More than a name

Our annual summer children’s program was last week. This year, we called it Rock U and the theme was stories connected to, well, rock. That might not sound super interesting, but we used it to connect to our relationship with the earth and God, building (especially ourselves), story telling and rock music (there was a band) and we managed to get in a little Lion King, Bob the Builder and Emmet from the Lego Movie. And there are a lot of cool crafts you can do with rocks.

One of the days we retold the story of how Peter got his name. In Matthew 16:15-19, Jesus asks the disciples who people say he is and then who they, the disciples, say he is. Simon answers that he is the messiah and Jesus renames him Peter, which means “rock,” because he is the rock on which he will build. Our version had a little more detail…

We wanted to connect the story to the idea that we are all building our selves on the rock which is love, being created in the image of God, finding God in ourselves and living into the goodness of life. So Simon was feeling a little insecure, being just a fisherman, and like he didn’t always understand things as clearly or quickly as the others seemed to. But when the time comes to answer Jesus’ question “who do you think I am,” he just somehow knows the right answer and can’t help but blurt it out. Jesus, knowing that Simon was feeling insecure, congratulates him on his courage for speaking up and points out that, while he’s not perfect (no one is), he knows what’s true and will stand by it. We had Jesus relate this moment to the parable of the wise man who builds on rock, the foolish man on sand. Simon is definitely rock, so Jesus says he’s going to give him a nickname: Rocky.

Right now you’re doing what many of the kids did in the moment of hearing the story: wait, that’s not right, it’s Peter. Yes, it is, but bear with me.

Jesus wants to call him Rocky. But here’s how the ending went:

“Simon looked at Jesus, a little alarmed, ‘I don’t know, Jesus,’ he said, ‘that’s not a very, I don’t know, Hebrew sounding name. I mean, I like it, of course, but what if someone decides to write this story down and put it in, say, a book of important stories about you that people will read far into the future? Shouldn’t it be something a little more fancy or serious.

“‘Okay, okay,’ said Jesus, ‘I see your point.’ Though he secretly didn’t and fully intended to keep calling him Rocky as a nickname. ‘How about a name that means ‘rock’ that’s a little fancier: I will call you Peter.’”

Peter’s okay with that, of course. But, while the key part of the story was the “rock” image, what it means and how that might be conveyed to children, I think it does open up an avenue we don’t explore nearly enough.

The Bible is holy and sacred. Yes. And, for many that holiness and sacredness may best be reflected in the dignity and beauty of the King James Version or, perhaps, a more accurate translation that more closely respects the most ancient texts we have available. For understanding, some people may prefer a more contemporary language version like The Message, but still we insist that it maintain the dignity of a sacred and holy text.

Except it shouldn’t be style and language that make them holy and sacred. It should be heart and spirit. The gospels are stories of a very down to earth Jesus who did his best to connect with people where and how they were. His followers were ordinary, everyday people who were inspired to do extraordinary things by the relationship they had with Jesus. In fact, Jesus, while being a respectful Jew, goes out of his way to question the holy and sacred rituals that had become meaningless for anything other than show. He questions the pharisees and the leaders of the Temple and reminds people to not be like them, not to be all for show, but instead to be for what’s heartfelt and soulful. He reached out to the sinners, the broken and hurting. He sat with the marginalized and the ordinary, not the holy and the “holier than thou.” Maybe, every now and then, it’s a good idea to get down there with Jesus and tell the story a little less holy and a little more real, a little less like it’s the words that make it sacred and more like it’s how we live the word that does that.

Maybe, if then were now, he might have called Simon “Rocky.” Or maybe even The Rock. It worked for Dwayne Johnson.

What you don't need

Do you have a basic “essentials” list of things you have to have with you when you go out the door? Your phone, of course, a wallet (or at least a debit card or some cash, maybe a driver’s license), keys, maybe a hat or coat, maybe a watch or a ring. Maybe it’s dependent on where you’re going or how, or even the weather. You want to be prepared, right?

Of course you do. And, while there may be things that we feel are essential, we might add to it, depending on where our journey is taking us today. Plan ahead for what’s expected. Or even unexpected.

No matter how few or many those things are, the point is that we bring what we need to feel prepared. It makes sense.

So imagine the surprise of the seventy followers that Jesus sends on ahead of him to spread the Good News and let people know he’s coming, when he tells them not to bring hardly anything at all. Go in pairs and “carry no purse, no bag, no sandals” and, wherever you go, “remain in the same house, eating and drinking whatever they provide, for the labourer deserves to be paid” (Luke 10:4, 7). Tell them two things: offer “peace to this house” and tell them the kingdom of God has come near. It’ll be like being lambs among wolves, Jesus says, but if you’re not welcomed, just shake the dust of the town off your feet and move on.

The “seventy” are only in Luke, but earlier in Luke and in Matthew and Mark there are similar accounts of Jesus sending the chosen twelve the same way. “Take nothing for your journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money—not even an extra tunic” (Luke 9:3).

Maybe Jesus has a different perspective.

We think in terms of what we need for what we might expect. Maybe Jesus is thinking in terms of what you need to let go of in order to be open to the possibility of what might happen.

Offer peace and the news that the kingdom of God is near. That’s enough. Let go of what you think the response should be or might be or how you could make it what you want. Let go of your preconceived ideas about the people, the places, the message even. Let go of how you think you could dress the message up or how “best” to present it. Don’t anticipate, simply engage. And don’t be afraid.

Because the message isn’t all you have. You have you, and that’s something worth sharing. You also have backup: the seventy were in pairs and we have each other. You also have the opportunity for hospitality that your openness invites. In that moment of engagement without anticipation or expectation, that’s where God can be found. That’s where love is at work.

Inside Out

Jesus isn’t easy.

I don’t know how many times I’ve said that so I’m just going to say, “ a lot.” Jesus isn’t easy. It can certainly be easy to say “I’m a follower of Jesus” or, even easier, “I’m a Christian,” but living it isn’t easy.

It’s both one of the reasons that churches - and churchgoers - can be so readily accused of hypocritical behaviour and why so many people don’t want to be a follower of Jesus. The first one’s too easy and the second one’s too hard. Let me unpack that a bit, because they’re related.

The legacy of christians behaving badly is astonishing. Yes, it is. So is the legacy of christians truly being Jesus. Thanks, I think we all know that, Captain Obvious.

We’re all human beings on a journey and no one’s perfect in this life (that’s for the next one). We come into this life created in the image of God and then life experience helps make us the human beings we are. Sometimes we grow, sometimes we struggle, sometimes we succeed, sometimes we fail, sometimes we do the right thing, sometimes we don’t. And because we’re human beings preaching good news of the divine, sometimes the behaviour doesn’t reflect the story we want to share. Sometimes we’re sorry and ask forgiveness, sometimes we’re not sorry and need it even more.

That doesn’t make the bad stuff okay. It makes it part of the struggle. Especially when we hold up Jesus as the perfection that we can achieve.

First of all - and don’t stone me for this - Jesus isn’t perfect. If Jesus is “the Word made flesh” (John 1:14) or “Immanuel, which means God is with us” (Matt. 1:23), if we understand Jesus as the incarnation of the love which we know is God, then Jesus is divine and human. We might not fully understand the divine, but we’re intimately acquainted with the human and all its potential flaws. Even in the stories we have - and remember, we don’t have every moment of Jesus’ life - there are examples of Jesus being very human, indeed.

Secondly, Jesus never asked or expected you or me or anyone else to be perfect, not in this life. That expectation we put on ourselves and then used it as a means to judge failure or to simply not try. It’s no wonder people find it hard to behave the way Jesus teaches.

But that’s just the point. It isn’t about outward behaviour, it’s about inner heart. It can’t just be words, but it also can’t just be action, either. Both must spring from the heart. And that’s where Jesus hopes transformation will happen. Not that we’ll behave right, but that we’ll live right, reflecting the image of God that’s in our heart in our mind and actions also, loving each other because there is love in our hearts.

In Luke, there’s a little vignette that begins Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem and his eventual death. It begins with the disciples telling Jesus that a Samaritan town wasn’t interested in him coming there. That shouldn’t be a surprise, since Jews and Samaritans were enemies, but two of the disciples ask Jesus if they should “command fire to come down from heaven and consume them” (Luke 9:54). Of course Jesus rebukes them. As the journey continues, they meet someone who says they’ll follow Jesus wherever he goes and Jesus replies that, unlike a fox or a bird, he has no home to go to. The next person he asks to follow with them says they have to bury their deceased father first. Jesus says let the dead bury their own, you should proclaim the kingdom of God. And then another says they’ll follow Jesus, but have to say farewell to their family first. Jesus says you can’t blow a straight furrow if you’re looking back.

Ok, what? That all seems rather random and dismissive.

Maybe it is if you think about the behaviour here: the disciples want to punish, even destroy, people who reject Jesus and he says no, but then Jesus seems to challenge the desire and the priorities of those who say they would follow Jesus. Which is it, Jesus?

But I don’t think Jesus was an either/or kind of teacher, I think he was a with/and. What this is all about isn’t behaviour, it’s heart. It’s what’s at the centre of your life. When it’s love, you won’t find anger or fear or retaliation when people disagree with you or are different from you. When it’s love, you’ll be open to wherever this journey takes you and not be afraid, knowing that there’s meaning to the ancient proverb - and modern cliche - home is where the heart is. When it’s love, death is a passing but it’s not the end, and our rituals or even our daily living are only meaningful if they speak to, and from, the heart. When it’s love, the way is always forward, always growing towards the moment when the burdens of this life are let go and there is only what is in our hearts: love.

A Story Worth Sharing

Have you ever seen or met someone possessed by demons?

Yeah. You have.

“Possessed by demons” or “having an unclean spirit” may be the biblical language, but whatever language you use, we’ve encountered them, even experienced them.

Historically, we personified or anthropomorphized anything dark, malevolent or evil as a demon - I just did by saying “them” - though the word didn’t specifically mean that. All evils were associated with The Devil and most likely sprang from Hell. That gave us an opportunity to say that the characteristics and behaviours associated with it weren’t us - it was a demon possessing us or acting through us.

Cynically, that might sound like an excuse, both for the behaviour and how we respond to it. But I can’t argue with it. I believe that we’re created in the image of God and that’s love. Anything that isn’t that, well, it could be a demon.

No, my issue isn’t with the language, it’s how we use it. I don’t believe in demonic possession in the whole “hell-spawn of satan” way we’ve historically used it. I think we defaulted to that thinking because of religious beliefs and systems trying to explain things we didn’t understand. We didn’t have enough knowledge to know any different. As we grow, we think, we learn and we become more aware.

The demons that challenge us and take over our lives could be serious mental illness or a disability. It could be post-traumatic stress related and the result of experience, even the result of something we learned or how we learned it. Sometimes, we may even label something we just don’t understand as a demon.

The reason I think we need to spend more time thinking about that is because it’s what’s going to determine our response. 

In the Bible, there’s a story of Jesus casting demons out of a man and into a herd of pigs. Some version of the story appears in the gospels of Mathew, Mark and Luke, but it’s Luke’s version I like best.

We’ve always described it as a story of healing. Jesus meets a man, possessed by so many demons they call themselves “Legion.” His community locked him away, at first, but he escaped and they abandoned him to a place he would be alone. Knowing who Jesus is, Legion asks to be sent from the man into a nearby herd of pigs. The possessed pigs then run into the lake and drown themselves. Seeing the man free of his possession and hearing the story of how it happened, the people are afraid and ask Jesus to leave. The man asks to go with Jesus, but Jesus tells him to stay and share his story.

We tend to focus on the moment: Jesus heals the man. Or, let me say that a little differently: the power of Jesus relieves the man of his demons. Notice, by the way, that the demons aren’t simply gone, they go into the pigs causing their death. I wonder if this isn’t a reminder that healing isn’t always easy and clean. Sometimes it comes at a cost. I wonder.

But let’s look beyond that for a moment. Let’s look at the townspeople. At first, their response to the man’s “demons” was to lock him away. Then, when he broke free, they let him go somewhere he could be alone and not bother anyone. Out of sight, where they would’t have to encounter him. Along comes Jesus and he is healed. Do the townspeople celebrate, joyfully embrace the man and thank Jesus? No. They’re afraid and ask Jesus to leave.

That’s not the end of the story. For the townspeople, it might just be the beginning. They’re still broken and afraid, not just of the demons, but of the power that healed them. So Jesus tells the healed man to stay and share his story, the story of his own brokenness and healing, his encounter with Jesus and his experience of God. In sharing that story, others might come to understand both the presence of real “demons” in our lives and the power of Jesus to engage them. In hearing that story, they might know that the power of Jesus is love and learn connection, understanding and relationship. In being that story, they might find true community, the “common unity” of engaging the unique, diverse, frail, sometimes broken, sometimes fearful hearts that are in all of us.

It is a big deal

For many christian churches, the Trinity is a big deal. It even gets its own Sunday in some churches, the Sunday after Pentecost. That’s unusual because most church festivals or observances commemorate a specific event or person and the Trinity is neither of those. Then there’s all the churches named Trinity, Holy Trinity or, my personal favourite, The Cathedral Church of the Holy and Indivisible Trinity (better known as Gloucester Cathedral in England).

But what is it, exactly?

Simply put, it’s the doctrine that describes God as being one God in three persons, God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit. The three persons are distinct, yet are one in nature or essence. The word Trinity is essentially “tri” (three) and “unity” (one, together). Well, there you go.

Of course, there is no “simply put.” The Trinity is considered a “mystery” of the faith because that paragraph above is just the tip of the iceberg. How can three be one and one three? Isn’t there just one God? What’s this mean about the relationship of the three to each other and to us? And what about our relationship with the one, especially when “you will have no other gods before me?” And all that is just where it started.

The word "trinity" isn't in the bible. It wasn't even used until the third century. We made it up. That’s why it’s “doctrine,” a teaching of the church. See, by the beginning of the second century, the budding church had a problem: inheritors of the belief that there is one God, we now had stories about Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Jesus was Immanuel (God with us), the “Word made flesh,” the Son of God and yet more than even that. And the Spirit was from the beginning, the wisdom, the power of God at work. How can God be in these, too, if God is one? The word might not have been in the Bible, but the concept certainly seemed to be.

And yet, it can’t be fully explained. That’s why it’s a “mystery.” Trying to define God is limiting, to say the least, especially since our relationship with God is both personal and communal (i.e. there's even more relationships). That's a lot of unique and personal understanding to contend with and a lot of different contexts to take into consideration.

And yet - again - that’s precisely what the early church attempted to do with The Trinity. The doctrine didn’t come about easily. There were many challenges and conflicts over how the concept was to be defined, producing more of a “what it’s not” understanding until a couple of creedal statements settled it. And that was really only by force. In other words, it became an issue that helped define the new institution and give it a sense of uniformity, but at a price. We built an institution on the foundation of Jesus but it had walls that excluded people. Walls that just got thicker and taller as time went on. And we stuck with it. Pretty soon the walls become more important than the foundation and the institution - the structure that’s supposed to help us understand our faith - becomes more important than what we thought we believed.

That’s not Jesus. At least, not the Jesus who said others will know you are followers of me by your love (John 13:35). I think Jesus invited questions and thought and wonder. I think Jesus opened his arms to those who felt excluded, marginalized and turned away.

I think it’s also counter to the real value of the idea of Trinity, not as a way to define God (as if that were possible), but as a way to engage what it means to be in relationship and to open the door on wonder.

I believe that there is one God and we all come to that God in different ways. Not just through different faith traditions, but even within those faith traditions. Some people find the power of the Spirit to be their cornerstone, for example. Witness all of the people these days who describe themselves as "spiritual" but not belonging to any tradition or church. Or the "pentecostal" tradition that emphasizes the power of the Spirit at work in the world. Or followers of Jesus, from those who follow the example of Jesus' life to those who look more to the atoning power of Jesus death or stress the need to receive "Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Saviour." Or those who look primarily to God as the creator, the power of the universe.

See, I think that we all connect with God in these many ways and we each, perhaps, have a relationship that is most meaningful to us, or at least more meaningful in some contexts.

We should also remember that each of these doesn't stand alone. In wondering at the immensity of the one God, we can meet the life of Jesus, "the Word made flesh" (John 1:14), and the Holy Spirit that inspired and empowered the disciples at Pentecost (Acts 2). As they are bound together, so are we: we are many persons, yet one in love.

It's in you

When I was little, one of the things that scared me most about church was the Holy Spirit.

I know, you’d think there would be other stuff, and there was: when I was a kid, church was a pretty stern and solemn place where you had to be on your best behaviour or else. I was never exactly sure what the “or else” was when I was really little, but I was pretty sure it involved fire and eternal darkness and pitchforks and scary things lurking behind every pillar in the church. Thank goodness churches today are so much more welcoming, warmer and friendlier places where fear has been replaced by love. They are, aren’t they?

But the Holy Spirit, that was a pretty scary concept for a little kid. (Didn’t help that we used to call it the Holy Ghost.) It can still be pretty scary, I think. The story of Pentecost is all about tongues of fire and mighty rushing winds coming down on peoples’ heads. Pretty exciting story, I’m sure, especially in the hands of Spielberg or J.J. Abrams. But pretty scary all the same. Fire and wind are often in the news, and it’s never good. If the Holy Spirit is the power of God at work in the world, I wondered when I was little, how come it sounds like it could hurt? A lot.

Pentecost, by the way, really just means fifty days after Easter. The Bible (Acts 2:1-6) tells of the disciples, after Jesus had left them, gathering for a festival - the Jewish harvest festival Shavuot (fifty days after Passover, commemorating Moses receiving the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai). There is a sound like a mighty rushing wind and there are tongues of flame and “they were filled with the Holy Spirit.” Because they then go out and share the story of Jesus with people, we usually understand this event to be the symbolic “birthday” of the church.

Like I said, as a child, I always thought this sounded like something that had to be done to you, that the Spirit - to use older language - had to “come upon you.” Brrr. Creepy.

But now I wonder if maybe all that blowing and burning wasn’t really just for show, a symbolic act to inspire us to action. Just like in John 20:22, when Jesus “breathed on them and said to them, ‘receive the Holy Spirit.’” Sure the firey tongues and gusty winds are more impressive, but really they’re both ways of saying that God will give you the strength to do what you know in your heart is right.

Or perhaps a better way to describe that might be like a tool, a conductor connecting what’s “the image of God” already in us with God and each other, inspiring the love that’s already in our heart of hearts to become action. Maybe that’s what Jesus means when he tells the disciples that there will be “another Advocate … The Spirit of Truth.”

In other words, the Spirit isn’t something done to you, it’s already in you. From the beginning. Coming from God and returning to God, created in the image of God, coming closer to God in Jesus and inspired to live out love and grace in our lives. When we connect with God and each other, when we reach deep into what’s true in our hearts, the Spirit is the action of love lived out.

Maybe when we ask God to “send” the Spirit to us, it’s not about something new being added to us, but rather something within us being empowered. We don’t wait with expectation to receive, but we open ourselves to the gift that has already been given us.  It’s about the spirit in us bonding with the spirit of God. We are one in the Spirit, with each other and with God. That’s love, lived from within our hearts and out into the world.

You had it in you all along.

A Whole New World

It’s Aladdin’s signature tune. A Whole New World won an Oscar and a Grammy award and you probably know the song, whether you saw the 1992 animated classic or are looking forward to seeing the new live-action one.

It’s no spoiler to say that the song comes at the moment that Aladdin, dressed as Prince Ali, takes Princess Jasmine for a ride on his magic carpet. She leads a very controlled and structured life and has never seen much of the world beyond the palace she lives in. Freed from the confines of this glittering box, he promises to show her the world and open her eyes to the wonders she’s missing. Of course, it’s also a whole new world because they’re together and, having experienced even just a little of that, Jasmine knows she “can’t go back to where I used to be.”

As followers of Jesus, the stories of Jesus we tell are at the heart of who we are. Jesus is our example, our model to take to heart, our Way to follow. And Jesus was all about busting out of the box we put ourselves in, breaking the structure and confines of a society that trapped people where they were.

When we hear Jesus saying things like love God and love your neighbour as yourself, love your enemy, care for the poor and the sick, be generous with all you have, love each other the way I loved you, I imagine the people he was telling this too had a little feedback. I imagine there was some discussion, some concern about how hard it is to do some of these things, to live love as Jesus did. And I’m sure Jesus would say I know, I understand how hard it is, and he’d share some practical advice and encouraging words.

But most importantly, I think he’d say just imagine how things would be if we could. Imagine the world that we’d live in if we loved each other, built relationships with each other, engaged instead of feared, embraced instead of hated, loved life instead of worrying about death. It wouldn’t just be a new world, it’d be a whole one, too.

And it’s not imaginary. It’s a promise. It’s hope. Not for some distant future, but today.

Look at the Book of Revelation for minute. We spend altogether too much time on hearing Revelation as being a vision of the end of things. All this terrible craziness and destruction that’s going to happen when the world comes to an end. But Revelation isn’t just a prophecy of doom and destruction and the end of things, it’s the hope of the beginning of things: “a new heaven and a new earth … and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” (Rev. 21:1, 3-4)

Somedays it feels like we’re already living in those end times. And maybe we are because endings and beginnings are all around us. They’re part of our daily life and they’re part of what brings us new life, daily. So how do we bring the world, experiencing brokenness and pain and hurt to the Whole New World that Jesus and Revelation promise can be here?

At the end of that story in John when Jesus tells the disciples - and us - to love one another as he showed us with his life, Jesus prays. One of the things he prays is that “all may be one.” But Jesus idea of unity isn’t about agreeing on everything, being identical, following a specific idea or religion. It’s not about sameness. It’s about finding the one common thread that connects us all, and he describes it: just as God is in Jesus, Jesus is in us; just as we are in Jesus, so is Jesus in God. In other words, we are all related.

Diverse, unique, special and all connected by God. Describe that how you like: as being created in the image of God, made of love, part of the fabric of creation, all my relations - we are all connected to each other. When we embrace that instead of fighting it, we can make a whole new world.