Andy's Blog: A Personal Word

November 2007 Archive

November 28, 2007

Nov. 28, 2007

Advent/Christmas sends us into sensory overload. There are the smells of evergreens, the sounds of carols, the tastes of Christmas cookies, the array of lights, the touch of cold. This is as it should be. The Christian faith is earthly, material, sensual – it centers in the belief that the “Word became flesh and dwelt among us.” Far from being some other-worldly, flight of fancy, Christmas is very much this worldly. It is here God engages us fully. God did not come to us in a set of philosophical principles. He did not send us a book, He sent us his Son – so that we could see, hear, touch, feel, taste his love.

Penelope Duckworth has a poem which goes:
The Holy One took face and voice, beginning with an infant cry,
Took food and sleep, nestled in arms not unlike yours.

He listened to the dropping rain, watched it bead the naked twigs,
saw it polish stones and faces, stood once beneath this lift of sky
And sill, in a word, understands.

Jesus entered fully into our experience, and because He did, He understands. He understands our joys and our sorrows – there is no part of our life and death He did not/does not share. And not only does He understand, through Him we too begin to understand who God is. When we see Jesus, we see the Father. In Jesus, the “Holy One takes face and voice.”

This Advent, we invite you to “Make Sense of Christmas.” Over the next weeks, we will engage all of our senses in an attempt to discover God’s presence in our lives.
Be ready to hear, see, touch, taste, and feel His grace.

November 21, 2007

Nov. 21, 2007

One of the emails making the rounds these days warns that telemarketing companies will soon be free to make sales calls to your cell phone – and you will be charged for these calls. It then gives a number to call to be added to the Do Not Call List.

You may have received this email. If so, you can delete it, because it is false, as in there is no truth to it. It is another Urban Legend, a myth.

It’s amazing how many of these myths are around that people accept as truth. One of the myths that I run into from time to time goes something like this: “I don’t make my children come to church because I want them to be able to decide about religion on their own when they grow up.”

I understand the logic here. People should be free to make their own choices in life, especially when it comes to faith. But the truth is that none of us make choices in a vacuum. Our choices are formed by our experience. Part of our essential role as parents is to share life experience that forms children to make wise choices.

It’s strange to me that I never hear a parent say, “I think I will leave it up to my child to decide if he will go to school to learn to read and write.” Or, “I don’t need to teach my child to swim. I can just throw him in the water and he/she can make their own choice.”

And yet, that’s exactly what we are doing when we abdicate our responsibility as spiritual teachers for our children. There is a price being paid for this. In a recent article, Bishop Willimon cites a researcher who, after scores of interviews, calls the twenty-something crowd the “Postponed Generation” because they have been raised by the children of the sixties, who are so uncertain of their own values that they do not dare pass them on. He quotes Yale’s Allan Bloom who put the problem:

... the souls of young people are in a condition like that of the first men in the state of nature—spiritually unclad, unconnected, isolated, with no inherited or unconditional connection with anything or anyone. They can be anything they want to be, but they have no particular reason to want to be anything in particular.
Do we really intend to throw our children into the churning and confusing seas of modern life with no instruction except:  “It’s up to you. Good luck.”

The truth is that our children will someday make their own personal choices about faith, but it is a choice that will be shaped by our own faith stance. We know for certain that children of parents who have a strong and vital faith are much more likely to find that faith for themselves. And vice versa, children whose parents do not pass on spiritual values are much more likely never to discover these values for themselves. 

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD; and you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart; and you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.
Deuteronomy 6:4-7

November 14, 2007

Nov. 14, 2007

Rejoice always, pray constantly, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.  I Thessalonians 5:16-18

This is one of those passages where Paul goes over the top. “Give thanks in all circumstances.” Surely he is engaging in hyperbole. Certainly, as we sit down to our thanksgiving meals next week, we can easily see reasons for giving thanks – food to eat, shelter to keep us warm, families that nurture us. But there are other times – times in the hospital, times when we face failure, times of grief when we find little for which to be thankful. In these difficult times, we want to say to Paul, “Give it a rest!”

But Paul himself is no stranger to failure, difficulty, and suffering. Imprisoned, beaten, shipwrecked, ill, persecuted – Paul could name you a litany of woes. Yet in spite of these, he insists, “Give thanks in all circumstances.” Gratitude is more than a tip of the hat to good fortune, it is an attitude of life that can help to create good out of bad.
Someone has put it this way:

Be thankful that you don’t already have everything you desire,
If you did, what would there be to look forward to?

Be thankful when you don’t know something
For it gives you the opportunity to learn.

Be thankful for the difficult times.
During those times you grow.

Be thankful for your limitations
Because they give you opportunities for improvement.

Be thankful for each new challenge
Because it will build your strength and character.

Be thankful for your mistakes
They will teach you valuable lessons.

Be thankful when you’re tired and weary
Because it means you’ve made a difference.

It is easy to be thankful for the good things.
A life of rich fulfillment comes to those who are
also thankful for the setbacks.

GRATITUDE can turn a negative into a positive.
Find a way to be thankful for your troubles
and they can become your blessings.
~ Author Unknown ~

Wherever life finds you in this thanksgiving season, there is reason to give thanks for God’s grace, which is always at work to redeem and transform our lives.

November 7, 2007

Nov. 7, 2007

In his book, A Resilient Life, Gordon MacDonald writes about his high school track coach. Each day at noon, on a large bulletin board near the track, Coach Goldberg would post a list of daily workouts for each member of the track team. At lunch, they would all go to look at the list and talk among themselves, “You aren’t going to believe what coach has for you today!” or “Are you in trouble!”

The workouts were individually planned for each member of the team. If you asked him why you were doing certain things on a given day, he would say something like, “Reaching this goal now will help you run the 400 meter in the spring.” Coach Goldberg took the long view. He saw everything in terms of building people for the future.

Gordon writes that sometimes he would try to alter some of the planned workouts.  “Sir, did you really mean for me to run ten 400’s today?” “Sir, I have a headache.” But the response was always the same, “Now Gordie, why don’t you start your warm-ups? You’ll feel much better when you have warmed up.”

The Coach had plans for his runners, and he intended to stick with them. He knew better than they did what each was capable of accomplishing. He believed in them more than they did in themselves. He was teaching them about resilience. 

Gordon writes, “I didn’t understand then (but do now) that Goldberg was looking ahead to life when we were in our 35th, 47th, or 58th year – when we would bear greater responsibilities and would have to reject the seductive call of sniffles and other distractions so that we could do what had to be done.”

Gordon goes on to say that when he is tempted to quit something that is difficult, he can hear his coach say, “Gordie, quit now and it makes it easier to quit something more important later.” Or, when he gets busy and is tempted to blow off doing something he has promised to do, he hears “Gordie, you have a commitment to fulfill, you gave your word.”

What Gordan learned was that the race of life was of distance, not a sprint. To go the distance in life requires commitment and resilience. And it requires never losing sight of the goal. 

Hebrews 12:1 reads: “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith.”

If we are to go the distance in life, the disciplines of our faith – prayer, worship, reading the Word, sacraments, service, giving – are not options. They are what enable us to live a life of resilience.

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