I always thought the more I had, the less worrying I would do because I would want for nothing.  But it wasn’t true.

The more money we get, the less compassionate we are, for the most part.  I recently heard on NPR that the richer people get, the less they donate as a percentage of their income.  People get removed from the lives of the poor.  They hang out with other rich people and live in communities for the rich where they never have to see poor people.  They develop an “us and them” mentality and forget about what it was like when they didn’t have so much.  All compassion is lost, and they become self-absorbed and only concerned with maintaing their wealth.  I’m not saying that the love of money is the root of all evil or any of that kind of misquoted and inaccurate scripture babble.  No, I’m saying that Jesus was teaching a valuable lesson here.  The more stuff we have, the more money we need to maintain it, and therefore the more anxiety that comes as we worry if we are going to have that much money.  We create anxiety when we chase the person whom we aren’t and were never meant to be.

Many times when we come across this passage, we see it as Jesus telling that God will always take care of us and that we should never worry.  Some who preach this text even go as far as to say that it is sinful to worry and not trust God for anything.  Apparently those folks have never lost a child to leukemia or a husband to a drunk driver.  Is Jesus telling us that everything will be hunky dory so don’t fret?  No!  It would have been hypocritical to tell us not to worry about anything.  After all, he is the one who eventually said, “My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?”  We only have to look around us to see suffering.  It’s everywhere.  There will be worries.  There will be anxiety.  Jesus is just telling us in this passage that we don’t have to create any more worry than we already have.  Like the birds of the air and the lilies of the field, just be.  Be satisfied.  Be you.  Don’t worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will take care of itself without adding more to be worried about.

                In 1796, my first ancestor to come to North America, Jacob Mueller, left the Mueller Castle in Prussia at the age of 20 and went to Canada.  He was the son of the King of Prussia and as such, he was required to lead the Prussian army.  At this time that was quite a prestigious task.  Prussia all had but conquered Europe at that time and being the leader of the Prussian army was to rule a good portion of the civilized world.  Jacob had no interest, however, and did not have the taste for war that his father had.  So, he and his brother took their inheritance and left.  Over the years, Jacob made numerous attempts to reconcile to his father through letters but they went ignored.  The King as such had a sense of entitlement.  How dare anyone, let alone his own son, disobey him.  So, they never reconciled and not only did they lose the opportunity to share their lives, but their extended family members and descendants would never have the chance to interact with one another.

One does not have to go far to find messages of entitlement.  All we need to do is open the newspaper, log on to the internet, turn on the TV, or look up at a billboard to see just how darn special we are.  Every day we are bombarded with messages that puff up our ego telling us how much we deserve only the very best.  Go ahead and buy that car that you can’t afford because you’re worth it.  Get that $30,000 watch because you deserve the very best.  Or one of my favorites, buy this shampoo and then “don’t hate me because I’m beautiful.”  After a while these messages sit on our brain and get us to actually believing them.  We start to get needs and wants confused and before you know it, we are disappointed when although we have plenty, we don’t have best there is.

The worst part about all of this is that we lose sight of what the word “entitled” really means.  We see a person who is hungry and in the food line at the shelter or the person who is on food stamps and we tell ourselves that those lazy people have a sense of entitlement – entitlement to our tax dollars.  Food is a need.  Water is a need.  A roof over your head, a warm place on a cold day and a cool place on a hot day are needs not wants, not something resulting from a false sense of entitlement.  So we end up using the same word in different contexts and argue over one another’s heads.

I would love to believe that this is only something that happens in the secular realm, but we all know that’s not true.  God forbid that it should happen amongst us, the people of God.  A few years back at the Church of the Good Shepherd in Pennsylvania the church had been growing and the need for a new building was beginning to become apparent among some folks in the congregation.  There were already three services and with 800 people, they were to their max.

Their senior pastor, Gary, was called to be district superintendent for their denomination and so he left and a young pastor, Randy, was hired to “lead the church into the future”.  They had hired Randy to be a visionary and affect change within the church and so he started to do so.  It didn’t take him long to see the need for a new building to meet their growth.  He started the conversation up again within the congregation and was quickly met with resistance.    Randy suggested they have a congregational meeting to discuss the issue amicably and upon this suggestion, was told by Sam, the former council moderator, that if he even brought it up for discussion he would be met with fierce resistance.  You see, Sam felt that the Church of the Good Shepherd existed for its own people and should just focus on shepherding the existing flock and meeting their needs.  At the time, there was about 30% of the congregation who supported Sam’s position.

Randy went ahead and called a congregation meeting anyway.  The meeting was ugly from the start.  People were yelling and getting frustrated at one another and eventually the moderator got up and walked out.  So, Sam feeling it was his place to step in and run the meeting as former moderator wasted no time in taking the microphone and turning to Randy and saying, “I warned you that if you did this things would not be good.  So, I also want to inform you since you did not heed my advice that we have gathered the required consent to bring a no-confidence vote against you right now.”  Sam called the vote and to many people’s surprise, the vote passed and Randy was no longer their pastor.

Randy left and the fighting and backbiting continued for months until many people lost faith in the idea of church and left.  The remainder of the people split and went to different churches and in a matter of months, I church of 800 vanished into non-existence.  It is easy to hear this story and just sort of shrug our shoulders because such things happen all the time.  There are plenty of churches out there and plenty more are being created, so what?  It is easy to say so what if we think that church exists solely for those people inside the church’s walls.  The so what is that if we really believe that church is a place to do the things that Jesus taught us to in the world, then that day that the Church of the Good Shepherd ceased to exist was a very sad day indeed.  Think of all of the lives that were supposed to be touched out in the community that would never be touched.

We live in a day that most call Post-Christendom.  This is a time when people don’t feel that they have to go to church just because it is the thing to do.  They need a reason.  And so this conversation about the emerging or emergent church occurs but many from the old guard (for lack of a better term) maintain their sense of entitlement because they have been around and put so much time into the church that they should be able to direct the conversation or decide if a conversation should even take place.  I think this is what Jesus was talking about.   Just like the older brother, so many of us are missing the party.  We are missing the point that we are ALL the prodigal and we are ALL the older brother and we ALL need to learn to be like the father.

Imagine if just right here in Hanover township each church just donated $50.  Not $50 per member. $50 per church.  Imagine if each church would have just half of their membership out volunteering in the community.  Imagine if each member would just donate one food item per month.  Imagine if people who have certain skills and knowledge would just take one hour a week to teach those skills to others in the community.   We would be on the cover of the Wall Street Journal.  I can just see the headline now, Chicago Suburban Community churches partner together and eradicate hunger and poverty in their communities.

But, this could never happen.  Churches setting aside their ideologies to do what Jesus taught them to do?  Haha, it’s more likely that the Cubs will come back and win the World Series this year.  How could we even start such a thing?  How can we get all of the churches to a point when we can all get together and have a party and celebrate the truly important things?  Well, maybe it starts here. Maybe we have to get decorating and get those invitations out.