When you're the pastor but not the leader by Ron Edmondson
Sponsored
Without welcoming refugees, there is no Christian faith by Zack Hunt
The Flight into Egypt by Giotto di Bondone / courtesy Wikimedia Commons
I’ve been unplugged for most of the past week.
When I heard about the Paris attacks, I was packing up for a 2 week trip to Nashville. I spent the next day driving across the country. About a day or so after arriving in town, we made an unexpected trip to the hospital (thankfully, everybody is okay now).
When I finally plugged back in, I returned to a world — and a Church — gone mad.
Though always terrible and inexcusable, xenophobia proliferates exponentially when it’s incubated in the fertile soil of fear and wrapped in the euphemistic pretense of security. So, though deplorable, it’s not altogether surprising to me to see so many Americans call for a blockade against Syrian refugees — or worse, a militant round up. It’s not unlike how American fears after Pearl Harbor led to the creation of concentration camps on American soil or how fear pushed 67% of those same Americans to demand that Jewish refugees be turned away on the brink of World War II .
Sadly, we are still poor students of history, apparently incapable of learning from our past mistakes.
What did surprise, almost shock, me about the response to the Paris attacks was the sheer number of my fellow Christians who blindly and almost gleefully jumped on the anti-refugee bandwagon in the sacred name of security.
By now, you’ve surely heard from a whole chorus of voices denouncing the repugnant absurdity of the anti-refugee movement. From ignoring our fundamental identity as a nation who welcomes the tired, the poor and the huddled passes to the so-obviously-hypocritical-it-hurts-your-brain rhetoric of anti-refugee folks who say one potentially dangerous Syrian is enough to close the borders but one potentially dangerous person with a gun shouldn’t force us to act on gun control to the simple fact that over 750,000 Syrian refugees are already in the United States and have been for years and not a single one of them has turned out to be a terrorist, the problems inherent to the American anti-refugee movement are legion.
But for anti-refugee Americans who also claim to be Christian, the problems are much, much worse, and it is to that chorus of voices already shouting this truth out from the mountaintops that I want to add my voice.
Because being anti-refugee is antithetical to the Christian faith at the most fundamental level.
At its core, Christianity is about a radical act of welcoming the other even at the risk of one’s self. It’s a faith defined by a God who gives life to the radically other, makes them His neighbors, and risks to live among them in order to save them even though they could — and eventually would — kill Him.
Without this divine act of love and risk there is nothing.
Without this sort of radical love and risk taking there is no Christian faith.
And without it being continually reenacted in our own lives, there is, according to Christ himself, no hope for salvation.
We live and move and have our being because God so loved the other regardless of how radically different — and potentially dangerous — we are as human beings who, though made in the image of God, are deeply and disturbingly sinful.
We have the gospel because a family of refugees found safe haven in a foreign land. As we will hear once again this year when the calendar turns to Advent, out of fear of a potential threat, King Herod ordered every male child in the place of Jesus’ birth to be executed. Warned by an angel of the impending danger, Jesus’ family fled their homeland and became refugees in Egypt. Had a foreign country not welcomed this refugee family, Jesus would have been killed before he could even take his first step
Before he could ever preach his first sermon.
Before he could ever carry his cross up the hill of Golgotha.
Had a foreign country not welcomed this family of refugees, there would be no Christian faith to believe in, no gospel to preach, no Jesus to follow.
But even though this refugee family did find safe haven and though as Protestants we cling fervently to the notion of salvation by faith alone, as if simply saying the right words and believing the right list of things is true will save us, Christ made it unequivocally clear that not everyone who says “Lord, Lord” will enter the kingdom of heaven; for apart from loving the least of these, without feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and caring for the sick and imprisoned whenever and wherever they may be, there is no salvation:
When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.”
Then the King will say to those on his right, Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.”
Then the righteous will answer him, “Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?”
The King will reply, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
Then he will say to those on his left, “Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.”
They also will answer, “Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?”
He will reply, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.”
Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.
This isn’t a cherry-picked proof-text; it’s the very heart of Christ’s life and teaching, an incarnational ministry that blessed the poor, loved enemies and welcomed those the rest of the world wanted nothing to do with.
That made faith not merely an act of intellectual assent, but a particular and peculiar way of life.
It is impossible to understand Jesus and just as impossible to be his disciple without this central focus on loving, embracing and defending the least of these.
The story of the sheep and the goats is also the fulfillment of a calling to care for the stranger that runs throughout the entire Hebrew Bible, from the Pentateuch’s demand that Israel remember its own time as refugees in Egypt and care for the stranger among them, to the words of Isaiah — the prophet most often connected with the promise of a Messiah — who warned that without defending the oppressed, taking up the cause of the fatherless and caring for the widow, God would neither listen to Israel’s prayers nor accept their sacrifices.
Nowhere in the Bible’s continued, vehement and undeniable call to care for the stranger among us is there any opt-out clause for the potential danger of making the other our neighbor. Any notion of such an idea is obliterated by Christ’s call to take up our cross and follow him, to love and embrace the other no matter the danger that love may put us in.
Listen, I get it.
Fear is an incredibly powerful force.
It can cause us to abandon even our most core principles in the quixotic pursuit of perfect safety.
And it’s true: there is a risk in loving others, especially others we don’t know who look and think and eat and speak and act differently than we do.
But God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.
Or as the apostle Peter put it, “Now who will harm you if you are eager to do what is good? But even if you do suffer for doing what is right, you are blessed. Do not fear what they fear and do not be intimidated.”
As Christians, in moments like this our calling is clear.
While our fellow countrymen worry and fret about what might possibly happen and ban together in the fraternity of fear and prejudice in the vain hope of keeping themselves safe from even the mere specter of danger, we must allow God’s perfect love to cast out our fear and take the risk demanded of us as followers of Jesus to defend the oppressed and care for the least of these whenever and wherever they may be.
If we don’t do that, if we cower in fear at what might happen instead of daring to love those in need, then we will have utterly abandoned the way of Jesus.
And we will have no right to call ourselves his disciples.
This article was originally published at zackhunt.net.
Beyond Bethlehem: Hope for refugees this Christmas by Mike Slaughter
This Christmas, Jesus followers across the country have an incredible opportunity to celebrate Jesus’ birthday in a way that truly honors him as we focus together on the urgent, global refugee crisis. Ginghamsburg Church is partnering with the United Methodist General Board of Global Ministry, the United Methodist Committee on Relief, United Methodist Communications and the United Methodist Publishing House on the Beyond Bethlehem initiative.
The intent
Let’s remember that “Christmas is not our birthday” as we honor Christ on his.
The action step
Spend half as much on our own Christmas this year and give the rest as a sacrificial miracle offering to Advance #3022144.
How to prepare
1) View this brief video that introduces the Beyond Bethlehem global refugee initiative. (You can download the video at the end of this post.) 2) Watch this 8-minute video produced by Ginghamsburg’s chief storyteller Dan Bracken based on his trip three weeks ago to Beirut, Lebanon, a country with over one million struggling refugees – one-third of the Lebanese population. Allow your heart to be broken by that which breaks the heart of God. (You can download the video at the end of this post.) 3) Share these videos and other print, web and electronicresources available from our partner Cokesbury with your church family and communities.
I also want to remind us in the tragic aftermath of the violence in Paris that the most repeated command in scripture is — Fear Not. Our faith is based on sacrificial love, not self-protection.
As C.S. Lewis once wrote in The Chronicles of Narnia, Jesus [Aslan the Lion character] is good, but he is NOT safe. If self-preservation were at the core of Christianity, then Jesus was a poor practitioner. At the moment when he should have hidden himself away in secure isolation before his final Passover on Planet Earth, “Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem” (John 9:51). His destination? The cross.
This is not the time to allow the powers of this dark world and the spiritual forces of evil to prevail (Eph. 16:12). This Advent and in all seasons to come, Christ calls us to love our neighbors as ourselves, welcome the stranger, and DO LOVE.
To learn more about the refugee crisis and how the church can help, access these resources:
We Welcome Refugees
Refugee Welcome Communication Resources
Prayer Guide
Mike Slaughter is the author of Christmas is Not Your Birthdayand Renegade Gospel. He blogs at MikeSlaughter.com.
Download: Mike Slaughter intro video.mp4
Download: Beyond Bethlehem video.mp4
Shane Raynor and Adam Hamilton discuss the Gospel of John.
ADAM HAMILTON AND THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
by Shane Raynor
I’ve been unplugged for most of the past week.
When I heard about the Paris attacks, I was packing up for a 2 week trip to Nashville. I spent the next day driving across the country. About a day or so after arriving in town, we made an unexpected trip to the hospital (thankfully, everybody is okay now).
When I finally plugged back in, I returned to a world — and a Church — gone mad.
Though always terrible and inexcusable, xenophobia proliferates exponentially when it’s incubated in the fertile soil of fear and wrapped in the euphemistic pretense of security. So, though deplorable, it’s not altogether surprising to me to see so many Americans call for a blockade against Syrian refugees — or worse, a militant round up. It’s not unlike how American fears after Pearl Harbor led to the creation of concentration camps on American soil or how fear pushed 67% of those same Americans to demand that Jewish refugees be turned away on the brink of World War II .
Sadly, we are still poor students of history, apparently incapable of learning from our past mistakes.
What did surprise, almost shock, me about the response to the Paris attacks was the sheer number of my fellow Christians who blindly and almost gleefully jumped on the anti-refugee bandwagon in the sacred name of security.
By now, you’ve surely heard from a whole chorus of voices denouncing the repugnant absurdity of the anti-refugee movement. From ignoring our fundamental identity as a nation who welcomes the tired, the poor and the huddled passes to the so-obviously-hypocritical-it-hurts-your-brain rhetoric of anti-refugee folks who say one potentially dangerous Syrian is enough to close the borders but one potentially dangerous person with a gun shouldn’t force us to act on gun control to the simple fact that over 750,000 Syrian refugees are already in the United States and have been for years and not a single one of them has turned out to be a terrorist, the problems inherent to the American anti-refugee movement are legion.
But for anti-refugee Americans who also claim to be Christian, the problems are much, much worse, and it is to that chorus of voices already shouting this truth out from the mountaintops that I want to add my voice.
Because being anti-refugee is antithetical to the Christian faith at the most fundamental level.
At its core, Christianity is about a radical act of welcoming the other even at the risk of one’s self. It’s a faith defined by a God who gives life to the radically other, makes them His neighbors, and risks to live among them in order to save them even though they could — and eventually would — kill Him.
Without this divine act of love and risk there is nothing.
Without this sort of radical love and risk taking there is no Christian faith.
And without it being continually reenacted in our own lives, there is, according to Christ himself, no hope for salvation.
We live and move and have our being because God so loved the other regardless of how radically different — and potentially dangerous — we are as human beings who, though made in the image of God, are deeply and disturbingly sinful.
We have the gospel because a family of refugees found safe haven in a foreign land. As we will hear once again this year when the calendar turns to Advent, out of fear of a potential threat, King Herod ordered every male child in the place of Jesus’ birth to be executed. Warned by an angel of the impending danger, Jesus’ family fled their homeland and became refugees in Egypt. Had a foreign country not welcomed this refugee family, Jesus would have been killed before he could even take his first step
Before he could ever preach his first sermon.
Before he could ever carry his cross up the hill of Golgotha.
Had a foreign country not welcomed this family of refugees, there would be no Christian faith to believe in, no gospel to preach, no Jesus to follow.
But even though this refugee family did find safe haven and though as Protestants we cling fervently to the notion of salvation by faith alone, as if simply saying the right words and believing the right list of things is true will save us, Christ made it unequivocally clear that not everyone who says “Lord, Lord” will enter the kingdom of heaven; for apart from loving the least of these, without feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and caring for the sick and imprisoned whenever and wherever they may be, there is no salvation:
When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.”
Then the King will say to those on his right, Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.”
Then the righteous will answer him, “Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?”
The King will reply, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
Then he will say to those on his left, “Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.”
They also will answer, “Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?”
He will reply, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.”
Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.
This isn’t a cherry-picked proof-text; it’s the very heart of Christ’s life and teaching, an incarnational ministry that blessed the poor, loved enemies and welcomed those the rest of the world wanted nothing to do with.
That made faith not merely an act of intellectual assent, but a particular and peculiar way of life.
It is impossible to understand Jesus and just as impossible to be his disciple without this central focus on loving, embracing and defending the least of these.
The story of the sheep and the goats is also the fulfillment of a calling to care for the stranger that runs throughout the entire Hebrew Bible, from the Pentateuch’s demand that Israel remember its own time as refugees in Egypt and care for the stranger among them, to the words of Isaiah — the prophet most often connected with the promise of a Messiah — who warned that without defending the oppressed, taking up the cause of the fatherless and caring for the widow, God would neither listen to Israel’s prayers nor accept their sacrifices.
Nowhere in the Bible’s continued, vehement and undeniable call to care for the stranger among us is there any opt-out clause for the potential danger of making the other our neighbor. Any notion of such an idea is obliterated by Christ’s call to take up our cross and follow him, to love and embrace the other no matter the danger that love may put us in.
Listen, I get it.
Fear is an incredibly powerful force.
It can cause us to abandon even our most core principles in the quixotic pursuit of perfect safety.
And it’s true: there is a risk in loving others, especially others we don’t know who look and think and eat and speak and act differently than we do.
But God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline.
Or as the apostle Peter put it, “Now who will harm you if you are eager to do what is good? But even if you do suffer for doing what is right, you are blessed. Do not fear what they fear and do not be intimidated.”
As Christians, in moments like this our calling is clear.
While our fellow countrymen worry and fret about what might possibly happen and ban together in the fraternity of fear and prejudice in the vain hope of keeping themselves safe from even the mere specter of danger, we must allow God’s perfect love to cast out our fear and take the risk demanded of us as followers of Jesus to defend the oppressed and care for the least of these whenever and wherever they may be.
If we don’t do that, if we cower in fear at what might happen instead of daring to love those in need, then we will have utterly abandoned the way of Jesus.
And we will have no right to call ourselves his disciples.
This article was originally published at zackhunt.net.
Beyond Bethlehem: Hope for refugees this Christmas by Mike Slaughter
This Christmas, Jesus followers across the country have an incredible opportunity to celebrate Jesus’ birthday in a way that truly honors him as we focus together on the urgent, global refugee crisis. Ginghamsburg Church is partnering with the United Methodist General Board of Global Ministry, the United Methodist Committee on Relief, United Methodist Communications and the United Methodist Publishing House on the Beyond Bethlehem initiative.
The intent
Let’s remember that “Christmas is not our birthday” as we honor Christ on his.
The action step
Spend half as much on our own Christmas this year and give the rest as a sacrificial miracle offering to Advance #3022144.
How to prepare
1) View this brief video that introduces the Beyond Bethlehem global refugee initiative. (You can download the video at the end of this post.) 2) Watch this 8-minute video produced by Ginghamsburg’s chief storyteller Dan Bracken based on his trip three weeks ago to Beirut, Lebanon, a country with over one million struggling refugees – one-third of the Lebanese population. Allow your heart to be broken by that which breaks the heart of God. (You can download the video at the end of this post.) 3) Share these videos and other print, web and electronicresources available from our partner Cokesbury with your church family and communities.
I also want to remind us in the tragic aftermath of the violence in Paris that the most repeated command in scripture is — Fear Not. Our faith is based on sacrificial love, not self-protection.
As C.S. Lewis once wrote in The Chronicles of Narnia, Jesus [Aslan the Lion character] is good, but he is NOT safe. If self-preservation were at the core of Christianity, then Jesus was a poor practitioner. At the moment when he should have hidden himself away in secure isolation before his final Passover on Planet Earth, “Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem” (John 9:51). His destination? The cross.
This is not the time to allow the powers of this dark world and the spiritual forces of evil to prevail (Eph. 16:12). This Advent and in all seasons to come, Christ calls us to love our neighbors as ourselves, welcome the stranger, and DO LOVE.
To learn more about the refugee crisis and how the church can help, access these resources:
We Welcome Refugees
Refugee Welcome Communication Resources
Prayer Guide
Mike Slaughter is the author of Christmas is Not Your Birthdayand Renegade Gospel. He blogs at MikeSlaughter.com.
Download: Mike Slaughter intro video.mp4
Download: Beyond Bethlehem video.mp4
Shane Raynor and Adam Hamilton discuss the Gospel of John.
ADAM HAMILTON AND THE GOSPEL OF JOHN
by Shane Raynor
Recently Adam Hamilton and I had an in-depth conversation about the Gospel of John on the set where Adam filmed the video sessions accompanying his new book John: The Gospel of Light and Life.
John is considered to be the most deeply spiritual of the four Gospels. John’s purpose in writing it was for readers to not only believe in Jesus Christ but that they might also “have life in his name.”
In our interview, Adam and I discuss a number of topics connected to John’s Gospel, including Communion, the Holy Spirit, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, and the modern-day fascination in our culture with near-death experiences, heaven and hell. If you'd rather download the interview for later viewing rather than stream it, visit one of the following links: Highest quality(5GB) or Mid quality (0.4GB)
To learn more about other Adam Hamilton resources (including forthcoming titles) visit Adam's website and sign up for email updates on the main page.
Sponsored
Advent: A season of blessings by Jim Hawkins
Yuletide rush
For many people, the Christmas season has already begun. This Friday is so-called Black Friday, when stores kick off their official Christmas sales and many people flock to malls, downtowns and shopping centers festooned with Yuletide decorations. Next week is Cyber Monday, when online retailers will have sales of their own and some online shoppers will be busy looking for deals. Television Christmas specials, school Christmas concerts, work-related Christmas parties and more Christmas events fill calendars for the next several weeks.
Yet in the midst of the rush, Advent beckons us to remember the blessings of this often overlooked season. While the blessings of Advent are numerous, this article will focus on five: patience, perspective, hope, service and opportunity.
Patience
Advent is a season of waiting. We gradually light the candles of the Advent wreath, adding a new candle each week until all four candles are lit over the course of four weeks. If your family has an Advent calendar, you mark the slow, daily progress of the season. These and other Advent symbols arrive in their fullness over time. All this symbolic waiting has roots in the theological significance of Advent.
In Advent, we remember Jesus’ first coming as a baby born in Bethlehem. If your congregation follows the lectionary, you’ll notice that the Old Testament lessons during worship feature prophets who proclaimed that God would fulfill the promise: the coming of the Prince of Peace, the righteous branch of David’s line, the Messiah. Later in the season, the Gospel lessons focus on John the Baptist proclaiming the coming of the Messiah and an angelic visitor telling Mary and Joseph of Jesus’ coming.
At this time, we also remember that Jesus promised to come again in the future. We’re reminded of that promise in the lectionary passages in the early weeks of Advent. We live in this time of waiting, when we’re between the inauguration of the kingdom of God and its culmination, between the already of Jesus’ first coming and the not yet of his return. During Advent, we also remember we don’t know exactly how long the wait will be. We’ve been waiting for the Kingdom to come in its fullness for nearly 2,000 years; the wait may be over soon — or it may be thousands of years from now.
The blessing of Advent patience teaches us to let go of anxiety. We can’t make Jesus’ return come any sooner. What we can do is live by the values of the Kingdom in the here and now.
Perspective
We can easily get caught up in the jolly frenzy of the world around us. We can be seduced into believing we have to make this the best Christmas ever for ourselves and our loved ones. We may get caught up in the quest to buy the perfect gift or in the desire to receive the thing we most crave. We may become outraged over people who say “Happy Holidays” or “Season’s Greetings” instead of “Merry Christmas,” or threaten to boycott companies we believe aren’t focusing enough on Christmas, be it in their decorations, their advertisements, or their coffee cups.
Advent is a reminder of what’s really important. We are to live by the values of the Kingdom. In what will be the Old Testament lesson the first Sunday of Advent next year, the prophet Isaiah uses the image of the mountain of the Lord’s house becoming the highest of the mountains. In that time, we’ll pray to learn God’s ways, to walk in God’s paths. We’ll beat swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, turning implements of war into tools for caring for the earth and nurturing life. Nations will no longer wage war. While we wait for that promised future to come in fullness, we’ll walk in the light of the Lord (Isaiah 2:1-5).
Advent reminds us of the Christian perspective that walking that path, loving God and loving our neighbor, is where our focus should be.
Hope
We’re entering into the darkest time of the year, with the sun gradually setting earlier and rising later each day until the winter equinox next month. All the world’s focus on spending time with family and friends during this season can be depressing for those who are alone. Newspapers and news broadcasts are often filled with bad news around the world and closer to home. All these factors and more can lead us to believe that things are hopeless.
Yet during Advent, we remember the hope we have in God. We remember the prophets who lived in much more challenging times than ours, times when their nations were on the brink of extinction, when many wondered if God still loved them. Yet Jeremiah, Isaiah, Malachi, Zephaniah, Micah, and others remind us that nothing is impossible with God. The light of God continues to shine, even in the deepest darkness. And as a people of hope, our mission is to reflect that light so others can hope.
Service
This time of year provides numerous opportunities to proclaim the love of Jesus Christ with our actions. Many nonprofit organizations have seasonal service projects that individuals and church groups can join. Or you or your group can plan a short-term project. Some ideas:
Opportunity
The end of the year provides opportunity to share God’s love with others. While the Christmas frenzy surrounding us can be overwhelming, it can also open doors. Even a person who rarely thinks about attending worship, engaging in Bible study, or praying understands that this season is at heart a celebration of God’s love. The weeks of Advent can provide the perfect opportunity for you to extend the blessings of the season to other people.
You may find that your friends, co-workers, neighbors, and family members who aren’t part of a church family may be open to an invitation to join you for worship, either on a Sunday morning during Advent or on Christmas Eve. You could organize a caroling outing as an opportunity to invite neighbors to your church’s seasonal events. To prepare for caroling, make song sheets with the lyrics for several well-known carols as well as information about your church’s events to offer to those who hear you carol. I have organized caroling outings in neighborhoods, a downtown shopping district, and a mall (though be sure to ask for permission when caroling on private property like a mall).
Advent offers many blessings. When we worship during this season, sing Advent hymns, read the lectionary texts, light the candles of the Advent wreath, slowly reveal the days of the Advent calendar, serve others, and take the opportunity to share God’s good news, we receive the blessings of Advent and offer those blessings to others.
Be sure to check out FaithLink, a weekly downloadable discussion guide for classes and small groups.
Oneness with God, Dante and prayer
by Clifton Stringer
Dante and Beatrice speak to the teachers of wisdom Thomas Aquinas, Albertus Magnus, Peter Lombard and Sigier of Brabant in the Sphere of the Sun (fresco by Philipp Veit), Canto 10.
The initial stanza of Dante's poem Paradiso — a vision of heaven and a journey to oneness with God — goes like this:
Glory, from Him who moves all things that are,
penetrates the universe and then shines back,
reflecting more in one part, less elsewhere.*
Lately I have been reading the Paradiso, and it fills me with a desire to be united with God, and, specifically, to pray the Liturgy of the Hours. I'll have to take you on a short excursion through Dante's thought to explain this.
The human soul, for Dante, is the horizon between creation and Creator, between the dust of the earthy material cosmos and the infinite sea of divine being.** (Angels would abide on this Creator-creation horizon as well, though they are not as intimate with creation's materiality as are human souls, married as we are to our bodies.)
The human soul, also for Dante, is thus one of the principal loci of God's glory as it penetrates the universe and shines back again — one of the sites of "more" reflection, rather than "less."
To better understand our lives, as well as Dante's poem, we can ask a question: what hinders (and so decreases) or furthers (and so increases) this reflection? Briefly, what hinders this reflection is sin, about which Dante is entertainingly eloquent and insightful in his Inferno and Purgatorio. What furthers this reflection is Christlikeness, for in Christ the divine and the created perfectly coincide, in personal union or oneness. Christlikeness, for Dante, primarily entails love, which is human oneness of will with God who, as the last lines of Paradiso tell us, is "love that moves the sun and other stars" (33.145). Christlikeness also includes intellectual awareness of truth. But by virtue of the fact that we are finite while God is infinite, we will never (even in heaven) know God fully. We may, however, be perfectly at one with God's will, Love.***
Now we come to our point: the activity of the souls in heaven in Dante's Paradiso is contemplation, prayer, grateful union of loving awareness with and of God. This is how souls shine back and reflect the divine glory by which they are penetrated. This activity of ardent, contemplative love, and all other humble activities as they are reflections of it and share in it, is and are what we are made for. In a deep sense, they may be just what we are.
And we can practice such loving contemplation here below. At least, we can begin to learn its delight. In all kinds of worship and prayer and Bible study we are making a start. One of the great gifts we're given in the Christian tradition is the Liturgy of the Hours, which developed in various monastic strands of the tradition, yet can be shared in by all Christians.
Dante emphasizes, as we have seen, that divine love moves all things. The 'name' of divine omnipotence is Love. Divine love, for Dante, is what moves and inspires all things in their respective cyclical itineraries.
The Liturgy of the Hours, in its various forms, draws us into seasonal cycles of scriptures and prayers that let us responsively participate in God's love and "shine back" the divine glory. It is a way that we, whether "alone" (though never really alone) or in a group, can be at one with the love animating us.
So, I'm going to do some praying. Would you like to join me?
Here are some (mostly digital) ways to do so:
Divine Office - a fancy Roman Catholic site. That app ain't free!
iBreviary - less fancy, but convenient. That app is free. Brought to you by the Franciscans in the Holy Land.
Methodist Prayer - a new Methodist arrangement of the Liturgy of the Hours. Simple, elegant, practical.
Daily Prayer - the Church of England's LH site.
The Eastern Orthodox have various English prayer books. One that I like is Prayer Book of the Early Christians by John McGuckin.
Happy praying! Peace and good!
*Dante, Paradiso 1.1-3, trans. Robin Kirkpatrick
** See Christian Moevs, The Metaphysics of Dante's Comedy
*** Vittorio Montemaggi emphasizes this in his chapter in Dante's Commedia: Theology as Poetry, edited by Montemaggi and Treherne.
Clifton Stringer is a Ph.D. student in Historical Theology at Boston College and the author of Christ the Lightgiver in the Converge Bible Studies series.
Why should we give thanks?
by Kimberly Winston / Religion News Service
(RNS) Thursday is Thanksgiving, the annual food fest that sometimes devolves into a food fight. So if the conversation around the turkey starts to get a little heated — "Why aren't you married yet?" "Who are you voting for?" "Refugees, anyone?" — grit your teeth and keep in mind: The impulse to give thanks — in either a religious or secular setting — can be be good for the body and soul.
Q: Where does the tradition of giving thanks come from in the first place?
A: The answer is both religious and secular. Almost every world religion requires its followers to give thanks to a divine being, often in prayer, song and deed. The Book of Psalms is full of praises of thanksgiving. The Talmud tells Jews to give thanks for their blessings 100 times a day; the Quran tells Muslims “God always rewards gratitude and He knows everything.” Nonbelievers give thanks, too, as the growing number of secular thanksgiving "prayers" attest.
Robert Emmons, a University of California psychology professor and author of "Gratitude Works!," says gratitude is "profoundly basic" to the human condition. "When we are grateful for something we consider its origins. Where did it come from, who was responsible for it, why and for what purpose does it exist, what should I do about it? These questions strike me as profoundly religious."
Q: How did we go from the religious practice of giving thanks to a secular holiday of Thanksgiving?
A: The holiday, of course, has its roots in a celebratory meal between the Puritans and Native Americans in Plymouth, Mass., in 1621. The Puritans frequently held days of giving thanks — a somber kind of extra Sabbath, often with fasting, silence and prayers. The local Wampanoags also routinely gave thanks for a plentiful harvest or other good fortune. There were numerous "proclamations of thanksgiving" made by the Continental Congress, often with language recognizing a religious duty to give thanks. Thanksgiving didn't become a national holiday until 1863, when, in the midst of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln declared that the U.S. would "observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. "
Fun Thanksgiving fact: Lincoln was pressured to create Thanksgiving by one of the first women poets in the U.S., Sarah Josepha Hale, author of "Mary Had a Little Lamb."
Q: Is one day a year enough to count our blessings? How often should we give thanks?
A: The answer seems to be the more, the merrier. Emmons' multiple studies of gratitude show that people who pause to count their blessings daily report they are 25 percent happier than people who don't. He also found that thankful people exercised daily, reported fewer illnesses and had higher levels of energy and alertness. Other scholars have studied the benefits of gratitude — there's even a program on the "science of gratitude" at the University of California, Berkeley — and researchers find that giving thanks regularly improves romantic relationships and can be a kind of natural anti-depressant.
Q: OK, giving thanks is good for my body. But what about my soul?
A: That takes us back to the religious foundations of giving thanks. Bradley Malkovsky, a professor of comparative theology at the University of Notre Dame, says giving thanks is "spiritually good for us ... a training in connectivity, of getting beyond the ego" to each other and to the divine. "If we look closely at our lives, we see so much of what we have achieved is a gift," both from other people and from God, he said. "Gratitude is the recognition that we are not the center of the universe."
The unheard cry of the rural poor
by Kitty Taylor
Bigstock/telliott
I am well-educated, gratefully-employed and poor.
At 35, with a graduate degree under my belt and working for a non-profit organization that serves rural communities, I do not always know how I am going to afford life. Earlier this year, I found myself in an unspoken yet familiar panic as I faced an all-of-a-sudden (because spacing out a dwindling supply of generic Lexapro is not a good idea) ambush of medical bills. Self-pay (read “uninsured”) appointments came with a 20% discount, but to renew both my depression medication and birth control, I had to pay $150.00 total for two appointments, one within a week of the other. That kept me on schedule for both prescriptions, though by the time I exchanged cash for medicine, I added another $50.00 monthly expense.
Combine that $200 with $400 in rent, $200 in student loan payments, $55 in cell phone expenses, $225 for car and insurance, and I hit $1080 in bills alone for one month of survival. Deciding to feed myself within the USDA Food Plans scale ($167-$332), transport myself in a fuel-efficient Focus ($75-$100), and keep myself, my clothes, and my apartment clean ($25-$40), I was looking at the $1,347-$1,552 range. In one month, I clear $1550 and still have a credit card bill to pay. With student loans also swimming heavy in interest, both of those debts are getting by month-to-month, much like me.
Yet according to the North Carolina Division of Social Services, I am $2,008 over the maximum gross annual income percentage allowable for food and nutrition assistance. With a gross salary of $25,000 per year and my take-home pay just over $20,000, I make too much money to get help with a basic need.
In rural Appalachia, specifically western North Carolina, I am poor but not in poverty. I might even be considered privileged. I have reliable transportation, a must in a town where the already limited, weekday-only, public transportation shuts down at 5:00 p.m. and—depending on just how rural you are—few, if any stores or resources are a walk away. I do not have a spouse, a child or a pet. I am within a 25-minute drive of immediate family, should times get even tougher. I rent an apartment at the mission and retreat agency where I work, providing me with access to some discounted meals when missions teams and our county’s chapter of the Rotary Club are dining on campus. I am in generally good health, though better when taking both prescriptions every day.
Compared to my surrounding population in Clay County where one out of every three children is food insecure, I am living on the sunny side. In an area where a number of kind-hearted and appreciative folks come to retire, many who have spent generations in these mountains have and will remain focused on today’s needs, not retirement’s possibilities. Rural poverty is prevalent and not going anywhere soon. Even with my privilege of "poor but not impoverished," the cost of financial instability has occasionally meant taking one medication every 2-3 days to avoid refilling and paying for two from the same paycheck. That’s planning ahead.
Like the many who want to do more than bandage a temporary fix on a long-standing issue, the question of where to begin is one faced by well-intentioned but overwhelmed congregations and outreach services. To address the problem from the ground up, the ground is the place to start. Enter the Cost of Poverty Experience, the product of a partnership between the CareSource Foundation and Think Tank. During these poverty simulations, participants are given real-life roles with real-life challenges and real-life consequences. They visit stations representing a variety of community services and attempt to complete one month’s worth of responsibilities: paying bills, taking children to school, going to work, buying groceries, budgeting for medication and deciding when something will have to wait. They do so as a family living in poverty, stretching their resources to fulfill needs one week at a time.
Throughout the scenario, they gain an in-depth understanding of life under poverty’s circumstances in the rural areas, enviroments which struggle with limited resources. In my small town, that includes a volunteer-operated, county food pantry that distributed over 15,000 boxes of food in 2014 while being open only one day per week.
When the 2012 United Methodist General Conference offered C.O.P.E. to its attendees, church leaders, advocates, organizers and ministers left with a deeper level of understanding of and compassion for their neighbors, relatives, coworkers, parishioners, students, patients and friends living full-time in scarcity and need. “By putting myself in the shoes of those who live daily in poverty, barely able to stay afloat, I was able to feel a whisper of their pain,” said Jessica Conner, editor of the South Carolina United Methodist Advocate newspaper. “The experience transformed me. It’s one thing to serve low-income families, as I do in my local church. It’s quite another to serve with a deeper, more personal understanding of their journey.”
While C.O.P.E is one avenue of moving the church out of the pews and into communities, it doesn’t take a poverty simulation to learn someone else’s story. It does, however, take a willingness to listen. It also takes a willingness to understand that every sect of poverty comes with its own unique challenges. As I heard a pastor friend recently remark in a meeting, “Out in Raleigh, they think we just need to put all of our jobs on the internet.” We all laughed because there was little else to do with a remark so disconnected from the reality of rural life.
Internet service isn’t a given or a priority for everyone.
I have the luxury of Wi-Fi, but if I were living in some other apartment complex (of which there are few) or housing development (of which there are some), that expense would not be included with my rent. In my current living situation, which is on the lower end of monthly cost for a one bedroom/one bath, it’s not an extra bill. That matters.
I also have job security and safety nets of family members. I am one of the lucky ones who can face one month of that unspoken yet familiar panic. With my salary for one just above the 2015 federal poverty guidelines for a family of four in the lower 48 states and a bit closer to a family of three in Alaska and Hawaii, I live with advantages unavailable to many of the families served through my place of employment. That’s a hard to truth to reconcile, especially when I’m a paycheck-to-paycheck kind of adult.
Besides, next month might be better.
I’ll figure that out when I get there.
Did Pope Francis say Lutherans can take Communion at Catholic Mass?
by David Gibson / Religion News Service
Pope Francis gives Communion at the end of the first mass of his visit to Cuba in Havana’s Revolution Square, September 20, 2015. Reuters/Claudia Daut
(RNS) Pope Francis has a knack for setting traditionalist teeth on edge with unscripted musings on sacred topics. He recently did it again when he seemed to suggest that a Lutheran could receive communion in the Catholic Church after consulting her conscience.
The exchange came up during a prayer service last Sunday evening (Nov. 15) at a Lutheran church in Rome that had invited the pontiff, who used the occasion to engage in a question-and-answer session with some of the congregants.
One woman, Anke de Bernardinis, told Francis that she was married to a Catholic and that she and her husband share many “joys and sorrows” in life, but not Communion at church. “What can we do on this point to finally attain Communion?” she asked.
The question is fraught because the Eucharist is so central to sacramental Christianity, and because of the Catholic belief that Jesus’ body and blood is truly present in a special way in the bread and wine consecrated by a priest — an understanding that was rejected by most Protestants after the Reformation, and which has been a source of division ever since.
Francis recognized the weight of the moment, and joked that he was “afraid” to respond in detail on such a topic in front of his friend Cardinal Walter Kasper, a renowned German theologian who was also present.
Then he went on at some length to wonder whether Communion should be thought of as an end point of ecumenism, or as an aid on the journey together toward full communion. Francis stressed that it was not his place to give permission for Protestants to receive Catholic Communion, and that differences on doctrine remain.
But he noted that “life is greater than explanations and interpretations,” and he cited his own experiences in which Protestant friends said they also believe in the “real presence” of Jesus in the Eucharist.
The common baptism of believers was the key starting point, Francis said. “One Baptism, one Lord, one faith,” he repeated, concluding with this counsel to de Bernardinis: “Speak with the Lord and go ahead,” indicating that it was as much a personal as an institutional question. “I don’t dare say more.”
Of course others were quick to fill in that silence, mainly with criticisms.
“Once again Pope Francis, in being pastoral and kind, has muddled things up and confused the faithful,” wrote the Rev. Dwight Longenecker, a blogging priest who was raised Protestant and converted to Catholicism. It was an “unsatisfactory waffle from a successor of Peter,” Longenecker said, adding that Francis should have told the woman to become Catholic.
“Hard to avoid the conclusion that Pope Francis just effectively rewrote the Catechism, and destroyed a Eucharistic discipline that has existed since the Reformation,” wrote the American Conservative’s Rod Dreher, another convert to Catholicism who later left for the Orthodox Church. “The Pope is refuting the magisterial teaching of his own Church, and not on a small matter either.”
Yet the assumption about the sharp dividing line on Communion isn’t quite right.
Bishop Denis J. Madden, an auxiliary bishop of the Baltimore archdiocese, noted in an interview that both Catholic canon lawand the 1993 Ecumenical Directory provide for certain cases in which “intercommunion” is possible. Those circumstances are usually in cases of emergency or “grave necessity,” or with the permission of the local bishop or national hierarchy.
One crucial condition for a Protestant to receive Communion is that they genuinely believe in the “real presence” of Christ in the Eucharist.
That, in fact, is something that Lutheran and Catholic leaders agree on, said Madden, who last month issued, with his counterpart from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, amajor document summarizing 32 points of agreement between the two churches as they head toward the symbolic 500th anniversary of the Reformation, on Oct. 31, 2017.
“I don’t think we should jump to the point and say, ‘Oh come on, we’ll all just put our hands on each other’s shoulders and go to Communion together.’ No, there are still things we differ on,” said Madden, who noted there are other disagreements about ordination and the like.
“But what we try to say in this document is that while there are a number of things we differ on, they are not enough to keep us separated.”
As far as Francis’ implication that a Protestant believer could consult his or her conscience and decide to approach for Communion, Madden said that’s not completely out of bounds.
He recalled the episode at the 2005 funeral of Saint John Paul II, when Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — a theological straight shooter who would be elected Pope Benedict XVI a short time later —gave Communion to Brother Roger, a Swiss Protestant and founder of the Taize ecumenical monastic community in south-east France.
“Ratzinger was criticized for that, but he felt that Brother Roger believed in the real presence, that he was prayerful, that it was an appropriate setting for that particular time,” Madden said. “And he did not feel it was inappropriate.”
(It later came out that John Paul himself had repeatedly given Brother Roger Communion at Mass, though the monastic never converted.)
“If you have those times when there is shared communion that does not mean that everything is agreed upon,” Madden said. “There will always be time for debate and for parsing and so on. But then there comes a time when you have to look at what is the greater good.”
Edward Condon, a canon lawyer who writes for the Catholic Herald of Britain, made a similar point.
“While some have gone bonkers at the suggestion that the pope wants to give Communion to Protestants, the church already holds that this is not a simple question of can they or can’t they, but one of time, place, disposition, and belief,” Condon wrote in a column.
“These are not procedural hoops to jump through but necessary expressions of the seriousness of the Eucharist.”
This Sunday, November 29, 2015First Sunday of Advent: Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21:25-36
John is considered to be the most deeply spiritual of the four Gospels. John’s purpose in writing it was for readers to not only believe in Jesus Christ but that they might also “have life in his name.”
In our interview, Adam and I discuss a number of topics connected to John’s Gospel, including Communion, the Holy Spirit, the Crucifixion, the Resurrection, and the modern-day fascination in our culture with near-death experiences, heaven and hell. If you'd rather download the interview for later viewing rather than stream it, visit one of the following links: Highest quality(5GB) or Mid quality (0.4GB)
To learn more about other Adam Hamilton resources (including forthcoming titles) visit Adam's website and sign up for email updates on the main page.
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Advent: A season of blessings by Jim Hawkins
Yuletide rush
For many people, the Christmas season has already begun. This Friday is so-called Black Friday, when stores kick off their official Christmas sales and many people flock to malls, downtowns and shopping centers festooned with Yuletide decorations. Next week is Cyber Monday, when online retailers will have sales of their own and some online shoppers will be busy looking for deals. Television Christmas specials, school Christmas concerts, work-related Christmas parties and more Christmas events fill calendars for the next several weeks.
Yet in the midst of the rush, Advent beckons us to remember the blessings of this often overlooked season. While the blessings of Advent are numerous, this article will focus on five: patience, perspective, hope, service and opportunity.
Patience
Advent is a season of waiting. We gradually light the candles of the Advent wreath, adding a new candle each week until all four candles are lit over the course of four weeks. If your family has an Advent calendar, you mark the slow, daily progress of the season. These and other Advent symbols arrive in their fullness over time. All this symbolic waiting has roots in the theological significance of Advent.
In Advent, we remember Jesus’ first coming as a baby born in Bethlehem. If your congregation follows the lectionary, you’ll notice that the Old Testament lessons during worship feature prophets who proclaimed that God would fulfill the promise: the coming of the Prince of Peace, the righteous branch of David’s line, the Messiah. Later in the season, the Gospel lessons focus on John the Baptist proclaiming the coming of the Messiah and an angelic visitor telling Mary and Joseph of Jesus’ coming.
At this time, we also remember that Jesus promised to come again in the future. We’re reminded of that promise in the lectionary passages in the early weeks of Advent. We live in this time of waiting, when we’re between the inauguration of the kingdom of God and its culmination, between the already of Jesus’ first coming and the not yet of his return. During Advent, we also remember we don’t know exactly how long the wait will be. We’ve been waiting for the Kingdom to come in its fullness for nearly 2,000 years; the wait may be over soon — or it may be thousands of years from now.
The blessing of Advent patience teaches us to let go of anxiety. We can’t make Jesus’ return come any sooner. What we can do is live by the values of the Kingdom in the here and now.
Perspective
We can easily get caught up in the jolly frenzy of the world around us. We can be seduced into believing we have to make this the best Christmas ever for ourselves and our loved ones. We may get caught up in the quest to buy the perfect gift or in the desire to receive the thing we most crave. We may become outraged over people who say “Happy Holidays” or “Season’s Greetings” instead of “Merry Christmas,” or threaten to boycott companies we believe aren’t focusing enough on Christmas, be it in their decorations, their advertisements, or their coffee cups.
Advent is a reminder of what’s really important. We are to live by the values of the Kingdom. In what will be the Old Testament lesson the first Sunday of Advent next year, the prophet Isaiah uses the image of the mountain of the Lord’s house becoming the highest of the mountains. In that time, we’ll pray to learn God’s ways, to walk in God’s paths. We’ll beat swords into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, turning implements of war into tools for caring for the earth and nurturing life. Nations will no longer wage war. While we wait for that promised future to come in fullness, we’ll walk in the light of the Lord (Isaiah 2:1-5).
Advent reminds us of the Christian perspective that walking that path, loving God and loving our neighbor, is where our focus should be.
Hope
We’re entering into the darkest time of the year, with the sun gradually setting earlier and rising later each day until the winter equinox next month. All the world’s focus on spending time with family and friends during this season can be depressing for those who are alone. Newspapers and news broadcasts are often filled with bad news around the world and closer to home. All these factors and more can lead us to believe that things are hopeless.
Yet during Advent, we remember the hope we have in God. We remember the prophets who lived in much more challenging times than ours, times when their nations were on the brink of extinction, when many wondered if God still loved them. Yet Jeremiah, Isaiah, Malachi, Zephaniah, Micah, and others remind us that nothing is impossible with God. The light of God continues to shine, even in the deepest darkness. And as a people of hope, our mission is to reflect that light so others can hope.
Service
This time of year provides numerous opportunities to proclaim the love of Jesus Christ with our actions. Many nonprofit organizations have seasonal service projects that individuals and church groups can join. Or you or your group can plan a short-term project. Some ideas:
- Go caroling at a hospital or a retirement community. Be sure to ask for permission in advance.
- Host a party for family, friends, or neighbors, and ask each guest to bring a nonperishable food item for the local food pantry. Contact the pantry to discover their food needs and then pass them on to guests.
- Bake cookies and give them to teachers and staff at a local school or daycare center. Check with an agency that works with people who are homeless to learn about how you can help during this season. You may find your service becomes the start of an ongoing commitment.
Opportunity
The end of the year provides opportunity to share God’s love with others. While the Christmas frenzy surrounding us can be overwhelming, it can also open doors. Even a person who rarely thinks about attending worship, engaging in Bible study, or praying understands that this season is at heart a celebration of God’s love. The weeks of Advent can provide the perfect opportunity for you to extend the blessings of the season to other people.
You may find that your friends, co-workers, neighbors, and family members who aren’t part of a church family may be open to an invitation to join you for worship, either on a Sunday morning during Advent or on Christmas Eve. You could organize a caroling outing as an opportunity to invite neighbors to your church’s seasonal events. To prepare for caroling, make song sheets with the lyrics for several well-known carols as well as information about your church’s events to offer to those who hear you carol. I have organized caroling outings in neighborhoods, a downtown shopping district, and a mall (though be sure to ask for permission when caroling on private property like a mall).
Advent offers many blessings. When we worship during this season, sing Advent hymns, read the lectionary texts, light the candles of the Advent wreath, slowly reveal the days of the Advent calendar, serve others, and take the opportunity to share God’s good news, we receive the blessings of Advent and offer those blessings to others.
Be sure to check out FaithLink, a weekly downloadable discussion guide for classes and small groups.
Oneness with God, Dante and prayer
by Clifton StringerDante and Beatrice speak to the teachers of wisdom Thomas Aquinas, Albertus Magnus, Peter Lombard and Sigier of Brabant in the Sphere of the Sun (fresco by Philipp Veit), Canto 10.
The initial stanza of Dante's poem Paradiso — a vision of heaven and a journey to oneness with God — goes like this:
Glory, from Him who moves all things that are,
penetrates the universe and then shines back,
reflecting more in one part, less elsewhere.*
Lately I have been reading the Paradiso, and it fills me with a desire to be united with God, and, specifically, to pray the Liturgy of the Hours. I'll have to take you on a short excursion through Dante's thought to explain this.
The human soul, for Dante, is the horizon between creation and Creator, between the dust of the earthy material cosmos and the infinite sea of divine being.** (Angels would abide on this Creator-creation horizon as well, though they are not as intimate with creation's materiality as are human souls, married as we are to our bodies.)
The human soul, also for Dante, is thus one of the principal loci of God's glory as it penetrates the universe and shines back again — one of the sites of "more" reflection, rather than "less."
To better understand our lives, as well as Dante's poem, we can ask a question: what hinders (and so decreases) or furthers (and so increases) this reflection? Briefly, what hinders this reflection is sin, about which Dante is entertainingly eloquent and insightful in his Inferno and Purgatorio. What furthers this reflection is Christlikeness, for in Christ the divine and the created perfectly coincide, in personal union or oneness. Christlikeness, for Dante, primarily entails love, which is human oneness of will with God who, as the last lines of Paradiso tell us, is "love that moves the sun and other stars" (33.145). Christlikeness also includes intellectual awareness of truth. But by virtue of the fact that we are finite while God is infinite, we will never (even in heaven) know God fully. We may, however, be perfectly at one with God's will, Love.***
Now we come to our point: the activity of the souls in heaven in Dante's Paradiso is contemplation, prayer, grateful union of loving awareness with and of God. This is how souls shine back and reflect the divine glory by which they are penetrated. This activity of ardent, contemplative love, and all other humble activities as they are reflections of it and share in it, is and are what we are made for. In a deep sense, they may be just what we are.
And we can practice such loving contemplation here below. At least, we can begin to learn its delight. In all kinds of worship and prayer and Bible study we are making a start. One of the great gifts we're given in the Christian tradition is the Liturgy of the Hours, which developed in various monastic strands of the tradition, yet can be shared in by all Christians.
Dante emphasizes, as we have seen, that divine love moves all things. The 'name' of divine omnipotence is Love. Divine love, for Dante, is what moves and inspires all things in their respective cyclical itineraries.
The Liturgy of the Hours, in its various forms, draws us into seasonal cycles of scriptures and prayers that let us responsively participate in God's love and "shine back" the divine glory. It is a way that we, whether "alone" (though never really alone) or in a group, can be at one with the love animating us.
So, I'm going to do some praying. Would you like to join me?
Here are some (mostly digital) ways to do so:
Divine Office - a fancy Roman Catholic site. That app ain't free!
iBreviary - less fancy, but convenient. That app is free. Brought to you by the Franciscans in the Holy Land.
Methodist Prayer - a new Methodist arrangement of the Liturgy of the Hours. Simple, elegant, practical.
Daily Prayer - the Church of England's LH site.
The Eastern Orthodox have various English prayer books. One that I like is Prayer Book of the Early Christians by John McGuckin.
Happy praying! Peace and good!
*Dante, Paradiso 1.1-3, trans. Robin Kirkpatrick
** See Christian Moevs, The Metaphysics of Dante's Comedy
*** Vittorio Montemaggi emphasizes this in his chapter in Dante's Commedia: Theology as Poetry, edited by Montemaggi and Treherne.
Clifton Stringer is a Ph.D. student in Historical Theology at Boston College and the author of Christ the Lightgiver in the Converge Bible Studies series.
Why should we give thanks?
by Kimberly Winston / Religion News Service(RNS) Thursday is Thanksgiving, the annual food fest that sometimes devolves into a food fight. So if the conversation around the turkey starts to get a little heated — "Why aren't you married yet?" "Who are you voting for?" "Refugees, anyone?" — grit your teeth and keep in mind: The impulse to give thanks — in either a religious or secular setting — can be be good for the body and soul.
Q: Where does the tradition of giving thanks come from in the first place?
A: The answer is both religious and secular. Almost every world religion requires its followers to give thanks to a divine being, often in prayer, song and deed. The Book of Psalms is full of praises of thanksgiving. The Talmud tells Jews to give thanks for their blessings 100 times a day; the Quran tells Muslims “God always rewards gratitude and He knows everything.” Nonbelievers give thanks, too, as the growing number of secular thanksgiving "prayers" attest.
Robert Emmons, a University of California psychology professor and author of "Gratitude Works!," says gratitude is "profoundly basic" to the human condition. "When we are grateful for something we consider its origins. Where did it come from, who was responsible for it, why and for what purpose does it exist, what should I do about it? These questions strike me as profoundly religious."
Q: How did we go from the religious practice of giving thanks to a secular holiday of Thanksgiving?
A: The holiday, of course, has its roots in a celebratory meal between the Puritans and Native Americans in Plymouth, Mass., in 1621. The Puritans frequently held days of giving thanks — a somber kind of extra Sabbath, often with fasting, silence and prayers. The local Wampanoags also routinely gave thanks for a plentiful harvest or other good fortune. There were numerous "proclamations of thanksgiving" made by the Continental Congress, often with language recognizing a religious duty to give thanks. Thanksgiving didn't become a national holiday until 1863, when, in the midst of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln declared that the U.S. would "observe the last Thursday of November next, as a day of Thanksgiving and Praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the Heavens. "
Fun Thanksgiving fact: Lincoln was pressured to create Thanksgiving by one of the first women poets in the U.S., Sarah Josepha Hale, author of "Mary Had a Little Lamb."
Q: Is one day a year enough to count our blessings? How often should we give thanks?
A: The answer seems to be the more, the merrier. Emmons' multiple studies of gratitude show that people who pause to count their blessings daily report they are 25 percent happier than people who don't. He also found that thankful people exercised daily, reported fewer illnesses and had higher levels of energy and alertness. Other scholars have studied the benefits of gratitude — there's even a program on the "science of gratitude" at the University of California, Berkeley — and researchers find that giving thanks regularly improves romantic relationships and can be a kind of natural anti-depressant.
Q: OK, giving thanks is good for my body. But what about my soul?
A: That takes us back to the religious foundations of giving thanks. Bradley Malkovsky, a professor of comparative theology at the University of Notre Dame, says giving thanks is "spiritually good for us ... a training in connectivity, of getting beyond the ego" to each other and to the divine. "If we look closely at our lives, we see so much of what we have achieved is a gift," both from other people and from God, he said. "Gratitude is the recognition that we are not the center of the universe."
The unheard cry of the rural poor
by Kitty TaylorBigstock/telliott
I am well-educated, gratefully-employed and poor.
At 35, with a graduate degree under my belt and working for a non-profit organization that serves rural communities, I do not always know how I am going to afford life. Earlier this year, I found myself in an unspoken yet familiar panic as I faced an all-of-a-sudden (because spacing out a dwindling supply of generic Lexapro is not a good idea) ambush of medical bills. Self-pay (read “uninsured”) appointments came with a 20% discount, but to renew both my depression medication and birth control, I had to pay $150.00 total for two appointments, one within a week of the other. That kept me on schedule for both prescriptions, though by the time I exchanged cash for medicine, I added another $50.00 monthly expense.
Combine that $200 with $400 in rent, $200 in student loan payments, $55 in cell phone expenses, $225 for car and insurance, and I hit $1080 in bills alone for one month of survival. Deciding to feed myself within the USDA Food Plans scale ($167-$332), transport myself in a fuel-efficient Focus ($75-$100), and keep myself, my clothes, and my apartment clean ($25-$40), I was looking at the $1,347-$1,552 range. In one month, I clear $1550 and still have a credit card bill to pay. With student loans also swimming heavy in interest, both of those debts are getting by month-to-month, much like me.
Yet according to the North Carolina Division of Social Services, I am $2,008 over the maximum gross annual income percentage allowable for food and nutrition assistance. With a gross salary of $25,000 per year and my take-home pay just over $20,000, I make too much money to get help with a basic need.
In rural Appalachia, specifically western North Carolina, I am poor but not in poverty. I might even be considered privileged. I have reliable transportation, a must in a town where the already limited, weekday-only, public transportation shuts down at 5:00 p.m. and—depending on just how rural you are—few, if any stores or resources are a walk away. I do not have a spouse, a child or a pet. I am within a 25-minute drive of immediate family, should times get even tougher. I rent an apartment at the mission and retreat agency where I work, providing me with access to some discounted meals when missions teams and our county’s chapter of the Rotary Club are dining on campus. I am in generally good health, though better when taking both prescriptions every day.
Compared to my surrounding population in Clay County where one out of every three children is food insecure, I am living on the sunny side. In an area where a number of kind-hearted and appreciative folks come to retire, many who have spent generations in these mountains have and will remain focused on today’s needs, not retirement’s possibilities. Rural poverty is prevalent and not going anywhere soon. Even with my privilege of "poor but not impoverished," the cost of financial instability has occasionally meant taking one medication every 2-3 days to avoid refilling and paying for two from the same paycheck. That’s planning ahead.
Like the many who want to do more than bandage a temporary fix on a long-standing issue, the question of where to begin is one faced by well-intentioned but overwhelmed congregations and outreach services. To address the problem from the ground up, the ground is the place to start. Enter the Cost of Poverty Experience, the product of a partnership between the CareSource Foundation and Think Tank. During these poverty simulations, participants are given real-life roles with real-life challenges and real-life consequences. They visit stations representing a variety of community services and attempt to complete one month’s worth of responsibilities: paying bills, taking children to school, going to work, buying groceries, budgeting for medication and deciding when something will have to wait. They do so as a family living in poverty, stretching their resources to fulfill needs one week at a time.
Throughout the scenario, they gain an in-depth understanding of life under poverty’s circumstances in the rural areas, enviroments which struggle with limited resources. In my small town, that includes a volunteer-operated, county food pantry that distributed over 15,000 boxes of food in 2014 while being open only one day per week.
When the 2012 United Methodist General Conference offered C.O.P.E. to its attendees, church leaders, advocates, organizers and ministers left with a deeper level of understanding of and compassion for their neighbors, relatives, coworkers, parishioners, students, patients and friends living full-time in scarcity and need. “By putting myself in the shoes of those who live daily in poverty, barely able to stay afloat, I was able to feel a whisper of their pain,” said Jessica Conner, editor of the South Carolina United Methodist Advocate newspaper. “The experience transformed me. It’s one thing to serve low-income families, as I do in my local church. It’s quite another to serve with a deeper, more personal understanding of their journey.”
While C.O.P.E is one avenue of moving the church out of the pews and into communities, it doesn’t take a poverty simulation to learn someone else’s story. It does, however, take a willingness to listen. It also takes a willingness to understand that every sect of poverty comes with its own unique challenges. As I heard a pastor friend recently remark in a meeting, “Out in Raleigh, they think we just need to put all of our jobs on the internet.” We all laughed because there was little else to do with a remark so disconnected from the reality of rural life.
Internet service isn’t a given or a priority for everyone.
I have the luxury of Wi-Fi, but if I were living in some other apartment complex (of which there are few) or housing development (of which there are some), that expense would not be included with my rent. In my current living situation, which is on the lower end of monthly cost for a one bedroom/one bath, it’s not an extra bill. That matters.
I also have job security and safety nets of family members. I am one of the lucky ones who can face one month of that unspoken yet familiar panic. With my salary for one just above the 2015 federal poverty guidelines for a family of four in the lower 48 states and a bit closer to a family of three in Alaska and Hawaii, I live with advantages unavailable to many of the families served through my place of employment. That’s a hard to truth to reconcile, especially when I’m a paycheck-to-paycheck kind of adult.
Besides, next month might be better.
I’ll figure that out when I get there.
Did Pope Francis say Lutherans can take Communion at Catholic Mass?
by David Gibson / Religion News ServicePope Francis gives Communion at the end of the first mass of his visit to Cuba in Havana’s Revolution Square, September 20, 2015. Reuters/Claudia Daut
(RNS) Pope Francis has a knack for setting traditionalist teeth on edge with unscripted musings on sacred topics. He recently did it again when he seemed to suggest that a Lutheran could receive communion in the Catholic Church after consulting her conscience.
The exchange came up during a prayer service last Sunday evening (Nov. 15) at a Lutheran church in Rome that had invited the pontiff, who used the occasion to engage in a question-and-answer session with some of the congregants.
One woman, Anke de Bernardinis, told Francis that she was married to a Catholic and that she and her husband share many “joys and sorrows” in life, but not Communion at church. “What can we do on this point to finally attain Communion?” she asked.
The question is fraught because the Eucharist is so central to sacramental Christianity, and because of the Catholic belief that Jesus’ body and blood is truly present in a special way in the bread and wine consecrated by a priest — an understanding that was rejected by most Protestants after the Reformation, and which has been a source of division ever since.
Francis recognized the weight of the moment, and joked that he was “afraid” to respond in detail on such a topic in front of his friend Cardinal Walter Kasper, a renowned German theologian who was also present.
Then he went on at some length to wonder whether Communion should be thought of as an end point of ecumenism, or as an aid on the journey together toward full communion. Francis stressed that it was not his place to give permission for Protestants to receive Catholic Communion, and that differences on doctrine remain.
But he noted that “life is greater than explanations and interpretations,” and he cited his own experiences in which Protestant friends said they also believe in the “real presence” of Jesus in the Eucharist.
The common baptism of believers was the key starting point, Francis said. “One Baptism, one Lord, one faith,” he repeated, concluding with this counsel to de Bernardinis: “Speak with the Lord and go ahead,” indicating that it was as much a personal as an institutional question. “I don’t dare say more.”
Of course others were quick to fill in that silence, mainly with criticisms.
“Once again Pope Francis, in being pastoral and kind, has muddled things up and confused the faithful,” wrote the Rev. Dwight Longenecker, a blogging priest who was raised Protestant and converted to Catholicism. It was an “unsatisfactory waffle from a successor of Peter,” Longenecker said, adding that Francis should have told the woman to become Catholic.
“Hard to avoid the conclusion that Pope Francis just effectively rewrote the Catechism, and destroyed a Eucharistic discipline that has existed since the Reformation,” wrote the American Conservative’s Rod Dreher, another convert to Catholicism who later left for the Orthodox Church. “The Pope is refuting the magisterial teaching of his own Church, and not on a small matter either.”
Yet the assumption about the sharp dividing line on Communion isn’t quite right.
Bishop Denis J. Madden, an auxiliary bishop of the Baltimore archdiocese, noted in an interview that both Catholic canon lawand the 1993 Ecumenical Directory provide for certain cases in which “intercommunion” is possible. Those circumstances are usually in cases of emergency or “grave necessity,” or with the permission of the local bishop or national hierarchy.
One crucial condition for a Protestant to receive Communion is that they genuinely believe in the “real presence” of Christ in the Eucharist.
That, in fact, is something that Lutheran and Catholic leaders agree on, said Madden, who last month issued, with his counterpart from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, amajor document summarizing 32 points of agreement between the two churches as they head toward the symbolic 500th anniversary of the Reformation, on Oct. 31, 2017.
“I don’t think we should jump to the point and say, ‘Oh come on, we’ll all just put our hands on each other’s shoulders and go to Communion together.’ No, there are still things we differ on,” said Madden, who noted there are other disagreements about ordination and the like.
“But what we try to say in this document is that while there are a number of things we differ on, they are not enough to keep us separated.”
As far as Francis’ implication that a Protestant believer could consult his or her conscience and decide to approach for Communion, Madden said that’s not completely out of bounds.
He recalled the episode at the 2005 funeral of Saint John Paul II, when Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — a theological straight shooter who would be elected Pope Benedict XVI a short time later —gave Communion to Brother Roger, a Swiss Protestant and founder of the Taize ecumenical monastic community in south-east France.
“Ratzinger was criticized for that, but he felt that Brother Roger believed in the real presence, that he was prayerful, that it was an appropriate setting for that particular time,” Madden said. “And he did not feel it was inappropriate.”
(It later came out that John Paul himself had repeatedly given Brother Roger Communion at Mass, though the monastic never converted.)
“If you have those times when there is shared communion that does not mean that everything is agreed upon,” Madden said. “There will always be time for debate and for parsing and so on. But then there comes a time when you have to look at what is the greater good.”
Edward Condon, a canon lawyer who writes for the Catholic Herald of Britain, made a similar point.
“While some have gone bonkers at the suggestion that the pope wants to give Communion to Protestants, the church already holds that this is not a simple question of can they or can’t they, but one of time, place, disposition, and belief,” Condon wrote in a column.
“These are not procedural hoops to jump through but necessary expressions of the seriousness of the Eucharist.”
Video courtesy of Catholic News Service via YouTube
This Sunday, November 29, 2015First Sunday of Advent: Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21:25-36
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Lectionary Readings for Sunday, 29 November 2015:
(Courtesy of Vanderbilt Divinity Library)
Jeremiah 33:14-16
Psalm 25:1-10
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Luke 21:25-36
(Courtesy of Vanderbilt Divinity Library)
Jeremiah 33:14-16
Psalm 25:1-10
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Luke 21:25-36
---------------------
Lectionary Readings:
Jeremiah 33:14 “Here, the days are coming,” says Adonai, “when I will fulfill this good promise which I have proclaimed for the house of Isra’el and the house of Y’hudah.
15 When those days come, at that time,
I will cause to spring up for David
a Branch of Righteousness.
He will do what is just and right in the land.
16 When those days come, Y’hudah will be saved,
Yerushalayim will live in safety,
and the name given to her will be
Adonai Tzidkenu [Adonai our Righteousness].”
Psalm 25:(0) By David:
(1) I lift my inner being to you, Adonai;
2 I trust you, my God.
Don’t let me be disgraced,
don’t let my enemies gloat over me.
3 No one waiting for you will be disgraced;
disgrace awaits those who break faith for no reason.
4 Make me know your ways, Adonai,
teach me your paths.
5 Guide me in your truth, and teach me;
for you are the God who saves me,
my hope is in you all day long.
6 Remember your compassion and grace, Adonai;
for these are ages old.
7 Don’t remember my youthful sins or transgressions;
but remember me according to your grace
for the sake of your goodness, Adonai.
8 Adonai is good, and he is fair;
this is why he teaches sinners the way [to live],
9 leads the humble to do what is right
and teaches the humble [to live] his way.
10 All Adonai’s paths are grace and truth
to those who keep his covenant and instructions.
1 Thessalonians 3:9 Indeed, how can we thank God enough for you or express to our God all the joy we feel because of you? 10 Night and day we pray as hard as we can that we will be able to see you face to face and supply whatever shortcomings there may be in your trust. 11 May God our Father and our Lord Yeshua direct our way to you.
12 And as for you, may the Lord make you increase and overflow in love toward each other, indeed, toward everyone, just as we do toward you; 13 so that he may give you the inner strength to be blameless, by reason of your holiness, when you stand before God our Father at the coming of our Lord Yeshua with all his angels.
Luke 21:25 “There will appear signs in the sun, moon and stars; and on earth, nations will be in anxiety and bewilderment at the sound and surge of the sea, 26 as people faint with fear at the prospect of what is overtaking the world; for the powers in heaven will be shaken.[Luke 21:26 Haggai 2:6, 21] 27 And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with tremendous power and glory.[Luke 21:27 Daniel 7:13–14] 28 When these things start to happen, stand up and hold your heads high; because you are about to be liberated!”
29 Then he told them a parable: “Look at the fig tree, Indeed, all the trees. 30 As soon as they sprout leaves, you can see for yourselves that summer is near. 31 In the same way, when you see these things taking place, you are to know that the Kingdom of God is near! 32 Yes! I tell you that this people will certainly not pass away before it has all happened. 33 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will certainly not pass away.
34 “But keep watch on yourselves, or your hearts will become dulled by carousing, drunkenness and the worries of everyday living, and that Day will be sprung upon you suddenly like a trap! 35 For it will close in on everyone, no matter where they live, throughout the whole world. 36 Stay alert, always praying that you will have the strength to escape all the things that will happen and to stand in the presence of the Son of Man.”
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Jeremiah 33:14 “Here, the days are coming,” says Adonai, “when I will fulfill this good promise which I have proclaimed for the house of Isra’el and the house of Y’hudah.
15 When those days come, at that time,
I will cause to spring up for David
a Branch of Righteousness.
He will do what is just and right in the land.
16 When those days come, Y’hudah will be saved,
Yerushalayim will live in safety,
and the name given to her will be
Adonai Tzidkenu [Adonai our Righteousness].”
Psalm 25:(0) By David:
(1) I lift my inner being to you, Adonai;
2 I trust you, my God.
Don’t let me be disgraced,
don’t let my enemies gloat over me.
3 No one waiting for you will be disgraced;
disgrace awaits those who break faith for no reason.
4 Make me know your ways, Adonai,
teach me your paths.
5 Guide me in your truth, and teach me;
for you are the God who saves me,
my hope is in you all day long.
6 Remember your compassion and grace, Adonai;
for these are ages old.
7 Don’t remember my youthful sins or transgressions;
but remember me according to your grace
for the sake of your goodness, Adonai.
8 Adonai is good, and he is fair;
this is why he teaches sinners the way [to live],
9 leads the humble to do what is right
and teaches the humble [to live] his way.
10 All Adonai’s paths are grace and truth
to those who keep his covenant and instructions.
1 Thessalonians 3:9 Indeed, how can we thank God enough for you or express to our God all the joy we feel because of you? 10 Night and day we pray as hard as we can that we will be able to see you face to face and supply whatever shortcomings there may be in your trust. 11 May God our Father and our Lord Yeshua direct our way to you.
12 And as for you, may the Lord make you increase and overflow in love toward each other, indeed, toward everyone, just as we do toward you; 13 so that he may give you the inner strength to be blameless, by reason of your holiness, when you stand before God our Father at the coming of our Lord Yeshua with all his angels.
Luke 21:25 “There will appear signs in the sun, moon and stars; and on earth, nations will be in anxiety and bewilderment at the sound and surge of the sea, 26 as people faint with fear at the prospect of what is overtaking the world; for the powers in heaven will be shaken.[Luke 21:26 Haggai 2:6, 21] 27 And then they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with tremendous power and glory.[Luke 21:27 Daniel 7:13–14] 28 When these things start to happen, stand up and hold your heads high; because you are about to be liberated!”
29 Then he told them a parable: “Look at the fig tree, Indeed, all the trees. 30 As soon as they sprout leaves, you can see for yourselves that summer is near. 31 In the same way, when you see these things taking place, you are to know that the Kingdom of God is near! 32 Yes! I tell you that this people will certainly not pass away before it has all happened. 33 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will certainly not pass away.
34 “But keep watch on yourselves, or your hearts will become dulled by carousing, drunkenness and the worries of everyday living, and that Day will be sprung upon you suddenly like a trap! 35 For it will close in on everyone, no matter where they live, throughout the whole world. 36 Stay alert, always praying that you will have the strength to escape all the things that will happen and to stand in the presence of the Son of Man.”
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John Wesley's Notes Commentary for Jeremiah 33:14-16
Verse 15
[15] In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land.
The branch — The kings they had hitherto had of the line of David, were most of them unrighteous men, but God promises that after the captivity, they should have a branch of David who would execute judgment and righteousness in the land, for the protection and government of those that feared him.
Verse 16
[16] In those days shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell safely: and this is the name wherewith she shall be called, The LORD our righteousness.
Saved — It is the opinion of some that a spiritual salvation and security is promised under these expressions, but by the most and best interpreters, a temporal salvation. This was typical of that spiritual and eternal salvation which is promised to the true Israel of God; as their rest in Canaan typified that rest which remaineth for the people of God.
The Lord our righteousness — There is no such name any where given, either to the Jewish or Christian church, as the Lord our righteousness, but the full import of that name is spoken of Christ, Isaiah 45:23, which text is applied to Christ, Romans 14:11; Philemon 2:10.
Psalm 25:1-10
Verse 2
[2] O my God, I trust in thee: let me not be ashamed, let not mine enemies triumph over me.
Ashamed — Disappointed of my hope.
Verse 3
[3] Yea, let none that wait on thee be ashamed: let them be ashamed which transgress without cause.
Cause — Without any provocation of mine.
Verse 4
[4] Shew me thy ways, O LORD; teach me thy paths.
Teach — Teach me my duty, and cause me to keep close to it, notwithstanding all temptations.
Verse 8
[8] Good and upright is the LORD: therefore will he teach sinners in the way.
Upright — Holy and true, in all his declarations and offers of mercy to sinners.
Therefore — He will not be wanting to such poor sinners as I am, but will guide them into the way of life and peace.
Verse 9
[9] The meek will he guide in judgment: and the meek will he teach his way.
The meek — Such as meekly submit themselves to God, and are desirous to be directed and governed by him.
Judgment — In the paths of judgment, in the right way.
Verse 10
[10] All the paths of the LORD are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies.
Paths — All the dealings of God with them, yea even those that are afflictive, are done in kindness and faithfulness to them.
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Verse 10
[10] Night and day praying exceedingly that we might see your face, and might perfect that which is lacking in your faith?
And perfect that which is wanting in your faith — So St. Paul did not know that "they who are once upon the rock no longer need to be taught by man."
Verse 11
[11] Now God himself and our Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, direct our way unto you.
Direct our way — This prayer is addressed to Christ, as well as to the Father.
Verse 13
[13] To the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints.
With all his, Christ's, saints - Both angels and men.
Luke 21:25-36
Verse 25
[25] And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring;
And there shall be — Before the great day, which was typified by the destruction of Jerusalem: signs - Different from those mentioned Luke 21:11, etc. Matthew 24:29; Mark 13:24.
Verse 28
[28] And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.
Now when these things — Mentioned Luke 21:8,10, etc., begin to come to pass, look up with firm faith, and lift up your heads with joy: for your redemption out of many troubles draweth nigh, by God's destroying your implacable enemies.
Verse 29
[29] And he spake to them a parable; Behold the fig tree, and all the trees;
Behold the fig tree and all the trees — Christ spake this in the spring, just before the passover; when all the trees were budding on the mount of Olives, where they then were.
Verse 30
[30] When they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand.
Ye know of yourselves — Though none teach you.
Verse 31
[31] So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.
The kingdom of God is nigh — The destruction of the Jewish city, temple, and religion, to make way for the advancement of my kingdom.
Verse 32
[32] Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled.
Till all things be effected — All that has been spoken of the destruction of Jerusalem, to which the question, Luke 21:7, relates: and which is treated of from Luke 21:8-24.
Verse 34
[34] And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares.
Take heed, lest at any time your hearts be overloaded with gluttony and drunkenness — And was there need to warn the apostles themselves against such sins as these? Then surely there is reason to warn even strong Christians against the very grossest sins. Neither are we wise, if we think ourselves out of the reach of any sin: and so that day - Of judgment or of death, come upon you, even you that are not of this world-Unawares. Matthew 24:42; Mark 13:33; Luke 12:35.
Verse 35
[35] For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth.
That sit — Careless and at ease.
Verse 36
[36] Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man.
Watch ye therefore — This is the general conclusion of all that precedes.
That ye may be counted worthy — This word sometimes signifies an honour conferred on a person, as when the apostles are said to be counted worthy to suffer shame for Christ, Acts 5:41. Sometimes meet or becoming: as when John the Baptist exhorts, to bring fruits worthy of repentance, Luke 3:8. And so to be counted worthy to escape, is to have the honour of it, and to be fitted or prepared for it.
To stand — With joy and triumph: not to fall before him as his enemies.
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The Upper Room Ministries
Verse 15
[15] In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land.
The branch — The kings they had hitherto had of the line of David, were most of them unrighteous men, but God promises that after the captivity, they should have a branch of David who would execute judgment and righteousness in the land, for the protection and government of those that feared him.
Verse 16
[16] In those days shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell safely: and this is the name wherewith she shall be called, The LORD our righteousness.
Saved — It is the opinion of some that a spiritual salvation and security is promised under these expressions, but by the most and best interpreters, a temporal salvation. This was typical of that spiritual and eternal salvation which is promised to the true Israel of God; as their rest in Canaan typified that rest which remaineth for the people of God.
The Lord our righteousness — There is no such name any where given, either to the Jewish or Christian church, as the Lord our righteousness, but the full import of that name is spoken of Christ, Isaiah 45:23, which text is applied to Christ, Romans 14:11; Philemon 2:10.
Psalm 25:1-10
Verse 2
[2] O my God, I trust in thee: let me not be ashamed, let not mine enemies triumph over me.
Ashamed — Disappointed of my hope.
Verse 3
[3] Yea, let none that wait on thee be ashamed: let them be ashamed which transgress without cause.
Cause — Without any provocation of mine.
Verse 4
[4] Shew me thy ways, O LORD; teach me thy paths.
Teach — Teach me my duty, and cause me to keep close to it, notwithstanding all temptations.
Verse 8
[8] Good and upright is the LORD: therefore will he teach sinners in the way.
Upright — Holy and true, in all his declarations and offers of mercy to sinners.
Therefore — He will not be wanting to such poor sinners as I am, but will guide them into the way of life and peace.
Verse 9
[9] The meek will he guide in judgment: and the meek will he teach his way.
The meek — Such as meekly submit themselves to God, and are desirous to be directed and governed by him.
Judgment — In the paths of judgment, in the right way.
Verse 10
[10] All the paths of the LORD are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant and his testimonies.
Paths — All the dealings of God with them, yea even those that are afflictive, are done in kindness and faithfulness to them.
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Verse 10
[10] Night and day praying exceedingly that we might see your face, and might perfect that which is lacking in your faith?
And perfect that which is wanting in your faith — So St. Paul did not know that "they who are once upon the rock no longer need to be taught by man."
Verse 11
[11] Now God himself and our Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ, direct our way unto you.
Direct our way — This prayer is addressed to Christ, as well as to the Father.
Verse 13
[13] To the end he may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints.
With all his, Christ's, saints - Both angels and men.
Luke 21:25-36
Verse 25
[25] And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring;
And there shall be — Before the great day, which was typified by the destruction of Jerusalem: signs - Different from those mentioned Luke 21:11, etc. Matthew 24:29; Mark 13:24.
Verse 28
[28] And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.
Now when these things — Mentioned Luke 21:8,10, etc., begin to come to pass, look up with firm faith, and lift up your heads with joy: for your redemption out of many troubles draweth nigh, by God's destroying your implacable enemies.
Verse 29
[29] And he spake to them a parable; Behold the fig tree, and all the trees;
Behold the fig tree and all the trees — Christ spake this in the spring, just before the passover; when all the trees were budding on the mount of Olives, where they then were.
Verse 30
[30] When they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand.
Ye know of yourselves — Though none teach you.
Verse 31
[31] So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand.
The kingdom of God is nigh — The destruction of the Jewish city, temple, and religion, to make way for the advancement of my kingdom.
Verse 32
[32] Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass away, till all be fulfilled.
Till all things be effected — All that has been spoken of the destruction of Jerusalem, to which the question, Luke 21:7, relates: and which is treated of from Luke 21:8-24.
Verse 34
[34] And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares.
Take heed, lest at any time your hearts be overloaded with gluttony and drunkenness — And was there need to warn the apostles themselves against such sins as these? Then surely there is reason to warn even strong Christians against the very grossest sins. Neither are we wise, if we think ourselves out of the reach of any sin: and so that day - Of judgment or of death, come upon you, even you that are not of this world-Unawares. Matthew 24:42; Mark 13:33; Luke 12:35.
Verse 35
[35] For as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth.
That sit — Careless and at ease.
Verse 36
[36] Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man.
Watch ye therefore — This is the general conclusion of all that precedes.
That ye may be counted worthy — This word sometimes signifies an honour conferred on a person, as when the apostles are said to be counted worthy to suffer shame for Christ, Acts 5:41. Sometimes meet or becoming: as when John the Baptist exhorts, to bring fruits worthy of repentance, Luke 3:8. And so to be counted worthy to escape, is to have the honour of it, and to be fitted or prepared for it.
To stand — With joy and triumph: not to fall before him as his enemies.
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The Upper Room Ministries
PO Box 340004
Nashville, Tennessee 37203-0004 United States
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Sermon Story "The Coming Days" by Gary Lee Parker for Sunday, 29 November 2015 with Scripture: Jeremiah 33:14 “Here, the days are coming,” says Adonai, “when I will fulfill this good promise which I have proclaimed for the house of Isra’el and the house of Y’hudah.
15 When those days come, at that time,
I will cause to spring up for David
a Branch of Righteousness.
He will do what is just and right in the land.
16 When those days come, Y’hudah will be saved,
Yerushalayim will live in safety,
and the name given to her will be
Adonai Tzidkenu [Adonai our Righteousness].”
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We coem to realize that as we read the Scripture for today, God through the prophet was attempting to encourage the Israelites as conqueored and exiled people or soon to be conquered and exile that God will not forgive them. In this short pasage we can see where God is going to send a root of David to be ruler over all of Israel and that there will be be peace on all sides of Israel while all the nations will honor Israel and worship their God. In this passage, we see the coming of the Messiah which was fulfilled in the coming of Yeshua on the earth to be born, suffer, die, be buried, be resurrected, and ascend back into the Heavens. Yet, even with the coming of the Messiah Yeshua, the full promise will not be fulfilled until He returns in all of His Glory to set up Heaven on Earth with eternal peace and salvation. We are living in the inbetween times yet God is calling us to work with Him to recreate His creation on earth as it is in Heaven. This includes the full and active inclusion in His church of people who have been marginalised such as the people who are differently abled. We read and reflect on this passage asking: How do I understand this message for today? How have I lived out God's Message in love and mercy in recreating His creation? What is God asking me to be and do for His Kingdom? We come to seek God's Blessings and Power to be all we are called to be in coming and eating the Body of Jesus and Drinking His Blood in our participation of the Holy Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. We come to receive from God singing the Hymn "Soon and Very Soon" by Andre Crouch:
Chorus:
Soon and very soon we are going to see the king x3
Halelujha, halelujha, were going to see the king (sp)
No more cryin there, we are going to see the king X3
Halelujha, halelujha, were going to see the king (sp)
Bridge:
Should there be any rivers we must cross
Should there be any mountains we must climb
God will supplt all the strength that we need
Give us strength till we reach the other side... go in to verse
Verse:
We have come from every nation, God has already signed our name. Jesus took his blood and he washed my sins.. he washed them all away. Yet there are those of us who have laid down our lives but we all shall meet again on the other side... soon and very soon.
Chorus:
Soon and very soon we are going to see the king x3
Halelujha, halelujha, were going to see the king (sp)
No more cryin there, we are going to see the king X3
Halelujha, halelujha, were going to see the king (sp)
Bridge:
Should there be any rivers we must cross
Should there be any mountains we must climb
God will supplt all the strength that we need
Give us strength till we reach the other side... go in to verse
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Gary Lee Parker
4147 Idaho Street, Apt. 1
San Diego, California 92104-1844, United States
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Sermon Story "The Coming Days" by Gary Lee Parker for Sunday, 29 November 2015 with Scripture: Jeremiah 33:14 “Here, the days are coming,” says Adonai, “when I will fulfill this good promise which I have proclaimed for the house of Isra’el and the house of Y’hudah.
15 When those days come, at that time,
I will cause to spring up for David
a Branch of Righteousness.
He will do what is just and right in the land.
16 When those days come, Y’hudah will be saved,
Yerushalayim will live in safety,
and the name given to her will be
Adonai Tzidkenu [Adonai our Righteousness].”
---------------------
We coem to realize that as we read the Scripture for today, God through the prophet was attempting to encourage the Israelites as conqueored and exiled people or soon to be conquered and exile that God will not forgive them. In this short pasage we can see where God is going to send a root of David to be ruler over all of Israel and that there will be be peace on all sides of Israel while all the nations will honor Israel and worship their God. In this passage, we see the coming of the Messiah which was fulfilled in the coming of Yeshua on the earth to be born, suffer, die, be buried, be resurrected, and ascend back into the Heavens. Yet, even with the coming of the Messiah Yeshua, the full promise will not be fulfilled until He returns in all of His Glory to set up Heaven on Earth with eternal peace and salvation. We are living in the inbetween times yet God is calling us to work with Him to recreate His creation on earth as it is in Heaven. This includes the full and active inclusion in His church of people who have been marginalised such as the people who are differently abled. We read and reflect on this passage asking: How do I understand this message for today? How have I lived out God's Message in love and mercy in recreating His creation? What is God asking me to be and do for His Kingdom? We come to seek God's Blessings and Power to be all we are called to be in coming and eating the Body of Jesus and Drinking His Blood in our participation of the Holy Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. We come to receive from God singing the Hymn "Soon and Very Soon" by Andre Crouch:
Chorus:
Soon and very soon we are going to see the king x3
Halelujha, halelujha, were going to see the king (sp)
No more cryin there, we are going to see the king X3
Halelujha, halelujha, were going to see the king (sp)
Bridge:
Should there be any rivers we must cross
Should there be any mountains we must climb
God will supplt all the strength that we need
Give us strength till we reach the other side... go in to verse
Verse:
We have come from every nation, God has already signed our name. Jesus took his blood and he washed my sins.. he washed them all away. Yet there are those of us who have laid down our lives but we all shall meet again on the other side... soon and very soon.
Chorus:
Soon and very soon we are going to see the king x3
Halelujha, halelujha, were going to see the king (sp)
No more cryin there, we are going to see the king X3
Halelujha, halelujha, were going to see the king (sp)
Bridge:
Should there be any rivers we must cross
Should there be any mountains we must climb
God will supplt all the strength that we need
Give us strength till we reach the other side... go in to verse
---------------------
Gary Lee Parker
4147 Idaho Street, Apt. 1
San Diego, California 92104-1844, United States
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Jeremiah 33:14-16
Have you ever seen a ghost town? Maybe you’ve seen one on television if you haven’t seen one in real life. Shops sit with boarded-up windows, dust and tumbleweeds blow down the street, and things seem eerily still. Perhaps you’ve seen it when small communities abandon their oncethriving downtown areas. Faded billboards promise happiness bought with medicine or lawnmowers or soft drinks, streets are empty, and buildings are abandoned. These places died when the interstate bypassed them, railroads forgot them, or politicians ignored them. If you take a walk through such places, you have some idea of what Jeremiah sees when he looks out over Israel: a wasteland.
Sometimes we see the wasteland even in populated cities. Ghost neighborhoods, sections of town full of abandoned buildings, places where prosperous folk pulled up stakes and fled to the suburbs. “White flight,” we call it. Here in Birmingham, Alabama, forty years after marches and riots, poorer African Americans in West End still live in virtual segregation. The only stores that seem to thrive are ones that charge outrageous interest for payday loans and car titles. I drove a friend from Latvia through our city, and when we turned a corner from a wealthy neighborhood into a poor one, she gasped and asked, “Are we still in Birmingham?” Walk through nearly any town, any city, and you will find the same. The poet T. S. Eliot looked at Western culture, thriving with life and commerce, and saw a wasteland, a giant ash heap. People living their lives like zombies, sleepwalking through their days with hollow eyes, working meaningless jobs so that they can go home and stare at flickering images on a screen. Have you seen such a ghost town? Do you live in one?
We pine for the good old days. Maybe you’ve heard people talk about them, or perhaps you remember? Wide porches where people would visit with neighbors on Saturday afternoons. We didn’t lock our doors at night, because we lived in safety. No one played soccer or had football practice on Sunday morning, because people worshiped and spent time with family. We looked up to leaders in those days. We trusted our mayors, our preachers, our presidents. Not like these days, when some churches sit empty on Sunday, when people lock their doors, their cars, and their hearts, when leaders care more about cutting their own business deals than caring for their constituents. These days it seems we hear nothing but scandal, violence, and materialism. Is it any wonder that Jeremiah spends most of his ministry railing against his culture? He has strong words for them. He calls them prostitutes (Jeremiah 2:20), selling their bodies and souls to whatever fad comes along. Cynics say we see the past through rose-colored glasses, but just as Israel longed for the age of David and Solomon, we long for the good old days, for heroes and leaders. Something has to change!
Jeremiah says, “Squint.” Exercise your eyes. Look past the interstate crawling with cars, the hollow eyes of tired workers. Tune past the talking heads on television to see a new kingdom. He gives us specifics: in these streets where you see only traffic and crime, God sees a party processional. A married couple and their entourage laugh and sing, on foot, down the middle of the interstate. Empty ghost town shops open up, their shelves full, their owners haggling with shoppers. Where you see asphalt parking lots, God sees pastures of green grass and cattle too numerous for their owners to count. Where you see only a dead stump, a tree chopped down prematurely, God sees a slender stalk twisting its way through the aged bark. God sees a branch unfurling its leaves to the sun. The promise of an entirely new tree growing out of the stump of the old one. The days are coming, says the Lord. It’s just a matter of time. Can’t you see it?
Advent is the season of preparation for Christmas. It begins today and covers the four weeks leading up to December 25. We often feel overwhelmed by hustle and bustle, advertising, and the push to buy more stuff to show people we love them. We may feel cynical and see the real and spiritual wasteland around us. But God calls us to look forward and see a different reality—a kingdom of God that stretches its thin stalk toward the sun. Occasionally, like weeds pushing through cracks in the sidewalk, the kingdom breaks through and we see it clearly, without squinting. The other day I stood in the living room of a newly-built house in a neighborhood that, five years earlier, had been overrun by gangs and abandoned by the city. This house had been built by several churches of different denominations. Local businesses and subcontractors donated materials and labor. People from all over the city and from the neighborhood pitched in to build a house for a family who had no home. These churches and the family had made a commitment not to abandon the neighborhood but to work for change. As we stood in the living room giving thanks to God for all God had given, we had the sense that Jesus had built the house with his own hands, that already he had begun to rule in that part of the city with justice and righteousness.
As Christians we pledge our allegiance to a new kind of king, one who changes us from within and gives us a new name. During Advent we announce to the world his coming rule, and we invite the whole world to claim Jesus as its righteousness.
First Sunday of Advent
COLOR: Blue or Purple
SCRIPTURE READINGS: Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21:25-36
THEME IDEAS
How can we participate in the coming reign of Christ? That is the challenge of Advent. God promises a new order, the birth of a world in which justice and righteous- ness rule. The promise is irrevocable—the birth will come. Whether we are among those who will be reborn with that world depends upon our commitment and allegiance, in each moment of our lives, to the one true God rather than the false gods we so often honor. God shows us the way in the life and words of Jesus, and gives us companions— our sisters and brothers in Christ. But ultimately, each of us must actively prepare if we are to be part of what is being born at Christmas.
INVITATION AND GATHERING
Call to Worship (Jeremiah 33, 1 Thessalonians 3, Luke 21)
People of faith, prepare for the coming reign of Christ!
As we gather to pray and sing and listen,
a spirit of anticipation and hope fills us.
The days are surely coming, says Our God,
when justice and righteousness will prevail.
May our worship illuminate our hearts and minds,
freeing us to respond joyfully
to God’s call in the days to come.
Opening Prayer (Psalm 25, 1 Thessalonians 3, Luke 21)
Holy Source of life and hope,
as we come together this day,
open our ears to hear,
open our eyes to see,
and open our hearts to love,
that we may come to know your ways
and follow your paths.
Help us grow in love for one another,
and for all creation,
as we prepare for the coming of the one
who calls us to turn from our false gods
to you, Holy One,
the true source of our salvation. Amen.
PROCLAMATION AND RESPONSE
Prayer of Confession (Jeremiah 33, Luke 21)
Loving Creator, you call us to rejoice
in your promise of the birth that is to come,
but we are afraid.
You invite us into a world
where justice and righteousness prevail,
but we turn away in fear.
We long for an easy path into your promised world,
but you warn us that there is no easy way.
Birth new life within us,
that we may abide in your perfect love —
the love that casts out fear.
Words of Assurance (Psalm 25, 1 Thessalonians 3)
God’s mercy and steadfast love endure,
strengthening our hearts and overcoming our fears.
God will remove every obstacle
that keeps us from being the body of Christ.
Amen.
Passing the Peace of Christ
Anticipating the blessings of the one who is coming,
let us offer one another signs of Christ’s peace:
The peace of Christ be with you, always.
And also with you.
Response to the Word (Luke 21)
Ever-faithful Teacher of Truth,
your word is born anew each moment.
It will never pass away.
Grant that we may be bearers of that word,
bringing your love and hope and justice
into this violent, hurting world. Amen.
THANKSGIVING AND COMMUNION
Invitation to the Offering (1 Thessalonians)
God’s love for us knows no bounds. In grateful response, may our gifts to others abound.
Offering Prayer (Luke 21)
Giver of all good things,
as we offer these gifts to you,
open our eyes to see more clearly
all that we have been given
and all that we have to give.
Stretch our capacity to give of ourselves:
our love, our companionship,
and our material resources,
wherever they are needed. Amen.
SENDING FORTH
Benediction (1 Thessalonians 3, Luke 21)
Go into the world awake to the signs
of God’s invitations to new life.
Know that the reign of Christ draws nearer
with each right action we choose.
Amen.
CONTEMPORARY OPTIONS
Contemporary Gathering Words (Luke 21)
People of faith, prepare for the coming reign of Christ!
We are getting ready!
Praise Sentences (Luke 21)
The Chosen One is coming in a cloud
with great power and glory!
Thanks be to God!
The beloved Son is coming in humble estate
with a love that embraces all.
Thanks be to God!
From “The Abingdon Worship Annual 2012,” edited by Mary J. Scifres and B.J. Beu, Copyright © 2011 by Abingdon Press. “The Abingdon Worship Annual 2016” is now available.
WORSHIP CONNECTION: NOVEMBER 29, 2015 by Nancy C. Townley
First Sunday of Advent
COLOR: Blue or Purple
SCRIPTURE READINGS: Jeremiah 33:14-16; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13; Luke 21:25-36
CALLS TO WORSHIP
Call to Worship #1
L: The days are shorter and darkness comes early to our lives.
P: Lord, hear our prayers through the darkness.
L: Come, seek the Lord. Place your hope in God's mercy and love.
P: Lord, we seek your presence among us.
L: Look closely! God is making us ready.
P: Brighten our Spirits this day, and help us to receive your Good News. AMEN.
Call to Worship #2
L: The Lord will fulfill all the promises given to God's people.
P: Praise be to God.
L: The days are coming when all shall be revealed.
P: Thanks be to God.
L: The signs of God's Good News are all around us.
P: The darkness has overshadowed them.
L: God will bring to us a new light for all generations.
P: Open our eyes, Lord, to see your promises fulfilled. AMEN.
Call to Worship #3
[Using THE FAITH WE SING, p. 2177 "Wounded World That Cries for Healing", offer the following call to worship, as directed]
L: It's everywhere. Darkness, Anger, Despair, Hopelessness.
P: Where is the Lord?
L: Look closely! The signs of God's wonders are present.
P: But the world is an angry and violent place. How can we see the signs of God's love?
[Sing v. 1 of "Wounded World That Cries for Healing"]
L: Pain and mourning are for but a time. God's love is forever.
P: The newspapers, radio, TV, everything talks about lies and deceit; violence and hatred. How can we see God's love through all of this?
L: There are those who walk among us with such loving spirits and gentle compassion. Look for them for they are reflectors of God's love.
P: Are they truly among us today?[Sing v. 3 of "Wounded World That Cries for Healing"]
All: Lord, help us to behold your love and mercy everywhere. AMEN.
Call to Worship #4
L: Have you seen it ......the Spark of Hope which God is placing among us.
P: All we can see is hectic lives, crowded stores, darkness and fear.
L: Look again.......the spirit of God is moving, bringing hope.
P: We need to place our hope in God, but we are afraid.
L: A long time ago, people were afraid and God brought to them Light.
P: May God bring that light to us today! AMEN.
PRAYERS, LITANY/READING, BENEDICTION
Opening Prayer
We can hardly believe it, Lord. The Advent season is upon us. We usually translate that into the buying season in preparation for THE BIG DAY. But when we place our hope in the tinsel, wrappings, tape and boxes, we forget the most glorious gift of all, the gift of God's absolute love. Open our eyes, our hearts, our spirits today to behold God's gracious love for us in the fulfillment of all God's promises. For we ask this in the name of Jesus. AMEN.
Lighting the Advent Candle
Reader 1: Today we light one candle - the Candle called HOPE, as a reminder that God's promises are true.
Reader 2: We place our hope in God.
Reader 3: We place our lives I n God's care.
Reader 4: Come, all is ready. Let the light of this one candle, called HOPE, bring brightness to your spirits.
[The first Advent Candle is lighted]
Prayer of Confession
It is so easy for us, Lord, to let the anger, frustration, and fear overshadow our lives. We can't seem to escape it. We try to find some way to cover it up, but it remains. And in our anxiety, we act out our fear in ways which are not helpful and, far too often, go against the ways you have taught us to live. We feel the pressure to give, and resentment in giving. We feel the push to be present at every upcoming event, and want to run and hide. Help us, Lord. Heal our wounded spirits. Free us again to look to you for Hope. Let us see the many ways in which you are present to us...... guiding, healing, loving, encouraging us. Forgive us for our fears and our stubbornness. Bring us again to your light, for we ask this in Jesus' Name. AMEN.
Words of Assurance
"The days are coming", says the prophet Isaiah, "when all God's promises will be fulfilled." These promises of hope, peace, joy, and love are for you. Receive the hope that God offers to you today.
Pastoral Prayer
The celebration, or selling, didn't even wait until after Thanksgiving. Shouting to us through advertisements, blaring at us from every edifice, the message of "Happy Holidays" proclaims the season of giving, or rather, purchasing. And each year, we succumb to it. We enter this season already feeling pushed and pressured and these things become a darkness to us. Where is the light, O Lord? Where can we find hope and refuge from the din? From the distant past a voice cries that our hope is in God. In the midst of the darkness, God will bring a light. We can count on that. God has always been present for us. This day, as we have come bringing our prayers for those near and dear to us, let us remember that God has already heard our prayers and the cries of our hearts. God will respond in love. As we feel we are being overcome by the darkness, God brings us the absolute light of Love, to pierce our gloom. Arise, shine! People of God. The Lord has not abandoned us. God's mercy and love are coming to us in many wondrous and surprising ways. Behold, the love of God, that is around you all the time. Rejoice, Hope is given for you this day. AMEN.
Litany/Reading
L: Boxes, tissue paper, tape, ribbons, tags.....is everything all ready now for the season of giving?
P: Wrap us in your love, O God.
L: Lights, wreaths, trees, lawn ornaments, window candles.....is everything all ready now for the season of celebration?
P: Light our way in the darkness, O God.
L: Schedules, Parties, Gatherings, Visits......is everything all ready now for the time of gathering?
P: Guide and direct our lives and steps, O God.
L: What is there left to do?
P: Place our hope in your presence and love, O God.
L: That's it? Place our hope in God?
P: That's it!
L: But all the stuff we have to do....what happens to all of that?
P: Don't be frantic. Place your hope in God.
L: But.......
P: Place your hope in God. Slow down. Listen. Behold! God is with you!
L: Where is God?
P: Here, right here, right now, beside you, before you, behind you - with you always. You don't have to fear.
L: Thank God.
Benediction/Blessing
God's presence and promises are real. Go now into God's world, trusting in God's love and placing your hope in God. Go in peace. AMEN
ARTISTIC ELEMENTS
The traditional color for this Sunday is PURPLE or BLUE.
Note: I recommend putting a brief paragraph describing or explaining the symbolism used in your visual display. These become good teaching tools for a congregation.Note: Risers are any objects which create a higher place than the main level. You may use books, wood blocks, anything that is sturdy on which to place various objects. Usually the risers are placed on the worship center first to create the variation in levels.
Note: For ADVENT 1, I have chosen to use the color blue, varying the shades each week with the addition of fabric and other symbols for the day. If your worship center is against a wall you may want to consider placing fabric behind the worship center so that it forms a screen effect and then draping the worship center with the same identical fabric. I recommend the use of dark blue during Advent (leaving the purple for Lent).
I have chosen not to have the cross on the worship center during Advent, but rather to focus on the Advent symbols themselves.
SURFACE: Place 5 risers on the worship center. One riser in the center back and the other four risers to the right and left, but not in a straight line, they should be staggered.
FABRIC: Cover the entire worship center with dark blue fabric (or dark purple).
CANDLES: Place one dark blue 8-10" pillar candle on the center riser. Place dark blue votive candles, in holders on each of the other risers.
FLOWERS/PLANTS: No plants or flowers are recommended at this time.
ROCKS/WOOD: Place one gnarled, bare branch in the center of the worship table, so that the candles flank it (the larger candle in the back of it, and the other candles on either side).
From a Child's Point of View
Old Testament: Jeremiah 33:14-16. The child's cry, "But, it's not fair!" reminds us that justice and fairness are big concerns for children. They yearn for teachers, parents, and playmates who are fair. They want just rules for the groups in which they participate and the games they play. They protest vehemently when they sense injustice—especially when it affects them. Therefore Jeremiah's Advent promise—that when God's kingdom comes fully, there will be justice for everyone and a leader who deals with people fairly—is good news for children.
The words of the promise, however, need to be decoded for children. Before the passage is read, Children need to hear that "house of Judah" and "house of Israel" are names for God's people; and that when God made this promise, God's people, being ruled by cruel foreigners, felt as hopeful as an old dead stump. It also helps them to see, or hear described, the possibility of a fresh branch growing from a stump.
Psalm: Psalm 25:1-10. This passage is a personal prayer, asking God that I be treated well by others, that God teach me how to live, and that God not remember all my sins and shortcomings. It is a prayer for people of all ages.
Epistle: 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13. In this loving message to friends in the church at Thessalonica, Paul prays that God will help them love one another and the people beyond their church as much as Paul and God love them. To love others that much is a good Advent challenge for children.
Gospel: Luke 21:25-36. This apocalyptic passage is filled with images that are not easy for children to understand, and an idea (that we should watch and be prepared) that is hard for children to grasp. It is probably best to read the passage for the older worshipers and present the idea for the children during the sermon.
One interpretation of this passage that speaks to children is that some frightening, horrible things happen in human experience, but that God is still in control and will be there for us even after "the worst." Given this, we are called to avoid both (1) worrying too much about the awful things and (2) ignoring the awful things by partying and being self-centered. Instead, we are to remember that God is in control, and we are to live accordingly.
Warning: Do not underestimate the "horrible things" children worry about. At an early age they see television's graphic pictures of war, famine, natural disasters, and the potential for nuclear annihilation. Many see the devastation of divorce in their own families or in those of their friends. More children than we wish have been mugged by older kids and know the fear of participating in the drug culture. Children need to know that God will see them through even these "horfible things." They also need to hear that such things are the products of our imperfect age and that when God's kingdom comes in its fullness, those things will end.
Watch Words
Avoid tribulation, affliction, and other big words that describe suffering. They are obsolete. Instead, use specific, concrete words to describe wars, natural disasters, and personal tragedies.
Be careful about using righteousness. If children have heard the word at all, it has probably been used with a negative connotation, such as self-righteous. Instead, speak about living by God's rules, or take time to explore what righteousness means today.
Children use the word fair before they use justice. Using the words interchangeably will help make the connection between them.
Let the Children Sing
"Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus" is filled with difficult, unfamiliar vocabulary. But when it is sung after a sermon about Jeremiah's promise, older children, when encouraged, can find phrases that identify Jesus as the promised "righteous branch."
The words of "O Come, O Come, Emmanuel" are beyond most elementary-school readers. But the sad, "stumpy" feeling of the music of the verses and the happy, hopeful music of the chorus attract them. Invite even young readers to feel the sad sound of the verses, and then sing along on the simple-to-read happy chorus.
"Song of Hope" offers a straightforward message in words that are easy to read and understand. If the Argentine folk melody is unfamiliar, ask a children's choir or class to sing the hymn at the close of the service.
The Liturgical Child
1. For your worship area, ask someone to create a banner picturing a branch growing out of a stump, with the words of Jeremiah. Or replace the usual flowers with a stump from which a branch is growing. (This may be a real stump into which a seedling or leafed branch has been drilled. Or it may be a potted seedling wrapped with brown paper or burlap to look like a stump.) Refer to this display before reading Jeremiah's promise, urging worshipers to listen for the unusual stump in the reading.
2. In the congregation's prayers, pray for fair teachers, coaches, community leaders, and government officials. Alos, ask for God's wisdom to see unjust situations at home, at school, on the job, and in the community, and for God's courage to do what we can to change them. Ask the choir to sing "Lead Me, Lord, in Thy Righteousness" (a paraphrase of Psalm 25:4-5) as a choral call to this prayer.
3. Psalm 25 is best understood and claimed when it is read in its original responsive form from a translation such as Today's English Version, the Good News Bible. So invite the congregation (or half the congregation) to read verses 1-7, with the understanding that they are "I." A worship leader (or the other half of the congregation) then can assume the priest's part and read verses 8-10 to assure the worshipers that God wants the same things for them.
4. One effective use of the Epistle passage would be to recite verses 12 and 13 from the Good News Bible as the charge and benediction with which worship concludes.
Sermon Resources
1. Challenge children to draw a picture of an unjust or unfair situation and a picture of the same people in the same situation acting justly or fairly. Provide blank space on the worship bulletin or suggest using the back of a pew card. Invite them to share the pictures with you as they leave the sanctuary. Take time to learn what caused the difference in the two pictures.
2. Everyone likes stories in which seemingly hopeless situations come to a happy ending. The beast in Beauty and the Best felt hopelessly trapped by the spell that could be broken only when a woman loved him. Kevin, accidentally left behind by his family in Home Alone, had to defend himself and his home from robbers. Jeremiah promises that one day God will bring all the unfair, seemingly hopeless situations in our world to fair, happy solutions. (Beauty and the Beast is the richer example because two people must learn to love before the situation is resolved.) Both videos are available on Netflix, in video rental stores and in many public libraries.
THE PROMISED ONE
JEREMIAH 33:14-16
According to a recent study, 1.6 percent of the world’s population will commit suicide. On one hand, that percentage seems too high. On the other hand, it may be surprising that more people aren’t in line for the highest windows.
When C. S. Lewis’s wife died, in his grief he wrote: “What reason have we, except our own desperate wishes to believe that God is, by any standard we can conceive, ‘good’? Doesn’t all the evidence suggest exactly the opposite?”
I. Our Lives Can Seem Hopeless
In his darkest hour, the prophet Jeremiah cursed the day he was born. He spent his life telling the Hebrew people to shape up, with almost no results. The Babylonians had demolished Jerusalem and the temple and run off with all the best stuff and some of the best people. Jeremiah was left in captivity in Jerusalem. He is at this writing (v.1) confined to quarters. The Jews left behind at the exile lost their home, too, for they knew that life was not what it should be.
The whole world understands the feeling of hopelessness. Sinclair Lewis closed one of his novels with a successful businessman telling his beautiful wife, “Deep down we are all just the same. We are desperately unhappy about something—and we don’t know what it is.”
We spend our lives waiting. We bury our treasures. We are intimidated by the giftedness of others, incapacitated by our lack of discipline, and mesmerized by our fear of failure. Our lives aren’t what they should be.
II. God Offers the Hope of His Grace
From captivity, Jeremiah speaks a word of hope. God promises that his people will be slaves no longer. The Messiah is coming from the line of David to fulfill the ancient promise of salvation. Jeremiah does not say a word about the people keeping up their end of the bargain. There is no bargain. There is only grace. This kingdom is dependent not on the goodness of the subjects, but the love of the King.
The game of hide-and-seek has occupied hours of many of our lives. In one version, the person who was “it” could shout, “Alley, alley, outs are in free.” Anyone who was still hiding could return to home base without fear of being caught. The Creator of the universe stands at the home base of heaven calling “Alley, Alley, outs are in free.” Everybody, come home. The game’s over and you’ve won.
III. We Need to Accept God’s Grace
Our refusal of grace does not change God’s grace. We are forgiven even for putting off the celebration. We are not saved by anything we hold. We are saved by the One who holds us. We have only to accept grace and rejoice in God’s unmerited favor.
During the days of sailing merchant ships, one ship was stuck off the coast of South America. Weeks went by without the slightest bit of wind. The ship was helpless and couldn’t move. The sailors were dying of thirst when another ship drifted close enough to hear their shouts for help. They answered, “Let down your buckets.” They found fresh water. Although they were at sea, they were surrounded by the current that came from the Amazon River. They only needed to recognize where they were. Thirsty people are surrounded by Living Water.
As children of God we are free to try and fail, free to make mistakes, and free to rejoice. At the end of it all, there is only grace. (Brett Younger)
A FULL LIFE
1 THESSALONIANS 3:9-13
I remember when I was young pastors and evangelists commenting that we never know when life will end. “Death is near,” they would say. Even young people die.
During my junior and senior high school days, none of their predictions proved true among the young people I knew. But only two years out of high school, two college classmates and my favorite professor died. They weren’t just names in a newspaper. They were flesh-and-blood people that I had laughed, cried, and prayed with at college. These were people I cared about deeply.
I was hundreds of miles away on summer break, August 4, 1967, when they died. They were traveling on assignment for the Christian college that I attended in Oklahoma. When I heard about the tragedy, I was overwhelmed with grief. One of the young men grew up in my hometown of Kansas City. I attended his funeral along with several other classmates. Their lives were too short. Even my “old” professor was only forty-two. Although their lives were short, they all lived full lives.
Paul summarizes what a full life is in 1 Thessalonians 3:9-13.
I. A Full Life Includes Joy
Look at many Christians today. There seems to be little joy in their lives. Why? Fear of failure, rushed hours, lack of trust, lack of prayer, a restless spirit, and anxiety are only a few reasons.
Vernon C. Lyons said that if doing God’s holy will is all that matters to you, then no matter what the rest of life brings, you can find joy.
Do you have joy, real joy, wonderful joy in your heart? If not, let Jesus come into your heart.
II. A Full Life Includes Love
Often, love is misdirected, left out, hurt, and selfish. There are great cracks in the hearts and lives of the human heart. The world needs Godlike love poured down into those cracks.
Love demands ingenuity, consideration, and time. When we learn how to love, we learn how to give the center of ourselves to others and God. Real love gives, forgives, is open, waits, and promises full life. Love doesn’t disappoint—it fulfills and satisfies needs.
The American Civil War began just as one New England couple planned to be married. The man was drafted into the army, so the wedding had to be postponed. The battles were severe, but the man escaped injury. He wrote regularly to his loving fiancee‚ back home in New England. She would pore over his letters, reading and rereading them by the oil lamp of her home.
Abruptly, the letters ceased. Finally a much-anticipated letter arrived, but it was an unfamiliar handwriting. It stated, “There has been a terrible battle fought called the Battle of the Wilderness. It is very difficult for me to tell you this, but I have lost both of my arms. I can’t write for myself. So a friend is writing this letter on my behalf. You are the dearest person to me, but because of my physical condition I feel I should release you from the obligation of our engagement.”
The young woman never answered his letter. Instead, she took the next train and went directly to the hospital where he was being treated. A sympathetic army officer directed her to the young soldier’s cot. The moment she saw her fiance‚ she tearfully threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. She cried, “I will never give you up! These hands of mine will be your hands.”
A full life demonstrates this kind of love.
III. A Full Life Includes Holiness
I read about a plant in South America, called the pitcher plant. On the stalk of the plant just below the leaf is a little cuplike formation that, regardless the size of the “cup,” is always full of water. It is a good illustration of practical biblical holiness. All that God asks is that the heart should be open completely to him and be filled with holiness. (Derl G. Keefer)
THE ULTIMATE SIGN
LUKE 21:25-38
This text is part of Jesus response to a request for a sign of his return. Jesus answer was better than what his listeners hoped to hear.
I. The Desire for a Sign
This was not the first time Jesus was asked for a sign. Often after proving who he was, people asked for more and more signs. He wanted people to believe in his message, to believe in the words of the Scriptures, and respond to God out of hearts full of love and appreciation for who God is. He did not simply want an army of miracle watchers.
Today people would love to know exactly when Jesus will return. Some would want to live like the devil up until the last minute, then repent and get ready for Christ in the hour prior to his return.
Before I accepted Christ as my Savior, I wished I could live my entire life in sin and then become a Christian in the hours before my death. Maximum pleasure, minimum discipleship. Jesus says in verse 34 to avoid that type of thinking. The parable of the foolish bridesmaids makes the same point.
Signs of the end times are not given so we can waste time until we know the day of Christ’s return is at hand.
II. Specific, yet General Signs
The signs given were wars, earthquakes, and famines (v. 10). Rather than signs saying, “Jesus is coming this week,” these events are constant reminders to the church of all ages, “Jesus could come anytime.”
The events Jesus mentioned are all life-threatening events, and are all common around the world. They are intentionally general so that everyone, every week, everywhere, can be reminded: “Jesus could return this week.” Every time you turn on the TV and Brian Williams tells you about the latest fighting somewhere, or an earthquake destroying buildings, or a famine in some little known section of the world, realize God is simply using the six o’clock news as a reminder: “Jesus could come anytime!”
Jesus used the example of a fig tree in verse 30. Is he saying he will return when the fig tree blossoms? Yes, and no. Every year when you see a tree blossoming, you know spring is coming in a few weeks. Likewise, every time you see a tree in bloom, you know Jesus is coming. Perhaps within a few weeks, like spring; perhaps not for another thousand years.
III. The Lesson of the Signs
Thus, the signs of Jesus are reminders he is coming, not warnings telling us when. Jesus warned us not to be deceived (v. 8) or terrified (v. 9), but to watch and pray (v. 36). This is the message of Advent.
Consider this: the people asked for a sign, proof Jesus is who he says he is, and when he is returning. And he gave them a sign: pray always!
They say, “Jesus, are you real? Are you coming? Give me a sign!”
Jesus responds, “Here is your sign: confess your sins, turn from them, take up your cross daily, and follow me. You do these things, and you will know! I will forgive your sins, I will carry your burden, I will change you from the inside out, and I will give you the assurance of your salvation!”
“Jesus, that’s not what we were talking about! We want you to raise some more dead folks. Do something exciting!”
“I am offering a far greater sign than a miracle a stage magician or a skilled physician could duplicate. I’m offering the sign of a changed heart, the ultimate sign!”
Have you experienced that sign in your life? (William Groover)
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