The Emerywood Pulpit
“Loving Self…It’s Not What You Think”
Romans 13: 8-10

January 26th, 2014

Do you love yourself?  I’ll bet you never thought you would hear that question in church — and said positively. This concept is not something I ever heard as a young boy growing up in a Southern Baptist Church.  I heard “deny yourself,” “sacrifice yourself,” “surrender to Jesus” and phrases such as these.  Over and over we heard these words of Jesus as if they were the only words he ever said:  “If any would come after me let them deny themselves, take up their cross, and follow me.”  Again and again these words came ringing from one pulpit or lectern after another.  The idea we heard was that as humans we already “loved ourselves” too much — and what we needed was to get a focus for our lives that was greater than our “self.”  The primary sin of humans, we were told, was that we were selfish and egotistical — and if we were to know true happiness then we would sacrifice ourselves, our desires and our ambitions on the cross of Jesus Christ.
Then, in the 1970’s a concept started floating around some of the churches and youth gatherings, based on a popular book entitled “I’m O.K., You’re O.K.”  This concept was that a healthy person was one who had a healthy sense of self.  After all, we were created by God and, as one famous slogan went, “God don’t make no junk.”  Grounded in psychology, the understanding was that if we had a good sense of self, then we would be much more likely to make good choices and have good lives.  If we had a negative sense of self then we would be more likely to make negative choices and live out those consequences.
From that point onward, the battle raged — and did it ever.  Depending on the pastor and the church one would hear sermons proclaiming each as the gospel and the other as the embodiment of evil, itself.  The word “confusion” does not even begin to do justice to what happened to lay people as they heard both sides of this issue.  Do I love myself or do I hate myself?  Do you have to be a schizophrenic in order to be a Christian — at one point loving and another hating yourself?
It is my belief that Christ intends for us to love ourselves, but that self-love is not what we usually think.  Self-love is not egotism — thinking that we are better, smarter, or more beautiful than other persons.  Self-love is not self-centeredness — thinking that the universe revolves around us and our wants and desires. Self-love is not self-esteem — feeling good about ourselves.  There are times when, because of our actions, we need to not feel good about ourselves even though we love ourselves. In fact, egotism, self-esteem and self-centeredness are prescriptions for making your life miserable. 
Do you want to know how to make yourself miserable.  It’s easy, really nothing to it:
"Think about yourself. Talk about yourself. Use "I" as often as possible. Mirror yourself continually in the opinion of others…Expect to be appreciated. Be suspicious. Be jealous and envious. Be sensitive to slights. Never forgive a criticism. Trust nobody but yourself. Insist on consideration and respect. Demand agreement with your own views on everything. Sulk if people are not grateful to you for favors shown them. Never forget a service you have rendered…”
Self-love means that we know, care, respect, and take responsibility for our self. As healthy individuals we only have one self.  If we do not take care of our self, then who will?
Self-love begins with self-knowledge, i.e., an understanding of ourselves, who we are, our likes and dislikes, as well as our strengths and weaknesses.  The ancient Greeks had an adage, “know thyself,” which, while attributed to Socrates long predated him.  Self-knowledge is considered inimitable to a healthy personality and a successful life.  If we do not know ourselves then we will find ourselves time and again responding in wrong and immature ways — and in so doing creating difficulties for ourselves and others.  Lack of self-knowledge could and does often lead us into ventures or areas where we have little or no expertise or talent. 
What does it mean for us to “know our self?”  To begin with, it means knowing our heritage, our family of origin — that home into which we were born and where we were raised.  Nature (genetics) and nurture (environment) are major players in our development and if we are unaware of them then we will be “flying blind” in life, as it were.   Not only is this true physically, it is also true mentally and emotionally.  A great part of our attitude toward life, our personality, and our likes and dislikes is derived from these major players in our development.  Our understanding of and attitude toward God, faith, the church and religion in general is set to a large extent by our family.  Many times this is positive — but it can also be negative, especially in circumstances where the church is continually critiqued by the parents.  I have had more than one conversation through the years with adults who are reluctant to return to the church because of the great criticism they heard from their parents who faithfully attended. 
Are we aware that as humans our personality is basically set by the time we are seven years of age?  By this time our basic attitude toward life and others has been implanted within us: extrovert, introvert, trusting, non-trusting, joyful or sad — we are the way we are before we ever realize any choice in the matter.  Now, to be sure how we develop this personality — what we choose to do with it — that is ours.  The reality, however, is that our personality is set early on.  Have you ever asked yourself why you are the way you are?  How do you see life?  Is the glass half-full or half-empty?    Most of this came out of the environment of your home — you are your parents’ child, whether you like it or not.  Knowing our self is foundational to loving our self.
Once we know ourselves, then we need to respect ourselves as persons worthy of God’s image and love.  Every person — no matter their race, ethnicity, sexual identity, gender, educational level, economic standing or religion — every person is made in the image of God and is loved by God.  For most of us this is not “news,” i.e., we have heard this since we were young.  However, there are many people who, for differing reasons, have never heard this at the levels where it matters — in the depth of the soul and self-image.  In the most recent issue of Time magazine there is an excellent discussion of why persons from certain ethnic groups tend to out perform those of other groups —  particularly in the United States.  Interestingly enough, it is written by a woman whose family immigrated from India in 1977.  She notes that while “Indian Americans” had overwhelmingly succeeded in this country — 38% of all medical doctors are now of Indian origin, India remains one of the most backward and illiterate countries in the world.  Part of her conclusion is that those who come here have the family background and drive to succeed, regardless of their family of origin.
It is imperative that we help all ethnic groups to develop a positive sense of self.  Can you imagine growing up black in a world where the basic metaphor of good/evil is white as good and black as evil? Or, can you imagine growing up in poverty and being told that you are poor because you are lazy or a bad person?  Is it any wonder that many of the successful movements from churches which reach out to minority and poverty groups include self-love as a basic part of their program?  When you are told repeatedly that you are helpless and worthless, then you need someone to counter those statements and rebuild you from the inside out.
To respect ourselves means that we invest time and energy in our own personal growth and development.  Self-respect means that we look at our talents, our strengths and weaknesses — and work to develop our strengths and shore up our weaknesses.  Self-respect means that we treat others as children of God just as we require others to treat us in the same manner.  Whenever I see someone disrespecting another person, I realize that they, at bottom, do not respect themselves. 
Studies of successful executives show that they have a positive sense of self, what we would all “self-love.”  They believe in themselves and their abilities to solve whatever lies before them.  Further, they believe that they can grow and develop the talents necessary for them to be a success in life.  One of the reasons they succeed is that, since they respect themselves, they then respect others.  If we do not have a positive sense of self then we will not have a positive sense of others. 
Self-love also means that we care for ourselves, that we love our selves enough to see to our physical, emotional, and spiritual needs.  The reality is that though others will care about us at different levels, rarely will they ever care for us enough to see that our needs are met.  In really good marriages spouses do this for one another — but being fallen humans we never do this completely, even when we try.  As parents we try to provide this for our off-spring, but our children grow up, leave the nest and look to others for these needs.  The healthy person recognizes that they have needs which are important if they are to be a whole and healthy personality.
Corporations started recognizing the importance of these needs decades ago and are afar ahead of the local church in developing programs that address these needs.  For instance, we all have a need for regular periods of exercise — walking is one of the best.  If we do not set aside that time then we will discover that our bodies will deteriorate and we will pay the price.  Too many times I have watched as extremely obese persons have died way too early, all because they refused to practice a good diet and moderate exercise.  Sometimes I wonder if these people love themselves at all — or if they have a death wish?  Physical abuse of our bodies through poor diet, no exercise, smoking, alcohol abuse and failure to have regular check ups, etc., can be a poorly disguised form of self-hate or even slow suicide. 
Emotional and spiritual needs are often harder to pick up on — but are equally important.  In fact, I have discovered that these three: physical, emotional and spiritual are all interrelated.  When we are physically inactive we tend to get emotionally drained and spiritually down, often “beating ourselves up” for not being faithful, loving, obedient, etc.  Likewise, when we are emotionally down, it is hard for us to engage in regular physical activity.  We just do not “feel” like it.  Similarly, when we are in the spiritual doldrums we will fell unloved and uncared for — and think ourselves not worthy of God’s love or anyone else’s.  
Self-love also means taking responsibility for our actions and our lives.  Whenever I hear someone playing the victim card, the blame-game, over and over and over, then I know that they are in a stage of spiritual dis-ease and are neither feeling God’s love or the love of others, nor are they loving themselves.  Only those who properly exercise self-love can take responsibility for themselves and their actions, good and bad.
Self-love is not the same as self-esteem.  The focus in self-esteem is on how we feel about ourselves, not how we understand or take responsibility for ourselves.  High self-esteem persons are all about perfection — being so in love with themselves ands who they conceive themselves to be.  These persons find it impossible to admit failure or guilt, for to do so would be to admit that they were not “not perfect.” 
On the other hand, proper self-love includes an appropriate element of guilt — knowing that there are times when our actions are not what they should be.  If we have a good sense of self then we will be able to admit that we “blew it” and are in need of a “re-do.”  If we do not have a good sense of self, then we will not have the proper ego-strength to admit our failure and, in any objective sense evaluate ourselves and improve.  Taking responsibility for ourselves and our behavior is a key element in loving ourselves.  We are not perfect…we will make mistakes…and the healthy person evaluates and moves on.  The unhealthy person remains stuck in their blindness and unwillingness to see.
Rabbi Albert Freilander tells of how as a young boy in Germany during WWII he was subjected to vicious racial epithets and propaganda.  He would lie awake at night in his bed and remind himself that he was a child of God and that he was not what they claimed.  From the depths of his faith he found the where withal to maintain his personal affirmation in the face of overwhelming odds.
Why is all of this important?  Simply, if we do not properly love ourselves, then we will not be able to properly love others.  The person who is able to “love your neighbor as your self” is the person who loves their own self.  Do you love yourself?  Do you like yourself?  Do you know yourself? 
Think about this:  God loves us so much that ever since creation God has tried to reach out to us that we might live in full relationship together.  God loves us so much that God was willing to come as a full human being, Jesus the Christ, and die upon a cross for us.  If God loves us that much — would it not behoove us to love ourselves and in so doing to walk with Christ in this journey we call life?  If God loves us that much — are we not persons of worth and value to God? 
Most of us have pets…especially dogs.  We treat our dogs very, very well, do we not?  Let me ask you this week to do one thing: treat your self as well as you treat your dog.  You will be amazed at how great you will feel!
The journey with Jesus is a journey of transformation which begins with our loving God, loving our self — and then are we able to love our neighbor.  It is in our response to God’s love that we discover the strength to love ourselves. 
Thanks be to God.

The Emerywood Pulpit
“Loving Neighbor — It’s Never Easy”
Luke 10: 29-37

January 19, 2014

I don’t know about you, but quite frankly, I have a lot of sympathy for the priest and Levite.  Yes, they are portrayed as the “bad guys in this story — and to be sure they fall far short of the Good Samaritan — but think about this with me:  What did they do to deserve their portrayal?  They did not rob the traveler…they did not beat him or put him in the ditch…that just happened and in one way of thinking they came by at the wrong time.  A day earlier or later and no one would have said or expected anything.  Besides, this was dangerous territory — robbers were common on these roads.  Who is to say that there is anything wrong with looking out for one’s self in circumstances such as these?  Do we really have to stop and take care of every last person who winds up in the ditches of life?  Haven’t we really made too much of this Good Samaritan?  Do you really think that our Good Samaritan did this each and every day for each person he saw in need.  I doubt it…he would never get anything else done.
What does it mean to love our neighbor, i.e., particularly another to whom we are not related and with whom we do not have a prior relationship?  Am I really responsible for each and every needy person in the world?  With modern technology we are confronted daily with both still photographs and video of people, needy beyond measure, from around this globe.  What are we to do?  How shall we love them?  Does God really expect us to pick up every person who winds up in the ditch and get them back on their feet?  Does proximity determine love?  Does depth of need?  Do my resources?  What does love, in this context, mean, anyway?
There are four primary words for love in the New Testament:
Philia — friendship
Storge — affection
Eros — sexual love
Agape — divine love
Each of these is a proper manifestation of love in its particular setting.  With friends we have love and care that often runs deep but short of  familial. With family we have deep affection (storge), i.e., familial love that we share with those who know us best.  Eros, sexual love, is that which unites couples far beyond any other human union.  Agape — sacrificial love — is considered the apex of all human loves and the essence of divine love. Used very rarely in ancient times, it is the word that early Christians used to describe their experience of the accepting and forgiving love of God which they encountered in Jesus Christ.
In an interesting move Dr. Lewis claims that we can categorize these “loves” by their internal motivation:  need-love and gift-love.  Need-love comes out of our human frailty and emptiness, born of our insecurity and desire.  It is the most basic and most prevalent form of love which we encounter. Need-love’s best image is a circle — for it always seeks to possess and pull back into itself the object of its love.  When we say to another person, “I love you,” often what we are saying is that I need you and want you in order to complete myself. So often in marriage we see this where one spouse will say, in essence, to the other: “I will love you as long as you love me back and make me feel good about myself.  When you stop doing that…then I will stop loving.” In other words, “I love you not for who you are, but for how you make me feel about myself.”
Or, we see it in parenting where parents confuse love with control, seeking to form their child into their image, i.e., to fulfill their dreams through their child.  What looks like “pure love” is really need-love expressing itself through the lens of parental love.
The reality is that raw need-love is like a sink-hole which, on the surface looks solid, but eventually gives way and sucks all in around it.  All of our human loves, i.e., affection, friendship, and erotic love — all of these can originate in and express need-love.  If we do not recognize this in ourselves, then our loving will always be a struggle.  Unless When we think we are expressing gift-love, we are probably expressing need-love.
Gift-love is the love we ideally share with one another, for this is the love which each and every person needs at the core of their being. Gift-love loves the other person for who they are, desiring to bless and increase the other rather than subtract and lessen them.  Gift-love’s symbol is an arc, not a circle — for it gives and loves regardless of whether it gets anything back.  Gift-love works from an open hand rather than a closed fist, refusing to grasp that which does not hold onto it.  Rather than the sink-hole of need-love, gift-love is like an artesian well, flowing non-stop up from beneath and bestowing love on all, liberally and fully.  Gift-love never ceases giving, never ceases caring, and never stops loving. 
Interestingly enough, C.S. Lewis claims that there is a sense in which all our human love is bound up with need love.  No matter how much we may try, need is at the core of our longing for another — whether at the familial, friendship, sexual or even agape level.  We try and try to approximate gift-love, but we find it most difficult if not virtually impossible.  We are such a mixtures of motives and desires, needs and wants, that for us to ever love another with pure gift-love seems impossible.
At this point I must agree with Dr. Lewis: though we try I do not believe that we ever completely and wholly come to the point of “gift-love.”  For pure gift-love is not disinterest or stepping back from involvement — but is involvement on the sacrificial level all the while ceding to the person one loves the final decision as to how that love will be received and be manifest in their lives. That, my fellow companions, is virtually humanly impossible.  All of us, when we invest that type of energy and emotion in any other person, wish to have our say as to the manifestation and direction of our love, not to mention the other.  Very few of us can or do see ourselves clearly enough to know exactly how we ought to receive that the love of another.  All of us need gift-love; again — it is my experience that very few of us really know what to do with it. 
Let’s be honest this morning and admit that in any and all situations where we love another, we always do so with at least one eye blind to our personal prejudices and perspectives.  Though we may think that we are expressing gift-love, in reality all our love is partial and tainted by self-interest.  Even our loving of God can be need-love — looking for the approval of a divine father-figure who will provide meaning and value in life.  While I do not agree with Sigmund Freud that God is nothing more than the sum of our wish projection of a father-figure, I do agree that for many this is the sum/image of the God they worship.  Do we love God from self-interest, i.e., for what we can get out of our relationship?  Do we only love God for what God can do for us, i.e., get us to heaven when we die?  Doe we ever really love God for God’s sake, i.e., for who God is rather than for what God can do in our lives? 
If we find loving God with gift-love difficult, then how difficult is it to love our family member, our friend, the anonymous neighbor — or even ourselves — with gift-love?  If we cannot even receive gift-love, how are we to ever share it?
The challenge is rooted in how we understand God and love.  We read “God is love” and that is correct.  However, too often we flip this around to mean that “love is God” — which is not so.  C. S. Lewis put it this way: We may give our human loves the unconditional allegiance which we owe only to God. Then they become gods: then they become demons. Then they will destroy us, and also destroy themselves. For natural loves that are allowed to become gods do not remain loves. They are still called so, but can become in fact complicated forms of hatred. When we configure love as God then we open the door to any and all distortions of love ruling our lives.  “All You Need Is Love” may have been a hit song of the Beatles, but it is at best a poor and incomplete theology.  Love of family, love of ethnic group, of tribe, of nation — all of these can be put in the place of God-love.  In fact, sadly I believe that much of what passes for “loving God” in many churches is nothing more than tribal love for our group.  Is this not the essence of civil religion — when we equate our country, our race, and our group with being God’s chosen people, with being those whom God loves best?
The agape love of the New Testament — the love of God which we meet fully and completely in Jesus Christ — this is the essence of gift-love.  Gift-love recognizes life itself as gift from God and sees every part and parcel of life as opportunity to know and share this love.  Gift-love knows that love involves pain, suffering, and self-sacrifice if it is to be love.  The struggle of Abraham in Genesis 22 is one that has amazed and challenged scholars, ministers, and ordinary folk for thousands of years.  How could God ask Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, his son of promise?  The secret to this text is to realize where Isaac came from, anyway.  His birth was a total shock to this older couple who were, as Paul puts it, “as good as dead.”  His very presence was nothing less than gift.  Could Abraham see Isaac as gift and return the gift if God asked?  Did Abraham trust that God would raise up Isaac if he died, accepting that the promise and the gift were from God?
The reality is that real love, even gift-love, hurts and challenges us at our core.  Dr. Lewis put it this way: The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell.  If we are to love, then we will be hurt…and hurt deeply.  To love another is to extend ourselves beyond all measure we have ever thought possible — and then to keep going.  If Abraham was to truly love God, then he had to be willing to give up that one who meant the most to him, even Isaac.  For it is only in the giving up that we discover the true gift and the Giver. 
In the classic novel Les Miserables Jean Valjean is nothing more than a common thief who, being paroled from prison spends a few days in the home of a Cardinal.  One night he slips outside and in so doing takes the silverware with him in order to sell it.  Jean Valjean is apprehended and returned to the Cardinal’s home.  The Cardinal, rather than accusing Valjean of stealing the silverware, remarks, “You forgot the candlesticks.  I gave you the silverware and the candlesticks.”  In a tremendous act gift-love the Cardinal transforms Valjean from a petty thief into one who has the strength to handle life.
Discovering the gift and the Giver is another way of expressing one’s coming to faith in God and Jesus Christ.  For it is in that total surrender of ourselves that we discover a love so wonderful — and a Lover (God) so incredible — that nothing else in this universe comes even close.

The Emerywood Pulpit
“Loving God — The Focus of our Lives”
Matthew 22: 34-40
January 12, 2014

What does it take for us to come to the place where we love God?  A couple of weeks ago I asked this question of us in a slightly different form, noting that while we often believe in God, fear God and try to obey God, how many of us “love God?”  I confessed that “loving God” was not something which had crossed my mind in recent weeks.  Interestingly enough, several of you commented or emailed me about this sermon with the indication that it had struck a nerve with you as well.
So, I started to ponder — and when ministers ponder strange things can happen.  Why don’t we feel that we “love God?”  Have we in the church put people under such a strain, religiously and spiritually, that loving God is virtually impossible?  Have we made God so complicated or distant that we can no longer feel God’s love?  Or, is our modern existence so frenetic and fragile that we are all emotionally hanging by a thread, seeking to just hold onto a modicum of sanity in a world of chaos?  Is it possible that in the middle of what seems to be economic and moral instability we feel somehow cheated of the life of simplicity and prosperity our parents knew and are therefore resentful of God?  Have these experiences made “loving God” a rare if not impossible reality in our world?
Yet, the truth remains that both Judaism and Christianity are based in the same command: loving God.  Life, it would seem to me, is no more perilous or challenging for us than for previous generations.  So, over the next year we will be exploring this truth in many different facets — for I have come to believe that if we cannot love God then we are so distanced from God that our life of faith will be weak and ineffective.  It is in loving God that we discover not only God, but also ourselves.  “Loving God…Loving Neighbor” — this will be our theme of 2014.
We begin, however, not with our loving God, but with God loving us.  All of our love, faith and belief is at its core a response to the action of God:  we love in response to God’s loving us.  From the Biblical perspective all love comes from God — and it is only in knowing the love of God that we can understand and demonstrate that love to others.  If it were not for the love of God we have experienced in Jesus Christ, would we really know love?  How did Jesus, the Word become flesh, love and so command us to love?
Augustine has given us a couple of directives to go on:  Jesus, he intoned, loved each person he met as if there were none other in all the world to love.  Jesus never loved in general without loving in particular — the people whom he lived with and encountered in his life.  Jesus looked to each person, to their uniqueness and their particularity. In so doing he loved “them” — in the flesh — as they were and not as they ought to be.  Jesus never let sin or failure get in the way of him loving a person.
Let’s face it: we find that to be incredibly difficult, do we not?  After all, it is easy to love a figment of one’s imagination; the more difficult task is to love a real human being, warts and all.  My premarital counseling focuses not on any one Biblical understanding of marriage for there are several different models therein.  No, I focus more on helping these couples to know the person that they say they love and are marrying.  Far too often couples discover that who they thought they were marrying is not who they are marrying.  In fact there is an old Chinese proverb which says:  “It matters not who you marry for it will be a different person that you thought when you awake the next morning.”
I find this true in all human relationships.  We hire a new person or take a new job — and too often we idolize another person — just imagining that they are virtually faultless in their life. “I’ve got the perfect boss,” someone says.  Or, “I have finally found the perfect salesperson.”  However, for each of us if we look behind the curtain we discover a flawed human being who can be as difficult to love as any other.  This is the core sin of the soft-pornography industry, not to mention the entire modeling industry.  They promote an image of women which is unreal and therefore unattainable.  Studies have shown that men who engage in viewing pornography have a terrible time both with maintaining relationships and with a healthy understanding of intimacy.  Or, consider the way many teenage girls (and older) feel about themselves after looking at the ads in the magazines targeted to them.  The person they idolize in their minds is just that — a figment and not a part of life.  Real people have bodies which sag and droop; real people have hair that falls out and breath that stinks and armpits that…well, you get the picture!  Real people are really hard to love…if you are looking for perfection. 
It matters not who you are, where you came from or where you are going.  Know this morning that Jesus loves you just as you are—warts and all.  Jesus did not lump people into categories or expect them to change in order to be loved: he loved them so that they could be whom God created them to be.
The second clue of Augustine is that Jesus loved all as he loved each.  Jesus never rejected a person based on their race, ethnicity, home, status in life, vocation or relationship with God.  To those rejected by the religious establishment Jesus offered love and grace.  To racial outcasts he offered acceptance and hope.  Jesus may have responded with anger to people, but he never responded with hatred.  Yes, there were times when Jesus challenged the perspectives and actions of others.  Yet, we must remember that indifference, not opposition, is the polar opposite of love.  Jesus loved enough to confront those who pushed others beyond the pale of God’s love.  Jesus confronted us — rabbis and sinners, priests and publicans — all in a desire to touch them with the inclusive and accepting love of God.
Of all the traits of Jesus which amaze me, his inclusive love is primary.  If there were every any evidence for divinity, this would be exhibit “A.”  No one, not even Gandhi or the Buddha or Mother Teresa was able to love as Jesus loved — wholly and without limits.  Think of his love for Judas as he looked at him and in that time before the betrayal expressed not condemnation, but sadness.  Think of Jesus, abandoned by his closest colleagues and hanging on the cross, saying: “Abba, forgive them…they know not what they do.” 
One of my favorite movies is The Bucket List.  At the end the narrator (Morgan Freeman) says this of his companion:  Edward Perryman Cole died in May. It was a Sunday in the afternoon and there wasn't a cloud in the sky. He was 81 years old. Even now, I can't claim to understand the measure of a life, but I can tell you this: I know that when he died, his eyes were closed and his heart was open…”
Is that not the goal of each and all of us…to so grow in our lives that when we depart our hearts are fully open to the other?  I hope and pray that when I die someone will say the same about me: “his heart was open.”
Hear me clearly:  God loves each and all as if there were no other — with a love which gives and gives and gives.   It is this love into which he challenges us to grow — and it is how we share that love with one another that we shall look next Sunday.  For today let us rejoice and live out of the love that is ours in Jesus Christ.  Thanks be to God!
Amen.

Is God a Seminole?

As I write this it is the morning after the NCAA Division I FBS National Championship in which Florida State University came back from the dead to beat Auburn University.  With about 2 minutes to go in the game I turned to Debby and said, "I guess we'll now see which side God is on."  She merely groaned an inaudible response.  

Since I did not have a dog in that fight (I pull for Alabama and Clemson in that order,) I thought it an interesting way to view the last part of the game.  Why do we assume that God is always on the side of the winning team?  Does God not care about the losing team?  Did they not pray enough or give enough in order for God to bless them?  Why is it that God always seems to favor the team with the bigger, stronger, faster and better prepared players?  Does God not care about slower, weaker, and smaller players?  Are these teams always reduced to "building character" through accepting loss?  Does David ever beat Goliath?  Not on a consistent basis it seems -- although Georgia Southern did beat the University of Florida this year.  

Earlier that Monday a particular golfer won the PGA opening event in Hawaii.  While being interviewed he said to the effect "I want to thank my family, friends, supporters and my Lord."  I am glad that he has a good relationship with Jesus Christ.  However, I am saddened to think of how attributing winning a golf tournament cheapens our understanding of God, faith and Jesus.  Does Christ Jesus really care about who wins a golf tournament when thousands of people are dying in Syria, the Sudan and countless other war ravaged areas of our planet?  When children starve to death around the planet do we really think God gives a whit about athletics?  When millions die from the lack of potable water, does making a six foot putt rank high on the list of divine priorities?

It is high time, I believe, to divorce faith from football in particular and all sports in general.  God does not care who wins a football game or a golf tournament -- at least the God I know through Jesus Christ.  Yes, having a relationship with God through Christ can give us peace and acceptance along with the ability to put the goals of the group ahead of personal achievement.  But, at the end of the day, God does not sit enthroned in the heavens and decide to pick winners and losers.

What God does care about is how we treat one another, how we live with one another, and how we touch "the least of these."  What God does care about is the ethics we share, the love we express, the relationships we develop and the care we give to one another.  God wants us to get out of our tribes, i.e., Seminoles, Tigers, etc., and relate to each other in love, encouragement and mutual support.

I have been a life-long fan of college and to a certain extent professional athletics.  I do believe that these can have a positive role in our communities -- but it seems to me that the tail is wagging the dog.  When we start invoking God on our side we have so trivialized God that we make a mockery out of all that we claim in the name of religion and faith.  When poverty and poor schools ravage the lower socio-economic groups while we spend billions on college and professional sports -- and then attribute winning to God -- we have taken the name of the Lord in vain.

So, pull for your team and cheer them on to victory!  There's nothing wrong with that.  Please, however, leave God out of it.  Somehow I think God would rather have it that way.

“The Peaceable Kingdom: Life in God’s Love”

Isaiah 63: 7-9; I John 4: 7-12

Well, we made it through Christmas 2013 — and seemingly in one piece!  Many of you have spent your holidays with family and friends and for a lot of us that meant traveling up and down the highways of our country.  It is always good to gather back again in God’s house on God’s day (but then all houses should be God’s houses and all days God’s days, shouldn’t they?) to worship, to praise and to celebrate our Lord and our faith.

Throughout Advent we have tethered ourselves to the prophet Isaiah — the one to whom early Christians looked more than any other to interpret the who, the what and the why of the coming of the Messiah, Jesus the Christ.  Under the theme of the Peaceable Kingdom we have engaged in a short study of what it means to live in the Kingdom of God.  Through Isaiah we have looked at what it means for us to walk in the way of the Kingdom proleptically — in advance of its final fulfillment.  We have discussed whether sitting around anticipating a return of the Messiah is the best use of our time and energies.  We have renewed and refreshed ourselves in those “streams in the desert” provided for by our Lord.  Then, on Christmas Eve, we celebrated the reality that “a child is born…a son is given” i.e., in the Incarnation we have God’s own presence in our universe as the reality of that Kingdom.

Now, as we have come to the end of the Isaiah texts we find ourselves looking at life through the lenses of the other side of devastation and destruction.  Our text comes from what is known in scholarly circles as “Third” Isaiah (chapters 40-66.)  Seemingly much later than the Isaiah of earlier chapters, this Isaiah focuses not on the coming devastation — for it has already come.  The temple and city have been destroyed and lie in ruins.  Now the question is how to live while rebuilding?  Where is God in the aftermath?  Can Israel any longer consider themselves people of the covenant as they begin the process of removing the rubble and restoring the ruins?

Isaiah calls upon Israel to engage in holy memory — to remember that though judgment has come God’s final word is not wrath but love.  In God’s love will be their salvation and restoration…the covenant is not ended and their relationship not fully severed.  Though for their sin they have felt the vengeance of God, now they will know once more the hesed, the loving, forgiving and eternal presence of God.  Their hope for the future lies not in their goodness, but in God’s faithfulness.

As I read this passage this week I was preparing to preach a normal sermon on God’s love for us.  I made some mental notes about God’s love, how we experience it and how we ought to respond to it.  Then, in the middle of my meditation a new thought hit me, one which I have not dealt with in a very long time.  We talk so much about God’s loving us…but what about our loving God?  Jesus said that the greatest commandment to follow, the essence of true faith was to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind; and, Love your neighbor as yourself.”  Do we love God?  We argue about God.  We certainly worship and fear/respect God.  But, the question remains:  Do we really love God?

As I thought about this it hit me that perhaps love of God is a missing link in our current/post-modern expressions of faith.  Most of us talk and argue about believing in God.  We are caught up in our day about whether God exists and whether we can even understand God to be loving given the reality of human suffering and evil.  What we never seem to talk about, at least in the circles of which I am a part, is our love for God.  What does it mean to “love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul…?”  How do we love the One whom we believe called all of this universe into being and even invaded this existence on our behalf?  Love is about feelings and even passions — emotions we rarely associate with faith any more.

So, I started thinking, reflecting and even did a little search on my computer of past files.  Low and behold, a seventeen year old article from the esteemed Martin Marty addressed this very subject.  Dr. Marty, of the University of Chicago fame, quoted Dr. Edward Collins Vacek, a Jesuit priest: 

“Every age has its central religious concept. At one time the question of faith energized. Today Christians often answer the question ‘Do you believe in God?’ with little investment. The question Do you trust God?’ is more involving, but it still leaves in abeyance the way we live our lives. A question that will challenge all of us today is this: ‘Do you love God?’ That question evokes the endlessness of our hearts quest as well as the incomprehensibility of God, and it gives us an absorbing center of our lives.”

This quote woke me from my post-Christmas somnambulant state like the proverbial ton of bricks.  Have we so focused on the reality of God’s love for us that we have neglected what was a central focus for Jesus — loving God?  I thought over how the church spiritual fathers and mothers spent hours focusing on their love for God and Christ.  Their writings at times seemed to be virtual love letters as they poured forth from the depths of their souls their love for and devotion to Christ Jesus.  The mood, the warp and woof of these pages is so passionate as to move one to pause and reflect upon one’s own feeble faith in the process.  Are we passionately in love with Christ?  Or, is Christ more of a convenience than the focus, an option rather than a priority of our lives?  What does it mean for us, in the early stages of the 21st century, to love God?   What does that look like to us who so often lead with our minds rather than our hearts. How do we go about loving God?

Loving God means our focus is to be upon knowing God rather than knowing about God.  The idea is quite simple: we Christians spend far more time learning about God than we do developing a personal relationship with God, i.e., a relationship wherein not only are we known but we also know.  In spiritual growth there is an openness required if we are to know God.  We must look deep within and  reveal to God the very depths of our souls if we are to know God — for any type of in-depth personal relationship requires complete and total transparency.  As Dr. Bill Hale taught us years ago: YCKAMAAPTYAWTRAY.  (You cannot know any more about another person than you are willing to reveal about yourself.)  If we would know God then we must be willing to go deep within ourselves and share our fears, our failures, our drives, our desires, our hopes and aspirations with God.  

Loving God means our focus is upon loving others — living by a distinctively Christian ethic of love and grace.  In I John we find the challenge to be different from ours.  We do not claim to love God — only to believe in God.  In I John Christians were claiming to love God deeply and fully, yet they were treating one another with animosity and divison.  Jesus took the Jewish “Shema” of loving your neighbor as yourself — which meant to them your Jewish neighbor — and extended it across racial and ethnic lines to include any and all persons.  I John simply expands upon that interpretation:  “Those who say, “I love God,” and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen.”  

For historic Christianity love of God is ultimately expressed not only in devotion to God, but in devotion to one’s brothers and sisters in need.  If one loves God then that love will be seen in how one treats those who are, as Jesus puts it, “the least of these.” 

It seems to me that there are at least three levels of loving God:

Loving God for our sake — we love God in return for God’s love and to be saved, i.e., to go to heaven when we die.

Loving God for God’s sake — we love God because of who God is and what God has done in Christ Jesus.

Loving Others for God’s sake — we love the other because of how we have experienced the love of God.

People say to me things like, “I want to see my church grow and reach people.  How do we accomplish that goal?”  My reply is simple:  Begin first by asking one question:  What does spiritual growth look like to God?  Follow that with another:  How we can work with the Spirit of God in accomplishing that ideal?  To answer in the language of the day, spiritual growth means growing to love God increasingly more each and every day until our lives are totally and completely encapsulated in Christ.

One of my heroes in the faith, Henri Nouwen, stepped out of a Harvard professorship and moved to Daybreak, a community in Toronto, Canada, for people with mental and physical disabilities.  He decided that loving God, for him, was now about service rather than success.  He once said to a group of Baptist ministers: “Ministry is the least important thing. You cannot not minister if you are in communion with God and live in community. A lot of people are always concerned about: ‘How can I help people? Or help the youth to come to Christ? Or preach well?’ But these are all basically nonissues. If you are burning with the love of Jesus, don’t worry: everyone will know. They will say, ‘I want to get close to this person who is so full of God.’”

On another occasion a well known Christian writer and youth leader, Mike Yaconelli, came for a lengthy stay with Dr. Nouwen and confessed later:  “I knew what it meant to believe in Jesus; I did not know what it meant to be with Jesus. ... I found it easy to do the work of God, but I had no idea how to let God work in me.”

There is an old expression in Christianity which is known as “Journey Inward…Journey Outward.”  Basically what it means is that the deeper our journey inward, to the very presence of Christ, the greater will be our extension outward — to our brothers and sisters in need.  So, I issue to all of us a challenge for 2014: Will you join me in making this the year in which we grow in our love for God?   Will you join me in making personal knowledge and spiritual growth the keys to our life of faith and church?  Maybe, just maybe, what we need is to know God in the depths of our souls?  I close with the words of a famous song from the Musical Godspell:

Day by day, day by day

Oh dear Lord, three things I pray

To see thee more clearly

To love thee more dearly

To follow thee more nearly

Day by day 

Amen.

11-17

The Emerywood Pulpit

“The Ancient-Future Church”

Micah 6: 8; Romans 12: 1-2

Where is the church going and what will it look like in the next 20 years?  This is a question I have had asked of me on a regular basis. In the church we are living through a cataclysmic revolution similar to what the Reformation must have felt like — only at warp speed (they had no smart phones, twitter, Facebook or the Cloud.)  Today transformation occurs in a matter of days and weeks, not decades or centuries.   The late 60’s and early 70’s were known as a period of great change — yet the pace was nothing like the present day.  Recently National Public Radio had a report about how churches in decline were having “beer and hymns” worship services in pubs and even church basements.  (I must admit that I never saw that one coming!) In other places blue jeans and tee shirts are being exchanged for robes, candles and altars as even “contemporary” churches are discovering the value of liturgical worship.  

All this rapid change is frightening to most ministers I know — for we were not educated to live in this world.  What is scariest is that often churches cannot cope with this change and so they batten down the hatches, thinking that if they can just keep the proper forms and methods of worship and church, then all will be well.  Personally, this makes me grateful to be pastor of Emerywood, a church which has never been afraid of change or newness.  Just as you were on the cutting edge in 1957 — and were roundly criticized for being so, so we are striving to move in those directions today.  There are those who see our attempt to transform our church and tell me that I am foolish, that it is impossible to modify a “modern” church into a “post-modern” one.  However, I have never been accused of backing down from a challenge, so, as I reflected upon our church, where we are, and the future ahead of us, I thought idea-sharing might be in order.  What will the church of the future, the church that survives and even thrives through this revolution, look like?

To begin with it will be a church which is never too quick to mirror the contemporary culture, but remains grounded in the past.  In another day Dean William Inge put it best:  “He who marries the spirit of the age will soon find himself widowed.”  Before you think I am mixing my message and confusing myself and you, let me explain.

I do not think that the pure gospel of Jesus Christ needs updating or changing.  The content of the good news is the same.  What does need updating is the mode, the form in which the gospel is incased.  Just as the clothes which we wear become outdated and need changing, so the structures and forms of our churches are continually in need of renewal and remodeling.  This is why I have titled this sermon  the “Ancient-Future Church” — a term which I first heard from Dr. Robert Webber of Wheaton University.  The emphasis of “Ancient-Future” lies in returning as it were, into the first century, understanding the nature of the early church, and then working to recreate that church in 21st century culture.  The church of the future is the church which first goes back to the past (as much as possible) to gain its values and beliefs, and then comes forward to the present and on into the future with new forms and structures within which it will carry out its calling and mission.  Every generation does not have to reinvent the church, but every generation must re-focus the church in its purpose, calling and values.  These are what we lose as we get comfortable doing church the way we’ve always done it. The road to the future leads through our ancient past.

The Ancient-Future church will be one which focuses resources and energies on those areas in which it is particularly gifted and which are most effective and efficient in achieving their goals.  In the past churches tried to be all things to all people — rarely saying “no” to anyone.  In an age of declining revenues churches are discovering that they must prioritize ministries.  No one church can provide everything to everyone…even the mega churches are discovering that this does not work. 

This emphasis on effective ministry means that we will now evaluate our personal faith and the life of our church by the nature of our Christian walk, by how well we follow the path Christ Jesus has laid for us and not by how many times we attend a church event or how much money we give.  Many of us can remember when Sunday evening worship was the mark of a “true follower of Jesus Christ.”  The wide gate/road folks came on Sunday morning; the narrow gate/road folks, i.e., the true believers, came back on Sunday evening.  Now, few churches have Sunday evening worship as a warmed-over replica of Sunday morning.  Previously we evaluated people by how many times they showed up at church during a given week.  Now we know that even our best and most devoted members may be absent for weeks at a time.  The Ancient-Future Church will meet at those times and places which are most effective and not on someone’s ancient, farm-based calendar.  The Ancient-Future Church will be one which focuses on a faith walk and not an attendance record.

The Ancient-Future Church will be one which focuses on mystery, awe and wonder in worship.  Rather than using Powerpoint or printed sermon outlines to communicate, it will use imagery, including art and metaphor, as its primary focus.  For instance, we print Orders of Worship because we are mostly accustomed to reading something we can hold in our hands; we like print media.  The Ancient-Future Church will reject print media as too costly and ineffective and will instead use multi-media and all manner of art in worship.  Worshippers will be able to download images, liturgy and even sermons on their iPads.  Paper bulletins will become a relic of the past, much like the Gutenberg Press was in the last century.  This will result in a change in focus for worship:  experience/encounter of God rather than education will be the norm for worship in the Ancient-Future Church.

The Ancient-Future Church will be one which does not proclaim to have all the answers or to possess all the truth.  Taking its clue from the world view changes of a post-modern culture, the church will see truth as subjective and open to discussion and evaluation depending upon one’s criteria and experiences.  Theological truth itself will be understood more as metaphorical and less as literal.  For instance, in theological circles we have had 3-4 differing interpretations of the atoning death of Christ. I believe that in the future we will see dozens of interpretations — each illuminating an aspect of the Crucifixion which we have not previously seen.  This type of openness will spread to every dynamic of Christian thought as an incredible flow of creativity moves dynamically through the Body of Christ.  The Incarnation, the Virgin Conception, Creation and even the Resurrection will go through vast changes in meaning and understanding.  Who is to say that this is bad?  I happen to believe that it will be quite good and that the church which emerges will be stronger than ever, better able to relate to persons in all circles of human existence.

The Ancient-Future Church will formulate a discipleship which is focused more on “being like Jesus,” i.e., being incarnational and less on “being like Moses,” i.e., being legalistic and rules oriented. If we would mirror Jesus rather than Moses, then we must live out of the ethic of love rather than law.  Whereas Judaism came down hard on “sins of the flesh” Jesus refused to do so, saving his harshest condemnation for the “sins of the spirit,” i.e., the religious leaders whom he thought to have known better and whom he accused of keeping “sinners” out of the Kingdom.  To the “sinners” Jesus offered forgiveness and acceptance, i.e., love and grace.  

This pattern was not unnoticed by Paul — and in reading him we can see how he tried to move his understanding of ethical behavior out of the legalistic structure of Judaism and into the freedom of Christ.   At times Paul seems to be caught in the throes of moralism/legalism on the one hand and grace on the other.  However, on other occasions he reaches what seems to be heights that no one else could touch, as in our Romans 12 text this morning.  This passage calls us to the highest and greatest ethical norms — a mountain which could only be scaled through the transforming power of the Spirit: “…you be transformed through the renewing of your minds…” is how Paul stated the matter.  Grace, not law, leads us to the heights of ethical lifestyle.

As a result we are already seeing a dramatic shift in how the church views sex and sexuality.  Lifestyles are being accepted as normative which in the past would have received great condemnation.  The younger people I know are seeing sex and sexuality more from a cultural perspective.  They are not singling it out for focus as has the church of the past 200+ years.  The age of Puritanism had died for most people and that is a good thing.  How our views of morality work themselves out vis a vis sexuality is a matter that is still in process.  Even secular culture is beginning to see that sexuality without restraint is not a good thing.  The Ancient-Future Church will struggle with this — as did the Ancient Church itself!

The Ancient-Future Church will be one where serving, loving, and being are valued as the essence of true discipleship.  This church will emphasize “big issues or macro-matters” over “small or micro-matters.”  For instance, having a service of “Beer and Hymns” seems sacrilegious to those of us in the South.  We can recall the temperance movements, when the pious saints were those who did not let a drop of the “devil’s brew” pass over their lips.  Now, we know that the problem is not alcohol, but the disease of alcoholism — and that we can be a place where people with that disease receive acceptance, help, and healing.  Interestingly enough, there are European Baptist conventions which will serve beer but are appalled at American Baptists who smoked cigarettes.  Go figure.

As the Ancient-Future Church emphasizes “macro-matters” we will find ourselves working on issues such as world hunger, housing, potable water, sanitation, education and literacy in addition to touching people with the love of Jesus Christ.  These are far more important to us than whether someone smokes a cigar or has a beer.  The Ancient-Future Church will work to resolve major issues and not just by doing small projects one facet at a time.  I can see the time soon coming when housing projects, child care facilities, and senior care all come together under the rubric of a community of faith — clear from governmental intervention, control, or subsidy.  Rather than be known by what we are “against” we will be known by what we are for — or we will cease to exist.  Macro-matters will dominate our thinking as we move against the forces of evil and oppression.  

We will be a church which, in the words of Rachel Held Evans, will need larger banquet tables and rooms — for community will be a major focus.  Every time one turns around in the gospels we find Jesus at a party (that is my kind of Savior!)  The Ancient-Future Church will be one that throws bigger and bigger parties — and keeps inviting more and more outsiders to those parties. 

In these parables of Jesus we find the King tearing up the “A” list and going to the “B” list time and again.  In the last 30 years we have re-discovered that more people are loved than coerced into the Kingdom.  We have been reminded time and again, that evangelism is about an ongoing relationship much more than about praying a prayer or walking an aisle.  I have spent much of my ministry listening to people telling me of scare tactics and worse used to entice them down an aisle and through the baptistry — all in the name of coming to know Christ.  The Ancient-Future Church will be one which understands salvation to be a life-long process and coming to Christ far more about relationship than repeating a canned phrase.  Further, participation in the Kingdom of God will be far broader than the membership rolls of any church or denomination.  The question, “To which church do you belong?” will be replaced by “Tell me about how you follow Jesus?”

We will be a church which will work better at Christian education than at indoctrination.  I am often appalled at what passes for Christian education in many of our churches and church schools.  Many strive to teach children “what” to think rather than “how” to think.  So many churches and “Christian schools” are tied to wooden, literalistic, outdated and even false interpretations of Scripture so that I am not surprised when young adults walk away from the church.  How dare we tell children to believe “Biblical facts” which are plainly contradicted by science?  Do they really believe the earth is only 6,000 or so years old when science says 13.7 billion or so?  Do we really expect our children to listen to us when we tell them that dinosaurs inhabited the earth with humans, despite all the scientific evidence to the contrary?  Is my faith so weak that it is tied to a literalistic reading of Genesis which is not even in accordance with the nature of the text or how Judaism understood it?  The Ancient-Future Church will espouse a faith which transcends such ignorance and leads us to a deeper and more balanced understanding of God and life.

In the future how we interpret and proclaim Scripture will change as with education more people understand the basics of Scriptural interpretation.  We will exchange the pulpit for a live microphone, and instead of a monologue we will have a dialogue about how we interpret Scripture and understand our faith.  The pastor will be the one who keeps us pointed toward God and hopefully sets the proper parameters for our interpretations.  The old New Testament principle of “Soul Competency” will be reborn in communities of faith around the globe.

The Ancient-Future Church will be a church which, I believe, will call people to a greater sense of personal responsibility for their actions and the results of their actions.  We will emphasize community over self — and stress the responsibilities we have as citizens of our world, our country and members of a community of faith.  The “connectedness” of life which we see in our communications and media will become front and center in our faith.  This connectedness will flow more relationally than it does institutionally — it will be more to each other and less to any particular church, denomination, or religious structure.  Those churches which connect with people will be those which grow. 

The Ancient-Future Church will be one in which missions/missional will not apply to just that which happens somewhere else, but will apply to all that a particular community of faith is and does.  Young people now tend to view church not as something to which they go to sit and soak, but as a dynamic, active group through which they serve.  This will only increase.  They see that a community of faith only has a couple of primary purposes:  community, which includes worship and relationship;  and ministry, i.e., providing a place through which one can live out one’s calling.  The days of institutional loyalty are over; the church is expected to prove itself time and again as to its worthiness and effectiveness in the world.

So, there you have one person’s vision of what is coming.  Do I agree with all of it?  Not necessarily — there are parts that I would change.  Will it happen for all at the same pace?  No — some churches will die before they will make the necessary changes to adapt to this new and vibrant age.  It is estimated that this year alone 8-10,000 churches will have closed their doors.  Many others are on life-support as 6-10 persons keep the doors open and the institution afloat.  However, when they die — and they are dying as they tend to be members of the Builder Generation born before 1946 — the rate of church death will become catastrophic.  

The reality is that just as the shopping habits of the public have changed, i.e., people no longer flock to shopping malls to make their purchases, so their worshipping and church habits are changing as well.  Dramatic transformation is already here and more is on the horizon.  Either we will adapt in the Spirit of Christ and become that Ancient-Future Church, or we will soon become irrelevant to the work of Christ.  The choice is ours.

Robert U. Ferguson, Jr., Ph.d.

Emerywood Baptist Church

1300 Country Club Drive

High Point, North Carolina 27262

November 17, 2013

Thoughts at the End of Summer

As I read the paper and listened to the news the past two days, I became incredibly disillusioned and depressed by two events.  The news of chemical warfare in Syria, while not surprising given all the carnage of their “uncivil” war (what war is ever “civil?”) brought the reality of human existence to the fore.    In our church this weekend we hosted Al Staggs who gave us a memorable performance as Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the young Lutheran/German who returned to Germany from the safety of the US to be with his people and to be a part of the movement to oppose Hitler.  This courage wound up costing him his life.  As he performed I thought of the prison camps, the genocide, and of the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. and how otherwise good Christians participated in this horrific evil.  Then, to hear and read the reports from Syria brought all of this to an ever greater reality.  

The other was the MTV/VMA award program with the virtual pornographic act of Miley Cyrus.  No, I did not watch this program -- I would rather watch paint dry than MTV and have been that way since it came into existence.  What I did see was some snippets replayed and the shock reaction of those in the news media -- most of whom I thought were beyond any ability to be shocked.  Do these producers have young children?  What do they want their impressionable teens to grow up and emulate, anyway?  To be honest, the moral standards of MTV are non-existent, as their seeming only “god” is the Almighty Dollar.  They are out to make a buck -- and whether they have to sacrifice your children or mine on their altar is immaterial to them.

What are we to make of these events?  Are they connected in any way?  Of course they are, for at bottom they are both indicators of societies which have completely lost their moral compass.  When the standards of right and wrong become completely subjective, then we as a culture lose any sense of morality.  When “I” am the interpreter of my morality, then others are in trouble.  Now, before you lump me in with the Religious Right, understand that nothing could be further from the truth.  I am not that kind of Baptist -- never have been and never will be.  Legalism is the furtherest thing from my personal ethic or the ethic I believe that our society ought to uphold.  My ethical norms lead with grace, with forgiveness, and with kindness, compassion, and service to “the least of these.”  My favorite image of life is that we are all on a journey just trying to enjoy the ride which will end all too soon.  If we treat one another with grace and love, the journey will be a lot better for us all.

Wednesday, August 28th, is the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington and the “I have a dream” speech by Martin Luther King, Jr.  On that day in 1963 the USA was faced with our own face of immorality, that of a vicious racism that was endemic to our culture “from sea to shining sea.”  Having lived from the Southeast to the Northwest and in between, I can assure you that racism lived (and still lives) in every hamlet of every state.  It is part of our natural “sin” as human beings that we prefer those of our own tribe and look down upon those of other tribes.  Fifty years later and we have made great progress -- yet vestiges of our tribal past still remain embedded in our souls.  

The reality is that we humans can be vicious and evil creatures who can rationalize/justify any and every action under the sun.  I am sure that King Assad justifies his use by saying that these are rebels who must be destroyed if the country is to survive.  I am sure that MTV justifies their production by saying that this is art and what people want to see.  Decades ago the great theologian Reinhold Niebuhr penned the classic “Moral Man and Immoral Society.”  His basic thesis was that while we may be moral as individuals, when gathered in groups we will do evil that we would never do as individuals.  Niebuhr was right, of course, but in the moment I am having trouble even believing that we are ever moral as individuals.  Brief moments...possibly.  Lifetimes...not so much.

It was C.S. Lewis who, when asked if he believed in total depravity replied, “I believe in sufficient depravity.”  Yes, we are all sufficiently depraved so that we can do anything under the sun for our “cause” and our “people.”  Without a moral compass, without some sort of moral code to guide and correct us, we are nothing more than the blind leading the blind..and God help us all as we stumble into the future.