Day 25 of Lent, Wednesday, April 2, 2014

Whoever welcomes one of these children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me isn’t actually welcoming me but rather the one who sent me.
                                          Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in Mark 9:37 (CEB)

One of the challenges of moving to an appointment without a parsonage is buying a home. Difficulties aside, the good thing about this is that we get to choose which school district we want for our children.  We picked the Cheyenne Middle School because Kyla already takes orchestra there on Monday nights so the transition will be smoother.

Unfortunately, this school district seems to be a popular one around Edmond which means the housing prices are higher.  Parents want quality education for their children and are willing to pay more or live in a smaller home to get it.

Our teachers held a rally at the capitol on Monday to remind the rest of us that education is important.  If we believe it to be important, we need to do a better job of funding it.  As we can look at Edmond or Piedmont, we see that young families are attracted to these areas because of the good school systems.  When we think about the long term future of our state, if we become known for top-notch education, it will be easier to attract families to come and live in our state.

As a church, we have always supported education.  We believe that God can more fully utilize a person's gifts if they are educated than if they aren't.  It's a matter of giving God more tools to work with!

I saw the sign below on a post from Twitter:

Great sign. #OKEDRally pic.twitter.com/LcICRNrv0D
— Cal Hardage (@calhardage) March 31, 2014

This sign is sobering because it is likely true.  It really gets to the heart of our priorities, darn it!

As we continue during Lent, we may look at extending our hand to the least of these in society.  As we do so, we discover that we are serving Christ.  The scripture in Mark above reminds us that this same relationship exists as we serve the children.



This is one of my favorite educational songs of all time:

Day 24 of Lent, Tuesday, April 1, 2014

"Guess what, kids?  It snowed last night!"

This might actually be believable this year as we've had some strange winter weather but I think spring is finally here to stay.

And with spring comes April Fool's Day.

Every year I usually tell the kids that it snowed.  It's a fairly harmless prank that used to work every time.  Alas, they are getting older and it is hard to use the same trick year after year.

I told Sheryl today that I was going to tell them that the Bishop changed his mind and we aren't actually moving.  She cringed and said, "I'll probably just listen from the next room."

I won't actually do that one - a little too cruel to play with their emotions that way but my mind seems to go to extremes.  It's a gift.

A prank in London going back to at least 1698.

It wasn't on April Fool's Day but I do remember a good prank I played in college.  It was Easter Sunday afternoon and we had an Easter Egg Hunt scheduled for the Wesley Foundation at OSU for those students that didn't go home.

Shannon Davis (now the pastor at Woodward First United Methodist Church) and I were in charge.  We decided not to hide the eggs but then go ahead and tell them that they were hidden all around Theta Pond.

We told everyone that this was a really tough hunt and only the most diligent would find any.  They looked for about 10 minutes before we revealed that there were no actual eggs hidden.  This was all on videotape and at this point, you saw the camera drop to the ground as we ran for our lives.

I'm not sure how we escaped being thrown into Theta Pond but the other students showed more grace than we did.

As you consider April Fool's, have a little fun with it.  But remember not to be cruel.

If you get punk'd, remember to be a good sport about it even if it really irritates you.

The best thing to do is to realize that people wouldn't go to the trouble if they didn't like you.

And remember, patience, joy, gentleness and self-control are all fruit of the Holy Spirit!




A good April Fool's song for the day.  Don't try this in Piedmont, kids!

Day 23 of Lent, Monday, March 31, 2014

          Do not be deceived: 
               "Bad company ruins good morals."

                                                                    Paul of Tarsus, 1 Corinthians 15:33 (NRSV)

Carver Transitional Center located at 400 S. May Avenue in Oklahoma City is a halfway house run by Avalon Correctional Services, Inc.  On Monday, the Oklahoma State Corrections Department surprised them with a random drug test for 153 of the residents. Over half (78) tested positive for illegal drugs.

Frankly, I'm surprised it was not higher.

The fact is that most criminal charges have roots in substance abuse.  When someone who is incarcerated is released from prison, there is a strong pull toward the circles that led to imprisonment in the first place.

The court costs alone that need to be repaid after exiting prison are overwhelming to those newly released.

Many of these men and women did not have strong support before they entered jail.  I don't imagine that people are lining up to help them afterwards.

The pressures often lead to more substance abuse as an escape.

Our support of ex-offenders through the Exodus House is a way that we are making a difference in people's lives.  As I have toured this facility many times as well as attended Redemption Church, I am proud of the transformation in Christ that we can accomplish through our church's ministries.



As we see God at work through people that were once walking down the wrong path, it might be a good idea for us to look at our own path.  Are there behaviors that could lead us into chaos?

Let us pray:

God of love, whose compassion never fails; we bring before you the troubles and perils of people and nations, the sighing of prisoners and captives, the sorrows of the bereaved, the necessities of strangers, the helplessness of the weak, the despondency of the weary, the failing powers of the aged.  O Lord, draw near to each; for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.


Prayer by Anselm of Canterbury, 1033-1109

Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 30, 2014

This is my commandment, 

that you love one another 

as I have loved you. 

                                                                          Jesus of Nazareth, John 15:12 (NRSV)

Loving others as Jesus loves us is not an easy thing to do.

We like to complicate the matter.

This video shows a dog greeting the master after a long time away.  He is a soldier who was serving in Afghanitstan.

It is hard to watch this and not smile!

As I think about our enthusiasm for others, it is different than a dog's love for a master. We are more intelligent and discriminating but this also leads to us hurting each other more deeply.

We don't have enthusiasm for others like this and even this dog wouldn't have the same reaction for a stranger.  The command to love others as we have been loved doesn't come naturally.

It comes through faith.  It comes through prayer.  It comes through the reminder in worship that this is what we are about.

What does it mean that God would work through us to love others?

It might not look quite like the video.

But seeing others receive justice and joy can sure bring us a sense of meaning and well-being.  It can bring a sense of peace.

Peace that passes any real understanding.

Let us pray:

Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace;

St. Francis by Albert Chevallier Tayler (oil on canvas)
[Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
Where there is injury, pardon;
Where there is error, truth;
Where there is doubt, faith;
Where there is despair, hope;
Where there is darkness, light;
And where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master, Grant that I may not so much seek
To be consoled as to console;
To be understood as to understand;
To be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
And it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

                                                Attributed to St. Francis of Assisi, 13th Century

Day 22 of Lent, Saturday, March 29, 2014

               for all have sinned 
               and fall short 
               of the glory of God

                                                     Paul of Tarsus, Romans 3:23 (NIV)

Jagger at Winterland Palace,
San Francisco, June 1972

Mick Jagger of The Rolling Stones is back in the news.  L'Wren Scott, his girlfriend of ten years, committed suicide on March 17th and left her entire estate to Jagger in her will.  The suicide is believed to be related to the large debts her business had accrued.

Mick Jagger has gained some amount of respectability through the years actually receiving knighhood from the British throne a little over ten years ago.

As a part of the Stones, Jagger played to the bad-boy image in the late sixties and early seventies with songs that seemed to indicate a fascination with the occult.

The most notable of these was "Sympathy for the Devil", the opening track on the 1968 album, Beggar's Banquet.  The song is sung in the perspective of the devil as we hear him speak about being present at some of the awful parts of history such as the crucifixion of Jesus up to World Wars I and II.  They even reference the death of the Kennedy's as the song was written during the news of the death of Bobby Kennedy.

During the song, we continue to hear, "Pleased to meet you, hope you guess my name."

Towards the end of the song we find the identity revealed:

                 But what's confusing you
         Is just the nature of my game
         Just as every cop is a criminal
         And all the sinners saints
         As heads is tails
         Just call me Lucifer
         Cause I'm in need of some restraint

Jagger later spoke about singing this song as acting a part indicating that he didn't profess any kind of supernatural meaning to it.  Instead it speaks more to the idea of the apostle Paul's referenced in Romans above that all people have sinned.

This is an important lesson for Christians who get too full of themselves to remember and is a lesson that Jesus emphasized to the Pharisees as they saw themselves as closer to God's favor than anyone else.

However, the danger we may see in a song like this is the acceptance of evil because "everybody does it."  There can be a fatalism that all people have a dark side and so we simply accept it for what it is.  This is allowing ourselves to reach a lowest common denominator.

Rather than this, when I hear the song on the radio, I'm reminded that I too have a dark side that shouldn't be indulged.  





Photo by Larry Rogers [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Day 21 of Lent, Friday, March 28, 2014

[The widow of Zarephath] said, “As the Lord your God lives, I have nothing baked, only a handful of meal in a jar, and a little oil in a jug; I am now gathering a couple of sticks, so that I may go home and prepare it for myself and my son, that we may eat it, and die.” Elijah said to her, “Do not be afraid; go and do as you have said; but first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me, and afterwards make something for yourself and your son. 
                                                            1 Kings 17:12-13

This request by Elijah to a poor widow seems counter-productive.  It is almost laughable to see the hubris of Elijah in asking for something of a widow who is so poor she sees no future for herself or her son.

Our initial response is for Elijah to go and beg from someone else!

When we imagine that we have nothing
to share, we are poor indeed.

And yet, as we continue in the story, we see that the woman is blessed during a drought with a miraculous never-ending jug of meal and jar of oil.  If she had not paid attention and done something for someone else, would she have received the blessing?

I think this is something everyone needs to consider from time to time.  Often, our initial response to others may be, "that's not my responsibility."

Yet we try to teach our children the opposite as when we instruct them to pick up the mess regardless of who made it.

"But it's not mine!"

"Yes, but it won't hurt you to pick it up.  We help each other that way."

The following video is a wonderful testimony of someone who didn't say, "That's not mine."

I'm sure that he feels good about what he is doing even though he knows that he didn't put it there in the first place.  During Lent, what would it be for you to do something for someone else?  It might be that you find the abundance of blessing just like the widow of Zarephath.

Day 20 of Lent, Thursday, March 27, 2014

             For if you love those who love you, 
                               what reward do you have?
                                                                          Matthew 5:46 (NRSV)

Last week, there was a terrible news story about two Maryland teenage girls that abused a 16 year old autistic boy multiple times and recorded some of the abuse on their phones.

The 17 year old girl was changed as an adult and the 15 year old was charged as a juvenile.

The difficulty about this story is that the autistic boy still considers the girls his friends and when his mother told him to stay away from them, he wasn't sure that he would.

To take advantage of one who is vulnerable socially like this is horrific and it makes my heart ache with the kind of pain that I feel for all those involved.

The reaction on websites has been understandably derogatory for the two girls.

However, some of the comments go overboard.  Here's one from a man calling himself "Bar Man" from Los Angeles, California.  He supposedly has 558 subscribers that follow his comments:

       Life in prison is how you would sentence an adult human. These two are not human. I suggest the local pound. The Dogs at the pound are a better example of good, of love, and possible betterment. Yet most Dogs at a pound are only a few days away from execution. I prefer any Dog over these two.

This post had 6,161 likes as of my research on Tuesday.

This post had a one-word reply by a woman named Betty Cole:

Amen.

I understand that it is easy to pile on.  These girls are easy to despise.  Anyone who ever faced bullying can channel those feelings into a reaction to this case.

As a pastor, I can't justify taking away someone's humanity by referring to them as animals.   I understand the argument that says that they dropped their humanity when they acted in such a manner.  But a part of the Christian faith is to see as God sees.

What kind of Hell are these
girls already in to allow themselves
to treat another person in this way?

And I realize that these girls did not learn this behavior by themselves.  It was not gleaned from the internet. When you have a blatant disregard for human feelings like this, it is probable that they also have been abused in some way in the past.  The feelings have bubbled up and been released in a way that is unacceptable.

There's no good solution for any of the three involved.  But if we want to salvage the future of the two girls, we might seek some measure of rehabilitation rather than simply seeking punitive measures.

As we find ourselves halfway through the Lenten season, we may be tired of considering our own sins by now.  In fact, it may be refreshing to turn to others that are far worse than ourselves.  But in the end, we need to remember that we are all in need of redemption.

Let us pray for all three of these teens as they experience the cross.


Photo by Biswarup Ganguly (Own work) CC-BY-SA-3.0-2.5-2.0-1.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0), via Wikimedia Commons