Paul – Page 3 – Salvaged Faith

Imagine the Transformation

Posted on October 20, 2019Leave a comment

Text: Matthew 14:13-21 (focusing on verses 18-19), Philippians 1:3-11

Last Sunday in worship, I preached about our limitations.
About how little we have… or think we have… that can be offered up for ministry.
When we see so much need around us in the world, it is easy to believe that we can’t possibly begin to make a difference.

And the truth is, we can’t.
Not on our own.
Not by ourselves.
But the good news is… it isn’t about us and what we can do.
It’s about what God can do through us.

This morning as we heard, once again, the miraculous story of how five thousand men (plus women and children) were fed, I want to focus in on just two verses of this pericope.
First, Jesus invites the disciples to hand over what they have.
“Bring those fish and loves to me,” he says. “Let me see what I can do with it.”
And then he invites people to gather around and he does something that is all too familiar to us when we gather for communion…
He prays.
He blesses the bread.
He breaks it.

What does that remind you of?

Communion!

Jesus blesses the gifts, breaks them
And he gives it back to the disciples.
Only then do they give it to the congregation…
To the crowds…
To the multitudes.

Only AFTER Jesus has taken their gifts and blessed and transformed them do the disciples head back out in service.

Or maybe it is simply after we recognize that our gifts are from God that we are truly able to share them with others.
There are times in our lives when we underestimate and we under appreciate our gifts.
We devalue ourselves and others and the most common way we do it is with a tiny little word: “just.”

We “just” have five loaves and two fishes.
I “just” have five minutes to give.
She is “just” a stay at home mom.
They “just” come to coffee time.
I “just” sing at church.

Can you hear the limitation?
Can you hear how we are denying the possibility?

What if instead we claimed:
We HAVE five loaves and two fishes – Jesus, what can you do with them?
I HAVE five minutes that I can give, how can I make the most of them?
She IS a stay at home mom and is able to be present for her children and volunteer in a really special way.
They come to coffee time and build these amazing relationships where they share about their families and check in when no one else is there and laugh until their bellies hurt.
I sing at church and praise and make music to God!

If instead of dismissing our gifts, we offered them up and let God transform and use our minutes and presence and abilities – imagine what could happen.

Now, I want to highlight that last one because it was something that might have been said by a middle aged woman who lived alone with her cat, Pebbles.
But when Susan Boyle stepped on a stage in 2009, she allowed her gifts to be used for something far bigger than she could ever imagine.

When she walked out on that stage, everyone underestimated what she could do and what her gifts were. And, I’d venture a guess that she probably also underestimated herself.
In fact, as much as she might have believed in herself, the immense joy that crossed her face when the judges all said yes was simply amazing.
Stored up inside of her for all of those years were these powerful notes and no one took them seriously.
It wasn’t until she was given a chance to really and truly share her gifts with others and to receive encouragement and affirmation did she realize what a blessing she had received and what it could do to change the world.
In the aftermath of her performance, Susan Boyle caused millions of people to take a second look at their preconceptions and to reach out to affirm the gifts they see in others.

In many ways, I think that is part of what the Apostle Paul is doing in his letter to the people of Philippi.
He sees their gifts.
He notices their generosity.
And he thanks God for the ways that they are allowing themselves to be used by Jesus to make a difference in the lives of others.
One of my favorite lines from this comes in verse six, and here it is from the Message translation:

There has never been the slightest doubt in my mind that the God who started this great work in you would keep at it and bring it to a flourishing finish on the very day Christ Jesus appears.

Friends, God is doing a great work among you here at Immanuel, too.
I look out at this congregation and my heart is full of prayers of thanksgiving as well.
I think about the way a mission trip got started decades ago and how every single year communities are transformed by our Volunteers in Mission who are willing to hammer nails and lay floors and serve their neighbors. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about how a simple garage sale a couple of years ago raised over $7000 for our homeless neighbors. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about how a idea sparked at the worship vision conversation turned into a benefit concert for DMARC this summer. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about all of the adults who joined forces to work on our Vacation Bible School sets – offering up their carpentry or painting or crafting skills… sets that not only blessed our children, but those at other churches, too. THANK YOU GOD.
My mind wanders to the women who gather to knit and crochet on Wednesdays and in their own homes and all of the lives who have been comforted by prayer shawls. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about the parents who are so blessed because people give their time on Wednesday afternoons to come in and prepare meals for our evening programming. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about our neighbors who walk by this building and can look out on our beautiful flowers and plants because some generous souls have given their time and energy to plant and water and maintain our gardens. THANK YOU GOD.
I think about the homebound folks who know they are not alone because one of you has stopped by for five minutes to drop off a simple card or gift or just to say hi. THANK YOU GOD.

And I know and believe and have no doubt that the God who started all of these good works in you will keep at it and keep using and multiplying and blessing your gifts so that they will continue to spill out into this world.
What you do matters.
What you give matters.
And it matters because God is working through you to bless this world.

We’re All Here

Posted on September 15, 2019Leave a comment

Text: Romans 8:38-39, Acts 16:22-34

The first thing I want to prayerfully acknowledge this morning is that we are all entering this space from different places.
Some of you may be concerned about a family member or friend who you worry are having suicidal thoughts.
I know that some of us have lost a loved one to suicide.
And it is without a doubt that there are persons in this room who at one time or another have experienced a dark time and thought about suicide yourself…
No matter whether you have personal experience with this struggle or not, my hope and prayer is that we will all learn better how to share and offer hope and comfort to one another.

This morning as we reflect together on how we, as a faith community, can come alongside those who are considering suicide, I’m drawing heavily upon the work of Fe Anam Avis and Soul Shop. A couple of years ago, I had the opportunity to not only take their Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training, but also become a presenter for this program. Soul Shop was developed by the Pittsburgh Pastoral Institute to equip faith communities to minister to those impacted by suicidal desperation.
Notice I said “desperation” and not “depression.”
While sometimes suicide and depression are linked, that is not always the case. Not all people who are depressed have suicidal thoughts and not everyone who is suicidal is depressed.
Henry David Thoreau once wrote, “the great masses of men [and I would add women] lead lives of quiet desperation.”
There are many people in this world who are struggling just beneath the surface, invisible to the rest of us.
We might marvel at how wide their smiles are or how well they are handling the difficulties in their lives, not realizing that they feel overcome by the immensity of their situations.
And when they don’t feel like they can be honest about that desperation, they might become isolated, which leads even further down the path.
Fe Anam Avis reminded me that this is why suicide often comes as such a surprise to us. Too often, the depth of desperation in a person’s life is only visible after an irreversible tragedy.

When I was in college, one of my roommates attempted suicide.
She is and always has been a bright and bubbly person, full of energy and life. We noticed that she was a bit more sharp and stressed out, but we all were. It was college and life was full of anxiety and the drama of boyfriends and tests. We never sat down and had a real conversation about what was going on in our lives in that way… at least not until she had to be taken to the hospital and our whole friend group made the long drive in the middle of the night from Indianola to Des Moines.

I can remember feeling helpless and full of guilt and shame as I sat in the car that night.
Why didn’t I see it?
Why didn’t she tell me?
Why didn’t I ask?

The truth is, too often we feel unequipped to even begin to respond in the midst of our worry about loved ones.
But friends, we can move from a reality of others struggling with quiet desperation to one of honest conversation. We can create space right here at Immanuel, but also in the lives we live outside of this building, to be honest about the struggles in our life, for others to be honest with us, and together to and to know they are not alone.
In fact, one of the most difficult problems that people face in the midst of their quiet desperation is simply finding someone to talk to. Someone who will listen. Someone who will hear them. Someone who will be there.

And it starts with being able to talk about suicide.
I want to invite you to try something. I want to invite you to turn to the person next to you and use the word “suicide” in a sentence. Any sentence. Just practice saying the word.
Fe Anam Avis says that if you can say the word “suicide” in a sentence, you can save a life.

For too long, the church has largely been silent about this quiet desperation, instead of actually wrestling with the many different stories within our scriptures that relate to suicide.
We are quick to think of Judas, but that only further connects these kinds of thoughts with feelings of guilt, betrayal, and condemnation.
The very first thing I want to say about this is that our United Methodist position on suicide is very clear. “Suicide is not the way that a human life should end… a Christian perspective on suicide begins with an affirmation of faith that nothing, [not death or life, angels or rulers, or powers, things past or present…. NOTHING] including suicide, separates us from the love of God (Romans 8:38-39).

The reality is, our scriptures describe many instances where people struggle with suicidal desperation… Job, Elijah, Jonah, Jeremiah, Paul, and King Saul, just to name a few.
And there is a text in the Bible that describes a successful suicide intervention… a moment where a life was saved because someone was willing to talk about suicide.
Let’s turn to Acts 16 and explore that story together.
First, I want you to notice in Acts 16:24 that the jailor in this story was busy just going about his life doing his job. He received the order, put Paul and Silas in the cell, and locked them up. Fe Anam Avis calls him a First Day person – someone who may never have remotely considered suicide and was totally unprepared for how quickly life could change and desperation could show up.

But then something unexpected happens. An earthquake shakes the prison, the doors fly open and the shackles of the prisoners are broken.
In that moment, described in verse 27, the jailor finds himself in a dark night of desperation. In his case, this was a sudden change triggered by a life event. We sometimes see this with young people after a break-up or failure, but also among adults who have experienced a dramatic failure or loss or rejection.

But there is another part of this story. The community shows up and they too are desperate. They are concerned and worried for the life of this person in their midst. They notice. And they say something.
“Don’t harm yourself. We’re all here!” Paul cries out in verse 28.
In that moment, the jailor discovers he is not alone… and he chooses to live.

One of my colleagues, Heidi Carrington Heath, has written about her own experience with suicidal thoughts and what it meant when someone showed up in her life. (https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/2017/11/9/second-day-people-suicide-and-faith)
“I was 18 the first time I was suicidal… I don’t remember reaching out to my best friend, but I did.
I remember that she appeared at my door in what felt like moments with another friend of ours. He crawled on the floor with me… and told me that I had two choices. He told me I could leave the room walking, or he could carry me out, but the option of sitting alone in that room with a box cutter in my hand wasn’t an option anymore. I haven’t seen either of them in years, but I literally owe both of them my life.
In that moment, I became a second day person. Second day people are people like me who live through the dark night of suicidal desperation to see the resurrection of the second day. “
She goes on to write,
“People suicide primarily for two reasons: a loss of hope, and a loss of social connection. And if the Church of Jesus Christ and our faith communities cannot do something about that, we should shut our doors. Building communities where no one loses hope, and no one is alone should be the heart of our work together.”

And so to that end, I want to share with you a simple acronym for how we, as people of faith, can show up to provide hope and connection with one another.
C.A.L.L.

First… we Commit.
We commit that if we are ever experiencing desperation and thoughts of suicide that we will reach out and find someone to talk to. I am someone you can talk with – but so are so many other people in this room.
If we make this commitment, we reduce our isolation and we don’t have to carry those burdens all by ourselves.

Next, we can Ask.
If you notice that someone around you is struggling, don’t be afraid to ask if they are thinking about suicide. They may not tell us. They may not want to admit it. But simply noticing their struggle and being to say the words, “That sounds like a lot. It is a lot to carry. Sometimes, people going through what you are going through begin to think about suicide. Do you ever think about suicide?”
Simply asking the question helps someone to know they are not alone. That you are there. That you care for them… deeply.

And once we ask, we have to Listen.
Listen for their story.
Listen for their struggle.
Let them tell you about what they are going through and be willing to sit with them through that.

But then, as in the story of Heidi… and also the jailer… the final thing we can do is Lead someone to safety.
You cannot change someone’s thoughts or their struggle or desperation, but you can help them get to a safe place where they can get the help they need.
Maybe you sit with them and make a phone call.
Maybe you remove an object of harm.

You are not a professional and you don’t have to be.
Just remember that you are called.
CALL: Commit, Ask, Listen, and Lead to safety.
The apostle Paul struggled with his own life in ministry in Philippians 1:19-25, which perhaps better equipped him to notice the desperation in the life of jailer who was right in front of him.
But as people of faith, we all are equipped with love, compassion and mercy. We are all equipped with love and grace. And we know that life is not easy and that desperation is a reality for all of us.
So friends, you, too, are called…. And we are here. We are here for one another. We are here for you.

Sing! Play! Summer! – The Old Rugged Cross

Posted on June 30, 2019Leave a comment

Text: 1 Corinthians 1:18-29

A young rabbi found a serious problem in his new congregation.
During the Friday service, half the congregation stood for the prayers and half remained seated, and each side insisted that theirs was the true tradition.
Nothing the rabbi said or did moved toward solving the impasse.
Finally, in desperation, the young rabbi sought out the synagogue’s 99-year-old founder. He met the old rabbi in the nursing home and poured out his troubles.
“So tell me,” he pleaded, “was it the tradition for the congregation to stand during the prayers?”
“No,” answered the old rabbi.
”Ah,” responded the younger man, “then it was the tradition to sit during the prayers?”
“No,” answered the old rabbi.
“Well,” the young rabbi responded, “what we have is complete chaos! Half the people stand and shout, and the other half sit and scream.”
“Ah,” said the old man, “that was the tradition.”

Like that Jewish congregation of sitters and standers, one of the things that I appreciate about the people of Immanuel is that no matter what differences you have, you still come together to worship and serve.
There have been winners and losers and conflict in our history.
There have been folks who got their way and those that didn’t,
people who stayed and people who left.
Sometimes conflict appeared over silly little things.
And sometimes conflict brought to the center of our attention real problems that needed to be addressed by our whole community.

One of the things I love about turning back to these letters from Paul to the first Christian communities is that they help us remember the struggles we face today are problems people of faith have been facing for thousands of years.
There may not be much comfort in that… but at least we have good company!

Paul begins his letter to the church in Corinth by praising God for all of the potential of this amazing congregation.
But then he reminds them of the one thing that is keeping them from realizing God’s will in their midst.
“In the name of Jesus,” Paul writes, “you must get along with each other! You must learn to be considerate of one another and cultivate a life in common.” (message paraphrase)
Paul looks at this church and sees people who are wrestling for the spotlight.
He sees people who think they are right and everyone else is wrong.
He sees people who really do want to be faithful, but are going about it the wrong way.
They think to be faithful, they have to be on the “right team.”
So they pick sides.
They follow Apollos or Cephas.
They throw their lot in with Paul.
Some of them even go around saying, “to heck with all this division… I’m just going to follow Jesus!” And in doing so, they only stoke the fires of competition even more… because, isn’t everyone trying to follow Jesus? Who among us gets to claim that name more than any other?

In the worldly realm of politics, we see this all the time.
There are winners and losers on every issue.
There is competition for money and time and we don’t care who gets run over in the process.
We don’t care who our words hurt or what we do to our nation in the process.

I think about the crisis happening on our nation’s southern border.
Global Ministries and the United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) have declared today a Sunday of Solidarity with the Suffering of our Children.
They call us to pay attention, to pray, and to respond out of the love of Christ.
We need to become more aware of the devastating conditions in Latin American countries that lead families to pick up everything and risk their lives for a better opportunity.
I think about how complicated our asylum process is and how misunderstood it is by U.S. citizens.
We wrestle with the tension between security and compassion, safety and welcome and long for a solution that isn’t an either/or.
The reality is, this isn’t an issue between Democrats and Republicans, because policies of family separation began under the Obama administration and have simply been continued and enforced under Trump.
This past week, when a government lawyer argued against providing toothbrushes to children, the reality is, she was in court because of a violation of the Flores Agreement under the previous president.
We get so caught up in slinging words at one another and picking sides, that we have closed our eyes to an immoral response to this humanitarian crisis for years.
We become trapped in a cycle of blame.
We are unwilling to examine the problems in our own corner of the political spectrum.
Every side thinks it has the answer and is unwilling to listen to those who are most impacted by the decisions being enacted.

When Paul wrote to the Corinthians, he was aware that this continuous practice of win/lose partisan behavior ends up exacting a high cost.
It is not the politicians or the intellectuals or even the biblical scholars who will save us.
We won’t find our solutions by picking a side and tearing the other down.
The only answer that will really and truly bring life is found in the way of the cross.
It is sacrifice.
It is humility.
It is weakness.
It is utter foolishness.
It is everything.

George Bennard was born in Ohio, but grew up in Iowa as the son of a tavern owner and coal miner.
He came to faith as a part of a Salvation Army ministry in his early twenties and became a Methodist evangelist, traveling throughout the Midwest.
One of his journeys took him to Michigan in 1912-13 to help lead a revival and he found himself heckled and ridiculed by some young people in attendance.
Bennard felt low, shamed, let the words of those young people start to get to him…
The world doesn’t always understand the way of the cross.
But he kept his eyes on Christ and began to study and write about his experience.
The words began to flow and before long, he sat with his guitar and finished the song.

The Old Rugged Cross is an emblem of suffering and shame.
It is despised by the world.
It is full of shame and reproach.
And yet… to that very cross we are called to cling.

Paul tells that Corinthian church trapped in their conflict between who is right and wrong that they are called to become fools.
They are called to be the laughing-stocks of their community.
They are called to lay down their weapons of division and look out instead to where God is showing up in the world:
In the weak.
In the lowly.
In those who are considered nothing.
The good news that points to Christ on the Cross seems like sheer foolishness to those hellbent on destruction, but for those on the way of salvation… it makes perfect sense. (paraphrase of the Message).
The cross is what unifies us.
The cross is our standard.
The cross of Christ, his life, death and resurrection, should be the focus of all our decisions.

Faced with any conflict, we should cling to that Old Rugged Cross.
We are called to love as Christ did… sacrificially.
We are called to go to the margins, to the outcast, to the forgotten.
We are called to die to self, to leave behind security and safety in order to be in radical solidarity with others.

I think about Scott Warren, a teacher from Arizona who was arrested for leaving water and sheltering migrants from Central America in 2017.
He broke the laws of our country and found himself in prison because he took seriously the call of Christ to clothe the naked and give drink to the thirsty.
In the midst of a nation pointing fingers and arguing about laws, we are called to find a way through the chaos of difference… and the only path is through the cross.
And sometimes that makes us look like fools by worldly standards.

When we cling to the Old Rugged Cross, we allow Christ to transform us.
We become the crucified and risen body of Christ in the world…
We go to those who suffer and suffer with them.
We enter the lives of the broken and the lost to bring healing and hope.
We share our love and compassion and mercy and in doing so, we share the good news of the salvation with the world.

It is in the weak and the lowly and those the world declares are nothing that we find Christ.
So let us join our hearts in prayer…

(adapted from a prayer offered by UMCOR)
God of All Children Everywhere,
Our hearts are bruised when we see children suffering alone.
Our hearts are torn when we are unable to help.
Our hearts are broken when we have some complicity in the matter.
For all the times we were too busy and shooed a curious child away, forgive us, oh God.
For all the times we failed to get down on their level and look eye to eye with a child, forgive us, oh God.
For all the times we did not share when we saw a hungry child somewhere in the world, forgive us, oh God.
For all the times we thought about calling elected officials to demand change, but did not, forgive us, oh God.
For all the times we thought that caring for the children of this world was someone else’s responsibility, forgive us, oh God.
With Your grace, heal our hearts.
With Your grace, unite us in action.
With Your grace, repair our government and communities.
With Your grace, help us to find a way to welcome all children everywhere,
That they may know that Jesus loves them, Not just because “the Bible tells them so,”
But because we have shown them Your love in real and tangible ways,
And they know that nothing, absolutely nothing, can separate them from Your love.
May the cross of suffering and shame bring beauty and light and love and light to those who are the most in need of love.
And in loving them, in becoming fools for them, in denying ourselves and taking up Your cross, may we find life, too.
Amen.

Bible 101: Art, Science, History of Interpretation

Posted on February 10, 2019Leave a comment

Text: Luke 11: 27-28

Over these last few weeks in Bible 101, we have explored how our scriptures were put together, translated, and some of the creative tension that was baked into the text itself.
Today, our focus is on interpretation. Once we understand what a scripture meant in the time and place it was written, how do we then live and apply it today.
After all, Jesus said that blessed are those who hear God’s word and obey it, who put it into practice, who allow it to shape how they think and live.

There is part of me that wants to offer you six simple rules for interpretation.
To give you a set of guidelines to follow.
To say this is the United Methodist way of approaching scripture.
But the reality is, interpretation is messier than a list of how-to instructions.
It is as much an art as it is a science.
It is as much about the mystery of the Holy Spirit as it is about the rigid teachings of our ancestors.
And because of that, faithful United Methodists today disagree about how to read and apply scripture.

That was the struggle lifted up by our friend, Al Lockin, near the beginning of our Bible 101 series. What are we to make of our differences? How can we read the same text and come to such different conclusions?
When we hear the word, but our interpretation of scripture leads us to obey, to practice, to live out the teaching of Jesus in different ways, what do we do about it?
This particular question is so important for this moment in the life of our church, because in just two weeks, our denomination will hold a four-day conference in St. Louis. The reason we need to have this big meeting is because we don’t agree on how to interpret and live out the scriptures as they relate to LGBTQ+ persons. As I shared with you last summer during our series on A Way Forward, faithful Christians read the same six scriptures and come to different conclusions about what they mean for us today.
And while in some ways what we are debating in St. Louis is that interpretation, the deeper question, the bigger question is actually this: are we willing to continue to be a part of a church, of a community, of a denomination with people who disagree with us?

So today, I want to step back from the rules and guidelines of interpretation. I want to offer a reminder that confronting differences in how we live and apply scriptures is not something new.
In fact, scripture itself lifts up the reality that faithful people interpret things differently.
As we have shared these past few weeks, even the Torah itself, those first five books of scripture, hold within them contradictions and tensions and different interpretations of events.
Were there two of every kind of animal, or for some animals on Noah’s ark were there actually seven pairs? Well… it depends on if you are reading the interpretation of the priests or of the other oral traditions.
Our biblical canon even contains different historical accounts – in the books of Kings and Chronicles, we find different takes on the same events, told from different perspectives. It would be like holding in your hands two different histories on George Washington – one told from a military expert writing in the 1800s and the other from a modern day expert in leadership… you are going to get different stories… but its all about the same set of events.

When we get to the time of Jesus, the recognized and agreed upon texts of the Jewish faith were fairly established… but there were different schools of thoughts and ways of understanding what those texts meant and how we were called to live them out.
Earlier this week, I posted in our facebook group a video from Rob Bell that talks about what it meant to be a disciple in the time of Jesus.
While all children would have learned and would have memorized the torah… the first five books of scripture… after the age of ten, most children would finish their education and would go and learn their family trade.
But what Bell describes as “the best of the best of the best” would embark on a new phase of education.
They would go and apply to become a disciple of a particular rabbi whose teaching that student wanted to embody. One rabbi might look at a verse and say that this is what it means…. But a different rabbi from a different town might look at it slightly differently. And they would commit their life to learning from that rabbi.

One of the things that tends to happen, however, when you have different ways of interpreting God’s message is those differences can become institutionalized.
In the gospels, we see a number of schools of thought present… kind of like different denominations today.
The Pharisees held together the written law of the scriptures with an oral tradition of interpretation called the Talmud. They believed in an after life and that a messiah was coming to usher in a new age. Much of their practice was shaped not around the temple, but around gatherings in synagogues.
The Sadducees rejected that oral teaching and focused only on what was written in the law. And since there is no mention of an afterlife in the Torah, they didn’t believe in one. They also focused their practice around the Temple. A unique feature for a group that held close to a literal interpretation of their texts is that they were open to much of Greek thought and incorporated it into their teaching.
You’ll also find descriptions of the Essenes in this time. This was a sort of monastic movement with strict dietary laws and a commitment to celibacy. Their relationship to the written and oral law was often more spiritualized and we have discovered writings like the Dead Sea Scrolls from communities like the Essenes that show us very different ways of approaching the life of faith.

Much of our New Testament, aside from the gospels, was written by Paul – a Pharisee, taught by the Rabbi Gamaliel, who was a student of Hillel. One of the more fascinating things that I found as I was doing research for this message is that Hillel was known for his seven rules of interpretation… and many have worked to draw parallels between those seven rules and the writings of Paul and how Paul himself worked to interpret Jewish scriptures into early Christian teaching.

As the church began to be established, one of the things that the early Christian leaders did was to try to form a standard, a core set of beliefs that we all hold in common together. We call these creeds. For example, the apostle’s creed was not written by the apostles, but summarizes the core of that teaching. Let’s turn to page 881 and read aloud the traditional version together.

I believe in God, the Father Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth;
And in Jesus Christ his only Son, our Lord;
who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, dead, and buried;*
the third day he rose from the dead;
he ascended into heaven,
and sitteth at the right hand of God the Father Almighty;
from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic** church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and the life everlasting. Amen.

But as time has moved on from this time of creedal confessions, we have watched as time after time, our different ways of understanding God and the scriptures have created new schools of thought, and fractures and splinters and new denominations and movements… including the United Methodist Church.

In our core scripture for today, Jesus has been teaching the disciples and was casting out demons. Even in the midst of that miracle – there were different interpretations happening in the crowd around what was happening.
One woman finally shouts out – Blessed is the woman who gave birth to you!
I find this a really thing to shout out in this moment, but perhaps one of the reasons she felt the need to raise her voice is that in the midst of all of the conflict and chaos of interpretation, she wanted to affirm where Jesus was coming from.
She wanted to celebrate his particular brand… his line of thinking… the people who formed and taught and shaped the way he was approaching scripture.

What I find really fascinating here is that Jesus challenges her words… It’s those who hear God’s word and live it, obey it, put it into practice that are blessed.

Our work is not to focus on the people who formed us, or the rabbis we follow or the perspectives we belong to. Our job is not to get so stuck in one school of thought or to be focused on the past.
Our job is to take God’s word and live it out.
Our responsibility is to take ownership ourselves for how we put into practice the faith that has been handed down to us.
In fact, one of the core teachings of the United Methodist Church is that we believe it is the theological task of each and every single person not to regurgitate the work of others, but to engage with the scriptures and to wrestle with what they mean today.

In the past, we have talked about some of general framework in the United Methodist tradition for approaching scripture and applying it to faith today.
You’ve heard about the quadrilateral – scripture, tradition, reason, and experience.
But guess what… even faithful United Methodists don’t agree on THAT as a general framework… or how to apply it… or what to do when faced with disagreement between tradition and something like experience.

When we go back farther to the writings of John Wesley, I find some very helpful advice as we encounter our differences today.
One… he talked about being a man of one book… but he always had a number of other books in his hands…. Other translations of scripture… writings and teachings from history and tradition… wisdom from the natural sciences of his day… even a manual for how to heal people who were sick.
But over and over, he also reminded us that as we each engage in our work of interpretation, that personal responsibility, we are not called to do it alone. He formed people into groups of accountability. He reminded people of their call to be the church. And in various ways he reminded us that we are called to embrace humility and love and compassion when we are confronted with conflict in our interpretations.
As he wrote in his sermon on the Catholic Spirit “If your heart is as my heart, take my hand.”
In essentials unity, in non-essentials, liberty, in all things love.

Bible 101: Pulling Meat Out of a Text

Posted on February 3, 2019Leave a comment

Text: Hebrews 5:11-6:3, Revelation 3:15-16

The author of Hebrews doesn’t seem very nice.
The people they are writing to are called lazy.
They are compared with babies, needing milk instead of solid food.
And… the author is impatient because they aren’t sure the people have been listening at all.

Well, maybe I might snap just a little bit too if I have been trying to teach a community about the importance of faith and I realize I had to start all the way back at the beginning all over again.

In contrast, I have actually been really excited to get back to some of the basics about the bible with all of you. And I think that is because we never really do this kind of work together.
In fact, I was talking with some colleagues and aside from the small groups of people who attend actual bible studies, most of their congregations, like ours, have not really been taught biblical literacy.
We simply don’t challenge each other to read scripture in depth.
We haven’t wrestled with the contradictions in texts and what they mean.
And as pastors, we have not equipped you with the tools that you need to dive into the text.
That is our fault.
Not yours.
And over this last month, I have seen just how hungry you are to know more, to read more, and to understand more. So… I’m excited you are on this journey with me and I can’t wait to see where it continues to take us.

In these last few weeks, we have already covered a few things.
First, we acknowledged that the Bible is a complicated text, full of mystery. In its 66 books, we find history, testimony, letters, poetry, prophecy, law… and we should approach each part of the text recognizing that it is trying to do something different.
Then, we heard from one of our lay folks here at Immanuel, about the overarching message of the scriptures: to love God and to love our neighbor… and how that helps us when we encounter people with whom we disagree or on our own journey of faith.
In the past two weeks, I’ve shared with you about how the people who compiled and formed our canon of scripture intentionally left us a diversity of perspectives within the text. Four gospels all tell about Jesus, but emphasizing different things, in a different order. In this past week, we’ve read passages from 2 Kings and 2 Chronicles in our daily challenge and find the exact same story – but with different outcomes! The scriptures are not concerned with one right answer, but capturing a multitude of voices that all point to the bigger truths about God.
And last week, we talked a bit about translations – how the Bibles we read today might be different, but that inspiration of God has been carried through as each author was attempting to bring the message of God to a new people in a new place.

Today, we are going to dive a bit deeper into the meat of bible study. We’ve gone over some of the basics and so I want to give you some tools today to help you “press on towards maturity” as the author of Hebrews puts it. It’s time for some solid food!

First, I want to introduce you to the idea of exegesis.
The prefix (exe) relates to our English word exit… which we know as the way out. So when we use exegesis, we are working to pull meaning OUT of a text.
This is one of the basic building blocks of biblical interpretation. We want to figure out what the passage meant when it was written. It’s not always possible… but the more we research and learn, the more we discover.

Contrasting this is eisegesis.
Now, this is when you take meaning INTO a text. You don’t start from the text itself, but you start from what you know today and make assumptions based on modern understandings about what the text means.

Let’s dive into an example to show the difference.

These two verses are from a set of letters to seven different churches as a pat of the Revelation to John. These verses come from the letter to Laodicea:

“I know your works. You are neither cold nor hot. I wish that you were either cold or hot. So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I’m about to spit you out of my mouth.” (3:15-16)

So first… and I’m going to need your help with this… what do we know about what it means to be hot in the context of our faith… in modern religious understandings?
(on fire for God, zealous, 100% committed, loving, justice filled)

What do you think it means to be cold spiritually?
(apathetic, dead, unloving, meh, no life)

And we understand lukewarm to be somewhere in the middle, right? So we might read into this text that the church is only partly committed to God… or who might go to church, but not be “on fire”. Right?

All of this makes sense in modern English. But what we are doing is bringing OUR understanding of the words into the text. It is eisegesis. And… we are left with the question… why would God prefer that we were either hot or cold? What would ever be good about cold? Wouldn’t lukewarm be better, or at least closer on the path to God than being cold?

If we use exegesis, if we go back to the text, back to the context, back to the location, we might learn something different.

Laodicea seems to be compared with hot and cold churches in this letter… so who might those churches be that they are unlike? If we turn to a map of the area and think about where and who the Laodiceans were, we might get some clues.

This city was actually part of a triad with Hierapolis and Colossae, in what is now modern day Turkey. In fact, when Paul writes to the Colossians, he specifically mentions these other two cities as a part of a little circuit that Tychicus, Epaphras, and others travel, supporting the people in all of those locations. The people know each other and they support and encourage one another.
But they were each unique places as well. The Colossians were supposed to pass their letter on the Laodiceans… AND they were supposed to pick up a letter Paul had written to that church and bring it back. Unfortunately, we don’t have a copy of that letter today.

Hieropolis was known for its hot springs and mineral baths. In fact, ancient Romans would travel to the city for health and healing.

Colossae on the other hand was located right on the river and it was known for its cool and refreshing water. There were also cold, freshwater springs in the city. It was a place where people escaped in warm days in order to find relief and refreshment.

But Laodicea had no natural source of water. All of the water for the city was piped in via an aqueduct and when it finally arrived, it wasn’t hot or cold, but lukewarm.

People traveled to Hieropolis for hot healing waters. They traveleld to Colossae for cold and refreshing relief.

But no one came to Laodicea for the water.
As Terance Espinoza writes, “Jesus wishes that they were useful, that they were either healing or refreshing to people.” (https://www.sagu.edu/thoughthub/exegesis-versus-eisegesis)

No one noticed them or would miss them if they were gone. They had figured out how to take care of themselves… but they weren’t in turn taking care of anyone else.

Now that is a church I recognize. Closed in. Focused on itself. If it disappeared from the face of the earth tomorrow, no one would know any different.

In this passage… being either hot or cold… healing or refreshing… being useful and making a difference is the goal.

And the Laodiceans were neither.
That is the difference when you work to pull meaning OUT of the text, instead of starting from where we are and looking backwards.
And friends, it isn’t easy work.
When you begin to chew on the meat of a text, here are some helpful questions to carry with you as you work to pull meaning out of it:
1) Who is the author?
2) When did they write the text?
3) What was life like at the time?
4) Who was their audience?
5) Why did they write to them?
6) What questions do you have?

And that might seem like a lot of questions and a lot of work, but also remember that we have at our fingertips today more resources and tools to do this kind of study than ever before.
Study bibles and commentaries can help by providing us with current scholarship and notes on the text. Our own church is full of these kind of study resources and you are always welcome to stop by and use them.
There are also million online resources with everything from Wikipedia to The Bible Project. I use BibleGateway.com to compare translations.

One source that I turn to almost every single week is called The Text This Week, or textweek.com. This particular resource is geared towards churches that use the lectionary, or the three year cycle of texts, but what I appreciate is that you can search by scripture and find a compilation of history, commentaries, and exegesis all in one place.

Above all, you don’t have to do this work alone! Those who are interested in studying scripture together will find that each can take a piece of the work. Or… you can utilize a resource together to dive deeply into a particular book of scripture or a topic.

Our goal, friends, is to not just be content to be spoon fed information… we each have the responsibility to engage with scripture ourselves.
We are called to press on to maturity.
We are called to take the foundation of knowledge we have been given and to move beyond just the basics.
I don’t promise easy answers.
But I do promise that you will be fed and nourished when you dive into the text and chew on it yourself. And I know that our faith is so much richer and more meaningful when we can pull out truth from the meat of our Bible and carry it with us into our daily lives.

Bible 101: From the Septuagint to the Message

Posted on January 27, 2019Leave a comment

Text: John 1:1-14, 2 Timothy 3:16-17

First question I have for all of you… how many of you felt like last week’s discussion of quantum mechanics and elephants was a tiny bit over your head?
That’s okay!
Each week we are going to explore a different way of approaching the bible and a different part of its history, so to make up for all of the science last week, I thought we might start this morning by playing a little game.

NAME THAT TRANSLATION!
I do not promise that you will get all of the answers right… but I do promise you will learn something in the process!!!

John 1:6-8 The Message (MSG)
6-8 There once was a man, his name John, sent by God to point out the way to the Life-Light. He came to show everyone where to look, who to believe in. John was not himself the Light; he was there to show the way to the Light.

This bible was created and translated by Eugene Peterson between 1993 and 2002. He went back to the original languages and his goal was not to translate word for word, but to get the sense of the phrases in the original text and convey the idea. This is an idiomatic translation – or translating phrases rather than words.

John 1:6-8 Wycliffe Bible (WYC)
6 A man was sent from God, to whom the name was John.
7 This man came into witnessing, that he should bear witnessing of the light, that all men should believe by him.
8 He was not that light, but that he should bear witnessing of the light.

The Wycliffe bible is a whole group of translations that were made in the 14th century into Middle English. Most Christians at this time only had access to scriptures through hearing them orally or through seeing verses in Latin. In some ways, his goal was the same as Peterson’s – to translate the bible into the common vernacular. They worked not from the original languages, but from the Latin version of scripture – the Vulgate.

John 1:6-8 Mounce Reverse-Interlinear New Testament (MOUNCE)
There came on the scene a man sent from God, whose name was John. He came as a witness to bear testimony about he light so that everyone might believe through him. He was not the light, but came to bear testimony about the light.

This version of the bible was created for people who wanted to study the bible and explore the original languages… but who didn’t actually know Greek! The purpose is to help teach a little bit of Greek at a time. A traditional “interlinear” bible would use the Greek word order and then show the English word for word correlary – but that makes the sentence structure hard to understand. So the Mounce version starts with the English sentence structure and then adds in the Greek words.

I will often use a version like this to discover what the Greek was and then I can go back and consult a Greek dictionary to see if there are other meanings or how it is used elsewhere in scripture.

John 1:6-8 King James Version (KJV)

6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John.
7 The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe.
8 He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.

The King James Version is a translation into English that took seven years from 1604-1611. King James oversaw the translation himself – giving instructions to make sure that this translation would capture the structure and polity of the Church of England. 47 scholars were used in the translation and they went back to the original languages for their translation, adapting them slightly with known Septuagint and Vulgate texts.

Fun fact: The English alphabet at the time had no J! So it was King Iames Bible which talked about Iesus Christ.

John 1:6-8 Common English Bible (CEB)
6 A man named John was sent from God. 7 He came as a witness to testify concerning the light, so that through him everyone would believe in the light. 8 He himself wasn’t the light, but his mission was to testify concerning the light.

This is a very new translation of the bible which is distributed by Abingdon Press, the United Methodist denominational publisher. The goal was to make the bible accessible for people today and easy to read, aiming for a seventh-grade reading level. They also wanted it to appeal broadly to many cultural contexts over 120 scholars from a variety of ethnic and cultural backgrounds. More than twenty-four denominations were involved in its work. The key feature is that instead of churchy and traditionally biblical words, you will find more seeker-friendly words.

In various letters,Paul writes to the young man, Timothy, whom he is mentoring in the faith. Along with advice and doctrine, one of the things he reminds him is that the scriptures help him to be wise and give him the words he needs to help others grow. He includes that famous line “every scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for showing mistakes, for correcting, and for training character, so that the person who belongs to God can be equipped to do everything that is good.” (2 Timothy 3:16-17)
We read that passage within our own biblical texts and we automatically apply that sentiment to the whole of scripture. This entire text has been inspired by God and it is useful for helping us understand who we are and whose we are.
One thing that often fails to cross our minds is that the Bible that Paul and Timothy were reading was very different than the ones we have in our hands today.
Early Christians spoke Greek – the language of the empire – and the scriptures that they would have been basing their teaching and writing from would have been a Greek version of the Hebrew scriptures known as the Septuagint.

When Alexander the Great conquered the Persian empire (which would have included Jerusalem and the people of Israel), Greek became the common tongue. He was known not only for conquering vast swaths of land, but he also collected books and scrolls for his library at Alexandria.
Seventy-two scholars were employed to translate the Torah, two hundred years before Christ, and it took them only seventy two days to recreate those first five books of the Hebrew Bible. The very name, Septuagint (LXX) comes from the seventy days and seventy people.
Tradition has it six scholars from each of the twelve tribes (or seventy two people) were each asked to do so independently… and independently recreated identical versions of the Torah.

Talk about inspired!
The authors of the New Testament frequently relied upon this Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures in their own writing, so it is likely that Paul and Timothy were referring to the Septuagint in their own discourse and as they were teaching others about the faith.
Christian father, Jerome, however, working around 400 years after Christ, instead turned back to the original Hebrew. His translation of the scriptures into Latin is known as the Vulgate and was used by others in their further translations into English.

But something I think we often don’t think about is how we got from there to here… how that inspiration of God works… and what it means when we open up our bibles and read vastly different things.
A couple of weeks ago, one of the passages that we were all invited to read as part of the Bible 101 challenge was a selection from Job 38.
In some of the final chapters, as God kind of puts Job in his place by rattling off a whole series of ways that God is superior and cosmic and knows everything from the time when eggs will hatch to the course of stars in the skies… some of us read about a gigantic hippopotamus… and others read about the behemoth. Some of us read about a huge alligator and others read about the Leviathan.
There is a world of difference between a hippopotamus and a mythic beast.
So what gives?

As we went through some of those various translations, one of the things that you may have heard is that the purpose of each of our translators is different.
Some are trying to give us a word for word exact replica into a new language… and if there isn’t an equivalent word, sometimes they just use the word from the original text.
Some are trying to merely get the sentiment of a phrase, with idiomatic translations and so they might try to say the same thing or explain the original phrase with more words in the process.
Others are trying to make the bible as accessible as possible… and to use words or concepts that are foreign to our ears like behemoth don’t help. They find the closest equivalent in English, in this case, and simply allow the meaning to change slightly.

It is always good to understand what the motivations might have been behind the translation of the bible YOU are using, because it might help you get a sense of how to approach that text. And when you read from a variety of translations, you get a fuller sense of how God has been speaking to people throughout time and place.
Because in the end, each author and translator began their work, inspired by God, in order to help bring to a new generation in a new time and place the messages of God.
While the exact words might differ and the phrases might not match, they are inspired to share what is “useful one way or another – showing us truth, exposing our rebellion, correcting our mistakes, training us to live God’s way. Through the Word we are put together and shaped up for the tasks God has for us.” (2 Timothy 3:16-17 MSG) Thanks be to God. Amen.

Bible 101: Unraveling the Mystery

Posted on January 6, 2019Leave a comment

Text: Ephesians 3:1-12 and Matthew 2:1-6

A group of astrologers looked up into the night sky and saw something that caught their eye.
A new star had appeared.
A king had been born.
Preparations for a journey to the west, towards Jerusalem, began.

Today, we find ourselves on the 12th day of Christmas, the Day of Epiphany.
This day reminds us that some of the first to recognize the good news of the birth of Christ were not religious leaders or rulers, but Gentiles from far off.
That star in the sky, that manifestation of light, drew them from their homes and set them on a journey to find the truth for themselves.
As Pope Leo the Great wrote in the fifth century,
“A start with new brilliance appeared to three wise men in the East” that “was brighter and more beautiful than others” attracting the “eyes and hearts of those looking on.” The determination of the magi to “follow the lead of this heavenly light” expressed a willingness to be “led by the splendor of grace to knowledge of the truth.” (As recounted by William J. Danaher Jr. – Feasting on the Word – Epiphany C)

A star shone in the sky.
Something had changed in the world.
And these magi, these wise men, these astrologers wanted to find out what it meant.

The story that we follow in the gospel of Matthew takes them to the doorstep of Herod in Jerusalem.
He listens intently to their story and his first response is to feel threatened.
He is the King of the Jews and as far as he knows, there is no child that has been born or that is expected within his court.
But there was prophecy about God’s anointed one, the Messiah, and so he calls together the religious experts of his court, the Sanhedrin, and to ask them what this might mean.
In turn, they turn to the scrolls of their faith… to the writings and teachings of their ancestors… to make sense out of this epiphany, this revelation, this new truth in the world.
They return with a few sentences of scripture that appear to speak about the Christ, from the prophet Micah and the history of 2 Samuel.
Herod sends the magi away with this information, to seek this child, but his intent is not worship or homage or truth… rather, he seeks to stop this revelation before it makes an impact on the world… HIS world.
And he will do everything in his power to stop it.

What we know is that while Herod turned his rage and fury upon the region and massacred all of the little ones who were under the age of two, he ultimately was unsuccessful.
The magi find the child, but are warned in a dream not to return and reveal the location.
Mary and Joseph and the Christ Child become aware of the danger posed to them and flee to the land of Egypt.
Jesus is saved, he grows up, and becomes an epiphany all of us:
He is the Truth.
He is the Light.
And because the Word was made flesh among us, everything has changed.

In Christ, in the good news, in this mysterious and awesome collection of texts, something new is happening in the world.
And, Paul writes, we have access to that truth.
God’s great Epiphany was not just something that happened long ago.
No, the mystery of God’s plan, the good news of God, is being revealed right here and right now through you and me, through this household of God, through the church present in the world.
Paul believes, as is evident in this selection from Ephesians, that through the church the wisdom of God is now being made known to the world.
What was begun in the promises to Abraham,
what has been confirmed through the prophets to the people of Israel,
what is now being revealed through the life of Jesus,
is that God has a plan to bless the whole world… and you and me are now part of that blessing.

Like Paul, like the religious scholars in Herod’s temple, like the astrologers from the east, we want to know what it all means.
We want to know how to make sense of the things that are happening all around us.
We want to know what difference it should make in our lives.
We want to know when we are supposed to drop everything and follow.
We want to know what is really and truly important enough that it will turn our world upside down.

Or… maybe we are afraid of precisely those things.
After all, as Flannery O’Conner paraphrased, “You shall know the truth, and the truth will make you odd.”
Or as another put it, “you shall know the truth, and the truth will set you free. But first it will make you miserable.”

I think sometimes we are content with ignorance because we don’t have to change.
We don’t want to dive into the truths of scripture, because we are afraid something we have always relied upon might be inaccurate or wrong.
Or perhaps, we are ashamed after a lifetime of being a part of the church of how little we know of these holy words.
This book…
This wonderful, holy, inspired collection of texts, is itself an Epiphany.
It is a revelation.
Every time we open its pages and allow the Holy Spirit to lead us, we discover new truths about who we are supposed to be and how we are supposed to live in this world.
And so as we start a new year, I want to invite you to let go of your fears.
Let go of your shame.
Let go of your hesitation.

Over the next seven weeks of this series, I want to invite us to be like those ancient astrologers.
They did not yet know what that star in the sky meant.
They were unaware of how that child would change the world… would change their world.
But they were curious.
They were interested.
And they opened themselves up to the possibility.
They didn’t stay at home and wonder, “what if?”
No!
They did the work.
They made the journey.
And they discovered something amazing.

That is what I want for each of us in this church over these next two months.
I want us to be curious.
I want us to ask lots of questions.
I want us to be open to new insights.
I want us to do the work of opening up this scripture and allowing it to be a part of our lives.

And here is what I promise you along the way…
Like Paul, who felt called to share the teachings of Christ with others, to help make plain the mystery, I promise to walk with you.
In the coming weeks, we’ll learn together about context and language and interpretation. We’ll dive into words like hermeneutic and exegesis. I’ll give you tools each week that will help you to better understand these texts and how they relate to one another.
And what I promise at the end of this journey is not that we will all be experts, but that we will know that in spite of our questions, in spite of all we have left to learn, in spite of the depths of the mystery that is before us… that God truly is with us and that God is present in these texts.
And… that God is present in this church.
And through you… and through me… God is going to change this world.
May it be so.
Amen.

A Way Forward? Which Way?

Posted on September 2, 2018Leave a comment

Text: Acts 15

The book of the Acts of the Apostles is the story of how the good news of Jesus spread from Jerusalem, through Judea and Samaria, to the ends of the earth. Along the way, the culture and traditions and scriptures of our spiritual ancestors encountered a variety of peoples and backgrounds.
When should the gospel be adapted? What was essential to maintain? Which traditions and practices should be enforced and which were merely contextual?
These were all questions being asked by the disciples and the communities they encountered along their evangelistic journeys.
Peter, in Acts 10, has a vision of the clean and unclean together and then is brought to the home of a Gentile centurion. Moved by the Holy Spirit, he baptizes the entire household… even though it was forbidden for a Jew to visit with outsiders.
In Antioch (Acts 11), Barnabas goes to minister to the Gentiles who were being converted. He is joined by Paul and together they not only convert many, but there is prediction of a famine and together the people there gather money to take to Jerusalem in response. This is not only a church of new believers, but ones who understand their connection to a larger community.
Gentiles were converted in Iconium and Lystra, but tension grew between Jews who followed Christ and those who did not. Those who rejected this new message stirred up conflict between new Gentile converts and Jewish Christians (Acts 14).
To complicate matters, other missionaries began to visit some of these places and the messages being shared about which practices must be followed as a part of the faith were different.
In particular was a very important question: Did you have to be circumcised in order to be saved by Jesus?
Now, circumcision had been an important identity marker for what it meant to be the people of God since the time of Abraham.
Jews who followed Christ did not see themselves as entering a new religion, but merely living into a new expression of that faith. Circumcision was still an important part of who they were.
Gentiles, however, were making a much larger change. Some, like the Roman centurion, were God-fearers… Gentiles who worshipped the God of the Jews but who had restrictions on what they could participate in because of their status as Gentiles. Others were pagans and were converting to a totally new faith. Circumcision would have been a significant cultural departure.

Last week, I shared with you a spectrum of theological stands that shape our church today ranging from progressive to traditional.
Imagine for a moment that this conversation was instead about circumcision.
Those on the progressive incompatibilist side might make the claim that since God is revealing a new way – no one anywhere has to be circumcised. Those on the traditional imcompatibilist side might claim – this is the same God we have always followed and everyone who wants to be saved must be circumcised. And surely there were people in the middle, who thought that Jews who wanted to be could, but Gentiles didn’t have to and so on.

Someone had to make an official decision about this so that the conflict among communities might cease. Local churches in these far flung places were confused about what was required and what wasn’t and it was hurting their ability to convert new followers to the way of Jesus.
And so the apostles and elders of the faith gathered together in Jerusalem in the year 48 to consider this question.
They heard testimony from people like Paul and Barnabas, and disciples like Peter and James made pleas. And together, the Jerusalem Council made a decision for the whole church.

In many ways, our General Conference functions every four years like the Jerusalem Council. We gather to listen and to share our stories and our witness and to make decisions that will guide the future of our entire denomination.
In February, when a special session of General Conference gathers, the decisions we make will impact not only our larger cultural witness, but also the practices and the people of local congregations like Immanuel.

As we hear this text from Acts 15, it is easy to focus on the Jerusalem Council itself… the leaders of the faith who have gathered together to make this decision.
But I admit, that in these past few weeks I’ve been thinking a whole lot more about all of the communities back in Antioch and Iconium who were waiting for a decision.
They sent off their representatives, but it would be some time before they heard a final answer. They knew that there were a variety of different directions the Council could take and so I imagine they began to prepare their hearts for a range of possibilities. Would they have to be circumcised? Would they be free to practice how they had been? Would there be other ways the Council might ask them to come into compliance with the faith?

Friends, we are those local communities waiting for a decision to be made. That decision will impact us in one way or another and so now is the time for us to begin praying and preparing ourselves for whatever might come.

Last week, I asked all of those who were here to identify where they personally fall along this spectrum of theological responses to scripture regarding LGBT+ persons. Because the impact of decisions upon OUR local community might look different from that of our neighbors.
This is simply a snapshot, but these are the responses from 110 of you who were in worship last Sunday morning. Nearly 60% of you identified yourselves on the progressive end, 27% of you on the traditionalist end, with about 13% of you not responding to that particular question. So I’m going to use your responses to help frame how Immanuel might be impacted by any of the particular plans in front of us. One thing I want to highlight is that in the answers for all of the questions, no matter whether you agreed or disagreed, nearly the vast majority of you continued to say that you would stay at Immanuel.

The first thing I want to explore are a couple of options based on this theological spectrum of perspectives. The first one is our current reality… the status quo. If nothing passes at the special General Conference, this is the default to which we revert.

Our Book of Discipline currently prohibits both the ordination of self-avowed, practicing homosexuals and same-sex marriage, which is a traditionalist perspective. However, there are places and people who are not following those prohibitions. In more progressive areas of our denomination, sometimes this happens with no enforcement of the rules at all. In more traditionalist areas, there are often charges filed and sometimes clergy are suspended or their credentials are removed. But there is vast inconsistency.
Currently, Immanuel’s response to this has been to largely to ignore the question. If we agree or disagree with the larger denominational stance, we don’t bring it up. Within our congregation are individuals and families who are impacted by this question, but they don’t push it within the larger church. Unlike other congregations within the greater Des Moines area that have strongly identified with a progressive or traditionalist perspective and have made outreach efforts around that perspective, we don’t talk about it.
And I think this is largely because identify ourselves as a family church. And families disagree about things, but still want to gather together around the Thanksgiving table. We might have private side conversations over pie, but it isn’t going to be the thing that we focus on. So we follow the rules of the denomination, whether we agree or not.

One of the plans included in the Commission on a Way Forward Report, although not recommended by our Bishops, is the Traditionalist Plan (begins on page 67). This plan would end the confusion and inconsistency by determining once and for all that we will not ordain or marry LGBT persons within the United Methodist Church.
There are two ways that accountability and enforcement are increased.
First, all bishops, annual conferences, and members of the Board or Ordained Ministry must certify that they will uphold, enforce, and maintain The Book of Discipline related to self-avowed practicing homosexuals. Those who disagree with the Book of Discipline and cannot make such a statement have three options.
1) Not certify the statement. This will result in all funds from the UMC being withdrawn and the annual conference will no longer be allowed to use the cross and the flame.
2) Certify the statement and break the rules – automatic penalties.
3) Leave the denomination to form/join a self-governing Methodist church, aka a new denomination that might be affiliated with the UMC.

What would be the impact of this on a local church like Immanuel?
Well, first of all, nearly 85% of you replied that if the current stance in our Book of Disciple remains unchanged [status quo] or strengthened [increased enforcement] you would stay as a part of Immanuel. We’d have a disagreement within our church, but again, I think largely we are focused on our community together and not on the larger denominational dynamics.
One of the complicating factors of this particular plan is that as a local church, we don’t have a lot of say of what happens at the levels just above us.
The Iowa Annual Conference, for example, might decide that it either will not certify the required statement or it might form or join a self-governing Methodist church that is more progressive. If that were the case, then this local church would have the opportunity to decide if we wanted to go with the Iowa Annual Conference, or if we wanted to stay with the United Methodist Church.

Another plan that has been presented along this same theological spectrum is the Simple Plan. This plan was not part of the Commission on a Way Forward report but was submitted by the United Methodist Queer Clergy Caucus. This particular plan seeks to remove all discriminatory language around homosexuality within the Book of Discipline.
It does so by striking statements like “Ceremonies that celebrate homosexual unions shall not be conducted by our ministers and shall not be conducted in our churches.” However, it does not add any additional affirming language, nor does it add language that would increase enforcement towards those who are traditionalist. No clergy or church would be required to perform a same-gender wedding. If and when a congregation wanted to allow such weddings, they could have that conversation and make that decision.

Based on your responses to our survey, that would be a possibility. Nearly 70% of you said that you would agree if same-sex marriages would be allowed in our sanctuary. However, I also imagine that since this congregation deeply values relationship, we wouldn’t jump into any decisions without first having some family conversations and make sure it was the appropriate choice for our church.
Very similar dynamics are at play in the question about the appointment of queer clergy to Immanuel.

So far, we have been working along this spectrum of theological perspectives. The Commission on a Way Forward wanted to break us out of those dynamics a little bit and so the next two plans I’m going to present fall within a sort of compatibilist realm, but are trying to do something a little different.

The One Church Plan (begins on page 19) is a proposal of the Commission on a Way Forward that was supported by a strong majority of our Council of Bishops. The fundamental theological statement within this plan is that our position on homosexuality, whatever it might be, is not an essential of our faith. It is not something that we should divide our church over.
Like the Simple Plan that I just shared with you, it removes all language that is restrictive towards LGBT persons. However, it adds in every one of those locations statements that ensures freedom of conscience for those who think differently. For example, in the section about the ministry of an elder it states:
“In conferences where civil law permits a pastor to perform same-sex marriage services, no elder shall at any time be required or compelled to perform, or prohibited from performing, any marriage, union, or blessing of same-sex couples, or of any couples. Each elder shall have the right to exercise his or her conscience to refuse or agree when requested…”
What would be the impact of such a plan on Immanuel? This particular plan allows us the freedom of conscious, much like the Simple Plan. This plan does specify, however, that same-sex weddings are not allowed in local congregations unless the congregation chooses to approve them by a simple majority vote.
Any congregation that felt like it could no longer remain a part of the United Methodist Church, potentially non-compatibilist congregations, this plan points to already existing mechanisms within the Book of Discipline for them to leave.

The other primary plan presented by the Commission on a Way Forward is the Connectional Conference Model (begins on page 37). This model also affirms that this question is not an essential of our faith and maintains the unity of the United Methodist Church by creating three branches within the denomination based upon our perspectives on human sexuality.
The difficulty with this plan is that it requires changes to the constitution of our church which would have to be approved by 2/3 vote of all of the annual conferences combined. If this happened, there is a plan of implementation with decisions filtering down.
First, each United States Jurisdiction would vote in 2020 which connectional conference it would want to join. After that decision, any annual conference within that jurisdiction could vote to join a different connectional conference if it so chooses. Then, beginning in 2021, any local church that disagrees with where the annual conference has affiliated can choose to join a different connectional conference.
As a result, different churches within our city might belong to various connectional conferences, but we would all still be a part of the larger United Methodist Church.

As a local church, we could decide to just go with the flow and follow the decisions made by the entities above us, or if we disagreed with their direction, we could vote to join another. Whichever conference we ended up affiliating with would determine our policies on ordination and weddings.

The final plan that has already been published and is available for conversation is not a plan of the Commission on a Way Forward. It is simply named, a Plan of Dissolution, and the purpose of this particular plan is to claim that this actually is an essential of our faith and for that reason, we must divide the church.
Rather than any one perspective claiming victory over the denomination, however, the goal of this plan is to dissolve the UMC in its entirety. Then at the 2020 General Conference, delegates will be elected to help form 2 or more new denominations that likely would fall into the same spectrum we have been discussing. As those new denominations are formed, local churches would have the opportunity to affiliate with and join whichever they felt called to join.

In the year 48, the church was at a crossroads. Would they embrace the Gentiles who were following the way of Christ? Would the Gentiles shape the church, or would the Jewish faith shape the Gentiles? Leaders of the faith gathered together in Jerusalem to allow scripture, the Holy Spirit, tradition, testimony, and reason guide them in making the best decision for the church.
I imagine as those local communities of faith sent their delegates, they joined together in fervent prayer.
And so that is what I hope you might do with and for us.
Pray. Pray hard. Pray every day.
Pray for God to guide us as we make these decisions, hard decisions, that will impact our church at every single level, from our local church here in Des Moines to the hospital we have built in Sierra Leone, to our seminary in Russia, to our publishing house in Nashville. Pray.