The wave

We have been in Dulce for five months and I would imagine that by now just about everyone in the congregation knows I run.  I would imagine that most people in town know I run, either from seeing me running on the side of the road or hearing about it from someone who saw me and told them.  I haven't seen very many runners since moving to Dulce and only once did I see a person who was clearly an Anglo, like me. 

I run every day.  Sometimes a few miles.  Sometimes quite a few miles.  I have run marathons and I found one in Shiprock in May that I'm training for.  But even if there wasn't the marathon on my schedule I would be running, outdoors, year-round.  It is just one of those things I do.

If you have seen me out running, did you notice that I wave?  I wave at nearly every car that goes by.  I toss in a "Hi!" at every cyclist or person walking along the road.  On occasion I also greet the dogs.  Waving at cars is something I started to do 5 or 6 years ago.

When we lived in Minnesota I ran along a particular section of road 5 to 7 days a week.  One lane in each direction, with a decent shoulder.  The speed limit was 45 and there was 'no passing' allowed.  I know, from driving that road myself, that the speed limit was easily exceeded.  'No passing' was for a good reason, although I saw people do that too. 

Because of my work schedule I ran that section of road in the dark roughly nine months of the year.  I started waving at drivers during the daytime as a protective mechanism.  I figured if I waved during the daytime those drivers might be more mindful of my presence on the road if they were out during the dark.  Before long I was waving at everyone, day and night.

Now waving at drivers is a habit, but the purpose has changed a bit.  Waving has become a way of people noticing me.  Sometimes they wave back.  I don't often make eye contact, partly because at my age my eyes take a bit longer to focus on a face in a vehicle, and by then I am drifting, usually towards traffic.  Waving while mostly looking ahead is safer. 

Being noticed is not for the purpose of fueling my ego, but just for the purpose of opening a conversation later.  I am an outsider, an Anglo pastor, serving a church in a Native American community.  It is likely that there are some people in the community I have waved at many times over the past five months.  I don't know who they are but they know who I am.  And if I run into them at the grocery store, or gas station, or wherever, it is my hope that my wave opens a conversation, one which, in time, may lead to our talking about things of greater importance than running or basketball, or whatever. 

I want God to use my wave to serve His purposes.  I want that wave to open a door and point another person to the joy and peace that is only known in Christ.  In 1 Corinthians 10:31 Paul writes,

            "So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, to all to the glory of God." 

"Whatever"…running, waving, witnessing….may all that I do, and all that you do, serve God, to His eternal glory.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Winsome

There are lots of different ways that a person can share with other persons their passion for a particular thing.  As a sports fan I could always wear clothing from my favorite team, decorate my home with team pictures and memorabilia, and I could always make my team the subject of my conversation.  Doing those kinds of things might not exactly endear me to other people.  While some would like it, i.e. fans of a similar persuasion, others would likely flee when they saw me on the horizon!  And there would be a few people who would engage me for the purpose of strongly expressing an opposite point of view.  So it can go when you are passionate about something, particularly in the world of sports.

Sports aren't the only place where people are passionate about things and desire to share that with others.  Sports just work easily as an example.  Other examples include families, politics, and hobbies.  And religion. 

When we get passionate about things we can also be very emotional in how we express our passion.  And we can express ourselves in ways emotionally that draw people to us, or push people away from us.  Which is why is some circles there are rules, sometimes written and sometimes not, that no one in the group talks about politics or religion.  Broaching those subjects in certain settings can cause the group to suffer as differences of opinion on politics and/or  religion raise people's emotions to a point where self-control falters and hard feelings emerge.

All of this came to mind this morning when I was remembering a certain friend who uses the word "winsome" to describe the way he tries to present himself to others as a witness for Christ.  To be winsome means to be:

"sweetly or innocently charming; winning; engaging: a winsome smile."

 

For my friend I think the term "engaging" is the most appropriate term from that definition.  He seeks to be a person who presents himself in such a way that people will be willing to listen to him as he finds ways of sharing his faith with them.

I think that this is what Peter was getting at in his first letter, where he wrote this in chapter 3, verse 15:

"...but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect..."

There are many people in the world that I care deeply for and many situations that from my point-of-view, as a Christian, cry out for the Good News of Jesus to be spoken into them.  But I need to be mindful of the way I bring that Good News to light, so that God may use it well for His purposes and to His glory.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Legacy

Yesterday I saw someone wearing a t-shirt with Johnny Cash’s picture on it.  In general I like Johnny Cash.  He had a very long career in music.  I don’t have an ear that can appreciate his early material but I do like his later music quite a lot, songs such as this one.

I remember reading his autobiography in the late 1970’s.  He talked pretty frankly about his early life, when the term ‘hell-raiser’ would have been an apt description.  I’m guessing that the picture I saw on the t-shirt came from that era, for it was a photo of an angry Johnny Cash, defiantly making an obscene gesture.   

Cash lived for quite a few years after the book I read was written.  I had read an autobiography, but one that only covered the first half of a long and complicated life.  I may be making a stretch of the imagination here, but judging from his later musical work and what I know of the second half of his life, I think that if he had anything to say about it that he would choose to have a much different picture as his public image on a t-shirt.  I don’t think that it would be his choice to be remembered as angry and obscene.  The legacy of Johnny Cash is much richer and deeper than that.

I read something just the other day that mentioned in passing how transient the legacies of most people will be.  Most of us may be remembered well by our children and grandchildren, from their first-hand experiences, but when they are gone most of the details of our lives will fade from history.  There will be information available to compile family trees.  Personal letters may survive, as well as written accounts that we may create and pass along.  But most of what we have done, and why, will fade from human history.

More public figures, like Johnny Cash, may be remembered generally for several more generations.  Others, such as John Dewey, may cast an influence on aspects of society and be remembered well, but by few people.  Still others, such as George Washington or Martin Luther, have cast shadows that have, and will, extend for centuries.

The words of Ecclesiastes 3:20 will apply to us not just in a physical sense, but also in terms of the kinds of people we were and the lives we led on earth:

“All go to one place.  All are from the dust, and to dust all return.”

Or do they?  Will we leave behind dust, or will we leave something more?

Two examples of people whose rather small actions made an enduring impact on my life come to mind.  One was about 25 years ago, when I wasn’t a Christian in any sense except a nominal one.  This woman told me in the course of conversation that she would pray for me.  I haven’t forgotten the setting of our discussion, nor her words to me.

The other was more recently, about 10 years ago, after I had come to know God personally and considered Christ Jesus as my Lord and Savior, even if I was only beginning to grapple with what that meant.  I met a man at a homeless shelter that was located in a church.  I asked if he was the custodian and he replied, “No.  I’m just an old man walking with the Lord.”  I got to know more of his story as we ate breakfast together and that image he placed in my mind, of an 'old man walking with the Lord,' was one that I thought I could aspire towards. 

I don’t know where this life will carry me, and I certainly couldn’t have predicted many of the places I have been over the past ten years.  But I have travelled them with God and I look forward to continuing to do so until He sees fit for me to draw my last breath and travel home.  And along the way I want to keep my eyes and ears open to the places where I may speak a small word, or say a small prayer, that God will use to eternal effect.

As much as it is up to me, that is what I would desire for my legacy.  To God be the glory, now and forever.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Tell it Like it is: a book review

How is a congregation shaped as its members share their stories in worship?  And how does telling one’s story shape that person’s faith?  These are the questions that lie at the heart of Tell it Like it is: Reclaiming the Practice of Testimony, by Lillian Daniels. Daniels tells the story of the practice of testimony within the congregation she was leading, a practice which became an important aspect of their worship and, like a stone thrown into still water, its effects rippled through the congregation.

Daniels led a congregation within the United Church of Christ (UCC), a faith tradition that she describes as being less-acquainted with having its members share their personal stories of faith than other traditions.  As her congregation began its experiment with testimony they believed that they were recapturing a practice described in a number of places in the Bible.  While there are varied accounts of testimony in the Bible they are consistent in this: “People of faith are called to testify to God’s power and presence in their lives, and in the New Testament this is a call to proclaim Christ.” (xvii)  This explicit understanding of testimony led them to define it simply as “a spoken word in the context of worship, and it could not omit God.” (xiv)  

Daniel’s congregation began their use of testimony during the season of Lent, with leaders of the congregation taking turns sharing a moment when God was present in their life.  The person sharing didn’t have any firm guidelines beyond the definition above, which provided a wonderful variety to the types of things that people chose to share.  As time went on a people from all parts of the congregation took part in the practice.  They were young and old, long-time members, new members and even some non-members who had been in the habit of worshipping there.   

Reflecting on the experience after she left the congregation whose testimony the book is drawn from, Daniels writes, “It is my thesis that the practice of testimony strengthened the bonds among us as a community and drew us closer to God as individuals and as a community.” (13)  I would say that she successfully demonstrates that there is much for a congregation to gain from the practice of testimony. 

There are times when we may have powerful experiences of God, but we may only share them with our closest friends.  And at the other end of the scale are those moments of group fellowship after worship when we may only share the most superficial of things, omitting God completely from the conversation.  Testimony can be an intermediate place of relationship building, both for members of the congregation among themselves and as individuals with God. 

Testimony involves risk.  The risk is that seemingly universal concern over what people may think about us after hearing what we have to say.  But perhaps there is a greater risk, the risk that the very words we are being led to speak go unsaid, and in that silence the possibility of God using us as his instrument is passed by. 

Daniels has written a book that encourages congregations to use testimony as a part of their witness in the world.  In reading it I am also reminded that God has called me, and all who follow Christ, to be his witnesses, both in church and in the interpersonal relationships we have every day.

John 14, part 3

A week ago I gave a lecture for my local Bible study on John 14.  In this third, and concluding, post of the series I want to share the things I learned from John 14 and taught to the class.  (Here are the links to Part 1 and Part 2.)

If you have missed the first two parts, or to review for those of you who have read them, John 14 is the beginning of Jesus’ farewell to his disciples.  They are gathered in the Upper Room and have shared a meal, shared in the Lord’s Supper and experienced the foot-washing.  Judas has left the group, putting in place the process of Jesus’ betrayal.  Chapters 14, 15 and 16 make up Jesus’ final teaching session for those who have walked so closely with him for three years.   

The broad theme I believe is present in chapter 14 is that it was Jesus intent to prepare his disciples for the time when he would be absent from them by giving them a firm sense of hope and assurance in their future.  He wanted to give the disciples a perspective that looked beyond the present and cast their vision on eternity.  And I believe that this same intent is true for us as we read and study John 14. 

Chapter 14 briefly considers Jesus’ teaching on six different topics.  In Part 1, I talked about Heaven and God, the Father.  In Part 2, I reviewed Prayer and the Holy Spirit.   In the last part of the chapter Jesus talks about the Father’s love and God’s peace.  He then closes with an enigmatic, but meaningful phrase.

In verses 19 through 24 Jesus talks about the love that God, the Father, has for the disciples.  Verse 21 says,

Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me.  And he who loves me will be loved by my Father and I will love him and manifest myself to him.

Despite the way it may sound here, I don’t believe that Jesus is teaching that the presence of God’s love in their lives is dependent on their keeping the commandments.  Instead, Jesus is teaching them that God’s love is present to them because they love Jesus.

The disciples grew up and lived in a culture where there was a precisely calculated system of sacrifice and atonement in order for one to experience forgiveness by God.  But even with the performance of the sacrifices I don’t think that a Jew would claim to know God personally, or to experience God’s love intimately.

But in these verses Jesus is teaching a radical truth.  He is teaching them that God’s love is known personally by them in the very presence of Jesus.

We can take great comfort in this too, because we can’t possibly be perfect in living within God’s commandments.  The radical truth is that God loves us nonetheless.  He has promised to love us no matter what the circumstances of our lives may be. 

There may be times when God seems distant, and in my experience these are times when the distance has been due to my own bad choices in relation to godly living.  And the misery I may know at these times is actually God’s merciful action towards me, driving me back to him, where in repentance I clearly know his presence and love.

The last thing that Jesus assures his disciples of, in verses 25 through 31, is that they will experience God’s peace.  In verse 27 he says,

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you.  Not as the world gives do I give to you.  Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.”

Throughout chapter 14 Jesus has been preparing his disciples for the time when he will no longer be with them, a time that he knows is very close.  But while he will be physically absent he wants to assure them that they will know peace, a deep and true peace.  The world’s peace is transient and imperfect but the disciples will know God’s peace, which is perfect.

God’s peace is something that they are hearing about in the Upper Room but that they won’t be able to really grasp until he is gone and they are living without him.  It is a peace in which they will have no reason to be troubled or to have fear. 

The disciples will experience persecution, but they won’t experience it on their own.  They will have the Holy Spirit and the deep comfort of God’s peace.  IN the presence of persecution they will have full faith in God’s promises. 

In the book of Acts we see something of the violent persecution of the church by Saul.  But later, writing as Paul, he tells the church at Philippi that God’s peace is one that surpasses all understanding.    

We, too, will know times of struggle.  Physical struggle.  Emotional struggle.  Spiritual struggle.  Struggles that can take us to our breaking point.  But we can go through those struggles knowing that in each and every circumstance of life we have the promise of God’s peace. 

Jesus has given his disciples assurance of God’s promises and hope for their future.  It may not have been fully known in the short-term but it is certainly true in the long-term, when they cast their vision on eternity.

And eternity is where we should cast our vision as well.  John 1:4 says,

“In him was life, and the life was the light of men.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

We will certainly see and know periods of darkness but God’s light, in Jesus, has already overcome darkness and shines eternally.

John 14 ends with the phrase “Rise, let us go from here.”  The curious thing is that there is no action that follows the phrase, as chapter 15 begins with Jesus continuing to talk, something that lasts through chapter 17.

This phrase is something that biblical scholars have differing views on, with some believing it to have been added in error, while others completely ignore it.

Because my lecture was only on chapter 14 I believed that it was of significance for our study, because it reminds us that the reason we study God’s word is not merely to learn it more deeply, but to live by it in the world.

We were gathered in a Bible study and were fed on God’s word.  And being nourished we were then sent out by him to serve him faithfully and to make his glory known through acts large and small in the places we live our daily lives.  In our homes.  In our places of work.  Through our recreational activities.  Through the seemingly chance encounters that occur each day. 

And this is true each and every time we draw from God’s word.

So let us rise, and go from here, out into the world, making the glory of God known wherever we are.

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

He Still Speaks

This morning I had the opportunity to read the Bible aloud for the congregation during worship.  The passage I read was Hebrews 11:1-19.  Over the last few days I read it aloud at home several times, so that I would be somewhat familiar with it and not stumble over any words or phrases as I read.  As I did this preparation I found that one phrase, verse 4b, just seemed to linger in mind when I was done reading.  It says,

            “And through his faith, though he died, he still speaks.”

In looking back to the first part of the verse we see that the author is talking about Abel, whose offering to God in Genesis 4, was found acceptable by God.  The intent of the author of Hebrews is that Abel, who has been dead a very long time, continues to “speak” to people of his faith in God.  In making his offering he demonstrates that the giving of our best back to God is something that pleases God.

The fuller reading that I did mentions a number of other people from the Old Testament who had faith in God, including Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac and Jacob.  Each one of them was long-dead at the time Hebrews was written, and none of them were perfect models of holy living, and yet each of them, in their own way, continues to bear witness to God. 

And that brought this question to my mind:

Who are the people whose lives have testified to their faith and whose examples still speak to me? 

Here is one example.

In 1986 or ’87 I had a brief acquaintance with a woman named Trudy.  I don’t recall how it came up that she was a Christian but in conversation one day she mentioned that she was going to be praying with another person that day.  Again, I don’t recall the specifics, or the timeline, of our discussions over 2-3 days but she knew that I wasn’t a Christian, at least not in anything but the most nominal sense.  And the fact is that my faith was so nominal that I didn’t even know it.

As she went off to meet this other person for prayer Trudy said that she “would pray for me.”  I don’t recall my response but I do recall what I thought, which was “Whatever.  Suit yourself.”  The circumstances that brought us briefly together changed and I never saw Trudy again.   

Moving forward in time, to October, 2000, God worked powerfully in my life, and faith in him became a real thing, something that remains so today.  In the intervening 11 years I have occasionally looked back on my life, to the times before the fall of 2000, and seen places where God had been evident in the circumstances of my life but I was completely inattentive and disinterested.  The brief connection with Trudy is one of them. 

I have no idea how long she prayed for me, whether it was just that one day or if it became an ongoing prayer of hers.  I like to think that she carried on and prayed in the manner that C.S. Lewis describes in Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer.  Lewis wrote that he was often uncertain how long he should carry a particular prayer concern, but that he was certain that any particular day was not the day to stop praying for that concern.    

Trudy was one of those people whose name belongs aside all of the others of Hebrews 11.  She was a person who bore faithful witness to her Lord and Savior, and by whose example God continues to speak to me today.

Throughout history there have been people with faith in God, people who have given witness of that faith to those around them.  Some of their names are in the Bible, such as the ones I mentioned above.  Others are in the history books, such as Augustine, Luther, Calvin and Bonhoeffer.  And still others are in the pews, sitting next to us each Sunday.

Who has God placed in your life to shape your faith? 

And through you, who is God speaking to?

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.