Get up and don't be afraid

The United Church of Canada, like all churches, is worried about it's future.  So they decided to survey all the congregations of the church.  The report's pretty much what you'd expect, concern about dwindling numbers in the pews and in ministry, financial concerns, unhappiness with unwieldy structures (institutions love their paperwork).  The report even has the very practical and entirely unimaginative title of "Comprehensive Review."  You can find it on the United Church of Canada website.  It's a little dry, but practical assessments have to be, don't they?

A few days after that report, the Comprehensive Review Committee produced something else: a document recommending possible directions the church could go, a remarkably creative discussion document they called "Fishing on the other side."

That seems right to me, somehow: the rather dry practical and factual document gets a suitably direct title and the creative one gets something kind of funky.

"Fishing on the other side" is a reference to John 21:4-6.  In the days following Jesus' death and resurrection, some of the disciples had gone back to fishing.  "Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.  Jesus said to them, 'Children, you have no fish, have you?' They answered him, 'No.'  He said to them, 'Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.' So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish."

Like any metaphor, it's fraught with complications, but the point is to suggest that bold and profound transformation is required of the institution we call "The Church."  Some change or adjustment isn't enough, we need to let go of how things have been done and recognize that living out God's mission means something "new."  Just like life.

This document's now being discussed by the local regions of the church and ours worked on it this week.  Locally, we're also working on a regional event called "Unstoppable Church," an opportunity for individual churches to work on their own particular issues and dream together.

There is no shortage of enthusiasm for these discussions and no shortage of desire for change.  But it also strikes me that there is a desire to know - now - what the future will be, to know where we are going and to have the expectation that comes with the knowledge of what that destination looks like.  And that's not surprising because that's often how we live.  We have that constant struggle between knowing where we're going and taking the time to enjoy the journey.

And what happens when it's not what we expected?  Disappointment?  Do we keep trying to make it what we thought it would be?  Or do we engage the people and places on our journey, looking to embrace where that takes us?

I don't have an answer for that.  I think we're all unique in our perspective and our personal interaction with life around us.  But I'm wondering about two bible stories that speak to me about it this week.

Near the beginning of John's gospel is another story of "invitation."  The first disciples come to Jesus because John tells them to: this is the one I told you about, he says.  They go and ask Jesus what he's doing and Jesus simply says "come and see."  No explanation, no promise of what's coming, no agenda, no pamphlet or informational brochure, no map.  Just the invitation to come and see: to experience the journey.  Maybe, as followers of Jesus, we're called to be life explorers.  Maybe as people, we're called to be life explorers.

That can be a pretty scary proposition, can't it?  But that's where another story seems appropriate.  It's a pretty universal moment in Jesus' ministry that happens frequently, in a variety of settings, but this week we hear it as part of the Transfiguration story (Matthew 17:1-9).  In one of those "magical" moments, two of the disciples witness Jesus being "transfigured" - illuminated in a bright light.  And they hear the voice of God say "this is my son, listen to him."  They don't know what's happening, they can't explain it, but it's something amazing and they're scared and they fall to the ground and Jesus says - wait for it, this is the moment - Jesus says "get up and don't be afraid."

Perhaps, as the season of Epiphany comes to a close, that's an "a-ha" moment.  How willing are we, really, to get up and step out into the world, living as Jesus taught, without fear because Jesus walks beside us?

That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard

That Jesus.  He says the darndest things.

Oh, he heals people and shows compassion to the marginalized and care for the poor and hungry, he loves everyone, he tells us that God loves us.  That's all pretty cool.  But did you hear what he said in that sermon on the mount?

Love your enemy.

He can't really mean that, can he?  Enemies must be defeated, overpowered and punished.  That's why we have "an eye for an eye," so that equitable justice will be meted out on those who break the law.  "Let the punishment fit the crime," says the Mikado in the famous Gilbert & Sullivan operetta.  Yes, that's how we maintain a well ordered society: retributive justice.  If only the law was always just.

But Jesus isn't talking about punishment at all, nor is he concerned with a well ordered society (that retributive justice idea has really worked well for us, after all, hasn't it?).  Remember, Jesus came to turn society upside down, to challenge the ideas that have brought us structure, but little else.  He's concerned with relationships, with creating community around love.  He's taking us back to the beginning, before we discovered the power of power, the ability to enforce and the desire to control.

No matter how much power we wield, an enemy is still an enemy, even in defeat.  Punishment, even as retribution, does not defeat evil.  Hatred, fear and ignorance are not ended by force.  Retribution changes nothing.  Centuries later, Gandhi was credited with the observation that a policy of "an eye for an eye" simply results in making everyone blind.  Furthermore, he said, "you cannot inject new ideas into a man’s head by chopping it off; neither will you infuse a new spirit into his heart by piercing it with a dagger."

Jesus isn't talking about management, he's talking about change.  And to make change, we need love.  Martin Luther King Jr., much influenced by Gandhi, would write "darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that.  Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that."

Moments later in the gospel story, Jesus calls for something seemingly even more impossible than loving an enemy: "be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matt. 5:48).

Well, that's the most ridiculous thing, isn't it?   Jesus asks the impossible.  Jesus calls us to perfection, not just the perfection our earthly minds can imagine, but the perfection of God. 

But that's precisely the point: Jesus doesn't mean that earthly kind of perfection.  In the ancient Greek of the text, it says "telos," which means the wholeness and completeness that comes with the fulfillment of purpose, the fulfillment of who we are.

If we believe that we are created in God's image, then Jesus is surely calling us to fulfillment.  He's not pointing out what we're incapable of, he's challenging us to be more fully who we are.  We do not come from sin, we come from love.  We do not come from evil, we come from love.  We do not come from hate, we come from love.  We do not come from fear, we come from love.  Our true power is love.

As long as we rely on the power of force, the idea of retribution, the need for punishment for us to be satisfied, we will only "manage" our world.  And how effectively?  Change comes with love.  Transformation comes with love.  Wholeness comes with love.

You are blessed.

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

“Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

“Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

“Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.  Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you."  Matthew 5:3-12 (NRSV)

I've always had a "love/slightly-less-love" kind of relationship with The Beatitudes.  And I'm referring to Matthew 5:3-12.   Luke 6:20-22 is okay in its own way as Luke tells it, but Matthew's is "The Beatitudes" for me.

That being said, I've also been around long enough to hear (probably) too many sermons about it, read too many columns, articles or blogs, all of which have left me feeling somewhat confused about a focused understanding of it.  That's not a bad thing.  Jesus speaks to us how Jesus speaks to each of us and I think there are a number of ways into his words here.  (Hence my "love/slightly-less-love" relationship, rather than love/hate.)  The Beatitudes are words of comfort and hope sometimes, a challenge at other times, an outline of gospel themes, a way of living, about the spirit, about life, about living God's Kingdom now and about living into the Kingdom to come.  They are variously about blessing, happiness, fortune and honour.  And how Jesus, as he so often does, turns those things upside down.

I should clarify that: Jesus turns things upside down from how we've made them.  We may even know that they're not right.  We just don't always live them the way we should.  And we're not just talking about the "spiritual" things.

God's blessing, for example, is for all.  We are all blessed.  Not in the future, if we do a certain thing, but now.  I don't believe we earn it or attract it (remember "The Secret?") or make it greater with "positive" thinking.  It is always freely given, as is grace and love.  It is our openness - or lack thereof - that determines how we receive it into our lives.

We don't receive God's blessing by seizing it with power.  We open ourselves to it by giving power away.  Those who have nothing, who are empty, are open to being filled.  Those who are kind to others, loving of others, forgiving of others, all open themselves to receiving kindness and love and forgiveness: those who open their hearts to others will receive as they give.  Those who seek peace by sharing peace will find peace, not those who impose "peace" through force or control.

I know: we don't always receive as we give.  Sometimes love is rejected.  Sometimes love receives hate and kindness receives anger and an offer of peace is crushed with force.  "Relationship" is both hard work and dynamic opportunity.

That's why these Beatitudes are such a challenge: they call us to vulnerability.  To be truly blessed, to be open to receiving God's blessing, we must be willing to make ourselves vulnerable, both spiritually with God and in reality with each other.

But we've learned that vulnerability is weakness.  We feel helpless when we're vulnerable and we need to be in control.  We establish our sense of worth and worthiness based on our power and how much stuff we have and we've learned that equality is something we allow rather than embrace, as if our value depends on superiority to another.

It doesn't.  You are blessed.  Already.  As am I and everyone around us.  Blessed with God's presence, God's grace, God's unconditional (if we can truly understand that) love.  To be blessed by God isn't as narrow and specific as we make "blessings" in our daily language, but an all inclusive gift: life.  Life that we share in relationship with each other.  To know that, we open ourselves to it.  To share it with others, we open ourselves to them.  We become vulnerable with them as God is vulnerable with us.

Risky.  Unsafe.  Dangerous.  Uncertain.  Sure, being vulnerable is those things.  It's also daring, fearless, courageous and bold.  Go and be that kind of vulnerable.  You are blessed.  Already.

If I asked you to tell me about your call, what would you say?

The manner in which Jesus acquires the twelve apostles is one of the most familiar stories to Christians.  And like most things familiar to Christians, there's more than one version of the story.  Since the story appears in all four gospels, there's at least four.  Three of those stories are remarkably similar - Jesus calls fishermen to "follow me" and become fishers for people - but they each have their own tweaks that reflect the character of the book in which we find them.  The fourth has John the Baptist kind of introducing two of his own disciples to Jesus.  They follow him around, Jesus invites them to come and see what he's doing and they're hooked - obvious fishing pun intended.

I said at least four because there's also the manner in which people might interpret those stories for their own context.  Like most things familiar to Christians, we try to relate the story to our own lives and see where our lives and the story intersect.  And, perhaps more importantly, where they should intersect.

And there's where things can just start to get interesting.

If you were to ask me, a "capital M" Minister, about my call, I would suspect that you were expecting a certain kind of answer.  I would think that you want to know about my call to ministry.  After all, I'm a minister.  And besides, Jesus called the disciples to ministry with him, right?

Did he?

Well, yes, I suppose.  But maybe the bigger question is "what do we mean by ministry?"  Do we mean: 1. the action of ministering, that is, serving someone; 2. the work or vocation of a minister of religion; 3. a government department; 4. a period of government;  or 5. a heavy metal rock band from the 1980's.  

Some people might choose 1 and 2 from that list, I guess - trust me, don't pick no.5 - but if you're like me, you'd now be looking for another word instead of ministry.  Suddenly it seems a little small.

How about "life?"  Jesus calls us, invites us, to life.

The call to simply "minister" seems too narrow and too specific for me.  I don't think that there's any way one could interpret the stories of Jesus's first disciples as calls to a specific purpose or style of ministry.  He doesn't say "come and see me Sunday at 11, then go home and come back next week."  He says "come and live with me, follow me, talk with me, experience life with me."  Jesus wants us to learn to live.

Jesus's call is simple, but it sure isn't small.  It's God's call to life, through the experience of Jesus's life in our lives.  Our "ministries" are the day to day relationships we share.  I believe God wants us to live those to the fullest.  I also believe that "call" for each of us can be revealed in a moment of blinding enlightenment as well as through years of thought, challenge and hard work.  And, I believe that God wants each of us to find our call as it finds us: in a way that best allows God to speak to us.

I think a good place to start is how we gather as a community, how we make "church."  Not the institution we've constructed that divides us into denominations and separates us by traditions and belief systems, but the "church" the earliest followers of Jesus made, the one that brings people together as Jesus did and says "come and see."

So: will you come and see?  Will you follow?  

One Story, Many Stories

It's a warm, happy scene every year.  The baby rests comfortably in the manger with Mary and Joseph hovering near by.  The animals sit and lay, quiet and attentive, in the stable which, until recently, had been occupied only by them.  The shepherds (if there's room for more than one) sit quietly, watching the baby intently with unwavering and unblinking eyes.  The Three Kings - one on bended knee, one stooped over, the other leaning back in awe and all three representing an appropriate diversity of ethnic origins - are offering their gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.

If you got the deluxe set, there's an angel that may hover overhead somehow or kneel nearby.  And in the really fancy ones, the angel holds a banner that reads "Glory to God in the highest."

It's the Christmas Creche, a perfect scene from a single, perfect night.

Except …

It was far from perfect.  Meaningfully so, in fact.  The scene we make is cobbled together from three gospels and a lot of imagination, not all the characters were there at the same time, it wasn't really that kind of stable, there … well, I could go through the list of things biblically "wrong" with the scene as we've assembled it, but I did that last year (and each year), so let's just cut to the point I also try to make each year: does it matter?

It's a beautiful way to draw people into the story.  And maybe the details aren't as important as the meaning, at least on Christmas Eve.  There's plenty of time to explore the story the figures  represent.  It's just that we need to do that: explore the story.

We have at least half a dozen manger scenes or creches at our house and I love them all.  I don't know that I realized how much I loved them all until this year when we were given a beautifully carved wooden set.  Each figure is a square pillar with the character carved in the top and biblical quotes about them written on the sides of the pillar.  The tops are all angled so that when you put the figures together, they gently slope upwards from the baby to the star.  It's impossible to describe it in any way which could do it justice.  But the thing is, everyone in the scene fits together perfectly.  And when someone's missing, it's pretty obvious.

That's what started me thinking about how important it is to explore the story.  So I wondered about the magi.

There's some obvious detail things, like how Matthew's gospel (where we find their story) doesn't say there was only three.  We assumed that from the three gifts.  Matthew doesn't name them either, nor does he say they're kings, only magi or wise ones, and, given that they had to travel, it's a certainty they didn't arrive at the stable that night.

But here's two things I wonder about.  "There, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was" (Matthew 2:9).  That sounds like the star moved as they followed.  The light led them to Jesus, it wasn't just a stationary marker, like a buoy.  It led them to Jesus.  (For the best "Star of Bethlehem" ever, watch the St. Paul's Art'n'Kids video The Christmas Story on YouTube.  Now that's an active star.)   You have to look for the light and be ready to follow it.

And second, the magi weren't Jews, they weren't even from the local area.  They were from the mystical "east."  To be blunt, they were foreigners, in every way.  Yet, it's revealed to them, and through them to us, that this is the promised one.  That sounds to me like Jesus is for everyone, for "all the nations of the earth."

That's what Epiphany is, really, The Big Reveal.

Jesus is here.  The Light, the Word made Flesh, Emmanuel (meaning God-with-us) is here.  Have you seen the light?  Do you see Jesus?

Bigger than snow globe

My love likes her Christmas decorations.  Correction, she loves her Christmas decorations.  Every year, Christmas explodes at our place. 

We have a number of Christmas themed snow globes around our house.  Alright, more than a few (some are still in their boxes downstairs).  Some are elaborate scenes with what looks almost like snow and they have a wind-up music box.  Some are simpler, and smaller, with glittering flakes that catch the light.

My favourite is a tiny, simple scene of Mary and Joseph and the baby Jesus, huddled together in a small glass globe not more than two inches across, while sparkly pieces of glitter float around them.  It's that "special moment" in time, perhaps what the shepherds saw, or the stable animals.   It's so simple.  And so pristine, protected by its glass shell. 

Just the way we like our Christmases.

But that's just the "Christmas" we make.  The one we prepare and package, order and organize to conveniently fit into our holiday schedule.  It's a special moment in time, sure, and it can make many memories, but when we put away the snow globes, the six trees and the three cupboards worth of decorations - or is that just at our house? - we're putting that Christmas away, too.

Christmas, real Christmas, is bigger than that.  

Argue about the origins of Christmas traditions all you like, the accuracy of the story, the arbitrary date, the pagan customs, the commercialism of today's festivities, but Christmas is bigger than all that, too.

Christmas, for me, is a reminder of a bigger story, a story of life since the beginning, a life we're living now and a life ahead.  It's about how our relationship with God, and each other, was and is, and how it can be changed for the better by love.

For as much as we mark yearly commemorations of the birth and death and resurrection of Jesus, and we mark certain days as moments in the story of his life, they're all surely less important than the life itself.  Struggling as we were, since the beginning, in our relationship with God and each other, it was that life, that daily living of love, compassion and grace, that became our example for living.  In living, Jesus showed us how we can make life better.

And how we've struggled with that since.  And often failed.  But perhaps that might partly be because we mark these "moments in time" and celebrate them without truly realizing that they are "moments for time."  The love that came down at Christmas, to paraphrase Christina Rosetti's poem, didn't stay in the stable.  That love lives, and we can give it life each day, as it gives us life, every day.

I have an "annual commemoration" of Christmas: I watch the 1951 classic film of A Christmas Carol.  In it, there's a wonderful moment when Scrooge first meets the Ghost of Christmas Present.  The Ghost, a grand, jovial sort, tells him this: "Mortal! We Spirits of Christmas do not live only one day of our year.  We live the whole three-hundred and sixty-five.  So is it true of the Child born in Bethlehem.  He does not live in men's hearts one day of the year, but in all days of the year."

The Christmas story is big.  It's life, every day.

The End is Near-ish

I wanted to begin with a little joke, like "the end is near - again!"  It's that time of year,   not the calendar year (a little early for that), but the church year.  The advent season is coming soon, and that begins the church year with the anticipation of the coming of Jesus.  So, these last few weeks before that, as we come to The End, we hear scripture readings in church that remind us of, well, The End.

Luke tells the story of the disciples admiring the impressive beauty of the Temple, only to be interrupted by Jesus prophesying that it will one day be rumble (Luke 21:5-19).  Furthermore, there will be false prophets and doom and destruction and they'll be hated, attacked and persecuted and killed.

You can just imagine the disciples saying "wow, Jesus, thanks for the encouragement."

But there's more, Jesus says: "not a hair of your head will perish. By your endurance you will gain your souls" (Luke 21:19).

"Well then," the disciples might say, "that's okay then."

No, they probably wouldn't.  Not if they're anything like us.  And I think they are, that's why Jesus picked them.

We find it so easy to focus on the trials and tribulations of the getting to The End.  And why wouldn't we?  We're surrounded by them.

We don't need to imagine war or famine, floods, earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, tsunamis or typhoons.  We can watch them on television, presuming that we are among the lucky ones not to be experiencing them in person.  Also thanks to television - and movies, too - we do imagine seven-headed dragons, horsemen of the apocalypse, great beasts and other computer-generated creatures.  We seem to be good at the destruction part.  Almost a little too comfortable with it, with coming to The End.

Maybe "comfortable" is the wrong word, maybe "familiar" is better.  Either way, I guess I'm wondering how we got to be so familiar with cataclysmic endings and not wondrous beginnings?  Every end is followed by a new beginning, how do we then find it so hard to imagine The Ultimate New Beginning?  We can certainly imagine The Ultimate End.

That's just it, though.  As we come closer to The End, the experience is behind us.  We know what we know.  But we don't know what we don't know because we don't know it … to paraphrase former US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

This "new thing" God promises will come after The End, we don't know it like we know the other.  We have hints and we have imaginings, but we have only the language and experiences that we've had to guide us and those are simply not enough.  This is something new.  This needs - demands - hope.  Not wishful thinking, but certain hope.

Perhaps hearing about The End and then experiencing the anticipation of Advent and the new beginning of Christmas is good practice.  What will the new beginning be like?  Wait and see.