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Watching our nation's politicians as they propose, dispose, impose, expose, compose and, of course, suppose regarding the economic crisis this country is facing, I find myself wondering how many actually know what they are talking about.
I hate to be skeptical, but common sense -- forged by a half-century of dealing with churches, finance people, and my own situations -- informs me that most people do not relate to budgets, debts, and deals in the millions of dollars, much less billions and even trillions. The present meltdown of America's financial institutions has complexities and ramifications and intricacies that baffle even the greatest minds.
That, however, does not prevent the lowliest politician from sounding forth on the matter, usually to tell the world all that is wrong with whatever the nation's leaders are proposing at the moment. And what is his own solution to the quandary we face? He never says.
A long time ago, Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton said, "The worst disease afflicting my constituents is a thing called 'the simples.' The folks back home want me to come up with simple solutions to their complex problems, answers that resolve all their difficulties without it costing them anything."
Unfortunately, life doesn't work that way.
Just outside Asheboro, North Carolina, is a tiny community named "Complex." As motorists approach, they encounter a roadside sign, "Complex," underneath which is printed in small letters: "Unincorporated."
Evidently, Complex is simple. And yet, looking at it from another angle, Complex is complicated because it's made up of people.
"Tragically, in most churches the pain of change is greater than the pain of ineffectiveness." -- Thom Rainer in "Simple Church."
My longtime friend, Max Youngblood of Bessemer, Alabama, sent us a delightful thing from the Birmingham area. The Jefferson County Commission is proposing a "non-user fee" for residents who do not use the county sewer system. Well, sir, that gave restaurant owner Tasos Touloupis an idea. The owner of Ted's Restaurants -- one at 328 12th St. South and the other at 1801 4th Avenue South -- has proposed a "non-diner's fee."
The way it works is this: Ted's will maintain a record of customers. At the end of each month, his bookkeeper will send a $12 NDF invoice to all residents of Jefferson County who did not eat at Ted's during the month.
Sounds like a deal, doesn't it.
In these times of economic uncertainty, our churches will need to become more creative in generating income. How does a "non-member's tithing" system sound?
Up in Alexandria, Louisiana, my friend Devona Able was at her computer the other evening. Her wonderful eight-year-old Grace Anne, looking over her shoulder, noticed an e-mail from "Dr. Joe McKeever." She asked, "Is he a doctor?" Mom answered, "Yes, but not like Dr. Marzullo (her pediatrician)."
Grace Anne said, "Oh, so he must be a doctor like Dr. Brooks (Calvary, Alexandria). They're like doctors of love because they teach people what love really means and that it comes from Jesus."
"Yeah, baby," mom said. "Something like that."
Out of the mouths of babes. (So, just call me "Doctor Love." Wait, on second thought, that sounds like a rap artist.)
1. I would not tell God what I require. We may assume He knows what I need.
2. I would not judge a church by the externals -- location, beauty, convenience, denomination, ample parking, landscaping, reputation.
3. I would ask: "Is God in this place?" "Do they teach His Word?" "Do they seem to care for people?" "Is this a 'safe place' in which to worship, serve, and grow?" "Is this home?" I would want the answer to those questions, but I would not make my decision on the basis of any of them. After all, it could be the church is not what it ought to be and God is sending me to help it grow and heal.
4. I would ask the Holy Spirit to lead me to the church he has chosen. After all, I don't have the time or energy to visit every possible congregation in this city. "He leadeth me in the path of righteousness."
5. And once I knew in my heart that 'this is the church,' I would join it. I would give my tithes and offerings and begin praying for the church leaders and looking for ways to encourage them. I would begin learning the names of church members, and not wait on them to reach out to me.
I opened my email this morning to find an urgent plea from one of our Metairie pastors. Immediately, all the bells went off. Something was not right.
The message began: "Hi, how are you doing today? I went on trip to London to attend a program for the support of those living with HIV/AIDS. I am very sorry I didn't tell you about it til now. I really need your assistance because I'm stranded in London. You won't believe I forgot my little bag in the taxi where my money, passport, documents, and other valuable things were kept...."
He needed $2500 to "settle my outstanding hotel bills, feed myself, and transport myself to the embassy to recover a temporary traveling paper back home."
A temporary traveling paper? Was this written by someone unable to express himself? Certainly not by this pastor, the sharpest guy in the city.
I phoned Freddie Arnold and said, "You're not going to believe this e-mail. Listen to this." I'd not read two sentences when he said, "Ninfa (one of the secretaries in our office) got one just like it."
It was a scam. Someone had stolen the internet address and mailing list from one of our finest and best-loved pastors in our association, and was emailing everyone, asking for money. Send the cash by Western Union, of course.
I heard the other day that with all the trillions of dollars flowing out of Washington into our troubled economy, Congress accepts the fact that a certain percentage will be lost to fraud. Billions of dollars of it, if you can believe that.
I find it so difficult to believe that right now people are sitting in their homes and offices scheming to lay their hands on portions of that cash.
But they are.
The most courageous person I know is Misha McKeever, my wonderful daughter-in-law, wife to Marty and mother of Darilyn and Jack. This Charlotte, NC, child is training to run a marathon in Seattle this summer, to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. I am stunned, impressed, and possibly a little envious. Check out her page and send her some encouragement at: http://www.tinyurl.com/misha-runs
Once in a blue moon, a blogster (like yours truly) ought to take a chance and unload. I suppose that's what I did in the recent "Rush Limbaugh" article, although at the time I thought of it as just a typical expression of where my mind was that day. Judging by some of the reactions I've gotten, though, you would have thought I had a death wish to have done something so risky and insane.
I really do not mind that the blog was controversial. In fact, I completely expected that. It's absolutely fine for people to disagree with it. I do not feel like I have to defend it or argue. But one of the surprises I've had in several of the responses that came to me and some arriving at the editorial offices of our state paper (The Baptist Message in Alexandria, LA) is to learn that many conservatives absolutely hate (despise, abhor, cannot stand) Newsweek.
Now, anyone who read the article noticed that I did not actually quote Newsweek (which would have been all right if I had; I happen to like the magazine). I quoted a CONSERVATIVE leader who was asked by that magazine to write his own assessment of Rush Limbaugh's role in the country and in the conservative movement. That's important. I was not quoting Newsweek. I was quoting the conservative leader whose article happened to have been published in that newsweekly.
But some people either do not read or do not care, one or the other. In making a passing reference to Newsweek, I happened to press their button and they spilled out their hatred for that magazine, in the process coupling me with the object of their disgust.
It was a 'red flag' moment.
Webster gives as one of many definitions of "red flag" something that provokes an angry or hostile reaction.
Jesus had His red flag moments. So did the Apostle Paul. This little Limbaugh episode gives me an opportunity to point them out.
The only constant, they say, is change.
I sometimes tell pastors, "There are only three Baptists in the entire world who enjoy change -- and none of them are members of your church!"
And yet, change we must. Everything around us is morphing at a pace we can hardly track.
Churches would do well to note what is happening on the international missionary front.
An article from the president of one of our denomination's mission boards just arrived. International Mission Board President Jerry Rankin is informing Southern Baptists, his constituents, of impending changes in the way the missionaries who serve with and under him will be doing missions.
I was a member of the board of trustees of the IMB (when it was called the Foreign Mission Board) thirty years ago. The board itself was birthed in 1845 when Baptists in this country divided for a multitude of reasons. Over the decades, the leaders had changed their methodology numerous times. During my four year tenure from 1976 to 1980, I saw them go through another radical change.
During the quarter-century the board was led by former China missionary Baker James Cauthen -- that would be 1954-1979 -- the emphasis was on career missionaries going oversees to devote their lives to one mission field. But the times were a-changing in the 1970s. People in our churches wanted to be involved in hands-on missions and not just pay others to travel across the world and do it for them.
Number 12--Rick Warren is determined to help New Orleans.
The first installment on the several-year commitment his Saddleback Church is making toward the churches and pastors of this city is a "New Orleans Purpose-Driven Church Conference," scheduled for Saturday, May 2 (from 8 am to 4:30 pm) at Celebration Church, 2701 Transcontinental Drive, Metairie, LA. All pastors and every church leader (lay or staff) is invited, of all denominations. To register, go to http://www.purposedrivenchurch.com/NewOrleans or call 800-723-3532.
Speakers and teachers for that day-long event will be Bryan Crute of Destiny Metropolitan Church in Atlanta, Gerald Sharon, the North American Director of the Purpose Driven Network, Gonzalo Rodriguez, pastor of Good Shepherd Baptist Hispanic Church of Metairie, and Dennis Watson, pastor of Celebration.
Gerald Sharon emphasizes that while the name says "New Orleans," everyone from anywhere may attend by registering in advance.
Number 11 -- Jesus promised His disciples only three things:
They would be absurdly happy, entirely fearless, and always in trouble.
"And David arose and went...to bring up from there the ark of God which is called by The Name, the very Name of the Lord of Hosts who is enthroned above the cherubim." (II Samuel 6:2)
You don't have to read far in the Bible, particularly the portion we call the Old Testament, to observe that the writers seem to be bending over backward not to actually speak the Name of God.
In Psalm 20, for example, we read this blessing: "May the name of the God of Jacob set you securely on high."
That reads like they have left a blank for God's actual name, under which they penned in tiny letters: "You know, the Name of the God of Jacob."
We could use some of that. We desperately need more reverence for the name of God today.
I read the other day that the Catholic Church has announced it will no longer be referring to God by the name "Yahweh." That, to the best of our knowledge, is the proper way of spelling and pronouncing the YHVH or YHWH which is found in the Hebrew Bible everywhere the name of God is given. Not to belabor a point you probably know from having read it countless times, but the Jews would not pronounce that name, and so gradually lost the vowels that accompanied those four consonants. Instead of pronouncing the proper name (YHVH), Jewish worshipers would say "Adonai," meaning "The Lord."
The Hebrew for "The Name" is "Ha-Shem." A common expression was "Baruch Ha-Shem." Blessed be the Name.
When the King James translators came along in the early 1600s they took the vowels from Adonai and stuck them under YHVH and gave us Jehovah (or something close to it). But that name was just an invention on their part.
In the 1960s when I would try to dialogue with members of the Jehovah's Witnesses, they would insist how absolutely necessary it is that a church carry the proper name for God (that being "Jehovah," of course). A dozen years later, by the time their leaders had learned their mistake, they changed their tune. Then, when we would "dialogue," they would say, "It doesn't really matter; it's the spirit of the thing that counts." Uh huh.
Nick Vujicic has no arms or legs but has come to terms with his lot in life and he delivers an inspirational speech to these school kids that they will probably never forget.
Margaret and I were talking about my upcoming retirement from this position with our association. I said, "What do you want me to do when I retire?" She said, "Clean out the garage."
And then? "The attic," she said.
My wife has learned to lower her expectations concerning tasks around the house by her spouse of nearly 47 years.
The other day, our oldest son Neil was over. He's being ordained as a deacon in our church on Sunday night, April 5 -- we're all excited; if ever a man had a servant heart, he does -- and he said, "I decided that being ordained deserves a new suit, so I'm going to treat myself." After suggesting a good men's store, I said, "I'll give you some financial help on that suit if you will help me clean out the garage."
Sneaky, huh.
This morning, Friday (Neil works 4 ten-hour days at Northrop-Grumman's local shipyards, so he has long weekends for himself), he arrived early with his pickup truck. He and I tease about a bumper sticker I once saw on an F-150 like his: "Yes, it's my truck and no, I will not help you move." But with family, it's different.
Hey, if your prayers are boring you, how do you think the Almighty feels?
In the introduction to his book on prayer, "Invading the Privacy of God," Cecil Murphey begins, "Prayer bores me and I sometimes wonder why I'm doing it."
"There! I said it in print," he continues.
For years Murphey admits he has vacillated between excitement and boredom in his prayer life. He writes, "I've read dozens (literally!) of books on the subject; learned four different methods for praying the Lord's Prayer; embraced techniques for praying the Psalms; recited the Jesus Prayer ('Lord Jesus Christ, be merciful to me, a sinner') for nearly an hour at a time; taken lessons on meditation techniques; praised my way out of despair; sung hymns of petition; and like a lot of others, I've used the Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, and Supplication (ACTS) method of prayer."
And did all that work for him? "Yes -- sometimes and for a while."
At the best of times, Murphey has "felt such a closeness to Jesus Christ that it seemed I could actually feel a hand wrap itself around mine." And at other times, "I've fallen asleep on my knees, or I've prayed for four minutes that felt like two hours."
At first, he confesses, he rebuked himself for being bored during prayer. He chided himself to "get past the boredom, press on!"
The best solution he has found to the problem of being bored while praying was to use different methods in his prayers. After all, Murphey says, "there is no one method of prayer. We can approach God in many ways."
I agree completely.
The times when I've felt bored while praying, I have confessed what seems so elementary as to be silly: it's my problem and not God's. I mean, imagine walking into the control-central of Heaven where the Ruler of the Universe sits enthroned -- and being bored. (Okay, I can imagine some teenagers pulling it off. But we're talking about normal people.)
The problem is mine.
I once asked Ruth Bell Graham for her favorite Bible verse. She laughed, "It keeps changing!" Then she wrote, "Proverbs 8:19-31" and signed it for me. It hangs on my wall, alongside the signature of her husband who had written "Billy Graham" under "Psalm 16:11."
I sympathize with Mrs. Graham. The Bible is so rich, so teeming with great stories (think of the sagas of Joseph in Genesis and David in I and II Samuel) and tiny insights (like Matthew 13:52 and Psalm 18:35), that we keep making these discoveries of people and lessons and stories we overlooked the previous times we've made this journey through God's Word.
Take the story in II Kings 8:1-6. I have no idea how many times I've read the Bible through or the number of times I've studied and taught this portion of Israel's history. But one day last week, this little event rose up and slapped me in the face; I've not been able to get it out of my mind since.
That, incidentally, is one way the Holy Spirit calls my attention to a wonderful truth: the story or scripture or quotation will not go away. (Like the Sonny and Cher song "I've Got You, Babe" in the movie "Groundhog Day," it keeps coming back. Okay, bad illustration!)
The Lord is sending us a message.
The king of Israel (that would be the Northern Kingdom, not Judah) has Gehazi, the veteran servant of the Prophet Elisha, regaling him with stories of Elisha's past. Apparently nothing much was going on in the country at the time, today's news was slow, and the king was enjoying some down time.
Gehazi was glad to tell how God had used his master over a ministry of many years.
Want to see faith at its starkest? Take a look at Free Mission Baptist Church.
Now, it's not much to look at, just a single rectangular brick building that might seat a hundred people. The front door opens to a cozy worship center and in the back, behind the pulpit, a few classrooms sit. Freddie Arnold says the church is prettier on the inside than the outside. But that's not the amazing thing about this church structure.
What's incredible about Free Mission is that it has been rebuilt and where that happened.
Free Mission Baptist Church is located on Egania Street smack dab in the heart of the devastated Lower Ninth Ward, the most severely ruined section of New Orleans as a result of Katrina's floodwaters. This, the lowest part of the city, lies along the east side of the Industrial Canal on your way from downtown New Orleans to St. Bernard Parish. The levee broke just a few blocks west of Free Mission Church and floodwaters swamped the church as they did everything else in their path. The rushing torrent lifted homes off their foundations, jumbled them on top of one another, set houses down on boats and cars, and collapsed older homes. Most of the people who had stayed behind to ride out the storm were drowned inside their houses.
For months after Katrina, tourists drove up and down the narrow streets of the Lower Ninth, aghast at what they were seeing---a neighborhood in tatters. For more than a year, dead bodies were still being taken from collapsed houses.
Today, the Lower Ninth is mostly vacant lots, many with weeds knee-deep. Here and there a house has been rebuilt and a few homes are marked for restoration, but nothing has been done yet.
In the heart of all that, Pastor Johnny Jones and his small congregation have rebuilt their church. With money from the insurance and some volunteer help, the building was gutted and restored. The dedication of this structure has been set for this Sunday afternoon, March 22, at 2 pm.
Only faith goes into the Lower 9th Ward and rebuilds a church before the population returns.
When the people come home, Free Mission will be here, waiting.
An article in the March 16, 2009, issue of a popular newsweekly (I'd say "Newsweek" but don't want to send some of my friends into a frenzy of righteous indignation! Ha) bemoans the recent passing of financial experts, due to the economic mess our country -- and the entire world -- is experiencing.
"One of the not inconsiderable side effects of the current economic meltdown is the demise of the economic expert, if experts they truly ever were." -- Joseph Epstein
I remember hearing a fellow say a couple of years back, "America is the only country in the world where a fellow drives downtown in a Cadillac to take financial advice from a guy who rode the bus to work that morning."
No more. After one loses his shirt -- or, in the case of Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, a few billions -- he learns not to trust the experts and authorities, no matter how firm their promises, reliable their sources, and sweeping their confidence.
After reading two or three books recently on Franklin D. Roosevelt's early days in the White House, I don't recall who said this, but one feature of FDR's presidency was his complete distrust of experts. He would listen to them, put little stock in what they advised, then would go with his gut, as they say. Often that meant doing the opposite of what the experts counseled.
One writer said Roosevelt acquired that skepticism as a result of his polio. When he did everything the medical experts ordered, he grew weaker and weaker. Finally, taking matters into his own hands and trusting his instincts in matters of his mobility and conditioning, he ended up having a productive political career, against all expectations of his medical experts.
This is the place where we should drop in some humorous definitions for experts. Since all I know are ancient and stale, excuse me for passing. (If you know a good, recent one, leave it as a "comment" at the conclusion.)
Louis Rukeyser was the original "expert" on television's Wall Street Week, from a generation ago. For some reason, back then he pretty much had the field to himself. These days, the channels giving financial news and advice are as numerous as the sports stations.
Speaking before a chamber of commerce meeting in Jackson, Mississippi, Rukeyser made a point I've never forgotten. If you write a book predicting that the economy is going to keep growing and the Dow Jones Average climbing, no one will buy it. People figure, if everything is going to be fine, my investments will come out all right and I don't need the book.
However, he said, write a book on the coming disaster, telling how the bottom is going to drop out, and your book will sell like snow-cones on a sultry summer day in New Orleans. The reason for this, Rukeyser explained, is if the economy is going to tank, the investor will want to plan for it and find ways to protect himself.
That's why bad-news prognosticators in financial matters proliferate, and good news prophets are dismissed as naïve and shallow.
Earlier this week, I got something off my chest about America's most controversial radio celebrity, Rush Limbaugh. Marty posted it on the website and it went out to our 1200 subscribers Wednesday night. I stayed home on Thursday to do my taxes and take care of a few tasks, and then turned on the computer Friday morning on entering the office. I had quite a surprise in store.
There were 18 comments at the end of that article (and more since) and almost that many bypassing the blog and coming directly to my e-mail. They were equally divided, in case you're wondering. Some could not believe I would be so naïve as to suggest that Rush Limbaugh has outlived his usefulness, some blamed my mental contamination on reading Newsweek (which I had referred to), and one said, "I know that you are a Democrat." (I replied that I've taken Newsweek ever since they made seminary students a good rate some 40 years ago -- it's a great magazine in a hundred ways--and that I'm a life-long Republican, although what that has to do with anything I'm not sure.)
Other writers chimed in with variations of "I agree" and "I'm glad you said it." One said, "Now that you're retiring, you can get these things off your chest!"
The editor of our state Baptist paper emailed that he wants to run that article. I replied, "Kelly, you're trying to get me hung in effigy!" He's tweaking the article a little (I don't know how yet), and then plans to run it. (I'm uncertain whether this is courage or foolhardiness on my part.)
Contributing comment number 19 at the end of that article, I suggested one more lesson in this business for preachers: don't mess with politics, pastor!
Similar lessons are found all around us, of course. I noticed a great one in this (Friday, March 13, 2009) morning's op-ed page of the Times-Picayune. Charles Krauthammer of the New York Times is commenting on President Obama's signing the bill last week to overturn the Bush administration's ban on stem cell research. Krauthammer had supported such research and now the White House was inviting him to attend President Obama's signing of the executive order which will allow federal funding for such.
Krauthammer turned down the invitation.
Interesting. And why did he do that? In his answer lies the lesson for every pastor. (Honestly, I don't know a pastor in a hundred who could have turned down such an invite to the White House for a cause he believes in.)
Turning the invitation down turns out to have been the smart thing to do.
The first time I heard Rush Limbaugh on the radio in New Orleans nearly 20 years ago, I was embarrassed. I thought, "What a terrible preacher -- yelling and screaming." Little did I know!
In time, I came to enjoy the fellow's rants as much as the next person. He was a showman, sometimes spoke the truth, often crossed the good-taste line in the interest of entertaining and making his point. He was clearly an egotist of the first order, and it was fun to see him drive liberals up the wall.
I could never take a full three-hour dose of the man, but it had nothing to do with his political views. His "preaching" style was unbearable. He got on my nerves. He loved the sound of his own voice too much. It took him forever to make a point. He would begin talking on some subject and interrupt himself to chase a rabbit, then interrupt the interruption. I was one of the conservatives and it irritated me. No telling what the liberals were thinking!
My opinion is that Rush Limbaugh has had his day. What made him strong has now done him in. (I'd teasingly say that I'm writing his obituary here except for the fact that that task has been done countless times over the past 20 years and he's still very much with us!)
What I mean is he has outlived his usefulness. Look for more radio stations to drop him as they realize his support base has deteriorated and it's now safe to do what they've wanted to do for ages: cancel him.
He has no one to blame but himself. And that's where preachers can learn an important lesson.
His name was Emile Cailliet. In later life he became a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and then Princeton Theological Seminary. His story is so special, so well-loved, it has been told and retold over the years. If you question that, "google" his name. I googled "the book that understands me" and found versions of Cailliet's story of all shapes and sizes, with one preacher even referring to him as "Emile Clay."
Lately, I've been downsizing my library and tossing out superfluous, dated files. When in running across this blessed story of Emile Cailliet, I knew it had to be retold here for the benefit of those encountering it for the first time.
Cailliet was born in a small French town, received an education that "was naturalistic to the core," and grew up a pagan. He did not lay eyes on a Bible until he was 23 years old. As a lad of 20, he fought on the front lines of World War I and saw atrocities unspeakable. If he had been an atheist before the horrors of that war, his unbelief was now set in stone.
When a German bullet felled Cailliet, an American field ambulance crew saved his life. In time, his badly shattered arm was fully restored during a 9 month hospital stay. While recovering, he married a Scotch-Irish lass he had met in Germany just before the war. She was a deeply committed Christian. Cailliet later said, "I am ashamed to confess that she must have been hurt to the very core of her being as I made it clear that religion would be taboo in our home."
Emile informed his wife that no Bible would ever be allowed in their home. And yet, he found himself longing for meaning in life. In his reading -- and he was a voracious reader -- he went through everything he could find to satisfy the yearnings of his heart and soul. He said, "I had been longing for a book that would understand me."
A book that would understand me.
Unable to find such, Cailliet decided to prepare one of his own. Over the next few years, he filled a leatherbound pocket book with significant quotations he discovered in his reading. "The quotations, which I numbered in red ink for easier reference, would mead me as it were from fear and anguish, through a variety of intervening stages, to supreme utterances of release and jubilation."
That was the plan, at any rate.
Finally, the day arrived when Emile Cailliet put the finishing touches on his book, the "book that would understand me." He walked outside the house, sat down under a tree, looked around at the bright blue sky, and opened his precious anthology. This was going to be a great experience.
"As I went on reading, however, a growing disappointment came over me." Far from speaking to his life and situation, the various quotations simply reminded Cailliet of their context, of where he had found them, and nothing more.
"I knew then that the whole undertaking would not work, simply because it was of my own making." Dejected, he put the book back in his pocket.
He had no idea what to do then. But God did.
God was up to something at that exact moment.
You know who John Updike was. This famous author died on January 27 of this year after a bout with cancer. A friend sent me his Easter poem and it blew me away. I had no idea the guy was a believer, but his words here are far more eloquent than anything I've ever thought or said about this greatest of all Christian events. Here it is in its entirety....
SEVEN STANZAS AT EASTER
By John Updike
Make no mistake, if He rose at all
It was as His body;
If the cells' dissolution did not reverse, the molecules
reknit, the amino acids rekindle,
The Church will fall.
It was not as the flowers,
Each soft Spring recurrent;
It was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled
eyes of the eleven apostles;
It was as His Flesh: ours.
The same hinged thumbs and toes,
The same valved heart;
That -- pierced -- died, withered, paused, and then
regathered out of enduring Might
New strength to enclose.
Let us not mock God with metaphor,
Analogy, sidestepping transcendence;
Making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the
faded credulity of earlier ages;
Let us walk through the door.
The stone is rolled back, not paper mache,
Not a stone in a story,
But the vast rock of materiality that in the slow
grinding of time will eclipse for each of us
The wide light of day.
And if we have an angel at the tomb,
Make it a real angel,
Weighty with Max Planck's quanta, vivid with hair,
opaque in the dawn light, robed in real linen
Spun on a definite loom.
Let us not seek to make it less monstrous,
For our own convenience, our own sense of beauty,
Lest, awakened in one unthinkable hour, we are
embarrassed by the miracle
And crushed by remonstrance.
(from "Telephone Poles and Other Poems" by John Updike, 1961. Published by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House.)
"Hey, I'm the boss of this outfit. I'm not accountable to anyone."
No right-thinking pastor or mayor or bishop or even CEO would be so foolish as to utter those exact words, but believe me, some of us are living them out.
During this morning's drive across New Orleans, headed to the office, I listened with interest to the NPR report of a bill being presented to the Connecticut state legislature that would result in a committee of parishioners overseeing the finances of the Catholic Church in that state. The bishop, as you might expect, is alarmed and Bill of Rights proponents (we all fall into that group, I trust) are concerned.
What brought this about, we're told, is something the previous bishop (or maybe he was only a local church priest) did: embezzled a million dollars to finance a lavish lifestyle including a Florida condominium which he shared with -- ready for this? -- his boyfriend.
The matter was made worse by that priest's refusal to allow anyone to look at the parish books. Consequently, parishioners felt they have no recourse to make certain this does not happen again other than going to the legislature.
As a pastor to pastors, I am forever counseling (and urging and preaching!) openness to our church-shepherds. While I'm not in favor of monthly church business meetings where members go over every little decision and every tiny expenditure with a microscope -- this is a form of tyranny that should not occur or be condoned by God's people -- nevertheless, there needs to be a proper accountability for every leader. In most cases, a good finance committee will fill the bill.
"The Gambit" is a weekly, free New Orleans magazine devoted to the goings-on in this town, everything from where to find the best crawfish etouffee to what entertainers are playing in the city to the shenanigans at City Hall. In an editorial titled "A Culture of Arrogance," the paper chides New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin for going back on his election promises of transparency and integrity. His administration has been characterized by everything except that!
The first time I encountered this, I was just out of college and serving part-time on the staff of Central Baptist Church in Tarrant City, Alabama, next door to Birmingham. Pastor Morris Freeman was educating his young pre-seminary protégé on the realities of church ministry.
Morris said, "Our people would rather pay a staff-member to do ministry than do it themselves. If they could, they'd pay someone to do the church visitation for them." He laughed, as though he had made a joke.
Not long after, that low standard (paying ministers for every aspect of the ministry) became the norm for a great majority of churches, including Southern Baptist congregations.
Writing in "The Volunteer Revolution," Pastor Bill Hybels says, "I'm not enough of a historian to define exactly how or when the church train jumped tracks, but jump it did. Although the early church started out with this beautiful concept of the priesthood of all believers -- with every member an active minister and good works carried forth in all directions -- during the last couple of centuries, most churches have retreated to the Old Testament model."
Hybels says the way it works now is a group of Christians get together and decide to hire them a minister. That's how they put it. "Hire a minister." Then, they instruct their new employee on the duties of his office: preach, teach, marry, bury, make hospital calls, visit members, counsel, evangelize, fund-raise, administrate the office, make announcements, promote the program, pray for the sick.
Then, Hybels remarks, at the end of the year, the group fills out their report cards and lets the pastor know how well he met their expectations. "If you have, we'll sign you up for another year. If not, we'll hire someone else."
The shortest tenure of my forty-plus year ministry ended when the hirers decided that I, the employee, had not lived up to their expectations. It was a corruption of everything the Scripture teaches about the ministry of the church and its shepherds.
I'd like to report to you that that situation was an aberration. Unfortunately, it is becoming the norm. More and more, the leadership of our churches see themselves as a board of directors and the pastor as the executive-director who serves at their pleasure. If he fails to meet those expectations, he's gone.
In the old Snuffy Smith comic strip, cartoonist Fred Lasswell would sometimes have him rushing from one place to another, uttering, "Time's a-wastin'!"
In recent days, I keep finding more and more time-wasters in my life. Recently, when my children and grandchildren began forwarding stuff from Facebook in my direction -- photos of themselves, comments about what they're up to -- I decided I'd better get an account so I can stay informed. Whoa. What a pandora's box that opened up.
"I want this-person (fill in the blank) to be my friend." "You are now friends with that-person (fill in the blank)."
Now, don't misunderstand. I treasure every friend and want all I can get and intend to enjoy the ones I have even more. But on this Friday morning, I quickly saw that my Facebook jottings (replying to this friend, commenting to that one) used up a full hour. Was this good or not? I'm of two minds on that.
Most days, when the mail comes, either in this office or at home, it's a rarity to receive an actual first-class letter. Those are almost relics of the past. We can cry over it, worry about what the world is coming to, and find plenty of old-timers who agree, but it's not going to change a thing. This generation stays in touch through the internet and sites like Facebook. (I am aware there are other similar sites out there, some for Christians only and such, but please -- no one tell me about them and urge me to join. One is enough.)
The early Jerry Lewis had a line I've quoted for years which fits here: "Enough is enough and too much is plenty!"
I've decided the people who can get the most benefit from sites like Facebook are retirees. Most of them (soon to be me, too) have more time than folks with jobs. But for normal people with families and small children and jobs and other demands, they have to really watch it or these things can sponge up all their time and energy and brain power.
I heard a fellow say the best way he's found to spend time on a plane is with solitaire on his laptop. For others, it's Sudoku. And for someone else, it's a favorite movie on DVD.
And did we mention texting?
"Why shouldn't I be afraid? There's good reason to panic!"
All through Scripture, every time a heavenly entity shows up, the first thing he blurts out to puny humans is, "Don't be afraid!" And with good reason, we might add. After all, if an angel suddenly appeared in this office or my living room -- I'm talking about the kind of mighty angels we see in Scripture, not some chubby cherub from medieval paintings -- my first impulse would probably be to have a heart attack on the spot.
We rarely have the response of the humans who receive this command not to be afraid, but doubtless some could have argued that there is plenty of reason to be afraid. In this day when "men's hearts are failing them out of fear" (Luke 21:26), we have no trouble whatsoever finding causes for our torment and panic and worry.
However -- and this is the heart of the Christian message -- we have even better reason not to be afraid, to be courageous and bold even.
Here are three favorite variations on this theme found in God's Word --
"Do not fear, for those who are with us are more than those who are with them." (II Kings 6:16) The prophet Elisha spoke to his servant who had just gone out for the morning paper and found himself face to face with the army of the Arameans who were encircling the city, there to arrest Elisha. A moment later, the prophet asked God to open the eyes of the servant. Suddenly, he saw the skies filled with the hosts of heaven. It was quite a reassuring moment.
"Be strong and courageous, do not fear or be dismayed because of the king of Assyria nor because of the multitude which is with him, for the one who is with us is greater than the one with him. With him is only an arm of flesh, but with us is the Lord our God to help us and to fight our battles." (II Chronicles 32:7-8) King Hezekiah is addressing his citizens who have taken a look at the mighty Assyrian army just outside the gates and are ready to hand them the deed to the place. Sennacherib, the pagan king, cannot believe that Hezekiah is hesitant to surrender. After all, he has conquered everything in his path, including the Northern Kingdom of Israel. Now, tiny little Judah and its capital of Jerusalem are balking before him. The very idea! He sends messengers to Hezekiah with one of the greatest questions anywhere, a real testament to the faith of this leader. He asks, "What is this confidence you have?" (32:9) I love it! (Sure wish someone would ask me that.)
"You are from God, little children, and have overcome them, because greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world." (I John 4:4) This reads like John has been studying his Old Testament stories, doesn't it. In 1960, as a sophomore at Birmingham-Southern College and a newly baptized member of West End Baptist Church, the youth named me as pastor for their annual Youth Week in the church. Consequently, I got to preach the Sunday night sermon. (Mind you, this was a full year and a half before the Lord showed mercy and called me into the ministry.) The text -- I have no memory whether it was assigned or what -- was this passage from I John 4:4. Struggling with building a sermon from it forever burned its assuring truth into my mind and heart.
In both the II Kings 6 and II Chronicles 32 passages, it's helpful to note that no one had to ask the people to look around and see all the reasons for panic. They were obvious. The enemy was at the gate and he was roaring with threats. Hearts were failing. The most natural thing in the world was to shiver in one's skin and shake in his boots.
God doesn't like it when His people fear.
In fact, He's offended by it. Fear before the enemy is a vote of no-confidence in God and gives courage to the wrong people.
Sunday, March 8, at FBC Grosse Tete, LA -- 10 am
Billy Sutton, Pastor
(The best I recall my college French, "grosse tete" translates to "big head." I can't wait to get there and see who the town was named after! I'll be speaking on missions.)
Saturday, March 14, deacon training at New Testament Church, Harvey, LA 8 -- 10:30 am
Jerry Davis, Pastor
(Jerry lined me up for this, then said, "We don't actually have any deacons." When I expressed surprise, he said, "But we have some great people who ought to be deacons, so this is a good time to prepare them." Smart man.)
Sunday, March 22, dedication of restored sanctuary of Free Mission BC, New Orleans, 2 pm
Johnny Jones, Pastor
(This wonderful little church, smack in the middle of the Lower Ninth Ward of this city, was flooded by Katrina, but has been rebuilt. For the last three years, they've had Sunday services in our associational building. Even though the church has been restored, that entire neighborhood is mostly vacant lots. Johnny Jones is a retired school principal and easily one of my favorite people.)
Friday, March 27, I'm the emcee at Kathy Frady's "Gigglefest" at FBC Slidell, LA 7 pm
A young friend sat across the table from me at lunch today and somehow -- I forgot how it started -- got me talking about my cowboying period. Yes sir, I recall every detail of those three days.
I was a young minister on the staff of Jackson, Mississippi's First Baptist Church. That summer the student minister had taken two busloads of college kids to our conference center at Glorieta, New Mexico. Afterwards, they planned to take a rustic excursion into the Santa Fe Wilderness for a few days of camping. Murph called me on Friday and said, "Can you fly out here and go with us? I need you."
At the time, I'd never been to Glorieta and had never flown west at all, so I had no way of knowing you do not want to fly from Albuquerque to Santa Fe. A friend who owned a travel agency in Jackson worked up the tickets and I was on my way: Jackson to Dallas-Fort Worth to Albuquerque to Santa Fe. Everything was fine until I got to Albuquerque. The airport people had to direct me to the desk for the Santa Fe Airways. A fellow who could have been a pilot or the mechanic handed me his business card and said, "That will be your boarding pass."
The airline had two little Cessnas and for this trip, two passengers, me and this other Indian. They put our luggage on one plane and us on the other and off we went. For the next 45 minutes the updrafts from those mountains bounced us up and down across the sky. Nothing about it was fun.
Murph and the buses filled with collegians were waiting at the airport, we ate lunch at a Mexican restaurant, and we headed out of town. We arrived at our destination around 4 o'clock that evening, only to find that the ranch people had forgotten us. The reluctant cowboys had to go looking for horses to take us and our luggage the several miles back into the wilderness. Half of our group started walking on and the rest of us waited for the horses. We were midnight arriving at the campsite, and then had to set up tents. Not a good beginning.
The best line I've heard in a while comes from Brenda Crim, one of our SBC missionaries in Alaska. She said, "Everything I own got its start in the offering plate of a Baptist church!"
Pastors and staffers (and our families) say, "Amen" to that. That humbling thought makes us grateful for those faithful brothers and sisters who year after year give to the Lord out of their love to Him and thus keep His church strong.
"Preaching the parables is like playing the saxophone -- it's easy to do poorly." Don't know who said it. A pastor, no doubt.
"The woman in John 8 was just a stone's throw from dying."
A man asked his friend, "When you stand before the Lord, what do you think will be the first question He will ask you?"
The friend said, "He won't ask me a thing. He'll look at me and say, 'That one's mine.'"
When seminary president Jeff Iorg went from the pastorate into denominational work, his predecessor said, "The things you will do in this job that mean the most to you, no one else will ever know about." He soon discovered the truth in that. My guess is it's true in 90 percent of our lives.
If I ever write my memoirs, Lord help me please not to do what a pastor friend of mine did. He's been gone for a while now, but I located a copy of his autobiography on the internet and purchased it recently. Yesterday I read interesting and inspiring things from his life, then began to encounter a series of putdowns of those of us who believe the Bible and take it at face value.
This is what started it.
On February 18, the country's new Attorney General, Eric Holder, the first African-American to hold that distinguished post, said, "In things racial we have always been and continue to be in too many ways, essentially a nation of cowards."
With that one sentence, he provided fodder for a hundred talk shows around the country.
He was right, of course. And I think I know why. Okay, one reason why.
A couple of days after he uttered those words, police in a Northeastern city shot to death a rampaging chimpanzee that had mauled a woman. That sad story made all the news programs.
Now, one thing editorial cartoonists love to do -- it's sort of a trick of the trade -- is take some news item that deals with one thing and connect it to another, something entirely unrelated but which when juxtaposed makes an interesting point. So the cartoonist for the New York Post did that with the death of the chimp.
The cartoon -- you've seen this, so I'm making no attempt to research the name of the cartoonist and the exact date it ran in the paper or even the precise quote -- showed police shooting the chimp. One cop asks the other, "Now who are they going to get to write the next stimulus bill?"
This was clearly a reference to the slipshod bill which Congress was just dealing with and since passed. It was a slap at congressional leaders. Anyone who was up on his current events could see that.
Enter Al Sharpton.
You hear it, see it, read it, or experience it. All your senses come alive. "This is one I'll remember a long time," you think, and sure enough you do. For a long time afterward, your mind reels with the possibilities. What can I do with this great story? What sermon will it fit? How can I work it in?
I've sometimes facetiously said that a great story will fit my sermon next Sunday. The sermon may have to be reworked, but that story will fit.
Like the time my wife and I were dining in Baby Doe's restaurant on the mountainside in Birmingham, Alabama. At the time, we were living in Columbus, Mississippi, and were visiting relatives back in our hometown. As the waitress came and went, I noticed her name was Auburn.
That's when I decided to get cute.
"Your name is Auburn," I said. "I'll bet you have a sister named Alabama."
The smile I had hoped to generate did not appear. She said, "I have two sisters, Tulane and Cornell."
I said, "Yeah, right."
She said, "I have four brothers -- Stanford, Harvard, Princeton, and Duquesne."
I said, "Lady, I don't believe a word of this."
She said, "My father's name is Stanford and my mother is Loyola. They were engaged before it occurred to them they both had colleges as names, and they decided to do this to their children."
I was speechless. But she wasn't through.