Joe McKeever

It's Such a Little Thing

A pastor in Haiti tells about a fellow he knew who wanted to sell his house for $2,000. In time, he found a buyer, but the man could scrape together only half the asking price. The owner agreed to sell for that amount but with one reservation: he would continue to own one nail above the front door.

A couple of years later, the first fellow decided he wanted to repurchase the house. The new owner declined, saying, "I like this house; I don't want to sell."

The previous owner found the carcass of a dead dog on the street and hung it from the nail he still owned above the front door. Soon the stench became so strong no one could go in or out of the house, and the family had to leave. They sold the house to the former owner.

The Haitian pastor said, "If we leave the devil with even one small peg in our life, he will return to hang his rotting garbage on it, making our lives unfit for Christ's habitation."

To my friends on facebook

My account somehow became corrupted, and we've had to recreate it from scratch. If you're a friend on facebook (or if you'd like to be), you'll need to re-friend me at the new account:

http://www.facebook.com/joemckeeversr

Thanks!

Purging the Membership Rolls? -- Part II

Over the last year, few things in this blog have drawn such attention and comments as the article earlier this week titled "Shall We Purge the Church Membership Rolls?"

Everyone has an opinion. That's good.

Not everyone agrees. That can be good, too.

Nothing we said should be interpreted to imply I'm against a church cleaning up and making current the membership rolls to reflect those who are part of that family. If people have moved away and cannot be located after a period of time, we do not want to drop them altogether but to simply transfer their information into an inactive file.

However, as one of our friends put it, the object of "church discipline" should be to restore a sinner. When the church's efforts work toward that aim, no reasonably minded person should fault that.

The problem comes when a church decides to go through the membership rolls with a scythe (chain saw?), clearing out all those who do not measure up to someone's concept of what a member of that congregation should look like. The only two outcomes of that are to wound good people and to guarantee that the outcast never again darkens the door of a Christian church.

Someone says, "The object is to have a regenerate membership." Sounds good. After all, who doesn't want that?

My limited experience says that many people promoting "a regenerate membership" are convinced the big problem in the church today is that vast numbers of church members have never been saved.

Could be. Unable to look inside the hearts and souls of others, I have no way of knowing.

But neither does anyone else.

Twelve Things

12. Ever wonder what makes a person blog? I think I know.

Nothing makes me feel better than a friend saying something I wrote in an article was used of God to touch his life or to encourage him. One said today, referring to the words of Job 4:4, "Your words really did stand me on my feet." That's as good as it gets.

However, I confess to you that at no time do I ever sit at this computer and begin a blog with, "What can I say to help someone?" Rather, it's all about what's going on down inside me, what have I been struggling with, what is eating at me.

The blogger blogs for himself. (That is to say, something is inside and he has to get it out.) When it helps someone else, that is lagniappe.

11. Have you ever decided you would register to leave comments on a website--particularly for an online news media outlet--and found that there are too many hurdles, and that their machine keeps kicking your registration back asking you to fill in information you've already filled in three times? Happened to me today. I finally got enough and clicked off.

Makes me wonder how all those extremists (that would appear to sum up most of the commenters on those things) managed to negotiate those hurdles when a normal person like myself (ahem) can't figure out how to do it.

10. More scandals in New Orleans. A number of members of the New Orleans Saints football team, including Coach Sean Payton, invested big money in a startup movie studio that was to be built here. Turns out the guy in charge was mainly looking out for himself. NOLA.com says tonight that fellow used the first half-mil of their investments to pay off a court judgment against him for failing to follow through on a similar plan from a couple of years back.

And now--you'll love this part--the fellow says he plans to pay off all the Saints just as soon as he lines up more investors. Oh yes, that's one scheme I want to get in on! I look for that guy to go to jail.

Shall We Purge the Church Membership?

A pastor called me recently. "I have a fellow in my church who wants to exclude every member who belongs to such-and-such a lodge. What do you think?"

I don't think much of the idea, I told him.

I know someone else who wants to kick out of the church everyone who takes the occasional beer or glass of wine. Another feels that way toward those who attend movies or dance or smoke. If you've had an abortion, heaven help you, you're out. In fact, if you have committed a sin--the bad kinds, of course, which are on some Pharisees' list of no-nos--you will not be allowed to remain in their church.

If you start kicking people out of your church because of sins and failures in their lives, I have a few questions:

--where do you start?
--where do you end?
--who's going to decide?
--how are you going to do it?
--and maybe most of all, how are you going to get anything else done in the Kingdom for spending all your time protecting the purity of your church membership rolls?

"If the Lord should count iniquities, who would stand?" (Psalm 130:3)

Nothing speaks to me on this subject stronger than the second parable of Matthew 13, the one we call "The Parable of the Tares."

The Best Thing You'll Ever Do For Yourself

I saw Jeff Ingram yesterday morning. We were both away from home and overnighting at the Hampton Inn, it turned out, in Ruston, Louisiana. I had spoken at a local church the night before and he had led a conference for Sunday School directors at an associational meeting held in a neighboring community.

He said, "I had 14 directors in my conference. It was great."

I have never worked for Jeff's employer--the Louisiana Baptist Convention headquarters in Alexandria, Louisiana--but I know what he is experiencing.

Without asking him or any of his colleagues, I can tell you the high point of his day.

Jeff is sitting in his office and the phone rings. A pastor or church staffer or lay leader from somewhere across this state is on the line.

"I need help," he says. Jeff's heart races. "Great," he thinks to himself. "Someone needs me."

What he says is, "Well, I'll be happy to do anything for you I can."

If it turns out that the caller has a problem of untrained leaders or an anemic organization that needs a shot in the arm or his Sunday School is in disarray and he is desperate for assistance, all the juices start flowing in Jeff Ingram's veins.

This is great.

This is what a denominational worker lives for. (He even uses the Esther verse of himself: "I've come to the kingdom for such a time as this.")

This is why he's there.

Courtesans in the Pulpit

In the mid-1990s, the United States Ambassador to France was Pamela Churchill Harriman, an appointee of Bill Clinton. On February 5, 1996, she died. The burial she received was, pardon the expression, fit for a queen.

She was anything but a queen. Pamela Churchill Harriman was a courtesan, plain and simple.

Webster: "Courtesan: a prostitute; esp. one whose associates are wealthy, aristocratic, or of the nobility."

A high class prostitute.

Bear with me; I'm going somewhere with this story. (If anyone ever publishes these blogs of mine, the title will probably be: "Bear with me; I'm going somewhere with this.")

As a resident of this world since 1940 and a history student all my life, I knew who this woman was. She was born into an English family in 1920, the kind of family with an impressive title (her father was Baron Digby) but little money or power. Someone remarked, "Pamela was not born rich, but she was born to be rich."

At the age of 20--the year I was born--she married the only son of Winston Churchill, Randolph, a weak man given to temper tantrums, self-indulgence, and strong drink. Later that year she gave birth to the prime minister's namesake, Winston S. Churchill II. The marriage ended within a couple of years, and Pamela was off on her new career, that of courtesan to the high and the mighty. The Churchill name opened doors for her.

She married twice more, to Broadway producer Leland Hayward and Averell Harriman, a wealthy businessman and political figure who served as ambassador to several countries.

"Reflected Glory" is the biography of Pamela Churchill Harriman. The author is Sally Bedell Smith. I stumbled across the used book recently, the selling price was next to nothing, and I bought it.

I'm halfway through and probably won't finish it.

Reading the Constitution, the Bible, and Pastors

Jeffrey Toobin is a law professor, a consultant for various news media, and the occasional columnist for The New Yorker. In the July 27, 2009, issue of that magazine he helped me understand something that has puzzled me about Supreme Court justices as they approach the U. S. Constitution.

Toobin is talking about the questioning of Judge Sonia Sotomayor by the Senate Judiciary Committee in the last few days. I watched snippets of it, enough to see she didn't say a whole lot. But that's the plan, these days, if you've kept up with how these things work. Anything controversial like abortion or same-sex marriages, you just say, "Senator, since there are cases involving that subject before the High Court at the present time, I'm unable to answer your question."

Anyway, back to Toobin.

Before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Judge Sotomayor said, "In the past month, many senators have asked me about my judicial philosophy."

"Simple," she said. "Fidelity to the law. The task of a judge is not to make law--it is to apply the law."

Sounds good, right? But it's too good, says Toobin. "Coming from a jurist of such distinction, this was a disappointing answer."

And why is that?

"...it suggested that the job of a Supreme Court Justice is merely to identify the correct precedents, apply them rigorously, and thus render appropriate decisions."

"In fact," Toobin goes on, "Justices have a great deal of discretion--in which cases they take, in the results they reach, in the opinions they write."

Then, here is the clincher: "When it comes to interpreting the Constitution--in deciding, say, whether a university admissions office may consider an applicant's race--there is, frankly, no such thing as 'law.'"

Read Me; Read You

A few years ago, a certain televangelist was "outed" by a network news team. All those letters which he promised viewers he would pray over, interceding with the Almighty for the healing requests they contained, were ending up in dumpsters without having been read. Someone slit the envelopes open to remove money or checks, then sent them on their way into oblivion.

The nation--religious and irreligious alike--correctly called this shameful and almost immediately put that preacher out of business.

Contrast the callous attitude of that preacher toward his correspondents with the graciousness and openness of C. S. Lewis.

Among the numerous C. S. Lewis books on my shelves is one titled "Letters To An American Lady." For over 10 years, Lewis carried on a correspondence with this woman--known to readers only as "Mary"--whom he never met. He had no idea these letters would ever be published. They were published in 1967, four years after Lewis' death.

Clyde S. Kilby, a Lewis scholar (who incidentally used to worship with us at the First Baptist Church of Columbus, MS, while I was pastor there, during his visits South to see relatives) from Wheaton College, wrote in the introduction to that book that the reason for publishing the letters was "they stand as a fascinating and moving testimony to the remarkable humanity and the even more remarkable Christianity of C. S. Lewis."

To the modern reader,someone who knows him only through Narnia or a couple of his other books, these letters provide wonderful glimpses of the humanity of the man and his keen insight into matters of God and man.

But what strikes me about them even more is that Lewis took the time to continue this correspondence with someone he never met and to do so for so long. There are over 100 of his letters in the book. (But none of Mary's. I assume that was because she kept his letters but he did not keep hers.)

Do the famous write letters to their fans today? Why did Lewis write these letters and hundreds more of a similar character?

Clippings from My Journal

Carl Sandburg said, "There is an eagle inside me that wants to soar, and there is a hippopotamus inside me that wants to wallow in the mud."

We all get to choose--have to choose!--every day of our lives which it shall be.

Chuck Colson once asked a prisoner on death row if he wanted a television in his cell. "No," he said. "TV wastes too much time."

We get to choose--have to choose!--what to do with our time each day.

Thomas Merton said, "There were only a few shepherds at the first Bethlehem. The ox and the ass understood more of the first Christmas than the high priests in Jerusalem. And it is the same today."

We choose what to do with Jesus.

Someone called our church office the other day inquiring if non-members were allowed to use the sanctuary for weddings. The secretary informed her that the answer was "no." A few minutes later, the woman called back. This time she wanted to know if the pastor could marry her and her fiance over the phone.

Some people just don't get it. And others who don't want to work at their marriage try to "phone it in."

Speaking of those who don't get it, Walter Moore is still shaking his head. A student came into his office complaining about his parents. They were controlling his life, making him go to school, telling him what time he had to be in, that sort of thing. He had had taken about all he could stand and had come to a decision.

"What are you going to do?" asked Walter.

"I'm going to run away and join the Army."

Easter Grinning

Occasionally in my reading, I come across something that trips all the wires and pushes all my buttons. Rings all my bells.

An inner alert goes off to notify me a special message from the Holy Spirit is now arriving in control central.

That happened this morning.

The novel I'm reading is "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society," by Mary Ann Shaffer and her niece, Annie Barrows. The "Guernsey" in the title refers to the Channel Island off the coast of France. For a thousand years--ever since William the Conqueror brought them with him from France--these islands have been the possession of Britain. During the entire six years of the Second World War, they were occupied by the Nazis, the only area of Britain so "honored."

The novel is a series of letters to and from Juliet Ashton, a writer, in the early months of 1946, just after the end of the war. She is considering making the Nazi occupation of the islands the subject of her next book.

At one point, she writes to her editor this paragraph:

"For example--yesterday I was reading an article on the liberation. A reporter asked a Guernsey Islander, 'What was the most difficult experience you had during the Germans' rule?' He made fun of the man's answer, but it made perfect sense to me. The Islander told him, 'You know they took away all of our wireless sets? If you were caught having a hidden radio, you'd get sent off to prison on the continent. Well, those of us who had secret radios, we heard about the Allies landing in Normandy. Trouble was, we weren't supposed to know it had happened! Hardest thing I ever did was walk around St. Peter Port on June 7, not grinning, not smiling, not doing anything to let those Germans know that I KNEW their end was coming. If they'd caught on, someone would be in for it--so we had to pretend. It was very hard to pretend not to know D-Day had happened."

Any minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ--any disciple at all, for that matter--who reads that immediately sees the parallel.

What Even the Best Preachers Do

Sit in a preaching class in any seminary or divinity school in the land and you'll hear professors stress the importance of context.

Basically, the "context" of a Scripture means "what is the setting for this text?" What was the occasion of the event, who was speaking, who was listening, and what was meant?

A preacher can and will want to apply that text to the world he lives in and the people who sit before him. But before he can do that, he will want to explain the meaning of that Scripture and the setting in which it was presented.

It's about integrity in scripture interpretation and there is no more serious subject for the would-be preacher.

"A text without the context is a pretext." That's one of those cliches we preachers toss around to one another. It's pretty much the case. But maybe there are exceptions...

To "take a Scripture out of context" means making a verse say something that was not intended. The most famous example is placing Matthew 27:5 ("Judas went out and hanged himself") alongside Luke 10:37 ("Go thou and do likewise").

My August (2009) Preaching Schedule

JACKSON, MS -- Wednesday, August 5 -- speaking to the adult choir of First Baptist Jackson at the kickoff of their fall schedule, then spending the rest of the evening sketching them.(Lavon Gray, min/music; Stan Buckley, pastor)

PINEVILLE, LA -- Tuesday, August 18 -- quarterly meeting of the Directors of Missions from Louisiana. I'm speaking on leadership.

COLUMBUS, MS -- Saturday, August 22 -- Deacons retreat for First Baptist Columbus. (Shawn Parker is pastor.)

WAGGAMAN, LA -- Sunday, August 23 -- morning worship service at First Baptist Waggaman. (Bobby Malbrough, pastor)

ALEXANDRIA, LA -- Tueday, August 25 -- "Conflict Training Conference" at the Baptist Building. Bill Robertson, director.

(A quiet August before the schedule heats up in the fall. Our three New Hampshire granddaughters are flying down to visit for a week early in August. This will be the first time the two younger ones have met their three New Orleans cousins. I'm as excited as they are. Then I have jury duty one day. That'll be fun.)

As always, I'm open to whatever the Lord leads--whether pulpit supply, revivals, deacon training, prayer conferences, leadership banquets, whatever. My phone is 504-615-2190.

Reasons Not To Give? They're All Around.

When we say that when people bring their offerings to God, they're doing so by faith, we mean two important things.

One: It means there are great reasons to give--such as God's honor and His commands, God's people and their needs, our gratitude for His blessing, and the personal benefit we derive from giving.

Two: It also means there are good reasons not to give. (That's the nature of faith--there are reasons pro and con.)

We pastors are always telling people the first ones--why to give--without telling them the second, that they can find good reasons not to give and what they are.

I know, I know. They don't need our help to find reasons not to give. They can find plenty on their own.

But still, we may want to offer a few biblical insights on reasons not to give to the Lord's work.

Take the widow who gave her two mites, for example--a story found in several places in the Gospels, notably Mark 12.

The Lord and His disciples were standing to one side in the Temple watching as a line of contributors snaked through the worship center. One by one, the people dropped their offerings into the huge urns put there for collections.

"Watch this," said the Lord, nudging the disciples just as a little widow woman dropped her two small coins--the smallest available--into the urn.

"All the rest gave out of their surplus," Jesus said. "But she has given all she had. Therefore, she gave the most."

I venture to say there's not a preacher worth his salt who hasn't preached that story a number of times. It's an inspiring and positive lesson on giving.

But there is a negative lesson here, also.

If ever a person had a good reason not to give, that woman did. I've thought of four, you may come up with others:

Not To Be Presumptuous

When Maria Bousada of Madrid, Spain, contacted the California fertility clinic, she lied about her age since 55 was the maximum age for their clients.

When she gave birth at the age of 66, she assured the world she was a good choice for being the oldest woman on record to give birth. After all, her mother had lived to the ripe old age of 101. Twin sons, Paul and Christian, were born to this single mother who had experienced menopause two decades ago. The boys are now three years old.

Maria died this week at the age of 69.

You never know.

I said to a deacon in my church, "Your father is in his 90s. I suppose we'll be having you with us for a long time to come."

He died at the age of 66.

People say to me, "Your dad lived to be 95-plus and your mom has just celebrated her 93rd birthday. You'll live to a ripe old age, too."

Maybe so. Hope so. No way to tell. If it's up to me, I'll do all the things I know to do in order to assure it.

But there is a great unknown in this equation. "Thou art my God; my times are in thy hands." (Psalm 31:14-15)

What does the Lord want?

When my cousin, Dr. Bill Chadwick of Clanton, Alabama, went to Heaven on Wednesday of last week--in his office in the middle of a work day--it caught us all by surprise. At his funeral, his pastor said, "Bill had planned to live to 100."

God had other plans.

Which brings me to this personal note.

Thanks for the Birthday Cards!

A couple of days ago, my Mom--Lois McKeever of Nauvoo, Alabama--celebrated birthday number 93. You helped to make it special. So far, she has opened nearly 100 cards and notes and they're still arriving, a few each day. Thanks so much. She enjoys every one, and I take your doing this as a personal favor. (Of course, she received cards from friends outside the circle of this website. But still...)

Mom jokes that "they all say you must be a wonderful person to have raised such a special son." She adds, "Don't they know I raised four special sons? and two special daughters?"

No favoritism with this lady. Even though she's proud of her two preacher boys (Ron and Joe), the other four (Glenn, Patricia, Carolyn, and Charlie) are just as precious.

These days she looks outside her large front window onto fields that are lovely in every way. With her two sons-in-law James and Van plowing and planting the fields (in their spare time; James works for the telephone company and Van for the Jefferson County Sheriff's Office) and Ron growing his own garden up there, one would think we were back in the 1950s when all the kids were at home, everyone had an assignment in the fields, and every tillable acre was blooming with productivity.

Come Now and Let Us Criticize Prayers

The first prayer I criticized, I was in college. Eventually, I became quite good at it.

It's not a skill to be desired.

A church across Birmingham had invited me to speak to their young people that morning. I was the guest of a leading church family for the service and lunch to follow. Their pastor was out that day, so the minister was a college professor who taught the Bible.

At the sermon time, the guest preacher strode to the pulpit, looked out at the congregation and led us in prayer. I was struck by the way the last sentence of his prayer and the opening sentence of his sermon lay back to back, separated only by the "amen" of the prayer.

Here is what he said:

"Bless us, O God, as we come to worship Thee---for we are here for no other reason. Amen."

He took a breath, looked out at the congregation, and began:

"People come to church for many different reasons!"

Instantly I reacted. Wait a minute. You just told the Lord we were here to worship Him and nothing else, and told us we had come for a variety of reasons.

He was not being honest to someone, either the Lord or us, I reasoned. And I think I know who it was. He was telling the Lord what He felt the Lord wanted to hear, it seemed, but knew he could not get by with that with us. So he had to tell us the plain fact of the matter.

It occurred to me his view of God was severely lacking.

My criticism was valid, I believe, but unfortunately that little event started me on my life of crime.

Joe McKeever & Joe McKeever

This Week in History (Sort of)

On Tuesday, July 14, my wonderful Mom, Lois J. McKeever, reaches age number 93. Far from keeping it a secret, she's justly pleased to have attained this pinnacle. I think this makes her the oldest member of her (Kilgore) family in memory. Also, probably the oldest living member of her church (New Oak Grove Free Will Baptist). She still lives on the home place, across the hill from the house where she was born. Each day, she reads the newspaper, reads her mail and her Bible, watches the TV news and "The Price is Right" and "Wheel."

Thanks to all who have sent (or are sending) birthday cards or notes to her. At last check, she has received 70 or so. However, anyone who would still like to send one, Mom loves getting mail, so go right ahead. The address is 191 County Road 101, Nauvoo, Alabama 35578. Thanks!

Mom says so many of the cards she is receiving are from my friends (from this blog and Facebook) who all say things like, "You must be a wonderful person to have raised such a fine son." She laughs and says, "I have three fine sons--which one are they talking about?"

You can see why I like her to get these notes!

Idolatry Comes In All Varieties

(This concludes with a short Bible study from Luke 6; don't miss it.)

A good question to ask ourselves: what subject or issue could my pastor speak on--and disagree with me concerning--that would send me over the edge?

What trips my cord? What provokes my wrath? Invites my hostility, stirs up my rage, arouses my ire?

Nothing tells the tale about us like the answer to this.

A few weeks ago, I wrote a rather uncomplimentary piece concerning Rush Limbaugh. The editor of our state Baptist paper asked if he could reprint it. I agreed, but came to question that decision. All the mail the editor received (and forwarded to me) was not just negative, but hostile. I was a raving liberal, a satan, unworthy to call myself a preacher or even a Christian.

I had touched a nerve. Stepped on some toes.

Ann Landers or Dear Abby--one of the advice-giving twins--used to say, "Throw a rock among a bunch of dogs; the one that hollers is the one that got hit."

This week, it was the Michael Jackson thing.

On this website--and nowhere else, not in any newspaper anywhere, but in the blog which I personally pay for--I wrote about the memorial service which was going on at the time. I started by pointing out that the expected crowd of a million did not materialize, quoted Sean Hannity and New York Times columnist Bob Herbert on the MJ phenomenon, and then commented on Rev. Al Sharpton's glossing over of the MJ child abuse in his sermon. He assured the Jackson children (and said to the world), "There was nothing strange about your father. What was strange was the way he was treated," or something to that effect.

The fascinating thing about cyberspace is you put something on a website and it's gone. The world has it now. It gets passed around and people find it by googling and your thoughts are in the public domain.

It's great and it's terrible.

My Cousin Who Put the 'Wow' in My Faith

In my early-to-mid-teen years, for two weeks each summer, the Chadwick family rescued me from the farm in north Alabama and made me their honored guest in Birmingham. We were kin. Our mothers, Lois and Ruby, were sisters. Ruby was married to John Chadwick, a Birmingham policeman. The McKeever and Chadwick children were closely matched in age.

My brothers Ron and Glenn matched up with Bill Chadwick, the oldest of Johnny and Ruby's four. I thought they were all daredevils.

Nelda Chadwick and I were almost identical in age. In between came Betty and Barbara Chadwick, lovely older cousins whom I idolized. (In case they read this, just a tad older, not much!)

Going from the drudgery of the farm to the excitement of the city--the soda fountain at the drug store, the street cars downtown, movies with Nelda, bike-riding, going to VBS at Calvary Baptist Church, carpet golf, but particularly, this wonderful loving family--made this the high point of my year.

To Bill Chadwick, perhaps 6 years my senior, I must have appeared as a little squirt. A nuisance. But he never made me feel that way.

In fact, he did some things that minister to me even today, over a half century later.

The Same Problems in Prayer as They

One of the lies of the enemy is that you are different, that others are more spiritual than you and find spiritual disciplines easy.

You're the only one with these problems in prayer.

Others get up in the morning eager to spend an hour with the Lord in prayer; you're the only one who has to drag yourself over to a chair and open the Bible and force yourself to pray.

Others pray smoothly and eloquently and always know what to say; you're the only one who stumbles along haltingly as though you were just learning to speak or were trying on a foreign tongue.

Others never are plagued by doubt and offer up these magnificent sacrifices of praise and intercession that Heaven welcomes, values as jewels, and immediately rewards; you're the only person who fights back the doubts as you pray and wonders whether the whole business is accomplishing anything.

Others see answers to their prayers as a matter of routine; you're the only one who doesn't.

Way wrong. Not so at all.

Satan is a liar and the father of lies.

The fact of the matter is that those holy people you admire a lot for their piety and resent a little for their religiosity fight the same battles you do. They encounter the same temptations, struggle with the same difficulties, and know the same doubts about prayer's effectiveness.

You're not so different.

You're definitely not fighting battles in your walk with the Lord others have not faced, or more likely, are struggling with at this very moment.

In my yesterday's reading, I came across reminders of this from two of the Christian faith's heroes, Elisabeth Elliot and C. S. Lewis.

Tuesday's News

First.

The crowd of a million expected to jam the streets of Los Angeles for Michael Jackson's memorial service at the Staples Center did not materialize, they're announcing on the radio. My guess is they were scared away by--what else--predictions of a crowd of a million.

The best way I know to kill a high attendance is to talk about all the traffic, parking, seating and crowd control problems one can expect. Most people will choose to stay home.

Sean Hannity said today, "If you think this is the last of this (the Michael Jackson business), you are wrong. This is just the beginning. They're already beginning investigations of four doctors."

The editor of a newsmagazine whose staff rushed to put together a special edition on MJ pointed out that the pop star's life conveniently divided into three sections: a) the Jackson Five (his life with the family group), b) the rock star years, and c) Jocko (the last 15 years of weirdness).

At the memorial service today, the last segment of Jackson's life does not exist. The children he hurt along the way do not exist. The program is all about Neverland.

In this morning's Times-Picayune, the New York Times' Bob Herbert gave his take on "Michaelmania." Meeting the star back in the mid-1980s was "one of the creepier experiences of my life." He says he knew that MJ was unable to make small talk. "Lots of people have trouble with that." But Jackson had a child television star with him and for all the world, they seemed to be two little children playing around the furniture.

Herbert, who is African-American, mentions the reality of MJ with these words: "Behind the Jackson facade was the horror of child abuse. Court records and reams of well-documented media accounts contain a stream of serious allegations of child sex abuse and other inappropriate behavior with very young boys."

Finally, this sentence: "One case of alleged pedophilia against Jackson, the details of which would make your hair stand on end, was settled for a reported $25 million."

Now, in light of that, consider the accolades being thrown his way by the parade of preachers and celebs at the Staples Center today.

The Number One Sin of the Church?

Google that--the number one sin of the church--and almost all the responses will be the same: Jim Cymbala, pastor of the Brooklyn Tabernacle telling Mark Buchanan the church's leaders are not on their knees crying out to God for the outcasts of this world--the prostitutes, the gang leaders, the druggies.

Included among all the Cymbala citations, I found only two other mentions of the church's primary sin.

Scott Peck said the number one sin of the church is its arrogance and narcissim, the attitude that we have God all sewn up, that all truth resides with us.

Another pastor said it is "tolerance to the point of obsequious stupidity." I looked up "obsequious." It means "fawning," a "servile attitude," "sycophantic."

Each of those makes a great point. But here is my candidate for the primary failure of the church in our day.

The greatest sin of the church today is that it does not take itself seriously enough.

By that I mean, it does not take its Lord, its message, its identity, and its role seriously.

Go into almost any city in the land and drop in on church after church. You will find some great congregations and hear the occasional excellent sermons, to be sure. However, again and again, you will walk away shaking your head, convinced that instead of visiting the power center of the planet, ground zero for the actions of Almighty God, you have just sat in on something akin to a family reunion, a civic meeting, or a community improvement session.

A weak sister of the Oprah self-improvement society.

Instead of a sense of urgency, you saw half-heartedness on every side.

Outreaching

First, let me tell you what my pastor said and then what he did. It's what he did that bordered on the outrageous.

In his sermon this Sunday, Pastor Mike Miller told the congregation of the First Baptist Church of Kenner, Louisiana, that Jesus' message in Luke 14 has a direct application to us today. (My disclaimer: I did not get Mike's permission to give a representation of his sermon; so consider this a 25 minute message from a great communicator filtered through the mind of a senior preacher who was sometimes distracted by his grandchildren and at other times by his own untamed imagination.)

In the parable of the great supper, Luke 14:16-24, the order of the invitations that went out is significant:

1. Friends first.
2. Outcasts next.
3. Then the strangers.

You'd think telling our friends and family about Jesus and inviting them to know Him as Savior and Lord would be the simplest thing in the world. Often, it's the hardest.

Outcasts are those rejected by "respectable people" and would not normally feel accepted in church. Yet, our Lord seemed to have a certain affinity for them, and so should we.

Strangers are anyone and everyone outside the family of God.

Mike challenged the congregation to invite five family members/friends, outcasts and strangers to church in the next week. He ended the service with a video making that point and a benediction reinforcing it.

Now, what Mike did.

We Have Seen the Future

This Sunday morning at the men's breakfast, it was announced that Houston and Eleanor Glover have moved to Madison, Wisconsin, to be near their son. This move is all about advancing age, declining health, and the absence of any family members down here. The Glovers have rented a small apartment and are putting their house on the market and starting life in a state which we call "the north" and Wisconsonians call "the midwest."

A request went out to the men for assistance in loading the truck next week. "Everything left over will be given to Goodwill," church administrator Danny Moore said.

When I commented that this has to be traumatic for the Glovers, easily some of the nicest people on the planet, Danny said, "They've lived here 61 years. Moved here in 1948."

Houston was a life deacon in the First Baptist Church of Kenner and Eleanor served as wedding director for years. Classy, loving, gentle people. Low maintenance for a pastor; high returns of faithful service and dedicated labor for the Lord.

When Eleanor expressed that they would probably not find a church home there, Pastor Mike Miller made some calls, talked to a pastor in Madison, and located them a church family.

Still, the transition has to be extremely difficult. Danny said, "Eleanor is from Grand Rapids, Michigan, and has family there."

But after 61 years, New Orleans is home.

Or to be exact, River Ridge and the Kenner/Metairie community is home. As locals will tell you, even though we are part of metro New Orleans and you can hardly tell when you drive from one into the other, it ain't the same.

As the morning's benediction was spoken and we gathered up the clutter of breakfast to toss in the trash, someone said to Danny Moore, "This is our future. Every one of us."

A Facebook Wedding

We pastors are always looking for ways to make our wedding ceremonies more interesting and more helpful.

Friday afternoon, an hour before time to head across Lake Pontchartrain for the 6:45 wedding of Steven and Laci, on a whim, I typed the following into my Facebook page and posted it:

"Give me your best ONE SENTENCE advice on marriage and I'll work the best of them into the wedding for Laci and Steven tonight. Funny is good, inspiring is great, true and catchy is best."

An hour later, I had a half dozen responses. Fifteen minutes before the wedding was to begin, I called son Marty in North Carolina and had him go to my Facebook page and read off every entry. There were 20 by that time. I jotted a few down and used them.

So. Here is the setting. There are 200 people sweating it out (the temperature at 7 o'clock was still in the 90s) on the back deck of Palmettos-on-the-Bayou in Slidell, Louisiana. Most are sitting on white plastic chairs, but a number are standing in the back near the giant blowers. Six gorgeous bridesmaids and an equal number of handsome groomsmen line the front. There's no microphone so we have to speak up to be heard.

I've known Laci since she was a child. She is the granddaughter of one of our deacons and related to more of our church members. She is bright and creative and cute and never meets a stranger. Steven, I met for the first time when they drove over for pre-marital counseling. He's handsome, bright, and adores Laci. They both are young Christians and making a genuine effort to live for God. I was honored to be asked to do their wedding.

Early in the proceedings, I said, "Two hours ago, I asked my Facebook friends to give Laci and Steven advice about marriage. Here are some of the responses...."

Southern Baptists are the New Methodists

Dr. Chuck Kelley has more nerve than I. A lot more.

On March 3 of this year, the president of our New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary gave his analysis of the Southern Baptist Convention--our family of churches--concerning the 89 percent of our churches that have either stopped growing or are in decline. He made this statement:

"We are the new Methodists."

What he meant, he went on to say, is that this major denomination--the United Methodists--once set the pace for the Christian church in America, both in reaching large numbers for Christ, and teaching the rest of us how to evangelize. "What Baptists know about evangelistic harvesting," Dr. Kelley said, "we learned from Methodists."

Gradually that great denomination lost its zeal and is now in serious free-fall, declining in numbers of members at the fastest pace in the history of the American church.

Southern Baptists are following in their footsteps, Chuck pointed out.

President Kelley's statement and his analysis have been reported and quoted far and wide by news services and countless blogs like this one.

No one has reported (to my knowledge) how the Methodists took that. It's no fun being pointed out to the other children as the wrong kind of example.

That's why I say he has nerve.

He's right, of course.

Neighborly Advice

The wife of President Theodore Roosevelt was chatting with French diplomat Jean Adrien Antoine Jules Jusserand (don't you love that name!), when she decided to teach his countrymen a lesson.

Mrs. Roosevelt said, "Why don't you learn from the United States and Canada? We have a three-thousand-mile unfortified peaceful frontier. You people arm yourselves to the teeth."

The ambassador replied, "Ah, madame. Perhaps we could exchange neighbors!"

France's neighbors, you may recall, include Germany on the north and Spain on the south. Over the centuries, that neighborhood has seen countless wars and constant strife.

When people are house-hunting, I wonder if they ever stop to consider the neighbors who will come with the purchase. They look at the structure and the furnishings, do a detailed search of the title and consider the value of the homes in the area. But have you ever heard of a potential home-buyer checking out the people who are about to become their neighbors? Maybe they should.

Do realtors furnish buyers with that kind of information? Do buyers have the right to go door-to-door on the street interviewing residents about the people who live on each side of the home they're considering buying? Is that a good idea? Would that permanently injure the relationship with the future neighbors?

I don't know. It's worth thinking about.

I have neighbors.

For 15 years now, we have lived with the same neighbors in every direction. For a community as transient as metro New Orleans, that is something of an oddity. All our neighbors are nice and, like us, keep to themselves. With the houses practically crammed against one another and yards the size of postage stamps, people tend to stay inside when they return home at the end of the day. So, we barely know one another.

If you could choose your neighbors, would you?