Sermon for the 17th Sunday after Pentecost - "Real and Messy"

We’re going to begin this morning with a little bit of readers’ theatre. A Presbyterian colleage of mine in Alexandria, VA wrote in her blog about some conversations she's had in the church over the years:

Sweet Church Lady: I sat beside Betsy at the women's luncheon the other day and she wouldn't stop criticizing you.
Pastor: So what did you say?
SCL: Oh, I would never say anything. I wouldn't want to make waves.

Church Leader: Would you pray for my daughter? She's back in rehab again.
Pastor: Of course I will. Shall we add her name to the prayer list?
CL: Oh, please don't. I couldn't face my friends if they knew. I've never told them about Deena's problem.

Church Officer: I think ___ (another officer who is a recovering alcoholic) might be drinking again.
Pastor: Do you think we should go talk with him?
CO: Oh, no. I wouldn't want to embarrass him.

As a child of the 1960s, I remember dressing up in patent leather shoes and donning a bow in my pin-curled hair for Sunday School and worship where I would join dozens of other little girls dressed just the same. Little boys wore little jackets and ties. Moms and Dads also donned their Sunday Best. And everybody filed into their pews and smiled at their neighbors and worshipped the LORD and went home.

At home, there might have been marriage/addiction/financial/mental health/sexual problems. But - God forbid - we disclose such family secrets, especially in church. We wouldn't even tell the pastor unless we were desperate.

As late as the 1980s when I served as a summer intern in a NY church, I met a family who disappeared for the summer, only to return my last weekend. They asked to speak with me and shared that their only son had died of AIDS in another state.

Me: Oh my gosh. I am so sorry. I didn't even know he was sick. And no one said anything to me.
Grieving Mom: We didn't tell anyone he was sick. That's why no one told you.
Me: ? Well . . . would you like to have a memorial service here after the pastor's back from sabbatical?
Grieving Mom: Oh no! Please don't tell anyone. We can't tell people about it. It would be too embarrassing.
Me: (long pause) So . . . you aren't going to tell your friends that your son died . . . because it would be too embarrassing?[1]

I will admit that, like many preachers, I’ve struggled with the Gospel text this week. This parable, as well as the verses that surround it, is one of the most confusing passages in scripture for me. Now I know I’m not supposed to say that – I know I’m not supposed to comment on the Bible as if it were a novel under review. But it’s the truth: I honestly don’t know how to understand this parable. I’m not the only one, either.

Deciphering what Jesus meant to say in this parable is a tough nut to crack. Was the manager merely shrewd, or was he corrupt? The manager said, “I’m too weak to dig, and I won’t stoop to begging.” Jesus insisted all along that beggars and laborers were as much children of God as anyone else – does this parable invalidate all of what Jesus said? Under the accusation of squandering the rich man’s property, the manager confirms the accusation by squandering even more in an attempt to cover his butt for the time he gets sacked. But at the end of the parable, Jesus tells his disciples to be faithful and honest in all things, whether it’s a little or a lot. How again is all of this supposed to work?

I’ve read several attempts to decipher the meaning of this parable, some old and some new. Some look closely at the Greek to find an escape hatch; others use socio-economic policies of the time to try and determine how the manager might have been working for his master's benefit. An Episcopal preacher for whom I have a lot of respect says that this is a story about how the shrewd manager actually freed the peasant farmers from their oppressive debt to an incredibly wealthy landowner. These are all valid attempts to make sense of a very difficult parable – but none of them rang true to me this week. This is one of those moments in the story of Jesus where I'm not really sure what's going on, but I don't want to try to escape the uncertainty by changing the rules of the story – that seems false to me.

Philipp Melanchthon, the Greek and Latin scholar who was Martin Luther's most trusted colleague during the Reformation, once said that "to know Christ is to know His benefits." So, if that's the case, let's take a look at this parable in terms of benefits, shall we? The landowner doesn't really gain any benefits, other than possibly in the goodwill of his debtors. Important, but not essential to the story. The manager gains the benefit of shelter and protection, but at the cost of his honesty; even though the landowner says he's been shrewd, the manager has in fact squandered his master's property. But the debtors – they are the ones who gain benefits clean, aren't they? The end result for the debtors is forgiveness; their debts have been significantly reduced. Even if it's unfair – even if it's a cheat – even if the manager did it to save his own skin, the debtors have in fact found their burden lessened and now may walk that much more free. It's messy, it's not fair, it's bad economics – but it's also a gift to the debtors which they couldn't have gotten for themselves.

We have a choice when it comes to forgiveness – we can take it real and messy, or we can take it false and clean. The Pharisees, who had been grumbling about Jesus dining with sinners, wanted their forgiveness clean – so clean, in fact, that Jesus once described them as “white-washed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of filth.”[2] Jesus came to forgive sinners – and we were so offended at the thought that we crucified Him for it. In that sense, we are all Pharisees – all people who try so very hard to maintain that no, we’re not messy, we’re not sinful, and we don’t need forgiveness like that. If we just maintain the illusion that everything’s okay, no one will notice that we’re covered, head to toe, in our failings, our disappointments and our sins. Real and messy, or false and clean: how do you want it?

Perhaps the manager really was squandering his master’s property; we’ll never know if the accusation was just or unjust. What we do know is that the people to whom he offered forgiveness of their debts took that forgiveness without a second thought. When you’re under the load of an unpayable debt, you don’t question whether or not you’re too proud to accept the gracious gift that lifts the burden: you take it. What Jesus offers us is the same reckless, squandering gift. We owe God a debt for our sins that we could never repay. But Jesus offers to forgive the debt: no payment, no required sacrifice, just forgiveness and mercy. Jesus gives up what is “fair” and “just” for the sake of obtaining what he desires: the justification of sinners. Your righteousness cheats the Law for the Gospel. The question is: can we accept the grace He offers?

Every faith community has a choice: either we can be a bunch of real, messy, forgiven sinners or a bunch of false, clean, white-washed Pharisees. We are messy and in need of forgiveness. We make mistakes and we cannot be what God has created us to be. We have no hope at all without the squandering grace of a Son who cannot resist giving his Father’s forgiveness away. This is the real, messy truth about who we are: sinners in bondage to sin who cannot free ourselves. Living together in a faith community isn’t about pretending nothing is wrong – it’s about admitting that with all that IS wrong, we have hope in Jesus that all will someday be right.

Jesus offers you forgiveness, I suggest you take Him at His word and accept it. Take it as the free gift of a manager who is recklessly giving away His Master’s property. Stop pretending that you can stay clean when you’re up to your neck in your sins and burdens. Put away all your false pretenses to righteousness and purity on your own, and let the gracious Son offer you the new, clean garments He washed in His own blood, the garments of forgiveness and mercy. Let it be real if it’s real. Let it be messy if it’s messy. Let it be squander if it’s squander: you are free, regardless. Amen.

---

[1] Jan Edmiston. “What We Talk About When We Talk About Life” http://churchforstarvingartists.blogspot.com/2007/09/what-we-talk-about-when-we-talk-about.html

[2] Matthew 23.27

Wishing for Perfection

Before moving to Ames in 2008, we lived in Barrett, MN, a small town surrounding a lake much like the one in this picture. In fact, I took several sunrise photos that looked quite a bit like this in the four years I served Peace Lutheran Church in Barrett. Our house was just across the road from the lake, and when the conditions were right, you could get the most beautiful scenes when the sun came up across the lake.

I had a somewhat disheartening meeting today, one that reminded me that no matter how much we might wish for it, no Christian community is ever perfect. As I walked, sweating, over to the bus stop for my ride home, I thought of how nice it was last week when it was so cool, and how few days there have been this summer that weren't either rainy, steamy or (more often) both. Imperfect weather today, to do with an imperfect church (with an imperfect pastor, I might add).

Not every sunrise in Minnesota looked like this one. Most were ordinary, unremarkable, and passed without notice. Some were as beautiful as this one, some were even more spectacular. Some were, frankly, ugly - especially in March and April when the snow was finally melting and everything was grey and brown and mushy.

Gordon Atkinson, who blogs at Real Live Preacher, wrote a piece in which he reminded everyone that churches, at their heart, are "a silly bunch of dreamers and children, prone to mistakes, blunders and misjudgments." This doesn't excuse us from apologizing and trying to make amends when we blunder and misjudge, or when others make mistakes. It also doesn't allow us to go searching willy-nilly for "the perfect church," because that church only exists in fantasyland.

That town in which we lived and worked in Minnesota had its share of flaws. We had some genuine disappointments and struggles in four years there. We also had some really wonderful moments of grace, which were not of our creation but simply moments to see what wonders God can do in communities dedicated to living in faith with one another, with all our mistakes, blunders and misjudgments.

Perfection this side of heaven is a fairy tale. God chooses what is weak, foolish and imperfect to shame the strong, wise and seemingly perfect. We trust that God will supply the grace and faith necessary to live together as part of the body of Christ: forgiven, set free to enjoy grace when it comes, and dedicated to living together as one community, no matter how imperfectly we might do it.

Grace & peace,
Scott

God and Sabbath

If you refrain from trampling the sabbath,
from pursuing your own interests on my holy day; if you call the sabbath a delight
and the holy day of the Lord honourable; if you honour it, not going your own ways,
serving your own interests, or pursuing your own affairs; then you shall take delight in the Lord,
and I will make you ride upon the heights of the earth; I will feed you with the heritage of your ancestor Jacob,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.

Isaiah 58.13-14

The question was raised tonight at Bible Study: "How does God keep the Sabbath?" Christians and Jews tend to understand the commandment to "Remember the Sabbath and keep it holy" as a commandment designed to elicit worship out of God's creatures - and since God is, well, God, worship of Godself seems nonsensical at the least, not to mention in some ways impossible.

We are not merely playing with semantics here: Genesis 1 describes the first Sabbath, and it is God doing the observing, not us. Obviously, Sabbath is important to God - but we know precious little about what God actually does with God's Sabbath.

Sabbath weighs heavily on the Old Testament and Gospel readings from the Revised Common Lectionary this week. Isaiah 58, quoted above, reminds the hearer that the Sabbath is a day in which one's own interests are put aside and one's affairs take the back seat. In Luke 13, Jesus heals a near-crippled woman on the Sabbath; this act of healing brings condemnation from the leader of the synagogue, who insists that the woman could have been healed on any other day of the week. It is the third of four Sabbath controversies in Luke's gospel, and in all of them Jesus calls the strictest Sabbath observances into question. The question that arises is, "What is Jesus saying about the Sabbath and its purpose? How does God do Sabbath, and how should this transform our observance as well?"

One wonders if the issue is not work or not-work, but rather delight or drudgery. In his commentary on the lectionary this week, Dan Clendenin wrote,

"When religious rituals like sabbath-keeping and fasting — or our Bible studies, sermons, church attendance, and retreats — are divorced from human health and wholeness, whenever a believer "turns away from your own flesh and blood" (Is. 58:7), then our religion has gone very bad indeed."

When the things we do as religious people become more important than our delight in the One who calls forth work and play and Sabbath, we have missed the point of Sabbath altogether. When God had finished a "hard week" of creation, God rested on the Sabbath; what do you suppose that rest looked like? Here's one possibility: imagine you have slaved all week on an outdoor patio or backyard retreat like the one pictured above. Once you've finished all that work, what will be the first thing you'll want to do? Take delight in that which you have wrought. Was this what God did on that first Sabbath? Moreover, is delight what God asks of us when we ourselves observe Sabbath?

I am coming to believe that delight is indeed the first and most important point of Sabbath: delight in the presence of God, delight in the company of our fellow sinner/saints, delight in the promise, made in baptism, through preaching and in the Lord's Supper, that Christ has lived, died and risen again for you. Sabbath is a time to put down the laptop, to stop looking at the clock, to deny the omnipresent modern desire to produce and consume and simply be in the good creation which God hath wrought. Walter Bruggeman insists that the modern pre-occupation with production and consumption is a metaphysical equivalent of Pharaoh's yoke. Let the reader note that when Jesus explains himself in Luke's gospel, he points back 1300 years to the time of slavery in Egypt and says, "Ought not this woman...have been released from her bondage on the Sabbath day?" Call it a date night, call it a backyard retreat, call it what you will - the call to Sabbath is not about satisfying God's need to be praised, but rather about the sheer joy of taking delight in God, of being shaped by God's grace, of hearing regularly "You are My beloved child, fearfully and wonderfully made."

That's my answer, at least: what's yours?

Grace & peace,

Scott

Shining Lights

It was a day for shining lights in the Windy City. I know I'm going to miss one or two, but here's a brief list.

• Eboo Patel, founder and executive director of Interfaith Youth Core, spoke for 45 minutes this morning to a spellbound audience about a "theology of the bridge," his metaphor for ways interfaith cooperation can overcome those who use religion to dominate or separate people of different faiths.
• A workshop with Hamsa and Emy of IFYC discussing concrete ways we as campus ministry staff can promote religious freedom and respect in our own environments. It was their first workshop, but they carried it off without a hitch and really opened our eyes.
• I sit down to lunch, and one of our campus ministry students hands me a list of all the things she and the rest of the group have been planning for this academic year. Completely. Freaking. Unprompted. By. Me. This is what I was hoping we could do after returning from the conference, and now it's already done. Time to hang on for a wild ride this year, I think.
• A remarkable conversation with B, a seminary classmate serving in a new call since we saw each other last. Her new call is a) a very important synodical staff position, b) one for which she is very well-equipped and, I imagine, at which she is succeeding wildly, and c) one which usually goes only to ordained clergy, regardless of whether the clergyperson in question is qualified. Here's a great example of the church not being bound to its past when looking to its present needs. Professional lay ministry is a growing part of the church and needs to be lifted up when we do it right!
• A plenary session on social media that turned out to be more valuable than I suspected it would be. Lots of helpful information, but the caveat by which our use of that information can be judged: "Don't mistake effort for success."
• Another workshop with Rosella and Mike on Alternative Spring Break programs. Rosella and Mike are two incredibly vivacious 20somethings who have been carrying out heavy ministry responsibilities over the past two years, if not longer. I was floored by their intelligence and commitment to the important ministry they are doing, and I wish I had known about them prior to this conference.
• Finally, a gut-busting dinner with our friends from Christus House at the University of Iowa. We all went to Gino's East for true Chicago deep-dish, and I'm about ten minutes from succumbing to a major food coma.

It was a day to celebrate the many ways God is active in this church. In the midst of all our anxiety about mission support, social issues and the future of our denomination, we need to take time to look around and see the fearfully, wonderfully made people carrying out important ministry in our midst. God be praised: this church will have a future if we are wise enough to encourage and empower those with such remarkable gifts.

Grace and peace,

Scott

Confessing the Cost of Vocation

I'm in Chicago with four of our students for Follow Me: Sharing the Gospel in a 2.0 World. It's been an enriching experience thus far: time to re-connect with colleagues, strengthen ties across the church and hear from others about ways to be the hands and feet of Christ in a culture becoming more and more suspicious of or apathetic to the church. I met Pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber, who I've appreciated from a distance for a few years now but never had the opportunity to meet in real life. (Her church, House for All Sinners and Saints, sells the awesome shirt shown here) I heard a passionate sermon from Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson, which in itself is remarkable because, even with all of his many gifts taken into account, "passionate" is not a word I would have formerly used to describe the man. Seeing that side of a leader I greatly respect was empowering. His message, which was to meet the question, "Can anything good come out of Christianity?" with Philip's response, "Come and see" was inspiring. My hotel room is swanky and my roommate is gracious, especially when it comes to putting up with my snoring.

All of this good stuff, however, comes with a cost. Normally the cost is simply time away from my girls, which in itself is never fun, but endurable in the short term. Campus ministry is a specialized ministry that puts a lot of us out "on the island" in our local context, so we need this time together, even though it takes us away from family and friends. This time, however, the cost is considerably more painful. A flood swept through Ames this week, and unfortunately my being at this conference has left Beloved on her own with our girls in Ames with no day care, no potable water from city lines and heat indexes above 100 degrees. They're safe: friends have provided drinking water, there's water for bathing and toilets, the electricity is running and we didn't have any water in the house. But this week will never make Beloved's list of top ten favorite weeks of all time. Not by a long, long shot.

All of us, not just pastors, have these moments where your vocation, whatever it may be, comes with a price. For the farmer, it's the continual anxiety about rain, sunshine, hail and the gazillion other things that can ruin a crop every single year. For the teacher, it's the long hours, low pay and continual managing of all the different hurdles between a student and their educational progress. For the manager, it's juggling schedules and emotions, maintaining the proper balance between caring for employees and remaining the boss. Every job comes with a price to pay. I think the difference between a profession and a vocation is the willingness to pay the price - and maybe vocation takes an unhealthy turn when one doesn't even notice how high the price has become.

I'm going to be uncomfortable most of my time here, not because Beloved has laid a guilt trip on me, but because I'm torn between my vocation as a husband/father and my vocation as a pastor. Jesus help me if I ever stop noticing how much the latter takes away from the former; if that happens, I'm not sufficiently equipped to be either.

Grace & peace,

Scott

Friday Five: Nostalgia Edition

Today's Friday Five takes us on a trip down memory lane, from Sally:

This year Tim and I have planted and nurtured a vegetable garden, and I have just spent the morning preparing vegetables and soups for the freezer, our veggie garden is producing like crazy and it is hard to keep up with, that said it'll be worth it for a little taste of summer in the middle of winter :-). That got me thinking of the things I treasure, memories are often more valuable than possessions.

1. A treasured memory from childhood?

I remember the chair pictured here very fondly. We all loved that chair: it was the per

fect size for reading, snuggling with Mom or Dad, and all kinds of fun to turn over on its back and/or side. I know it got re-upholstered at least once in its lifetime. I have treasured comfy reading chairs ever since. A close second to this memory is Ed, the black lab we had when I was just a wee little thing. He was the gentlest, kindest dog I ever knew. I used to fall asleep in the yard using Ed as a pillow. Any wonder I wanted a lab when we started looking for a dog? I'm happy to say that Jack shows the same patience and love to the Sisters that Ed did to me and my brothers.

2. A teenage memory?

This time of year I'm always thinking about football. At the moment I'm listening to The Junction Boys: How Ten Days in Hell with Bear Bryant Forged a Championship Team on my iPod, and it brings back memories of two-a-days on "the hill" back home in Wakefield, NE. You never forget the feel of the pads on your shoulders, the helmet on your head, the smell of grass and sweat and maybe a little blood if you got popped in the nose or mouth. I remember my senior season most fondly: we weren't expected to amount to much, but we only lost two games that year, both very close games

against teams that went on to high post-season results. We worked our asses off for what we got that year, and so far as I can remember, it was the first time most of us had went out and gotten something people didn't think we could get. Man, those fun Friday nights were worth every torturous practice beforehand.

3. A young adult memory?

Ranch Camp, Week #7, 1994 at Carol Joy Holling Camp. I have a lot of wonderful memories from my five summers at camp, but this one week will always stand out for me. My co-counselor was Tanya, on whom I had a bit of an unrequited crush, but despite me making calf-eyes all week, we got along great and worked really well together. Our campers that week were just incredible. They bonded really well from the start, even Blake, who was our big rebel/too-cool-for-camp kid that week. We hiked, we cooked out, we had an overnight sleepout on the hill; you name it, we did it that week, and it was the kind of week that makes you think you could do that job for the rest of your life. The Bible Study was particularly good that summer: "Jesus, Who Are You?" was the theme, and each day we studied one of the "I am" sayings from the Gospel of John. Thursday was "I am the Resurrection and the Life," and as you can imagine, we talked about death. This particular Thursday was a very emotional session, but in the best possible way. Our village walked to the Closing Program in one big long line, arms around shoulders, me and Tanya right in there with them. We both cried when the campers were all gone that week. Experiences like that are so few and far between, yet they carry so much weight in ou

r lives; who would have imagined a bunch of teenagers, most of whom I can't even remember individually anymore, would remain in my heart all these years later?

4. A memory from this summer?

Just yesterday, as I was hurrying the girls into the car to go to the gym, Ainsley looked at me and said, "Daddy, you just have to be patient with me!" That's just one snapshot of this summer for us: growing girls who are blossoming into real people right in front of us. Holy. Crap. Ferris is right: "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." We've tried to take time to look around this summer, and I'm really thankful to be able to do it.

5. A memory you hope to have?

Lots in general: family vacations, happy weddings, great accomplishments for the Sisters, weddings, grandkids, etc. But one in particular we hope to start working on soon is a big anniversary trip back to Europe in 10-15 years. I'd dearly love to tour Ireland with Beloved; nights in the pub, days on the road, seeing the sights I saw in 1996 when I went with the Nebraska band, but with the appreciation I've gained over years of reading about Erin and her children. After some time in Ireland, a trip to Germany so Beloved can see "Luther Land" would be neat as well. We honeymooned in Bavaria, but Kristin hasn't seen Lutherstadt-Wittenberg, Eisenach, Leipzig or any of the wonderful sights I saw

during my J-term class in seminary. It would be great to spend a night or two in Haus Hainstein with my beloved, ja?

Bonus- a song that sums up one of those memories.

My folks had one of these gigantic counter-style stereo systems. They had (and still have) a chest full of LPs, but the ones that got the coveted spots inside the stereo itself were the Statler Brothers albums. My dad loved the Statler Brothers, and we all followed suit. I remember loading that record player up with three or four records and listening for what seemed like hours. I learned to harmonize from the Statler Brothers. (The fact that I'm likely doing the same thing to Ainsley and Alanna with Storyhill has certainly not escaped my notice.) Anyway, this is one of many songs I remember singing all those years ago:

Grace & peace,

Scott

Anne Rice and the Failure of the Church

Big news last week: Anne Rice has left the church.

Everyone's got their take on it, of course, and I'm no different. Pretty Good Lutherans has a good comment thread going, numerous bloggers are weighing in, and in one of the most crassly opportunistic grabs I've ever seen, the UCC is actively campaigning for Rice to join their flock.

I find myself in the “understanding but not agreeing with Anne Rice” camp. I find the institutional church an exhausting, frustrating, maddening bunch of hypocrites and powermongers far more often than I would like. During the Unbloggableness, a person involved in the situation said, "There are lots of good people here." Unfortunately, there is a threshold over which it doesn't matter how many good people are present: one can only exist in a toxic environment for so long. It appears that for Ms. Rice, that threshold has been crossed, at least for the time being.

I’m forced to wonder how closely connected Ms. Rice was to her local parish/congregation. Did her fame and notoriety keep her from forming the kind of spiritual friendships which carry us through those times of spiritual struggle? Or, on the flip side, was she deeply involved, but spurned or turned away by a cadre of power elite in her local community? It seems, from her description, that this isn't over one issue, so I'm betting on my the former, but we won’t know the answers to these and other questions unless Ms. Rice tells us. Frankly, I hope she keeps it to herself; adding more church gossip to this situation would be gasoline on an already-merrily-burning fire.

Regardless of the actual facts of this particular case, once again the church has failed one of its own. This one’s on us, at least partially, no matter what flavor of Christianity Rice called her home. Until the church acknowledges that we are part of the problem, and takes action to correct those contributions we are making to the dysfunction and dystopia of the life of faith, we will continue to hemorrhage members in increasing numbers. True, every believer must struggle to reconcile the sinner/saint nature of existence for herself, but this in no way excuses the church from its responsibility to deny sin within its power to do so.

The whole thing is saddening. I hold many of the same beliefs as Ms. Rice, according to her original posts, as do many of my friends in faith. The polarizing forces within the church are becoming so abhorrent that the rest of us suffer as a result. We're forced to wonder if we'll be defined by our fringe elements for the foreseeable future: how can we be louder about who we are without sounding the same strident tone as those who are often caricatured as "the Christians?"

We can't. That's just the thing. The way of Jesus doesn't allow us to attempt a hostile takeover of the church, from any political, socio-economic or moral perspective. When any of us attempts to do so, we become the Christians Anne Rice is leaving and Christopher Hitchens despises. We are called to co-exist with fellow sinners in the church - period. Yes, sometimes sin and evil need to be called out, but it seems to me we draw that particular circle far larger than Jesus does, and we don't always have the same things in the middle.

Gordon Atkinson wrote a wonderful reflection on the church a few years ago. If I were advising Ms. Rice, I'd suggest she read it, and take her time considering her next step. I hope her self-imposed exile doesn't last long, as I can't imagine being without a community of believers with whom I can pray, laugh, sing, shout and weep. As for the church, the call remains the same: do justice, love mercy, walk humbly with our God. The rest is not up to us.

Grace & peace,

Scott

ps: One commentary from the Philadelphia Atheist Examiner claimed that Rice's Interview with the Vampire series is "decidedly atheistic." I'm thinking he didn't read The Tale of the Body Thief or Memnoch the Devil, both decidedly not atheistic. Details, people!

Sermon for the 10th Sunday after Pentecost/Ordinary 18C - "Fear and Control, Faith and Freedom"

Leo Tolstoy wrote a wonderful short story entitled "How Much Land Does A Man Need?" in 1886, a story which author James Joyce called "the greatest short story ever written." In the story, a Russian peasant farmer named Pahom says to himself, "If I had plenty of land, I shouldn't fear the Devil himself!"

It should go without saying, of course, that in the course of the story, fear and greed drove Pahom to greater and greater lengths to find happiness and security in his land. Pahom certainly isn't the only literary figure to chase a treasure. Captain Ahab had his Moby Dick. Lord Voldemort had his Harry Potter.

Me? I've got my running shoes.

When it comes to shoes, many of us runners are shopaholics. We compare websites, we email one another, we spend lots of time looking for the perfect shoe, preferably at a low price. I bought this pair a few months ago, because I found them on sale at an online retailer. I ordered two pairs, one for now and one for six months from now when I need another pair.

In the grand scheme of the running life, this is the moment when I’m satisfied. This is the moment when I'm holding the box, inhaling the intoxicating scent of new shoes, and I think, "Now I'm okay. Now I'm set." This is the moment of real trouble for us – and Jesus hit that moment right on the head when he told this parable to the crowd around him. The fact that it has something to say to us today just proves that God’s Word is always doing something, doesn’t it?

First we need to understand this isn’t about bad people suffering the consequences of their sin. Grain that isn't stored properly is ruined, and it was common for rabbis to adjudicate inheritance disputes in Jesus‘ time. The characters in this story weren’t necessarily doing anything wrong. What’s wrong is not their actions, but the trust and faith driving their actions. Mistakes were made at the level of heart and soul, which is more often than not the very place our struggles begin.

The mistake of the rich man had nothing to do with grain. The mistake of the brother had nothing to do with inheritances. Their mistakes were made long before this stuff was ever part of the problem. Their mistakes were their misplaced treasures. The possessions they treasured held them captive, while the freedom in which God created them was buried under fear.

But what is it that drives this fear? What causes such great fear in us, that we should put all our trust in possessions or money or stuff? Is it a fear of inconvenience? I don't think so: inconvenience isn't pleasant, but it is definitely survivable. Is it a fear of discomfort? Again, no, for the same reason. Are we afraid of a loss of social standing? This might be nearer the mark, but again, a loss of social standing or reputation might be unpleasant, even painful, but we can survive such things. Even a fear of poverty, which can certainly be painful and even harmful to us and to our families, is not what drives our misplaced trust in things and possessions.

Our need for stored treasure has to do with one great, overwhelming fear: the fear of losing control. We are afraid that we are not in control of our world. We are afraid of the random, the uncertain. We are afraid of what we cannot control – and we fool ourselves into thinking that the things we can control are the things that matter, that they are, in fact, the things that will save and preserve us.

Our fear can lead us into all sorts of sins and trouble. Think of some of the commandments we break in our lust for treasures we think we can control. Our fear of commitment, vulnerability and authenticity us into superficial relationships a mile wide and an inch deep. Our fear of not being compared favorably to our neighbors leads us to covet our neigbor's possessions – "keeping up with the Joneses" is an expensive sin, but it is also one of the most common among us. Our fear of speaking the truth leads us to gossip and false witness, and not only that: fear leads us to think that the only way we can improve our own reputation is to bring down our neighbor's reputation. Our fear of risking peace, which makes us vulnerable but also makes us more completely God's children, leads us into thinking that harming our neighbor physically, even killing him, is justified if the circumstances can be defended adequately. And our fear of poverty, chaos and loss of control, as we've already seen, leads us into satisfying our greed and hoarding treasures, stealing those treasures if necessary.

Now, of course, we all fall into different places when it comes to fear and what it can do to us. But no matter how close or far away we may be from that which causes us to fear, we are all afraid, and deep down it comes back to our fear of losing control, of what may happen to us.

Friends, we need only look around us to see how little control we have of the world around us. Do you remember when the I35 bridge collapsed in 2007? My brother-in-law crossed that bridge less than two hours before it collapsed: it could have very easily been our family on the news, grieving a loss we couldn’t control. For nearly nine years we’ve been living under a cloud of fear that formed when the World Trade Center was destroyed on a normal, ordinary Tuesday morning. Floods sweep away dams; economies crash; accidents happen. Where we can, we try to stay in control, because so much of life is beyond our control.

Here’s the thing: control is not the primary value in the life of a Christian. Jesus told the parable of the rich fool to teach us that control is not our problem – fear is our problem. The primary value in the life of a Christian is faith. The opposite of faith? Fear. Fear leads to greed, to envy, to lust, to violence; fear leads us astray in many, many ways. Jesus brings the treasures which destroy the power of fear: faith, and out of faith, love.

It would be easy to think that managing our possessions better is the teaching point of this parable, but it’s not. The Teacher was absolutely right in our reading from Ecclesiastes today: possessions are meaningless; they are, after all, just stuff. What Jesus wants his disciples to understand is the fear that drives us to treasure such meaningless things. Learning to manage things better doesn’t solve the problem of our fear – only faith and love can do that, and faith and love are what Christ comes to give.

Here are the treasures of faith and love: to believe that God is always present, that even in the worst of circumstances God is there: that is a treasure worth treasuring! To believe that our lives consist of the presence of a creating, redeeming and sanctifying God: that is a treasure worth treasuring! To believe that our souls are far more important than our possessions, that each of us bears the breath of a loving Creator within us: that is a treasure worth treasuring! To know that out of love God did not withhold himself from us, but came in the person of Jesus Christ and lived among us, living in love even when it cost him his own life: that is a treasure worth treasuring! It is faith, and love, and far more, that Jesus puts in place of the treasures we have stored up for ourselves in our possessions. Our lives are created for the treasures of faith and love, and without them “all is vanity, a chasing after the wind.”

I have one more prop to show you: this marshmallow roaster. My Grandma Johnson died in January 2005, and over the next few months, we cousins watched our parents divide their inheritance amongst themselves, and they invited us to request anything we’d like to have from Grandma & Grandpa’s house in town and also the farm. Among the list of things I requested were these marshmallow roasters (we have four of them). They’re pretty ingenious, if you ask me: the handle extends. They can be short when you load them up and long when you want to roast stuff in the fire. Looking at these roasters the other night, while we were sitting by our own fire, I realized that as inconsequential as they may be, these roasters have now outlived my grandparents. Properly maintained, they will outlive me. But they’re roasters! They are not a treasure – they are things. Our family’s treasure is wrapped up in the faith my grandparents handed down to their children and then to us grandchildren. Faith, and love, cast out fear; the treasure worth treasuring frees us from our misplaced trust in shoes, grain bins and marshmallow roasters.

Brothers and sisters, what you have is not nearly as important as what you believe and in whom you trust. Martin Luther once wrote “to have a God is nothing else than to trust and believe in that one with your whole heart.”

Your life is meant for faith, and love, the treasures worth treasuring, and with joy Christ offers them to you freely. Put your trust in God, not your things. Treasure what you’ve been given in the love, grace and peace of Jesus Christ, and behold: all things are yours in Christ, now and forever more. Amen.

A Preaching Quandary

I am in the middle of a theological, homiletical dilemma. Perhaps you can help me out.

I love my kids. (No, that's not the quandary) I spend a good portion of my time thinking about my kids, driving my kids from place to place, picking them up, playing with them, teaching them, cooking for them, etc. I smile when they wake up in the morning (or when they wake me up, if it's at a decent hour) and both Beloved and I breathe a sigh of relief when we get them to sleep, even though they look adorable all snuggled up in their beds.

Anything into which you pour this much energy is bound to affect your thinking, and over the last three years I've noticed that my teaching and preaching are greatly influenced by my experience as a parent. To a certain point this is all well and good, but here's the quandary: how do I keep it from becoming too much? When do those who listen to me reach the point of saturation and stop hearing the good news because of the way my voice puts it?

When I was nine years old, our church back home had an interim pastor who constantly talked about California. He'd been raised there, and obviously had a great love for his home state. After a while, though, it became a joke: whatever the gospel reading was for that week, it would have something to do with California by the time the sermon came around. From what I remember, he was a pretty decent interim but for this one thing. Our new pastor made a great first impression when someone asked him about California in his "welcome" potluck and he said, "I've heard California is the land of fruits and nuts."

I don't want to be that interim, but I'm afraid I'm heading in that direction. My students have already begun to claim the sermon isn't finished until I've made a poop reference. They say it in jest, but we all know that some good jokes are funny because they're also true.

That's just one aspect of the problem. Another is this: how does "God as parent" preaching sound to the ears of those who don't have kids? When I preach about the patience and love required to be a good parent, how do those who don't have kids hear it? How about those who can't have kids, or those who had abusive parents?

The gospel reading for this week seems a text which offers several opportunities to go off the rails into "Daddy Knows Best" territory. That was my first impulse upon reading the text yesterday, but I'm leery of developing things in that direction for fear of the problems listed above. If you'd like to join a good discussion on the texts themselves, RevGalBlogPals has a Tuesday Lectionary post that always offers fruitful discussion. But if you're willing to offer them, I would appreciate your thoughts on this in the comments section. Tell me what you've seen in my blog posts, in my sermons, in places where I've taught: am I going overboard? Can you offer helpful suggestions to keep from doing so?

There's nothing wrong with loving your kids. In my life, the order of priorities is:

1. Child of God
2. Husband
3. Father
4. Son/Brother/Family member
5. Friend
6. Pastor

I'd like my preaching to reflect this ranking of priorities as well. Thoughts?

Grace & peace,

Scott

Keeping the Main Thing the Main Thing

Had a moment with Ainsley on the way to Pre-school the other morning.

It started when it was time to get ready to leave, but she wanted to keep watching the Sesame Street episode we'd called up from the DVR. (Put this one under the "Problems my parents didn't have" column) As sometimes happens with toddlers, hearing "No." brought tears. She cried all the way upstairs. Cried when I asked her to put her flip-flops away and get shoes (no flip-flops at Pre-school). Cried when I brushed her hair. Cried when I put the barrettes in her hair, even though I used the Princess ones. Cried when I opened the door (she wanted to open it, and I was rapidly losing my patience and just walked out of the house with Alanna, who promptly hit me in the eye). Cried for the first mile of the car ride to pre-school. And I didn't care one little bit.

I'll admit it - I was frustrated and emotional. Part of me knows how important some measure of control is for a growing child, and how much it hurts when you don't get something you think is really important. I remember that sense of childish frustration very, very well, and knowing that I'm standing where my parents once stood for me doesn't help matters much. But every little tantrum meant another couple of minutes late for pre-school, and we had lots to do at home and work this week.

Here's the thing, though: by the time we'd driven five minutes, the crying was done. I asked Ainsley what she wanted to listen to, and she said, "Storyhill, please - the ghost song." "The Ghost Song" is "Give Up The Ghost" from their self-titled release on Red House Records:

Some of you who've been reading for a while know that Ainsley has a pre-birth connection to Storyhill. I don't know if that's a contributing factor recently or not, but I do know this: for all that we love Storyhill ourselves, the connection with our kids is even more wonderful. It adds another dimension to the music we already love. So when the song started, I looked into the rear-view mirror, saw my little girls smiling, heard Ainsley starting to sing along, and nearly had to pull over for wanting to cry at how rude I'd been to my kids.

By the time we got to pre-school, all was well. We had listened to "Give Up The Ghost," "Paradise Lost" and "Highlight," and the girls were all smiles. I dropped them off, with hugs and kisses from both before I left, and headed off to work. When I picked them up that afternoon, they were overjoyed to see me, and when we all went to the waterpark later that afternoon, we splashed and giggled and played and loved on each other a whole bunch.

The Gospel reading for this week is Jesus' encounter with Mary and Martha in Bethany, where Jesus reminds Martha, "Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her." It's not that Martha chooses things that are evil or even unimportant; Martha knows, rightly, that there are tasks in every time and place which need doing. But Mary has grasped the main thing, and has her priorities in order. Martha needs re-ordering so that she might receive what Jesus has to give, which can never be taken away from her. Martha, like me, needs to be reminded to keep the main thing the main thing.

Sure, we'll be late to pre-school sometimes. Life does that. I could benefit from remembering that for a three-year old girl, opening doors and getting to pick out your own clothes are far more important, and sometimes it might do me well as a parent to let her go to pre-school in whatever hideous ensemble she's selected, because it really isn't that important right now. I need to be reminded, as I was that morning, that the love I bear for these little girls is far, far more important than running absolutely on time or matching every outfit perfectly. Clothes will come and go. Someday I'll want Ainsley and Alanna to open doors for me because I won't be able to do it for myself. But the love between us? That can't ever go away - and I'm glad to have been reminded to chose the better part.

Grace & peace,

Scott

More Home Improvement (Not Thumb Improvement)

So, the latest steps in our home improvement process are almost complete. Here's a look at what we've done so far with paint, etc.

New kitchen look with "Merlot" on the east wall and "Oregon Coast" everywhere else (yes, we're considering renaming the house "Le Chateau de Paint Names We Liked.")


New dining room curtains and hardware. (The cat is Reggie. He's not new.)


New accent wall in the "dining room." We blatantly stole this look from the wall at our favorite Ames restaurant, the Cafe. We did not, however, steal the pre-chewed ottoman - Jack gave us that one for free.

As to the title of this post: on Friday afternoon I was going to finish up the painting in the kitchen while Beloved and the girls were at the gym. I got home around 4:00, started pulling the oven away from the wall so I could paint behind it, and promptly pulled the oven door off. While trying to put the door back on, one of the hinges popped out of its receptacle and closed on the end of my thumb with horrifying speed and power. The blood flow was immediate, and the amount would have been impressive if it wasn't, you know, MY OWN BLOOD. After about thirty seconds of rinsing it off in the bathroom sink, I realized this was a bit more than an owie, and I also realized the next fifteen minutes were not going to be fun because a) I was home alone with only my Volkswagen to drive to the hospital (my beloved manual transmission Volkswagen, and b) to get to the hospital, I would either have to brave the idiotic four way flashing red lights at 13th and Stange or take a chance on getting green on all the stoplights on Lincoln Way. Thankfully, I had the presence of mind to deeply lacerate my non-shifting hand, so I wrapped it up in a washcloth and set off for the emergency room.

I actually got to the hospital with no problems except for cursing the stop and go traffic at 13th and Stange (apparently the alternating pattern of 4-way stops is too cognitively taxing for many Iowa drivers). Once I arrived, it was pretty obvious why I was there. The admitting nurse even looked at me and said, "Laceration?" But they made me wait while the girl in front of me got to see the doctor first. I almost wished I was bleeding more profusely just so I could get somebody to DO something about it. Finally, after triage (seriously? You couldn't ask me if I'm taking drugs while the doctor's looking at my mangled thumb?) and twenty minutes waiting in a room, I got to see the doctor.

In the end I got three stitches and a lot of laughs out of the deal. The actual medical staff were very nice and profusely apologetic about how long it took to actually get me sewed up and on my way home. Apparently 4:30 Friday afternoon is not the best time to slice your thumb in half, as they were very busy with many patients at the time. Once I figured out how to work the TV it wasn't so bad: ESPN Classic was replaying the 2007 Fiesta Bowl and I got to watch Boise State beat Oklahoma again - always a good time. I even felt good enough to drive down to Target and pick up my painkiller prescription before going home.

It was an interesting experience - I haven't been hurt bad enough for an immediate trip to the ER since I seriously sprained my ankle over ten years ago playing church league volleyball. Calling Beloved from the hospital wasn't a lot of fun, but thankfully she took it in stride, found someone to cover her shift, and came to see if I needed her to get me home or whatever. The girls understood that Daddy hurt his thumb, but the doctor was taking care of me, so there weren't any tears or anything. When I got home they didn't understand why I didn't just have a band-aid on it, but the only comment since then has been Ainsley not wanting me to touch her with my owie (frankly, I wouldn't want to be touched with it, either, as you'll see). I even managed to run the 10K I was entered in on Saturday night, and still broke 60 minutes which, considering the last two days, I thought was a victory. Today it doesn't even hurt much - I have only taken two doses of the Vicodin, and good old vitamin I has done the trick since yesterday morning.

It was the crazy start of a good weekend - more on that later. Now, if you don't really care to look at stitches, this would be a good time to head over to Facebook or something.




Okay, we good? Here's some pictures from this morning:



I like how in this last one you can really see how I split the nail pretty good. I said earlier this wouldn't be "Thumb Improvement," but I might be wrong - after all, Keanu Reeves once said "chicks dig scars." I'll have to ask Beloved about that in a few weeks.

Grace & peace,
Scott

Sermon for the Seventh Sunday after Pentecost - Ordinary 15C - "Certainty Comes At The End"

There’s a quote attributed to Mark Twain that goes like this: “What gets us into trouble is not what we don't know. It's what we know for certain that just ain't so.” It’s one of those sayings that is so like Mark Twain that if he didn’t say it, he should have.

What does it mean to be certain of a thing? In our readings for today, God shows the prophet Amos the plumb line by which God’s people will be judged, but in the Gospel parable, Jesus uses the same plumb line to insist that what we know for certain is going to get us into trouble. Pay attention, brothers and sisters, and let’s talk about what we know for certain. Let us pray: O Creator of all that has been, all that is and all that will be, have mercy on us. You set a plumb line by which all things are judged, and we always come up out of line. Forgive us when we know for certain things that just aren’t so. Humble us and renew our hearts with your love, the only thing that is certain in all that exists. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.

Some of you may have worked with plumb lines before, but I’ve got a similar tool here that most of you, if not all of you, will know for certain that does the same thing. This is a level. Last summer I rebuilt the fence in our backyard and used this level to make sure the fence rails were straight up and down. This particular level comes from my Grandpa Johnson’s workshop, so I know that it has a long history of setting things straight in our family. You use this level in the same way a bricklayer uses a plumbline: it’s a tool to make sure that everything is lining up right, so that a wall is constructed to be as strong and sturdy as it needs to be. God is going to judge the state of the people of Judah, Amos will provide the level, and we see immediately how out of true the state of things really can be.

When Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, heard what Amos was telling the people of Israel, this was his response: “...never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king's sanctuary, and it is a temple of the kingdom.” Anyone who knows a little bit of Hebrew sees the irony in this sentence right away. The name “Bethel” means “house of the Lord” in Hebrew. Amaziah insists that “God’s house” is the king’s sanctuary, and God’s call for Israel to return to God is no longer welcome there. Out of plumb, for certain: things are not the way they should be for Israel, so God will begin the hard work of tearing down and rebuilding so that things might be what they are meant to be in the future.

Let’s move forward a few hundred years to Jesus and his conversation with the lawyer in today’s Gospel reading. There are many places in the gospels where people are trying to trap Jesus with their questions, especially the closer Jesus gets to Jerusalem in the gospel of Luke, but this isn’t necessarily one of those times. This lawyer seems to be genuinely seeking wisdom and eternal life, and Jesus seems to be genuinely interested in giving him the truth. But while the lawyer’s first question and answer session goes exactly how he might have expected, the parable would have seemed completely out of plumb to someone listening in Jesus’ time.

Who were the Samaritans? What do you know about them? Remnants of the Northern Kingdom, the people no one wanted, religious half-breeds who said they worshiped God but didn’t follow the same religious patterns Jewish people followed. Worshiped at Mt Gezirim, not the Temple. People would cross the Jordan when traveling between Galilee and Judea to avoid going through Samaritan territory. When Jesus identifies the merciful Samaritan as the one who is doing and being right to his neighbor, he blows up the certainty every listener would have had about Samaritans.

How would we put this in modern terms? Well, imagine the group of people you would avoid at all costs, and put them in the role of the Samaritan. You get “The Parable of the Good Democrat.” “The Parable of the Good Republican.” “The Parable of the Good Hawkeye Fan.” “The Parable of the Good Baptist.” “The Parable of the Good Muslim.” All of us have those groups of people with whom we would never, ever want to associate: that’s the group Jesus uses to show the lawyer how out of plumb his certainty really is.

One of the problems is how Jesus and the lawyer are asking and answering the question in different ways. When the lawyer asks, “Who is my neighbor?”, he is asking Jesus to identify who’s in and who’s out. The lawyer thinks, “Certainly, Jesus can’t suggest that my neighbor is anyone who’s actually near me at any given time. There are good guys and bad guys, and I’m only expected to love the good guys, right?” The lawyer isn’t only asking, “For whom must I show care?” He’s also asking, “Who can I ignore?” Jesus answer is plain and shocking: “You can’t ignore ANYONE.”

Professor Marilyn Salmon of United Theological Seminary in St. Paul, MN says, “Jesus shifts the question from the one the lawyer asks – who is my neighbor?—to ask what a righteous neighbor does.”1 What was once a question of doing becomes, on the lips of Jesus, a question of being. Asking Jesus to identify which group of people are our neighbors is like asking a carpenter which fence rail needs the level - if things are going to be the way they’re supposed to be, the level has to be used on every single fence rail. It’s not a question of which fence rail you can ignore - it’s a question of how the carpenter does all of her work.

My oldest daughter is beginning to understand manners and the like. We’ve worked very hard to impress the need to say “Please” and “Thank you.” The inevitable developmental shift, of course, is this: now that she knows how to ask nicely, she’s come to believe that every time she asks nicely we’ll give her what she wants. “But I asked nicely!” is something we’re hearing a lot these days. She sees manners and politeness like I see the quarters I plug into the vending machine when I want a Diet Coke. In the same way, the lawyer sees care for the neighbor as the coin he must pay to earn eternal life - and if you can find a vending machine that gives you a soda for 50 cents instead of 65, wouldn’t that be all the better?

Parables are not fables. Parables do not have “morals of the story.” Parable are intended to shake up our world, to get in our heads and mess with what we know for certain that just ain’t so. Parables are intended to explode our smugness and certainty and replace them with faith - because, in the end, faith is all we have and faith is all we need. Notice that in some ways, Jesus never gives the lawyer a “certain” answer to his question. There’s no point at which the lawyer can say, “I’ve done enough good deeds for my neighbor - I’ve earned eternal life.” Morals and good deeds are only the after-effects of the gospel: until our certainty is based on Jesus and Jesus alone, we will have traded the good news of God’s love for the conditional requirements of vending-machine spirituality, which cannot save and leaves us empty in the end.

Darrell Guder writes, “The ‘gospel which meets my needs’ must be replaced with the good news that reveals needs I did not know I had while providing healing I never dreamed was possible.”2 This is what Jesus is after for the lawyer and for you. Certainty isn’t part of what we do in this world, at least when it comes to knowing who’s in and who’s out. Mercy is for everyone, love is for the world, and the church of Jesus Christ is called to lives of faith and love, not certainty and division. We should feel unsettled by what Jesus does - because that unsettled feeling is what happens when God rips down those parts of ourselves that are out of plumb and starts building them anew and righteous.

Erica Jong wrote a poem entitled “You Are There” which I think describes the feeling of being trued by God’s righteousness:

You are there.

You have always been

there.

Even when you thought

you were climbing 

you had already arrived.


Even when you were

breathing hard,

you were at rest.

Even then it was clear

you were there.



Not in our nature

to know what

is journey and what

arrival.

Even if we knew

we would not admit.

Even if we lived

we would think

we were just

germinating.



To live is to be

uncertain.

Certainty comes

at the end.

Certainty comes at the end. Until then, we walk by faith, trusting God to show us our neighbors in need, or to show our neighbors our own need. In the ditch, on the road, listening to Jesus - may we all be made uncertain, faithful followers of Jesus who love, and are loved by, all our neighbors. In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Damn - I Know I Came In Here For Something...

You Lutherans in the audience likely remember this little book. Augsburg Fortress has been making this appointment book for years. I've never used it myself (too small for my taste), but Larry, my campus pastor, carried one with a golf pencil rubber-banded onto it for as long as I knew him. Today's Friday Five is all about why we need such things...

a) What's the last thing you forgot?

Well, I bought tickets for a group trip to a DCI show in Des Moines next weekend, and I bought one for Beloved so she could come along, but forgot that she has a church commitment that night. Unfortunately, if I can't find someone to take the ticket, this one will cost us a little bit of money. Oops.

e) How do you keep track of appointments?

I used a Palm device from 2001 until just a few months ago when we got new phones. The new Palm devices are just too expensive, so we got Samsung Reclaim phones and I switched to Google Calendar, which is working pretty well so far. In other words, I haven't trusted my own memory for these things for nearly ten years, longer if you count the number of paper appointment books I kept before 2001.

i) Do you keep a running grocery list?

About half the time. We're in a bit of a grocery rut right now - toddler tastes don't vary much, so most of the time we're buying the same stuff every week. But we're getting food from a local CSA now, so hopefully we'll expand our palates a bit over the weeks to come.

o) When forced to improvise by circumstances, do you enjoy it or panic?
I'm not sure - I have the feeling what I think might not match what people see when circumstances happen. Generally, one of the things I love about being a minister is the flexibility. There are very few hard and fast administrative "rules" for us - basically, if you've got the sermon on Sunday and you're present in emergencies, the rest of your time is your own to manage as you see fit. I remember Larry Meyer telling me once, "When it comes to worship, you plan as much as you can in advance, make sure everyone's on the same page, and then you let what happens happen. Don't ignore surprises, but don't act like they ruin everything, either." I've adopted that wisdom for a fairly large portion of my life, and it seems to suit me just fine. Beloved would definitely disagree on this one, though - she does NOT enjoy being easy-going when it comes to deadlines, packing, etc. It's one of the few things to have actually caused fights in our marriage.

u) What's a memory you hope you will never forget?

Three in particular: our wedding day and the days Ainsley and Alanna were born. If I can hold on to those three, I'll be pretty good if everything else goes.

Now, has anyone seen my sunglasses?

Grace & peace,

Scott

In Which Old Things Become New-ish OR If There's Wallpaper Borders In Heaven I'm Not Sure I Want To Go.

Lots of you blowed up stuff real good over the weekend - good for you. We spent our lovely holiday weekend working around the house, literally. Lots of things to do for which we've finally scraped together some dough (including a generous guilt love offering related to the UB, which we gladly spent). We didn't get it all done this weekend, not by half, but we're off to a good start.

I need to say this first: when my wife gets the bit in her mouth, it's best just to let her go until she runs out of steam. HOLY. PAINTING. BATMAN. She's awesome, but exhausting to watch. We played the heathen this Sunday and stayed home, choosing to sleep in. Once everyone was awake, however, it was ON, baby. I corralled the kids downstairs while Beloved started scoring, soaking and scraping the awful wallpaper border off our dining room walls. No, it wasn't nearly as bad as some houses (my brother and his wife had six layers on one bedroom in their house, I think), but it's just freaking annoying to stand there and scrape above your head just so's you can slap on some new paint. At any rate, once she had the scraping done and sanded down the holes I'd spackled the night before, she jumped right into the painting.

At that point I could no longer control the Sisters downstairs, so upstairs we came to watch the progress. That meant "helping" Mommy, of course:

Meanwhile, we also made a trip to Lowe's and bought lots of fun new things for the house: new doors to replace the ones we ruined when the carpet was installed, drywall patches for the basement bedroom (yes, I finally got it patched, and will sand and texture tomorrow!), new curtain hardware for the dining room, stain for the doors and cabinets (and, eventually, the trim as well), and most importantly, new vinyl flooring for the kitchen. I wanted to do porcelain tile, but that was WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY out of our price range, so I'll have to wait to tackle that project. My brother's coming in a few weeks, and we'll send Beloved and the Sisters off to visit her sister while we boys install the vinyl (and likely take in a ballgame or something fun on our own).

I'm of two minds about this kind of home work. On the one hand, the clutter and mess drives me nuts. I HATE having things scattered hell to breakfast around our house, especially since Alanna has reached the "I can take everything out of this?" phase and regularly demolishes our movies and bookshelves. On the other hand, it's a lot of fun to see the end result of all that work, right? We're finishing up the dining room/kitchen painting tonight, so it'll be nice to see how all our work makes the house look that much nicer (and more in line with our taste as opposed to the former owners).

Best of all, we get to enjoy it for ourselves. We watch a lot of "house porn" these days (DIY and HGTV are two of the channels we didn't lose when we went to low-tier cable), and it seems like everything is geared toward increasing value for resale. While we're certainly not opposed to making money on the house, we're not going to be selling for a while, hopefully, so we made these changes for US to enjoy. That, combined with the satisfaction of doing the work ourselves, makes for some enjoyable living these last few days. Now if only I could keep the garage clean for one day...

Grace & peace,

Scott