Enchanted Community

BLOG 9/23/15. I WONDER, … IS IT TIME TO RETHINK PREACHING AND SERMONS?

I spent this morning in my favorite coffee shop. Here were the present generation of Information Age adults all equipped with their laptops and cell phones, plugged into the world, to their workplace, to the resources of a nearby university, as well as chat rooms, and all the rest.

Yes, and here we are with the recent phenomenon of MOOCs (Massive Open On-line Courses) offered by major universities, and here we are with asynchronous resources so that you can plug into a lecture, stop and go for pizza, take a nap, then pick it up right where you left off.

… And then, here we are with a form of preaching and sermons that are probably one of the least effective forms of communicating information (as also with any lecture). Such preaching may well satisfy the preacher, and may be what he/she learned to do in theological school, but is it the most effective way to communicate the message of Christ, and to form disciples? In the seats of even the most innovative church plants sit those same folk with their cell phones and with the apps that can give them access to the most profound sources of Biblical understanding. The answer to the question is that when one is in dialogue with the ones to whom one is seeking to communicate, then that communication takes on a whole different flavor.

So I’m just raising a question here. In Biblical times every believer was to be so equipped with the knowledge of Jesus and his teachings (of the whole of scriptures) that they were able to communicate it to others. So, in a real sense, every believer was a ‘preacher’ and the word of Christ went everywhere. There were those especially gifted in the knowledge, but the ‘on the ground’ preaching took place in the lives of the ordinary believers where they operated—even in prisons (often) or in difficult places. It was a long time before someone decided that an academic degree in theology qualified a person to be a preacher. Part of the genius of the Wesleyan movement was the semi-literate circuit riders who usually were out of the ranks and who went about and were effective because they spoke the language of the people. This grassroots preaching is very obvious in the majority world today where the Christian faith is growing most rapidly.

For myself, I have never been given the luxury of being isolated from those who have been brutally honest in keeping me in communication. For example, when I was in theological school, I was just back from a year of special study in Philadelphia when I was asked onto a church staff to implement a ministry to the students of nearby Georgia Tech (and a neighboring women’s college). In Philadelphia I had taken a graduate level course in the theology of the Westminster Confession of Faith, so I thought I would enlighten these ‘poor benighted’ collegians with this information. After about the second Sunday, and when I was feeling full of myself for how outstanding I had been, . . . three of these ‘Rambling Wrecks’ from Georgia Tech cornered me, and with a grin said: “Bob, We don’t know what in the hell you’re talking about!” So there. I’ve never lacked such friends since then.

From that time on, for whatever reason, I have always had those close friends, who were insistent in keeping me honest and not at all intimidated by me, who probed me with questions, who pressed me on the meaning of Biblical passages for their very real and existential incarnations. For a season I even had ten of my close friends who insisted on Bible study with me, and with whom I agreed only if they would work on my sermon text with me, which they did. It was incredible. Were I starting over, were I 27 years old rather than 87, I would give some fresh thought on the place of preaching in our communities of faith with the resources of this information age, and how to dynamically engage every believer in the process, maybe a whole alternative conception of preaching. To be continued . . .

BLOG 9/20/15. ASLAN THE LION … AND POPE FRANCIS: NOT TAME

The dismay of some at some of the evident agendas that Pope Francis will be bringing with him as he arrives in this country reminds me of the dismay that the innocent Pevensie children brought with them when they arrived in Narnia, frozen in winter under the rule of the evil white witch (in C. S. Lewis’s classic children’s stories: The Chronicles of Narnia). They began to hear stories of a lion named Aslan who was on the move, and who would bring the end of the witch’s winter, but who had awesome power and was capable of ferocious acts to accomplish his will. (To bring the culturally deprived, who have not read these classics, up to speed) When the children are rescued from their immediate danger by Mr. Beaver and hustled away to his den, they express their misgivings: “But we thought Aslan was safe,” “Safe?” said Mr. Beaver; “don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good.” From that point it becomes axiomatic in these stories that Aslan is not a tame lion.

Pope Francis brings with him a life formed by Jesuit disciplines, and as Time Magazine reports: “Above all, though, Francis’ views are grounded in Catholic social teachings that sees itself as above world systems, offering a corrective to both communism and capitalism, . . . he is siding with the victim, with the poor, with the detritus of international politics, frankly, the people who suffer the mistakes most directly from climate change and corporate exploitation of natural resources to people caught in the cross fire of war.”

Many of his critics ridicule his naiveté and that of the papal encyclicals on these subjects. This is especially true of their ridicule of the encyclical on global warming and environment. But such critics underestimate the weight of these encyclicals. These are not the personal opinions of the pope, but the product of profound study and research by Vatican scholars, and are never to be taken lightly. I am a card-carrying Reformed Christian and Protestant, but I always find the encyclicals worth my profound study and reflection. They are the church’s attempt to nurture its laity in the realities of the world in which they live and operate.

The Christian church has always stood in missionary confrontation with the economic, political, cultural, and military principalities and powers of this age. It is always a witness to the design of God as God’s Age to Come invades this present age. And the social teachings of the Catholic Church are founded in the very teachings of Jesus himself. Jesus is “not a safe lion!” The Sermon on the Mount does not consist of sweet spiritual stuff that is of no practical value. It is radical to the core. It is salt and light.

What is thrilling is that the Pope brings with him that prestige that will give him a hearing in some very influential venues—but he will not be “safe.” His witness is certain to rankle and upset many. But it has always been so. In my own very modest career I have been assaulted verbally for publicly questioning Desert Storm, because of the enormous number of non-combatant casualties it inflicted. The assault on me came from the families of those service men and women who were part of that. I was also assaulted publicly for questioning the Mutual Assured Destruction nuclear policy of this nation at the height of the Cold War. And again for questioning the ethics of some major American corporations. And I am just a little guy.

So I am anticipating eagerly what this fresh Christian voice will herald in a country beset with a lot of confusion in its political, ethical, economic, and military policies. Be it known, that ultimately the will of God and the kingdom of God will prevail. So this Protestant guy is cheering for Pope Francis, even is some powerful figures seek to write him off. He’s not safe!

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BLOG 9/16/15. “I HAVE GIVEN THEM THE GLORY” . . . WHAT’S THAT?

The Biblical word glory is a fantastic word, and much used (maybe overused), but it certainly does need definition. I have heard too many people trip over it, or give it totally inept definitions. But when Jesus prays to his heavenly Father that he has given to his followers the same glory that the Father has given to him, then it ought to catch our attention and call for some definition. And if that passage were not enough, then there is Peter who reminds his readers that God has called his followers to: “his own glory and excellence” (II Peter 1:3). He will also comment in his first letter that when his followers are insulted, or are victims of fiery trials, then they are blessed “because the Spirit and glory of God rests upon you” (I Peter 4:12-13).

So let me give you the best definition I have found (and I am indebted to the Biblical scholar and pastor Gregory Boyd for this one): “Glory is the radiant display of the divine nature.” God glorifies himself in displaying his own divine nature in creation and redemption. He glorifies the Son in displaying in Jesus is own divine nature, and then his intent is to display his divine nature in his sons and daughters as he indwells them with his own Spirit of glory and of God. This is precisely what Peter tells us: “. . . he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, . . .” (italics mine). God has created us and all things for his glory. The venerable Westminster Catechism says that: “The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever.” The glory of God in us is not something accomplished by our merely human effort, but is the working of that Spirit, that glory, that Jesus has given us. It comes with our new birth into the Kingdom of God.

And where does that take place? It takes place exactly when and where we are at all times. It is Christ in us who is the hope of glory. Our mission is to incarnate the glory of God, the divine nature, precisely where we are, … not somewhere else or at some other time. It is an incarnation that God intentionally intends to take place in the most unlikely and un-glamorous places. It is more authentic when we are engaging the existential realities of daily life than sitting in some “glorious worship service.” It is our brothers and sisters living out their divine nature in the chaos of Syria, what with all the violence and tragedy, as well as those in more pleasant and congenial places. This is the world that God so loved that he gave his Son, i.e., this very real world of lost and broken humankind.

Let me tell you a story. One of my dearest friends is the Christian community developer, John Perkins. John grew up as a sharecropper’s son in rural Mississippi before civil rights days, and endured all of the indignities and injustices of that culture. Later, after he had escaped to California, and when he had encountered Christ, God led him back to Mississippi to be an evangelist and a reconciler, to develop Christian communities among the neediest, and to be an advocate of civil rights. This resulted, on one hand of his being nearly beaten to death by the sheriff, but also accomplishing amazing developments in places of need. Long story short: the state actually ultimately named a day in his honor. Then John moved to Pasadena and did the same thing. People began to tune-in to the amazing ministry of this “third grade dropout” and he was granted honors and honorary degrees, and was guest in the White House. I was staying with him in Pasadena and noticed all of the pictures and honors hanging on the wall of his study. He and I were out to supper that night and I asked him how he maintained his humility with all of those accolades. (Note: there is no pretense in John, and his humility is incredible.) He chewed on his fish for a couple of minutes and then replied: “Bob, I don’t care if I’m chopping cotton in Mississippi, or a guest in the Oval Office of the White House, I am the glory of God.”

That’s a great model. We are called to be the glory of God, wherever and whenever. Glory!

BLOG 9/13/15. A WORD ABOUT THE CHRISTIAN FAITH AND ISLAM

Anyone who has been hanging around the Christian church for a while has probably heard the classic old hymn: “God moves in a mysterious way his wonders to perform . . .” We are probably watching that “mysterious way” unfolding before us right now in God’s passion to reach the Islamic world. As those who study the missionary mandate to the church (missiologists) have been telling us now for some time, one of the largest unreached people groups in the world is that of Islam. Islamic nations have a way of making it difficult if not illegal to publicly profess Christian faith, and frequently engage in severe persecution of Christians.

Ah! But from minor news sources comes the leaked word that as the situation in Syria and its neighboring nations has become more and more violent, due to the extremism of ISIS, and of the Assad regime, . . . there has unfolded before us this enormous migration of folk into Europe, Scandinavia, and the UK—and as our own president has opened this nation to receive sizeable numbers—to escape the un-livability of their home countries. These refugees are primarily Islamic. And what this minor news source reports is that thousands of them, as they come into Europe and out of Islamic domination, . . . are converting to the Christian faith!

Add to this the word from other well-researched missionary sources that even within the heart of the Islamic culture, that those Islamic teachers/imams, who are students of the Quran, have discovered that the Quran says more positive things about Isa, son of Mary, as a prophet than it does about Muhammad, and have become somewhat contagious with this (though secretly) and in some cases have even instituted study groups, which opens a positive response to the gospel. So it is not at though the current flood of refugees are totally ignorant of the basics of the Christian faith since their own Quran contains clues.

God moves in a mysterious way. It is God’s ultimate design to cause the gospel of the Kingdom of God to be heralded into every people group. Think about it. The refugees are one interesting potential, … but then also most of the world has some connection to the Internet, or to the social media, and therefor have access to the Christian message.

Consider also that Islamic people are not any longer halfway around the world. They live next door. Here in Atlanta, Georgia there has been constructed a large and handsome Islamic mosque right next to the Georgia Tech campus. (We also have Hindu temples scattered around the metropolitan area.) Islam has its radical and destructive elements (ISIS and other extremists) but they are in violation of the teachings of the Quran, just as we have those extremist proponents of a distorted version of Christianity who are also a contradiction, or oxymoron, and who miss the point of the redemptive and reconciling grace of God for the whole human community.

My point here is that this is important for those of us who profess faith in Jesus Christ, and who are to demonstrate God’s love for the world, to have on our feet the shoes of the readiness of the gospel of peace (cf. Ephesians 6:15) so that when Islamic refugees become our neighbors we are able to be those hospitable sons and daughters of the Light, and welcome them into the household of Christian faith. The world becomes very small in this present day, but the whole purpose of the church’s calling and mission is to speak the words of Jesus: “Come unto me, you weary, and I will give your rest, . . . cast your burden on me for my yoke is easy and my burden light.”

“God works in a mysterious way his wonders to perform.”

BLOG 9/9/15. WHEN YOU SEE AN OPEN DOOR, DO YOU STOP TO THINK …

The entrepreneurs of many of the brilliant start-ups of recent years (Apple, Google, Facebook. Amazon, etc.) all had a somewhat (maybe the word is) brutal insistence by their planners to have a very clear focus on what it was that they were seeking to accomplish that no one else ever had. They had also an insistence on the experience of the customer. Not only was this insisted upon at the dreaming stage, but as the companies began to come into being and to be successful, they kept that laser-like focus on performing effectively, and being very sensitive to the customer experience as the start-ups grew into huge business empires. They saw the need of constant change and fine-tuning. As one of their CEOs stated it: The competition didn’t provide them with money. Rather, it was the satisfied customer that would provide them the money they needed. They also knew that times and circumstances and the purchasing public are not static. Their needs differ and they change and they needed to respond to the change.

So, what has this interesting tid-bit of information have to do with the church (which happens to be something of the purpose behind this Blog)? Well, since I’ve raised the question, I’ll begin by saying that any Christian community/colony needs to have a very clear (laser-like) focus on what it is that Jesus has called his church to be and to do. He never ever talks about establishing some kind of religious institution. He doesn’t even, ultimately, call upon his followers to build the church—that’s his own initiative: “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” What he does is present himself as the Door into something radically new and reconciling and joyous and empowering. It is a life of transformational discipleship.

But, . . . just stop and think: If Jesus presents himself to us as the Door through which men and women go in and out and find life, then one would be well-served to do a bit of investigating as to precisely what was beyond that Door, and what it would promise and what it would demand. It is not a Door into mindless religion, or into some ecstatic spirituality. It is a Door into a radical newness, into obedience to his commands, into his mission, and into a supernatural encounter with his own divine power that ultimately creates his own divine image in those who come to him. It is an invitation into a cosmic battle with darkness as God’s children of the Light.

Yet, tragically, all too often it is that institutions that pass themselves off as ‘the church’ that actually obscure this calling. There are invitations to membership with offers of all kind of perks, institutional activities, and yet never seriously pursue the radical claims made by one’s going through the Door, through Jesus, and accepting the demands of the new life and relationships that are of the essence of God’s New Creation, of the Age to Come that is now invading this age.

Keep pursuing this question and you come to the questions: Precisely what is it that the church is to be seeking to form in those who are baptized into its community? And how is a given Christian community/church implementing the disciplines necessary to make that New Creation a reality? How does a community justify every activity and engagement in the light of its core purpose to see the image of God created in every baptized participant? What is the most effective form of community to make this a reality? How and where is the leadership formed for such, and proven effective and fruitful in its leadership role? How is the knowledge of God and his calling most effectively communicated to, and appropriated by the church’s participants?

It is never a call to mindless or passive church membership. As a matter of fact there is never anywhere in the New Testament any comment about “joining a church.” It is always a calling to a dynamic and growing relationship to the Door, Jesus Christ, by which his own life and power become incarnated in those who have come to God the Father through him.

Such pursuit renders many ostensible church institutions highly questionable, while it also reveals some dynamic colonies of faith in totally unexpected places and forms. Stand by . . .

BLOG 9/6/15. CHRISTIAN FAITH: SET FREE FOR RIOTOUS LAUGHTER

Years ago friends gave me a framed painting, which hangs over my desk and looks down on me every day. The painting is entitled by the artist: The Laughing Jesus. So, I admit it is not scripture, however it does portray something of the reality that wherever Jesus went he seems to have brought something that was freeing, and rejoicing. Think of the woman at the well, who seems to have found in her accidental encounter with him that which she had always longed for. Or the very fact that he was chided by his religious critics of hanging out with publicans and sinners, or winebibbers and gluttons. He came declaring that in following him, and responding to his teachings, that men and women would be set free, and if he made the free then they would be really free.

The irony of this freedom is that the very first requirement in realizing it is to confess that we are real sinners, that we have really screwed-up by missing the point of God’s wonderful design and meaning for our lives, that we have made gods of all the wrong things, . . . and especially that we have taken on a self-sufficiency, or made a god of own desires, created designer gods to our own liking, or don’t need to be dependent on anybody else’s God. A brash young college student once protested something of this in an actual conversation with a wise and crusty old Christian teacher, when he said: “I don’t need your God. I am my own God.” The humorous and somewhat mischievous teacher, took a drag on his pipe, and asked him to repeat what he had just said. When the young man repeated his self-deification, the old teacher responded: “Well, son, all I can say is that you’ve got one helluva poor one.”

Yes. We are not very good at playing God, or being our own source of meaning and hope.

So where does one begin to find the freedom that Jesus promised? We begin at the beginning. The very first thing we do is to appropriate the great all-democratizing principle of the Christian community, namely that we are all incorrigible sinners–sinners in many diverse ways. “If any person says that he/she is without sin, he deceives himself and the truth is not in him, but if he comes clean that he is a sinner, God also forgives us begins the process of cleansing us . . .” It is the beginning of being set free in order to enter into the joyous new relationship with God, to be made free, to engage in the riotous laughter of God’s New Creation.

But we also begin as little children. We begin by discerning very clearly what it is that God came to do for us by Christ and in Christ. We begin by ingesting the Word of Christ, and as we appropriate it, and begin to do it, we begin to grow into maturity in Christ, and to have his divine image created in us by that very knowledge. “His divine power has granted us all things that pertain to life and godliness according to his power at work in us” (II Peter 1:2-4).

And a part of that maturity is to be immersed in this very broken and distorted human community, what with all of its false gospels, it’s difficult and broken persons, its false values, . . . and to do so as an authentic incarnation of the very same grace that Jesus displayed in his love for those despised by the religious establishment. No grim-faced self-righteousness, but rather authentic and genuine grace and love for those whom Jesus came to seek and to save. Jesus came to give us laughter not so much stimulated by alcohol or coarse humor, or our own achievements, but by a freedom to know what our lives are really about, and to have an intimate relationship with the God who created us. Love, joy, peace, compassion, gentleness, goodness—the divine nature—and the capacity of laugh the laughter of freedom. We are to be those out of whose innermost being come springs of Living Water . . . and holy laughter.

BLOG 9/2/15. WHAT IF THERE WAS A CLEAR FOCUS ON THE PURPOSE OF THE CHURCH?

Pardon me if I confess that what I see in so much of what passes for the church is a lot of ‘religious stuff’ that is very difficult to relate to the teachings of Jesus—of all of the scriptures for that matter. I could wish that someone had taught me to think and see into that which New Testament writers would designate as “the beautiful bride for the Lamb,” early on in my life, i.e., a community of identity and of intimacy with that one who came to inaugurate God’s New Creation, and to usher in the Age to Come right here in vicissitudes of this present age.

It should be somewhat obvious from early on that when the Israelites left Egypt in that mass exodus, that God gave them a pattern for their lives. First there were those beautiful Ten Commandments, which spelled out life as God intended it to be, i.e. love and devotion for God, and love and ministry to one another in that new humanity. But often overlooked, was the significance of the pattern of their encampments on their pilgrim journey. The symbolic dwelling place of God, which was the tabernacle, containing the Ark of the Covenant and the altar for their sacrifices, was to be in the very geographical center of their encampments. God always insisted that he wanted to dwell among his people. He was not some aloof God who was indifferent to the daily realities of their lives. He also made provision for all of their shortcomings and violations, their pettiness and their unbelief. He provided that which secured their atonement, their reconciliation to the God who loved them and who was their deliverer. God was also very patient.

The story that followed the exodus is not always a happy one. The people Israel very much depended on God’s blessings and protection, but increasingly did not allow God to interfere with the conformity to the merely human aspirations and religions of the nations around them.

So what does God do? He takes on our flesh and blood and comes (as Eugene Peterson so skillfully paraphrases it) “to dwell in the neighborhood.” God comes, in Jesus of Nazareth, to dwell with his people, to demonstrate his love and healing and forgiveness, … to be touched with the feeling of their infirmities, . . . right where they lived.

But then, skip all the way over to the closing chapters of the Book of Revelation, and pick up the perennial theme, but in its ultimate realization. When God shall have, in Christ, triumphed over all of the alien forces of the dominion of darkness, then Jesus shall deliver the kingdom up to God and God shall be all and in all, . . . and: “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes” (Rev. 21:3-4).

But don’t tune out yet! That is not accomplished in some ‘out there’ future hope. It is the consummation of what is already true about God’s design for the church right here and now. The apostles taught that: “. . . you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit” (Ephesians 2:22 in loc.). Here. Now. The church is to be (not some humanly religious institution, but . . .) the radiant display of God, and the community of God’s Age to Come in our lives. This is what the church is all about. And every one who is baptized needs to be consumed with reality that our lives and our small colonies of faith and worship are where God dwells—often in the most tragic and difficult, or indifferent and secular contexts. The church is not at all some spiritual never-never-land passively waiting for some future hope. “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth …” That’s the church’s calling. The church is not some mindless, or merely religious bunch of folk. Rather it is God’s subversive presence in this world that he loves infinitely. God, create us as such.

BLOG 8/30/15. THE CHURCH’S SILENCE ON GUN VIOLENCE: WHY?

The statistics on gun violence and gun-related deaths in the United States are frightening, even nightmarish. They are so horrendous that statistics from mass killings, and terrorists killings in other nations, are trivial by comparison. In this year, thus far, there have been nearly 34,000 victims of gun violence, 8619 deaths, 491 children killed or injured, 1707 teenagers killed or injured, 247 mass shootings in the U.S., . . . and on and on. Eighty people die each day in this country due to guns.

So where is the church? Where are those who have the power to put restraints on this? Who has the fortitude to confront the ‘principalities and powers’ of the gun lobby, or the NRA with their obscenely powerful capacity to hold the church, the congress, the Supreme Court, and any opposing entity captive? Culturally it would seem that we have become deaf, or immune to such a horrific reality on our doorstep. We get exercised briefly when there is a mass shooting at a church Bible study in Charleston, or the killing of two journalists on television, or a school shooting in New England, . . . but then its back to normal, and guns continue to proliferate.

What anyone who has raised a significant voice against the gun phenomenon knows, there is quick retaliation, personally or politically. The gun industry seems not to even allow the subject to be broached in public debate. Even the more progressive political candidates seem to skirt it as a significant issue in the current campaign.

And those of us who are the teachers and leaders inside the church, know that often there are present the otherwise most polite and placid members of our congregations, who are passionate about their right to have guns, and their membership in the NRA. To oppose such exacts a strong reaction, and often the loss of friendship.

The church does, however, have a prophetic role, and that prophetic role is seldom popular. Go back to the fifth century account of the Christian monk Telemachus who was so appalled at the carnage of the popular gladiatorial contest (as the story is related) that he leaped down into the arena, raised his hand and commanded the gladiators: “In the name of Jesus, I command you to cease!” (or something to that effect). He was immediately killed by stoning or stabbing. But the Emperor Honorarius was so impressed at the monk’s witness that he, forthwith, banned the gladiatorial contests in the empire.

So with the Old Testament prophets. They seldom lived or died ideal and popular lives. They frequently died violent deaths. Is the death of one’s popularity, or the dismissal of one’s protest, or the loss of one’s position in the community to come as any surprise. Many timid followers of Christ may see injustice and violence for what they are, but wait until the protest is safe before going public. I watched this in the civil rights struggle in the 1960s. It was Martin Luther King, Jr. who publicly exposed the huge injustices of racial injustice, and when challenged that he was violating the laws of the state, countered: “I appeal to a higher law.” Along the way, King and the civil rights battle became more familiar and acceptable, and King won a Nobel award. But then he exposed the injustice of our engagement in the Viet Nam War, and his popularity plunged again.

The church has a very definite prophetic calling, but that calling can be very unpopular. The existence among us of violence and injustice, and the awesome influence of the principalities and powers of the gun industry should call forth the righteous indignation of any one who professes to be part of the community of the Kingdom of God, and their calling to be instruments of God’s peace and justice. So where is the church’s voice in a country with more guns per capita than any nation on earth, and where 80 persons die each day due to gun violence? Lord have mercy! Christ have mercy! Lord have mercy!

BLOG 8/26/15. THE PARABLE OF LAZARUS AND DIVES: WEALTH AND POVERTY, THE ISSUE IS REAL AND INESCAPABLE.

The political atmosphere contains the frequent reminder of the awesome influence of the 1% of the wealthy in this nation, and the apparent helplessness of the other 99% to be able to do much about it. In this election season it is a stump speech only engaged in cautiously, if at all, by most candidates. Wall Street and its allies seem devoid of any sense of the moral and ethical responsibilities of their wealth, other than their own security (that may be unfair to some, but it appears that way to me). What is even more puzzling is how very little that voter constituency which the press labels: the Christian right, or the Evangelical Right, presses the candidates on this issue. Jesus never dodged the issue of the responsibilities of economic justice.

Consider the parable of the rich man, Dives, and his poverty-stricken and physically disabled counterpart, Lazarus. The parable portrays Dives as one who dressed in the most expensive clothes, and who daily partook of the richest of foods. His table scraps would have been a good meal for many, which is why Lazarus, the poor man, was carried each day and laid at the gate of the estate of the rich man. A colorful detail of the parable is that the guard dogs, ordinarily there as vicious protectors of the estate against intruders, . . . were fond of Lazarus and came and licked his wounds. So Dives never noticed, or at least never paid any humane attention, to Lazarus. Then they both died, and as the parable concludes, Dives went to hell, or Hades, and suffered, while Lazarus went into the embrace of Abraham. Dives complains out of his torment, and is reminded that in his lifetime he enjoyed comforts and riches, and was oblivious to the needs of his human counterpart, notwithstanding the clear teachings of the (Old Testament) patriarchs and prophets. It’s a frightening parable, given the disparity of wealth in the world today.

Jesus began his ministry with the statement that he was come to fulfill the Messianic role of one who brought good news to the poor, and release from debtors prisons (most prisoners in Jesus’ day were there because they couldn’t pay their debts). Near the end of his earthly ministry he gave the sobering teaching that, at his return, the criteria for judgment would be how the naked and hungry and homeless and prisoners were treated.

If wealth and poverty are not an issue for every follower of Christ today, then somebody is not reading the teachings of Jesus and prophets very intelligently. There are more homeless refugees in the world today than ever in history. There are huge numbers seeking economic survival everywhere. The immigration issue cannot be a political football. It is an ethical issue. Any mother or father trapped and helpless in poverty or danger would seek better circumstances for their offspring.

Ah! But those with the power and wealth to at least seek workable solutions are protective of their wealth and status, and turn a blind eye, or intentionally refuse to look at this issues, . . . whether in the poorer neighborhoods of their own cities, or with millions displaced in Syria. Personal wealth and security easily become a god. Mammon is the only entity that Jesus named as a competitor to God, to Jesus “who for our sakes became poor that we might you through his poverty might become rich.”

Having grown up in the Great Depression, my parents had to determine what was essential in the use of their meager incomes. They were great stewards, but they also shared with those who had even less. At this moment in history we are the wealthiest nation, and the North American church is the wealthiest in the world. We dare not ignore the huge multitude of ‘Lazaruses’ on our doorstep locally and globally, . . . “to love justice and to do kindness” (Micah 6:8).

BLOG. 8/23/15. CHURCH DENOMINATIONS CERTAINLY MUST BE CONFUSING

Mercy! If I were an observer unacquainted with much of what the church is all about, I certainly would be confused by denominations. I can have sympathy with such, because many of them are my friends, and the let me know how confusing denominations are. Here, Pope Francis is about to arrive in the United States, and so the news media get all hyped about Roman Catholicism , and this unique pope. Then the presidential candidates are making their way to denominational gatherings and tailoring their campaign rhetoric to accommodate the perceived policy positions of that particular constituency. Does any of it have much to do with the life and teachings of Jesus?

For the first several centuries of its history, the church was a movement and reinventing itself as it moved out into the Roman Empire and meeting the cultural challenges, and the growth pains of such a subversive faith in a hostile world. In the fourth century the Christian faith became the official religion of the empire (for questionable reasons), and its primary location of leadership was at the center of the empire: Rome. For a millennium thereafter the church in the West was fairly unified, though there were major divisions such as the Eastern Orthodox church, the Coptic church, and a few others. Many Christian colonies simply emerged and had little communication with Rome, or anywhere else. (Most people hardly realize that even the venerable St. Patrick had little communication with Rome, communications being so primitive at that time, but that was the only church he knew.)

Then near the turn of the 16^th century you began to get rumblings of discontent, perhaps with the direction and the excesses of the church hierarchy in Rome, or its questionable doctrinal aberrations, and protest movements sprang up and were broadly described as Protestant. Here we are, all these centuries later, and with the church becoming quite global, there is this huge proliferation of what we designate: denominations, i.e. Lutheran, Anabaptist, Waldensian, Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, Pentecostal—and now expressions from West Africa, and the many African nations, Latin America, the Orient and from the numerous nations and cultures of the world.

Let me stop right here, however, and speak to those of this Western, or North American culture where the Christian faith, though much in the news for its controversies, is diminishing into less and less influence in many ways (and yet probably growing vigorously under radar, and apart from prominent church denominations).

What is a curious outsider to make of all of these denominational labels? How confused should he or she be? What it such a person to make of those who, on one hand, profess to be followers of Jesus, and yet seem to be oblivious to the scandal of their controversies. How do they relate to the basic mess of Jesus, and the Christian faith expressed in the early creeds of the church (Apostles Creed, Creed of Nicea, etc.)?

We are undoubtedly in a post-denominational era. Those seeking Jesus Christ do not go looking for a denominational franchise. Rather, they look for authenticity of life, and for the source that makes people new and hopeful, to find meaning and some authority, or guiding line for their lives. They are not looking for church activities, or colorful television personalities, or any of that baggage—hungry seekers are looking for reality and meaning for their lives, for some sure foundation. Denominations can clutter the landscape. The late theologian, H. Richard Niebuhr called denominations: “The moral failure of Christianity.”

Have I got you confused? For my part, let me recommend a couple of good starting places for inquiry: Simply Christian by N. T. Wright, or The Reason for God by Timothy Keller. Start there. Find out what the Christian faith offers, and then go looking for a community or a colony of those who embrace that core Christian faith and are being transformed by it authentically . . . and go from there. But look out! Jesus Christ is powerful stuff!