Why Even When I Hate Baseball, I Love Baseball

The first time I gave a second thought to Scooter Gennett, I was on a long drive somewhere listening to Bob Uecker do a Brewers game.  Being a Reds fan means being used to a multi-person booth, so listening to Uecker, who mostly works alone, is both entertaining and claustrophobic...but I digress.  Gennett came up to bat and I remember wondering how a major league ballplayer could be named Scooter and thinking this is the kind of player that winds up on the Brewers...serviceable enough, but this is why the Brewers are so far from the main stage of baseball.  I was dismissive of Scooter, but mostly as a symptom of a larger dismissal of the team for whom he was plying his trade.

To be fair, my team, the Cincinnati Reds, has in recent years had more in common with the Milwaukee Brewers than with any team that truly matters in baseball.  It has not always been so.  I grew up in Xenia, Ohio, about an hour north, more or less, of Cincinnati.  I was eleven when the Big Red Machine won the 1975 World Series, fielding the greatest team in the history of the sport.  Again, I was eleven, so I thought my team was always going to be this good.  Not so much.  We repeated in 1976, but things slowly fell apart and it would be 1990 before we would win another World Series.  

My fate was sealed in those Big Red Machine years.  I was young and impressionable and Marty Brennaman and Joe Nuxhall took advantage of these characteristics, relaying the exploits of the mighty Reds through my Panasonic transistor radio, assuring that of the many sports I would love, I would love baseball best and of the many teams in those many sports to whom I would pledge my loyalty at the top of the heap would be a red cap with a white C front and center.

1990, as I said, was a magical year.  My wife and I graduated from seminary, got jobs in St. Charles, Missouri and the Cincinnati Reds swept the Oakland A's in the fall classic.  We moved to St. Charles in July of 1990.  On May 1 of that glorious year, in the early days of that wire-to-wire first place season, one Scooter Gennett was born in, of all places, Cincinnati, Ohio.

Fast forward to spring training 2017.  The Reds have not sniffed a World Series since 1990.  The past couple of seasons have been particularly vexing, yet I was optimistic.  I was wary of our starting pitching (I was right), but I liked our position players (I was right) - I believed we would be competitive, at the very least we'd be better than last year.  One bit of unhappiness - we'd unloaded long-time second baseman Brandon Phillips to make room for youngster Jose Peraza.  I didn't love it, but I also understood - it was a graceful way to allow Phillips to play elsewhere and we needed to see what we had in Peraza.  

Then just a few days before the season started we picked up...Scooter Gennett.  I was not happy.  This was not a knock on Scooter.  It was frustration with our front office.  You go all the way through spring training and not only do we not have a starting rotation ready to start the season we also now appear to be hedging on Peraza by picking up a guy who started at second base in Milwaukee last year.  So I wanted to not like Gennett.

That lasted for about two games.  Gennett is every good cliche.  He's a gamer.  He's a scrapper.  He'll play wherever you put him.  He doesn't take an at bat off.  He's a team-first guy.  Scooter came to play every day and was getting starts all over the diamond and excelling as a pinch hitter.  I really liked the guy.  And I liked this team.  Not just because they were my Reds, but because they liked each other and they played hard and they were winning about half the time.  Winning half the time may not seem like a high bar, but it was mid-May and we were still playing meaningful baseball games. What?

I was feeling a strong connection to this team and somehow this new guy, Scooter, seemed to exemplify much of what was winsome about this group.  I got on MLB.com and ordered up a Gennett t-shirt jersey.  It was my way of investing not just in the Reds, but in this incarnation of the Reds.  Around that time we lost seven games in a row and went from three games over .500 to four games under .500.  Which was hard.  But the guys didn't give up.  They kept battling.  Got it back to .500.  Then dipped back under again.  It's a tall order to win with regularity when you are only sending out a legitimate starter every one and a half out of five times one of them takes the mound.  

One of the games in a multi-game losing streak was a loss to the Toronto Blue Jays by roughly 172 runs.  It was soul crushing.  When your offense gives you 5 or 8 or 6 runs - that's enough runs to win. Unless your opponent is scoring 8 or 10 or 172 runs.  Sooner or later it happens each season (except for 1990 in the last thirty-five or so years) - I come to the realization that I hate baseball.  I hate because I care, but make not mistake, I hate.  For about a day.  Or two.

And then baseball gives me something.  Usually a little something.  A win.  A quality start by an unlikely pitcher.  Billy Hamilton makes a ridiculous catch.  Joey Votto fouls off 8 pitches with a 3-2 count and lines a double off the wall to drive in a run.  Something like that.  Baseball reminds me of its greatness and why I love it.

But baseball has kind of outdone itself tonight.  The Cardinals are in town.  Ever since they put us in the same division with the Cardinals it feels like we've not gotten along with them very well.  Or played very well against them.  So it is always nice to beat them.  It's really, really nice to beat them 13-1.  

And it's supremely nice when a big part of why we beat them 13-1 is scrappy, over-achiever Scooter Gennett.  He started in left field in lace of Adam Duvall, the Louisville Slugger.  And Scooter went all Louisville Slugger on Cardinal pitching.  Scooter hit not one, not two, not three, but four, that's right, four home runs tonight.  Here is a list of all the Cincinnati Reds who have ever hit four home runs in one game:

Scooter Gennett

End of list.

Here is a list of all the players in the history of major league baseball who have hit four home runs, had five total hits and driven in ten runs in one game:

Scooter Gennett

End of list.

We may yet lose lots of baseball games.  We still have a woeful lack of starting pitching.  But we have offense up and down the lineup.  We have a very nice bullpen.  And we might be able to pull together a rotation.  But even if we lose a lot of ball games, there will be tonight.  June 6, 2017.  When Cincinnati born Scooter Gennett hit four home runs and we beat the Cardinals 13-1.  And I am reminded of the one thing I do not need to be reminded of - no matter how much I may hate baseball at any particular moment, I will always, always, always love baseball, specifically as it is played by my Cincinnati Reds.

Listening For The Word Of God

You are preparing to make a recipe that you have wanted to try for some time.  You know that it has pecans in it and you love pecans.  You make the decision to focus on the pecans to the exclusion of all else.  The recipe is for a pecan pie.  If you follow through on your plan to focus solely on pecans at the end of the day will you have a pecan pie?

You buy a bookshelf.  One of those prefab jobs that come with a nice long list of instructions.  You empty the contents of the box and take a look at the instructions.  There are nine steps.  You really like step two.  It looks doable and it makes sense.  You decide that you are going to focus on step two to the exclusion of all the other steps.  If you follow through on this plan to focus solely on step two at the end of the day will you have a bookshelf?

Most all of us have passages of scripture that are our favorites.  Some folks really resonate with John 3:16 or Psalm 23.  I personally am drawn to Romans 8.  It can surely be a benefit to have pieces of scripture that speak powerfully to us and perhaps are our go to scripture for times when we feel in special need of comfort, encouragement or guidance.  However, if we find ourselves consulting only passages of scripture that we enjoy or feel connected to, if we focus only on what we like in God’s Word to the exclusion of all else we risk having a stack of pecans instead of a pecan pie, a pile of parts in place of a bookshelf, a limited view of the kind of person God created us to be and the kind of life God desires for us to live.

2 Kings 5:1-19 is the story of Naaman, a general in the army of the King of Aram.  Naaman had a skin disease.  An Israeli servant girl is captured in a raid and becomes a servant of Naaman’s wife.  Seeing the suffering of Naaman, the servant girl tells of a prophet in Samaria, Elisha.  If Naaman would go to Elisha, she believes he could be healed.  After some back and forth with the King of Israel, Naaman decides to visit Elisha.

Naaman and his entourage pull up in their limousines in front of the prophet’s home.  Naaman anticipates that Elisha will come out, there will be a light show or something, words will be said, maybe a small explosion or two and he will be healed.  Instead, one of the prophets aids trots out to the car with a message.  “Go wash seven times in the Jordan river and you’ll be fine.”  Naaman is not happy with the lack of ceremony and not happy with being told to go wash in the Jordan which he feels is a subpar river, not terribly clean and truth be told more of a mud puddle masquerading as a stream.

Naaman’s people have a word with him.  They point out that if he’d been told to go climb the highest mountain or slay a dragon or some really hard thing he’d be all about completing the task.  Here all he has to do is go take a dip in the Jordan - maybe it would be a good idea to set aside his dignity and give it a shot.  Naaman does and it works.

In the Luke 17 passage, Jesus heals 10 individuals all suffering from a skin disease, all keeping their distance from the world because of that skin disease.  They call across the distance to Jesus for help - he sends them to the Pharisees to be certified clean and as they turn to go they realize they are indeed clean.  Of the ten, one comes back to express gratitude to Jesus.  That one is a Samaritan.  Only one comes back and as Jesus notes that one is a foreigner.

Two great stories.  Both stories chock full of great life lessons.  We might say Naaman needed to get over himself and do what God suggested, and we should move our egos aside and listen for God’s direction as well.  We could assert that one person out of ten who were helped showed gratitude to Jesus and that we should take note and aim to express our thanks to God for the blessings in our lives.

But there is more.  Even within the individual stories there are a wealth of takeaways beyond the two in the previous paragraph.  With scripture there is always so much more.  Most Sundays when I read the scripture before I begin I will say, “Let us listen FOR the Word of God.”  The wording is intentional.  Listening for the word of God asks something of you.  You are not passive in the process.  You have interpretive work to do.  Scripture does not speak one word to us and then it is exhausted.  Scripture speaks and speaks and speaks and then speaks again.

We may listen TO scripture and we may hear a particular message from a specific story.  But we may also listen FOR scripture.  For the voice of God speaking in multiple scriptures.  Across time.

On the edges of the two stories today we may notice that Naaman is a foreigner to the people of Israel.  God helps him.  In the story of the ten folks who Jesus helps we don’t know the breakdown of who made up that group, but it seems safe to assume the majority were of a Jewish background as Jesus sent them to the Pharisees for their certification of cleanliness.  And a point is made that the one who showed gratitude was…a Samaritan, a foreigner as Jesus pointed out.  When we listen for the Word of God we listen not just to one scripture, but the many voices of scripture.

And this day when we listen for the Word of God we listen not just to what happened, but to what is happening - now.  And in that listening this day there emerges a message about diversity and inclusion.  God moving beyond boundaries imposed by humans and showing that the God of Israel can heal a general in the army of Aram and that the Jewish Messiah can heal a Samaritan and that a Samaritan can be the one person in ten whose heart is so filled with gratitude that a thank you is offered.

A message that reminds us that God’s heart knows no borders and that if we are seeking after God’s heart ours won’t either.

I think of this in particular this day in the wake of Hurricane Matthew.  My son moves to Charleston, South Carolina and a week and a half later they are in the path of a massive hurricane.  And so I will be honest and say I was paying closer attention than I might normally have been to the hurricane as it developed and was moving towards the United States, moving towards Charleston, South Carolina, moving towards Cameron.  And as I was watching my vision was pulled this morning to the north of Cameron to North Carolina where there is flooding and where, as the actual hurricane is winding down, some of the worst damage and most dangerous moments in the US version of the hurricane in terms of human life are taking place.  And I was watching as this monstrous hurricane was battering Haiti, leaving nearly nine hundred people dead, and a population still staggered by an earthquake, devastated by Matthew.  A reminder that God's heart is breaking for the people of Haiti and when I look beyond where my own vision would naturally take me I find my heart breaking for Haiti too.  (And grateful for the folks at Presbyterian Disaster Assistance who are already there.)

On this day God sends two scriptures about looking beyond where our vision may be set.  As though God may know that Hurricane Matthew has been packaged for us as though everything that happened prior to it’s arrival in Florida was preamble to when it truly mattered.  As though God was pointing us beyond our first glance, to Haiti and to the devastation and the need there.

It is a powerful thing we do when we approach God’s Word and when we attend our ears we may trust that God will have something to say.  To us.  Today.

Let us listen, always, for the Word of God.  Amen.

Why What We Do Matters: A Written Version Of A Sermon Preached At Hebron Presbyterian Church On September 11, 2016

A quick assessment of the world we live in today.  The world is a dangerous place.  It is an unpredictable place.  We are very often not able to disagree with one another and then continue to maintain a conversation.  We cannot read the newspaper or watch the news on television without encountering something awful, something that surprises us even past the point where we previously thought we were as shocked, disappointed and outraged as we could be with the way we humans are capable of treating each other.

This tone to the world did not begin yesterday and did not begin recently and most likely stretches back and back and back in time.  But there is a day we can point to and say on this day this problem was painfully and violently brought unavoidably into focus.  September 11, 2001.

I remember attending a high school football game in the town where I was serving at the time, Prestonsburg, Kentucky.  Blackcat football is a wonderful communal experience in Prestonsburg.  The game I am referencing was the first football game, the first real community gathering following 9/11.  That night people were still tense and uncertain.  We were glad to be out and doing something that felt like normal, but it surely did not truly feel like normal.  As we sat in the bleachers nestled in between the mountains, a plane flew over.  One by one, heads turned away from the game and to the plane, until it felt as though all of us were focused on that plane.

I think in that moment we wondered if this was how it was always going to be - we wondered a lot of things.  Would we feel safe again?  Would we laugh again?  Would we be happy and maybe one day experience joy again?  And where would God be in all of it?

In some ways it was a time when we reflexively turned to God.  And held on.  In other ways, God may have seemed distant and far away to some as the world spun out of control.

We turn to two New Testament scriptures this morning.  New Testament passages, meaning some two thousand years old, more or less, which do what the Scripture does time after time - speak to our moment in time like they were thinking of us when they were writing down the words.

The first passage, Luke 15:1-10, is Jesus telling a couple of stories speaking about the vital importance of finding what is lost.  A sheep and a coin.  Both lost.  One sheep of ninety-nine.  One coin of ten.  The owners of the sheep and of the coin will not rest.until what is lost is found.  We are told, then, that God is like this.  Continuing to seek us out, to be in relationships with us, until all of us are connected with God and with one another in relationship.  Until we all found by God and in turn find one another.

And when a new one is found, when a new relationship with God is formed - discovered - in that moment we are told there is a celebration in heaven.  Not because ninety-nine are already in the group, but because one more adds their unique self to the mix.

In 1 Timothy 1:12-17 Paul is explaining how he, rather like the sheep and the coin, had needed to be found.  It had happened.  God had found him.  Paul tells us that he needed finding because he had been very diligently becoming lost.  He says he was an accomplished sinner, the world’s foremost sinner - a champion at getting lost.  God through Christ shows God’s infinite patience and does amazing work in Paul.  Paul becomes more than found.  Paul becomes an example.  An example of the transformation that God can work in a person’s life.  An example of a life lived in fidelity to God’s call and of the fulfilling nature of such a life.  Fulfilling in that it is a life of hope and a life of joy.

There are moments in our present moment world - back to where we started - where things like joy and hope seem like quaint ideas.  Circumstances make it so easy to find opportunities to embrace despair.  There is no challenge to believing that the world is broken.  It is a short step from that belief to imagining that no one will ever be able to put things right.  In our darkest moments it may feel like God is far off and perhaps has lost interest in our failures as well.

This is why what we do this morning is so important.

The Church, the body of Christ, has always existed in this world.  Never too far from the one we live in - the one with challenges and difficulties and things that oppose hope and joy.  The Church has never given up.  It did not give up in it’s earliest days in the face of Roman persecution.  It did not give up hope in the face of injustices like the reality of slavery.  It did not give up hope in the past century as the world traversed  two World Wars and the Holocaust.  All manner of moments of massive darkness throughout history - the church did not give up.

And after September 11, 2001, the church did not give up.  We continue doing what we are doing here this very day.  We worship.  We baptize.  We confirm.  We are a resistance movement that says that however great the power of darkness that is thrown at us, we renounce it’s power over us because we really, truly, honestly believe that the body of Christ is built on so solid a rock that the gates of hell cannot and will not prevail against it.  This is who we are and this is what we do.

Just as Paul was an example to Timothy and to so many other individuals and communities, faithful Christians across history have inspired us.  They have showed us how the unlikely forces of a cross, an empty tomb, forgiveness, love and hope are stronger than any opposition.  And they remind us of our call to be examples that point to a better way and a greater reality.

Our family attended a soccer game this past Saturday evening in downtown Louisville.  In the midst of the game there in the twilight, a plane flew over.  Do you know what I thought when I looked up.  I thought the sky looked pretty.  Somewhere in the past fifteen years a plane returned to being a plane in my mind, and could not make itself so big that it blotted out a beautiful sky.

The world has not gotten easier to navigate or more peaceful or even less threatening in the past fifteen years.  But we have not closed the doors, ceased gathering here and decided it was all beyond us and there was nothing we could do save throwing in the towel.  We do not give up.  Specifically, the church does not give up.

In the face of adversity, challenge and potential despair, we worship, we baptize and we confirm.  Today is our no to hopelessness.

And we don’t simply survive.  We celebrate.  

When one sheep is found, when one coin is discovered, when one person is baptized, when one person is confirmed, when one person says yes to God’s hope, forgiveness and love, says yes to the truth that God is Lord and that God is creator…when that happens, scripture is clear.  Heaven rejoices.  

Thanks be to God.  Amen.

Remember Me: Based On A Sermon Preached At Hebron Presbyterian Church on September 4, 2016

(This sermon, a written version of the sermon given at Hebron Presbyterian Church on September, 4, 2016, contains ideas inspired by and references to the book “The Road To Amazing:  Basics Of Christian Practice” by Mary Brooks Casad and Clayton Oliphint)

Text:  Luke 24:13-35

Inscribed on the front of our communion table are these words - This Do In Remembrance Of Me.  These words are not on every communion table, but these words or some close approximation are on many tables.  Keep that in mind.  We’ll come back to it.

Two sad disciples.  That’s who we have in the story in Luke 24:13-35.  We don’t know many specifics about them.  We know one of them is named Cleopas.  Beyond that we know they were on their way from Jerusalem to Emmaus.  And they were sad.

They were sad because everything had come to an end.  Okay, obviously not everything.  They are still alive and they are walking on the road to Emmaus, so we know something remains, but they feel like everything has come to an end.  Where there was hope, there is now no hope.

Our two disciples are talking about what had just taken place in Jerusalem.  What had just taken place was Jesus - the person they had pinned all of their hopes and dreams on - had been crucified and placed in a tomb.  As we meet the two disciples they are heading away from that misery and they are heading back to…something.  Something unclear.  Something filled with despair.  They were on the road to nowhere.

It was the road to Emmaus.  But it was also, in that moment, the road to nowhere.

The road to nowhere is a cruel place to be.  Things can seem so hopeful and so promising.  And then it all goes away.  We have been on this road at one time or another.  May be on it now.  A job disappears.  A visit to the doctor and health circumstances change for ourselves or for someone we care about.  A relationship hits the rocks.  The clouds roll in.

The size of the problem often doesn’t really matter.  Despair just needs a toehold.  It could be something great or it could be something small.  To be honest sometimes nothing happens.  Sometimes that’s the problem.  It feels like nothing is happening.  And we begin to think nothing ever will happen.  In those moments, we share the same road those disciples were on.  The road to nowhere.

An unexpected thing happens to those two disciples on the road to nowhere.  A third person joins them on their journey.  Luke doesn’t leave us in suspense.

Jesus himself arrived and joined them on their journey.  (Luke 23:15b, CEB)

This is so unexpected that the two travelers don’t recognize Jesus.  He’s right there walking with them and they don’t realize who he is.  Understandable.  Jesus had been crucified.  Jesus had been put in a tomb behind a stone to seal the entrance.  That same Jesus does what the hymn says.  He walks with them and he talks with them.  He teaches them

He asks what is bothering them.  They are curious if he is the only one who doesn’t know what has happened in Jerusalem.  Over the course of time, Jesus teaches and something interesting begins to happen.  The travelers don’t know who is teaching them, but they know they like it.  By the time they reach Emmaus they, somehow, are starting to feel better.  They may not recognize him, but they want him to stay.  

They gather around a table for dinner.  Jesus breaks bread.  Their eyes are opened and they recognize him.  The road to nowhere is a distant memory.

If we let it, this can remain a story on a page in Bible history.  We can be excited that two very depressed followers of Jesus had their eyes opened and felt better.  We can marvel and wonder how they walked all that way and didn’t know him.  We can meditate on what it might have been like to walk with Jesus and learn from him, to be at table with Jesus and experience the transformative moment of the breaking of the bread.  Joy and purpose and hope are all back in a moment.  

The road to nowhere, becomes the road to amazing.

We can leave it at that.  A story about an amazing encounter that happened…a long time ago, in a place far, far away.

Or it can be much, much more.  

Here is the thing.  Nothing changes about the road to Emmaus in this story.  It’s the same road.  Begins in Jerusalem.  Ends in Emmaus.  Same distance.  Same hills and dips.  All the same geographical features.  Same things going on in the world.  One thing changed.  The two disciples realized Jesus was with them.

This Do In Remembrance Of Me.  Yes, do this remembering what Jesus did on our behalf.  Remembering that Jesus lived for us, died for us on a cross, was buried and then rose for us.  Remember all that.  But more basically…remember Jesus.  Remember that you are not on any road by yourself.  The joyous roads.  The challenging roads.  The roads that are crowded with sadness and seem bent on leading to despair.  Remember that Jesus is on the journey with you.

We can be as blind to Jesus presence as the two disciples on that ancient road.  Remember Jesus.  Whatever the road is.  Wherever the road is.  Whatever it may be called.  With Jesus alongside, we are not simply headed for an amazing destination, we are on a journey that is itself, each day, amazing.

Faith's Vantage Point: Based On A Sermon At Hebron Presbyterian Church On July 31, 2016

Texts:
Luke 12:13-21
Colossians 3:1-11
Hosea 11:1-11

Louisville Slugger Field was built for baseball.  It’s a great place to watch a baseball game.  Baseball is my favorite sport and our family loves to go to Slugger Field and watch baseball.

Our family are also soccer fans and have become big supporters of Louisville City and enjoy going to watch them play soccer.  Lou City also plays at Louisville Slugger Field.  Which was not built for soccer.  It’s a great place to watch baseball.  It’s an…interesting place to watch soccer.  There really isn’t a good place to see everything.  We sit at the end of the field - along what would be the third base line - and it’s a great place to watch the final attacking third of that end of the field.  The side of the field is good for generally seeing what is going on, but the stadium angles away from the field and it is hard to have much detailed awareness of what is going on in front of either goal.

Our vantage point on life is like a seat at a Lou City match.  Our viewpoint is always limited as it always begins with us.  We see where we are.  Our vantage point for the way the world is playing out any particular day begins with where we are located.  Sometimes we may be at the end - we see a portion of the world very clearly, but there is a lot going on farther away that we either can’t see clearly or perhaps have no awareness of at all.  Sometimes we may be on the side - we have a general idea of what is going on, but we kind of lose the details.

And then there is this:  A couple of weeks ago I attended the Presbyterian Youth Triennium at Purdue.  On the campus of Purdue is the Elliot Hall of Music.  Our worship most days was in Elliot and one day I entered the main hall a bit late looking for a seat.  The room was mostly full so I thought I would need to go to the balcony.  When I saw a seat.  Wide open.  Not far from the stage really.  How could this be?  I darted for it, certain that someone else would get there before me.  I got to the seat, sat down, looked up and realized why this seat was available.  Rather than looking at the stage where the worship leaders would be I was looking at a pole.

Some seats are literally behind a pole.  A complication for us when it’s life we are talking about is that not only are we sometimes behind the pole, sometimes we are the pole.

Our three - yes three - scripture passages this morning give us three vantage points on the life of faith.  One from within ourselves.  One a map.  And one the very good news from God’s vantage point.

Luke shares the story of a rich man with a problem.  His land had produced abundantly.  Yes.  That was the problem.  This is a classic “I’m behind the pole and the pole is me” vantage point.  His land had produced abundantly.  It is conceivable that one might perceive this as a good thing, but rather than experiencing it as a blessing, the rich man saw a problem.  He’d need more space.  The problem is not that the man has been blessed.  The problem is that he never moves past thinking about the impact of the bumper crop on him personally.  He’ll need to build new barns so he can keep his harvest in his barns and then he can party.  No acknowledgement of the source of his blessings.  No mention of how he might be able to use his resources to be a benefit to anyone beyond himself.

Jesus is pushing us not to see our blessings as our doings and reminding us that the world does not begin and end with us.  The rich man’s vantage point is totally consumed with himself - it is dangerously limited.

Paul in the Colossians passage offers a way to lift ourselves out of life behind the pole.  We broaden our view when we make our faith, rather than ourselves our vantage point.

“Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.”  (Colossians 3:2, CEB)

“Cloth yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator.” (Colossians 3:10, CEB)

In setting our minds on things that are above and in clothing ourselves with the new self, we challenge ourselves to be on the way to having our perspective transformed.  To move ourselves from the center of the universe and to see ourselves as participants in the transformative work of God’s kingdom.  Paul makes some very specific suggestions in this passage that are in many instances not easy tasks - we are to get rid of evil desires, greed, anger, malice, slander and abusive language - but if accomplished are practical goals that can get us closer to where God intends for us to be.

Between the rich man in Jesus’ parable and Paul’s blueprint. That’s where we live most of our lives.  We know there is a larger view.  God’s view.  A world where we love God and where we love one another.  And yet we get pulled to a much more limited vantage point at times.

We are blessed by God and our response is…to wonder if we have enough barns.

The problem is it can be hard to recognize when we are losing our way.  There are fair reasons to wonder if you have enough barns.  Planning is not a categorically bad thing.  One might argue that it is even responsible.  But there are indications of where things may be going off the tracks.  That moment when planning and responsibility become hoarding and greed.  That’s a moment to have an eye out for.  The moment when our first, second and third thoughts are about ourselves.  That moment when a blessing is being assessed as a problem.  When there is no thought of God’s involvement in our windfall and no thought of what we might do with it other than take care of ourselves.

At our best, we will not always get it right.  Which is why it is awesome that we had three passages this day.  God know about us and our occasionally falling short of the mark.  God knows that in spite of our desire to be faithful, sometimes we make decisions from behind our pole.

The prophet Hosea speaks to a people who have become self-obsessed.  They are trending towards unfaithful with great momentum.  The prophet speaks of the early days of the relationship between the people and God.  When God called the people out of Egypt in a stunning act of liberating love.  They have lost sight of God.  But - behold - God has not lost sight of them.

My people are bent on turning away from me. To the Most High they call, but he does not raise them up at all.

How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over, O Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? My heart recoils within me; my compassion grows warm and tender.

I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and no mortal, the Holy One in your midst, and I will not come in wrath.   (Hosea 11:7-9, CEB)

God comes to us in love.  God forgives us when we stray.  God is the Holy One in our midst.  If you feel strained in your relationship with God - if you feel like you’ve been sitting behind the pole, there is such good news here.  God calls us to faithfulness.  God provides us with descriptions - like Paul offers in Colossians of what that faithfulness will look like in our daily lives.

But God has also had experience with us in our moments of poor decision making.  Then God calls us back to faithfulness.  God moves us to a better vantage point.  The whole purpose of that story Jesus told about the rich man is to respond to a question someone asked Jesus about a family dispute over money.  In the story Jesus is all about vantage point changing.

God loves us and is tireless in calling us again.  And again.  And again.  Calling us to move and to live forward in faith towards an ever expanding vision of life, not as we imagine it should be, but as God made us to experience and participate in it.  Amen.

Go And Do Likewise: Based On A Sermon At Hebron Presbyterian Church, July 10, 2016 (Text: Luke 10:25-37)

If you have attended church for any amount of time you have heard a few sermons on the Good Samaritan.  In my eleven years here at Hebron I have preached on this text multiple times.  And I have preached on it even more in my 25 years of ordained ministry.  And many, many other preachers have preached on it many, many times.  After all of these sermons have been preached by all these people in all these churches over all these years you might think there cannot be anything new to say. 

A secret.  I think you are right.  There may be nothing new to say.

And yet, here we are.  You.  Me.  Jesus.  The Legal Expert.  A traveler who has seen better days.  Some thieves who were our traveler’s problem.  A priest.  A Levite.  And…a Samaritan.

Sometimes it is not saying something new.

Sometimes it is saying something timely.

Sometimes it is the breathtaking reminder that the text we approach is unique and that while it spoke to specific communities at specific moments in time in its original presentation, somehow it speaks centuries and millennia  later as though it is saying, “This.  This is the moment for which I was intended.”

The lectionary is a three year cycle of suggested texts for preachers.  Not a mandatory thing, but a good idea for preachers to consult for suggestions of possible texts for Sunday.  When I saw that the Good Samaritan was among this weeks texts I thought here is another example of what the Holy Spirit looks like.  This familiar text is roaring to come and speak to the events of the past week.

Anybody watch the news this week?

To be truthful, I was to the point of being afraid to turn on the television to see what would come next.  The shooting in Louisiana and it’s aftermath.  Which was interrupted by the shooting in Minneapolis and its aftermath.  Which was interrupted by the shooting in Dallas and here we are in the aftermath of all of that.

Here is a thing I believe.  In a week like this with all that has happened, with not one, but two more shootings of black men by police officers captured on phone video, and culminates with a gunman in a major American city shooting a minimum of 12 police officers, five fatally - if you have a week like that and the preacher does not mention it - it is possible there are other things that absolutely need to be addressed, but it is also true that you potentially have a strong case for pastoral malpractice.  This is why we are here.  Not to pass the time thinking about interesting concepts from two thousand years ago, but to hear this stunning book - this Word of God - speak to us about our lives and our world now.  And it does.

I want to focus on a bit on the front and back of this story from Luke’s gospel.  The framework.  A legal expert asks Jesus a question.  “What must I do to gain eternal life?’  After some back and forth in which the answer to the question is love God and neighbor, the legal expert asks, “Who is my neighbor?”  And Jesus tells the story.  But let’s not lose sight of how it begins.  “What must I do to gain eternal life?”

Jesus does not tell the legal expert that he would need to pass a test about what he thinks about Jesus.  He says love God and neighbor.  Then he tells a story where he suggests that when he says neighbor he means everyone.

When he finishes his story, Jesus asks, “Which one of these three was a neighbor?”

And the legal expert, who has nowhere else to go with his answer, says, “The one who demonstrated mercy.”

And Jesus says this awesome thing.  “Go and do likewise.”

My wife hates ferris wheels.  We had been, I believe on one date before we went together with a group from the place we were working that summer in college, on a trip to Kings Island amusement park in Cincinnati.  She told me she did not like ferris wheels and so I insisted we ride a ferris wheel.  Friends, when someone tells you they do not like ferris wheels, listen to them.  I thought there were many rides one might not want to go on - a roller coaster, one of those spinning rides or sudden drop rides - but surely the ferris wheel was benign.  So we went.  Then she told me not to rock the cart.  Friends, if someone tells you not to rock the cart in the ferris wheel you are riding, do not rock the cart.  I rocked the cart.  And I learned she was serious.

You see the problem with the ferris wheel is not that it goes really fast, or that it spins like crazy or anything along those lines.  The problem with the ferris wheel is that you are not in control of when you get off.  And it takes a long time to work through getting folks on and off.  And there is a lot of time when you might be simply sitting there at the top, the ride not moving, and in a bad circumstance you’ve got a would be boyfriend the cart rocking the thing.  Somehow, the story ended well from my perspective.  I held her hand for the first time that day.  But I did not help myself with the ferris wheel thing.  I promise you this story has a point beyond confession.

I saw several articles this week posing the question, has the world gone crazy?  I talked with several friends who found their way to the question, is the world out of control?  It seems to be an open question.  So much pain.  So much anger.  So much hurt.  And along with that question I have heard a second thing.  There is nothing that can be done about it.  It’s too big.  It has too many moving parts.  It is too entrenched.  The world is too broken.  It’s out of control and there is nothing any one of us can do.

It’s like we are stuck on the ferris wheel and all we can do is ride.

Jesus say something else.  When we feel like there is nothing we can do.  When we feel like the best strategy is to move quietly to the other side of the road and keep on walking, try not to get engaged, see if we can’t ride this one out….  

Jesus tells a story about a Samaritan who didn’t do that.

You are not a passenger in life.  Things do happen around us and to us.  But we are not scenery.  We are participants.  If we feel like the world’s problems are glaciers - with the part we see and the much more massive part we know is under the water - dwarfing us and our ability to do anything to change the course…

Jesus has a story for us.

“A man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho. He encountered thieves, who stripped him naked, beat him up, and left him near death.  Now it just so happened that a priest was also going down the same road. When he saw the injured man, he crossed over to the other side of the road and went on his way.  Likewise, a Levite came by that spot, saw the injured man, and crossed over to the other side of the road and went on his way. A Samaritan, who was on a journey, came to where the man was. But when he saw him, he was moved with compassion. The Samaritan went to him and bandaged his wounds, tending them with oil and wine. Then he placed the wounded man on his own donkey, took him to an inn, and took care of him.  The next day, he took two full days’ worth of wages and gave them to the innkeeper. He said, ‘Take care of him, and when I return, I will pay you back for any additional costs.’ (Luke 10:30-35, CEB)

Then Jesus has a question for us.  “Which one of these is a neighbor.”

We know the answer.  We speak, “The one who demonstrated mercy to him.”

And Jesus, our Savior and teacher says, “Go and do likewise.” 

Amen.

Our Call To Contemplate Jesus: Based On A Sermon At Hebron Presbyterian Church, July 17, 2016 (Text: Colossians 1:15-28)

There is a video making the rounds on the internet of the singer Rufus Wainwright joining forces with a fifteen hundred voice choir to sing Leonard Cohen’s classic “Hallelujah”.  It’s sublime.  The lyrics, of course, matter, but there is so much more involved that contributes to the impact.  There is the unique and lovely voice of Wainwright.  The animated direction of the conductor.  The faces of the members of the assembled choir, a diverse group sharing their vocal gifts.  And before any of the folks came together there was the arranger who imagined the melody and the harmony, the back and forth, the ebb and flow of the music.

To view this video - click here:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGRfJ6-qkr4

It is transcendent.  I can describe it to you, but description only gets you so far.  It has to be experienced.  One must watch and listen for oneself.  It is possible, in watching, that you will find your emotions swelling, that you will be lifted up, that you might perhaps find tears in your eyes.  And it is just a song.

This morning we consider Church.  And we consider Christ.  We are pushed to consider what goes on in this place.  We will try to put into words what we suspect may be beyond words.  There is something that pulls us out of bed on Sunday mornings.  You could be home, perhaps still asleep in bed.  You could be home at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee.  You could be on the couch with a blanket on this particular day watching the final round of the Open Championship.  Phil Mickelson and Henrik Stenson are probably on about the fifth hole right now.

We may be here because it is our heritage.  People we love have come here before us and we follow their example, we follow in their footsteps.  We come to study - for Sunday School, on Wednesday evenings to engage the minds God gave us in pursuit of greater understanding of the things of God.  We come to worship, to pray, to gather around the Lord’s table along side of brothers and sisters in Christ.  We gather in order to not be alone.  To experience  support and encouragement, and at the same time to offer support and encouragement.  To know that there is a place where our presence matters, where people will miss us if we are not present.  All of this may describe what draws us to church - but none of these things get at the transcendent core of what we are about.

In the opening chapter of the letter to the church at Colossae, the Apostle Paul attempts to remind the people of what brings them together as the Church.  This passage is known as the Christ hymn.  It is Paul at his loftiest and most poetic.  He is summoning words to describe that which defies description.  He portrays the church not by what they do, but by who they are.  Not by what we do, but by what we are.

The Son is the image of the invisible God,

        the one who is first over all creation,

Because all things were created by him:

        both in the heavens and on the earth,

        the things that are visible and the things that are invisible.

            Whether they are thrones or powers,

            or rulers or authorities,

        all things were created through him and for him.

He existed before all things,

        and all things are held together in him.

He is the head of the body, the church,

who is the beginning,

        the one who is firstborn from among the dead

        so that he might occupy the first place in everything.

(Colossians 1:15-18, CEB)

Christ is the head of the body, the head of the Church.  Christ existed before all things and in Christ all things are held together.  Paul is pushing us to do work.  Pushing us to consider the Christ we follow and what is at stake in our choice to follow and be a part of the Church - Christ’s body.

Back in my college days - and this will come as a revelation to most of you who most likely have never utilized something like this - back in those days there was a resource known as Cliff’s Notes.  Cliff’s Notes were thin pamphlets that would communicate summaries of great works of literature.  The themes, the characters, the plot twists and turns.  Say, for instance you were assigned to read my favorite book after the Bible, Don Quixote.  Don Quixote is a hefty bit of reading.  Cliff’s Notes would give you a quick and efficient  overview of some of what you would know if you had actually taken the time to read the book.  This approach may be enough to get a busy student with too much to do and to little time to do it through an impending exam.  What it will not do is give that student the transcendent experience of actually reading and engaging this masterpiece.  You can quickly and efficiently gather information, you cannot quickly and efficiently experience a transcendent work of fiction.

And you cannot know Jesus quickly and efficiently.

You meet Jesus in a moment, but having met Jesus it will take every breathing moment you have remaining in your life to begin to know Jesus.  There may be hurried moments in life when someone is trying to explain an urgent matter to you.  You may become impatient and ask that they skip to what you need to know.  There may be times when that approach will work.  It will not work with Jesus.

Simply put, we dare not try to make Jesus seem tame or manageable.  If as we talk about him, Jesus begins to seem either tame or manageable we are not talking about the Jesus of the Bible.  Understanding the Son of God - just pause there for a moment, the Son of God… - comes in bits and pieces and even as a truth comes into view we will immediately come to understand how much more we do not understand.  

Writing about this passage, Matthew Flemming states that, “Given that Christ is the very structure of creation to live in accordance with his gospel is to follow the grain of the universe.”   Which is to say, because Christ is one with the Creator, to follow Jesus is to get in sync with the creation.

Knowing Jesus is where we will find purpose, joy, and unity with our Creator.  It is not an impossible thing, which is remarkable in itself - we can know Jesus!  However, it is not a do it today and forget about it job.  It’s a lifetime commitment.  To learn, to grow, to seek to know Christ and in knowing Christ to know who we are and what we are about as Christ’s body.  Perhaps more effectively stated it is a lifetime commitment to desire to know Christ.  To desire Christ.  To feel deep within ourselves that need to “follow the grain of the universe”, to get in sync with creation and with the Creator.

This desire becomes all the more acute in times where things have the feel of falling apart.  A week ago we considered the quality of events going on in the world.  The relentless pounding of bad news following bad news following bad news.  This week has continued the theme.  It feels more rather than less this morning as though the world is falling apart.  Under such a barrage of news it can feel like what we must do is hold things together.  Grab on to whatever we are able to grab on to and hold the world in place.  That project is doomed to failure.

But here is good news.  Paul tells us, that Jesus existed before all things and all things are held together in him.  Not held together by the Colossians.  Not held together by us.  Held together in Christ.  The Christ Paul calls us to contemplate.  Contemplation that is not about satisfying religious curiosity, but about keeping sane and finding a way to move forward day by day, in our lives, in our world.

Our hope, our call as participants in the Church - the body of Christ - is to continuously seek to know, to understand and to follow the One in whom all things are indeed held together.

Thanks be to God.  Amen.