Heresy in the Home

July 31, 2009 | 5 Comments

And from my 3 year old son, nonetheless.

The other day I was straightening up the bathroom when he came in and said, “Dad, did you know that there are TWO Gods?!”

“Really?” I said.  (As I began a surreptitious search for something with which to stone my wicked, heretical son in accordance with Leviticus.  Can you stone someone with a bottle of Johnson & Johnson’s Lavender Baby wash?  That would be ironic considering its claim to be “No tears.”)

“Yeah,” he said, “There’s a Big one in the sky…” (He said this with his hands spread wide apart and standing on tip toes.  Then he made himself really small and brought his thumb and index finger close together)”…And there’s a little one in my heart.”

Touché.  It appears someone has been paying attention at church and then filling in the gaps for himself.  That makes him a theologian.

Posted by Robert | Filed Under Amen Corner, Blog 
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Free Backpacks

July 28, 2009 | Leave a Comment

H/t to Ray Stiff for forwarding this.  You or someone you know may be eligible for free school supplies and backpacks.   Follow the link below to register:

Military families of E-1 through E-6  ONLY  are encouraged to sign up for
free backpacks and back-to-school supplies which will be distributed before
school begins, this year.  Registration is limited to the amount of
backpacks and supplies donated and the registration is open from now until
all slots are filled.  Families with the greatest need have priority.
Military ID cards showing rank of E-1 through E-6 must be presented by
families at their pick up.

This program has been made possible through kind donations from all branches
of the military, as well as corporate and private donors throughout the
Hampton Roads area.  Please go to:  www.operationhomefront.net/hamptonroads
to sign up for backpacks.

Posted by Robert | Filed Under Amen Corner, Blog 

A Very Biblical Wedding

July 24, 2009 | 3 Comments

I have come into my garden, my sister, my bride; I have gathered my myrrh with my spice. I have eaten my honeycomb and my honey; I have drunk my wine and my milk. [ Friends ] Eat, O friends, and drink; drink your fill, O lovers. (Song of Songs 5:1)

Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory! For the wedding of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made herself ready. (Revelation 19:7)

You’ve got to see this.  A friend from Grad School posted this to her Facebook account.  As with the Sound of Music video, I defy you not to smile.  I defy you to resist the urge to move.  It’s like a Bollywood movie.  What a great way to start a wedding.  Check out my thoughts after the jump.

Let me say a couple of things.  First, if you want a picture of a Biblical wedding, there you go.  The wedding feast was a party.  The betrothal (engagement) was long. So when the long-awaited day finally arrived, the groom and his friends would go as a group to the house of the bride and fetch her and her friends. Then they would go as one raucous procession to the place of the feast.  Then the marriage would be consummated and a feast lasting several days would follow.  There would be music and dancing and wine.  Weddings were not solemn occasions.  They were blowouts.

That’s why Jesus uses the image of a wedding when he’s asked why his disciples do not fast.  He basically says, “Why should they fast?  The groom (Jesus) is here; it’s time to party (Mark 2:18-20)!”

Second, I wonder if we would do well to make more room for rejoicing in our church services.  In one sense, we are still waiting for the groom to return.  In another sense, the promise has been made.  It’s just a matter of time.  I’m a pretty serious guy, so I don’t always go to the rejoicing stuff very naturally.  But how would our times together benefit if we could?

Just a thought for you this Friday.  Keep reading the Good News according to Mark.  Can’t wait to see you all on Sunday morning.

Posted by Robert | Filed Under Amen Corner, Blog 

What Did He Say Part 2

July 22, 2009 | Leave a Comment

28“…I tell you the truth, all the sins and blasphemies of men will be forgiven them. 29But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; he is guilty of an eternal sin.”

  • The Bible is incredibly simple to understand.
  • The Bible is incredibly difficult to understand.

Which one of these statements is true?  It would be interesting to take a survey and see what you all think.  Me?  I could vote for either one.  Sometimes I read the Bible and it seems so straightforward.  Especially the more “Big Picture” I get.  God made the world.  Jesus came to show us who God is and reunite us with the Him.  We are members of the Kingdom of Heaven and we’re expected to act like it.  Pretty simple stuff.

But “the devil” is in the details.  It’s when I start dealing with specifics that the Bible can become really difficult to understand.  That’s because there are little statements scattered here and there that really throw me off.  They’re like the pebbles you occasionally get in an otherwise comfortable pair of sandals.  I can understand most of a passage, but then I’ll come across some statement and think, “Huh?”  And the Bible just says it and keeps on going as if it’s as clear as day.  Jesus is especially good at giving us statements like these.  He likes to go at something in a roundabout way.  My theory on that is that it makes us think rather than go on autopilot.

I’ve finally decided that I will never understand everything the Bible says.  There comes a point where a shrug is as good a response as any.  It gets me past the need to create an answer for every problem no matter how tortured my response may be.  What a relief just to say, “I don’t know.”

The recent issue of Relevant Magazine has this great article about what it means to be “agnostic.”  We tend to get all worked up by this term, but what it means is simply acknowledging that I don’t know.  When it comes to the Bible, there are numerous details about which I continue to be an agnostic.  The author argues that this is perfectly normal and even beneficial to our faith.  He says:  I mean to challenge the version of Christianity that says we’re called, above all, to play it safe…as if there are certain confessions of honest confusion or doubt our faith can’t afford.[1]

Today we’re going to talk about one of Jesus’ statements that can be difficult to understand.  I’ll tell you what I think Jesus is saying.  But that’s about the best I can do.  At the end of the day, I’ll have to live with the difficulty of not completely getting it.  It’s certainly not the greatest failure in my life that’s God’s grace will have to overcome.

[1] David Dark. “Insert Soul Here.” Relevant July/August 2009.

Posted by Robert | Filed Under Amen Corner, Articles 

What Did He Say

July 10, 2009 | 1 Comment

Once again, I’ll show my age. Back when I was in 9th or 10th grade, the band, Depeche Mode came out with a song called “Personal Jesus.” While it was on the pop charts and in the public eye, it got the attention of quite a few preachers. As I recall most of them didn’t have very kind words for it. The word I remember being used most was the word “blasphemous.” Something to the effect of, “How dare these rock and roll singers mock God?”

But I don’t really think they were mocking God. I don’t know enough about the personal beliefs of the songwriters or singers to say anything about them as individuals. But I don’t think “Personal Jesus” is a slam on God. Here’s a sample of the lyrics:

“Your own personal Jesus, someone to hear your prayers, someone who cares…feeling unknown and you’re all alone, flesh and bone by the telephone, lift up the receiver I’ll make you a believer.”

First of all, the song wasn’t really about Jesus Christ. The inspiration for the song came from something Priscilla Presley once said about Elvis and how she made him out to be more than human and, frankly, how she made something of an idol out of him

The point they were trying to make is that we’re often looking for someone to meet all of our needs, and take care of us and be there whenever we need them. Sometimes that’s a family member or a friend. Sometimes we do that to Jesus.

Actually, I think Mark (the writer whose Gospel we’re studying) would agree about that. He would go so far as to say that we don’t really have any business doing that with Jesus, either. That Jesus isn’t just here to make all of our problems go away. He’s not some personal valet who will see to our every whim.

It comes up more than once in Mark. The people are looking for Jesus to be one thing for them, but his mission is to be something else. We’ll see the first (but not the last) example in chapter 3 of Mark this morning. It happens when Jesus says something to a demon, something we would not expect Jesus to say.

If I understand the lyrics of the Depeche Mode song right, Jesus isn’t the problem, our perception of him is. We want him to be our little servant. He wants to be our Lord. I hope this morning we’ll have the courage and honesty to see Jesus as he is rather than as we want him to be.

Posted by Robert | Filed Under Amen Corner, Articles 

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