Giving Jesus a Drink

Racially-motivated shootings. The legalization of same-sex marriages. The fear of Islam encroaching on our religious and personal freedoms. A sixteen-month-long presidential election cycle that will divide the nation into two broad camps.

We have many reasons to distance ourselves from other people, reasons which have had a lot of air time in recent days.

But from a Christian perspective – and from my inherited perspective of white, male privilege – I wonder what our response to these things should be. If you are involved in social media at all, you have likely seen more than enough responses to any or all of these topics in the past week or so. Many of these have been so angry and dismissive that it grieves my heart.

Let me offer an alternative response: the example of Jesus in John 4. Continue reading →

Should Conservative Christians Take a Stand?

In recent days, an editorial in the Midland Daily News argued that “conservative Christians need to take a stand” regarding the widespread acceptance of same-sex marriage in our nation. The author compared the present situation to the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s, in which Rosa Parks took a stand (by sitting down, ironically) against the cultural requirement that she yield her seat at the front of a bus to a white passenger. This editorial suggests that conservative Christians are being isolated, quieted, and accused of intolerance when they speak against current trends in society.

A few years ago, on an Easter Sunday, we had our usual lineup of special services and activities for that day. A “sunrise” service – I use the term loosely because the sun had already been up for a couple of hours – began the festivities. With awe and humility, we celebrated the mystery of the empty tomb. And then we shared in a special breakfast, a celebratory meal that reminded us of Jesus’s post-resurrection breakfast with his disciples. Our children participated in games, hunted down dozens of Easter eggs, and won a variety of prizes. Finally, our regular morning worship was full of praise and adoration of our risen King and Savior.

On this particular Easter Sunday, two middle-aged couples visited our congregation. Both couples visited us with other family members who are regular members of our congregation. And in both couples, the partners are of the same gender.

I’m not sure if others in the congregation realized this at the time, but I was aware – and happy – that we welcomed both a gay couple and a lesbian couple into our Easter Sunday worship service. After all, any time we join in worship, we do so in honor of Jesus Christ, not in honor of our particular worldview or political opinions. Everyone is welcome to worship the Lord.

In recent days, a pizza shop in Indiana closed its doors after its owners stated that they would not serve pizza at a same-sex wedding reception. The intense furor and passion around this story – by those supporting the pizza shop and those opposing it – has been amazing to witness. It seems that everyone has an opinion on this, whether or not they can even identify Walkerton on an Indiana map.

A few years ago, in another place, Tara and I built a close relationship with a wonderful young woman who is now in her early twenties. I’ll call her Nicole. She spent a great deal of time with us due to some instability in her own home. She loved us at least as much as we loved her in return – and probably more. And even now that we are far apart, we still remain in contact with Nicole and count her as part of our family.

Nicole is a lesbian. She “came out” to the world last year. She has shared with us some of the joys and pains of her relationships that have succeeded and failed. Because of her sexual orientation, she has experienced some emotional distancing from some friends at her local church, which I consider an unfortunate development in her life.

Nicole has held down a job for the past few years and works hard at what she does. She has purchased her own car, she pays her own rent, and she contributes to society in a number of ways. Nicole is a regular person, with regular needs, regular laughter, and regular tears. And for some reason, she counts us as part of her family too.

In recent days, the Indiana state legislature passed Senate Bill 101, also known as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. No small amount of media coverage has accompanied this bill since it was signed by Indiana’s governor a few weeks ago. Again, everyone has an opinion on this, whether or not they are experts in law or politics. I, for one, am not concerned about this law; its worst elements will be corrected and its best intentions will be honored. In any case, I firmly believe that we cannot legislate morality (that is, make people behave by creating laws). Ban same-sex marriage, legalize marijuana, ban assault rifles, legalize gambling: the systems we form do not create morality and goodness. The law is not the ultimate measure of right and wrong. On the other hand, the law should uphold the cause of justice for all people, a goal that is much higher than any Senate Bill.

Many years ago, and in a very different place, a carpenter’s son crouched down and drew designs in the dirt with his finger. The people eagerly awaited his response to the most pressing moral question of the day: what should they do with a woman caught committing adultery? The conservative religious leaders wanted to stone her to death, as the religious law required. And if this carpenter’s son did not give the officially correct answer, then they could silence him as a radical progressive. Rather than taking sides on the issue, this carpenter’s son, this teacher, this divine reformer recognized the humanity of all those around him and called each of them to a higher moral standard:

“If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.”

“Has no one condemned you? Then neither do I condemn you. Go now and leave your life of sin.” (John 7:53-8:11 NIV)

I believe the recent editorial’s appeal to Rosa Parks is inappropriate. After all, people on the other side of this moral question can make precisely the same appeal as an argument to stand up against discrimination. Comparing conservative Christians (or the LGBT community, for that matter) to Rosa Parks is comparing apples to oranges; it is a rhetorical device intended to create an immediate victory. After all, who can argue against Rosa Parks?

But Rosa Parks’s victory was not immediate, nor, indeed, is her struggle finished. The issue of racial reconciliation and justice has not been resolved in twenty-first century America. Similarly, the gay and lesbian couples who visited our church, my friend Nicole, conservative Christians, and other Christians are all involved in an ongoing struggle over the question of homosexuality.

In some ways, this struggle is similar to the conflict in John 8. Jesus’s answer to the question in that story is not “black and white” or “quick and easy.” He understands both the value and the imperfections of each individual around him. He creates a new way of answering the moral dilemma: not by adhering to religious law, not by accepting sexual immorality as the new norm, but by extending love and grace to everyone. He desires justice for all and calls each person to higher standards of righteousness and holiness.

Perhaps we would do well to learn to imitate him in how we think about, discuss, and act on the important moral questions of our day.

Refuge and Redemption

In today’s Chronological Bible reading, we come across one of my favorite topics in the Old Testament: the cities of refuge. These were six cities in ancient Israel that were set apart as “safe havens” for people who committed murder or manslaughter. Something about the conditions set forward in Numbers 35:9-34 strikes me as meaningful for our lives as disciples of Jesus. Continue reading →

Rescue in Christ

“I do not do what I want to do. Who will rescue me from this body of death?” Paul’s words in Romans 7:14-25 ring true in today’s world, in a variety of ways. How can Jesus rescue us from the things that bind us? What difference does faith in Christ make in the fight against human trafficking? Listen in to Pastor David’s sermon as we continue our Lenten series on this important subject:

Listen now!

A Day in the Life of Jesus

This Sunday we heard testimonies from the men of Mid-Michigan Teen Challenge – tremendous stories of transformation in Christ! Pastor David then gave a short reflection on the sermon text for the day, Mark 1:29-39, a day in the life of Jesus, in which he answers the question of why he exists. Maybe his answer can help us with the same question!

Listen now!

The Stupendous Stranger

Christopher Smart was an English poet who lived just before the American Revolution. He contributed regularly to a couple of popular magazines in London, but he was eventually locked away in a mental institution by his father-in-law for various reasons. Smart accumulated so many debts throughout his adult life that he was finally placed in a debtors’ prison, where he died of an illness at age 49.

I just learned about Christopher Smart because of a poem he wrote, entitled The Stupendous Stranger, which has been set to music. One of the choirs in which Tara and I sing will be performing this piece of music at an upcoming Christmas concert this month. The poem is rather short, just two verses long. I offer this to you as an Advent reflection:

Where is this stupendous stranger?
Gentle shepherd, now advise.
Lead me to my Master’s manger,
show me where my Savior lies.
O Most Mighty! O Most Holy!
Far beyond the seraph’s thought,
art thou then so weak and lowly
as unheeded prophets taught?

O the magnitude of meekness!
Worth from worth immortal sprung;
O the strength of infant weakness,
if eternal is so young!
God all bounteous, all creative,
whom no ills from good dissuade,
is incarnate, and a native
of the very world he made.

Sometimes the most powerful ideas are contained in just a few words. I fear that anything I write here might detract from the impact of Smart’s poem on my life – and, perhaps, on yours – so I will keep these comments brief.

Jesus is the stupendous stranger whom we meet as the baby in Bethlehem. The contrasts of this poem are remarkable: great and meek, strong and weak, eternal and young, creating and incarnate, strange and native. Jesus is all of these things.

How can we ask “What Child Is This?”, as the Christmas carol goes, when he is the very one who created Mary, the one on whose lap he is now sleeping?

How can we speak “sleep in heavenly peace,” as the Christmas carol goes, when this tender and mild infant is the immensely powerful God of all creation?

How can we sing “welcome to our world,” as the recent song by Chris Rice goes, when this child is not really a stranger to this world at all?

Perhaps we are the strangers whom God graciously invites to approach his manger. Perhaps we are the visitors who get to meet someone who is so unlike ourselves (immortal, strong, creator, master) yet who is very much like us (enfleshed, weak, vulnerable, native). Perhaps we are the gentle shepherds who are called to escort others to the manger, to the cross, to the tomb, to the Table.

Perhaps we are simply those who read Christopher Smart’s words and pause in awe and thanksgiving. The Stranger is now native. The Creator is among us. The Baby is eternal. The Weak is our Strength.

Pastor David

Jesus’s World: The Innocence

Jesus is the “Boy Who Lived.” Herod’s best efforts to kill the newborn king in Bethlehem failed. But what about the families that lost children in that massacre? Where was God then? To whom could they turn in their broken world? Listen in as Pastor David preaches from Isaiah 40:1-11, which speaks loudly into the culture of the first century – and the twenty-first.

Listen now!

Jesus’s World: The Tension

This Advent, as we approach Christmas Day, we will be studying the world of Jesus to see just how dramatic his entrance into that world really was. The lessons we discover along the way will shape how we look at our world, as well. Listen in as Pastor David preaches on Isaiah 64:1-12 and the tension that filled Jesus’s world.

Listen now!

On Veterans, Armistice, and Peace

Three years ago, I wrote an article entitled “Thoughts on Veterans Day.” In it, I encouraged us to seek a “peaceful way of life” and to “pray for peace around the world.” But what a difference three years makes! When I wrote those words, the ongoing civil war in Syria was just beginning; the “Arab Spring” was less than a year old; ISIS did not exist; and Sandy Hook and Benghazi were just locations, not tragedies of violence. Osama bin Laden had been killed six months earlier, and American troops were still heavily engaged in Iraq and Afghanistan. in our own nation, Michael Brown and Trayvon Martin were still alive.

God, grant us peace in our time, so that three years from now we will have fewer reasons to be surprised at the human capacity to wage war and to act violently.

Today, Veterans Day, is a day when our cultural sensitivity is at its highest: the nation pauses at 11am, the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, in honor and remembrance of all those men and women who have served in the armed forces of the United States. This is an expansion of the original Armistice Day, a celebration of the end of World War I – the “war to end all wars” – which ended at 11am on November 11, 1918. In the intervening ninety-six years since that date, we have seen many more wars, many more acts of violence, many more veterans being carried home in caskets or carrying PTSD home with themselves, many more pursuits of arms rather than pursuits of armistice.

God, grant us peace in our time, so that four years from now we can celebrate the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I with thankfulness that peace is defeating violence both at home and abroad.

Today, in my daily Bible reading, I read the four gospel accounts of the burial and resurrection of Jesus. For Christians, this event is the climax of human history. Everything changes because Jesus lived, taught, ministered, died, and rose again. We interpret our lives and world events through the lens of Christian faith. Our allegiance is first and foremost to the kingdom of God, which Jesus proclaimed throughout his ministry. Our hope is in the salvation of God, which Jesus brought about through his death and resurrection. Our peace is found in reconciliation with God, which Jesus graciously provided through no help of our own. Jesus is the True Veteran, the one who waged war against sin itself and was victorious, the one who achieved this victory not through aggression and violence and bombs and guns and survival tactics but through laying down his life of his own volition, the one who served not a nation or state but a kingdom, his kingdom, an unending kingdom, a kingdom of peace.

God, grant us peace in our time, so that ten, twenty, fifty years from now we will see that “the kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ” (Revelation 11:15 NIV).

Yes, Lord, bring your peace into this world, and bring it quickly.

In the final words of the Bible (Revelation 22:20-21 NIV),

He who testifies to these things says, “Yes, I am coming soon.” Amen. Come, Lord Jesus. The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God’s people. Amen.