Prayers to Try Out

This week in Lent, our church is exploring the practice of prayer. We Christians often set rules around prayer - what we can and can't say or do, what kind of attitude is appropriate - even the lack of rules can become a rule, and we can start to fear structure or routine in our prayers. But in truth, anytime we are being real with God, that is prayer.

For many of us (like me!), that means that we need lots of reminders to be real with God. After all, as much as I want to be real with God, and as much as I know that it's been good every time I've done it before, it's also scary. Because there are parts of me that are selfish, dishonest - there are parts of me that I don't want to expose. And on the other side, there are things that God might say to me that I really don't want to hear, because I like life easy. (This foolishness is truly an everyday part of my life. I need so much help praying that I "pray the hours," getting a reminder seven times a day to pray. All this in spite of what experience has told me - that prayer is one of the best joys of life.)

So here are some types of prayers to try - things to help you be real with God. If you try one and it doesn't help you be real with God, go to a different one. God comes to us in ways we don't expect - I've noticed that the methods of which I am most skeptical have often been the most meaningful.

Prayers to Try

Pray with music – listen to music, sing, play an instrument, with God.

Pray with motion – on a walk or in other exercise, let the motion of your body invite you into a deeper place of connection with God. Dancing can be particularly fun and meaningful (and it's okay if you don't know how to dance).

Pray in nature – notice the particular sights, sounds, smells, and feels of nature as God’s expression.

Pray with poetry – read or write poetry as a time of prayer. Mary Oliver is a great poet to check out; I especially like the poem Wild Geese, which you can find here.

Pray with humor – tell jokes with God, watch for God’s humor in your life.

Pray in silence – spend at least 5 minutes in silence, focusing on one word, and let yourself be loved by God. Check out centeringprayer.com.

Pray with your body – create body motions to the words of a familiar Bible verse or song. I like to use "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength, and love your neighbor as yourself." Or, a good song is Sanctuary.

Pray with doodles – write someone or something you’d like to pray for, then doodle around it; or write a name for God, and doodle around it, spending the time in prayer. Check out prayingincolor.com.

Pray with a partner - one person shares what they'd like to pray for, and the other person prays for them; then switch.

Pray the hours - using a prayer book, pray specific prayers at specific times of day. Go here for more information and resources.

Pray with a labyrinth – using a finger labyrinth or a walking labyrinth, spend time with God. You can download a finger labyrinth to print here or find a local walking labyrinth here (make sure you call ahead before you go).

Pray in the style of Taize - on the first Sunday of each month, our church offers a Taize-style evening worship service of prayer, song, and silence. Go here for more information.

I often find that current Christian thinking puts down intentional structure, timing, or repeated words in prayers. Personally, I have found these to be very meaningful and helpful, stretching me and inviting me deeper into prayer. If they're not helpful for you, don't use them - but I do encourage you to try them first.

Blessings to you as you are real with God in prayer!

Question and Response

This past Sunday, we had a Question and Response time. Please remember that I don't have all the answers! Here are the questions and responses.

What is sin and how does it affect us?

One of the best ways I know to respond to this is from St. Augustine. To help us understand Augustine's ideas, I want you to imagine a fish.

"Something's not right here, Fred. Do you have a tingling feeling?"

Fish are designed to do certain things: swim, eat bugs, lay eggs, live in particular kinds of water, and so on. When fish do these things they're designed for, they live their little fishy lives well.

Just like fish are designed to do particular things, Augustine says that humans are designed to do particular things. We are designed to have the things that we love in a particular order. We're designed to love God above all. And then somewhere in the middle, to love human beings: our neighbors and ourselves. And then third, way down at the bottom, comes everything else. When we have our loves in that order, we're like fish doing what fish are designed to do: we live our lives and it's all good.

But pretty often we put the things we love out of order: we love material things, or power, or status, or work, or learning, or play, more than we love people. Or we love people - ourselves or someone else - more than we love God. And when we put our loves out of order, we're not working the way we are designed to work.

It's like trying to use a fish as a microwave oven. It's just going to end badly.

That's sin: having our loves out of order.

For example: If I love status more than I love people, then when I make a mistake, I'm going to try to hide it - I'm going to lie about it. That might work in the short run, but it's going to hurt everyone in the long run.

Loving humans more than God is a little trickier, because we're supposed to love people, right? How can we love people too much?

Let's take an example. I love Erik, my husband, very much. But if I were to love him as God, then I would need him to be available to receive my love and attention all the time. It would be pretty disappointing for me when he, you know, went to work, or paid attention to other people. Because Erik's not God, and Erik doesn't have it in him to live his own life and to be God for me.

It would begin to be very obvious that he's not God, and that would be devastating for me. So then I might try to pretend I didn't notice. I might build up this idea of Erik that's actually very different from who he really is, so that I don't have to face the fact that he's not God. And now, you see, I've stopped loving Erik. Now I love this idea that I've created.

Or maybe if I love Erik as God, then I'm willing to do whatever I think is necessary to help and protect him, even at the cost of hurting other people. Again, not loving people, not loving God, and people are getting hurt.

That top-tier love that ought to be reserved for God - it's just too much for humans to receive. And if we give it to humans instead of God, whether to ourselves or someone else, then people get hurt.

That's why it's a sin to have our loves out of order. It's not an arbitrary line. It's because people get hurt when we put our loves out of order. It's trying to use a fish as a microwave oven. It's just going to end badly.

For any particular action, then, the question to ask is: Who am I loving above all with this action? Is it God? Not sin. Is is anybody or anything else? Sin.

Angels: What function do they play? Where do they come from? Who created them and why? What references to angels are in the Bible? Where do the names of angels come from?

The word "angel" means "messenger." This is the primary role that angels play in the Bible. They are messengers from God to humans. For instance, angels tell Abraham and Sarah they're going to have a child, angels come to the prophet Elijah in the desert, and an angel comes to both Mary and Joseph to tell them about Jesus. In addition to being messengers, angels in the Bible also praise God, and sometimes they protect certain groups of people.

An interesting connection here is with cherubim. We think of cherubs - the cute, fat little children with wings. But cherubim in the Bible actually have nothing at all to do with angels. They're completely separate. Cherubim in the Bible have wings, and they're usually made up of a bunch of different animals, all put together - like a lion and an eagle, smashed together.

Don't let those sweet faces fool you.

The clouds are hiding lizard/shark/camel bodies.

Cherubim in the Bible protect holy things and travel with God.

What's interesting here is that in the Bible, there are no angels described as having wings. In fact, angels aren't really described in any detail. The idea that they have wings - that comes from the cherubim, not from Biblical angels at all.

Where do angels come from, who created them, and why? In the Bible, it's fairly easy to see a progression from God being directly present in people's lives (God is WALKING AROUND in the Garden of Eden) to God being a little more distant. As that progression happens, angels come into place to bridge the gap between God and humanity. They are created by God to be intermediaries (messengers), and to praise God and protect particular groups of people.

There are two named angels in the Bible: Michael and Gabriel (see Daniel 8-12). Michael is the protector of Israel. Gabriel is a messenger - in fact, he brings the messages to both Mary and Joseph.

Other names for angels come from later Jewish traditions, especially mystical (highly spiritual) traditions, and especially from the time in between the Old Testament and the New Testament. There are references to angels in the book of Tobit, which is not in Protestant Bibles, but it is in the Bibles of some other churches, like the Catholic church. There are also references in the book of Enoch, which is in almost nobody's Bible. It's a mystical Jewish writing from that time between the Testaments. These extra-Biblical writings are where many of the names of angels come from.

There is no United Methodist doctrine or stated belief about angels, the devil, or demons. Many United Methodists believe in them. Many don't.

I think that if we understand angels as messengers, then something really important happens: Anyone can be an angel. We are all potentially angels - if we speak God's words. It also means we've got to listen to each other, because anyone around us could potentially be an angel: a messenger of God.

Where in the Bible does it deal with Lucifer being cast out of heaven?

In Isaiah chapter 14, there's a long, long taunt against the king of Babylon.

"Now go away, or I shall taunt you a second time!"

It says the king of Babylon has set himself, basically, as a god, as a part of the heavens, like a star. But the real God is going to nip that right in the bud.

So it says, "How you are fallen from heaven, O Day Star, son of Dawn!"

Now, the Bible is very, very clear that this is directed at the king of Babylon. If you read only Isaiah, you would have no idea that this might be talking about some sort of devil. But these things often have layers of meaning, so it's certainly possible that it's a statement both against the king of Babylon and against the devil.

Keep this Isaiah passage in mind, because we'll come back to it in a minute.

Next, we need to look at the book of Enoch, that Jewish mystical text that's not in the Bible. This is where we find the clearest account of the devil falling from heaven. Most of our ideas about what that looked like come from the (non-Biblical) book of Enoch, and they're enhanced by much, much later (non-Biblical) writings like Dante's Inferno and John Milton's Paradise Lost.

Remember, the book of Enoch was probably written in between the Testaments, and it looks like at least part of Enoch had a significant influence how people thought when they were putting together the New Testament and in the early church. The idea of the devil falling from heaven is echoed a couple of times in the New Testament.

In Luke 10:18, Jesus says, "I watched Satan fall from heaven like a flash of lightning." Then in Revelation 12, there's a description of a war between Michael and his angels on one side (Michael is the angel protector of Israel), and "the dragon" and his angels (read: demons) on the other side. It says, "The great dragon was thrown down, that ancient serpent, who is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world."

So there are three Biblical mentions: Isaiah, one sentence from Jesus, and this image from Revelation.

Let's go back to Isaiah, because this is where the name "Lucifer" comes from.

Long before English was a thing, the original Hebrew text of Isaiah was translated into Latin.

The Bible wasn't written in English. You're thinking of The Lord of the Rings.

In Latin, there's a word - just a word - that means "day star" or "morning star." The word is lucifer. Small "l."

Later, people had the story from Enoch in mind of the devil falling from heaven. They saw the echoes of that story in Luke 10:18 and in Revelation. And they saw it echoed way back in Isaiah, too. They figured that must be talking about the devil as well. That's when "Lucifer" began to be known as a proper name for the devil, rather just a word for a star.

Who was the heavenly group that Satan was part of - the "heavenly beings" in Job 1:6? Where did they come from?

In the book of Job, there's a scene described like this: "One day the heavenly beings came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan also came among them."

So we have these heavenly beings - which could also be translated as "sons of God." And Satan, it says, was among them.

"Satan" here is a very bad translation. We think of "Satan" as a proper name, as the devil, the personification of evil. But that idea did not exist when the book of Job was first written and read.

The Hebrew word here is ha-satan. You see the word "satan" in there. But the "ha" at the beginning means "the." "The satan." We would never say that with a proper name. We wouldn't say "The Rachon," for instance. A much better translation here would actually translate the word ha-satan instead of using it as a name. Translated, it means "the accuser."

So: "One day the heavenly beings [or sons of God] came to present themselves before the LORD, and the accuser also came among them."

To picture this, imagine a modern-day courtroom. There's a judge - that's God. There's a prosecuting attorney, who brings charges against people. That's the accuser. And there are other people too, who have other roles: a defending attorney, a bailiff, and so on. Those are the "heavenly beings."

"Your Honor, why are there no women in this courtroom?

And why are those guys in front of you reading and knitting?"

Keep the modern courtroom image, and add in an image of a royal court. There's a king or queen - that's God. There's some sort of police force that goes around and keeps an eye on the people - that's the accuser. And there are other people too, knights and such, that are the heavenly beings.

This picture has actually happened one other time in the Bible. In 1 Kings 22, the king of the time is Ahab. He's a bad guy. Ahab wanted to go into battle, and his pet prophets - the ones he paid to tell him he was awesome - told him that he would win the battle.

But then a real prophet, Micaiah, came to the king and described this scene: God was sitting on a throne, Micaiah said, and all the host of heaven was standing around. Just like the heavenly beings from Job. God asked for a volunteer - one of the heavenly beings needed to go trick King Ahab into going into battle. So one of them volunteered, and that's why Ahab's prophets thought he'd be okay. It was a trick from God to get him to go into battle and be killed.

By the way, it's stuff like this that got the prophets killed.

Nobody tells the king he's a fool.

So the picture of the heavenly court from Job echoes this picture from 1 Kings. But there's an even earlier mention of the "sons of God" - back in Genesis 6, they actually get married to human women and have children. Awkward.

These images of "sons of God" or "heavenly beings" are the forerunners of the images of angels that we have today. They're intermediaries between God and humanity. Because God is just so cool that we can't even handle it.

What does Job teach us nowadays?

Something to keep in mind in thinking about the book of Job is that it presents itself as a sort of parable. It opens with "There was once a man in the land of Uz named Job." This is something like our formula of "Once upon a time." When we hear "Once upon a time," we automatically know some things about the story that's coming. We know that the story is probably not factually accurate. But that doesn't mean it's not worth hearing. We also know that there's a good chance that the story has some moral or spiritual truth to it, even though it's not factually accurate. And this is how Job presents itself.

The story of Job, as we've seen, begins with a heavenly court. The accuser comes in, and God says, "Hey, have you seen Job? Boy, that guy's faithful!" The accuser says, "Well, sure, he's faithful. He's had pretty smooth sailing. Who wouldn't be faithful? But if you messed around with him a bit, I bet he'd turn away from you." So God gives the accuser permission to destroy Job's family, his property, and his body, as long as Job survives.

Once Job's life has been torn apart, his friends come to visit. For a while, they're silent, which is good. But then they open their mouths and things get ugly. They say, "Job, you must have done something to deserve all this tragedy. Because God is fair."

Job argues and says that he didn't deserve it, which, of course, he didn't. After a while Job gets angry with God for being so unfair. Finally, God comes into the picture and basically says, "Job, who do you think you are?" and then leaves, which is very unsatisfying.

But then at the end of the story, God does scold the friends. Remember, they've been saying that God is fair, but God says they're wrong. The story ends with God giving Job a new family and property and everything (on the assumption, I suppose, that this makes everything okay).

So what does it teach us? In a big way, the book of Job is a response to the book of Proverbs, which basically holds to the idea that if you do what's right, then good things will happen to you. And if you do bad things, bad things will happen to you.

So imagine living in a world where, if you got sick, or the animals you were raising got sick, or something happened to your family, then everyone around - including you - would blame it on you. You must have done something wrong.

That's how the world was when the book of Job came into play. People believed that God is fair, so you get what you deserve. It's a really tempting thing to believe, because then if we're just good enough, nothing bad will ever happen to us. But the book of Job emphatically says that we don't get what we deserve.

Today, we've sort of toned down the idea of blaming people for tragedies. But we haven't gotten rid of it. As an example, there's a part of us that believes that if you're poor, it's because you don't work hard or you made bad choices. And if you do have enough, then it's because you do work hard or you made good choices. We often don't bother to find out how hard people actually work or what choices were actually available to them.

To me, the book of Job says that life is not fair. It's just not. So when I'm blaming people for their circumstances, I need to take a second look.

Why does God seem so different - jealous, petty, and angry sometimes, but also a God of love?

The best way to answer this question is to start with a human being.

Let's imagine that we're all going to sit down together and write a biography of our friend Wayne. (Internet people, you may not know Wayne. Imagine someone else.)

So we go around and tell stories about Wayne. My guess is that there would be some overlap, but there would also be a lot of different stories. And we all know only one slice of Wayne. People he worked with would have other stories. Other friends would have other stories. Family members would have other stories. The truth is, even if you feel like you know Wayne, there's a huge amount that you don't know.

And if we put Wayne aside for a moment, and think about the person closest to you, someone you feel like you know really well - even that person can surprise you.

Because human beings are so, so complex. We can take a lifetime trying to get to know just one person, and we can still be surprised.

And if human beings are that complex, how much more complex is God! The Bible has many different voices and perspectives on God for a reason. Imagine if we tried to boil Wayne down to one word, or concept, or story, or even one person's understanding of Wayne. That would be so incomplete! And Wayne's just Wayne, he's not God.

Our picture of God would be so incomplete if it was simple.

Now, there is a core of identity. There are things about Wayne that would show up over and over. And God has a core of identity, too. From what I see in the Bible, and in the wisdom of faithful people since the Bible, that core of identity, that primary characteristic of God - it's love. Love, love, love. It's all over the place.

But! How humans have understood love has changed over time. In a world where dissent or disobedience could put an entire community in danger - in a world where villages were constantly in real, physical danger from bandits and armies and nature and everything else - I think a loving God might have some anger, some judgment. A loving God would keep the community together, united, which means that God might be jealous.

And that's not the only world in which a God who gets angry makes sense. For many victims of abuse or rape, a God who is all rainbows and sunshine and no judgment or accountability - that does not seem like a loving God. Which is not to say there's not forgiveness - there is. But forgiveness is meaningless without judgment.

So ultimately, as we think about God, the best way to approach it is through love. God seems strange in places in the Bible. So let's ask ourselves, How might this seem loving in different circumstances? Or to different people? We won't always get it.

But I'm so, so thankful for the many different voices and perspectives on our one huge, complex, fantastic God.

Do you have other questions? Send them to me or post them below!

No, I didn't draw these pictures.

Every year I write a letter that looks back over the past year and looks forward to what's coming next. This is the letter this year. If you only have time to read part of it, I encourage you to skip down to the pictures and look at that part (the "what's coming next" part). God bless us all, and Merry Christmas!

My Dear Friends,

Being with you for the past year at Milton United Methodist Church has been a real joy for me. I believe that our congregation is truly living out of God’s vision for us. Through the ministries here, we are providing opportunities for folks in our community to know and love God, and to love each other.

One of the things at the core of our church’s identity is the idea that everyone is welcome at God’s table, even if we disagree or don’t understand each other. Folks at Milton UMC take this seriously and show very real hospitality, and I am tremendously thankful to be a part of this church’s witness to God’s welcoming arms!

One way we saw this welcome coming to life this year was with our Blessing Bag service project in February – a project that saw roughly equal parts participation from our church community and from the wider Milton community. Welcoming folks to God’s table continued during Lent and Easter, with meaningful services for Holy Thursday and Good Friday, and our first ever Easter pageant. Another first this year was Milton UMC’s participation in Relay for Life. We participated to follow in Jesus’ footsteps and heal the sick, and again, we saw a very large group of folks from the wider Milton community joining our Relay for Life team.

This year, we continued the tradition we started last year of participating in Milton Days. We are becoming known as the church that provides free face painting and brain-teasers. This year, we expanded by having our worship service in the park on the Sunday of Milton Days. It was small (this year), but as I walked around the booths later in the day, several people working the booths wanted to thank us for providing the service. They had been setting up their booths during the service, so we didn’t see them, but they were worshipping along with us!

There were other welcoming moments, as well: for instance, we had our second annual Halloween party. Our children’s Sunday School group began having regular outings as the Second Sunday Society. Our special music group began – The Spice Girls and the Three Wise Guys. Right now, the kids are preparing a very special Christmas pageant. The pageants and kids’ events have been a great way for all of us to invite our friends and families to experience God’s welcome.

For those of you concerned with numbers, you should know that our average Sunday morning attendance is 10% higher this year than it was last year. That doesn’t feel like very much when you’re sitting in the pews (it’s basically adding 3 people), but this is significant. It is a sustainable amount of growth that I hope to see continue next year. This growth reflects real people who have made real commitments to being in relationship with God and people through Milton UMC. God is extending a welcoming hand through Milton UMC!

Because God has called us to display God’s welcome, we have been looking into becoming a Reconciling congregation. Being a Reconciling congregation would mean that we make a public statement that all people are welcome at Milton UMC, regardless of sexual orientation. This decision has not been made yet. We will be having two workshops – on Sunday, February 10, and Sunday, February 24 – that will help us discern how God is speaking to us about Reconciling, through Scripture and our own experiences. I am looking forward to these workshops very much.

In the coming year, I hope that we can start thinking about how God might be working at times other than Sunday mornings. How can our congregation be a home base from which we all create communities of discipleship? Imagine this:

These are people in the congregation – people you see Sunday mornings:

Each two (or three, or five) people in the congregation start a group during the week. They invite folks they know – folks who are wanting to be closer to God and each other. They invite  people who may not be able to attend on Sunday mornings, or may not be interested in attending on Sunday mornings. (Don’t worry, Pastor Rachon will help get the groups started):

Remember, in this scenario, you might not see all the people who are getting closer to God and other people because of our church’s ministries. Some folks in these groups may come on Sunday mornings, but others probably never will. Does that mean they’re not part of the church, not faithful disciples? No, it just means we need to define the church a little more broadly. In fact, these kinds of groups are often much more effective in helping people get closer to God than Sunday morning worship. Each group can focus on what it needs to focus on. And there will be plenty of opportunities for the different groups to meet each other and be one larger community.

One of these groups has just begun – a group of local moms looking for intentional friendships. This is a model I believe could be very effective in the communities of Milton, Edgewood, and south Federal Way, where most of our folks come from. Milton UMC is uniquely equipped to use this model, because our congregation is like a patchwork, made up of small pockets of folks from different segments of the community. God has given us unique gifts and unique surroundings – and I believe that God has an amazing future in mind for our congregation and our wider communities: a future where people have more and more relevant, engaging, and meaningful opportunities to love God and love neighbor.

In closing, one phrase keeps recurring in my mind: “I thank my God every time I remember you.” It’s from Philippians 1:3. Here’s a little more:

I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ. (Philippians 1:3-6)

God bless us all. Amen.

Sometimes I write poems.

To Love

What does it mean to love?

To believe in another person’s existence

Enough to bend;

In the intricate painting of a life,

To let another’s colors and brush strokes

Reshape, re-imagine your own –

What does it mean,

When picnics in the shade of the apple tree

Are never perfect like in love songs,

When there are worms in the apples

And it hurts your ankles to sit like that on the ground

But you both smile anyway and lift your glasses to toast

Until a sudden frustration,

Half-meant joke,

Changes the scene: the smiling toasts become arguments, bickering – or maybe

The arguments were always there

And the smiles too

Like those old hologram pictures

Two images always present

And only perspective reveals one at a time.

What does it mean to love,

And what does it mean to grow together

Like moss and branches,

What does it mean to dance by a Christmas tree

And hold hands that gradually become more and more wrinkled,

What does it mean

When your life’s painting and that of your lover

Grow to have the same palette

Grow to be two pictures of the same place

But looking different directions

The stream that begins in your painting

Continuing in your lover’s –

What does it mean

To strip away the protective layers and to be vulnerable, soft,

But only to one person;

To respond to another’s seasons

Like trees respond to the tilting earth

Leaves budding, growing, dying, falling – and simultaneously

To be the seasons to which another’s leaves respond –

What does it mean?

“Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away;

For now the winter is past, the rain is over and gone.

The flowers appear on the earth;

The time of singing has come,

And the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land...

Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.”

(The quote at the end is from Song of Solomon 2:10-13.)

Questions and Responses

Today was Question and Response Sunday. The responses included here are a little more detailed than we had time for in the service. We'll be having another Question and Response Sunday within the next year or so, and I'd love to have your questions!

Scroll down for...
Heaven, hell, and the Bible
Jesus' life before his ministry
Doubt
Folly
Community connections

There are a lot of things out there about the nature of life after death. What does the Bible really say about it, about heaven and hell and what gets you into one or the other?

First of all, this is a huge question, and entire books have been written about it. I highly recommend Love Wins, by Rob Bell, which looks closely at what the Bible actually says, is easy to read, and brings up a lot of the questions that all of us naturally ask. You may not agree with Rob Bell’s conclusions, and that’s okay – it’s still a great overview. I also want to say that I have had to make choices here about what to include and what to leave out. I have my own beliefs about this, which inevitably color my response. I am not right about everything, and I am still learning. You are welcome to disagree or to come to different conclusions. I also recommend reading the Bible on your own to come to your own answers. A good place to start for this question is by reading Luke and Romans.

First: what does the Bible really say about heaven and hell? A great deal of our imagery about heaven and hell doesn’t come from the Bible – a lot of it comes from poetry and other literature like Dante’s Inferno and John Milton’s Paradise Lost. The Bible is much more concerned with life here and now than anything else.

Throughout the entire Old Testament, there is basically no reference to what we would think of as life after death. There are references to “sheol,” which is usually translated “the grave.” This seems to have been a sort of shadowy half-existence that continued after death. Resurrection became a part of Jewish belief during the time between the Old Testament and the New Testament.

In the New Testament, there is much more about heaven and hell, though the focus is still on this life. On occasion, Jesus says that somebody will be “thrown into the fires of hell, where the worm never dies, and the fire is never quenched” (Mark 9:48). There are also references to “weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Luke 13:28).

Most of what Jesus says about heaven and hell is in parables. Speaking of heaven, he refers to a great feast, a wedding banquet, and similar scenes. Hell is exclusion from the party. For instance, in the parable of the ten bridesmaids, Jesus says that five of them brought enough oil to wait for the bridegroom, and the other five ran out of oil and had to go get more. While they were gone, the bridegroom came and went into the feast with the five bridesmaids who were prepared. The five who didn’t have enough oil came back and knocked on the door to be let in, but they were left outside, with Jesus saying, “I do not know you” (Matthew 25:1-13). The usual interpretation is that Jesus is the bridegroom, and the bridesmaids are waiting for the second coming of Jesus, at which time they are either welcomed into the wedding banquet (heaven) or left outside (hell). It’s important to remember that parables almost always have more than one interpretation.

Coming at this from another angle, our ideas about heaven and hell are closely tied in with our ideas of the end times. In fancy church speak this is called eschatology – the study of the end, and in particular, how God will work out this beautiful mess of a world in ways that are loving, just, and good. Eschatology is featured much more often in the Bible than heaven and hell: Jesus gives mini-sermons about when he will come again, the end times come up in multiple letters throughout the New Testament, the whole book of Revelation is somehow about the end times, and it even comes up in the Old Testament.

The difficulty here is that much of this is metaphorical. We see that very clearly in Daniel, where different stages of the end times are all but explicitly linked with various horrible rulers who lived near Daniel’s own time. Many scholars believe that the book of Revelation was a book of resistance against the Roman empire – a way for people to share hope with one another that someday the Roman empire would be overthrown and they would have freedom. They couldn’t come out and say that they hated Rome, but they could describe these poetic (and sometimes bizarre) images about God overthrowing the devil, and they could share these images of hope with each other as a form of encouragement in the face of Roman oppression.

I personally have trouble taking Revelation literally – when you read it, it just doesn’t seem to be written literally. There are symbols within symbols, and some of them we know or can guess at what they symbolize, but for others, we have no clue. It makes sense to me to read Revelation as a beautiful vision of God winning out over evil in a cosmic way – and Revelation truly is beautiful and moving (I recommend reading it all the way through in one sitting – it’s very powerful). Just like Jesus told parables that had truth even if they were made-up stories, Revelation and other visions of eschatology have truth even if they are not literal descriptions of heaven.

I find this metaphorical view especially convincing because Jesus talks about the “kingdom of God” as though it’s already here, at least partly. Talking about the kingdom of God was a way of talking about the end times, when God would rule completely – but Jesus brings it right here and now. He says, “the kingdom of God is among you” (Luke 17:21), and we often hear that he was going around, proclaiming that the kingdom of God had come. Revelation and other end-times visions give me hope that God is winning now, and God will win forever, even when it seems hopeless.

So, in summary, what does the Bible say about heaven and hell? Not very much. The Bible is overwhelmingly concerned with this life. What it does say is often in parable form or metaphorical. There is something there, but it’s vague and it’s usually not the focus.

Now the second part of the question: how do you get to heaven or hell? The Bible constantly goes back and forth here between two things: your actions are key, or the grace of God is key.

One passage is from Matthew chapter 25. Here, we have Jesus describing a future scene: “When the Son of Man comes in his glory” (speaking of himself coming to earth a second time). “All the nations” come before him, and he separates people to his right and left. He turns to those on his right and says, “Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.” The people are confused and ask when they did these things for Jesus, and he says, “Just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me.” Then he turns to the ones on his left, and says, “Depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels,” because they had not done these things “for the least of these.” The passage finishes by saying: “These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Here, and in many other places, it is very clear that actions determine eternal consequences. This view is present in many of Jesus’ teachings and parables, and in many of the letters that make up the New Testament. The problem here is that all of us would be partly on one side and partly on the other side. I seriously doubt that there is anyone who has never done a single good thing “for the least of these.” And even the most faithful people pass up opportunities to do these things. Additionally, how do we know how many good things are enough? Is passing up one opportunity to do good going to cause someone to lose salvation? There are some logical problems with the view that actions determine eternal consequences.

Other Bible passages emphasize that salvation is based on God’s grace, not human actions. Grace is a free gift of God, given without regard for merit. In the book of Romans, we hear, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God; they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” (Romans 3:23-24). Paul, the writer of Romans and many of the other books of the New Testament, held to this view quite consistently, though he also says that a good life is important. The key here is that when we receive grace, we receive eternal life, and we are also transformed so that we can live good lives. Actions count, but good actions are a result of salvation, not the cause of salvation.

This second view is the standard theology of most Christian churches, and of the Methodist church: God’s grace transforms us when we trust that grace, and the transformation causes us to live better. There is still an issue here: it is very clear that people who are not Christian are capable of good actions, and people who are Christian are capable of bad actions. Still, most Christians, including most Christian theologians, find the emphasis on grace to be more convincing than an emphasis on human actions. We do not do the work of salvation – God does the work of salvation, and by trusting that work (in other words, having faith, which means to trust), we are empowered to do good.

Somehow both God’s grace and human action are important. People have found many, many different ways of bringing these two together. I encourage you to think about what makes sense to you. I encourage you to read Luke and Romans, and to read Love Wins. I encourage you to pray about it.

What do we know about Jesus’ life beyond all the savior stuff? The young carpenter, the son of Mary and Joseph, the… wait, was he anyone’s brother? I don’t even know…

We don’t know very much. There is one passage in Luke that describes a twelve-year-old Jesus going to Jerusalem with his family. Imagine the whole town walking to Jerusalem as an annual trip. When they’re on the way home, his parents assume that he’s with the group, but then after they’ve traveled for a day they find that he’s not there. They go back to Jerusalem and look for him for three days before finding him in the temple. He’s been teaching the teachers at the temple, and he has no idea why his parents are so concerned. (Luke 2:41-51)

We also know that Jesus had brothers. At least one of his brothers, James, became a significant leader in the Christian movement after Jesus’ death and resurrection (Acts 15 and following). (There is more than one James; James the brother of Jesus was not James the disciple, brother of John and son of Zebedee.) Other brothers include Joseph, Simon, and Judas – these do not seem to be significant figures in the gospels. It also seems that he had sisters (Mark 6:3).

There is also a tradition that Jesus and John the Baptist were cousins. We know that John’s mother was related to Mary, though it is unclear how exactly they were related (Luke 1:36).

Matthew 13:55 tells us that Jesus was the “carpenter’s son;” the parallel passage in Mark 6:3 says that Jesus was a carpenter. This was not an upper-class profession. The Greek word could also mean “craftsman” or “builder.”

How do you deal with doubt? For instance, regarding: the divinity of Jesus, the existence of unconditional love, translations of the Bible, etc., etc.

The biggest doubt question, to me, is whether God is real and worth worshipping. So I’ll start there and then get to some of these more specific doubts.

When I find myself in doubt, my first instinct is to ignore it and hope that it goes away. That doesn’t really work out, though. Once I stop ignoring it, it tends to get worse at first, and that’s painful. It’s scary. It’s especially scary because if God is not real, then I have made a serious error in career choice!

But then after a while, if I don’t ignore the doubt, I find myself, ironically, praying about it. Which is the single most important thing I can do in that moment.

I’ve learned that faith is a gift from God. I really think that the only way to believe in God is to ask for help from God. There is a beautiful story about a man who came to Jesus asking for help for his sick child. Jesus asked him if he believed. He said, “I believe – Lord, help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24). This is a statement of vulnerability and hope. When we genuinely pray for faith, we open ourselves up to be let down. We are vulnerable. But we open ourselves in the hope that we will not be let down. And as we find God to be faithful, as we find God to be reliable and trustworthy, it becomes easier to trust even in times of doubt.

No matter how strong our faith, there are going to be times when it falls apart. That’s okay. That’s part of why we have church – so that we can carry faith for each other. When you come here and you find yourself singing “This is the day that the Lord has made,” and you just can’t believe it that day, that’s the day when all the rest of us carry faith for you. And in a few weeks, you’ll be carrying it again.

When I find myself doubting a specific piece of Christianity, I try to figure out why I believed it before, or why other people believe it. I talk with people whose faith I respect – people I can trust to have thought it through. I think about whether this piece is truly essential to Christianity. And, again, I pray about it a lot. In many cases, I have found myself starting with doubt about something, doing this research and thinking and praying, and realizing that there are other options that make more sense with the rest of Christianity as a whole. Sometimes one kind of belief has to die to make room for a better, more accurate, more meaningful belief. That death can be hard, but we have a religion of resurrection: the end of one thing makes room for something new and wonderful.

 have also found that things that I previously thought were essential to Christian faith are actually things that faithful Christians have disagreed about for centuries. For instance, there are, and there have been since the very beginnings of Christianity, Christians who do not believe that Jesus is divine.

The key is to trust God. Pray about it a lot, and trust that God would not have given you a brain that asks questions if God did not want you to ask questions. You are not abandoning God by asking questions. You might lose some blind faith, but you will gain a deeper faith. Approach with trust and humility, remembering that you’re not going to ask anything that God hasn’t handled before.

Just for fun, here’s an example:

When I doubt that Jesus is divine:

·         I think about why I believed it before.

o   I believed it before because it’s what I was taught, based on some parts of the Bible. But other parts of the Bible make that questionable.

o   This is a good time to look at the passages that are most relevant – here, John 1 and 17 are two of the main passages.

·         I think about why other people have believed that Jesus is divine. (I know some of the answer to this because I spent years studying it. I also talk with colleagues and others that I respect. If you didn’t go to seminary, ask someone who did, or find someone whose faith you respect –  someone you trust to have thought it through.)

o   Jesus’ divinity is part of our faith tradition because there are indications in the gospels and in very early traditions about Jesus that he had a special relationship with God (the “Father”). In a few places, it even seemed like there was another one there – an “advocate” or “helper” or “holy spirit.” There is no clear indication of the Trinity in the Bible, but people were trying to work out what these relationships might look like. Additionally, people were finding themselves praying to Jesus, but believing that there was only one God – so some of this belief came from how people actually practiced Christianity. Over the next few hundred years, people came at this Trinity business, especially the relationship between Jesus and the Father, from every possible angle. Wars were fought. It was the issue of the day for hundreds of years.

o   Karl Barth, a German theologian of the 20^th century, came up with this idea, based on the Bible and centuries of Christian thought: God creates the world out of love, and out of love, God wants to communicate with the world. But God is on a level that we can’t really understand or imagine. Since we can’t get on God’s level, God comes to ours. The beginning of the gospel of John describes Jesus as “the Word” of God (John 1): Jesus is God in communication with humanity. Jesus isn’t just a messenger, because God actually wants a personal relationship with humanity. Jesus is God’s communication, personified and brought to our level.

§  By the way, in Barth’s theology, this also means that the Bible is not “the word of God” – Jesus is. The Bible tells us about Jesus, but it’s not full of words that God actually spoke. For me, this makes it less essential to know that a Bible translation is exactly right – which is good, because none of them are exactly right. I’m going to get some idea about Jesus, the Word, by reading the Bible, even if the translation is flawed.

·         I pray about it a lot.

·         I think about how essential this belief is to Christianity as a whole.

o   If Jesus is not divine, his words carry less weight. What are the consequences of that?

o   If Jesus is not divine, what does that mean for how we practice religion? When we pray to Jesus, or in Jesus’ name, is that okay?

o   If Jesus is not divine, what does that say about his resurrection, or about eternal life for the rest of us?

o   If Jesus is not divine, does that have ethical consequences? Does it change what I believe about right and wrong?

o   Most things are not essential, or at least not as essential as we first thought. This is where sometimes it is good to let go of one belief to make room for something more accurate and meaningful.

What is wrong with folly? Mark 7:22: “For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly.”

The word “folly” is actually a technical word, which means that in some contexts, it has a very specific meaning. A similar word today would be “apple.” We all know that apples are fruit. But when you’re talking about computers, “Apple” is a brand name. It has a very specific meaning.

In Jewish culture, the terms “wisdom” and “folly” were technical terms that referred to something called the “wisdom tradition.” The Old Testament books of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Job, and several of the Psalms are part of this “wisdom tradition.” Solomon is a key figure in the tradition. The wisdom tradition is concerned with figuring out how to make the right choices – wisdom was about respecting God, taking responsibility, acting fairly, and spending your life in the right way. Teachers in the wisdom tradition would try to figure out how to do these things, and how to pass them on to others.

The list that Jesus uses here are things that were condemned in the wisdom tradition – adultery, slander, and pride in particular were contrary to wisdom. When Jesus says “folly,” he’s referring to this tradition. When I, 2000 years later, hear the word “folly,” I think of silliness or playfulness – but that is not what Jesus would have been talking about. The wisdom tradition didn’t always take itself that seriously, especially in Ecclesiastes, one of my absolute favorite books in the Bible. An example, from Ecclesiastes 11:3: “Whether a tree falls to the south or to the north, in the place where the tree falls, there it will lie.”

How can the congregation and community coexist more?

The bishop has called us to this attitude: Every church a mission outpost, every member a missionary. This is our mission field. This is our mission outpost. What would you be doing if you were a missionary in a foreign country? I would be getting to know people in the area, building relationships, finding out how people relate to God, and finding ways to help expand and deepen those things. This is the key to integrating the community and the congregation – it’s about each person here taking responsibility for that integration.

You are a part of sub-communities here, whether it’s the senior lunches or the PTA or your family. What’s your job as a missionary? Not to convert them, not to bring God to them, but to remind them that God is with them, to support them as they seek to be fed spiritually, to remind them that they need to be fed spiritually. To be the presence of God unmistakably. The people who know you should know that they can come to you with spiritual questions and needs, and maybe you can’t answer them, but you will help them think and seek. The people who know you should know that you do the things you do – work at the food bank, take care of someone in your family – that you do these things not just because they are nice, not just because you think you should, but because God is love and God’s love is in you.

And we can’t stop with the people we already know. A missionary doesn’t come in and say, “Well, I don’t know anybody here, so I’m just going to do nothing.” A missionary finds ways to get to know the people in a place – again, not to convert them, not to tell them they’re wrong, but to discover God with them, to remind them that God is with them, to support them being fed spiritually. How do we get to know people here? There is a group of folks who hang out at Dave’s together. There’s probably a group at Bud’s too, and one at The Milton. There are dances and spaghetti feeds at the senior center. There is a group of Kiwanis, and probably a Lions, and probably a Rotary Club. There are neighbors to have block parties with, or Fourth of July celebrations. There are dog owners walking their dogs at the same times each day. There are groups putting on events like Milton Days and Relay for Life and Walkathons and parks clean-up events. There are cub scouts and a kids’ choir and a preschool that meet right here in our building. There are AA groups and groups that walk the track together and carpools. That doesn’t mean that everyone here needs to be in all these things; it’s just to encourage you to think about how you can get to know the people who live here. That’s what missionaries do.

How can the congregation and the community coexist more? Corporately, all together, I think we are doing a fantastic job of this already. Do not underestimate Milton Days. This is the single most important community-building tool in Milton, and we are very involved in making that true. We are working on becoming involved with the Edgewood food bank, which does a terrific job and can really use our help. We are providing a place for people to find their sub-community, to be fed spiritually, to feed others. It’s happening. We are coexisting. This is one of the strengths of this church.

And by supporting each other, we are supporting each person’s efforts to make those connections. We have several folks who are involved in PTAs. By supporting them, you support the PTA. We have folks who visit others who need company. By supporting them, you are supporting all the people they visit. We have folks who spend their days trying to connect people with the resources they need. By supporting them, you support the work they do.

Work that makes the world better can quickly become discouraging, because there is so much to do. So let’s encourage each other. Ask each other how it’s going. Ask each other the question that the original Methodist societies asked each other: “How goes it with your soul?” And by asking each other those questions, we learn to talk about God and to talk about real life, and we can take those skills into the rest of the community.

Oh Right! A Blog!

You live and learn, right?

Back in May I had this awesome idea: we can't cover both the Old Testament and the New Testament passages during church, so I'll write a blog about the Old Testament stuff. It was going to be amazing, brilliant, and so forth. And I wrote a couple of them.

Then, well, you know. I know you've all been there. Life happens. "The best laid plans of mice and men." Or women. Or anyone.

So I've learned that summers as a pastor are different than what I expected. You all are on vacations a lot - which is great. I am out of town more than I had realized - also great. The blog writing got put on the end of the to-do list - other things just had to take priority.

After a while, I gave it up. To be honest, the past few weeks, I haven't even read the Old Testament passages before Sunday mornings. It's been a nice surprise each week when the Scripture reader comes to the microphone - what are we going to hear today? Like opening a little present each week.

Our God is a God of paradox and contrast. One way that we see that is in the interplay of change and stability in our lives and in the world. Some things never change - the sun always rises in the east and sets in the west. Gravity always works. My dog Henry always eats fuzz. And other things are constantly changing - the sun always rises and sets, but the seasons change, day turns to night. Gravity always works, but sometimes we find forces bigger than gravity, letting us explore Mars remotely. Henry always eats fuzz, but someday Henry will die (okay, that one turned out sadder than I had expected).

The point is, one of our challenges as humans, made in the image of God, is to learn to balance the change and stability. To follow through on things like writing blogs, and yet to move on when it is time for something new. To hold on to people we love, to traditions, to things we have learned - and also to be open to loving new people, to try new traditions, to learn new things. It's a tough balance.

As my life has changed since May, I know that right now, I can't commit to writing a blog post every week. But I'll get one up now and then. God be with all of us as we balance change and stability.

David and Goliath: Reflection on Annual Conference

It's been a little while since I've done this - note to self: don't plan to write a blog post while at Annual Conference. So we've got a little catching up to do. If you've been in Sunday services, you may remember reading the David and Goliath passage back on June 24. You can refresh your memory here.

It's a familiar story: Goliath, the giant of the foreign army, challenges the Israelite army to send him a champion to fight against. The idea is that whichever champion wins, that person's army wins the whole battle, and the armies don't have to fight. But because Goliath is so huge, and has such cool armor, all the Israelites are afraid of him. Nobody wants to be the Israelite champion, including Saul, the one that God had originally chosen as king (he's still king at this point, even though God has decided that David would be a better king). David happens to be delivering supplies to his brothers in the army when he hears about this. He   volunteers, even though he's much smaller than Goliath, saying that he's killed lions and bears before, and in any case God will be with him. And so we have the famous story of strength beaten by weakness. This is highlighted even more because Goliath is covered in fancy armor and weapons, and David beats him without armor and with only a simple stone and sling.

It's nothing new, but it's still true: Weakness can be stronger than strength.

As I mentioned above, I intended to write this post at Annual Conference, our yearly regional gathering of pastors and church folks to learn, worship, be together, and make decisions. Looking back on Annual Conference now, I see this same idea: Weakness can be stronger than strength.

We had a speaker named Diana Butler Bass, author of Christianity After Religion, which I am reading now and which I definitely recommend. Like David, Diana offered hope through God - this time to a church that has seen consistent decline for decades. The United Methodist Church, like all "mainline" denominations (think Presbyterian, Lutheran, Episcopal, etc.), has seen lower and lower numbers regarding church attendance, membership, and participation. We've had dozens and dozens of folks telling us how to "fix" our churches, usually with a new program or new way of advertising.

But Diana had a different take on it. In her view, this decline is one small indication of a wider phenomenon: a spiritual awakening. How can decline be an indication of awakening? She argues (convincingly) that people are moving away from inherited religion, religion as something that is done without depth, religion that focuses on having the right opinions about things - away from all that, toward experienced spirituality. (Some church folks are afraid of the word "spirituality," but spirituality in its truest sense is about an experience of God and community - it is actually the basis for good religion.)

In this awakening, people are seeking out and finding deep, real, substantial ways of knowing God and being together. Folks are leaving denominational churches because often these churches are towers of defense for a religion that has little meaning in their real lives. But even if the United Methodist Church - or any church - dies, God is still alive, and God will still find ways to connect with people.

That doesn't mean that the religion of denominations is bad or meaningless. Actually, if we take it seriously - by engaging in spiritual practices like prayer and hospitality, by creating loving communities, and by addressing ethically the things like consumerism that affect us everyday - then a church can be a gathering point for people seeking this awakening, a gathering point for deep, experienced spirituality. In our church's history, and in the history of faith recorded in the Bible, we have been most alive and faithful when we have been truly committed to this spiritual journey, when we have been a part of these awakenings. That is the same today.

But that doesn't look like exciting programs or advertising, which remind me of Goliath's fancy armor and weapons. It looks like David, trusting that weakness can be stronger than strength. Living in trust that the God who has healed and led and loved and transformed us through the centuries will continue to do that, even when it looks like we are up against something much bigger than ourselves.

So I invite you to be a part of this awakening. Be a part of it at Milton UMC or somewhere else, but be a part of it. Find a community of folks that will take the spiritual journey with you. Practice spirituality - you can find a good list of places to start here (it's written for Lent - the time before Easter - but you can use it anytime). And through this community and this practice, we will all be transformed.