Baptism - Children's Sermon

Today I did a children's sermon on how people see Jesus in us because he has been raised from the dead. I was trying to figure out how to make this comprehensible to children. So I decided to talk about how we look like our family members. I thought that was something they could grasp. I figured I'd then use that to talk about how we are part of Jesus' family and so we look and act like Jesus. So I used baptism to talk about how we became part of Jesus family, and I said, "When we were baptised we were adopted into Jesus' family." Was that really me that just said that? I thought baptism was just an "administrative function." :) OK, not quite that bad but I think its something along the lines of the symbol of our adoption into the family of Jesus. So...the main point of sharing this is to say that Duke continues to come out of my mouth whether I like it or not.
Tom

Apostasy: Wheaton College plunges into perdition

I am heart sick about this news. Simply heart sick. The royal alma mater, no less. Perhaps this is why Father Ben had to beat that mysterious sin out of Phil. Why was Phil so vague in his confession? Was he involved in this? Is his post below just a cover, deflecting our focus from the real apostasy? And what of Tom M? And TJ? What did they know, when did they know it, and who did they tell? Friends, I suggest we lift up all our Wheaties in prayer....and send all of them to Father Ben pronto....At least we still have Messiah....

Apostasy

The following are brief excerpts from a Time Magazine (July 17, 2006, pg. 6) interview with the Presiding-Bishop-Elect Katharine Jefferts Schori:

Q: What will be your focus as head of the US church?

A: Our focus needs to be on feeding people who go to bed hungry, on providing primary education to girls and boys, on healing people with AIDS, on addressing tuberculosis and malaria, on sustainable development. That ought to be the primary focus.

Q: Many Anglicans in the developing world say such choices [i.e., Bishop Robinson, et al] in the US church have hurt their work.

A: That's been important for the church here to hear [sic!]. We've heard in ways we hadn't heard before the problematic nature of our decisions. Especially in the places where Christians are functioning in the face of Islamic culture and mores, evangelism is a real challenge [i.e., they're killing them for being Xns in the first place, and the added difficulty of explaing that you're not THAT kind of Anglican just isn't helping things]. But these decisions were made because we believe that's where the Gospel has been calling us. The Episcopal Church in the US has come to a reasonable conclusion and consensus that gay and lesbian Christians are full members of this church and that our ministry to and with gay and lesbian Christians should be part of the fullness of our life.

Q: Is belief in Jesus the only way to get to heaven?

A: We who practice the Christian tradition understand him as our vehicle to the divine. But for us to assume that God could not act in other ways is, I think, to put God in an awfully small box.

Q: What is your prayer for the church today?

A: That we remember the centrality of our mission is to love each other. That means caring for our neighbors. And it does not mean bickering about fine points of doctrine.

[End--mercifully].

In God's providence, my best-friend Ben sent me the article from which I've supplied these apostate quotations several days ago, and I recevied it today in the mail, the very same day that Father Ben, my priest, sent me an article in First Things written by David B. Hart several years ago titled, "Christ and Nothing." In short, the thesis goes like this: either orthodox Christianity, or nihilism. I highly recommend reading the article, although it is, as you know if you've read Hart before, filled with words you don't know. The following are a few choice selections, chosen for their pugnacity on the one hand, and their relative verbal simplicty on the other:

"IT would be a willful and culpable blindness for us to refuse to recognize how aesthetically arid, culturally worthless, and spiritually depraved our society has become."

Hence, our orthodox response requires "self-abnegation, contrarianism, a willingness not only to welcome but to condemn, and a refusal of secularization as fierce as the refusal of our Christian ancestors to burn incense to the genius of the emporer."

Brothers and sisters, it's time to take up arms and pray for the heretics. May God have mercy on them. Amen.

Christianity According to Willimon

At the risk of opening some old wounds on this blog I submit Christianity According to Willimon:

"Christianity is a culture" (Pastor, 209).

"Being a Christian means to be someone who has been inculcated into a distinctive culture which, like any culture, has its own series of beliefs, words, myths, practices, rituals, and habits through which it demarcates itself from other worlds. More than that, it is our claim that this world, this culture--the church--is God's way with the world, the appointed means by which Christ is bringing all things unto himself" (Pastor, 211).

"Rather than construe the Christian faith as a set of interesting ideas to be affirmed, I think it is wise to present this faith as a set of practices to be inculcated, a set of habits to be assumed" (Pastor, 213).

I must admit that the previous conversation and these quotes from Willimon stretch me considerably to consider anew the role of the church and the "culture" of the church in answering the question: "What is Christianity." I am appreciating more and more this emphasis. And Criag should be please with the last quote above. At the same time, I fear falling too far into the direction of "communalism" or "communityism" and losing any emphasis on the personal. I realize my original defintion errored on being too personal and including nothing about the community. I fear that Willimon's thoughts may error by being too communal and not personal enough (though I am not sure he doesn't sneak the personal in there too).

Thoughts?

If you only picked 10 books to study for the rest of your life...

This was a little exercise brought on by our sponsor J Dub through my friend and bandmate Clifton Stringer.

It goes as follows:

"Since there are too many books in the world, too many great scholars to study, too many things to know and acquire, it is better to know 10 books really really well than to have a cursory knowledge of a thousand."

It helped to pass the time on the 20 hour drive to Texas, but I enjoyed it mostly because it showed me how little interest I have to study theology. I bet the King and Craig will see this soonest and hopefully will begin to formulate lists. I have mine, but I'll save it to see if anyone has interest in this sort of activity. I wouldn't call it a mere self-awareness exercise because though I won't limit myself to those books on my list, I will begin a study of each text on my list for at least a month once a year. You can take it seriously or just use it however you wish. &c.

Judgment/Second Coming Sermon

I've been given my last Sunday to preach. I'll be preaching the topic that the other pastors are working through right now: the Apostles Creed. I've got the line: "[he] will come again to judge the living and the dead." I think they gave me this line since its my last Sunday. Whatever I say, I'll be gone the next day.

anyway...It's obviously a challenging assignment. I think my strategy will be to stick very close to a text. Does anyone have text suggestions?

Truth & Meaning

I just read this article in Touchstone Magazine. It was an address given by Michael Ward (a British Anglican Lewis Scholar, friend of Sam Wells) at Wheaton on C.S. Lewis. He makes the following comments. I wonder what others think?

"For Christianity is not only true, it is also meaningful. ‘Of course,’ you say, ‘to be true, Christianity has to be meaningful, for meaning is the antecedent of truth!” Yes, but go with me here. Suppose truth and meaning could be separated. Which do you find yourself automatically regarding as the more important: truth or meaningfulness? It’s an interesting thought experiment to conduct on yourself.

When addressing mostly conservative Christians, I wouldn’t expect to find anyone prepared to describe Christianity as untrue, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised if there were many for whom Christian does not really mean very much…

Lewis once wrote that the mythical element in Christianity is the really nourishing element in the whole concern. He evens goes so far as to say that a man who thought Christianity untrue, yet constantly fed on its imaginative meaning, might be more spiritually alive than someone who accepted Christianity as ‘true’ but never thought much about it.

The organ of meaning and the organ of reason are, of course, both necessary to a full Christian life; but an excessive emphasis on the truth of Christianity, as if it were simply a matter of intellectual assent, at the expense of Christianity’s meaningfulness, at deeper, imaginative levels—that may be damaging. Truth is always about something, Lewis wrote; but meaningfulness is that about which truth is.”

7 Things I Want To Do As A Pastor

And a second list:

1. Meet with Church Council Members (when I am newly appointed)
2. Regular one-on-one meetings with staff and key lay-leaders
3. Regular lunch/dinner/dessert meetings with members
4. Learn the culture of the church (what is allowed and what is not allowed?)
5. Have a "coach"
6. Learn the history of the church (past areas of pain, success, # of pastors, attendance patterns, etc.)
7. Tour the church with the custodian (and spend time with the custodian)

Others? Comments?

8 Things Not to Do as a Pastor

Based on my experience this summer and past experience, I've compiled a brief list of 8 things not to do. At the risk of reducing the pastoral role to a list of things not to do, I submit it to you for perusal and comment:

1. Don’t be incongruent (say one thing and do another)
2. Don’t try to pull a traditional congregation too far to fast unless you’ve got the wherewithal to stick it out (which includes the leadership to back you up)
3. Don’t try to make a high church service low and a low church service high
4. Don’t forget to cover the bases of your weaknesses (which might mean giving those responsibilities to someone else)
5. Don’t try to be a small church pastor in a big church (or vice versa)
6. Don’t think that your leaving will solve all the problems the church has
7. Don’t ignore conflict
8. Don’t go visit single women at home by yourself

Others?

Lectionary questions

I have a short question concerning the lectionary and its uses. First off, I would like to comment on the incredible prescience the lectionary readings have had this summer for my own ministry. Every week, it seems like it fits a significant need in the ministry and this next week is no exception.

I had never heard of the lectionary until my last year in undergrad and it was just passing. I mean, my pastors probably used it (except for those stupid summer sermon series) but I don't know. And really, I didn't know who wrote it until I just did a wiki search.

But I preach from the lectionary solely because of the universality of it. If I used the older lectionaries there might be other reactionaries preaching from it (and I'm fairly reactionary myself, don't get me wrong) but it would be very limited. Sure I'm annoyed when it cuts and clips passages, but they are the verses that the church I belong to reads together.

So what do other people think about the lectionary, and/or preaching in general?

Liturgical calendar link

I found a helpful link I want to share. The following link will lead you to a handy liturgical calendar that includes information about famous "saints." This link goes right to the current date. By saints I don't mean persons beatified by Rome, but rather a rich tapestry of important figures in the church. There is also a commentary about each one that is useful. I share this as a preaching and teaching aid. I have observed that Jo Bailey Wells often uses such historical references in her preaching/teaching. It seems to be a good way to indoctrinate disciples into our history and thereby enrich their sense of heritage and identity as actors in God's drama.