When pastors don't give by Joseph Yoo
“Right now, I don't think I can really give anything to the church.”
“I'd love to give to the church, really, but I still have so much student loans to pay off.”
“My kids are attending private school, and we just can't scrape extra cash to give to my church.”
I was getting upset.
“What the heck is going on here?” I thought to myself. Only I didn't think it. I blurted it out. And everyone around the table looked at me, shocked that I'd dare to call them out.
I was annoyed and angry. Normally I tried to be more understanding and compassionate. But I couldn't that day.
“This is ridiculous! We should really be ashamed of what we're sharing here!” Harsh, I know. But I was already in and might as well make my point.
The reason I was so angry and upset was that this discussion wasn't taking place with average churchgoers. No, this conversation was taking place with my fellow candidates for ordination. Yes, fellow pastors and pastors-to-be. We were learning about covenant discipleship and the facilitators thought that it would a good exercise for us to create a covenant among ourselves. We listed things that we felt were important to our calling: daily devotionals, meditating on Scripture, praying daily, engaging in fasting, and of course, giving, among other things. Most of my colleagues were hesitant to agree to the giving and they definitely had a problem with my suggestion of tithing our salary. I would've reluctantly understood if they'd balked at tithing but they were balking at giving.
Needless to say, six years after this conversation I'm not popular among that group of colleagues. And rightfully so. On one hand, I do wish I'd handled the situation better, with more grace. My intent wasn't to shame them or embarrass them (which I ultimately did). I just assumed that giving was going to be a natural part of our discipline. I even assumed that 10% was a given. But you know what they say about assuming … On the other hand, I don't know (nor do I really care) what they thought/think about me. To me, it was an asinine conversation. It made it even more ridiculous when a few of them shared that their church was struggling financially.
How can we expect our parishioners to give when we aren't willing to give?
I certainly didn't mean to come off as holier-than-thou back then and I don't have the intention to come come across that way today. My parents (my father is a pastor) instilled within my brother and me early on the importance of giving and tithing. They modeled it to us faithfully. And whatever money we received (for birthdays, Christmas, special occasions) my parents would make us give 10 percent of it in the offering. I was thoroughly annoyed as a kid and it never made sense to me. And for a good chunk of my life, it was more of a habit than a discipline. But as I matured in my faith, I realized how important tithing is to my faith and my life. It helps me to focus on the fact that God comes first.
It continually reminds me that all I have is a blessing from God and that I should be a faithful steward of the things I'm entrusted with. It also helps to keep me from being owned by the things I own. What I wrestle with is that I know that 10 percent is just a starting point, not the max. And I get the same fears and reservations that my colleagues had about giving six years ago. Which is why looking back, I wish I'd handled the situation more gracefully. Which is also why I'm far more understanding of people and their hesitation to be generous today.
As clergy, it's important that we model the type of faith we want our parishioners to have. As Paul says, “Follow my example, just like I follow Christ's” (1 Cor. 11:1). And we need to depend less on the old adage “Do as I say, not as I do.”
Money is usually a touchy subject that offends many. But we can't ignore the things that Jesus said about money. Someone once told me that the biggest barrier between us and God is our wallets. Jim Wallis wrote that our budget is a moral documentas it shows what's really important in our lives. If we, as clergy, find that giving is only an occasional act, perhaps we need to do some wrestling with ourselves and re-evaluate our priorities.
At the very least, we should give up the right to complain about how our parishioners give so little.
____________________________
Progress, pushback and clergy women by Kira Schlesinger
Yesterday, in a momentous occasion, the Church of England consecrated its first female bishop, The Reverend Libby Lane, now Bishop of Stockport. This event was made possible by a vote this past July in which the Church of England voted to allow women bishops, even though women have been serving as priests in the Church of England since 1994.
As a priest in the Episcopal Church here in the United States, I have never known a world in which I could not be ordained. The first female bishop in the Episcopal Church was consecrated when I was only five years old. Symbolically, however, the Church of England remains the Mother Church of the Anglican Communion, of which the Episcopal Church (USA) is a part, so it is with much rejoicing and eagerness that I and other proponents of gender equality in all aspects of ordained ministry welcome this consecration.
However, the consecration of Bishop Lane has not been without controversy. During the service, a lone voice protested the consecration, shouting that it was “not in the Bible.” Additionally, there continues to be debate involving the subsequent consecration of the Reverend Philip North as Bishop of Burnley. As reported in Christian Today, no bishops who have consecrated or ordained women priests or bishops will lay hands on the Reverend North, preserving a “true” line of apostolic succession free of female “taint."
For those with knowledge of church history, this argument recalls the Donatist Controversy of the fourth century, in which clergy who had recanted their faith during the Diocletian persecutions were deemed ineligible to perform the sacraments, and those sacraments that the lapsed clergy had performed were invalid, leading to people seeking a second baptism.
The Church came down on the side of Augustine of Hippo who argued that, rather than requiring a priest of absolute pure moral character, the Church derived its holiness from its Head, Jesus Christ. Nonetheless, many practicing “traditionalist” Anglicans would prefer a bishop who has not been tainted by association with the ordination or consecration of women clergy.
While my experience with opposition to women clergy has not been nearly as fierce or as overt as that expressed over the consecration of the Reverend Lane, in many ways, the so-called “stained-glass ceiling” is still a present reality for women clergy. Women clergy are more likely to serve as associate priests rather than rectors or in positions where they receive part-time compensation. They are also more likely to practice their calling in non-parochial positions like school or hospital chaplaincy. This has little to do with qualifications or giftedness and much to do with leadership, particularly of larger churches, being viewed as a predominantly male attribute. Throughout their careers, many women clergy are told that they just don’t look or sound like a priest or pastor.
Personally, I am extremely blessed to serve a small, Southern congregation who has embraced me for who I am and who enjoy the shock on their friends’ faces when they introduce a young woman as their priest and pastor. But it gets tiring to constantly reassure people calling on the phone and showing up to the church for assistance that, yes, I am the priest. At the end of celebrating a large funeral, one gentleman informed me, “I’ve never had a woman preacher before, but you did a really good job!”
Reading Sarah Sentilles’ book “A Church of Her Own: What Happens When A Woman Takes the Pulpit” during my first year of ordained ministry helped me to know that I was not alone in my perception of some of the struggles I faced as a woman in ministry. Additionally, my colleagues around the world in The Young Clergy Women’s Project have offered me great support and comfort. Together we help one another live out our God-given callings in the face of myriad challenges, ranging from raising children to dealing with difficult lay leadership to overt sexism from superiors, while also celebrating one another’s successes.
Bishop Lane’s consecration was probably neither the first time nor will it be the last time she encounters resistance to her ministry due to her gender, and it can be lonely at the top. May she know that she is not alone, that God has called her to this role at this time for God’s glory and that her clergy sisters stand beside her in faith and prayer
____________________________
While you were wondering where the millennials went … by Shane Raynor
Two articles really grabbed my attention this morning: One is an Associated Press piece by Michael Weissenstein, “Cuban youth build secret computer network despite Wi-Fi ban.” The other is by Mark Tooley and is titled “Calvinist evangelicals in United Methodist Church!”
The first is about how thousands of people in and around Havana, mostly youth and young adults, have defied the Cuban government and built a hidden network consisting of thousands of computers so they can chat with each other, play games and download music and movies.
The second discusses a young Calvinist congregation meeting in the sanctuary of a declining United Methodist church in Washington, D.C.
These two sets of circumstances parallel each other somewhat, and there are some valuable lessons here for establishment churches, aging companies and anyone else trying to figure out “what went wrong.”
Today if young people aren’t happy with a system, they’ll either find a better one or create their own.
True internet access is virtually unheard of in Cuba. Only a select few have private access, and public access (via government-run access points) is too expensive for the average Cuban. Enter Streetnet, aka SNet, a network that young Cubans have set up to fill the void. What existed didn't work for them, so they created something that does.
Consider the church world, where house churches and church networks are on the rise while mainline denominational churches are losing members. There are a number of reasons for this, of course, but could part of it be that most established churches are still doing things the way they did 40 or 50 years ago?
Young people have less patience nowadays to wait for better systems. They’ll make new ones themselves.
Yahoo Tech ✔ @YahooTechFollow
Cuban youth build secret computer network despite nation's Wi-Fi ban http://yhoo.it/1CZiiTz
Youth and young adults usually find a way to connect with each other.
Youth in Cuba are connecting with each other the same way youth around the world are connecting — with technology. Ingenuity and resourcefulness have found a way, even in a communist country with little Internet access.
Tech makes it much easier for people to connect with others who share something in common. Churches that figure out how to help people do this have one less thing keeping them from growing.
One reason there are so many 20-somethings in the church Mark Tooley visited is that most people want to connect with others who are like them in some way — in this case age and the common experiences that go with it.
It’s why Christianity has theological “tribes” and it’s why age-level ministries developed in the first place. And it’s the reason why churches that have already lost most of their young people never seem to recover. When critical mass is gone, it’s hard to get it back.
Years ago, when I was working in Christian retail, I managed a bookstore in an urban mall. When I first took over the store, a large percentage of our customer base was white, middle-aged and mostly women. By the time I left a couple of years later, we had significantly more college-age customers, as well as more black and Latino customers. Part of that was because we tweaked the product assortment. But I believe most of it was because we hired people who were part of the communities our store wanted to appeal to.
Simply put, we got more college kids shopping in the store because we added more college kids to our team of employees.
In order to thrive nowadays, it helps if you know how to do a lot with a little.
I find it interesting that Mark Tooley had to go to the balcony to find a seat in the church he visited.
Mark Tooley @markdtooleyFollow
Why do Calvinists do better in United Methodist churches than Methodists? http://bit.ly/1D8Bkas @TheIRD
This means that on Sunday mornings, the church that owns the property is struggling with attendance in the same space that another congregation is filling on Sunday evenings. Think about how remarkable that is. (Rick Warren’s old wisdom that Sunday evenings are dead for churches may not be true anymore.)
And guess which church spends more on overhead and which has more money available for ministry. I don’t know what the guest church pays for rent, but as a former church treasurer, I can tell you that it probably doesn’t even come close to what the home church is spending to keep the place going.
In the AP article, we find out that Havana’s SNet (with more than 9,000 computers connected over the past five years) has been built for a cost of $200,000, maybe less. A 30-year-old systems engineer points out, “If I as a private citizen can put up a network with far less income than a government, a country should be able to do it, too, no?”
The article also notes that everything happens much faster and more efficiently over SNet than on the slow government connections, because on SNet, data passes from computer to computer without having to go through a central point. (That’s an object lesson that top-heavy, centralized denominations might want to consider.)
So under the nose of the Cuban government, young people with limited resources have built something that’s quite impressive. And without owning their own building, a young congregation in Washington, D.C. has also built something impressive.
Will the old guard adapt and catch up or remain in denial?
While you were wondering where the millennials went … by Shane Raynor
Two articles really grabbed my attention this morning: One is an Associated Press piece by Michael Weissenstein, “Cuban youth build secret computer network despite Wi-Fi ban.” The other is by Mark Tooley and is titled “Calvinist evangelicals in United Methodist Church!”
The first is about how thousands of people in and around Havana, mostly youth and young adults, have defied the Cuban government and built a hidden network consisting of thousands of computers so they can chat with each other, play games and download music and movies.
The second discusses a young Calvinist congregation meeting in the sanctuary of a declining United Methodist church in Washington, D.C.
These two sets of circumstances parallel each other somewhat, and there are some valuable lessons here for establishment churches, aging companies and anyone else trying to figure out “what went wrong.”
Today if young people aren’t happy with a system, they’ll either find a better one or create their own.
True internet access is virtually unheard of in Cuba. Only a select few have private access, and public access (via government-run access points) is too expensive for the average Cuban. Enter Streetnet, aka SNet, a network that young Cubans have set up to fill the void. What existed didn't work for them, so they created something that does.
Consider the church world, where house churches and church networks are on the rise while mainline denominational churches are losing members. There are a number of reasons for this, of course, but could part of it be that most established churches are still doing things the way they did 40 or 50 years ago?
Young people have less patience nowadays to wait for better systems. They’ll make new ones themselves.
Yahoo Tech ✔ @YahooTechFollow
Cuban youth build secret computer network despite nation's Wi-Fi ban http://yhoo.it/1CZiiTz
Youth and young adults usually find a way to connect with each other.
Youth in Cuba are connecting with each other the same way youth around the world are connecting — with technology. Ingenuity and resourcefulness have found a way, even in a communist country with little Internet access.
Tech makes it much easier for people to connect with others who share something in common. Churches that figure out how to help people do this have one less thing keeping them from growing.
One reason there are so many 20-somethings in the church Mark Tooley visited is that most people want to connect with others who are like them in some way — in this case age and the common experiences that go with it.
It’s why Christianity has theological “tribes” and it’s why age-level ministries developed in the first place. And it’s the reason why churches that have already lost most of their young people never seem to recover. When critical mass is gone, it’s hard to get it back.
Years ago, when I was working in Christian retail, I managed a bookstore in an urban mall. When I first took over the store, a large percentage of our customer base was white, middle-aged and mostly women. By the time I left a couple of years later, we had significantly more college-age customers, as well as more black and Latino customers. Part of that was because we tweaked the product assortment. But I believe most of it was because we hired people who were part of the communities our store wanted to appeal to.
Simply put, we got more college kids shopping in the store because we added more college kids to our team of employees.
In order to thrive nowadays, it helps if you know how to do a lot with a little.
I find it interesting that Mark Tooley had to go to the balcony to find a seat in the church he visited.
Mark Tooley @markdtooleyFollowWhy do Calvinists do better in United Methodist churches than Methodists? http://bit.ly/1D8Bkas @TheIRD
This means that on Sunday mornings, the church that owns the property is struggling with attendance in the same space that another congregation is filling on Sunday evenings. Think about how remarkable that is. (Rick Warren’s old wisdom that Sunday evenings are dead for churches may not be true anymore.)
And guess which church spends more on overhead and which has more money available for ministry. I don’t know what the guest church pays for rent, but as a former church treasurer, I can tell you that it probably doesn’t even come close to what the home church is spending to keep the place going.
In the AP article, we find out that Havana’s SNet (with more than 9,000 computers connected over the past five years) has been built for a cost of $200,000, maybe less. A 30-year-old systems engineer points out, “If I as a private citizen can put up a network with far less income than a government, a country should be able to do it, too, no?”
The article also notes that everything happens much faster and more efficiently over SNet than on the slow government connections, because on SNet, data passes from computer to computer without having to go through a central point. (That’s an object lesson that top-heavy, centralized denominations might want to consider.)
So under the nose of the Cuban government, young people with limited resources have built something that’s quite impressive. And without owning their own building, a young congregation in Washington, D.C. has also built something impressive.
Will the old guard adapt and catch up or remain in denial?
____________________________
Bible scholar Marcus Borg dies at 72
By David Gibson / Religion News Service
(RNS) Marcus J. Borg, a prominent liberal theologian and Bible scholar who for a generation helped shaped the intense debates about the historical Jesus and the veracity and meaning of the New Testament, died on Wednesday (Jan. 21). He was 72 and had been suffering from a prolonged illness, friends said.
Borg emerged as a major voice in biblical studies in the 1980s just as academics and theologians were bringing new energy to the so-called “quest for the historical Jesus,” the centuries-old effort to disentangle fact from myth in the Gospels.
Alongside scholars such as John Dominic Crossan, Borg was a leader in the Jesus Seminar, which brought a skeptical eye to the Scriptures and in particular to supernatural claims about Jesus’ miracles and his resurrection from the dead.
Like many of those critical scholars, Borg tended to view Jesus as a Jewish prophet and teacher, like many figures who emerged from the religious ferment of first-century Judaism.
But while Borg questioned the Bible,, he never lost his passion for the spiritual life or his faith in God as “real and a mystery,” as he put it in his 2014 memoir, “Convictions: How I Learned What Matters Most,” the last of more than 20 books he wrote, many of which helped popularize scholarship about the historical Jesus among lay Christians.
“Imagine that Christianity is about loving God. Imagine that it’s not about the self and its concerns, about ‘what’s in it for me,’ whether that be a blessed afterlife or prosperity in this life,” Borg wrote.
Marcus Borg was the youngest of four children, born March 11, 1942 in North Dakota and raised in a traditional Lutheran family. He attended Concordia College in Minnesota where he majored in philosophy and political science.
He remained fascinated by the New Testament, however, and accepted a fellowship to do graduate work at Union Seminary in New York City, where he delved deeply into the Jewish background of the Gospels and Jesus of Nazareth and studied with some of the major liberal theologians teachings there. Borg then went on to further studies at Oxford and taught at various Midwest universities on his return to the U.S.
In 1979 he joined the faculty at Oregon State University and taught religion there until his retirement in 2007.
Borg’s 1987 book, “Jesus: A New Vision,” launched him to prominence. The book summarized and explained recent New Testament scholarship for a popular audience while presenting Jesus as a social and political prophet of his time and place who was driven by his relationship with God – a relational approach that Borg saw as more important than traditional Christian beliefs based on a literal reading of the Bible.
In subsequent books, three of them co-written with Crossan, Borg continued to press and expand on those ideas, becoming a hero to Christian progressives and a target for conservatives.
Borg himself loved to debate but was no polemicist, and over the years maintained strong friendships with those who disagreed with him, developing a reputation as a gracious and generous scholar in a field and a profession that are not always known for those qualities.
For example, Borg co-authored a 1999 book, “The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions,” with N.T. Wright, an Anglican bible scholar who took a more orthodox view of the Gospels. But Wright also recommended many of Borg’s books and lectured alongside him on occasion.
“Spanning the study of Jesus and a wide variety of subjects, Marcus shaped the conversation about Jesus, the church, and Scripture in powerful ways over the space of four decades,” Frederick W. Schmidt, Jr., of Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, wrote on his blog on hearing of Borg’s passing.
“I came to different conclusions about a number of issues, but Marc was always incisive, tenacious, thoughtful, and unfailingly gracious; and over the years he became a cherished friend,”Schmidt wrote.
The Rev. Barkley Thompson, an Episcopal priest and rector of Christ Church Cathedral in Houston, Texas, broke the news of Borg’s death in a blog post in which he spoke of how much he had learned from Borg and how close they remained even as Thompson’s beliefs became more traditional and veered away from Borg’s.
“I once introduced Marcus to a church audience by saying, ‘I agree with roughly 75 percent of what Marcus will say to you this evening,’” Thompson wrote in his tribute. “When he stepped into the pulpit, Marcus quipped, ‘I’m tempted to forego my notes and discuss with Barkley the other 25 percent!’”
During a question-and-answer period with parishioners at one event someone asked Borg, “But how do you know that you’re right?”
Borg paused and responded: “I don’t know. I don’t know that I’m right.”
Thompson said he had corresponded with Borg in late November and asked how he was doing.
“I may have ten years left,” Borg wrote back. “Not sure I want more. There comes a time to let go. And I could, with gratitude, sooner than that. My life has been very blessed.”
Funeral arrangements were not immediately available. While raised a Lutheran, Borg gravitated to the Episcopal Church, which was his home for much of his life. His wife, Marianne, is an Episcopal priest and canon at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in Portland, Oregon, where Borg frequently lectured and was given the title of canon theologian.
With characteristic humor he said his wife informed him that “canon” means “big shot.”
Bible scholar Marcus Borg dies at 72
By David Gibson / Religion News Service
(RNS) Marcus J. Borg, a prominent liberal theologian and Bible scholar who for a generation helped shaped the intense debates about the historical Jesus and the veracity and meaning of the New Testament, died on Wednesday (Jan. 21). He was 72 and had been suffering from a prolonged illness, friends said.
Borg emerged as a major voice in biblical studies in the 1980s just as academics and theologians were bringing new energy to the so-called “quest for the historical Jesus,” the centuries-old effort to disentangle fact from myth in the Gospels.
Alongside scholars such as John Dominic Crossan, Borg was a leader in the Jesus Seminar, which brought a skeptical eye to the Scriptures and in particular to supernatural claims about Jesus’ miracles and his resurrection from the dead.
Like many of those critical scholars, Borg tended to view Jesus as a Jewish prophet and teacher, like many figures who emerged from the religious ferment of first-century Judaism.
But while Borg questioned the Bible,, he never lost his passion for the spiritual life or his faith in God as “real and a mystery,” as he put it in his 2014 memoir, “Convictions: How I Learned What Matters Most,” the last of more than 20 books he wrote, many of which helped popularize scholarship about the historical Jesus among lay Christians.
“Imagine that Christianity is about loving God. Imagine that it’s not about the self and its concerns, about ‘what’s in it for me,’ whether that be a blessed afterlife or prosperity in this life,” Borg wrote.
Marcus Borg was the youngest of four children, born March 11, 1942 in North Dakota and raised in a traditional Lutheran family. He attended Concordia College in Minnesota where he majored in philosophy and political science.
He remained fascinated by the New Testament, however, and accepted a fellowship to do graduate work at Union Seminary in New York City, where he delved deeply into the Jewish background of the Gospels and Jesus of Nazareth and studied with some of the major liberal theologians teachings there. Borg then went on to further studies at Oxford and taught at various Midwest universities on his return to the U.S.
In 1979 he joined the faculty at Oregon State University and taught religion there until his retirement in 2007.
Borg’s 1987 book, “Jesus: A New Vision,” launched him to prominence. The book summarized and explained recent New Testament scholarship for a popular audience while presenting Jesus as a social and political prophet of his time and place who was driven by his relationship with God – a relational approach that Borg saw as more important than traditional Christian beliefs based on a literal reading of the Bible.
In subsequent books, three of them co-written with Crossan, Borg continued to press and expand on those ideas, becoming a hero to Christian progressives and a target for conservatives.
Borg himself loved to debate but was no polemicist, and over the years maintained strong friendships with those who disagreed with him, developing a reputation as a gracious and generous scholar in a field and a profession that are not always known for those qualities.
For example, Borg co-authored a 1999 book, “The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions,” with N.T. Wright, an Anglican bible scholar who took a more orthodox view of the Gospels. But Wright also recommended many of Borg’s books and lectured alongside him on occasion.
“Spanning the study of Jesus and a wide variety of subjects, Marcus shaped the conversation about Jesus, the church, and Scripture in powerful ways over the space of four decades,” Frederick W. Schmidt, Jr., of Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, wrote on his blog on hearing of Borg’s passing.
“I came to different conclusions about a number of issues, but Marc was always incisive, tenacious, thoughtful, and unfailingly gracious; and over the years he became a cherished friend,”Schmidt wrote.
The Rev. Barkley Thompson, an Episcopal priest and rector of Christ Church Cathedral in Houston, Texas, broke the news of Borg’s death in a blog post in which he spoke of how much he had learned from Borg and how close they remained even as Thompson’s beliefs became more traditional and veered away from Borg’s.
“I once introduced Marcus to a church audience by saying, ‘I agree with roughly 75 percent of what Marcus will say to you this evening,’” Thompson wrote in his tribute. “When he stepped into the pulpit, Marcus quipped, ‘I’m tempted to forego my notes and discuss with Barkley the other 25 percent!’”
During a question-and-answer period with parishioners at one event someone asked Borg, “But how do you know that you’re right?”
Borg paused and responded: “I don’t know. I don’t know that I’m right.”
Thompson said he had corresponded with Borg in late November and asked how he was doing.
“I may have ten years left,” Borg wrote back. “Not sure I want more. There comes a time to let go. And I could, with gratitude, sooner than that. My life has been very blessed.”
Funeral arrangements were not immediately available. While raised a Lutheran, Borg gravitated to the Episcopal Church, which was his home for much of his life. His wife, Marianne, is an Episcopal priest and canon at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in Portland, Oregon, where Borg frequently lectured and was given the title of canon theologian.
With characteristic humor he said his wife informed him that “canon” means “big shot.”
____________________________
The lose-lose of ministry
By Preston Morgan
When I started pastoral ministry as a seminary student I was told that I needed “skin like a rhino and a heart like Mother Teresa.” Now, only four years into pastoral ministry, I am still coming to grips with the truth of this advice.
As a pastor, I seem to make — and am asked to make — decisions on an hourly basis. Fellow pastors have recommended that I read “The One Minute Manager,” but I have yet to find time to make it happen. Like many pastors, I have a “reading pile” that I try to chomp a chapter at a time, so perhaps one day I will read through it and all my problems will be solved. While I’m a person of hope, I doubt the book will perfect God’s ministry through me.
But even if I made every decision in a timely manner, and even if I made the most correct decision every time, I have come to learn that in church ministry someone will always disagree. We could be talking about the time of day a new ministry opportunity starts, the methods of taking attendance, the song selections in worship, the expectations of staff members (or clergy), the interpretation of a Scripture passage, the structure of lay leadership, the personal style of a clergyperson or whether the church should get involved in ministry with persons who are homeless.
Regardless of what decision a leader in the church makes, it is bound to leave someone upset. Let’s be honest; my decision to write this article will likely be met with a little resistance. It isn’t hard to feel that making any decision in church ministry is a lose-lose.
In an effort to minimize the hurt and anger that someone in the church is bound to feel when a decision is made, it’s not an uncommon experience in any church to see a committee or team of staff members venturing well beyond a helpful amount of time when weighing options for a decision. Our conversations awkwardly dance as we seesaw between problems, do-si-do in arguments, and finally fall to “analysis paralysis” without a conclusion. No one wants to misstep and mess things up when doing church, but in inaction we find ourselves stepping on toes and causing pain. Decisions are hard and require coordination, and the weightiness of these decisions make the lose-lose just rough enough that we can lose ourselves (and our purpose) in the process.
How can we step beyond the lose-lose of decision-making? How can we effectively lead our churches and communities down forks in the road?
Scripture tells us that the Word of God is a lamp for our feet and a light on our path. This doesn’t mean the prescription to the methods of taking attendance (or whatever dilemma you are facing) is found somewhere in the Bible, but, to me at least, it means that if we hold the Word of God in front of us, acknowledging that God goes before us through our troubles, then the pathway will be illumined. We still need to do our homework and creatively find solid footing along the way, but we can lead with confidence because we know we’re doing our best to follow God’s lead.
Lift up your questions, options and answers in prayer, individually and as a team, and listen! As a group, place your options next to Scripture and see what you find. Where do you hear God calling you to step next? Finally, look for hints within our church tradition, within the group’s ability to reason, and within your own experiences. I realize this doesn’t fit the expectation expressed by (the title of) “The One Minute Manager,” but perhaps it shouldn’t. Getting beyond a lose-lose often means the team needs to lose itself; not to the decision, but to the mission.
Try new things. Commit to experiments. Test hypotheses. Amend expectations. Celebrate tiny victories. Push for fresh concepts. Experience new angles. Ask visitors tough questions. Dare to say, “I don’t know. Come and see.” Cross ministry with social sciences. Blend tradition with technology. Prove your relevance. Build bridges. Cross them. Try again. Admit mistakes. Don’t be afraid to fail. Know that victory is found in Christ.
At the end of the day, don’t worry; someone will likely still be upset with your decision. When you hear someone is upset, listen first and respond as best you can. This is where it’s handy to have “skin like a rhino and a heart like Mother Teresa.” How you respond
The lose-lose of ministry
By Preston MorganWhen I started pastoral ministry as a seminary student I was told that I needed “skin like a rhino and a heart like Mother Teresa.” Now, only four years into pastoral ministry, I am still coming to grips with the truth of this advice.
As a pastor, I seem to make — and am asked to make — decisions on an hourly basis. Fellow pastors have recommended that I read “The One Minute Manager,” but I have yet to find time to make it happen. Like many pastors, I have a “reading pile” that I try to chomp a chapter at a time, so perhaps one day I will read through it and all my problems will be solved. While I’m a person of hope, I doubt the book will perfect God’s ministry through me.
But even if I made every decision in a timely manner, and even if I made the most correct decision every time, I have come to learn that in church ministry someone will always disagree. We could be talking about the time of day a new ministry opportunity starts, the methods of taking attendance, the song selections in worship, the expectations of staff members (or clergy), the interpretation of a Scripture passage, the structure of lay leadership, the personal style of a clergyperson or whether the church should get involved in ministry with persons who are homeless.
Regardless of what decision a leader in the church makes, it is bound to leave someone upset. Let’s be honest; my decision to write this article will likely be met with a little resistance. It isn’t hard to feel that making any decision in church ministry is a lose-lose.
In an effort to minimize the hurt and anger that someone in the church is bound to feel when a decision is made, it’s not an uncommon experience in any church to see a committee or team of staff members venturing well beyond a helpful amount of time when weighing options for a decision. Our conversations awkwardly dance as we seesaw between problems, do-si-do in arguments, and finally fall to “analysis paralysis” without a conclusion. No one wants to misstep and mess things up when doing church, but in inaction we find ourselves stepping on toes and causing pain. Decisions are hard and require coordination, and the weightiness of these decisions make the lose-lose just rough enough that we can lose ourselves (and our purpose) in the process.
How can we step beyond the lose-lose of decision-making? How can we effectively lead our churches and communities down forks in the road?
Scripture tells us that the Word of God is a lamp for our feet and a light on our path. This doesn’t mean the prescription to the methods of taking attendance (or whatever dilemma you are facing) is found somewhere in the Bible, but, to me at least, it means that if we hold the Word of God in front of us, acknowledging that God goes before us through our troubles, then the pathway will be illumined. We still need to do our homework and creatively find solid footing along the way, but we can lead with confidence because we know we’re doing our best to follow God’s lead.
Lift up your questions, options and answers in prayer, individually and as a team, and listen! As a group, place your options next to Scripture and see what you find. Where do you hear God calling you to step next? Finally, look for hints within our church tradition, within the group’s ability to reason, and within your own experiences. I realize this doesn’t fit the expectation expressed by (the title of) “The One Minute Manager,” but perhaps it shouldn’t. Getting beyond a lose-lose often means the team needs to lose itself; not to the decision, but to the mission.
Try new things. Commit to experiments. Test hypotheses. Amend expectations. Celebrate tiny victories. Push for fresh concepts. Experience new angles. Ask visitors tough questions. Dare to say, “I don’t know. Come and see.” Cross ministry with social sciences. Blend tradition with technology. Prove your relevance. Build bridges. Cross them. Try again. Admit mistakes. Don’t be afraid to fail. Know that victory is found in Christ.
At the end of the day, don’t worry; someone will likely still be upset with your decision. When you hear someone is upset, listen first and respond as best you can. This is where it’s handy to have “skin like a rhino and a heart like Mother Teresa.” How you respond
is how you win.
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By Dave BarnhartI went to a gigachurch a few years back — you know, the kind of church that is bigger than a megachurch, with a building larger than most zip codes and satellite campuses on other planets. I wanted to see what the hype was.
I settled into the routine of the expected praise songs and fog machines. Being a preacher, I was eager to get to the main event. I wanted to know: What’s he got that I ain’t got?
But before the pastor took the stage, we had to watch a video announcing an upcoming sermon series and a few other events. All of the commercials started the same way: “This is a fantastic church. I’m so excited to be part of this wonderful church. This is some terrific, radiant, humble church!” Then they went on to talk about the attributes that made it such an exceptional church: generous giving, tireless volunteers, spirit-filled prayer warriors and people who were hungry for the word.
I timed it: four minutes of nonstop praise.
But they weren’t done. The guest preacher (I came on the wrong day) then got up and continued singing the church’s praises for another four minutes. He loved the church. He loved the senior pastor. He loved the people. He loved the spirit-filled, generous, tireless members who were hungry for the word. He told an anecdote about how humble, visionary and funny the senior pastor was. Four more minutes.
“Holy propaganda, Batman!” I said to myself. “We just used over ten percent of the worship time on commercials for this church! I would never do that!”
That’s when I realized what they had that I didn’t (well, besides fog machines and the budget of a small country): a culture of cheerleading.
I thought back to missions team meetings I’d led when I or another team member would complain that “The twenty percent do eighty percent of the work.” I thought back to sermons when I had eloquently nagged and cajoled and laid guilt trips on my people, because I was frustrated that they wouldn’t invite their friends or volunteer for projects or show up for worship.
Psychologists call it “attribution theory,” and a famous classroom experiment illustrates it well: Three classrooms of fifth-graders were measured on how well they cleaned up after themselves and others. Class A was a control that received no reward and no special treatment. Class B received a reward for keeping their room clean. Class C received no reward, but various adults (other teachers, janitors, the principal) would occasionally stick their head in the door and say, “Wow, you guys really like to keep your room clean!”
Class C, the one that received the positive affirmation, blew the other classes away. They felt they needed to live up to their reputation; they internalized the messages they heard and attributed to themselves the qualities of cleanliness and conscientiousness. “We are a class who keeps our room clean.”
This research is the seed of truth in the much-maligned “self-esteem movement” that pundits love to ridicule. One of the most powerful tools in a teacher’s or parent’s toolkit is praise. To change children’s behavior, catch them doing something good.
It only takes a few minutes of reflection to realize how much this applies in our own lives. What motivates us adults to work harder? Harvard’s Rosabeth Kanter says we are motivated bymastery, membership and meaning. Money, she says, is a distant fourth. If I were to name the coaches, pastors and bosses who have inspired me most, it would be those who created a culture of gratitude and praise.
One church consultant I know talked about work he did for an established church’s stewardship program. The pastor ignored every recommendation he made except one: Before the offering, the pastor would say, “Because of your generosity last week, we were able to feed two hundred people at the local shelter.” Average giving soared. He was attributing generosity to his church.
If you read the book “Charlotte’s Web,” you read a story about how attribution changes attitudes and behaviors. The spider’s web-writing pointed out the qualities her pig friend already had, even though most everyone else could only see bacon. By naming those attributes, she created new possibilities for his future.
Although I don’t do eight-minute commercials for my church during worship, I do catch my church doing good things. I am thrilled when they invite guests and give generously. I see spontaneous acts of love and a sincere desire to serve the world, and every time they do something without my cajoling or nagging (which is ineffective anyway), I celebrate with them. This kind of cheerleading is more than empty, “Rah, rah, rah.” It is leading with gratitude and praise — with cheer.
Like most pastors, I also get frustrated with inertia and human nature. I can be very cynical about the state of American Christianity and “the church” as a whole. But my church? It’s the best. They really like to follow Jesus.
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By Matt RawleTwo billion people across the globe are connected to each other via some form of online social media. Whether it is Facebook statuses or Twitter tweets or Snapchat chats or Vine videos or Pinterest, Feedly, Instagram, Tinder, LinkedIn … we are certainly connected. The art of navigating social media is a crucial gift moving forward in today’s church culture. No one professes faith in Christ because of the kind of graphics on your church website, but a website that’s pleasing and informative just might be what gets the seeker to your door. The perception of being tech savvy is becoming more important as our daily connection with digital media in our home, cars, and hands grows. With any cultural trend there are blessings and growing edges, so here are five “Proverbial tweets” showing the positive and negative of our growing digital connectedness.
Proverbs 32:1 — A wise person will post original content, but the fool will only share. Creating original and clever content is the best way to multiply your digital influence. It can be a simple graphic or original language, but original content is the way to go. If creating original content isn’t your gift, try sharing information as an individual rather than as your church. 96 percent of content originates from individuals rather than corporate brands. In other words, your content will be more attractive if you post as “Mrs. Smith” rather than “First Church.” Have you noticed how sponsored Facebook ads look more like posts from individuals? That’s on purpose.
Proverbs 32:2 — A wise person offers a specific and targeted message, but the fool posts generalities. The good news of our connectedness is that you can quickly share a message with a wide audience; however this audience is quickly becoming splintered and polarized. Curtis Hougland, CEO of Attentionusa.com, mentioned in a recent article published by the University of Pennsylvania that our online connection is leading to a “Balkanization” of our communities. Even though with a few clicks you can reach two billion people, those two billion people are receiving an increasing amount of filtered and customized content.
Interestingly Hougland reports that individuals are becoming more loyal to personal content than to corporate entities. The good news is that our freedom to share our convictions is rather unfiltered and uncensored. The bad news is researchers are discovering that an individual is more loyal to one view of a divisive issue rather than corporate unity. For example, being online allows me to only socialize with dog lovers who oppose taxes for the community pool but who love strawberry ice cream. This means that social media is not a means of evangelism, but it is a great way to amplify preconceived belief. Meeting face to face, coming to the Communion table offers me the opportunity to swallow the “tough pill of grace” when I break bread with Mr. Smith who is a cat person. You see, I don’t like cat people, but God does and that’s what matters.
Proverbs 32:3 — A wise person posts sparingly, but the fool updates the world with every detail. Maybe it goes without saying that we sometimes share too much. Sharing too much is like sharing nothing at all. Instead of sharing your worship times over and over again, try sharing information in different ways. According to Webgeekly.com, digital consumers fall into six different categories: the creator, the critic, the collector, thejoiner, the spectator, and the inactive. Each person treats posts and tweets and pics differently.
For example, let’s say you want to share a blurb about the upcoming children’s musical coming up this spring. To catch the critic you might share something like, “Our Children’s Musical, ‘Hamlet meets Jesus’ is coming this March. Which one of Hamlet’s songs is your favorite?” To the joiner you might share a post that says, “Click here to join and support our ‘Hamlet and Jesus’ children’s musical coming up this spring.” The joiner would ignore the first post and the critic would pass over the second. If you post a generic message over and over, both would pass on all.
Proverbs 32:4 — A wise person delegates, but the fool tries to do it all. Social media is quickly become a specialized field. As a pastor, my week can quickly fill up with sharing content, producing videos, and creating Facebook events rather than focusing on the sermon, the fellowship, and the mission behind the online content. Creating original content can take hours, and unless the digital media enhances the order to which one is ordained, it is probably best to work with a tech savvy servant. Businesses like e-zekiel.com and motionworship.com really make you look snappy online with little cost. With anything there is a trade-off between convenience and customization, but I’m assuming most congregations really do want their pastor studying the Word more than crafting HTML.
Proverbs 32:5 — The wise person patiently posts, but the fool tries to be the first. It’s no sin to be the first person to comment on breaking news, but the problem is that stories change and not all information in initially shared. It is difficult to take back something that is out there, so it’s a good practice to let the dust settle on a breaking story before commenting or posting about it. It is quite tempting to jump into the mix when a story breaks so that your posts might trend, but you run the risk of trending in the wrong direction. It’s OK to wait and let the riffraff duke it out online before jumping in. Your church will appreciate a thoughtful response rather than, how does Craig Gilliam put it, a “reptilian reaction.”
We live in a world in which two billion people are a keystroke away, but there are some things that never change. A website or Facebook post might get people to your door, but it is God working through the church, the body of Christ, which will keep them there. Never underestimate the power of a handshake or a phone call or a cup of coffee with someone who cares. The church is still about a body, broken and resurrected, and no app can change that.
Matt Rawle blogs at MattRawle.com.
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By Courtney T BallRecently on Ministry Matters, Mark Lockard asked, ‘American Sniper’ or ‘Selma’: How Christian is your movie choice? In his article he juxtaposed the Christian faith represented by the hero of each movie: Chris Kyle vs. Martin Luther King Jr.
Mr. Lockard’s post was partially a response to Sarah Pulliam Bailey’s earlier piece detailing the Christian faith “you won’t see in the film” about Chris Kyle. She describes elements of Kyle’s faith by pulling quotes from his book, “American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History,” which, she points out, enjoyed a 37-week run on The New York Times’ best-seller list.
After reading Mr. Lockard’s piece, I was thankful that Ministry Matters had published a more thoughtful examination of the two movies that posed the question: Which version of the Christian faith is more accurate: Kyle’s or King’s?
The post generated quite a bit of online discussion. For my part, I began with this statement:
“I’m so glad I read this article after reading the one posted here about Chris Kyle’s faith. I would much rather support MLK’s version of discipleship than Mr. Kyle’s, as King’s more closely resembles the Jesus I see in the gospels. Likewise, I am more compelled by MLK’s version of patriotism than Mr. Kyle’s. King’s is one that calls us to live up to our proclaimed ideals of equality and justice rather than the more conventional “patriotism” that tells us freedom is only accomplished when we secure American economic interest through military dominance. Both forms of patriotism claim to answer evil with determined resistance, but while Kyle’s resistance takes the form of death by bullet, King’s embodies Christ’s sacrificial love.”
Many of those who posted comments after me suggested that it wasn’t fair or realistic to compare King’s nonviolent form of Christianity to Kyle’s, because they were acting in completely different contexts. In other words, nonviolent protest is fine within the protected confines of the U.S., but in the Middle East we’re dealing with evil, violent extremists who can’t be dealt with peacefully.
Here are some examples of such sentiments:
• “Protesting stateside or being thrust into a violate (sic) situation cannot be compared.” - alhatesreligion
• “Remember, pacifist resistance, MLK,Jr. and Ghandi style only work if the authorities we are resisting have a conscience.” - Sam Foreman
• “Of course we as Christians support the Selma version of our faith, but let us not be too quick to judge. Patriots like Chris Kyle are the reason we have the freedom to express ourselves and the Selmas of this country.” - Mack McClain
The main question I have in response to these kinds of statements is, do you think nonviolent activists like Martin Luther King Jr., Mahatma Gandhi or Jesus Christ existed in contexts less violent than the Middle East? Were they preaching, teaching and protesting in some sort of protected bubble where they could operate without risk?
Obviously they weren’t. All three of these leaders, and many who joined the struggle for freedom before and after them were killed for their resistance. They faced just as real a danger as any soldier ever has. The difference is they answered that danger with a refusal to act violently themselves. They chose to love their enemies instead of demonizing them.
Call them foolish if you want. The apostle Paul does. He and everybody else who followed Jesus in the first century understood that the nonviolent way of Jesus appeared stupid, naive and ineffective to the rest of the world. It’s okay, sensible even, to reject the teaching of Christ when it comes to violence.
But you can’t reject that bedrock teaching of Christ and then claim your actions are Christian. Justify violence any other way you want. Say it’s regretfully necessary. Call it prudent or practical. Believe that killing bad guys protects innocent lives even, but do not call it Christian, because Christ specifically rejected violence against humans every chance he got.
You can see more of Courtney's work at CourtneyTBall.com, or sign up to receive his weekly email, “Life and Depth.”
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By Mark Tooley
Last evening in Washington, D.C. I was walking by an old United Methodist sanctuary and heard uncharacteristic music emanating from the windows. Curiosity drove me inside, where I was surprised to see a full congregation of almost all twenty-somethings singing fulsomely as a band performed behind the altar. There being no seating left, I went upstairs to the balcony.
The congregation, of course, was not United Methodist but an evangelical congregation tied to a Calvinist network and founded just a few years ago by a young pastor from out of town. Meanwhile, the home United Methodist congregation has virtually died off. I was glad to see the stately old sanctuary put to good use for vital worship and ministry reaching millennials.
But I was saddened to contemplate there is no Methodist equivalent in Washington, D.C. or in most large cities. Institutional United Methodism in America has given up on cities and given up on young people, so no surprise we are declining by nearly 100,000 annually. Pockets of United Methodist vitality are typically in the suburbs.
Washington, D.C. is full of beautiful old Methodist sanctuaries that are mostly empty. Sometimes over the years I’ve been asked by friends where their young adult child newly arrived in the nation’s capital might find a vital and orthodox United Methodist church. I’ve told them there really are no options. So they end up at any one of dozens of evangelical new church plants that successfully attract young people, like the one I visited last evening.
Think about it. The most powerful city in the world has almost no vital, orthodox United Methodist churches. Instead there are typically small, liberal congregations that celebrate their diversity but have little capacity for meaningful outreach. The same is true for most large cities. And institutional United Methodism has no ability to address this challenge.
The evangelical congregation I visited this evening describes their mission evangelistically. Their website says: “We believe in the personal, bodily return of our Lord Jesus Christ. The coming of Christ, at a time known only to God, demands constant expectancy and, as our blessed hope, motivates the believer to godly living, sacrificial service and energetic mission.”
It also says:
God’s gospel requires a response that has eternal consequences. We believe that God commands everyone everywhere to believe the gospel by turning to Him in repentance and receiving the Lord Jesus Christ. We believe that God will raise the dead bodily and judge the world, assigning the unbeliever to condemnation and eternal conscious punishment and the believer to eternal blessedness and joy with the Lord in the new heaven and the new earth, to the praise of His glorious grace. Amen.
In contrast, what is the mission of diversity churches? Inclusiveness, community building, radical hospitality, affirmation, etc. One United Methodist congregation in D.C. advertises its welcome to all this way:
No matter,
– Where you’ve come from or are going;
– What you believe or doubt;
– What you are feeling or just not feeling;
– What you have or don’t have; and
– No matter whom you love
All of who you are
– is welcomed into this community of faith
– by a God who loves you passionately.
Thanks be to God. Amen!
So what does that mean? And whom would it excite? All are welcome into what, for what? Most millennials, and nearly everyone else, would respond with yawns. Hence the empty churches.
What can be done to share Methodism with young people and America’s cities? By the general church or most annual conferences, nothing. Diversity ideology and bland institutionalism have crippled those bodies from any effective action.
Here’s what might be done. Evangelical congregations in United Methodism might commit themselves to urban church planting. There’s no reason why strong churches could not plant 100 new congregations to preach the gospel from a Wesleyan perspective in America’s largest 20 or 30 cities.
It’s easy to complain about our struggling denomination. But why not focus instead on exploiting available opportunities by sending young church planting pastors into our great urban areas, starting with Washington, D.C.? The ultimate impact would not just be local but global and eternal.
This post originally appeared at Juicy Ecumenism.
Last evening in Washington, D.C. I was walking by an old United Methodist sanctuary and heard uncharacteristic music emanating from the windows. Curiosity drove me inside, where I was surprised to see a full congregation of almost all twenty-somethings singing fulsomely as a band performed behind the altar. There being no seating left, I went upstairs to the balcony.
The congregation, of course, was not United Methodist but an evangelical congregation tied to a Calvinist network and founded just a few years ago by a young pastor from out of town. Meanwhile, the home United Methodist congregation has virtually died off. I was glad to see the stately old sanctuary put to good use for vital worship and ministry reaching millennials.
But I was saddened to contemplate there is no Methodist equivalent in Washington, D.C. or in most large cities. Institutional United Methodism in America has given up on cities and given up on young people, so no surprise we are declining by nearly 100,000 annually. Pockets of United Methodist vitality are typically in the suburbs.
Washington, D.C. is full of beautiful old Methodist sanctuaries that are mostly empty. Sometimes over the years I’ve been asked by friends where their young adult child newly arrived in the nation’s capital might find a vital and orthodox United Methodist church. I’ve told them there really are no options. So they end up at any one of dozens of evangelical new church plants that successfully attract young people, like the one I visited last evening.
Think about it. The most powerful city in the world has almost no vital, orthodox United Methodist churches. Instead there are typically small, liberal congregations that celebrate their diversity but have little capacity for meaningful outreach. The same is true for most large cities. And institutional United Methodism has no ability to address this challenge.
The evangelical congregation I visited this evening describes their mission evangelistically. Their website says: “We believe in the personal, bodily return of our Lord Jesus Christ. The coming of Christ, at a time known only to God, demands constant expectancy and, as our blessed hope, motivates the believer to godly living, sacrificial service and energetic mission.”
It also says:
God’s gospel requires a response that has eternal consequences. We believe that God commands everyone everywhere to believe the gospel by turning to Him in repentance and receiving the Lord Jesus Christ. We believe that God will raise the dead bodily and judge the world, assigning the unbeliever to condemnation and eternal conscious punishment and the believer to eternal blessedness and joy with the Lord in the new heaven and the new earth, to the praise of His glorious grace. Amen.
In contrast, what is the mission of diversity churches? Inclusiveness, community building, radical hospitality, affirmation, etc. One United Methodist congregation in D.C. advertises its welcome to all this way:
No matter,
– Where you’ve come from or are going;
– What you believe or doubt;
– What you are feeling or just not feeling;
– What you have or don’t have; and
– No matter whom you love
All of who you are
– is welcomed into this community of faith
– by a God who loves you passionately.
Thanks be to God. Amen!
So what does that mean? And whom would it excite? All are welcome into what, for what? Most millennials, and nearly everyone else, would respond with yawns. Hence the empty churches.
What can be done to share Methodism with young people and America’s cities? By the general church or most annual conferences, nothing. Diversity ideology and bland institutionalism have crippled those bodies from any effective action.
Here’s what might be done. Evangelical congregations in United Methodism might commit themselves to urban church planting. There’s no reason why strong churches could not plant 100 new congregations to preach the gospel from a Wesleyan perspective in America’s largest 20 or 30 cities.
It’s easy to complain about our struggling denomination. But why not focus instead on exploiting available opportunities by sending young church planting pastors into our great urban areas, starting with Washington, D.C.? The ultimate impact would not just be local but global and eternal.
This post originally appeared at Juicy Ecumenism.
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By Aaron Griffith(RNS) Franklin Graham’s Facebook fulminations last week about plans to issue the Muslim call to prayer from the bell tower of Duke Chapel transformed what could have been a nuanced campus debate about religious establishment, sacred space, and pluralism into a countrywide fracas that calls to mind 1980s culture wars.
He helped generate enough publicity to ultimately lead a school better known for porn stars than piety to reclaim its chapel for Christianity.
Why did Franklin Graham’s Facebook post carry this much power? Two reasons. One, some people simply love his narrative about Islam. Recent polling shows that a significant number of Americans believe that Islam is more likely than other religions to encourage violence, and voice substantial support for police profiling of Muslims. Graham’s narrative builds off these suspicions that go far beyond his conservative evangelical constituency.
But more important, he’s a Graham. He carries the power of his father’s name and his legendary evangelistic ministry, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, or BGEA. According to Grant Wacker’s new biography, Billy Graham is the closest thing America has had to a pope, beloved by many for his ability to channel the ideals of middle America as much as a convicting gospel. The fact that, despite his retirement in 2005, the BGEA continues to use his likeness in promotional materials and that political candidates left and right still clamor for photo ops with Billy Graham are testaments to his enduring status as “America’s Pastor.”
But whatever “Graham” means now is different from what it meant in years past. For most of his career, especially in his later years, the elder Graham was the embodiment of a moderate evangelicalism.
After learning his lesson from entanglements with Richard Nixon, Billy Graham tried his best (albeit with mixed success) to stay nonpartisan, and avoid associating with the surging Christian right during the 1980s and ’90s.
He refused to take a hard line on biblical inerrancy. He moved away from speculating about hell or who would be there. Regarding Islam, Billy Graham once intoned “I have some wonderful friends among the Muslim people and have great respect and tolerance for them. Because we are a pluralistic society, we are going to have to recognize that we are no longer just a Jewish and Christian society.”
Billy Graham did meet with Mitt Romney before the 2012 presidential election. Shortly after, his elderly visage was plastered on a full-page ad promoting an unnamed candidate who professed “biblical values.” Some have questioned his actual involvement in this media campaign, but if nothing else, the exceptional nature of this near-endorsement proves the larger rule of how successful Graham has been historically in rising above the fragmentary cultural fray.
Franklin Graham, by contrast, has frequently criticized President Obama publicly (even questioning his Christian faith and repeating far-right rumors that Obama was born abroad). As CEO of the BGEA, he has recently led the organization into a much more conservative direction on questions of scriptural authority, eternal damnation, and hallmark culture war issues.
Recent covers stories of the BGEA publication Decision provocatively ask “Is Islam a Religion of Peace?” (with a blood-stained knife pictured prominently for effect), warn of the dangers of compromise on scriptural inerrancy, and posit hell as the likely result for those who do not toe the evangelical line on moral issues like homosexuality.
But the apple does not fall too far from the tree, because even though Franklin Graham seems to have departed from his father’s more gentle demeanor, there is commonality in their communication strategy. Like his father, the younger Graham is preaching to the choir.
Though Billy Graham was known as an evangelist to the unsaved, many attendees at his crusades were already Christians and most of those who made a decision for Christ were church attendees. They showed up not to be converted as much as to be reminded of who they already were, or at least aspired to be.
Franklin Graham, in his latest comments about Duke University and an Islamic prayer call, has delivered the same dynamic. He has taken a complicated debate about pluralism and made it about the inherent evil of Islam. This trope re-energizes those looking for an excuse to paint all Muslims with the same brush even as it gives liberals what they need to label other voices in the Duke Chapel debate as backwoods fundamentalists.
He has given the faithful of both camps what they want to hear, further proving the lasting legacy of the Graham name, for better or worse.
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By R. Albert Mohler Jr.
Kelly Shackleford(RNS) One day Atlanta has a fire chief; the next day it doesn’t. Once again, a moral scandal takes down a public official.
What was the scandal involving Chief Kelvin Cochran? He holds to views that Mayor Kasim Reed, among others, find out of bounds.
The facts in the case are now clear: Reed fired Cochran for what the mayor called “bad judgment” in writing a book in which Cochran asserted the sinfulness of homosexuality, and then sharing a copy of the book with three city employees.
The former chief is not accused of discriminating against any employee or citizen. Some are now claiming that this fact shouldn’t even matter, and that merely believing what Cochran believes is enough to disqualify him — or anyone else — from public office.
This is the new demand of modernity: Surrender to the moral revolution or keep your mouth shut.
Believing what the Christian church has held for two millennia (and most Christians around the world still believe) is now a disqualification from public office.
Cochran is a member of a Southern Baptist church, but the Roman Catholic Church also officially teaches that homosexual acts are “intrinsically disordered” and sinful. Does this mean that no Southern Baptists and no Roman Catholics who hold to the official teaching of their churches can now serve as Atlanta’s fire chief?
A new illiberal spirit threatens our most basic liberties, reducing the First Amendment’s protection of free religious exercise to the confines of our homes and our churches, or our minds. If you vocalize your religious beliefs in public, as Chief Cochran did, you can soon be out of a job.
Mayor Reed explicitly cited the chief’s religious views when he said that Cochran’s views were “inconsistent with the administration’s work to make Atlanta a more welcoming city for all of her citizens — regardless of their sexual orientation, gender, race and religious beliefs.”
But not Chief Cochran’s religious beliefs, evidently.
Amazingly, Atlanta City Councilman Alex Wan went even further: “I respect each individual’s right to have their own thoughts, beliefs and opinions, but when you’re a city employee and those thoughts, beliefs and opinions are different from the city’s, you have to check them at the door.”
The city of Atlanta now has an official theological position on the sinfulness of homosexuality? May God help us.
It is hard to imagine that Councilman Wan, or Mayor Reed for that matter, would make such statements in virtually any other context. A city leader cannot disagree with the “thoughts, beliefs and opinions” of the city of Atlanta? How can public officials make such statements with a straight face?
In 1981, Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger reminded the nation that “religious beliefs need not be acceptable, logical, consistent, or comprehensible to others in order to merit First Amendment protection.”
Yet now it seems that at least some major public officials are ready to redefine the First Amendment to exclude views they do not share or even reject. The First Amendment’s protections of speech and religious expression, however, were not designed to protect popular beliefs.
What comes next? Should we now expect this new illiberalism to subject citizens to interrogation on the basis of religious beliefs or church membership? Are agents of the city of Atlanta going to examine the religious beliefs of city employees as they arrive at work? Limiting religious beliefs to the confinements of heart, home and house of worship is tyranny masquerading as tolerance.
The First Amendment protects one’s religious belief — and also the speech that communicates such beliefs. Our world lacks diversity, not to mention courage and compassion, when freedom of speech is one-sided. Only when the freedom of speech is unfettered can we give voice to the causes that animate our souls. Because of free speech, we are able to understand our differences and, out of those differences, find unity — or, as the Founding Fathers put it: “E pluribus unum — out of many, one.” Unity is not uniformity.
Modern advocates of tolerance and the new erotic liberty may not find some religious beliefs to be “acceptable, logical, consistent, or comprehensible,” but the First Amendment protects those beliefs nonetheless.
If one’s religious beliefs are to be punished with (among other things) loss of employment, we need not possess a vivid imagination to guess where such logic may lead. Why would the front lines of the battle over free speech and religious liberty stop at the door of one’s house of worship if they will not stop at the beliefs of an individual?
The First Amendment does protect religious beliefs — especially when one is at work or in the public square. The question is: Will we as a nation yield to this new and ominous attack on religious liberty, or will we mean what we say when we affirm the First Amendment?
This question reaches far beyond Chief Cochran and the city of Atlanta. The news out of Georgia is a signal to the entire nation that we are all in danger of losing our liberties — fast.
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Presbyterians scrap ad campaign deemed offensive to minorities
By Adelle M. Banks / Religion News Service
From PCUSA.org
(RNS) The Presbyterian Church (USA) is scrapping an ad campaign for the needy after it was blasted for being culturally and socially insensitive.
The One Great Hour of Sharing campaign originally included an image of an Asian girl with the words “Needs help with her drinking problem” and, in smaller lettering: “She can’t find water.” Another image featured a man with the words “Needs help getting high,” followed in smaller lettering with: “Above the flood waters.”
Linda Valentine, executive director of the Presbyterian Mission Agency, said a redesign has begun and the new campaign should appear in February.
“We made a great misstep,” she said. “We acknowledged that the materials not only perpetuated offensive racial stereotypes but were insensitive to struggles with addiction that are real struggles and many of our churches and many of our ministries are working with those very people.”
(RNS) The Presbyterian Church (USA) is scrapping an ad campaign for the needy after it was blasted for being culturally and socially insensitive.
The One Great Hour of Sharing campaign originally included an image of an Asian girl with the words “Needs help with her drinking problem” and, in smaller lettering: “She can’t find water.” Another image featured a man with the words “Needs help getting high,” followed in smaller lettering with: “Above the flood waters.”
Linda Valentine, executive director of the Presbyterian Mission Agency, said a redesign has begun and the new campaign should appear in February.
“We made a great misstep,” she said. “We acknowledged that the materials not only perpetuated offensive racial stereotypes but were insensitive to struggles with addiction that are real struggles and many of our churches and many of our ministries are working with those very people.”
From PCUSA.org
Among those objecting to the original plans was the Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow, who is of Chinese/Filipino descent and served as moderator of the denomination, which is about 90 percent white.
“I am all for creativity, playfulness, and even well-placed snark, but, I’m sorry, this misses the mark — big time,” he wrote in the comments about the online announcement. “While we do some very good things, I am really disappointed that my denomination is going through with this offering campaign.”
The PCUSA controversy follows other cases where religious publishing decisions have caused offense. In 2013, LifeWay Christian Resources apologized for publishing “Rickshaw Rally” vacation Bible school materials a decade earlier that “used racial stereotypes that offended many in the Asian American community.”
In 2009, evangelical publisher Zondervan pulled a leadership book featuring a kung fu theme after Asian-American Christian leaders led an online protest against its images.
In a formal apology last week, Samuel Locke, director of special offerings, said a “variety of Presbyterians” would be involved in the redesign: “You spoke. We are listening. We plan to revise the campaign.”
It cost $65,000 to design and print the original ads and will cost the same to do it again.
In an open letter to the agency, Reyes-Chow and hundreds of others thanked the agency for revamping the campaign but called for more steps to be taken, including “(s)taff education in cultural sensitivity (including addiction) and anti-racism.”
“We feel deeply sorry and pained by what’s happened,” Valentine said, referring to a passage from the New Testament book of 1 Corinthians. “When one of us hurt, we all hurt. This has been a very painful experience that we’re working very hard to acknowledge, repent, correct and move forward.”
Among those objecting to the original plans was the Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow, who is of Chinese/Filipino descent and served as moderator of the denomination, which is about 90 percent white.
“I am all for creativity, playfulness, and even well-placed snark, but, I’m sorry, this misses the mark — big time,” he wrote in the comments about the online announcement. “While we do some very good things, I am really disappointed that my denomination is going through with this offering campaign.”
The PCUSA controversy follows other cases where religious publishing decisions have caused offense. In 2013, LifeWay Christian Resources apologized for publishing “Rickshaw Rally” vacation Bible school materials a decade earlier that “used racial stereotypes that offended many in the Asian American community.”
In 2009, evangelical publisher Zondervan pulled a leadership book featuring a kung fu theme after Asian-American Christian leaders led an online protest against its images.
In a formal apology last week, Samuel Locke, director of special offerings, said a “variety of Presbyterians” would be involved in the redesign: “You spoke. We are listening. We plan to revise the campaign.”
It cost $65,000 to design and print the original ads and will cost the same to do it again.
In an open letter to the agency, Reyes-Chow and hundreds of others thanked the agency for revamping the campaign but called for more steps to be taken, including “(s)taff education in cultural sensitivity (including addiction) and anti-racism.”
“We feel deeply sorry and pained by what’s happened,” Valentine said, referring to a passage from the New Testament book of 1 Corinthians. “When one of us hurt, we all hurt. This has been a very painful experience that we’re working very hard to acknowledge, repent, correct and move forward.”
___________________________________
By Jim WallisWASHINGTON (RNS) We’re a few weeks into 2015, which means many of us are striving to keep our New Year’s resolutions while others have already seen their best intentions collapse under the pressure of daily routines. Every year, we make promises to be better — we’ll go to the gym, save more money, slow down. But for Christians, every day is an opportunity to make resolutions. We call that repentance.
And this year — today — I am repenting of my dependence on fossil fuels.
While many associate repentance with sorrow or guilt, the biblical meaning of the word is to stop, turn around and go in a whole new direction. Repentance means changing our course and embarking on a new path.
For Christians, humanity’s failure to care for God’s creation warrants our repentance. This is not just a theological claim but a practical moral imperative when it comes to fossil fuel consumption. American Christians need to repent — and quickly!
Our society’s addiction to fossil fuels has had an unconscionable impact on the state of our Earth and on future generations. Coal-fired power plants are giving people cancer and asthma. Oil pipelines are spilling and destroying sacred lands. Natural gas fracking waste is leaking underground, threatening water sources. Through our consumption of coal, oil and gas, we have enabled this toxic activity.
The socially conscious among us might choose to drive hybrid cars and promote renewable energy sources, but we fail to realize that we are also investing our financial resources in this toxic industry. We vote with our dollars, both when we fill our gas tanks and when we choose our investments. True repentance requires us to put our money where our mouth is when it comes to fossil fuels.
That’s why I have started the process of divesting my retirement fund and other savings from fossil fuel companies. Will it make a “Big Oil” company close its doors? No, but it is an opportunity for me to live out my values and witness to my deepest beliefs. This is not just a symbolic act but a step toward living with integrity as a Christian.
As the indigenous community reminds us, our decisions today must be evaluated by their impact on the seventh generation out.
My organization, Sojourners, is also divesting from fossil fuels. Our mission is to help people put their faith into action for social justice. We would lack credibility by following any other path, and this reminds us that repentance is not just an individual decision. The church and other religious institutions — colleges, charities and other faith-based organizations — have an opportunity to put practical action behind our proclamation of God’s intentions for the restoration of creation.
Pulling financial support from toxic industries is just a partial solution. Both my divestment, and Sojourners’, will be coupled with efforts to “reinvest” in businesses that are sustainable — wind and solar energy, and energy-efficient projects. And if recent plunges in oil prices and future predictions about coal are any indication, this will probably be a financially sustainable move, too.
Socially conscious divesting is not a new concept. When the black residents of Montgomery, Ala., realized they made up more than half of the customers riding the bus system, they combined their economic power with strong moral critique to correct a pernicious injustice. They stopped riding the buses.
When U.S. college campuses realized the grave injustices of South African apartheid, they campaigned to remove investments that supported the racist polices of the South African government. In both cases, monetary divestment inspired social change. We can once again alter the course of history through collective action.
As Archbishop Desmond Tutu has said, “People of conscience need to break their ties with corporations financing the injustice of climate change.” If we continue to walk down this sinful path of destruction and consumption, our environment will continue to deteriorate, and the most vulnerable will continue to suffer increased health problems from pollution.
The trees, animals and even rocks groan, waiting for the children of God to do and say what their faith calls them to do. We cannot call ourselves people of faith and stand idly by.
In the Old Testament, God hears Solomon’s cry and replies: “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, pray, and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
We have an opportunity before us to turn from our reliance on and support of fossil fuels and go in a new direction — toward a future that helps us care for God’s creation. As Christians, we believe that God will forgive our sin and heal our land, when we repent, correct our behavior and pray. Will you join us?
____________________________
By Jason C. StanleyDisney brings the popular Broadway musical to the big screen doing very little harm to the story. “Into the Woods” is a mash-up of popular fairy tales, almost all of which have been animated features made by Disney. From the opening musical number, we learn that each character is wishing for something more. They are barely satisfied with the life they have.
They wish for more
If you’re not familiar with the story, the plot centers around the baker and his wife, wonderfully played by James Corden and Emily Blunt. The couple has sadly not been able to have a baby, the one thing they wish for the most in life. The witch (Meryl Streep), who happens to live next door, explains that she is the cause of their infertility. It seems that in retaliation for something the baker’s father did to her, she cursed the couple. She is, however, willing to reverse the curse if they collect four objects in three days:
“The cow as white as milk, the cape as red as blood, the hair as yellow as corn, and the slipper as pure as gold.”
This, of course, leads to the merging of plot lines. Jack (Daniel Huttlestone), of Jack and the Beanstalk, has the white cow. The cape as red as blood belongs to Little Red Riding Hood (Lilla Campbell) who is headed into the woods to visit her grandmother. The hair of gold refers to tower-bound Rapunzel (MacKenzie Mauzy) who was raised by the witch. And finally, the glass slipper belongs to the marginalized Cinderella, who is pitch-perfect by Anna Kendrick.
All of their plots and paths merge into the woods. The woods are dark and scary. It is the place of unknowns. It is easy to lose your bearings here, miss a step and stumble. Danger lurks in many forms, including Johnny Depp as the wolf.
There comes a point where everyone’s wish comes true in some form or another. But, in the final act, it seems that everything they have worked for falls apart as the wife of the giant comes seeking revenge. And as it often happens in moments of crisis, everyone begins to blame everyone else, and the secrets start pouring out.
It is during these scenes of escaping from the giant’s wife that the film offers a theological pondering. As the characters scheme a plan to kill the giant, Little Red Riding Hood tells Cinderella that she is not sure that her mother and grandmother would approve of what they're about to do. Cinderella reasons that their actions are justifiable as the giant has done a lot of harm to others. Red counters with the fact that the giant is a person too. They should, Red considers, show forgiveness.
Anna Kendrick / Walt Disney Pictures
The moment is there and then it is gone. The theological theme of forgiveness is offered and then it is taken away. The film does nothing with it. Yet Red makes a valid point. Yes, the giant’s wife has destroyed most of the village, killing many. And yes, the reaction, as is that of the princes, is to go to battle to protect what is left of the kingdom.
But what about forgiveness?
Theologians and scholars Will Willimon and Stanley Hauerwas remind us in their book “Lord, Teach Us,” that after the April 1995 Oklahoma City bombing, there were a lot of voices calling for a lot of things. The attorney general calling for retribution. The president calling for the death penalty. In the midst of those voices, Billy Graham, the renowned preacher, called for forgiveness:
“We are here with you to let healing begin. We are here to show you that a nation stands beside you in your grief. We are here to forgive.”
As Willimon and Hauerwas have written, “Forgiveness is not natural.” Just as the fairy tale characters seek retribution and the death penalty for the giant’s wife, so we seek these same things when someone has done us wrong. As Willimon and Hauerwas remind us, this is why we pray, “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.”
But forgive the giant’s wife? Forgive the terrorists? Billy Graham and Little Red Riding Hood both call upon the power of forgiveness in moments of great tragedy. It seems, however, that the characters don’t want to be troubled with forgiveness in the woods. It is, after all, in the woods that they face terror, challenges, uncertainty, and fear. In short, it is in the woods that life is turned upside down.
‘Forgiveness is not natural.’
The first reaction is to survive and to remove the thing that causes the terror, the challenges, the uncertainty and the fear. The characters start pointing the finger at one another, seeking a place to lay the blame. As the secrets begin to unfold, healing begins to take place. And while the film does not communicate it well, the healing includes forgiveness. The characters show forgiveness to one another.
Perhaps Red was on to something. And perhaps as they forgive one another, they can forgive those who do them harm.
Perhaps we can too.Jason blogs at JasonCStanley.com.
____________________________
This Sunday, February 1, 2015
Lectionary Scriptures:
Deuteronomy 18:15-20
Psalm 111
1 Corinthians 8:1-13
Mark 1:21-28
Lectionary Text:
Deuteronomy 18:15 Instead, he will choose one of your own people to be a prophet just like me, and you must do what that prophet says. 16 You were asking for a prophet the day you were gathered at Mount Sinai[a] and said to the Lord, “Please don’t let us hear your voice or see this terrible fire again—if we do, we will die!”
17 Then the Lord told me:
Moses, they have said the right thing. 18 So when I want to speak to them, I will choose one of them to be a prophet like you. I will give my message to that prophet, who will tell the people exactly what I have said. 19 Since the message comes from me, anyone who doesn’t obey the message will have to answer to me.
20 But if I haven’t spoken, and a prophet claims to have a message from me, you must kill that prophet, and you must also kill any prophet who claims to have a message from another god.[Footnotes:
18.16 Mount Sinai: See the note at 1.1-5.
Psalm 111: Praise the Lord for All He Has Done
1 Shout praises to the Lord!
With all my heart
I will thank the Lord
when his people meet.
2 The Lord has done
many wonderful things!
Everyone who is pleased
with God’s marvelous deeds
will keep them in mind.
3 Everything the Lord does
is glorious and majestic,
and his power to bring justice
will never end.
4 The Lord God is famous
for his wonderful deeds,
and he is kind and merciful.
5 He gives food to his worshipers
and always keeps his agreement
with them.
6 He has shown his mighty power
to his people
and has given them the lands
of other nations.
7 God is always honest and fair,
and his laws can be trusted.
8 They are true and right
and will stand forever.
9 God rescued his people,
and he will never break
his agreement with them.
He is fearsome and holy.
10 Respect and obey the Lord!
This is the first step
to wisdom and good sense.[a]
God will always be respected.[Footnotes:
111.10 This. . . sense: Or “This is what wisdom and good sense are all about.”]
1 Corinthians 8:1Food Offered to Idols
1 In your letter you asked me about food offered to idols. All of us know something about this subject. But knowledge makes us proud of ourselves, while love makes us helpful to others. 2 In fact, people who think they know so much don’t know anything at all. 3 But God has no doubts about who loves him.
4 Even though food is offered to idols, we know that none of the idols in this world are alive. After all, there is only one God. 5 Many things in heaven and on earth are called gods and lords, but none of them really are gods or lords. 6 We have only one God, and he is the Father. He created everything, and we live for him. Jesus Christ is our only Lord. Everything was made by him, and by him life was given to us.
7 Not everyone knows these things. In fact, many people have grown up with the belief that idols have life in them. So when they eat meat offered to idols, they are bothered by a weak conscience. 8 But food doesn’t bring us any closer to God. We are no worse off if we don’t eat, and we are no better off if we do.
9 Don’t cause problems for someone with a weak conscience, just because you have the right to eat anything. 10 You know all this, and so it doesn’t bother you to eat in the temple of an idol. But suppose a person with a weak conscience sees you and decides to eat food that has been offered to idols. 11 Then what you know has destroyed someone Christ died for. 12 When you sin by hurting a follower with a weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13 So if I hurt one of the Lord’s followers by what I eat, I will never eat meat as long as I live.
Mark 1: A Man with an Evil Spirit
21 Jesus and his disciples went to the town of Capernaum. Then on the next Sabbath he went into the Jewish meeting place and started teaching. 22 Everyone was amazed at his teaching. He taught with authority, and not like the teachers of the Law of Moses. 23 Suddenly a man with an evil spirit[a] in him entered the meeting place and yelled, 24 “Jesus from Nazareth, what do you want with us? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are! You are God’s Holy One.”
25 Jesus told the evil spirit, “Be quiet and come out of the man!” 26 The spirit shook him. Then it gave a loud shout and left.
27 Everyone was completely surprised and kept saying to each other, “What is this? It must be some new kind of powerful teaching! Even the evil spirits obey him.” 28 News about Jesus quickly spread all over Galilee.[Footnotes:
1.23 evil spirit: A Jewish person who had an evil spirit was considered “unclean” and was not allowed to eat or worship with other Jewish people.]
John Wesley's Notes-Commentary for
Deuteronomy 18:15-20
Verse 15
[15] The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken;
Will raise up — Will produce and send into the world in due time.
A prophet like unto me — Christ was truly, and in all commendable parts like him, in being both a prophet and a king and a priest and mediator, in the excellency of his ministry and work, in the glory of his miracles, in his familiar and intimate converse with God.
Verse 19
[19] And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.
I will require it — I will punish him severely for it. The sad effect of this threatning the Jews have felt for above sixteen hundred years together.
Psalm 111
Verse 2
[2] The works of the LORD are great, sought out of all them that have pleasure therein.
Sought — Diligently meditated upon.
Verse 3
[3] His work is honourable and glorious: and his righteousness endureth for ever.
Work — Either all his works, or that eminent branch of those works, his providence towards his people.
Righteousness — His justice or faithfulness in performing his word.
Verse 4
[4] He hath made his wonderful works to be remembered: the LORD is gracious and full of compassion.
Remembered — By their own nature, and the lasting benefits flowing from them, which are such as cannot easily be forgotten.
Verse 5
[5] He hath given meat unto them that fear him: he will ever be mindful of his covenant.
Meat — All necessary provisions for their being and well-being.
Verse 7
[7] The works of his hands are verity and judgment; all his commandments are sure.
The works — All that he doth on the behalf of his people, or against their enemies.
Truth — Are exactly agreeable to his promises, and to justice.
Commandments — His laws given to the Israelites, especially the moral law.
Sure — Constant and unchangeable.
Verse 8
[8] They stand fast for ever and ever, and are done in truth and uprightness.
Done — Constituted or ordered.
Verse 9
[9] He sent redemption unto his people: he hath commanded his covenant for ever: holy and reverend is his name.
Redemption — The deliverance out of Egypt, which was a type of that higher redemption by Christ.
Commanded — Appointed, or established firmly by his power and authority.
For ever — Through all successive generations of his people to the end of the world.
Reverend — Terrible to his enemies, venerable in his peoples eyes, and holy in all his dealings with all men.
Verse 10
[10] The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: a good understanding have all they that do his commandments: his praise endureth for ever.
The fear — True religion.
Beginning — Is the only foundation of, and introduction to, true wisdom.
1 Corinthians 8:1-13
Verse 1
[1] Now as touching things offered unto idols, we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth.
Now concerning the next question you proposed.
All of us have knowledge — A gentle reproof of their self-conceit. Knowledge without love always puffeth up. Love alone edifies - Builds us up in holiness.
Verse 2
[2] And if any man think that he knoweth any thing, he knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know.
If any man think he knoweth any thing — Aright, unless so far he is taught by God.
He knoweth nothing yet as he ought to know — Seeing there is no true knowledge without divine love.
Verse 3
[3] But if any man love God, the same is known of him.
He is known — That is, approved, by him. Psalms 1:6.
Verse 4
[4] As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the world, and that there is none other God but one.
We know that an idol is nothing — A mere nominal god, having no divinity, virtue, or power.
Verse 5
[5] For though there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be gods many, and lords many,)
For though there be that are called gods — By the heathens both celestial, (as they style them,) terrestrial, and infernal deities.
Verse 6
[6] But to us there is but one God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in him; and one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him.
Yet to us — Christians.
There is but one God — This is exclusive, not of the One Lord, as if he were an inferior deity; but only of the idols to which the One God is opposed.
From whom are all things — By creation, providence, and grace.
And we for him — The end of all we are, have, and do.
And one Lord — Equally the object of divine worship.
By whom are all things — Created, sustained, and governed.
And we by him — Have access to the Father, and all spiritual blessings.
Verse 7
[7] Howbeit there is not in every man that knowledge: for some with conscience of the idol unto this hour eat it as a thing offered unto an idol; and their conscience being weak is defiled.
Some eat, with consciousness of the idol — That is, fancying it is something, and that it makes the meat unlawful to be eaten.
And their conscience, being weak — Not rightly informed.
Is defiled — contracts guilt by doing it.
Verse 8
[8] But meat commendeth us not to God: for neither, if we eat, are we the better; neither, if we eat not, are we the worse.
But meat commendeth us not to God — Neither by eating, nor by refraining from it. Eating and not eating are in themselves things merely indifferent.
Verse 10
[10] For if any man see thee which hast knowledge sit at meat in the idol's temple, shall not the conscience of him which is weak be emboldened to eat those things which are offered to idols;
For if any one see thee who hast knowledge — Whom he believes to have more knowledge than himself, and who really hast this knowledge, that an idol is nothing-sitting down to an entertainment in an idol temple. The heathens frequently made entertainments in their temples, on what hath been sacrificed to their idols.
Will not the conscience of him that is weak — Scrupulous.
Be encouraged — By thy example.
To eat — Though with a doubting conscience.
Verse 11
[11] And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died?
And through thy knowledge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died? — And for whom thou wilt not lose a meal's meat, so far from dying for him! We see, Christ died even for them that perish.
Verse 12
[12] But when ye sin so against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, ye sin against Christ.
Ye sin against Christ — Whose members they are.
Verse 13
[13] Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend.
If meat — Of any kind. Who will follow this example? What preacher or private Christian will abstain from any thing lawful in itself, when it offends a weak brother?
Mark 1:21-28
Verse 21
[21] And they went into Capernaum; and straightway on the sabbath day he entered into the synagogue, and taught.
Luke 4:31.
Verse 26
[26] And when the unclean spirit had torn him, and cried with a loud voice, he came out of him.
A loud noise — For he was forbidden to speak. Christ would neither suffer those evil spirits to speak in opposition, nor yet in favour of him. He needed not their testimony, nor would encourage it, lest any should infer that he acted in concert with them.
____________________________
Sermon Story "The Prophet After Moses" by Gary Lee Parker with Sermon Test for Sunday, 1 February 2015
Scripture Texts:
Deuteronomy 18:15 Instead, he will choose one of your own people to be a prophet just like me, and you must do what that prophet says. 16 You were asking for a prophet the day you were gathered at Mount Sinai[a] and said to the Lord, “Please don’t let us hear your voice or see this terrible fire again—if we do, we will die!”
17 Then the Lord told me:
Moses, they have said the right thing. 18 So when I want to speak to them, I will choose one of them to be a prophet like you. I will give my message to that prophet, who will tell the people exactly what I have said. 19 Since the message comes from me, anyone who doesn’t obey the message will have to answer to me.
20 But if I haven’t spoken, and a prophet claims to have a message from me, you must kill that prophet, and you must also kill any prophet who claims to have a message from another god.[Footnotes:
18.16 Mount Sinai: See the note at 1.1-5.]
Psalm 111: Praise the Lord for All He Has Done
1 Shout praises to the Lord!
With all my heart
I will thank the Lord
when his people meet.
2 The Lord has done
many wonderful things!
Everyone who is pleased
with God’s marvelous deeds
will keep them in mind.
3 Everything the Lord does
is glorious and majestic,
and his power to bring justice
will never end.
4 The Lord God is famous
for his wonderful deeds,
and he is kind and merciful.
5 He gives food to his worshipers
and always keeps his agreement
with them.
6 He has shown his mighty power
to his people
and has given them the lands
of other nations.
7 God is always honest and fair,
and his laws can be trusted.
8 They are true and right
and will stand forever.
9 God rescued his people,
and he will never break
his agreement with them.
He is fearsome and holy.
10 Respect and obey the Lord!
This is the first step
to wisdom and good sense.[a]
God will always be respected.[Footnotes:
111.10 This. . . sense: Or “This is what wisdom and good sense are all about.”]
1 Corinthians 8: Food Offered to Idols
1 In your letter you asked me about food offered to idols. All of us know something about this subject. But knowledge makes us proud of ourselves, while love makes us helpful to others. 2 In fact, people who think they know so much don’t know anything at all. 3 But God has no doubts about who loves him.
4 Even though food is offered to idols, we know that none of the idols in this world are alive. After all, there is only one God. 5 Many things in heaven and on earth are called gods and lords, but none of them really are gods or lords. 6 We have only one God, and he is the Father. He created everything, and we live for him. Jesus Christ is our only Lord. Everything was made by him, and by him life was given to us.
7 Not everyone knows these things. In fact, many people have grown up with the belief that idols have life in them. So when they eat meat offered to idols, they are bothered by a weak conscience. 8 But food doesn’t bring us any closer to God. We are no worse off if we don’t eat, and we are no better off if we do.
9 Don’t cause problems for someone with a weak conscience, just because you have the right to eat anything. 10 You know all this, and so it doesn’t bother you to eat in the temple of an idol. But suppose a person with a weak conscience sees you and decides to eat food that has been offered to idols. 11 Then what you know has destroyed someone Christ died for. 12 When you sin by hurting a follower with a weak conscience, you sin against Christ. 13 So if I hurt one of the Lord’s followers by what I eat, I will never eat meat as long as I live.
Mark 1: A Man with an Evil Spirit
21 Jesus and his disciples went to the town of Capernaum. Then on the next Sabbath he went into the Jewish meeting place and started teaching. 22 Everyone was amazed at his teaching. He taught with authority, and not like the teachers of the Law of Moses. 23 Suddenly a man with an evil spirit[a] in him entered the meeting place and yelled, 24 “Jesus from Nazareth, what do you want with us? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are! You are God’s Holy One.”
25 Jesus told the evil spirit, “Be quiet and come out of the man!” 26 The spirit shook him. Then it gave a loud shout and left.
27 Everyone was completely surprised and kept saying to each other, “What is this? It must be some new kind of powerful teaching! Even the evil spirits obey him.” 28 News about Jesus quickly spread all over Galilee.[Footnotes:
1.23 evil spirit: A Jewish person who had an evil spirit was considered “unclean” and was not allowed to eat or worship with other Jewish people.]
We come to this week as we hear from God and relaize that the prophesy of God that there will be a prophet like Moses became fulfilled in the Presence of God coming to earth as the Messiah we know as Jesus. Yes, there is a description of what should happen to the false prophets who attempt to deceive the people, but this punishiment will come from God Himself. we recognize that as Jesus lived and healed, even the demons knew him, while the religious leaders had questions about His authenticity. We realize that even other leaders in non-Christian faiths point to who Jesus is, The Son of God, and the Savior of the world if we only believe and reopent of our sins. We see this in the writings of Paul where the meat that has been sacrificed to no-god idols is all right to eat because we Jesus' Spirit within us, but if this action would offend a weaker Christian we should partake of the meat that was sacrificed to a no-god idol. This even apply to the 21st century when we are free to do what continues to lead us closer to God and His Holiness in our life, but if a practice offends a weaker follower of Jesus we should partake of the event. This is why, for an example, is the conducting Faith on Tap is so important to reach people who would not step into a church for whatever reason, but we must be careful not to contribute to a follower or non-follower who has addiction problems with alcohol or drugs by either them coming or drinking the alcohol at the Faith on Tap. Yet, we cannot stop having Faith on Tap for those who are being reached with God's Grace and Love and/or growing in their journey of faith. This could also be in the exclusion rather than inclusion of people who have a different culture, language, or skin color or sexual orientation or even who are differently abled from fellowship with God's Church. What chararcters do you relate to in these stories? How does your faith fit into these thoughts and ideas? How will you reach people who do not know or even understand God's Grace and Love? may we sing this Hymn "O Worship the King all glorious above" by Robert Grant (1833)
1. O worship the King all-glorious above,
O gratefully sing his power and his love:
our shield and defender, the Ancient of Days,
pavilioned in splendor and girded with praise.
2. O tell of his might and sing of his grace,
whose robe is the light, whose canopy space.
His chariots of wrath the deep thunderclouds form,
and dark is his path on the wings of the storm.
3. Your bountiful care, what tongue can recite?
It breathes in the air, it shines in the light;
it streams from the hills, it descends to the plain,
and sweetly distills in the dew and the rain.
4. Frail children of dust, and feeble as frail,
in you do we trust, nor find you to fail.
Your mercies, how tender, how firm to the end,
our Maker, Defender, Redeemer, and Friend!
5. O measureless Might, unchangeable Love,
whom angels delight to worship above!
Your ransomed creation, with glory ablaze,
in true adoration shall sing to your praise!
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A SAVIOR WHO DISTURBS AND DISRUPTS
By Chris AndrewsMark 1:21-28
Jesus has a message. Jesus is an individual not with just words to fill an hour but with a message that can make the difference between life and death; a message that has the power to heal and make us whole. This is how Mark presents Jesus at the beginning of his ministry.
Several years ago I was present for the launching of a political campaign for a friend who was running for a state office. On the day of his official announcement, my friend selected certain sites that symbolized the issues of the campaign. He spoke at a college to articulate his position on education. He spoke at a factory to talk about jobs and the economy. The point he was making was that he was embarking on an important campaign and where he chose to speak was as important as what he had to say.
According to Mark, Jesus chose a special place from which to speak. Jesus went to the synagogue where the people of God came to hear God’s word for their lives. There was a lot of talking in the synagogue, but when Jesus spoke something was different. The Bible says he spoke “as one having authority.” There is something powerful about people who speak with authority — whose message is as much in their heart as it is in their mind.
Once two men recited the twenty-third psalm. One was a well-known actor, the other an old and rather unsophisticated minister. The actor’s rendering of the psalm was beautiful and commanding. Everyone enjoyed hearing the rich words of the beloved psalm spoken in his clear baritone. All the inflections and pauses were perfect.
Then the old minister spoke. He stumbled a bit and the words were broken with unnatural punctuations of silence. But when he finished there were tears in the eyes of the listeners. Something had happened and it was the actor who gave the interpretation: “I know the psalm,” he said, “but this man knows the shepherd.” That is the difference authority makes.
Have you ever noticed how, when someone speaks with authority, there will be those who hear and rejoice and there will be those who want to resist what is being said? There are always those who are invested in hearing the same old message, no matter how tired it becomes, rather than listening to something new and daring and challenging.
Jesus, speaking with authority, creates a crisis. In today’s text, the man with the unclean spirit cries out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” Such is the threat of a new word that invites us to live in a different way.
I wonder if this ancient scene is not lived out in the church again and again? Jesus came to a world that was immersed in religion. But it was a very tired religion. It was a religion that had everything completely under control and that offered a God who did things exactly as they wanted them done. There was no mystery, no surprise and no conversion. Confronted with Jesus, they felt torment. “Don’t destroy us, Jesus!” they seemed to cry out.
When Christ comes to us the doors of life are flung open to wonder and amazement. When you meet Jesus you know that great chunks of life exist that cannot be wrapped snugly inside a blanket of rational explanation. It is easy to feel disoriented by Jesus’ strange ethics, Jesus’ way of including everyone, Jesus’ dislike of religious convention.
We do not have a clinical name for the condition of the man healed by Jesus that day in the synagogue. All we know is that the man was healed and the people were amazed. And it was all so long ago.
But this text suggests that there may be times when, like the ancient man in today’s story, we too are in the grip of an evil spirit. A spirit that robs life of its joy and reduces everything to rational explanation. A spirit that keeps everything under control, tied down, neat and safe. Today I believe the gospel invites us to be healed by the authority of God. It takes the authority of God to keep our minds open to wonder, to be ready for the tug of God’s spirit on our spirits. It takes radical healing to be open to the grace of a new day or to feel your knees quiver at the sight of a mother loving her child, or have your mind confounded by the grace of forgiveness.
The authority of God commands us to imagine a new world. This imagination is so needed. Like the ancient people in today’s scripture lesson, we are tired of the same old ways of thinking and being. We have had the words with us so long that they have gone flat in our souls: “Love your neighbor”; “Care for the least”; “Show mercy to all.” We know this language well enough. But something is lacking between the words and the deeds. We need the authority of God to set us free to begin the exciting and dangerous work of imagining a new world. Perhaps it would be better to say that we need the authority of God to free us to use our imaginations in a new way. It takes imagination to create weapons of destruction and it takes imagination to create communities of healing. It takes imagination to rob people of their dignity through corrupt systems and it takes imagination to offer everyone the opportunity to live as a child of God.
The question is: Will we submit our imaginations to God’s authority? When we do, there will be resistance. Someone will cry out, “Don’t torment us!” But be of good cheer. We follow the one whose authority is such that it cannot be silenced. And, undergirded by that authority, we are invited to go forth and engage the work of creating a new day, a new world. It is the most exciting work any people could ever be asked to be about. It all begins today, in this place, before the authority of these wonderful words from Mark’s Gospel.
WORSHIP CONNECTION: FEBRUARY 1, 2015
By Nancy C. Townley, Worship Connection
Color: Green
Scripture Readings: Deuteronomy 18:15-20; Psalm 111; 1 Corinthians 8:1-13; Mark 1:21-28
CALLS TO WORSHIP
Call to Worship #1
L: From the pillar of fire and cloud of smoke, God led the people.
P: Praise be to God!
L: Through the voices of the prophet, God proclaimed the way to live.
P: Praise be to God!
L: Through the power and witness of Jesus Christ, God offered us new life.
P: Thanks be to God who has showered us with blessing upon blessing! AMEN.
Call to Worship #2
L: Come, let us praise the Lord!
P: We praise God with our whole heart!
L: God’s works are great!
P: Open our hearts and spirits to see your works, O Lord!
L: Come, let us worship the Lord who has saved us!
P: May our lives reflect the wondrous love of God that all may see and know of God’s greatness. AMEN.
Call to Worship #3
[In THE FAITH WE SING, p. 2011, use "We Sing of Your Glory" as an antiphonal call to worship. Begin with the Choir, using the first verse. With the choir assisting in the singing, the people on the left side of the congregation sing the second verse; the people on the right side of the congregation sing the third verse, and all the people and choir sing the final verse]
L: God’s eternal glory is showered on us.
Choir (singing): We sing of your glory, we praise you again, for you are eternal. Amen. Amen.
L: God’s eternal power and honor is revealed to us.
Choir and congregation left (singing): We sing of your power and honor again, for you are eternal Amen. Amen.
L: Surrender your lives to God.
Choir and congregation right (singing): We sing of surrender to you, God, again. Your power is eternal. Amen. Amen.
L: Let all the earth and heavens praise God. Alleluia!
All: "Glory in the highest, on earth," sing again. Glory, alleluia. Amen. Amen!
Call to Worship #4
L: Come to worship this day. Bring with you all your joys and sorrows.
P: Jesus will offer hope.
L: Come to worship this day believing in the power of God through Jesus Christ.
P: Jesus will bring us healing.
L: Come to worship this day feeling the presence of God.
P: Jesus will teach us new ways to live. AMEN.
PRAYERS, LITANY, BENEDICTION
Opening Prayer
Open our hearts and spirits this day to hear the great good news of your power and presence with all your people. Fill our hearts with rejoicing as the words are proclaimed in song and story. Enliven us and remind us that you are with us, through the pillar of fire, through the magnificent words of the prophets, through the ministry and love of Jesus Christ. AMEN.
Prayer of Confession
We think we know so much, O God, and with our meager knowledge we presume to judge others. We arrogantly announce our own righteousness without a compassionate thought. We proclaim your word when it suits us and often only to those with whom we want to associate. We shut others out because of our faulty judgment and our blindness. There have been so many times in which our humble help would have been a blessing to someone, but we have placed our comforts before serving others. In the competing voices of today’s world, we have turned around and around, trying to find the way to live. Help us, merciful God, to again listen to you. Help us to truly open our hearts to you. Remind us again of your great love and presence in our lives. Forgive us our foolishness and our stubbornness. Create in us new spirits, filled with your love, offering peace and hope to all. In Jesus’ Name we pray. AMEN.
Words of Assurance
Quiet your hearts, beloved of God, for God is speaking to you with love. Rest your spirits, struggling ones, for God will surround you with peace. Open your lives to God’s power and presence and do not be afraid. God is with us, now and for all time. AMEN.
Pastoral Prayer
What have we done, Lord? We want to praise you, so we splash your words on screens on a wall, with brightly colored and powerful images. We shout your praises, with hands held on high. We teach and preach your word. But we don’t listen carefully for you. We are so busy trying to shout above the noise of the day, that we don’t take time to really listen and know you. The voices of the prophets spoke to people long ago who were too busy and anxious to hear. Their words streamed in the winds of time and have come to us. We need to pay attention to your message offered through them. You are our God, the God of all creation, the God of power and love, whose mercy is offered to us. In Jesus’ time, he proclaimed the good news through words and actions, reaching out to those who were troubled, alienated, cast aside. He offered healing and hope to those others turned away. Help us to learn that you alone can heal us and fix those areas in our lives that are wounded and twisted. Help us to understand that you alone can offer to us a new way of life through Jesus Christ. Remind us again that as we have spoken the names of people and situations that concern us, praying for your healing touch, that the same touch is offered to us in Jesus’ name. Lord, we need to let go of our control issues and place our trust wholly in you. Now and forever. AMEN.
Litany
[Note: in this litany, I have chosen some people who have been strong witnesses to me in my faith formation. The phrases that contain their names have been italicized. Feel free to substitute those who are important in your own setting and life.]
L: The Lord shows us the way to life.
P: We want to see it again. We aren’t sure we understand it.
L: Long ago God gave to people in bondage, a pillar of fire to guide them to freedom.
P: We have seen God’s fiery pillar in the lives of those who have offered peace and freedom to all people in bondage
L: To people brought in bondage to a new world, God raised up a simple man: Abraham Lincoln
P: To people who, once freed from chains, needed full participation in decision making for their lives, God raised up a kind man: Martin Luther King, Jr.
L: To people who needed respect and dignity, God raised up a strong woman: Rosa Parks
P: To people who were disenfranchised, God raised up a woman of hope and power: Elizabeth Cady Stanton
L: To all people, God gave Jesus Christ, his Son and our Lord, that we might know of God’s awesome power and love.
P: Lord, help us to remember all those whom you have lifted up to faithfully speak your word.
L: Help us to be people of blessing and hope to those in darkness.
P: Help us to be people of strength and courage to those who struggle.
L: Help us to be people of compassion and peace, throughout all our lives.
P: Break down the barriers we erect. Help us build bridges of peace.
L: Alleluia!
P: AMEN.
Benediction, Blessing, Commission
Jesus comes to us, offering healing and hope, speaking and acting with authority. Listen to him. Go into this world, confident in God’s love and healing power. Go in peace and may God’s love and peace always be with you. AMEN.
ARTISTIC ELEMENTS
Note: It is a good idea to write a brief description of the visual presentation in the worship bulletin describing the symbols and their meaning.
Note: The traditional color for this season is green. This is a difficult Sunday for visual display. There are several approaches you might consider. One is to place a picture of Jesus, your favorite depiction, in the center of the worship space and surround it with candles. Another is to place the Cross in the center of the table and put pictures of people of great power and faith who have been a source of strength for your congregation. These can include "famous" people, and also local people. God speaks through many people. The cross should be the dominant feature.
Option 1: The Centering Cross and Candles
The large pillar candle represents Christ. The cluster of candles represent the prophets and witnesses to God’s love. The flowers represent the lives that have blossomed in God’s loving presence
SURFACE: Place a 6" riser in the center of the worship table. Place a 3" riser in front of the 6" riser.
FABRIC: Cover the worship center with green fabric, draping it to the floor
CANDLES: Placing candles in groups of three and five, make clusters on the table near the cross
Place a 3-4" pillar candle on the riser in front of the cross.
FLOWERS/PLANTS: Using leafy foliage and clusters of flowers, make arrangements on either side of the cross. Place large ferns or other leafy plants at the base of the worship center.
ROCKS/WOOD: Not necessary for this display
OTHER: Brass Cross
Option 2: The Witnesses in our Lives
So many people touch our lives and teach us. Place a picture of Christ, or if you do not have a picture, use a large while pillar candle, about 10" high, on the center riser, so that it is above the pictures on the worship center. Have your worship team select people who have influenced the church and place pictures of them in the worship setting. The pictures should be no larger than 8" x 10". Select only a few, about 5 and make sure that you write explanations about the influence of these people in the life of your church. You may want to place a votive candle near each picture, representing the divine light
SURFACE: Place a 12" riser in the center of the worship table. Place 2 3" risers to the right and left of the center riser. Place a riser in front of the worship table.
FABRIC: Cover the entire worship center in green cloth. You may also use strips of contrasting green cloth coming from beneath each picture.
CANDLES: Place a large 10" while pillar candle on the center riser. If you are using votives near the pictures, place them as you desire.
FLOWERS/PLANTS: Leafy plants and floral arrangements may be placed on either side of the large pillar candle, and in front of the worship center by the front riser.
ROCKS/WOOD: use flattened glass beads, the kind that you find in craft shops or aquarium supply stores, and puddle them in front of the various pictures, near the votive candles and in front of the large pillar candle. These glass beads will pick up the light and act as reflectors.
OTHER: If you are using a brass cross or Bible on the worship center, display them as follows. Place the brass cross on a riser behind the 10" white pillar candle. Place the open Bible, tilted forward so that the pages may be seen, in front of the Christ Candle.
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SERMON OPTIONS: FEBRUARY 1, 2015
The Promise of God’s Prophet
Deuteronomy 18:15-20
Is there any word from the Lord? We want to know God’s expectations of us and his will for us. When we are in crisis or face a decision we long for divine guidance and grace—a word from beyond.
This is why we worship, to thank and glorify God and to enjoy his divine presence. Worship is from an Anglo–Saxon word, worthship. It means to ascribe supreme worth to God. When we worship we come to
• hear a transcendent word from beyond.
• catch a glimpse of the divine Presence.
• discover heaven’s will and grace for our lives.
Just as Israel sought to know God’s will, so do we. Even as we come to worship, we hope to gain insight into God’s work and will in our lives. God responded to Israel’s need with a unique gift: the prophets, who were messengers of God to his people.
Although today we have the advantage of having God’s Word, the Scriptures, God still provides a prophetic ministry to his church today.
I. The Promise of a Prophet (v. 15)
The Israelites were forbidden to consult fortune-tellers and spiritualists (a la the New Age Movement). They were to avoid pagan religious practices, which included child sacrifice (v. 10). How would they know the will of God or hear his word? The Lord promised to provide a prophetic spokesman like Moses—the prototype of the prophets.
God has his spokespersons in each generation. He is not playing hide-and-seek. God wants us to know and do his will, made known to us by his prophets. Although they often did point to future events, biblical prophets were not so much fore-tellers as “forth-tellers”—inspired preachers of the divine word.
II. The Power of a Prophet (v. 18)
God promised to raise up his prophets and to put his word in their mouths, enabling them to speak all he commands. Any power the prophets possessed derived from their divine calling and the continuing presence of God in their lives.
Even today, God’s messengers are called to declare the gospel with both its offer and its demand. We are not called to preach our opinions but the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Authentic prophets proclaim the life, teaching, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
III. The Test of a Prophet (v. 20)
It is dangerous to presume on God and think too highly of oneself. That is the mark of a false prophet (see Jer. 28:8f.). The test of a true prophet is the fulfillment of God’s purpose. The proof of the prophet is the authenticity of his or her preaching.
God speaks in many ways. He reveals himself in the beauty and dependability of the natural world, his creation. God also speaks in the human conscience giving us a sense of right and wrong. He communicates in history as well. God’s will and purpose are discovered in the Holy Scriptures. The clearest word from God is heard in the person of his Son, Jesus (Heb. 1:1-2).
Someone has observed, “Jesus is the best picture God ever had taken.” Yes, there is a word from the Lord. Are you listening for it? (Alton H. McEachern)
When Freedom is Dangerous
1 Corinthians 8:1-13
Someone called me recently to tell me something they thought I, as pastor, should know. They had been at a local theater to watch a G-rated movie, and had seen one of our church leaders going into an R-rated movie. The caller asked: “What would the youth of your church think if they saw this person’s example?”
The shopping mall in Corinth did not have an eight-screen theater; but Corinth did have situations where a Christian’s freedom could lead to a dangerous influence on someone else.
I. The PRACTICE of the People in Corinth
Corinth had pagan temples where animal sacrifices were offered to idols. People would bring an animal, the priests would kill it, and some of the meat would be burnt in offering. But the rest of the meat became the property of the temple or the priests and was often sold at public market.
Many of these temples rented their facilities for private functions, just like churches today rent fellowship halls for wedding receptions. Thus the temples were centers of pagan worship and community social life.
II. The PROBLEMS Generated for the Christians
The questions arose: Could a Christian eat meat that had once been offered to the idols? Could a Christian attend a feast in a pagan temple? Even to purchase the meat could be seen as supporting the temple financially. And what would a Christian do at a wedding party if thanks were offered to a pagan deity?
These same questions can come up today when Christians are invited to a wedding in a non-Christian place of worship, pressured at their jobs to give to a charity they find unbiblical, or support a community festival that promotes unchristian values.
The more mature Christians knew the idols did not represent true gods; eating meat that had been offered to a stone idol was no more bowing to that idol than eating devil’s food cake is Satan worship today. But weaker Christians were confused. They feared any acknowledgment of the pagan deity would be a slippery slope to idolatry.
III. The PRINCIPLES Paul Applied
Paul applied two principles. First, “knowledge puffs up.” Sometimes spiritually knowledgeable Christians become impressed with their own level of learning. I once knew a man who memorized scriptures by the book, not by the verse. He could quote more passages than anyone I knew. But he did not go to church anywhere because he could not find a pastor who had “a heart for the Word.” He was a “super-Christian,” and he knew it!
Second, Paul said, “Love edifies.” The old preachers saying is: “Nobody cares how much you know’til they know how much you care.” This advice is good for all leaders. Paul makes this point in 1 Corinthians 13:2, where he says even if he had all knowledge but did not have love, he would be nothing.
The word translated “love” or “charity” simply means to prefer another; to put the other person’s needs ahead of your own. Though the mature Christian had a right to eat the meat, the needs of the weaker Christian to not be tempted take priority. “Sometimes we have to give up our right to be right in order to get right with God.”
IV. The PARALLELS We Face Today
We don’t have to worry about the origin of the meat we purchase at the market. Still there are many activities in which mature Christians can participate without harming their faith, but which hurt their witness. How many can you name? (Bill Groover)
Empowered Authority!
Mark 1:21-28
Authority is somewhat suspect in American culture today. Dr. Diane Komp, author of the book A Window to Heaven, identifies her own such suspicion in particular to God’s authority and reliability. In the foreword to her book, Dr. Paul Brand cites her suspicion concerning God when he writes, “Schooled by medical mentors who told her to set aside her personal feelings as she treated young cancer patients, Dr. Komp’s almost non-existent faith slipped away until she could no longer believe.” In her own words, Dr. Komp shares, “If I were to believe, it would require the testimony of reliable witnesses.”
The issue of a reliable and authoritative witness of faith provides the context of the story from Mark. It seems not all that much has changed in terms of God’s witness to a suspicious world.
For Dr. Komp, that reliable witness of God’s love came through the very children for whom she provided treatment. Their dreams, their stories, their undoubting trust of this God who loved them provided the needed reliable witness, the authoritative witness, to create an abiding trust in God.
Mark’s Gospel seeks to provide a reliable and authoritative witness to the reality of God’s present, in-breaking kingdom through Jesus Christ.
I. The Life of Jesus Is a Reliable Witness
As the children’s faith was an effective witness for Dr. Komp, the words and deeds of Jesus most powerfully testify to the authority of the source empowering such words and works. God empowers the authority of Jesus, and that empowerment becomes evident in the words and works of Jesus.
This is the difference between Jesus and the scribes. The words and deeds of the scribes lack something. The something they lack is the empowerment of God. Mark intends to show the difference between the empowered authority of Jesus and the kingdom he seeks to bring and the unempowered authority of the scribes.
II. Transformed Believers Are a Reliable Witness
In the business world today there seems to be a plethora of literature concerning empowerment in the workplace. The idea is that a good leader empowers others to productivity. According to Mark’s Gospel, God is empowering a new kingdom of love and grace through Jesus Christ and those who would seek to follow him. Word and deed receive their authority from God.
Jesus has come to proclaim such a kingdom empowered with the authority of God. People who witness this authoritative witness can tell the difference. In such a kingdom, such authority is even granted to dying children whose testimony can be so effective. So empowered are they by God that one doctor will never be the same because of their words and deeds. Such is the authority of God’s witness in a kingdom that will have no end.
The church needs to be reminded of the source of her authority and witness. It becomes easy to know the words and to mimic the work of Christianity. However, people know the difference between what is authoritative and what is not. In the long haul the false or unempowered witness will be found out.
The question this text poses for the church today is who is the source of its ministry and witness? Mark wants to make it clear to those who will listen that the words and deeds of Jesus are connected to God, who empowers them with authority in a kingdom that is here, now, and forever. If the church today is to preach, witness, or minister to the needs of a hurting world, it must do so with an empowered authority, thus ensuring the consistency between what it says and what it does. According to Mark, people will know the difference! (Travis Franklin)
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WORSHIP FOR KIDS: FEBRUARY 1, 2015
By Carolyn C. Brown, Worship for Kids
Old Testament: Deuteronomy 18:15-20. Setting the scene is an important part of presenting this passage. Children need to know before the reading that Moses is talking about how God does and does not communicate with us.
Moses' warning against expecting God to speak through the "magic" practices that would be encountered in the Promised Land interests children because they are fascinated by magic. They need to hear the difference between the slight-of-hand magic tricks done to entertain, and the attempts to contact the spirit world or the dead to learn secret messages.
Older children are curious about how such things as auguring and divination are done and what they aim to accomplish (an encyclopedia can provide details). While their curiosity needs to be satisfied, children also need to hear clearly Moses' warning that God does not speak through such means and that therefore they are to be avoided. This is good preparation for encounters during early adolescence with New Age channelers, and even dabblers in witchcraft.
Moses then insists that God will speak to them instead through prophets, and especially through one unique prophet (Jesus). Because children's curriculum devotes less time to prophets than to other biblical characters, most children will need to hear examples of biblical and modern prophets to understand the "job description." Jonah, who was highlighted last week, is one of the most familiar and usable examples.
Gospel: Mark 1:21-28. Though older children can understand the difference between the scribes, who based all their teachings on what this or that expert had said, and Jesus, who simply spoke what he knew to be God's word, the difference is of little significance to them. They are more interested in the healing story.
The bottom line of that story is that Jesus has power over all the evil powers that disrupt and corrupt life. In children's words, Jesus/God can beat out any other power in the universe. So we are safe. We can trust God's power.
The most, but not completely, satisfactory explanation of the demons is that they are "used-to-thinks." "Used-to-thinks" are ideas people used to believe but which now have been proved wrong that is, people used to think that the earth was flat; they used to think that the sun traveled across the sky each day. Similarly, people used to think that our problems and illnesses were caused by little invisible demons that went around causing trouble. Today we think that our medical problems are caused by germs and body disorders, and our other problems are caused by uncontrolled evil wishes and desires selfishness and cruelty. But no matter how you describe evil, Mark insists that Jesus can overpower it.
Psalm: 111. This is an acrostic, an alphabet psalm, praising God for powerful deeds. It fits well with either the Old Testament or the Gospel lesson. Unfortunately, most of the praises are general and use abstract words. Older children will catch a line here and there. Most children will appreciate the format more than the content.
Epistle: 1 Corinthians 8:1-13. The Corinthian argument about eating meat sacrificed to idols is not an issue today. Furthermore, there are no obvious parallels. Though adults can identify the principle behind Paul's answer and apply it to a variety of other situations, such thinking is beyond the mental abilities of children. About all they can glean from this text is that being considerate of the needs of others is a very high priority among Christians.
Watch Words
A biblical prophet is not a person who predicts the future, but a person who speaks God's message to others. To many children, an unclean spirit sounds like a dirty ghost. Remember that when you speak of demons and exorcism, children will take everything you say very literally. Even older children still see monsters and demons in the dark. Children also tend to tune in and out of such discussions, and therefore often misunderstand what is said.
Let the Children Sing
Praise Christ, who overcomes all evil, by singing "Come, Christians, Join to Sing." Invite nonreaders to join in on, maybe counting, the Alleluias. Nonreaders also can join in on the phrase "may Jesus Christ be praised" which is repeated twice in each short verse of "When Morning Gilds the Skies."
If the focus is on God speaking, sing, or ask a children's class to sing, the familiar camp song, "Kum-Ba-Ya." Consider creating some verses especially for this service.
"This Is My Father's World," known by many older children, recalls several ways God communicates with us.
The Liturgical Child
1. Have the reader of the Deuteronomy lection assume the role of Moses. After setting the scene, the worship leader may step to the center of the chancel, Bible in hand, to read the text dramatically, using the free hand for rhetorical gestures. Or, after the worship leader sets the scene, a costumed Moses may come to the chancel to present the memorized text dramatically. In either case, consider adding verse 14, to explain the reason for Moses' warning.
2. Following a sermon about God speaking to us through other people, include among the church's prayers opportunities (perhaps times of silence) for worshipers to thank God for the people who have been prophets to them.
3. Create a litany prayer calling on Jesus to overpower the demons that trouble our lives. The congregation's response: "Lord Jesus, defeat the demons that trouble us." For example:
God of giving love, we must fight the demon of selfishness every day. There are so many things we think we need, and even more that we want. We want the right clothes, the latest car, and all the toys we see on television. (CONGREGATIONAL RESPONSE) Forgiving God, the demon of war seems to be stronger than ever. No matter how hard we try to solve our problems peacefully, we find ourselves fighting at school, fighting at work, even fighting at home and with our friends. It is not surprising that so many countries are at war. (CONGREGATIONAL RESPONSE)
Sermon Resources
1. The Sundays after Epiphany are good days to celebrate the ways God is revealed to us. Today, focus on the way God speaks to us through people. Tell stories of biblical prophets and people you consider prophetic today. Describe people who speak to us publicly and those who speak to individuals. Tell about people through whom God has spoken to you. Invite children to draw pictures of people who have been prophets to them, and suggest that older worshipers write about such people. As worshipers leave, collect their work for display in a hall near the sanctuary.
2. To explore the world of magic, perform a simple slight-of-hand magic trick. (Check the children's section of the public library for books on such tricks.) Then talk about the dangers of misinterpreting the power of Ouija boards. Most older children have played with one and can sense the way the pointer could be moved in order to use it for someone's own ends. Be clear that God speaks through more dependable means such as other people.
To most children, power and love seem to belong to different arenas. People are either powerful or loving. Today's passages describe God as both powerful and loving. God creates the vast world, but knows each star by name and cares for each small creature. God never overlooks even the most hopeless people, but gives them the power they need. Jesus uses his powers to heal unknown people. Paul disciplines his powers to do his loving task. The texts call us both to celebrate God's power and love, and to follow Jesus' and Paul's examples of powerful loving.
Adapted from Forbid Them Not: Involving Children in Sunday Worship © Abingdon Press
____________________________
WORSHIP ELEMENTS: FEBRUARY 1, 2015
By Erik Alsgaard Worship Elements
Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany
COLOR: Green
SCRIPTURE READINGS: Deuteronomy 18:15-20; Psalm 111; 1 Corinthians 8:1-13; Mark 1:21-28
THEME IDEAS
Knowledge — not just what we know, but who we know (Jesus Christ and others) — focuses today’s readings. The danger, as these texts make clear, is that a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. “Anyone who does not heed the words that the prophet shall speak in my name, I myself will hold accountable” (Deuteronomy 18:19). How do we know when a prophet is speaking in God’s name? How do we distinguish true from false prophesy? Psalm 111:10 offers a clue: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.” Paul expands this theme, noting that knowl- edge can be both good and bad, so be careful how you use it. What we do with knowledge of God’s purposes, and how we respond once we come to know Jesus, makes all the difference.
INVITATION AND GATHERING
Call to Worship (Psalm 111)
By this I have known the presence of the Lord:
in the rising of the sun,
in the smile of another’s face,
in the touch of a hand
or the sound of a laugh,
in the scent of a flower
holding the promise of spring.
By this I have known the power of the Lord:
in the healing of hurts,
in the forgiveness of sin,
in the giving of gifts beyond all expectation,
in the shower of love
that comes from God’s Son.
Let us give thanks to the Lord with all of our heart!
Let us worship our God, whose presence and power endures forever!
Opening Prayer (1 Corinthians 8)
Almighty and most merciful God, we give thanks that you know us and love us. Help us, through the power of your Holy Spirit, grow deeper, wider, and fuller in our knowledge and understanding of your ways. Help us, through the bestowal of your divine Wisdom, bring others closer to you and to your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, in whose name we pray. Amen.
PROCLAMATION AND RESPONSE
Prayer of Confession (Psalm 111)
You, God, are known for your wonderful deeds— your mercy, forgiveness, and love. You have shown us the power of your works time and time again. And yet, we are slow to comprehend; we refuse to acknowledge your gifts; we act self-sufficient, as if we provide ourselves everything we need, when we know in our hearts that you are the author of life. Forgive us, we pray. As we confess our sins, in thought, word or deed, may your redemptive presence flood our lives that we may praise your name forevermore. Amen.
—Or—
Prayer of Confession (Mark 1)
We know who you are, O Christ; you are the one who silences demons and casts out evil spirits; you are the one who creates new life out of utter chaos. We know who you are, O Christ. Forgive us, we pray, when we act otherwise. In your name we pray. Amen.
Words of Assurance (Psalm 111)
God offers redemption to people of every generation,
making new life possible for everyone.
Repent, believe in the gospel, and be healed!
Passing the Peace of Christ (Mark 1)
In meeting Christ, we become new creations. As we share the peace of Christ with each other, we share the newness of life he brings. Come, enter into new life in Christ!
Response to the Word (Mark 1, Psalm 111)
We have heard a new teaching from Jesus, this Nazarene who speaks with authority. We have seen how Christ com- mands even unclean spirits to flee, and they obey him. Jesus calls us to exorcise demons—in every form they take.
God of grace and God of mercy,
grant us wisdom for the facing of this hour,
and for all the hours and days of our lives. Amen.
THANKSGIVING AND COMMUNION
Invitation to Communion
Come, the table is set. Let us eat the food that God has pre- pared for us. Let us drink the wine of the new covenant. Come, the table is set. All are welcome. Come.
Great Thanksgiving (Psalm 111, Mark 1)
The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Lift up your hearts.
We lift them up to the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give our thanks and praise.
It is right, and a good and joyful thing,
always and everywhere to give thanks to you,
Almighty God, creator of heaven and earth.
You have created the earth and sky,
the sea and stars,
and all the living creatures therein.
Your works are the essence of majesty and honor.
Your righteousness lives forever.
You demonstrate your power
in strange and unexpected ways:
from the birth of your Son in a manger,
to the gentle nudging of the Holy Spirit
calling us to love one another.
The works of your hands are faithful and just,
and your mercy endures forever.
And so, with your people on earth
and all the company of heaven,
we praise your name
and join their unending hymn.
Holy, holy, holy Lord,
God of power and might,
heaven and earth are full of your glory.
Hosanna in the highest.
Blessed is the one
who comes in the name of the Lord.
Hosanna in the highest.
Holy are you, and blessed is your Son, Jesus Christ
who came to cleanse us from our sins,
and to bring us newness of life.
In the power of the Holy Spirit, he healed people,
and taught as one who had authority.
He brought a new teaching—
a teaching of love, forgiveness, and the power of God for justice and mercy.
(Words of Institution)
SENDING FORT
Benediction (Deuteronomy 18, Mark 1)
Go on; get out of here! God’s prophet, God’s Son,
calls us to teach others of God’s power and might.
From this worshipping fellowship, we go into the
community, seeking to tell others our stories.
Go on; get out of here!
Share how God has transformed you.
Invite others to become disciples of this new teacher.
We will invite others to share our journey,
even if it scares us to death.
Go on, I mean it; get out of here!
Share how God has brought you to knowledge
and wisdom of new ways, new opportunities, new ways of being.
We go with joy. We leave in peace. Amen.
CONTEMPORARY OPTIONS
Contemporary Gathering Words (Psalm 111)
Do not fret because of all the stresses of the world!
Come, take delight in the Lord!
Leave the unpaid bills, the pile of dirty laundry,
the dirty dishes in the sink.
Come, take delight in the Lord!
Set aside the petty arguments, the backstabbing coworker,
and the person with the “I Heart Jesus” bumper
sticker who cut you off for that last parking spot.
Now is the time! Come, take delight in the Lord!
Praise Sentences (Deuteronomy 18)
God has raised up a new prophet, filled with teachings of love and forgiveness!
God has raised up a new prophet, Jesus the Christ!
From “The Abingdon Worship Annual 2009,” edited by Mary J. Scifres and B.J. Beu, Copyright © 2008 by Abingdon Press. “The Abingdon Worship Annual 2015” is now available.
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The Promise of God’s Prophet
Deuteronomy 18:15-20
Is there any word from the Lord? We want to know God’s expectations of us and his will for us. When we are in crisis or face a decision we long for divine guidance and grace—a word from beyond.
This is why we worship, to thank and glorify God and to enjoy his divine presence. Worship is from an Anglo–Saxon word, worthship. It means to ascribe supreme worth to God. When we worship we come to
• hear a transcendent word from beyond.
• catch a glimpse of the divine Presence.
• discover heaven’s will and grace for our lives.
Just as Israel sought to know God’s will, so do we. Even as we come to worship, we hope to gain insight into God’s work and will in our lives. God responded to Israel’s need with a unique gift: the prophets, who were messengers of God to his people.
Although today we have the advantage of having God’s Word, the Scriptures, God still provides a prophetic ministry to his church today.
I. The Promise of a Prophet (v. 15)
The Israelites were forbidden to consult fortune-tellers and spiritualists (a la the New Age Movement). They were to avoid pagan religious practices, which included child sacrifice (v. 10). How would they know the will of God or hear his word? The Lord promised to provide a prophetic spokesman like Moses—the prototype of the prophets.
God has his spokespersons in each generation. He is not playing hide-and-seek. God wants us to know and do his will, made known to us by his prophets. Although they often did point to future events, biblical prophets were not so much fore-tellers as “forth-tellers”—inspired preachers of the divine word.
II. The Power of a Prophet (v. 18)
God promised to raise up his prophets and to put his word in their mouths, enabling them to speak all he commands. Any power the prophets possessed derived from their divine calling and the continuing presence of God in their lives.
Even today, God’s messengers are called to declare the gospel with both its offer and its demand. We are not called to preach our opinions but the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Authentic prophets proclaim the life, teaching, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
III. The Test of a Prophet (v. 20)
It is dangerous to presume on God and think too highly of oneself. That is the mark of a false prophet (see Jer. 28:8f.). The test of a true prophet is the fulfillment of God’s purpose. The proof of the prophet is the authenticity of his or her preaching.
God speaks in many ways. He reveals himself in the beauty and dependability of the natural world, his creation. God also speaks in the human conscience giving us a sense of right and wrong. He communicates in history as well. God’s will and purpose are discovered in the Holy Scriptures. The clearest word from God is heard in the person of his Son, Jesus (Heb. 1:1-2).
Someone has observed, “Jesus is the best picture God ever had taken.” Yes, there is a word from the Lord. Are you listening for it? (Alton H. McEachern)
When Freedom is Dangerous
1 Corinthians 8:1-13
Someone called me recently to tell me something they thought I, as pastor, should know. They had been at a local theater to watch a G-rated movie, and had seen one of our church leaders going into an R-rated movie. The caller asked: “What would the youth of your church think if they saw this person’s example?”
The shopping mall in Corinth did not have an eight-screen theater; but Corinth did have situations where a Christian’s freedom could lead to a dangerous influence on someone else.
I. The PRACTICE of the People in Corinth
Corinth had pagan temples where animal sacrifices were offered to idols. People would bring an animal, the priests would kill it, and some of the meat would be burnt in offering. But the rest of the meat became the property of the temple or the priests and was often sold at public market.
Many of these temples rented their facilities for private functions, just like churches today rent fellowship halls for wedding receptions. Thus the temples were centers of pagan worship and community social life.
II. The PROBLEMS Generated for the Christians
The questions arose: Could a Christian eat meat that had once been offered to the idols? Could a Christian attend a feast in a pagan temple? Even to purchase the meat could be seen as supporting the temple financially. And what would a Christian do at a wedding party if thanks were offered to a pagan deity?
These same questions can come up today when Christians are invited to a wedding in a non-Christian place of worship, pressured at their jobs to give to a charity they find unbiblical, or support a community festival that promotes unchristian values.
The more mature Christians knew the idols did not represent true gods; eating meat that had been offered to a stone idol was no more bowing to that idol than eating devil’s food cake is Satan worship today. But weaker Christians were confused. They feared any acknowledgment of the pagan deity would be a slippery slope to idolatry.
III. The PRINCIPLES Paul Applied
Paul applied two principles. First, “knowledge puffs up.” Sometimes spiritually knowledgeable Christians become impressed with their own level of learning. I once knew a man who memorized scriptures by the book, not by the verse. He could quote more passages than anyone I knew. But he did not go to church anywhere because he could not find a pastor who had “a heart for the Word.” He was a “super-Christian,” and he knew it!
Second, Paul said, “Love edifies.” The old preachers saying is: “Nobody cares how much you know’til they know how much you care.” This advice is good for all leaders. Paul makes this point in 1 Corinthians 13:2, where he says even if he had all knowledge but did not have love, he would be nothing.
The word translated “love” or “charity” simply means to prefer another; to put the other person’s needs ahead of your own. Though the mature Christian had a right to eat the meat, the needs of the weaker Christian to not be tempted take priority. “Sometimes we have to give up our right to be right in order to get right with God.”
IV. The PARALLELS We Face Today
We don’t have to worry about the origin of the meat we purchase at the market. Still there are many activities in which mature Christians can participate without harming their faith, but which hurt their witness. How many can you name? (Bill Groover)
Empowered Authority!
Mark 1:21-28
Authority is somewhat suspect in American culture today. Dr. Diane Komp, author of the book A Window to Heaven, identifies her own such suspicion in particular to God’s authority and reliability. In the foreword to her book, Dr. Paul Brand cites her suspicion concerning God when he writes, “Schooled by medical mentors who told her to set aside her personal feelings as she treated young cancer patients, Dr. Komp’s almost non-existent faith slipped away until she could no longer believe.” In her own words, Dr. Komp shares, “If I were to believe, it would require the testimony of reliable witnesses.”
The issue of a reliable and authoritative witness of faith provides the context of the story from Mark. It seems not all that much has changed in terms of God’s witness to a suspicious world.
For Dr. Komp, that reliable witness of God’s love came through the very children for whom she provided treatment. Their dreams, their stories, their undoubting trust of this God who loved them provided the needed reliable witness, the authoritative witness, to create an abiding trust in God.
Mark’s Gospel seeks to provide a reliable and authoritative witness to the reality of God’s present, in-breaking kingdom through Jesus Christ.
I. The Life of Jesus Is a Reliable Witness
As the children’s faith was an effective witness for Dr. Komp, the words and deeds of Jesus most powerfully testify to the authority of the source empowering such words and works. God empowers the authority of Jesus, and that empowerment becomes evident in the words and works of Jesus.
This is the difference between Jesus and the scribes. The words and deeds of the scribes lack something. The something they lack is the empowerment of God. Mark intends to show the difference between the empowered authority of Jesus and the kingdom he seeks to bring and the unempowered authority of the scribes.
II. Transformed Believers Are a Reliable Witness
In the business world today there seems to be a plethora of literature concerning empowerment in the workplace. The idea is that a good leader empowers others to productivity. According to Mark’s Gospel, God is empowering a new kingdom of love and grace through Jesus Christ and those who would seek to follow him. Word and deed receive their authority from God.
Jesus has come to proclaim such a kingdom empowered with the authority of God. People who witness this authoritative witness can tell the difference. In such a kingdom, such authority is even granted to dying children whose testimony can be so effective. So empowered are they by God that one doctor will never be the same because of their words and deeds. Such is the authority of God’s witness in a kingdom that will have no end.
The church needs to be reminded of the source of her authority and witness. It becomes easy to know the words and to mimic the work of Christianity. However, people know the difference between what is authoritative and what is not. In the long haul the false or unempowered witness will be found out.
The question this text poses for the church today is who is the source of its ministry and witness? Mark wants to make it clear to those who will listen that the words and deeds of Jesus are connected to God, who empowers them with authority in a kingdom that is here, now, and forever. If the church today is to preach, witness, or minister to the needs of a hurting world, it must do so with an empowered authority, thus ensuring the consistency between what it says and what it does. According to Mark, people will know the difference! (Travis Franklin)
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WORSHIP FOR KIDS: FEBRUARY 1, 2015
By Carolyn C. Brown, Worship for Kids
Old Testament: Deuteronomy 18:15-20. Setting the scene is an important part of presenting this passage. Children need to know before the reading that Moses is talking about how God does and does not communicate with us.
Moses' warning against expecting God to speak through the "magic" practices that would be encountered in the Promised Land interests children because they are fascinated by magic. They need to hear the difference between the slight-of-hand magic tricks done to entertain, and the attempts to contact the spirit world or the dead to learn secret messages.
Older children are curious about how such things as auguring and divination are done and what they aim to accomplish (an encyclopedia can provide details). While their curiosity needs to be satisfied, children also need to hear clearly Moses' warning that God does not speak through such means and that therefore they are to be avoided. This is good preparation for encounters during early adolescence with New Age channelers, and even dabblers in witchcraft.
Moses then insists that God will speak to them instead through prophets, and especially through one unique prophet (Jesus). Because children's curriculum devotes less time to prophets than to other biblical characters, most children will need to hear examples of biblical and modern prophets to understand the "job description." Jonah, who was highlighted last week, is one of the most familiar and usable examples.
Gospel: Mark 1:21-28. Though older children can understand the difference between the scribes, who based all their teachings on what this or that expert had said, and Jesus, who simply spoke what he knew to be God's word, the difference is of little significance to them. They are more interested in the healing story.
The bottom line of that story is that Jesus has power over all the evil powers that disrupt and corrupt life. In children's words, Jesus/God can beat out any other power in the universe. So we are safe. We can trust God's power.
The most, but not completely, satisfactory explanation of the demons is that they are "used-to-thinks." "Used-to-thinks" are ideas people used to believe but which now have been proved wrong that is, people used to think that the earth was flat; they used to think that the sun traveled across the sky each day. Similarly, people used to think that our problems and illnesses were caused by little invisible demons that went around causing trouble. Today we think that our medical problems are caused by germs and body disorders, and our other problems are caused by uncontrolled evil wishes and desires selfishness and cruelty. But no matter how you describe evil, Mark insists that Jesus can overpower it.
Psalm: 111. This is an acrostic, an alphabet psalm, praising God for powerful deeds. It fits well with either the Old Testament or the Gospel lesson. Unfortunately, most of the praises are general and use abstract words. Older children will catch a line here and there. Most children will appreciate the format more than the content.
Epistle: 1 Corinthians 8:1-13. The Corinthian argument about eating meat sacrificed to idols is not an issue today. Furthermore, there are no obvious parallels. Though adults can identify the principle behind Paul's answer and apply it to a variety of other situations, such thinking is beyond the mental abilities of children. About all they can glean from this text is that being considerate of the needs of others is a very high priority among Christians.
Watch Words
A biblical prophet is not a person who predicts the future, but a person who speaks God's message to others. To many children, an unclean spirit sounds like a dirty ghost. Remember that when you speak of demons and exorcism, children will take everything you say very literally. Even older children still see monsters and demons in the dark. Children also tend to tune in and out of such discussions, and therefore often misunderstand what is said.
Let the Children Sing
Praise Christ, who overcomes all evil, by singing "Come, Christians, Join to Sing." Invite nonreaders to join in on, maybe counting, the Alleluias. Nonreaders also can join in on the phrase "may Jesus Christ be praised" which is repeated twice in each short verse of "When Morning Gilds the Skies."
If the focus is on God speaking, sing, or ask a children's class to sing, the familiar camp song, "Kum-Ba-Ya." Consider creating some verses especially for this service.
"This Is My Father's World," known by many older children, recalls several ways God communicates with us.
The Liturgical Child
1. Have the reader of the Deuteronomy lection assume the role of Moses. After setting the scene, the worship leader may step to the center of the chancel, Bible in hand, to read the text dramatically, using the free hand for rhetorical gestures. Or, after the worship leader sets the scene, a costumed Moses may come to the chancel to present the memorized text dramatically. In either case, consider adding verse 14, to explain the reason for Moses' warning.
2. Following a sermon about God speaking to us through other people, include among the church's prayers opportunities (perhaps times of silence) for worshipers to thank God for the people who have been prophets to them.
3. Create a litany prayer calling on Jesus to overpower the demons that trouble our lives. The congregation's response: "Lord Jesus, defeat the demons that trouble us." For example:
God of giving love, we must fight the demon of selfishness every day. There are so many things we think we need, and even more that we want. We want the right clothes, the latest car, and all the toys we see on television. (CONGREGATIONAL RESPONSE) Forgiving God, the demon of war seems to be stronger than ever. No matter how hard we try to solve our problems peacefully, we find ourselves fighting at school, fighting at work, even fighting at home and with our friends. It is not surprising that so many countries are at war. (CONGREGATIONAL RESPONSE)
Sermon Resources
1. The Sundays after Epiphany are good days to celebrate the ways God is revealed to us. Today, focus on the way God speaks to us through people. Tell stories of biblical prophets and people you consider prophetic today. Describe people who speak to us publicly and those who speak to individuals. Tell about people through whom God has spoken to you. Invite children to draw pictures of people who have been prophets to them, and suggest that older worshipers write about such people. As worshipers leave, collect their work for display in a hall near the sanctuary.
2. To explore the world of magic, perform a simple slight-of-hand magic trick. (Check the children's section of the public library for books on such tricks.) Then talk about the dangers of misinterpreting the power of Ouija boards. Most older children have played with one and can sense the way the pointer could be moved in order to use it for someone's own ends. Be clear that God speaks through more dependable means such as other people.
To most children, power and love seem to belong to different arenas. People are either powerful or loving. Today's passages describe God as both powerful and loving. God creates the vast world, but knows each star by name and cares for each small creature. God never overlooks even the most hopeless people, but gives them the power they need. Jesus uses his powers to heal unknown people. Paul disciplines his powers to do his loving task. The texts call us both to celebrate God's power and love, and to follow Jesus' and Paul's examples of powerful loving.
Adapted from Forbid Them Not: Involving Children in Sunday Worship © Abingdon Press
____________________________
WORSHIP ELEMENTS: FEBRUARY 1, 2015
By Erik Alsgaard Worship Elements
Fourth Sunday after the Epiphany
COLOR: Green
SCRIPTURE READINGS: Deuteronomy 18:15-20; Psalm 111; 1 Corinthians 8:1-13; Mark 1:21-28
THEME IDEAS
Knowledge — not just what we know, but who we know (Jesus Christ and others) — focuses today’s readings. The danger, as these texts make clear, is that a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. “Anyone who does not heed the words that the prophet shall speak in my name, I myself will hold accountable” (Deuteronomy 18:19). How do we know when a prophet is speaking in God’s name? How do we distinguish true from false prophesy? Psalm 111:10 offers a clue: “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.” Paul expands this theme, noting that knowl- edge can be both good and bad, so be careful how you use it. What we do with knowledge of God’s purposes, and how we respond once we come to know Jesus, makes all the difference.
INVITATION AND GATHERING
Call to Worship (Psalm 111)
By this I have known the presence of the Lord:
in the rising of the sun,
in the smile of another’s face,
in the touch of a hand
or the sound of a laugh,
in the scent of a flower
holding the promise of spring.
By this I have known the power of the Lord:
in the healing of hurts,
in the forgiveness of sin,
in the giving of gifts beyond all expectation,
in the shower of love
that comes from God’s Son.
Let us give thanks to the Lord with all of our heart!
Let us worship our God, whose presence and power endures forever!
Opening Prayer (1 Corinthians 8)
Almighty and most merciful God, we give thanks that you know us and love us. Help us, through the power of your Holy Spirit, grow deeper, wider, and fuller in our knowledge and understanding of your ways. Help us, through the bestowal of your divine Wisdom, bring others closer to you and to your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, in whose name we pray. Amen.
PROCLAMATION AND RESPONSE
Prayer of Confession (Psalm 111)
You, God, are known for your wonderful deeds— your mercy, forgiveness, and love. You have shown us the power of your works time and time again. And yet, we are slow to comprehend; we refuse to acknowledge your gifts; we act self-sufficient, as if we provide ourselves everything we need, when we know in our hearts that you are the author of life. Forgive us, we pray. As we confess our sins, in thought, word or deed, may your redemptive presence flood our lives that we may praise your name forevermore. Amen.
—Or—
Prayer of Confession (Mark 1)
We know who you are, O Christ; you are the one who silences demons and casts out evil spirits; you are the one who creates new life out of utter chaos. We know who you are, O Christ. Forgive us, we pray, when we act otherwise. In your name we pray. Amen.
Words of Assurance (Psalm 111)
God offers redemption to people of every generation,
making new life possible for everyone.
Repent, believe in the gospel, and be healed!
Passing the Peace of Christ (Mark 1)
In meeting Christ, we become new creations. As we share the peace of Christ with each other, we share the newness of life he brings. Come, enter into new life in Christ!
Response to the Word (Mark 1, Psalm 111)
We have heard a new teaching from Jesus, this Nazarene who speaks with authority. We have seen how Christ com- mands even unclean spirits to flee, and they obey him. Jesus calls us to exorcise demons—in every form they take.
God of grace and God of mercy,
grant us wisdom for the facing of this hour,
and for all the hours and days of our lives. Amen.
THANKSGIVING AND COMMUNION
Invitation to Communion
Come, the table is set. Let us eat the food that God has pre- pared for us. Let us drink the wine of the new covenant. Come, the table is set. All are welcome. Come.
Great Thanksgiving (Psalm 111, Mark 1)
The Lord be with you.
And also with you.
Lift up your hearts.
We lift them up to the Lord.
Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.
It is right to give our thanks and praise.
It is right, and a good and joyful thing,
always and everywhere to give thanks to you,
Almighty God, creator of heaven and earth.
You have created the earth and sky,
the sea and stars,
and all the living creatures therein.
Your works are the essence of majesty and honor.
Your righteousness lives forever.
You demonstrate your power
in strange and unexpected ways:
from the birth of your Son in a manger,
to the gentle nudging of the Holy Spirit
calling us to love one another.
The works of your hands are faithful and just,
and your mercy endures forever.
And so, with your people on earth
and all the company of heaven,
we praise your name
and join their unending hymn.
Holy, holy, holy Lord,
God of power and might,
heaven and earth are full of your glory.
Hosanna in the highest.
Blessed is the one
who comes in the name of the Lord.
Hosanna in the highest.
Holy are you, and blessed is your Son, Jesus Christ
who came to cleanse us from our sins,
and to bring us newness of life.
In the power of the Holy Spirit, he healed people,
and taught as one who had authority.
He brought a new teaching—
a teaching of love, forgiveness, and the power of God for justice and mercy.
(Words of Institution)
SENDING FORT
Benediction (Deuteronomy 18, Mark 1)
Go on; get out of here! God’s prophet, God’s Son,
calls us to teach others of God’s power and might.
From this worshipping fellowship, we go into the
community, seeking to tell others our stories.
Go on; get out of here!
Share how God has transformed you.
Invite others to become disciples of this new teacher.
We will invite others to share our journey,
even if it scares us to death.
Go on, I mean it; get out of here!
Share how God has brought you to knowledge
and wisdom of new ways, new opportunities, new ways of being.
We go with joy. We leave in peace. Amen.
CONTEMPORARY OPTIONS
Contemporary Gathering Words (Psalm 111)
Do not fret because of all the stresses of the world!
Come, take delight in the Lord!
Leave the unpaid bills, the pile of dirty laundry,
the dirty dishes in the sink.
Come, take delight in the Lord!
Set aside the petty arguments, the backstabbing coworker,
and the person with the “I Heart Jesus” bumper
sticker who cut you off for that last parking spot.
Now is the time! Come, take delight in the Lord!
Praise Sentences (Deuteronomy 18)
God has raised up a new prophet, filled with teachings of love and forgiveness!
God has raised up a new prophet, Jesus the Christ!
From “The Abingdon Worship Annual 2009,” edited by Mary J. Scifres and B.J. Beu, Copyright © 2008 by Abingdon Press. “The Abingdon Worship Annual 2015” is now available.
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