Palm Sunday: The little kids lead the church

One of the awesome, yet overlooked, facts of Palm Sunday is that in the scripture it is children who first take up palm branches and praise Jesus on the way into Jerusalem.

The kids get it.   They get how great this guy Jesus is - that he deserves our praise.
They aren't held back with false modesty or self-consciousness.  The kids go all out shouting, praising and expressing their love, joy and praise.

One of the running jokes is that mainline Protestants are the "Frozen Chosen" because we have a hard time expressing our religious faith.  Yet we have no problem expressing ourselves at ballgames.  Or at political rallies.  Why can't we cheer for Jesus??

We have been told that church is a quiet place -- but these ideas are not in the Bible.  They come from Puritan beliefs of the 1700's and were renewed in the 1930's on as protestant churches got wealthier and wanted to be "proper".  No where does Jesus tell us to be "proper".  In fact when the children are praising him, he tells his disciples that if people didn't give praise then the rocks would cry out.

Self-consciousness is a result of feeling judged, and the church is no place for judgement - we all have feelings.  Feelings aren't right or wrong, they just are.  And we need to accept each other's feelings as they are and as we express them.  

We need to let our inner child express its faith in our amazing wonderful God.
We need to let out our feelings whether joyful, sorrowful and everything in between.
Let the children lead us!

Starting a new era

Building a new church has been a 10 year journey that is now only months away from finishing.  Yet as excited as I am for the finish line to be in view on the building - I tremble with the enormity of how important the next year is for our congregation.  Because this first year in this new building is a huge opportunity that our congregation only gets once every (God willing) 100 years.   Its an opportunity to invite in all kinds of new persons to our new church home.  And because its a new building they will expect us to have a fresh attitude of love and grace.

Do we really have a fresh attitude of love and grace towards new persons?

Are we willing to let them work among us (and even lead us)in new directions?

We have to be ready.  Ready in our hearts to welcome, include and to follow the people God sends to us.


Pastor Carey Nieuwhof has a blog that I follow with great tips and here is his assessment of what it means to be ready for unchurched people.

You know your church is ready to welcome unchurched people when:

1. Your main services engage teenagers. Here’s what I believe: if teens find your main services (yes, the ones you run on Sunday mornings) boring, irrelevant, and disengaging, so will unchurched people. As a rule, if you can design services that engage teenagers, you’ve designed a church service that engages unchurched people.

2. People who attend your church actually know unchurched people. Many Christians say they want to reach unchurched people, but they don’t actually know any unchurched people well enough to invite them.   We want our families to get to know unchurched people. We want them to play community sports, get involved at their kids school and have time for dinner parties and more. You can’t do that if you’re at church 6 nights a week. We don’t do many ministries because our people are our ministry.

3. Your attenders are prepared to be non-judgmental. Unchurched people do not come ‘pre-converted’. They will have lifestyle issues that might take years to change (and let’s be honest, don’t you?). Cleaning up your behaviour is not a pre-condition for salvation, at least not in Christianity. What God has done for us in Jesus saves us; not what we have done for God. Is your congregation really ready to love unchurched people, not just judge them? One of Jesus’ genius approaches was to love people into life change. If your people can do that, you’re ready to reach unchurched people.

4. You’re good with questions. I think one of the reasons unchurched people flee churches is they feel shut down when every question they ask has a snappy or even quick answer. They will find answers, but you need to give them time. Embracing the questions of unchurched people is a form of embracing them.

5. You’re honest about your struggles. Unchurched people get suspicious when church leaders and Christians want to appear to have it ‘all together’. Let’s face it, you don’t. And they know it. When you are honest about your struggles, it draws unchurched people closer. I make it a point to tell unchurched people all the time that our church isn’t perfect, that we will probably let them down, but that one of the marks of a Christian community is that we can deal with our problems face to face and honestly, and that I hope we will be able to work it through. There is a strange attraction in that.

6. You have easy, obvious, strategic and helpful steps for new people. I am still such a fan of thinking steps, not programs  One sure sign that you are ready to handle an influx of unchurched people is that your church has a clear, easily accessible path way to move someone from their first visit right through to integration with existing Christians in small groups or other core ministries. Most churches simply have randomly assembled programs that lead nowhere in particular.

7. You’ve dumped all assumptions. It’s so easy to assume that unchurched people ‘must know’ at least the basics of the Christian faith. Lose that thinking. How much do you (really ) know about Hinduism or Taoism? That’s about how much many unchurched people (really) know about Christianity. Don’t fight it. Embrace it. Make it easy for everyone to access what you are talking about whenever you are talking about it.

8. Your ‘outreach’ isn’t just a program. Many Christians think having a ‘service’ for unchurched people or a program designed for unchurched people is enough. It’s not. When you behave like reaching unchurched people can be done through a program or an alternate service, you’re building a giant brick wall for unchurched people to walk into. You might as well tell them “This program is for you, but our church is for us. Sorry.”

Gospel of John Reading Plan

This Lent my challenge to Calvary is to read through the Gospel of John over the next 6 weeks.


Week 1   John chapter 1   Jesus is the Word made Flesh
Week 2  John chapters 2-5  The Miracles of Jesus
Week 3  John chapters 6-11  The "I AM" sayings of Jesus
Week 4 John chapters 12-17  The Farewell Discourse
Week 5 John chapters 18-19  The Arrest, Trial & Crucifixion of the King
Week 6 John chapters 20-21  The Resurrection


It is up to you how you want to read these -   you can read them in one sitting at the beginning of the week and then ponder/re-read them the rest of the week or you could break it up and read a little bit each day during your quiet time.  Whatever works for you.

I encourage you to do something in response to what you read -
blog, journal, doodle, write a poem, paint a picture, discuss with your partner/family/friend, join our small group discussions on Thursdays at 9:30 am  or Fridays at 2 PM.

Do something that takes the scripture and helps you to process it and bring it into your heart and life.
And if you are willing to share what you did, I'd love to know about it!

Be blessed this Lent!

Faith & Politics: Poverty & Hunger

In 2014  in the United States of America

• 46.7 million people (14.8 percent) were in poverty
• 15.5 million (21.1 percent) children under the age of 18 were in poverty.
• 4.6 million (10 percent) seniors 65 and older were in poverty.
•  48.1 million Americans lived in food insecure households, including 32.8 million adults and 15.3 million children.
• 14 percent of households (17.4 million households) were food insecure.
• 17% of Rural Americans live below the poverty line

From FeedingAmerica.org

I don't know about you, but these statistics shock me.  Here we are the most

wealthy, sophisticated, most powerful nation in the history of the world and yet

one in five of our children lives in poverty.

Poverty is an issue that we tend to look at from two different positions:  
Individual Responsibility vs. Social Responsibility

Personal Responsibility is important.  Jesus tells many parables illustrating that God wants us to use our talents and serve God through our work.  (see for example Matthew 25: 14-30)  We are also told that everyone is needed in the Body of Christ - everyone's gifts are necessary for the whole to be its best (Romans 12: 4-5)   

Yet Personal Responsibility has its limitations.  Ask yourself - is there anything that you have accomplished in this life completely on your own? Parents fed, clothed and nurtured you so you would have discover your talents and learn responsibility.   In school you had teachers, administrators, counsellors to develop your talents and how you could use them in the world.  Your first jobs you had bosses and managers who showed you how to use your talents in the workplace.

Social Responsibility is the role that we as a community have to create a world where individuals can use their gifts, be paid a living wage, and have a safety net for those who cannot work or are hurt or disabled.

We as a society will pay for those in poverty one way or another.  We either pay higher price on our junk from Walmart so that the workers there can earn a wage that keeps them out of poverty or we pay higher hospital costs when they are sick from lack of care, cost to schools and our kids when hungry kids can't sit still, have more ADD/ADHD, costs in law enforcement when poverty pushes people to desperate actions like stealing or dealing drugs.  As a society we will pay for poverty one way or another.  The question is - are we going to be proactive and pay to help people have productive lives?

Here is an awesome way Utah became proactive in addressing homelessness: read and listen to the NPR report on their work

As you continue to watch those who are running for President, and as Iowa begins its legislative session for 2016, lets think proactive in addressing how we can be responsible together for ending poverty and hunger.

Read John this Lent

Lent Starts with our Ash Wednesday service on Wednesday Feb 10  7 PM

Then lasts 40 days until Easter March 27th.  Lent is a time for Christians to go deeper with their spirituality and grow in faith.  One of the best ways to do this is to dig into scripture for yourself and grow closer to Jesus by reading his words and how he lived.   

Join Calvary this Lent in reading through the Gospel of John.  We will be using Adam Hamilton's book as our guide and one of the great things about the book is that it has the words from the Bible at the end of each chapter so you don't have to go searching or even know how to open a Bible - its all right there for you.  

I encourage you to buy a copy and join us in worship as we discuss the major themes of John and to join us in one of our discussion groups: 

Thursday mornings at 9:30 AM 

or

Friday afternoons at 2 PM 

both at the Boji Bay Pavilion behind Perkins in north Milford.  

Here is an excerpt from Chapter Two, “The Miraculous Signs of Jesus” in John: The Gospel of Light and Life. 

Changing Water Into Wine 

John calls the miracles of Jesus “miraculous signs.” A sign points toward something else. Scholars often refer to John 2 through 12 as the “Book of Signs.” John’s stories of Jesus are intended to have a deeper meaning, which answers the questions, Who is this man Jesus? How does he affect my life? What is required of me?

Today, we’ll focus on Jesus’ first miraculous sign in John 2:1-12—turning water into wine—and how we might study it to find deeper meaning.

Jesus and his disciples had been invited to a wedding, and a wedding banquet followed. Jewish wedding banquets in the first century are thought to have lasted seven days. These occasions were then, as weddings and wedding receptions are today, among the great moments in the life of a family and one of the most joyful times in any community. It’s for this reason that the Bible often associates heaven with a wedding banquet.

But remember, there is a deeper meaning to John’s stories. This story is not only about Jesus providing wine for a wedding but also about the life he offers to each of us.

At the wedding banquet described in John 2, the wine ran out. This was terribly embarrassing for the host. Remember, at that time water was not always safe to drink, and people often drank wine at every meal. Wine offerings were made to God as a sign of life and joy and goodness. And though some passages of Scripture warn about drunkenness, there also are many that portray wine as a good part of life. (There are over 250 references to wine in the Bible, and most are positive.)

In the story, Jesus’ mother came to Jesus and told him the wine had run out. Then she told the servants to do whatever Jesus told them. We don’t know that Mary was expecting a miracle at this point, only that Jesus was going to make sure the wine problem was solved. I think she may have imagined Jesus going with them to the local wineseller to purchase more wine. With this in mind, she gave instructions to the servants at the wedding banquet.

But remember, John’s stories of Jesus are intended to have a deeper meaning. Here’s a question that might help you see the deeper meaning here: Who are Christ’s servants today? The answer: we’re his servants.

Now, listen again to verse five: “His mother told the servants, ‘Do whatever he tells you.’” Note that when the servants did as they were told, a miracle occurred—water was changed to wine; the ordinary was converted to the extraordinary. John may have been saying, similarly, that if all of us do as Christ tells us, then our ordinary lives can become extraordinary.

You might say, “Is that really what John meant?” We can’t be sure, but so much of John’s writing has multiple levels that the little clues and phrases may well point to this deeper meaning.

The servants didn’t just fill the jars; they filled them “to the brim.” I think John is telling us that Jesus wants to fill us up completely. We’re meant to be overflowing, as a cup “runneth over.” Remember, the overarching theme of this Gospel is that we might have life in Christ’s name.

Notice that the wine Jesus created from the water was not just any wine, but the really good wine. And not just a little, but a lot: perhaps 150 gallons! The wine that Jesus created was better than the wine the guests had been drinking before. John wanted us to see that the life Jesus offers is richer, deeper, and of a higher quality than the life we live apart from him. 

To find out more about the meaning of Jesus’ transformation of water into wine, and the point of the other miraculous signs recorded in John’s gospel, check out, John: The Gospel of Light and Life and read the Gospel of John this Lent!

Lenten Challenge - Read John

I hope you’re planning to join me in reading through the Gospel of John during the Lenten season this year. We’ll get started on Ash Wednesday on February 10 and read together for 40 days.

To guide you through John,  we will be using Adam Hamilton's new book, John: The Gospel of Light and Life. This book is divided into 6 chapters to help you explore the major themes of the Gospel and is meant to be read alongside the Scripture.

With that in mind, the entire text of John is included. At the end of each chapter you’ll find a portion of the Gospel, and if you read each portion after you read the chapter, by the end of the book you will have completed the Gospel of John.

What if our entire church committed to read the entire Gospel of John together this Lent, and to take an in-depth look at the major themes in the gospel?  Even if you can't come to worship or to the small group, I greatly encourage you to buy a copy of the book  and read on your own.

Here is an excerpt from the Introduction to John: The Gospel of Light and Life. 

Introducing John: The Gospel of Light and Life

John is unique among the Gospels.

We call Matthew, Mark, and Luke the Synoptic Gospels. Synoptic is a Greek word that means “to see together,” and it is appropriate here because these three Gospels are very similar.

They share much of the same material and general outline of Jesus’ life.

John’s portrayal of Jesus is markedly different from that of the Synoptics. Many of the events recorded in John are not found in the Synoptic Gospels. John’s Gospel is largely set in and around Jerusalem, whereas the Synoptic Gospels record Jesus’ ministry in the Galilee. Jesus sounds different in the Synoptic Gospels, where he speaks in parables and in a straightforward, plainspoken way. But in John, Jesus speaks in metaphors that are more obscure.

In the Synoptic Gospels, Jesus describes the kingdom of God and the ethical imperatives demanded in the Kingdom. (The Kingdom is mentioned seventy-five times in Matthew, Mark, and Luke.) In John’s Gospel, the focus is not on the kingdom of God (only mentioned twice), but on Jesus himself as the one who reveals God. The author of John presents Jesus as the source of life, and he wants to be sure we “get” this.

In Matthew, Mark, and Luke, Jesus calls people to follow him. In John, Jesus calls people to believe in him and to abide in him. Both following and believing in Jesus are important dimensions of Christian discipleship.

Clearly, we need the insights and invitation of both John and the Synoptics. None of the Gospels are, strictly speaking, biographies of Jesus. But John’s Gospel, more than any of the others, is something of a spiritual or theological commentary on Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. We’re not meant to read it as a journalist’s or biographer’s account of Jesus’ life. In John, details of events and even the words of Jesus are not so much about what actually happened, though clearly they are rooted in what actually happened.

Instead they are about the meaning—the spiritual significance—of Jesus’ life. For this reason, I believe, Clement of Alexandria (a.d. 150–215) described John as “the spiritual Gospel.”

To find out more about why John wrote his gospel, how it differs from the Synoptic gospels, and the spiritual significance he hopes his readers will see, check out John: The Gospel of Light and Life and read the Gospel of John this Lent.

Faith & Politics: Immigration

We're worshipping this January around the idea of faithful engagement in politics.  How do we, people of faith, engage in political discussions in ways that help us build bridges and understanding?  Too often, political discussions get bogged down into Us versus Them, winner is right and losers are idiots, ranting.  But our faith in Jesus (who listened and didn't give easy answers but engaged persons who though differently from him) calls us to be better.  Jesus teaches us to love each other, listen, and work together to make our world, our nation, our community, better.

So lets talk politics.  Lets talk about what we have in common and what the deeper issues are so we can find better solutions.


Immigration
Immigration has become one of the hottest of the hot-button issues in this election cycle.  First, lets remember that we are talking about people.  Human beings like us.

Who do you know has immigrated?  All of us are children/descendants of immigrants.  We are all here because someone in our family tree left home and came to this place to find a better life.  We owe our country to immigrants.

I've been privileged to know many immigrants in my life.  Let me tell you about a couple.
Ian is a friend of mine who came to the USA from Great Britain in the late 1990's.  He was big in Boy Scouts and wanted to pursue camping ministry - something that is pretty unique to the USA.  He spent more than 20 years as a green card/permanent resident but then when back to the UK when he no longer felt called to that special ministry.

Harvey is a friend who came to the USA from Togo, a teeny tiny country next to Ghana in West Africa.  Togo had a political coupe and the new regime clamped down on free though, freedom of speech in the the media and other basic rights.  As a university student Harvey participated in some protests, his father was a professor and helped organize the protests.  Harvey and his father were both in prisoned, beaten and tortured.  His father died from his injuries, Harvey was released but then fled to the USA.  He now lives in Omaha with an Iowa-native wife and they have a son.  Harvey has never visited home because he still fears for his safety if he would return to Togo.

There are many reasons that people come to the USA.  And they come from many places.  They are people, like us who want a better life.  I talked to an Iowa DHS worker who worked with many immigrants in Storm Lake.  She told me that men come to the US to get higher wages, they want to work and provide.  Women focus on their kids and education, they want their kids to have a better life.  Aren't these universal human concerns?  We have to come to every immigration conversation remembering that we are talking about people like us, who just want the best life for them and their families.


Scripture Tells us (From Leviticus 19)

 You shall not defraud your neighbor; you shall not steal; and you shall not keep for yourself the wages of a laborer until morning. You shall not revile the deaf or put a stumbling block before the blind; you shall fear your God: I am the Lord.15 You shall not render an unjust judgment; you shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great: with justice you shall judge your neighbor. 16 You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not profit by the blood of your neighbor: I am the Lord.17 You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall reprove your neighbor, or you will incur guilt yourself. 18 You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord . . . .33 When an alien resides with you in your land, you shall not oppress the alien. 34 The alien who resides with you shall be to you as the citizen among you; you shall love the alien as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.

We should start on the issue of immigration as people who are called to love our neighbor, care for the alien and love them as ourselves - because God is the God of all and not just people like us.

So what are some of the issues:

Do we need a wall?   The media portrays this as a yes or no question.  But in reality we already have many walls in many towns that lie on the US/Mexico border.   The question is really: do we need to connect these walls into one giant wall that extends across the whole border, even in desert places where the cost effectiveness is doubtful?    You see how this question is not so "headline friendly"?
But its the real heart of the issue.  Walls are up, walls are being used.  There is broad agreement there.  The harder questions are about cost effectiveness in desert places - when there are many other places we can spend our tax money, is this the best place?

Vetting of Immigrants to keep our extremists
We have been scared (since 9-11) of the real motivations of immigrants among us.   We want to be sure we are safe, that every immigrant goes through a proper process and that we are sure they want to come to the US for the right reasons.  This is a place of broad common agreement from liberal to conservative.  We all agree:  we want to be safe.   The real struggle though is that the immigration system is a behemoth with many many entry points (because of air travel) into the US and many different offices processing information.   Think about it, we went from a half dozen ports of entry in the 1920's to a thousand points of entry in the 1960's.  This is huge change for a system, any system in only 40 years.  Democrats & Republicans agree our system is broken and needs fixing.  But changing a system this complex will be expensive and take a lot of time and focus -- things that politicians don't cater to.  Its so much easier to say "no immigrants" than to dig into the many details of fixing this system.  This is why both Democrats and Republicans need to come together around a common call to fix the system and encourage our elected officials to stop grandstanding on the issue but get to work together.   (in my humble opinion :)  )

Rule of Law versus Grace of Christ
So as Christians we are called to give grace, to welcome our neighbors and treat the aliens among us as citizens.  But a government is ruled by laws and is called to enforce those laws.  There is, and always will be, tension between the grace of Christ that we can extend one to one as people of faith and the the rule of law that governs broad groups of people.   We have to live in this tension.  We can't just give in to either side and say "they broke the law, kick them out"  or "all are welcome always".   To default to one or the other is a cop-out.   Again- we have to live in the tension.

So that means discerning how the laws of our country help us truly be safe, or are overly punitive and trying our best to find balance.  Let me throw out of few questions for thought:

-- a company recruits undocumented workers, takes advantage of their status and mistreats them.  The company is raided.  Who should have the most punishment and the most grace?  Scripture tells us the persons with the most power should be most accountable, but our laws don't always work that way.

--children of immigrants:  deported even though this is the only home they know?  Parents deported and kids left alone to the DHS system?   Deport children who are US citizens with their undocumented parents?  Jesus tells us it is better to have a huge rock tied to our necks and thrown into the lake then hurt his children.  Dealing with children should take our maximum grace.

--persons who come legally but become illegal.  The system is slow, expensive and hard to understand, so many illegal persons came legally but through a missed deadline or unpaid bill can become illegal at any time.  How do allow for persons to get back on the right path?


Immigration is a complex and difficult issue.  There are so many different aspects of the issue yet our media trains us to think only in terms of bold headlines and 2 minute sound bytes.  We people of faith have to call each other to a higher standard than our TV.

When we talk with friends and family around the table resist the temptation to give simple answers.  Live in the tension, talk about all the many issues and agree that neither party has all the answers.  Pray for our country and for wisdom.  Pray for people who are searching for a better life.