Juxtaposition

I was eating at a nice Italian restaurant the other night with family from out of town, and was struck by the juxtaposition between the opulence of the food and the words to the live Christmas music being performed.

Somehow "why lies he in such mean estate" didn't jive so well with my gorgonzola-pear salad; here I am, dining like Herod, and the guy 20 feet behind me is singing about the low-lifes (shepherds) who clustered around Jesus.

Mind you, I think creation is given us to be enjoyed and eating out (even at a really nice place) is hardly a sin, but the contrast was jarring nonetheless.

Less "Nice," More "Edge"

Some weeks ago I spent a few days at a Jesuit retreat house. The Jesuit order, of course, was founded by Ignatius of Loyola, a rough-and-tumble soldier who converted to Christianity - and for centuries now the Jesuits have been known for their rough-edged vigor in both missions and apologetics (with some of us Protestants on the receiving end, at times).

But in the days since I have been struck with just how many people who have been used so greatly by God have had that same kind of abrasive, aggressive 'edge' to them. Martin Luther, certainly. John Knox, absolutely. But also Ignatius of Antioch and Polycarp of Smyrna (not to mention St. Paul) from the ancient church and people I've respected like Kevin Blue, Mark Driscoll, Viv Grigg in our present day.

And, let's face it, on this issue the gospels don't really set up as much of a juxtaposition between John the Baptist and Jesus as we usually think. John the Baptist preached about "coming fire" but did so in a winsome and compelling enough way that crowds traveled huge distances to hear his preaching. And Jesus, while he was inimitably attractive to all kinds of people including prostitutes and scam-artists, had very harsh words and deeds (white-washed walls, hypocrites, thieves, Satan, "know neither Scripture nor the power of God," "sell all you have and give to the poor," "God will come and kill those servants and lease the vineyard to others" - not to mention physically separating Temple merchants from their merchandise with nothing other than a whip of cords) for all kinds of others.

So, considering my own life: though I will continue to learn more about Grace the rest of my life, I am becoming convicted that I have focused way too much on the "nice"side of human relations. If I am truly to become more like Jesus, my growth in these next years needs to be much more on the "rough edge."

Interesting, no?

I came across this on someone else's blog, who apparently got the link from yet another. A thought-provoking take on proselytism, from(as Ben points out)an atheist and one half of the comedy/magic duo Penn & Teller.

Labels, labels

Just took the hermeneutics quiz up at Leadership Journal and scored a 53, which pegs me as a "moderate" - although apparently a 52 would have labeled me as "conservative. Some of the questions lack satisfactory answers, but a fun snapshot quiz nonetheless.

Check it out yourself at: http://www.christianitytoday.com/leaders/newsletter/2008/cln80225.html

Another funny siting (and sitting) moment

Had dinner last night with a church committee at Buca di Beppo. Yes, keep the snickers down, it was that Buca, the "gorge yourself silly" kitschy Italian chain.

Anyway, I found it amusing to be eating in what was apparently the "Pope Room," and having this guy stare at me all night long from the center of our table.

Star Trek church (architecturally)

Recently visited a church not terribly far from here, and check out the pulpits and platform chairs. Not too hard to imagine them on the production set of a 1st Gen Star Trek episode, no?

I'm sure they looked very hip when they were first installed...

If you can't do it right, just don't do it. Please.

My wife and I just returned from watching the movie adaptation of Prince Caspian, the second of the Narnia series - which turned out to be a complete disaster. The movie, that is.

Not only did they add every variety of kid-oriented adventure movie cliche (up to and including romance between Caspian and Susan), but the writers completely eviscerated all theological allegory from the story. Aslan was trite and almost absent from the storyline, Peter was egotistical all the way through, and the over-arching message (to the extent there still was one) was self-reliance, rather than the goodness and joy of Aslan/God.

What a disaster. I do hope they find better writers for Dawn Treader - or, failing that, some writers who are less hung up on being 'creative' and JUST KEEP TO THE STORY IN THE BOOK!

I love my alma mater!

I just returned from a visit to the old collegiate stomping grounds, and while at one of the student coffee shops (actually at an adjacent college), my wife and I came across this notice:


Not only are the facts footnoted (ahhhh, nerddom), but on another, nearby flier someone came by and corrected a relatively subtle point of grammar (even more deletable nerddom!). As my former pastor would always say, "Isn't it wonderful?"

New Favorite Quote

I've started reading Brennan Manning's Ragamuffin Gospel, and was especially encouraged and convicted by these lines:

In essence, there is only one thing God asks of us - that we be men and women of prayer, people who live close to God, people for whom God is everything and for whom God is enough. That is the root of peace.

I very much want that to be more and more true of my own life.

Given that this seems true...

...how do we respond as a church? I think Susan Jacoby is right on the mark in her LA Times article yesterday - we don't tend to really engage with ideas and perspectives we don't already agree with. And this is no less true for us as Christians. I know that I don't do this as much (or as intentionally) as I should.

So, again, how do we do a better job of this?

Sharia - it's apparantly not what you think it is

I enjoy the Diane Rehm show (on NPR), and heard a great episode (via podcast) on my way into work the morning (real audio link; windows media link). A law professor at Harvard Law has written a new book on the idea of the Islamic state and its relationship to Sharia law.
He's not, apparently, without his detractors and critics, but fascinating stuff all the same.

It's ugly when it happens here too

I had the opportunity to attend a lunch forum here in Ann Arbor with the theologian and ethicist Nicholas Wolterstorff earlier this month.

During lunch he shared the story of how he first became professionally interested in issues of justice. At a conference in South Africa, Wolterstorff was struck by how white Afrikaner delegates would respond with language of benevolence to black and colored appeals for justice. South African blacks and coloreds would criticize apartheid as unjust; Afrikaners would respond by attacking their "ingratitude" for how much white South Africans had done for them.

But American whites can use the exact same language: check out Pat Buchanan criticizing Barack Obama in just this way. Granted, his insistence on gratitude isn't the only offensive element of his screed - but he uses it as the moral undergirding for his other assertions.

Thank you. Professor, for the insight.

Traffic and Worship

Sometimes God speaks loudest to me in the sheer incongruities of life.

On the way into work this morning I dropped some bills off at the post office, which required a left turn from a fairly busy 4-lane street. Unfortunately, the driver three cars ahead of me - apparently deciding that he really really had to have a parking spot right at the entrance - stopped right in the middle of the parking lot entry and waited for a spot to open up.

Minutes passed. Literally.

By the time a good enough spot opened up for him, there were four of us in line to enter the post office lot by turning left, with three others coming from the opposite direction waiting to turn right.

Meanwhile, playing in my car from my iPod, I've got Chris Tomlin singing:
See the heavens open up
Hear the music coming down
Nothing's gonna separate us from the Father's love...

It was a good reminder - although love was not what I was feeling in my heart at that moment.

Implications for after-school ministry?

The NYT review of Susan Jacoby's new book “The Age of American Unreason" caught my eye this morning, and made me think about what - in addition to spiritual formation, of course - we could offer kids in the Winship neighborhood at an afterschool program.

Ms. Jacoby, dressed in a bright red turtleneck with lipstick to match, was sitting, appropriately, in that temple of knowledge, the New York Public Library's majestic Beaux Arts building on Fifth Avenue. The author of seven other books, she was a fellow at the library when she first got the idea for this book back in 2001, on 9/11.

Walking home to her Upper East Side apartment, she said, overwhelmed and confused, she stopped at a bar. As she sipped her bloody mary, she quietly listened to two men, neatly dressed in suits. For a second she thought they were going to compare that day’s horrifying attack to the Japanese bombing in 1941 that blew America into World War II:

“This is just like Pearl Harbor,” one of the men said.

The other asked, “What is Pearl Harbor?”

“That was when the Vietnamese dropped bombs in a harbor, and it started the Vietnam War,” the first man replied.

At that moment, Ms. Jacoby said, “I decided to write this book.”

Seriously, I think I need to read this book, and I look forward to conversations about what kind of afterschool program we might start up this fall at Westminster.

It surprised me - but should it have?

At the Presbytery's leadership training day (actually quite a nice idea: lots of workshops offered in one location for a low cost, an especially great resource for smaller churches) I attended one workshop on children's ministry.

The workshop leader asked the 30 or so of us in the room to supply words that described "the world we see around us." Other than "technology" which is pretty neutral, literally every other word people suggested was negative: chaotic, violence, lack of sleep, stress, and many others.

Do we really live in that much fear? Is the world around us really that frightening?

An addendum to last Sunday

I heard a story from another pastor along the same lines.

A woman came up to a friend of his right before the service, visibly angry over some particular issues in the life of the congregation.

"If Jesus knew what was going on here in this church," she thundered, wagging her finger at the pastor, "he'd be rolling in his grave right now."

You have to wonder what exactly she thought Easter was about, don't you?

A sad/funny moment in Sunday School today...

The lesson this morning was from Matthew 4, Jesus' calling of the four disciples. Upon hearing from the teacher that Jesus still calls us today, one of the girls responded, "I thought he was dead!"

"No," I responded immediately, "he was dead but he came back from the dead - he's alive today."

The young one scrunched up her face in surprise as the teacher joined in my affirmation.

We have some work to do in our CE program, clearly. But I wonder if we would all do well to sometimes be at least a little surprised by the resurrection?