Jesus and the Fig Tree (Happy Arbor Day, indeed)

Note: between Wednesday, April 27 and Friday, April 30, which is arbor day, this blog will be devoted to trees.  Why don't you celebrate by planting a tree?  Please comment and tell me about your special trees.  If you're so inspired by this post that you can't wait for tomorrow's post, you can look at my tags for trees and treehouses.)

I’ve noticed that Wesley’s Christmas tree (that blue spruce next to the East driveway of the church) has been putting out bright green new branches lately.  That tree has been in the ground for four years now.  Blue Spruce are known to be slow growers, and the tree has only grown a six inches a year or so.  I’ve recently Julianna’s 2^nd Christmas tree too.  (We bought tabletop trees to plant for Christmas when the children were two—we found it easier to keep ornaments on the tree).  Wesley’s tree’s growth is especially noticeable because it sits next to Julianna’s tree—which has not yet put out any new growth.  I haven’t been able to find any information as to whether this is to be expected with a new tree that was just put in the ground in January, so if there are any horticulturists out there who have good advice, let me hear it because I’m worried about it! 

Scriptures say that God expects and hopes for us to show new growth in our Spirits.  Much is said in the Psalms and Prophets about fruitfulness and it is a major theme of Paul’s letters to the church.  Paul encourages the believers to bear fruit in their spiritual lives.  Just to make things clear, Paul spells out how that looks on a practical level. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.”  (Gal 5: 22-23)

 Jesus speaks of the urgency of us bearing fruit in prophetic action, recorded in Mark 11 and Matthew 21.  Jesus walks up to a fig tree (which Mark says is “not in the fruit bearing season, but had leaves”) and finds that it has borne no figs.  He curses the tree, and the disciples watch in amazement as the tree withers from the root.  I’ve always felt sorry for that poor fig tree.  It seems so out of character for Jesus to curse and hurt a living thing. I took this question to Brother Aidan, a hermit monk I had the opportunity to stay with for a week around 10 years ago.  He spoke about the importance of bearing fruit when we have an encounter with Jesus.  It’s not good enough just to just be in proximity to Jesus, we must respond to that presence.  Whatever we are called by God to do, even yield fruit out of season or tell a mountain to throw itself into the sea, we must be bold enough do it. 

 But I’m not the only one who has a soft spot for the fig tree.  This is one of those interesting stories that is contained in Mark (which Matthew and Luke utilized to compose their own Gospels) that Matthew adapted, but Luke left out entirely. Actually Luke doesn’t leave it out, he simply rewrites it as a parable.  In Luke 13: 1-9, Jesus tells the story of a man who has a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and seeks fruit from it, but finds none for three years, and then tells his servant to cut it down.  The servant then pleads with the landowner to spare the tree for another year, in which he will tend it carefully, putting manure at its roots, and then see if it will finally produce fruit.  Tradition says that Luke was a physician.  Perhaps he just couldn’t see Jesus cursing a tree because of his own interest in helping people recover from injury and disease.  Instead, he recounts Jesus being the servant.  He’s here to tend to the tree and stave off destruction.  Still, urgency is implied in Luke’s story as well. 

I like Luke’s story much better than Matthew and Mark.  I can see Aidan’s point about the urgency and necessity of complying with God’s call on us, but I think Luke’s picture is more in harmony with Jesus as Master Physician and Finder of Lost Sheep.  I think God looks at us with the same sympathy and hope that I look at my kids’ two Christmas trees.  I see the one putting out new lush green branches, and I see the other looking more brown and brittle by comparison.  Instead of being angry with brittle tree, I wonder what more I can do to help it become vibrant and growing.  

Tree Crime and Punishment

Note: between Wednesday, April 27 and Friday, April 30, which is arbor day, this blog will be devoted to trees.  Why don't you celebrate by planting a tree?  Please comment and tell me about your special trees.  If you're so inspired by this post that you can't wait for tomorrow's post, you can look at my tags for trees and treehouses.)

 In the 30 foot willow across the street, my neighbors and I once broke out a bunch of branches to build a little platform for a neighborhood cat.  I was about 8 or 9.  We didn't ask the cat if he wanted a 20 foot high platform in the tree, and he didn't seem to like it that much.  I remembering him scampering down after we flopped him out into the sunlight, never to return.  We didn't ask our neighbor who owned the tree either, and he called the police to pay us a visit.   I vividly remember the blue uniformed police officer coming to 3115 Cherokee drive.  He asked for me, and my stomach dropped.  I lied and said I didn't do it.  I remember the feeling of my throat swelling as I told the lie.  It didn't feel that easy, so I imagine he could probably see the truth on my face.  

Years later, I still felt horrible to lying to the policeman.  I sent a confession to the police department, and they wrote a letter back to me which commended me on the bravery of telling the truth.  (I had conveniently moved out of their jurisdiction by then.)   I think I still have the letter in a chest at home.  

Arboreal locomotion

(Note: From now till Friday, which is arbor day, this blog will be devoted to trees.  Why don't you celebrate by planting a tree?  Please comment and tell me about your special trees.  If you're so inspired by this post that you can't wait for tomorrow's post, you can look at my tags for trees and treehouses.)


I used to love climbing trees.  There were two maple trees next to my house in Fayetteville that I used to climb, and I remember liking how the bark was smooth against my palms and shorts clad knees, rather than grating and rough, like an oak or pecan or sweetgum.  That maple was the tree I learned to climb in.  It was small enough that I could climb to the top of it, and big enough to give a thrill. I used to sit in one branch that hung down like a little bench in the air, and my Kangaroos would dangle before I'd jump six feet to the ground.

There was a willow tree across the street, and I can't think of a better tree to climb in and sit under.  There were two at the pond I used to fish as a kid.  One had a big rock underneath the overhanging branches.  It used to seem like an Arabian tent with a big rock altar to our God of the outdoors. It made good shelter when we used to shoot our b-b guns at each other from across the pond.  If the hanging branches didn't deflect the b-b, the big sitting rock would.  

In the Earth

At my recent college reunion, by friend Dawn was raving about my blog, and I was thinking, "Yeah, and I haven't posted on it in about a month. If you're a loyal reader, and this has caused you any grief or distress, I apologize. We've been taking advantage of some fabulous spring days to dig a garden. A lot of our churchpeople have taken that act as a communication that we are not going to be moving this year. As far as I know, they are correct.. I'm planning on harvesting what I'm planting. Perhaps it's being in the earth so much, or perhaps it's our recent acquisition of the ReNew VBS and how I've been impressed with it, or maybe it's just the beautiful weather we've had here in what we call "Green Country," but I've been "keyed in" to the natural world lately.

Last week I wrote my sermon from the front porch, listening to all the birds sing in our sweetgum trees, (because we now have wireless!!!) and I think my "attentive participation" in the Spring is making a difference in my spirit. The robins that hop around in our yard looking for bugs came right up to my feet, unafraid. There is something profound about not causing fear in a wild animal.

I think the way we are shaped by our surroundings is fascinating. I'll never forget the time I got to spend at a workshop at Ring Lake Ranch with Belden Lane on that topic. He wrote a book called "The Solace of Fierce Landscapes" that really resonated with me. I've always enjoyed mentally fishing on the stream that is formed by the merging of ecology and theology. I've had great opportunities to plumb those depths. (thank you, Lilly pharmaceuticals)

One thing that the winter does for me is give me enough silence and stillness, with only the constant sound of the wind, to re-acquaint myself with the wildlife and plant-life that comes springing back around. When I lived in Los Angeles and would come back to Arkansas in the summer, it would baffle me how green everything outdoors was. So, in the same way, winter annually lulls our eyes and ears to sleep only to have them awakened again, refreshed and renewed.

So, in the spirit of Belden Lane, beautiful weather, birds chiriping, and Earth Day, I introduce you to my surroundings:

First are our two big Sweetgums.  They give us a workout in the fall and winter with all the balls they drop, but they give nice cool shade in the summer, and I like to hang my dartboard on the closest one there.  They rise to about 40 feet or more.

Lao-Tzu enjoys the empty lot to the south of our house.  There's always something to prowl around for out there, and that makes a cat feel worthwhile, I suppose. (Although she's gotten stuck in Lloyd's skunk traps on occasion)













There are four pecan trees in the big lot to the south of our house.  We enjoy finding pecans and munching on the ones that don't have wormholes.  I can occasionally practice with my pitching wedge in the lot when it is mowed.  (It is not right now)

Even further south is a cow pasture with some Black Angus cattle owned by a church member.  One time we got 1/4 of a cow from him.  This made me feel sustainability superior to everyone else.  That is, until we left the freezer unplugged for a few days, and had to throw a good bit of it out.  (Palm to forehead at that memory)






Looks like our little birdhouse in the maple tree in the front has an occupant.  There are also a pair of huge barn owls that make their home in the top of that tree.
(I have a picture, but I can't find it.)  This is the prettiest maple tree in town in the fall. It turns a brilliant golden color.  (See!)

Last but not least is our fledgling garden that has been the source of much dirt in my fingernails over the past week or so.  I hope it isn't too late to plant lettuce, b/c we have some of that, peppers, onions, tomatoes, strawberries, squash, and zucchini.  I'm hoping the best for our garden, and I think we'll have plenty to share with friends.  As Wendell Berry says, "One of the most important resources that a garden makes available for use, is the gardener's own body. A garden gives the body the dignity of working in its own support. It is a way of rejoining the human race." 


Soon I'll be putting up some lattice work on our porch to give some more shade and privacy on the west.  Then we'll be maxing AND relaxing.

I hope you've enjoyed your little tour of my yard.  It's not glamorous, but it's beautiful in a humble way, I think.  As Wendell Berry also says,"I see that the life of this place is always emerging beyond expectation or prediction or typicality, that it is unique, given to the world minute by minute, only once, never to be repeated. And this is when I see that this life is a miracle, absolutely worth having, absolutely worth saving. We are alive within mystery, by miracle." 


(Boy, the new formatting thing really didn't work on those photos--any pointers blogger geeks?)  

Holy Week and Beyond

Pastor’s Perspective: Holy Week and Beyond

“Why do you look for the living among the dead?”  (Luke 24:5)

These words, spoken by an angel at the empty tomb on Easter morning, haunt us—don’t they?  They are words of hope but also of chastisement.  We are people of the empty cross—we claim to celebrate the Resurrection every Sunday—and yet so often, we look for the living and breathing Christ only in the pages of record of a history that is dead and gone.  We look for the living among the dead when we try to trap Jesus in the pages of the Bible only, and we fail to see him in the everyday world that we inhabit.  As Jesus himself said, God is a God of the living, not the dead.  That isn’t to say we should have no appreciation for the story of what happened.  On the contrary, we gather together in the first week of April on Thursday and on Friday nights to remember that story that so often moves us to tears. 

            On Thursday we hear about the Last Supper that Jesus shared with his disciples.  It was a celebration of the Passover meal, that yearly ritual in which all Jews remembered together with friends and family the powerful events of their own history, in which God brought them out of slavery in Egypt and carried them into the Promised Land.  God had commanded his people to remember this event by participating in a meal each year.  God knows us so well because God created us.  And isn’t it true that sometimes a smell or a taste can cue a memory in our minds so vividly?  Remembering is re-membering the past and how it continues to shape us. 

            On Friday, we hear the story of Jesus’ passion in the Tenebre service.  “Tenebre” means darkness, and as the story unfolds and candles on the bare altar are extinguished, we’ll experience together perhaps a small taste of the darkness that must have been experienced that day by Jesus and his followers.  That darkness is important.  Darkness is integral to a deep and vibrant spirituality.  St. John of the Cross was a 16^th century Spanish priest who wrote about a “dark night of the soul” when describing the spiritual journey toward God.  It is our fate to suffer and to grieve and to not comprehend the depth and breadth of the Truth and Love which envelops us.  Fortunately, it doesn’t have to be that we suffer and grieve on our own or remain ignorant forever.  So on Good Friday we gather in the darkness together.  We huddle beneath the cross and hear the last words a loving savior gave his faithful followers. 

            On Easter Sunday, the Good News breaks open like that jar of nard that Mary used to anoint Jesus’ feet for burial.  The Good News “fills the whole” place, as we hear of the surprised wonder of the disciples.  But, as the angel said, we do not look for the living among the dead.  The miracle of the resurrection, for us, is not only that Christ conquers death and returns to his disciples in a living and breathing body.  It is the miracle that continues 50 days later, at Pentecost, when Jesus imparts his Spirit on the group that is gathered in his name and changes them into a living, collective, body.  So, when we only seek Jesus in the pages of a story, however rich and beautiful and life-giving that story is—if our gaze is only directed toward the scriptures to try and find the meaning and power of a Living and Loving God, we are looking for the living among the dead.  When we enact those scriptures, when we respond to them by living lives that are inspired (literally “breathed into”) by them, they become the “Living Word” that we so often call the Bible.  Those words tell us to look around for God—look in our daily lives.  Look especially at the poor and mourning.  Pay close attention to those who are oppressed or maligned.  It is easy to be inspired by the beauty of creation—and I can attest to the power of finding God’s presence in a magnificent sunset or in a grand mountain vista.  But Jesus reminds us to not forget about the underbelly of creation too. Do we see God’s presence in the people the world says are repulsive?  Jesus says, “I am there.”  It is when we open our eyes to this truth that we seek the living among the living.

Little Birds

I wonder what it must be like
to be a priest
who places the sacrament
directly in the mouths of his people,
and sees them
as filmy eyed hatchlings,
peeping and desperately seeking
nourishment
with mouths wide open.

If anything were to ever make me feel transparent,
I think that would be it.

Letter to Glenn Beck

Little Red Book being distributed to churches

From:	Nathan Mattox   View Contact
To:	me@glennbeck.com

---

Dear Mr. Beck,

I heard what you said about social justice being a covert word used by secret communists and nazis in the church to advance the common agenda of those groups.  I am disturbed and alarmed.  My own church uses that secret code word on their church website, which is umc.org.  I feel even more threatened because I began to notice lots of "Little Red Books" around the church. I have heard that this is a famous communist book so I began to grow even more enraged and appalled when I noticed that it said things like "All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need." and "When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your kinsmen or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return, and you be repaid.  But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind,  and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you."  These are only a couple of lines from that wretched commie tract, and it's chock full of stuff like that.  I feel so threatened and alarmed and disturbed and appalled and enraged that my head is spinning.  Please give me some orientation with your words of determination and resolve and purpose!  You told me I needed to run as far from my church as I can, but where can I find a church without those Little Red Books in them?  I'm beginning to notice that they are everywhere, even in motel rooms!  They even put little pocket sized copies of them in the children's Sunday School classrooms to infect their precious little innocent minds.  

Praise the Lord, and Pass the Ammunition!

Nathan Mattox

Morris, OK  

U2charist order of worship

I've spent the past few days putting together this service for our church here in Morris.  I'm excited, but also a little daunted about it.  I'd say about half of our congregation has never heard anything by U2.  (Mostly George Strait fans around here--and some family members of Merle Haggard)  We're going to be doing a lot of sitting and listening to recorded music, so I'm trying to think of ideas to get the congregation active or involved in some way.  I reeeeeealllly do not foresee any of my congregation getting up and clapping their hands and singing along and all that that may happen at other U2charists.  But, the folks are used to me brining in a song from time to time to hear and reflect or perhaps write something while they listen, etc.  If you have ideas, please share.  I'm rigging up a screen so that we can see some of the videos or other images/slideshows I may put together over the next few days, so there's a whole other layer of things to be nervous about.  I try to come right out of the gates with some of the most overtly religious songs by U2 to buy the some credibility with those who aren't familiar.  I wrote a confession where I drew from a few U2 songs (Acrobat, A Sort of Homecoming, One, Love Rescue Me), but I'm also still considering just having Love Rescue Me as the song of Confession-It has great lyrics and was cowritten with Bob Dylan-put in your vote!  Feel free to use or adapt for your own purposes.  I'm really excited because one of the youth is going to play Yahweh on guitar for the service.  There's a couple neat videos on youtube for that song too, so I may use them in some way as well.  For the service of Word, I'm probably going to use an interactive reading that combines a few stories from the Bible with "I still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" that I found at Bob Carlton's church. http://thecorner.typepad.com/bc/2006/02/u2charist_form_.html Thanks to them in advance.  I also got the opening prayer from them.  For the Children's sermon, I plan to talk with them about music and how it moves us, and then teach the kids to sing the old Bible School song, "this is the day that the Lord has made" which we will mash up with the refrain from Beautiful Day, "It's a beautiful day, don't let it slip away."  Oh, by the way, I noticed I have nothing from the 90s in the service.  Thought about using "One," my favorite song, but I had used that in a worship service recently, so they were already exposed to it.  I'd rather give them new stuff.   I'll probably wind up taking a couple/few songs out, I'd like to cut it closer to an hour to an hour and ten, but I thought I'd put the first draft up here for your use and pleasure, in case you're one of those hour and a half type churches.  In Morris, OK, we have pot roasts in the oven.

First United Methodist Church www.morrisokumc.blogspot.com

 U2charist: I will Sing a New Song

In this service of worship, we will be drawing from the music and lyrics of the band U2 to express our praise and thanksgiving, confession, and yearning for connection with God.  The band has been making music on a world stage for 30 years.  Each time they tour in concert, they draw millions of people, where they offer a sensory rich spectacle that attempts to focus fans toward goals in humanitarian causes developed by the United Nations.  They offer prayers and even play Psalms and recite other Scripture when they play.  They are a “secular band” that unabashedly proclaims their faith, and what it compels them to do in the world.    Approach this service with the prayer that whether you are a longtime fan of U2, or have never really listened to them, God will open something new inside you. 

Song of Praise: Magnificent (from No Line on the Horizon, 2009)

Magnificent

I was born

I was born to be with you

In this space and time

After that and ever after I haven't had a clue

Only to break rhyme

This foolishness can leave a heart black and blue

Only love, only love can leave such a mark

But only love, only love can heal such a scar

I was born

I was born to sing for you 

I didn’t have a choice but to lift you up 

And sing whatever song you wanted me to

I give you back my voice 

From the womb my first cry, it was a joyful noise ...

Only love, only love can leave such a mark

But only love, only love can heal such a scar

Justified till we die, you and I will magnify

The Magnificent

Magnificent

Only love, only love can leave such a mark

But only love, only love unites our hearts

Justified till we die, you and I will magnify

Prayer:                        Liturgist

We gather here in your presence, God,

In our need and bringing with us the needs of the world.

We come with our faith and with our doubts;

We come with our hopes and our hunger.

We come as we are, because you invite us to come.

You have promised never to turn us away.

Open us, God, to experience you here.

All Respond: Amen.

Prelude: Rejoice (from October, 1981)

Scripture Lesson: Psalm 40, read responsively with response, p. 774                 Liturgist

Song of Response: 40 (from War, 1983)

Prayer of Confession:

Holy God,

We confess at times of saying “Lord, Lord,” and then closing our hearts to others.

I must be an acrobat, to talk like this, and act like that.

We confess a numbness toward your presence in the world around us.

Dislocated, suffocated 
The land grows weary of its own 

We confess that we bear grudges and plot revenge against one another

We hurt each other, then we do it again. 

Our hearts are broken, Lord, mend them and fill them with your Love and Forgiveness.

I'm here without a name in the palace of my shame.  Love rescue me. 

Song of Assurance: Grace (From All That You Can't Leave Behind, 2000)

Prayers of Joys and Concern:

During the time of sharing our joys and concerns, after a name or circumstance has been shared, the pastor will repeat the name or circumstance.  If it is a concern, we will pray together, “We carry each other.”  If it is a joy, we will pray together, “Only Love can leave such a mark.”  After the local joys and concerns are shared, we will hear the song “Sunday, Bloody Sunday” which elaborates on the theme of war and violence, which are our global concerns, and is a prayer of petition. 

The Lord’s Prayer

Alleluia

Offertory: Love and Peace or Else (from How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, 2004)

Children’s Sermon:                   Pastor

Interactive Scripture Reading and Homily

I still haven’t Found What I’m Looking For (from The Joshua Tree, 1987)

Invitation to Communion: Yahweh (from How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, 2004)  Atticus Dellinger

Great Thanksgiving and Communion: All are Welcome to receive. 

(I'll probably just choose three of these

American Prayer (Live version recorded at a concert in South Africa with Beyonce Knowles at a benefit concert for Nelson Mandela in 2002)
Mercy (unreleased) 

City of Blinding Lights, (From How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb) 

Where the Streets Have No Name (from The Joshua Tree, 1987)

Hymn of Invitation:

Yahweh

Take My Life and Let it Be: 399

Compost, Legos, and Ash

My dad gave me a new composter for Christmas. I’ve been looking at everything with new eyes: everything is potentially something I can throw into the composter.

The tops of strawberries, eggshells, even the dust from my vacuum cleaner. And yes, I’ve checked. Ash can be composted as well.

I’m getting impatient with my compost pile. Unfortunately, a sweetgum ball blew out my yard vacuum mulcher, so I can’t chop up my leaves like I could before I had a composter. See, the smaller the pieces, the faster that stuff can turn into good compost.

But the thing is, once this stuff sits in there for a while, its going to make some great soil for Julianna’s Christmas tree we recently planted.

I’ve started thinking of Lent as a season of soul composting. You take all that junk that you just ignored and threw in the trash or down the garbage disposal before, and you use it. You see that there is value in reflecting on it. You put it in a special place, the soul composter, and you let it sit. I've always been impatient with "seeing results" from the "soul composter" of Lent, as I am with my leaf composter.

We begin Lent by taking a reminder of decay and sinfulness (the palm branches of last year's Palm Sunday--which I am tearing the leaves from and handing to the congregation and inviting them to write something they would like to see "burned away" during Lent.) and burning it down to its smallest form, then we mark our heads as a reminder that God can take all of this—all of this dirt and dust and rotting decay and He can make new life spring out of it.

But we must give it over, and in order to do that we must acknowledge that it exists within us. The ashy cross you will receive on your forehead is a visible reminder of this.

I’ve always been puzzled by the lectionary’s prescription for Ash Wednesday in the Gospel Text. Doesn’t Jesus basically say, when you repent, don’t make it a big show so that everyone will see? And here we are, marking ashes on our foreheads.

Then I began noticing what happened when I’d go home and get the kids in the bath, and see my reflection in the mirror. I’d pause there, and the truth of those ashes would ring in my ears: I am made of dust, and to dust I shall return. There’s something I was created for that would be missing in my reflection if it had not been given to me as a gift.

It reminds me of a story I heard in a children's sermon about his son playing with legos, and being frustrated because his little airplane that he’d made wouldn’t work right. The cockpit wouldn’t raise up.

His son stormed out of the room, and set it down on the dresser. The dad took a look at it, and saw that there was one wrong piece that had been turned the wrong way, and that was keeping the thing from working right. But, the dad had to take it all apart to get to that piece.

The son walked in right as dad had finished taking the whole thing apart, and he was furious! Dad had ruined the whole thing!

But then dad finally got through to the boy and showed him how the thing wasn’t working, and asked him to help put it back together again.

We are dust. We must acknowledge and see how we fall short, we must hold it up to God and ask God to put us back together again. This is the meaning of repentance. We will all experience death. We will all be taken apart. Our frustration and fears and anger about death must be met by the Father’s assurance that he intends to put us back together again.

So, let me suggest that these ashes are more about you seeing them in the mirror and letting them sink into your conciousness than they are about being an emblem for all to see. I wouldn’t wipe them off until you’ve had a chance to look at your reflection.

And those ashes are good news. "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. ²⁵For whoever wants to save his life^[a] will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. (Mt 16)

This is what Lent is about. It is about finding the compost materials. It is about taking apart the legos. Something will happen to all the junk we let go of and throw in the pile over these 40 days. They will become fertile soil for the seed of a promise that we will hear about on the day after Lent. The new life will spring out of decay. The resurrection springs out of a tomb. Our eternal life springs out our release of the mortal life.

Thanks be to God.

Midrash on Luke 4 and 5

I'm going to find some way to use this in the sermon tomorrow. I've enjoyed getting inside the story of Jesus from another perspective before with the Transfiguration account. I haven't decided whose this perspective is yet, but I kind of like the idea of it being the boy who later gives the five loaves and two fish to Jesus to bless and feed the multitude. (Although, I'd need to retool the ending for that.)

A fishing story.
You want to hear a fish story?
I remember that day Simon, the bully of Bethsaida, took that wandering prophet out in his boat to let him preach from it.

He had come once before, and had been welcomed by Simon. Simon usually gathered the largest men and went out to meet any newcomers in town, in case they were zealots or soldiers. But this man had come alone, and Simon had heard of him. He was a healer and a prophet—so he invited him to stay at his own home, where his mother in law was suffering from a fever. That night, the man rebuked the fever, and it immediately went away.

As soon as word had gotten around about Simon’s mother-in-law, everyone brought their sick and ailing to see the man named Jesus. I remember how everyone crowded around Simon’s house, and his daughters tried to organize everyone into groups small enough not to overwhelm the saint. This went on through the night, and he healed all of them, and then slipped away at dawn to be alone in the wilderness. When a group of us found him, he told us that he was going on to preach in more places.

So when he returned one morning, just as the fishermen were cleaning their nets from an unsuccessful night on the lake, everyone gathered around and wanted to hear what he had to say. Sound echoes well over the water. Every fisherman knows you don’t speak with your partners about things you don’t want to get out while you are fishing. Voices just seem to carry over the water, don’t they?. This day, I didn’t have to listen closely for the words of that man. They danced out over the water, and the lake itself seemed to stop lapping at the shore and listen attentively.

The man spoke for awhile about how the Lord was not some far off and aloof God, but was right there with us. He said that God wanted to be known to all of us a child knows his father, and that God wanted to be trusted. Then he told Simon to row out to the deeper water. Seeing him tell Simon what to do made me chuckle to myself. I’d never seen anyone do that before! Usually, Simon stormed around town telling everyone else what to do! He was larger than all the other men in town, and he was persuasive in ways that go beyond words. But, Simon obeyed the strange man.

Then, even though he had already folded his nets and finished for the day, I saw him throwing out the nets again. I couldn’t believe my eyes when they hauled up a catch so big it seemed as though the nets were about to snap! James and John, who were known as the “sons of thunder” because they were also large and commanding young men whom Simon had chosen as partners and everyone thought as future sons-in-law, since Simon only had daughters, were standing on the shore, dumbstruck by the prophet’s words. When they saw the full net, they leaped into their boat and rowed out to help with the haul.

Two boatfuls of beautiful fish shining in a new day’s sunlight weighed down the two boats so low that water actually started seeping over the tops of them. Waterlogged, it took the boats three times as long to bring the boats to shore as usual. When they got the boats to shore, Simon was weeping. I had never seen him shed a tear! There wasn’t a single stray catfish in the haul. (We would have had to throw the catfish back, as we are prohibited by the Law from eating them.) All of them were beautiful tilapia, which after that day we started calling by the name “Simon’s Fish,” and then when Jesus gave him a new name, “Peter’s Fish.”

Simon stumbled out of the boat, and made a plea to everyone there, “forgive me for how I’ve wronged you. Forgive my impatience and my temper and my haughtiness. At these words, James and John fell to their knees as well and joined in the prayer. Jesus stood in the boat, with the fish flopping around at his feet. He said, “Today these men bring in plentiful fish, but I am going to make them fish for people. Care for their families while they are gone. They will return, and you will have the chance to follow too.” Then, he turned to Simon and his brother Andrew and James and John and said, “Come, follow me.”

And they did! They left the fish and the boats and their homes and followed him. I looked at Simon’s wife Ruth, expecting her to be frantic, but she was peaceful. Ever since he had healed her mother, Ruth had spoken of Jesus with reverence. She looked as serene and joyful that day on the beach as she’d been that night, laughing and darting around the room serving the guests with her newly rejuvenated mother.

I wondered what would become of Simon and our town. I wondered if I would go if Jesus had called me. I wondered all of these things, because later that man who seemed so glorious and powerful in that boat would be nailed up on a cross and left to hang and die. Simon Peter would tell everyone who listened that he had seen him in the flesh after his death, but I never saw him again. And so I wonder, because his voice still echoes in my ears, and he seemed to be speaking to me when he said, “Come, Follow me."

Shaking the Foundations

I'm preaching on 1 Corinthians 13 tomorrow (lectionary) particularly 9-13 and so read a bit of Paul Tillich's The Shaking of the Foundations in order to do some study. I cam across the following paragraph in Ch. 13 that reminded me of the following clip from Being John Malkovich. I think it may be too weird for the church people tomorrow, so I wanted to share it somewhere.

Tillich, then Kaufman

Mankind has always tried to decipher the puzzling fragments of life. That attempt is not just a matter for the philosophers or priests or prophets or wise men in all periods of history. It is a matter for everyone. For every man is a fragment himself. He is a riddle to himself; and the individual life of everyone else is an enigma to him, dark, puzzling, embarrassing, exciting, and very being is a continuous asking for themeaning of our being, a continuous attempt to decipher the enigma of our world and our heart. Before children are adjusted to the conventional reactions of adults and have grown out of their creative individuality, they show the continuous asking, the urgent desire to decipher the riddles they see in the primitive mirror of their experience. The creative man, in all realms of life, is like a child, who dares to inquire beyond the limits of conventional answers. He discovers the fragmentary character of all these answers, a character darkly and subconsciously felt by all men. He may destroy, by means of one fundamental question, a whole, well-organized system of life and society, of ethics and religion. He may show that what people believed to be a whole is nothing but a fragment of a fragment. He may shake the certainty on which centuries lived, by unearthing a riddle or an enigma in its very foundation. The misery of man lies in the fragmentary character of his life and knowledge; the greatness of man lies in his ability to know that his being is fragmentary and enigmatic. For man is able to be puzzled and to ask, to go beyond the fragments, seeking the perfect. Yet, in being able to do so, he feels at the same time the tragedy implicit in his being, the tragedy of the riddle and the fragment. Man is subject, with all beings, to the law of vanity. But man alone is conscious of that law. He is therefore infinitely more miserable than all other beings in the servitude to that law; on the other hand, he is infinitely superior, because he alone knows that there is something beyond vanity and decay, beyond riddles and enigmas. This is felt by Paul, when he says that the creation itself shall be delivered from the bondage of decay into the liberty of the glory of the children of God.

Man is a fragment and a riddle to himself. The more he experiences and knows that fact, the more he is really man. Paul experienced the breakdown of a system of life and thought which he believed to be a whole, a perfect truth without riddle or gaps. He then found himself buried under the pieces of his knowledge and his morals. But Paul never tried again to build up a new, comfortable house out of the pieces. He dwelt with the pieces. He realized always that fragments remain fragments. even if one attempts to reorganize them. The unity to which they belong lies beyond them; it s grasped through hope, but not face to face.

This part of the film is where John Makovich goes through the portal into his own mind (which has been being exploited for profit by John Cusack and Cameron Diaz, and runs into the reality of the vanity about which Tillich speaks. I was surprised that HOllywoodJesus didn't even have a review of the film. Well, maybe I'll find the time to write one (laugh). If you haven't seen the film--find it and remedy that ASAP. The first from Charlie Kaufman, (Adaptation, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) and directed by Spike Jonze.

bulletin art

I'm preaching on Psalm 46 and Luke 13: 1-9 to address the crisis in Haiti and Pat Robertson's drivel.The gist will be how Pat Robertson makes a grave error in pointing to some concocted myth to explain the "evil" that God must be punishing (Haiti made a deal with the devil to get rid of the French.) for with the earthquake. On one hand, I don't think this is even worth responding to, on the other hand, when I preached on something else that fit that description (refuting 2012 end time hysteria) it seemed that the people were really "met by" the sermon. If I can help the churchpeople see one more reason Pat Robertson and his ilk don't speak for them, and what a more authentically Christian response to the people in Haiti might be (hmm, I wonder what it could be?), I think I'll have given the message I'm supposed to give.

We're saving money by not buying bulletins anymore--so I was inspired by some friends on the Facebook Textweek page to draw a little thing for the bulletin. I'm not saying I think it is great (it is a stick figure, and my handwriting isn't great)--but I'm posting it here so that you can use it or use the idea and improve upon the art if you're doing the same kind of thing I'm doing (or if you plan to use the scripture later on in Lent.

Novelty and Nostalgia

What is it about us that takes comfort and pleasure in nostalgia? Everyone nods their head in church when I bring up something like learning to drive a stick shift. We connect with one another through shared recollection. Our recollections are both novel and shared. My story is somewhat unique in its components, but it is essentially common. You can imagine what that experience must have been like for me because you too had a similar experience. I can really drone on about some concept or some idea or principle in church in a sermon, but if I can authenticate for the listeners that concept in a concrete example that they have experienced, they can tie the concept to things about that recollection.

This is in the ether for me because I recently ran a few errands and decided to keep the radio on the pop station that Lara listens to on her commute rather than immediately switching to NPR (aren't I a bore?) because she'd been singing a song to herself about 10 mill

ion fireflies--could the radio really be playing a song about getting 10,000 hugs from 10 million lightning bugs? If it isn't on SiriusXM 40's on 4 or on my Pandora Dub station, I probably don't hear it.

It turns out the radio is playing some such song, and it was a sweet sounding song with lyrics that are simple and strange, and hinting at some deeper rumblings. (I read something about the artist being primarily inspired and driven to make music by a persistent insomnia. "Please take me away from here.") I pictured my son Wesley liking it, and I liked it too (though when I sang it to him later that day, he said flatly--"I don't like that song." He highly prefers Johnny Cash's Orange Blossom Special or Bob Dylan's Santa Fe--which until Wesley's train obsession

((why he likes the song)) I had always assumed was about the town, not the train).

Owl City lyrics

Owl City - Fire Flies Video - Owl City Music Videos

Music Videos by VideoCure

Fireflies video The video is a phantasmagoria of nostalgic toys and light up items, and I can't decide if it is overly nostalgic or not, but perhaps you can put in your vote. The sheer volume and speed of which I was shown things from my own past in the video (such as a light up globe or a "Spell and Say" or a hot air balloon lamp, etc.) gave me a dip into my childhood by showing me images of many things with which I played. The effect is heightened in the video, because the singer remains unlit at a keyboard instead of getting any "face-time" whatsoever. It is like a music video for a child's toy-room. It got me thinking about nostalgia, and how we use it to "sell something." I use it to sell an idea. Artists use it to sell their ideas or their works, Commerce uses it to sell a product.

I don't think it is only my generation that has a special penchant for nostalgic "retro" stuff, but it certainly is prevalent in my generation. The video is one example. The "retro" Mustang, Camero, Challenger, and other new muscle cars is another, this kind of thing is another: There are hundreds of examples. We want to combine the old with the new. We familiarize ourselves with the new by linking it to something from the past. Or, perhaps we just like that feeling of "Oh yeah, I remember....!" How many facebook surveys have to do with our favorite toys or our favorite old cartoons or our favorite whatever it is. Is a certain extent of this connecting to products of our shared history due to the fact that my generation doesn't really have a galvanizing event that we all connect to in childhood or formative years? Instead we all remember products that shaped our play and our collective "identity?" (i.e. Lite Brites, Rainbow Brights, He-Man, etc.) I was telling Wesley about McGruff the Crime Dog and O.G. Readmore this evening. Why would I do such a thing? Is it just me, or does my whole generation (I was born in 1978) have an unusually soft spot for nostalgia?

Is it possible to be engaged by the completely novel? Perhaps that's what it's like to encounter God. The school of the Via Negativa found illumination in the notion that God is completely novel, and nothing in the world can ultimately describe God. Instead of holding up what God is in our prayer and discernment, we can only ultimately understand what God is not. A pitfall of nostalgia is that it can be hollow for some. While I may really get excited about football or dinosaurs, they could mean nothing to you. God is free from nostalgia. Nostalgia works because it is extremely personal. We get sucked into our past experience of life (not a bad thing) and it hits a soft spot with us. Though God, like the advertiser or the artist, has a desire to connect with each person through their sense of nostalgia, it is a carrot to pull us into a relationship that is completely novel. That's one way that I think of Process Theology. God is involved in our past and our identity and our nostalgia for the past, but God is drawing us toward a relationship with the rest of the world, with ourselves, and with God, that is completely novel. Process Theologians love this word, "novel." I think they like it because it speaks to the idea that God is fundamentally creative and fundamentally connected to creation. God takes the collective potential of the universe and instills a possible novel and creative outcome in our soul. If we follow this impulse toward the novel and creative, we follow God's "will." This relationship with God may involve nostalgia, but it may be completely novel. It involves "going out on a limb."
What do you think? It's not that our parents or grandparents or great great grandparents don't pine away for nostalgia (how many times have you heard it said "in the good ole' days."), but perhaps our generation is the first to have a product driven nostalgia (as showcased in the video.) Is nostalgia binding or freeing? Is the novel divorced from nostalgia, or shaped by it?

Little Boy's Dreams come true and why I like Streamlining

Wesley is really into everything trains these days. He loves model trains, and even got a special invitation via grand-daddy to ride an engine at the Little Rock Port Authority as they shunted cars full of things from the various plants by the river to the train yard. (We hauled a bunch of pipes that had been reclaimed from Canada by an Indian company and then sent to Arkansas to be refinished and then sent back to Canada for a oil pipeline to the U.S-((Wesley got an early taste of globalization)) as well as around 100 or so desert painted Hum-vees on flatcars.) We got to ride in two different engine models--a 45 ton switcher (the photo with the Little Rock port authority engine) and a Santa Fe engine that you're probably more accustomed to seeing pulling long trains . Of course, Wesley had a great time. It was one of those experiences that will surely last in my memory, and I am sure will live in Wesley's memory for a long time. How many 4 year old boys get to do that kind of thing? Thanks, Dad.

Wesley's whole fascination with trains has schooled me a bit on trains too (I never really was into them), and while he prefers the Diesel engines he can watch pull trains through Okmulgee, I like all the beautiful designs from the age of streamlining. The other day, I was listening to Studio Tulsa on our NPR station, and heard that the Tulsa Philbrook museum had been given a new collection of industrial design from the same era. Tulsa is a big hub of art-deco and streamlined architecture. I used to work at Boston Avenue UMC, which is a paragon of art-deco architecture.

We got to go up to the chapel on the top floor of the tower (right above the pastor's office--the pastor, by the way, is afraid of heights) the other day when we got our flu shots. It is interesting to me that art deco and streamlining really fits into the mystique of the era when those designs were popular. It really breathes optimism. Everything, including toasters and vacuum cleaners and camper trailers, deserve to look like they are poised to take off in flight. That suits me.

Mary and the Beatles

I've been doing reading a lot about the Beatles this week. I was clued into a good slant on the annunciation and the magnificat in preparation for the sermon this Sunday by the Ekklesia Project

Actually, the lectionary doesn't include the annunciation, but I wanted to include it since it is actually when Mary says "Let it Be," and it worked better for where I was going. But, down one of the tangential paths I typically meander when doing sermon research, I found what I think is going to be a great tool: Songfacts. There is a youtube clip of Paul singing the song there, and you can watch all of the Let it Be documentary (both it and the album Let it Be were released after the Beatles broke up, and Abbey Road was actually recorded after Let it Be, so it is typically considered their last album.) on Youtube. So, I'll treat you to the Ethiopians cover of the song, which is also great:

Anywhoo--I noticed on the songfacts page that John Lennon was so put out by what he considered the overt Christian symbolism of the song, that he made sure it was followed on the album by Maggie Mae, which was about a Liverpool prostitute. He also referred to "Let it Be" as "Angels we have heard on high." Paul, apparently wasn't speaking about the Virgin Mary at all (but didn't mind the lyrics being taken however they were by the listener) but instead was referring to his actual mother, named Mary, when he wrote "When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me, speaking words of wisdom: "Let it be." His mother died when he was 14, and appeared to him in a dream when he was going through a difficult period of life. I like that the song can be interpreted into the gospel text, and we are going to focus on the song during some time of lectio divina this Sunday during the service. Questions printed in the bulletin include:
In what ways is God calling me to be a vessel for Christ? What CAN I do to be God’s servant? In what areas of my own life could I echo Mary’s words, “Let it Be?”

In what ways do I ascribe to Mary’s radical song (the Magnificat: Luke 1: 46-55)?
“His mercy is on those who have feared him from generation to generation….”
“He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts….”
“He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly..”
“He has filled the hungry with good things, and has sent the rich empty away….”

You'll be able to hear the sermon or read the notes on the church blog tomorrow.

John, The Jordan, and Joshua

John baptized in the wilderness at the Jordan river. He drew people to the boundary line of Israel. Perhaps he baptized specifically at the Jordan since it was the boundary. The boundary is where you enter or re-enter. The first time the Israelites had crossed the Jordan river with Joshua leading the generations of wanderers out of slavery, God caused the river to part so the Israelites could cross on dry land. God reminded the people of the miraculous beginning of their journey at the Reed Sea as a symbol that their wandering was over.

John brought people back to the Jordan. The people of Israel needed to be washed from that journey out of slavery and wandering. Though the dry passage over the Jordan allowed the Israelites to remember their salvation, it did not afford them the opportunity to be washed of their past. The people of Israel were still living like slaves in their own land. They were wandering without a leader like Joshua. So, he washed them in the Jordan. He washed them of the residue of slavery. He poured water over their head, and got the dust of the wandering wilderness out of their hair. He proclaimed that they were free and that when they left the water of the Jordan, they were coming forth from their mother’s womb. A new Joshua would come and would lead them.

When the new Joshua came, he told his people how deeply enslavement had pervaded. This Joshua saved them from the slavery to sin and death. He led them toward a promised land that would not and could not be conquered or colonized.