Welcome to the Marrow’s Chapel UMC Blog!

Hello friends!  Welcome!  As pastor of Marrow’s Chapel UMC it is my hope that what you find here is a blessing to you.  If you don’t already have a church home and live in or around Henderson/Oxford N.C. I hope you will come visit us!   Please take some time to look at the pages posted in the right column to learn more about us or to download some past sermons. 

God bless you!  We hope your worship with us at Marrow’s Chapel or here online is like a real homecoming!

grace and peace,

Pastor Chad Holtz

Loving You ‘In Christ’

**Below is the manuscript for the sermon preached at Marrow’s Chapel about marriage on Oct. 25, 2009.   The text for the sermon is Ephesians 5:21-33.  

 

Loving You ‘In Christ’  

 

Divorce rates at an all time high.   Men and women change relationships as often as they change their clothes.  People marry for selfish reasons, to fulfill their own desires, and leave as soon as they feel those desires are no longer being met.   Women are seen as objects or possessions, better to be seen and not heard, left to busy themselves with housework and children.  And men?  Men are just pigs, as this 1994 cover of Time Magazine illustrates, asking the question, “Men.  Are They Really That Bad?”  

 

 You probably think I am describing a modern phenomenon, the reality that we witness around us and many if not all of us have experienced first hand.   While all of this may be true in our day, what I am actually describing is the world in Paul’s day as he pens this 5th chapter to the church at Ephesus.   We may be tempted to think Paul is simply describing the way things are and that Paul is merely reinforcing the patriarchal, man-centered culture of his day.   Thinking that way has led many people to the conclusion that Paul is irrelevant when it comes to talking about relationships between men and women while leading many preachers to other, more politically correct texts to preach (had I been following the lectionary, for example, we would have skipped this section altogether).   

 

So allow me to place this passage in context for us all.   Yes, the stuff I mentioned at the outset is all true – divorce rates are high, men and women change relationships like they change their clothes – all that is true then as it is now.  But here are some specifics.   Jews, of whom Paul was one and many of the first Christians were Jewish converts, had a very low view of women.   There was a sentence in the daily morning prayer that every Jewish man prayed where he gave thanks to God that he had not made him “a Gentile, a slave or a woman.”    Within Jewish law there was provision making a wife not a person but a thing.  She had no legal rights whatsoever but was a possession of her husband’s to do with as he pleased.    As the Church was coming into being divorce was tragically easy to do.   How to interpret the law of Deuteronomy 24:1, which reads, “If a wife finds no favor in the sight of her husband  because he has found some uncleanness in her, let him write her a bill of divorce, and send her out of his house,” was hotly debated.  Some rabbi’s interpreted “uncleanness” as adultery and only adultery.   Others thought it could mean anything from spoiling his dinner, talking with other men on the streets, not keeping her head covered or my biggest pet-peeve, hiding the remote.   And still others took the phrase “found no favor in his sight” to mean a man could divorce his wife if he met another woman he found more attractive.    It’s easy to imagine which school of thought was popular (Jesus weighed in on this debate in Mark 10).  

 

If you think marriage was bad in the Jewish world it was worse in the Gentile world.  Prostitution was an essential part of Greek life.  A prominent Greek statesman, Demosthenes, had this to say about the common rule of life among the Greeks: “We have courtesans for the sake of pleasure; we have concubines for the sake of daily cohabitation; we have wives for the purpose of having children legitimately, and of having a faithful guardian for all our household affairs.”   Socrates asked, “Is there anyone to whom you entrust more serious matters than to your wife – and is there anyone to whom you talk less?”   Seneca, a Roman philosopher who lived in Paul’s day wrote that women were married to be divorced and divorced to be married.   He even remarks that women in Rome date the years not by numbers but by the names of their husbands.  

 

This is the world Paul sees all around him.  The institution of marriage is deplorable.   Laughable, even.   It is against this backdrop that Paul, the pastor in prison, pens these words to husbands and wives.   But not just to any husband and wife….Christian husbands and wives.   “Be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ,” he begins.  In other words, we cannot expect the rest of the world to understand this or abide by it, but when they look at us, we who call Jesus our Lord, may they see this…

 

Now, given this context it should be obvious Paul is no misogynist.  He has a very high view of women.  He has a high view of men.  But this high view is not because of anything intrinsic about us as women or men but because we are all “in Christ.”   As such, Paul is not describing the way things are nor is he reinforcing the patriarchal culture of his day but rather he turns all of this on its head.   Let us examine more closely how Paul envisions Christians living as husband and wife.   

 

But first, a commercial break.   This is tough stuff.  It is tough for me personally and I know it is tough for some of you, if not directly than indirectly.  Scripture often calls us to the carpet and will make claims upon us that are not always easy to swallow.   But remember this: Scripture is authored by the God who is love.  It is this rule of faith that if we have the courage to follow will bring us life – a life only God can give – a life that Jesus calls “abundant.”   One more thing.   As we examine Paul’s directive to wives and husbands we must guard against taking a cookie-cutter approach.  Life is messy and relationships are anything but predictable.  Therefore, where there are cases of abuse, emotional or physical, or infidelity and the like we must guard against making blanket judgments or one-size-fits-all fixes.   If you leave here thinking Paul, or your pastor, would say to an abused spouse that you just need to respect your husband or love your wife in this or that way or following these steps will make you and God happy than you have missed the point.   End of commercial.

 

I think Paul would have made a great psychotherapist.  And why shouldn’t he?  He is writing under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, our Creator, the one who knows us better than we know ourselves.  2000 years ago Paul nails the deep, primal need of both male and female.   Wives, he says, respect your husband.  Husbands, he says, love your wives.  Wives, in the same way you are subject to the Lord, be so with your husband.  Husbands, in the same way Christ loved the church, love your wife.   As is usually the case when I open the Scriptures this passage confronted me.  The trials my own marriage has faced recently are a direct result of my failure to love my wife as Christ has loved the Church.  I have not loved her sacrificially.   I have not loved her as I love myself.  It is for this reason that this sermon has not been an easy one for me to preach but it is one I had to preach.  I want you to know that I am preaching every bit as much to myself, even more so, than I am to all of you today.   My prayer is that in some small way God will honor this and bless us all through the cleansing power of his Word.  

 

There have been countless books written that try to explain the differences between men and women.   We observe that Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus or we read about the 5 love languages or, God forbid, we glean 9 strategies to get your man’s heart from the cover of Cosmo – all of them fall flat, however, unless we begin here:  Respect and Love – the primal need of women and men.   Women, if you wonder where the knight in shining armor you married went, let him overhear you bragging about him to one of your girlfriends.   I promise you he’ll turn into a king before your eyes.   Husbands, if you wonder where the princess you married hid, sacrifice something important to you to show how much of a priority she is and watch her blossom. 

 

Of course we can only be responsible for our side of the plate.  Husbands, if we are not being respected perhaps it is because we are not first being loving.  Wives, if you are not feeling loved, perhaps it is because you are not first being respectful.   When wives respect their husbands and husband’s love their wives each is having their deepest need met.    The key to motivating your spouse is to meet their deepest needs.   

 

What if my spouse does not deserve my respect or my love?  I think this is why Paul is so quick to point both wives and husbands to Jesus throughout this passage.  Our example is not other people or other great marriages but Christ himself.   Therefore, perhaps we need to change our thinking.  Perhaps we need to think of respect and love like we think of grace.  It’s a gift.  It’s not deserved.    Remember, Christ died for us while we were sinners. We didn’t deserve it.  The respect and love we show one another is not because we merit it, not because we deserve it, but because Christ first loved us.    

 

Let’s go a little deeper, shall we?   In verse 31 Paul says a man leaves his father and mother and is joined with his wife, making the two become one flesh.  In vs. 32 Paul says he is applying this to Christ and the church, calling it a “great mystery.”   I want to offer some reflections on this “mystery” Paul speaks of.   

For me, this conjures up images of the kenotic (emptying) hymn found in Philippians 2.   This hymn speaks to the way Jesus emptied himself for our sake.   Paul writes,

“Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness.  And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death – even death on a cross.”  

 

In the same way Jesus left the Father, or we might say, he did not cleave to what was rightfully his, but rather emptied himself and gave himself even to the point of death to you and I, Paul says we are to leave our mothers and fathers and join ourselves to our wives so that two shall become one flesh.  

 

Consider the importance of this with me for a moment.  Paul says that a husband and wife  will become one flesh.  He then applies this truth to Christ and the Church.   In some mysterious way, Paul informs us, Jesus and the Church (the body of believers) are one flesh in the same way that a husband and wife ought to be one flesh.  In the same way a husband and wife are joined together, so too is Christ and those who believe on Christ.  If this is true, than it is also true that the ease with which we dissolve the one we dissolve the other.   The ease with which we dissolve the union of husband and wife reflects our lack of conviction that Christ and the Church are really one.   Our low view of marriage, our refusal to live sacrificially within it and the ease with which we flee from it when it appears to no longer meet our own selfish desires reflects our true convictions about Christ and his Church.   Likewise, our low view of church, our refusal to live sacrificially within it and the ease with which we flee from it when it appears to no longer meet our own selfish desires reflects our true convictions about marriage.   

 

If I truly believed that my wife was part of my very own flesh how differently might I serve her?  If I truly believed that my Lord Jesus was part of your very flesh, that my Savior was ever present in the bones and blood of the people that make up his Church, how differently might I serve you?   How differently might we serve one another?  How different might our mission be to the community and the world if we truly believed that the One who so loved the world that he gave his own life to save the world was joined to our flesh and bones and what the world sees the Church do or not do, they see Jesus do or not do?   Perhaps we should not expect to find power in the Church to change lives, let alone the world, because we have long ceased to expect to find power, life changing power, in the joining of flesh between husband and wife.   If we come to a place where we feel there is no hope for our marriage than are we not also saying there is no hope for the Church?   

 

Thanks be to God, we are not left hopeless!   A moment ago I read to you only the first half of the Kenotic Hymn.   I stopped at the cross, where Jesus, who is joined to the Church, was left hanging – lifeless, joyless, hopeless.    Now, hear the rest of the story, the Good News:   

Therefore God also highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess  that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.  

 

God did not allow death to have the final word.  God breathed new life into the tomb Easter morning.   God can and desires to breath new life into our marriages.  Following the Kenotic Hymn Paul goes on to say, “It is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”   Perhaps even now, wives, you sense a desire, a will, to respect your husband even when he does not deserve it.   Perhaps even now, husbands, you sense a desire, a will, to love and cherish your wife sacrificially, even if it means your own life, even when she may not be deserving of your love.   That desire does not come from yourself but from God.   It is the Holy Spirit speaking to your heart.  The same God who rose Christ from the dead is the same God who now gives you this desire, but also the power, enabling you, Scripture says, “to work.”   We cannot work this alone.  

 

In an attempt to keep any of us from feeling isolated as we strive to make our marriages mirror the marriage Christ has with the church, I have a proposal:  I ask you to join me in a challenge beginning today until the end of the year where wives commit to showing respect to their husbands and husbands commit to showing sacrificial love to their wives.   I am calling this the “Loving you ‘In Christ’” challenge, since one of the central themes of Ephesians is recognizing we are all “in Christ” and learning how to live in that reality.   The “not alone” component will be carried out online, on our church website, where you will find a transcript for this sermon and can share your own ideas as well as success stories with others in the comments section.   You may do so anonymously if you wish.   By “ideas” I mean you may wish to share what you did that showed your husband in a special way that you respect him and husbands you can share ideas of how you showed your wife she is loved.   I hope you will prayerfully consider entering into this challenge with me.   

 

Any work worth doing requires nourishment.  The Lord’s Supper is a constant reminder to us that the flesh of Christ is joined to the flesh of the Church – to you and I.   There is power here.  Paul calls what happens here a great mystery – and indeed it is.   Here we receive food for the journey.  Here we are reminded that we are not alone.   Brothers and sisters, husbands and wives, this is our altar call.   As we share in the life, death and resurrection of our Lord, if God has placed a desire on your heart I invite you to fan the flame.  You are welcome to kneel and pray, to rest in the arms of our Father who in beginning a good work in you promises to be faithful and true to complete it.   

**Please use the comments section to share how you have shown respect or love to your spouse (feel free to comment anonymously).   How did you do it?  What was his or her response?  What impact has it had on your marriage?   

Back to School Pizza Party!

Don’t forget that this Wednesday night from 6:30-8PM we will have a back to school pizza party at the Holtz house.   Parents are welcome to stick around and eat, play, or whatever!

Please let me know by lunch time Wednesday if you plan on attending so I know how many pizzas to get.

Also, this past Sunday’s sermon is online.   It was a joy to worship with you all this past week.   I hope you encountered God as I did.    

Let Us Bow Our Knees To The Father

I Pledge Allegiance…

Friends, I have wrestled over sharing this with you. I know some of you may not be ready to hear this word.  Some of you perhaps are ready, especially those who have been going through our study of Revelation this summer.   I share this as a means to offer a different perspective as we enter into the celebrations for this weekend.   I also share this as one who has served in the military for 8 years and has given much thought and reflection over the differences between gratitude for something (we should always be ready to give thanks and praise to God for our many blessings) and allegiance to something.   They are very different.   And so I offer this from my heart in the hopes that it can lead to fruitful discussion (please feel free to comment!) and perhaps lead us all into deeper conformity to Christ, the head of our Church.    Grace and peace to you all!  

 

Another civic holiday is upon us, the Fourth of July, and churches all across America will once more bring into question their allegiances.  Many churches will deck themselves in red, white and blue while parading the flag down the center aisle only to then direct everyone’s attention to it as they pledge their loyalty.  And few will see little problem with that.

I have been teaching the book of Revelation to an adult class at church.  Many of the chapters I have written study notes that can be found on this blog.  It is impossible to walk away from a study of Revelation without engaging questions about empire and the church’s collusion with her.  At nearly every turn in Revelation we find John, the Pastor, asking his churches, “Where does your allegiance lie?  With Rome or with the Lamb?”

The first century church was faced with some interesting dilemmas.  They were becoming increasingly non-Jewish which served to bring them under Roman scrutiny (Rome gave certain allowances to Judaism simply because they had a penchant for things that were ancient).  Christians were not Jews and yet they were also not part of the many Roman mystery religions, causing them to stand out like a sore thumb.

In Rome there were certain codes the citizens were expected to live by.  This way of life was known as the Mos Maiorum, or the “customs of the ancestors.”    Within this code of life was a practice called pietas, or offering proper respect and honor to the gods and goddesses of Roman civic life.   Pietas was shown in a number of ways, from attending celebrations in honor of Caesar, attending the games, partaking of the market economy, offering incense and offerings to the various gods, attending religious cultic festivals and so forth.   While Jews were exempt from these practices and allowed to practice their religion (so long as they did not cause trouble and paid their taxes to Rome), Christians, who were no longer protected under the umbrella of Judaism, were becoming increasingly suspect.   Don’t they want peace?  Don’t they want things to go well for Rome? According to the Roman tradition, things would go well with Rome so long as the citizens adhered to the Mos Maiorum, and especially observed pietas. When things went badly with Rome, even natural disasters such as earthquakes, famines, floods or fires, guess who got blamed?   The Christians who were not properly honoring the gods.

Life in the 1st century for a Christian was not particularly easy given this context.   It is quite natural for the people to ask their pastor, “What if we just offered a small offering on our way out of church to one of the temple gods?  What if we just attended a festival now and then honoring Caesar?  What if we just blended in a little bit, offering some small example of pietas so that we don’t get in trouble with Rome?”    Their pastor is uncompromising in his answer:  NO!   In fact, he calls the entire system that is trying to seduce them into thinking they are safe under it’s wings a beast from the pits of hell – a drunken, blood-thirsty whore who cannot and will not give life but only death and destruction.    It is a beast that has come from hell and will return there.   As such, he warns his flock in the seven churches, “Come out of her!”  There is no refuge there, John assures them, but only death.  John’s thrust throughout Revelation is an attempt to shock the church out of her complacency while also reassuring them that God, not Caesar, is on the throne.

There is a certain Mos Maiorum that exists in our culture today.  A certain pietas that is expected of citizens of this country we are at present blessed to live in.   Our pietasis not offering sacrifices to mystery gods or attending festivals honoring Caesar but being a good patriot, serving in the military, waving our American flag at home and in church, singing national anthems and of course, saying the pledge of allegiance whenever the flag is raised.    To not do any of these things will provoke a curious stare at best and outright anger and hostility at worst.   Don’t you want peace? Don’t you want things to go well for America?  Are you not a patriot? Recently I heard that a pastor told a congregation at a funeral that all Christians are patriotic Americans.   This is a problem if we are to take the Revelation of Jesus Christ seriously.  We have become a nation that has been baptizing people into becoming good citizens rather than disciples of Jesus Christ.

As we approach the Fourth of July churches across the nation will have a choice to make.  They, just like the people of John’s churches in the 1st century, will have to decide where their allegiance lies.   People in pews throughout America will be asking, “Isn’t it OK to offer just a little offering to the country?  Isn’t it OK to pledge my allegiance to something other than Christ just this one time?   What’s so bad about that?” Again, John’s answer, if we are to take the testimony of scripture seriously, is NO!   You cannot serve two masters, John would tell us.   Our allegiance is either to the Lamb of God or it is to something else entirely, something John describes as a beast, the whore of Babylon.

So I will refrain from pledging my allegiance to a flag or anything other than Christ this year.   Not because I feel that love of country is wrong or sinful (it is perfectly OK to have certain loves, and certainly OK to be a good citizen, and it is certainly OK to be very thankful and grateful for the freedoms we have and the people that made, and make, that possible) but because I feel a line is crossed when we move from love to allegiance.   So rather than allegiance to a flag or a nation I want to offer my own rendition of a pledge, one that I think the Pastor, Prophet and Poet John would give his consent to.   Would you join me in this pledge?

I pledge allegiance to the Lamb who sits upon the throne and to the Kingdom for which he stands.   Heaven and Earth, reconciled to God, in ministry and service to all.

Landmark Quartet and Church Picnic!

This Sunday will be a time of worship and praise as we are visited by the Landmark Quartet during our 11AM service.   Following the service we will have an outdoor picnic!   If you are a church member please bring a dish, dessert and/or some iced tea.    

This is a great opportunity to invite your friends to church!   

Looking forward to seeing you all Sunday.

Reflections on Revelation 12 and 13

Revelation 12 & 13 

 

INTRO

• Chapter 11 ends with the seventh trumpet.  The Kingdom has been established, God’s enemies are defeated, judgment has been pronounced and punishment dispensed and rewards given. But John is not ready to have the final curtain call.   The next few chapters unfold in a different way the struggle between God and evil.  
• The specific evil that is manifested here is the conflict between the church and the Roman Empire.   For John and his readers, the Roman Empire, with its claims to divinity, have become the incarnation of evil.  
• More than any other chapters in Revelation these are the most misinterpreted, misused and abused.  Nowhere else in the whole book does John draw so heavily on Jewish as well as other pagan myths that dominated the political world of his day

 

THE GREAT DRAGON (12:1-18)

 

Roman Myth:  Goddess Leto becomes pregnant by the god Zeus.   Child to be born is Apollo.   The great dragon, Python, learns that the soon-to-be-born child will one day kill him, and so he sought to kill Leto and the baby.   Poseidon, the god of the sea, intervened and protected Leto by carrying her to safety at the island of Delos and hid Leto by sinking the island under the sea.  Python gave up his search, Apollo was born who one day pursued Python and killed him.  

 

• Roman emperors used this myth to perpetuate their own propaganda, presenting themselves as Apollo, the destroyer of evil.  
• Recall that the Emperor Domitian, whom is believed to be the emperor in power when John is writing this, thought himself to be the incarnation of Apollo.  
• John redresses this pagan myth with Christian imagery.  Instead of Apollo being the one who defeats evil it is Jesus, the one who would “rule all the nations.”   
• The woman has been interpreted through history to be Mary the mother of Jesus,  the nation of Israel and the faithful Christians through all time.  All of these can fit.   Remember that Herod pursues Mary and baby Jesus when he is born, causing them to flee to Egypt.  Israel is the nation from whom the Messiah is born and faithful Christians have long been subject to the “evil one,” even being martyred for their faith.

 

Satan – Evil 

 

This chapter forces us to face squarely the reality of evil in our world.   John uses imaginative language to describe evil which may be both good and bad for us today.   Some possible dangers of the notion of Satan, at least as popularly held, carries some risks:  

1. Belief in a powerful, supernatural being of evil verges on denying the oneness of God.  Biblical religion is monotheistic (the belief in one and only one God).   Popular views of Satan produces an alternative god – an evil god that exists apart from the one true God.  One of the major themes of Revelation is that there is no God but God alone and all other pretenders (nation, emperor, angels, etc) are to be rejected.
2. Speaking of evil in terms of a Satan figure can easily lead to a failure to recognize our own responsibility for evil.  We resort to excuses like, “The Devil made me do it.”   Pointing the finger is as old as Adam and Eve.  Adam blames Eve, Eve blames the serpent.   To blame another or even Satan is an indication of our own moral weakness and sinfulness.    
3. Another problem is that it may lead us to “satanize” any person or institution that seems to operate contrary to the ways of God.  Once we label someone or some thing as in “league with Satan” it can become easy to rationalize our hatred of them and actions towards them.  We can demonize our enemies and rather than love them and pray for them we see them as pawns and less than human.  
4. We can fail to recognize the human face of evil.  Evil comes in human form – it is our refusal of God in our lives.  Evil is the result of living an idolatrous life – putting something else or someone else before God.   Evil has less to do with a literal Satan figure and more to do with the image I see in the mirror.  

 

• The purpose John has for telling the church about this cosmic battle with evil is not only to make them aware that it is real but to remind them that they (and we!) have an important role to play in the ongoing struggle against it.  There is a war on, a cosmic battle against evil, and we, the Church, are on the front lines.  We are called to “be conquerers” (Rev. 2-3).  We conquer, however, not by violence but by faithfulness to the testimony of Jesus, which means faithfulness to his sacrificial, self-giving lifestyle.  We bow to the slaughtered Lamb. 

 

CHAPTER 13:  THE TWO BEASTS

 

INTRO: At it’s core, this chapter is about the struggle over authority and loyalty.  Who is ultimately in charge of the world – Satan and his cohorts or God?  To whom do we owe our allegiance?  

 

The Beast of the Sea (13:1-10)

• As will become clear here and in chapter 17, the beast represents the Roman Empire and its emperors.   “On its heads were blasphemous names” (13:1) is likely a reference to the divine titles emperors gave themselves such as “savior,” “lord,” “god,” or “son of god.”  
• The Imperial Cult 
  • Temple priests facilitated emperor worship in all the cities of Revelation.  They held festivals to honor the emperors and their families.  To be part of the civic and social life of this day and age was to take part in these activities.   The question that confronted the Christians of this day (and our day!) is “To what extent can we be involved in the imperial cult ceremonies and still be true to our Christian convictions?”  
• Parodies – both beasts (from the sea and the earth) are parodies of Christ.   John is showing how these beasts rely on Satan (evil) for their strength.   Christ, however, the Lamb, speaks the words of God whereas the beasts speak “like a dragon” (Satan).    
• The beasts represent anything and anyone who encourages and fosters emperor worship.  Eugene Boring writes, “All who support and promote the cultural religion, in or out of church, however Lamb-like they may appear, are agents of the beast.  All propaganda that entices humanity to idolize human empire is an expression of this beastly power that wants to appear Lamb-like.”  

 

The Mark

• The mark of the beast is a parody of the mark given to the faithful (7:1-8).  The followers of the beast are marked indicating to whom their loyalties lie.  
• Who is the one marked 666?   John says it will take wisdom to discern this person.  Presumably, then, it is a person the people in the churches he is writing to will know.   Hebrew and Greek letters (like Arabic letters) have a numerical number assigned to them.   This is called gematria, a practice widely used in the ancient world.   666, when transliterated using gematria, gives us the name Nero, the emperor that for Christians in the 1st century was the embodiment of evil.   Nero is infamous for crucifying Christians around the palace, lighting them on fire to use as lighting during parties.   

 

CONNECTIONS 

1. In the cult of the emperor in John’s day, religion, politics and nationalism were all intermixed.  When offering or incense or sacrifice were made to the emperor (or to the gods on behalf of the emperor), the participant was expressing loyalty to the emperor and empire, as well as trying to get favor from the gods.  
2. Modern example of rendering to Caesar that which rightfully belongs only to God alone can be found in abundance.  Christians and churches gave allegiance to Hitler in his efforts to unify Germany, even at the expense of Jews and other “undesirables.”  Anything for the Fatherland! they cried.  In South Africa the Dutch Reform Church were supporters of government’s racist apartheid actions.   In America, the church has often rallied around the nation in times of war, demonizing our enemies and portraying them as godless subhumans who must be destroyed.  
3. Rev. 13 reminds us that no person or institution, not even family, deserve our ultimate allegiance.  God alone deserve our allegiance.  Every individual or group that lays claim to our allegiance has the potential of becoming “the great beast” that demands to be worshipped and kills those who refuse.

 

Reflect:  What things, groups or people might we give more allegiance to than we ought?  

  How might our church make it very clear that our allegiance is to God alone?  

 

Reflections from Conference: June 11, 2009

Thursday was a wonderful day for holy conferencing.  If you read yesterday’s reflections (which I wrote in the morning, recounting Wednesday’s meetings) I mentioned what holy conferencing is.  I had no idea that such good, worshipful work would be done as the day progressed.   Allow me mention a few highlights that stood out for me.

• The Bible study in the morning was done by Rev. Grace Hackney.  Many of you will remember her from the Community Garden DVD I showed at church a few weeks ago (she is the pastor at Cedar Grove UMC in Durham which started a community garden).   The theme for our conference, and her bible study, was “A Future With Hope.”   She led us through scripture to show how God is always the God of new beginnings and the God of hope, even in the face of exile, despair, turmoil.   She asked us to imaging two images to describe our churches…

1. The first image is a bunch of grapes.   A bunch of grapes is vibrant, full, juicy.   They are tethered together on an arbor.  The root of the vine that the grapes are attached to is rooted deep in the ground, with the branches of the vine extending out, wrapping and twining around the arbor which is shaped as a cross.   This is one image of the church – a people bunched together, vibrant, tethered to the cross and planted there by her gardner – God.  
2. The second image of the church is a box of raisins.  Raisins are lumped together in a box. Raisins are unable to reproduce – they are dried up grapes.  You cannot plant a raisin and expect it to grow.  Raisins just sit around in the sun long enough to be dried up, to be closed into their box, secluded from the sunlight and the vine.   

Churches will vacillate between these two images, sometimes looking and acting like a bunch of grapes and other times looking and acting like a package of raisins.    For those of us who feel like raisins we are reminded of the prophet Ezekiel asking God, “Can these dry bones live?”    God’s answer:  Yes!!!     (see Ezekiel 37).

I, all of us, should ask ourselves:  Am I living as a grape or a raisin?   Is our church a vibrant bunch of grapes spilling out into the world or a box of raisins?   This is not just a question to ask today, but every day of our lives.   

• Our business sessions can sometimes feel more like a corporate enterprise than a theological and worshipful time.   Certainly this can be true when it comes time to talk about salaries.  The equitable compensation committee presented their report with a recommendation to raise the minimum salaries for pastors (including student pastors), which is fairly standard year after year.  Perhaps taking our cues from the council of bishops who determined on their own to take a salary roll-back, taking the salaries they had in 2008, the clergy (and myself) rose to the floor during this session to argue that we would not accept a salary increase this year as a show of solidarity with the people of our churches who are losing jobs or suffering financially during these troubling economic times.   

             Friends, this amendment to the committee’s recommendation excited me.   This is just one of the many ways we live out our faith in a world that has very different values.   In a world that tells us to get all you can, the Church lives by a very different model:  The sacrificial Lamb who gave all he could.   Just this morning I saw a car with an advertisement pasted to its door that read, “Are you living your dream life?  Take back your life and take control of your income!”    Christians see a problem with this philosophy.   Our lives are not ours to “take.”   They are gifts from our Father in heaven.   Jesus taught that to be the greatest we must be the servant of all, to be first we must be last, to give of ourselves to others even to the point of laying down our lives.    It was a joy for me to stand in solidarity with fellow clergy all over North Carolina who sent a message to our churches and to the world that we live by a different standard.    Praise God!  

I am going to pause here.  There is much more that could be shared from this wonderful day.    It is now Friday morning and in just a little while we will be voting on the constitutional amendments that the General Conference of 2008 drafted.   These are 32 amendments that carry a lot of weight and, if passed, will change some rather important things.   I’ll share more on this later.    

Looking forward to worshipping with you all on Sunday.

grace and peace,

Chad

Reflections from Conference: Wednesday, June 10

Conference is a time to which I always look forward.  In the tradition of John Wesley we try to take to heart the notion of “holy conferencing.”   What is that?  Well, it is take seriously that we have been “set apart” (holy) to do the work of God.   Even mundane tasks such as debating amendments, voting, discussing budgets, etc. can be holy times – times where we intentionally consider that the work we do here is not for ourselves but for the kingdom of God.  

Of course, I also like Conference because right around the corner is a Krispy Kreme  My marathon training may take a back seat for the next few days!  

Our first day began with Bishop Al Gwinn giving a state of the church address.  The title of his address was “Your God is Too Small.”  By this he meant that the “biggest challenge for the Church today is to let God be God.”  The bishop challenged us to live into the mission statement for the Annual Conference which is, “healthy churches and effective leaders in every place making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.”   There is much to celebrate in our churches where we see transformation taking place and passionate disciples for Jesus Christ coming together with a clear sense of purpose for their local church.  There are also many challenges.    In what ways will we let God be God of our lives, our relationships, our churches, our careers, our finances, our dreams, or any other area of our life?  

I learned something fascinating.   North Carolina is the 4th fastest growing state in the Union (behind only Utah, Arizona and Texas).  We are the 10th largest state in the Union.  A recent Gallup poll showed that an astonishing 70% of the people in our society (nation wide) attend church less than 6 times a year!   For us in North Carolina, one of the fastest growing states, it means that more and more of our neighbors are unchurched.    We live in a culture that is changing and our churches need to wake up to the reality around us or we will slowly die.   

One of the efforts the United Methodist Church is putting forward to reach out to a world that is more and more “unchurched” is a new campaign called Rethink Church.  I invite you to check out what this is about by going to the website by clicking HERE.  Onc of the more compelling lines of this message for me is, “What if church wasn’t a place we go but something we do?  What if church wasn’t a noun but a verb?”    For me, this challenges us to be a church that does not just meet Sunday.  Rather, we are the church all week long and come together on Sunday to share in our joys and concerns, be encouraged and nourished through our prayers, praise, offerings, hearing the Word and breaking bread together for the transformation of the world in Jesus Christ.   How might we invite others to be part of this?

As we consider how to be church in a changing world, a world that is more and more “unchurched,” what will be your role?   It is not a question of whether or not we are called into ministry.  The question for all of us is, “Which ministry is God calling me to?”   

Stay tuned for more reflections from Conference.  

Grace and peace to you.

Dancing With God: Trinity Sunday

We began our service today watching this video (you’ll have to forgive the title – the content is redeeming  )

Below are some of my reflections on the idea of “dancing with God.”  Some of this came out in the sermon this morning.

Gregory of Nanzianzus used the term perichoresis, an image of a dance, to describe the mysterious union of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.   Clark Pinnock, in his wonderful bookFlame of Love, writes, 

The metaphor suggests moving around, making room, relating to one another without losing identity.  The divine unity lies in the relationality of Persons, and the relationality is the nature of the unity.  At the heart of this ontology is the mutuality and reciprocity among the Persons.  Trinity means that shared life is basic to the nature of God.  God is perfect sociality, mutuality, reciprocity and peace.  As a circle of loving relationships, God is dynamically alive.  There is only one God, but this one God is not solitary but a loving communion that is distinguished by overflowing life (31).  

Pinnock is focused primarily on the Holy Spirit in this particular book and goes on to say that the Spirit is the “ecstasy” of God’s Triune life.  The term ecstasy means to “stand outside oneself.”  Thus, it is the Spirit that makes the “triune life an open circle and a source of pure abundance” (38).  The Spirit is the creative juice of the Trinity. Pinnock writes, 

The Spirit is essentially the serendipitous power of creativity, which flings out a world in ecstasy and simulates within it an echo of the inner divine relationships, ever seeking to move God’s plans forward (21). 

It is important to begin here because there is no God outside of this.  God is God as revealed to us in this way – as Father, Son and Holy Spirit in loving, mutual, intentional relationality.  The Persons of the trinity are caught up in an eternal dance of reciprocity so intertwined that at times it may seem difficult to tell who is who.   They move with such choreographed harmony.  The love emanating from within cannot help but create, and so, the Spirit “flings” out new worlds because it is the nature of love not to harbor and hoard but to expand and create.  

What does this mean for us?  God has from the beginning been wooing creation to dance.  The community of God desires community with us.  You and I are being courted.  The love that created us and our world is the same love that desires to be in fellowship with us.   Those of us who have responded to the wooing of God, the Church, are then called to reflect this perichoretic ecstasy of our God to the world.  When we worship in “spirit and truth” we appear to the world to be united as one, bound by love, dancing in harmony and flinging out new creation from within our midst.  A church in step with the Triune God is a church that does not hoard what it has to herself but, like the day of Pentecost, bursts through the doors of sanctuary to enter into a world full of possibilities.   We call others to dance with us.   

Our worship ought to reflect this dance.  If I were designing a sanctuary today I would be sure to place the baptismal font at the entrance to our sanctuary.   In this way, we are reminded both as we enter and as we leave that we are children of God the Father, that we are in covenant with this God and that through the waters of baptism we have been immersed into new life – we are new creatures!    The saints gathered enter through the waters and are then greeted by the Lord’s Table, the altar, which is front and center.   It is here, in the Eucharist,that Jesus the Son of God has promised to meet us.  At his feet we lay down the idols that have cluttered our imaginations and feast on real sustenance, the body and blood of our Lord.   Here we confess our sins, make peace with God and neighbor, find forgiveness and nourishment.   We are once more filled with the Holy Spirit and empowered for ministry, so that as we pass by the waters once again we are flung out into the world to be dancers, to be ambassadors of Jesus Christ to invite others to enter this dance between Font, Table and Creation.

This is what this dance might look like for the church….

What a joy it is to be invited to dance with God. 

Benediction:  May the waters of baptism you just touched remind you today that you are a cherished child of God. May the supper we just ate remind you that you are redeemed and nourished by the blood of the Lamb. And may all of Creation remind you that the Holy Spirit has invited you to dance. Let’s dance.

Revelation Reflections: Chapters 10 & 11

 

REFLECTIONS : REVELATION 10 & 11

 

*Once more I am indebted to Mitchell Reddish and his commentary on Revelation for much of the information found here.

 

CHAPTER 10

 

• Verse 7 reads: “but in the days when the seventh angel is to blow his trumpet, the mystery of God will be fulfilled, as he announced to his servants the prophets.”  
  • We are given an important nugget of information here!  The “mystery of God” will be fulfilled when the seventh angel blows his trumpet.  
  • We don’t have to wait long to have the mystery of God revealed to us.  Rev. 11:15-19 is the story of what happens when the 7th trumpet is sounded (7, once again, means completion or wholeness).   Here we learn that judgment has passed, the saints are vindicated and praising God and the Lord is on the throne over all the “heavens and earth” and every nation.    
  • Is this the end?   It seems like it is.  We get a snapshot at the end of chapter 11 of God’s completed work on earth.   It is like one version of the end and then, come chapter 12, John will further describe the scene we just witnessed with the 7 trumpets being blown.   This should caution us against reading Revelation chronologically, as if John is dictating a series of events that unfold in a particular, linear order.

 

 

 

 

• Verse 4 reads: And when the seven thunders had sounded, I was about to write, but I heard a voice from heaven saying, ‘Seal up what the seven thunders have said, and do not write it down.
  • John is kept from writing something down
  • Humanity does not discover God;  God reveals God’s self to the world.  The title of this book is “Revelation,” a reminder that the understanding of God John communicates is God-given and not something John (or any human) can devise themselves.  We only know God insofar as God allows God’s self to be known.
  • Some aspects of God are to remain hidden or undisclosed to humanity.  Failure to recognize that we cannot and will not know God fully is a failure to recognize a distinction between Creator and creature.  
  • This reminder to us ought to make us humble.   All our efforts to speak about God are limited and partial at best.  None of us should ever claim to know “fully.”  
  • The mystery of God should be part of our worship.   When we become to “chummy” with God we may be in danger of reducing God to just a bigger, better us.  God is not like us.  God is wholly other than us.   While God has come near to us in Jesus Christ and abides in and with us through the Holy Spirit, we should hold this in tension with the fact that God transcends God’s creation.   We should be in awe of this God.  

 

• Verse 9 reads: So I went to the angel and told him to give me the little scroll; and he said to me, ‘Take it, and eat; it will be bitter to your stomach, but sweet as honey in your mouth.’
  • First, this is John’s commissioning as a prophet in the same vein as Ezekiel (see Ezek. 2:1-3:11).  The task to proclaim God’s word can be sweet at times but can also be bitter.  Eugene Boring writes, “Every person who struggles to preach and teach the word of God knows this taste, this satisfaction, and this sickness in their stomach.”  
  • Second, to speak the word of God (to live the word of God) can be both sweet and bitter.  There are times we can feel the joys and sweetness of life with God and other times when we will feel the sharp sting of bitterness.   Life with God is not about making our bed in roses.    As John well knows, it can cost us our very lives.  

 

CHAPTER 11

 

• The seventh trumpet brings about celebration and praise, not woeful events.   This is the culmination of God’s plan!   Rejoice!  
• In the second half of Revelation John will clarify who “those who destroy the earth” are.   We will see they are the dragon, the beasts and those who follow them.  
• Chapter 11 starts out with John measuring the temple. 
  • A reminder that even in the midst of chaos, difficulties and uncertainties, God is still central, alive, active and on the throne.  We have picture of sanctuary painted for us in the middle of judgment and chaos.   
• The Two Witnesses
  • Reminds us that the cost of being a faithful witness for Christ can be very costly – even costing us our very lives.
  • Authentic witnessing involves not just witnessing “to” but also witnessing “against.”   Reddish writes, “The true witness is the one who is willing to confront the power structures and the power brokers, to challenge the system when it demoralizes, demeans and crushes the innocent” (224).   Such witnessing can be dangerous (consider Martin Luther King Jr).  
  • Where in our communities does an authentic Christian voice need to be heard?  Who will be willing to confront the beasts of modern society with the message of God?  
• Celebrate 
  • The chapter ends with joyous song and praise.   How can we celebrate when evil has not yet been eradicated?   We live in an age where the evils of the world are all too readily apparent.  The Church is composed of people who see the world differently.  We were once blind but now we see.   The Church points to a future hope where God will make all things new.  Even in the face of evil we can celebrate, for we know who is on the throne.   
  • We celebrate what is already begun with us and in us.  The Church should be a place where the “kingdoms of the world” are not found but a people being transformed into the “kingdom of God.”   
  • When we pray, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done” we are placing ourselves under God’s sovereign rule.  We should not pray this lightly.   Praying this is to ask God to bring God’s sovereignty (which includes God’s justice, of course) not just into the world but into our own lives.   
    • Are we willing to relinquish all control, all claims to power, all prestige and dominance to the one who is Lord and sits on the throne?   

 

Trinity Sunday

Hi Friends,

Tomorrow is Trinity Sunday, a day where we celebrate the God who calls us into eternal Community with God and each other. It is also Peace with Justice Sunday where we pause to recognize and pray for those hurting around the world through war and injustices.

As part of our service we will be celebrating communion as well as having a special time of remembrance around the baptismal font. I have a special time planned for us that will highlight God’s 3-in-1 nature and how that is reflected in us as a church. I hope you will be in prayer for our church and that the Holy Spirit will visit us in a transformative way in our worship.

Please be reminded that I will be in the sanctuary from 9:20-9:40 praying for you and for our church as we prepare to worship. You are welcome to join me. Please remember that if you come to Sunday school early (before 9:40) to use the education building entrance until we are finished praying.

If you are in my Revelation class we will be tackling chapters 10 and 11 tomorrow. You may want to read over those two chapters this evening if you haven’t already. Next week we will do chapters 12-14. Looking forward to our time together! 

grace and peace.