Andy's Blog: A Personal Word
August 2010 Archive
August 31, 2010
Aug. 31, 2010In Mark Twain’s novel, Tom Sawyer, Tom’s Aunt Polly puts him to work one day whitewashing the fence in front of her house. Twain describes the scene
this way:
“Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep
melancholy settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of board fence nine feet high. Life to him seemed hollow, and existence but a burden.”
Work for Tom was drudgery. It was an infringement upon his freedom to do what he really wanted to be doing. The very thought of work seemed to suck
the life out of him.
We live in a society that has mixed views on work. On the one hand, we have a nation of workaholics. We believe in a strong “work ethic.” People work 60, 70,
80 hours a week out of a driving compulsion to “get ahead.” People get in to work early, stay late and bring their work home with them. One father kept
bringing his work home with him and his 1st grade son asked him why. Daddy explained that he couldn’t finish it all during the day. The boy thought for a
moment and asked, “Then why don’t they just put you in a slower group?”
On the other hand, we have a nation that worships pleasure and entertainment. We work at our jobs only to get a paycheck. We live from the time we punch out
until the time we punch back in again. Like Tom Sawyer, some see work only as an evil necessity that allows them to do the things they really want to do. Some of us seem to live to work, and others work to live. So which is right? What role does/should work play in our lives? What does the Bible have to say about work?
It seems like a good sermon topic for Labor Day. See you Sunday.
August 17, 2010
Aug. 17, 2010I love the story told of the teacher who asked her students what they wanted to be when
they grew up. One by one, the boys and girls said the usual things – teacher, doctor,
lawyer, baseball player, etc. They went around until they got to little Johnny. “What do you
want to be Johnny?” Johnny replied, “Possible.” Puzzled the teacher asked, “What do you
mean you want to be possible?” Little Johnny replied, “Well, my mother always says I am
impossible, so when I grow up I want to be possible.”
I like that response. So often in life we get stuck with the idea that things are impossible.
We even include ourselves in that category. It is what it is. We are what we are. End of
story. We close the book.
The biblical view is very different. Over and over again in the Bible, we read stories of the
impossible becoming possible. Sarah gives birth in her old age. The Israelites are freed
from slavery. David defeats Goliath. Jesus is raised from the dead. With God, the impossible
becomes possible. If we think in terms of possibility, then the future opens before us.
Change is possible. We escape from the tyranny of what is. We are freed of what can be.
We Methodists have a theological name for this. We call it sanctification. The doctrine of
sanctification says that we human beings are created with the potential to grow in grace
and in love. As John Wesley put it, “From the moment we are justified, there may be a
gradual sanctification, a growing in grace, a daily advance in the knowledge and love of
God.” In the words of Paul, “We are to grow up in every way into Him who is the head,
into Christ.” (Ephesians 4:15)
We view the Christian life as a journey. It is possible to grow, to become more Christ-like,
as we open ourselves to God through prayer, worship, and study of scripture.
John Newton, writer of the hymn “Amazing Grace,” was a living testimony to this. Newton
was a slave trader and captain of a slave ship which traded in human flesh. But Christ
changed that. He left behind the lucrative slave trade, and became a leading opponent to
slavery in England. Shortly before his death, Newton talked about his journey:
“I am not what I ought to be. Ah! How imperfect and deficient! I am not what I wish to
be. I abhor what is evil, and I would cleave to what is good. I am not what I hope to
be…Though I am not what I ought to be, nor what I wish to be, nor what I hope to be, I
can truly say, I am not what I once was, a slave to sin; and I can heartily join with the
apostle and acknowledge, by the grace of God I am what I am, what I am.”
This week, I will be focusing in my sermon on Growing in Christ.
August 10, 2010
Aug. 10, 2010Sister Madonna Burder is known as the Iron Nun. She is a Roman Catholic nun
from Spokane, Washington. What caught my attention about her was the fact that
last year, at the age of 79, Sister Madonna participated in the Canadian Ironman
Triathlon. She completed this grueling race. The Ironman is a particularly demanding
race which includes a 2.4 mile swim, a 112 mile bike ride, and a 26 mile
marathon – all in one day! One of those events would be enough to do me in!
Imagine being able to do this at the ripe old age of 79.
Sister Madonna did not begin training until the age of 48. (There is still hope for
some of you!) She has completed over 325 triathlons, including 26 Ironman distances.
She embodies the dynamic spirit of Christian faith by, in the words of Paul,
“Forgetting what lies behind I press on...” (Phil 3:14)
Often we tend to think of life in stagnant terms. We “grow up,” become adults and
that’s that. Adulthood is like a house we move into and never move out of. We tend
to think of growing older in terms of diminishment. Each year takes something
from us – we become less and less – we fade. The Christian view of life is much
more dynamic and forward looking. According to the Christian view, we don’t ever
come to a stopping place where we can say… “that’s all there is. I’m done.” The
Chrisitan life is one of growth in grace. Again, in the words of Paul, “we are to grow
up in every way into Him who is the head, into Christ.” (Eph. 4:25) The Christian
life is a journey. Each age and stage has things to teach us. The goal is to become
more and more Christlike.
Part of our mission statement at Trinity is to GROW people in Christ. Our hope is to
engage people at every age and stage in this lifelong adventure of being disciples of
Jesus. We never graduate, and we never retire from this journey. God isn’t finished
with us yet.
The next two Sundays at Trinity are GROW SUNDAYS - one for children, one for
adults. I encourage all of us to consider those ways God is calling us to grow.
This might be the year you start training for that marathon.
August 3, 2010
Aug. 3, 2010Part of the ongoing discussions about the conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan centers
around the questions: Why are we there? What is it we hope to accomplish? What is
our mission? Is it to neutralize a threat? Is it nation building? Is it to make the
world safe for democracy? These are important questions because if you don’t know
what the mission is, you won’t know how to proceed or what tactics to use when
you get there.
There is a tendency in any organization towards what is called “mission drift.”
Mission drift is a condition of diminished impact due to decisions that subtly change
the course of an organization. You start out in one direction to do one thing, and end
up headed in an entirely different direction. All organizations are subject to mission
drift, even – and maybe particularly – the church. For lots of good reasons, it is easy
for the church to find itself doing “many things” instead of the “one thing needful.”
One way we try to avoid mission drift is to give a very clear mission statement as a
congregation. A mission statement is like the North Star. It is a fixed point giving you
perspective on where you are going. It explains why we do what we do. A clear mission
statement acts like an invisible hand that guides us and keeps us on track.
Our mission statement at Trinity is to Glorify God by Gathering people to
Christ, Growing people in Christ, and Going to serve Christ in the world.
Gather, Grow, Go, Glorify – we believe that each of these are words that convey who
we are called to be as a faithful church.
During the month of August, we will be spending some sermon time looking at each
of these parts of our mission statement. I hope this will be time of remembering,
refocusing, and renewing our sense of who we are called to be as God’s people.