questions – Page 2 – Salvaged Faith

labeling cans of corn

Posted on July 24, 2012Leave a comment

The project site I am working at for the first two days of our mission trip is the Emergency Foodshelf Network. They distribute food to about 70 area foodshelfs and help to channel donations from organizations and larger corporations. Including cans… without labels.

Part of our job yesterday was to begin making a dent in the 18,000 cans of corn that were donated without labels. They sit on large palletes, all shiny and shrink-wrapped, just waiting for a generic corn label to be affixed. And so we have been cutting paper labels, adding two pieces of tape, and then moving them into boxes of 30 for distribution.

But there is this nagging question in the back of my head… how do we really know its corn? How can you officially tell?

You have to open it!

You have to ruin the product to ensure that it is what it actually is.

Now, of course this comes from a manufacturer and it is all the same and grouped together and not just some random cans tossed into a donation bin.

But there is still a level of hope and faith required in order to trust that in these cans there really is corn.

We can shake them and they kind of sound like kernels of corn – but really you just have to trust. You have to affix the labels and trust.

In so many ways our faith is like that.

We depend on the stories that others have told us and we can choose to believe and to trust or not. We can choose to fix our own label on the blank can that was passed to us and bless others with it, or we can refuse to label it, dig in with our doubts, and open up the can.

I love questions. I love people who doubt – because they push me to dig deeper in my faith and help me to grow. And hopefully they are also growing in their faith.

But at the end of the day, we have a choice: to believe something we can’t see… or not.

I have found that when I believe, when I make that choice, and when I share that faith…. both myself and others are blessed in the process.

That’s why I keep believing that cans of corn without labels really have corn in them. And that God exists and came to us in Jesus Christ and that we have been saved though we don’t deserve it and can be renewed through the gracious power of God in the Holy Spirit.

Sometimes I want to rip open that can and double check… I do… but today, I keep taping on labels and sharing the blessings with others.

Out of the Mouths of Babes – or – What I learned from VBS

Posted on June 26, 2012Leave a comment

We all know that kids say the darndest things… but they also speak deep truths and absolutely astound me with their questions. They are unafraid to wonder, not shy with their uncertainties, and will ask until they get a satisfactory answer.

Although I have been a pastor for five years, I have not spent very much time at all teaching little ones. My church has some dedicated Sunday School teachers and I have been blessed by their work. I do make the time and effort to lead the children’s sermon each week – in part because it is important for the little ones to know me and for me to spend some time talking on their level. But two-five minutes a week is nothing compared to the opportunities I had last week to teach students at Vacation Bible School.

Our community Presbyterian, Catholic and United Methodist churches sponsor a community wide VBS each year. The program was up and running long before I showed up and it is absolutely wonderful. Working together, we can do so much more than we could apart. And this year we had 65 students ages three through fifth grade. For the past two years, I participated as a shepherd for the 3 and 4 year olds. I moved them from station to station (crafts, music, snack, lesson, games), watched over potty breaks, wiped away tears, had little ones sitting on my lap and we played LOTS of “duck, duck, goose.” It was fascinating to watch them think, to get to know each of them better, and to love on them.

But for each of those years, I didn’t have to teach. I didn’t have to answer questions. I was hands and feet and eyes and ears and didn’t have to say a whole lot. Which was kind of nice.

This year, I was recruited to lead the lesson time for all of the students. In 20 minute blocks, students came to me in my basement forest campground and we told stories around my “campfire.”

Let me tell you, 20 minutes is NOT enough time to tell a story. Especially with the questions and insights these kids have.

Our very first lesson: Jesus calming the wind and the waves. I have my script in hand courtesy of the prepared and purchased VBS kit and launch into the story about how Jesus, God’s Son, had fallen asleep on the boat. A hand shoots up among from amongs the first and second grade class.

“But, I thought Jesus was God…”

I get my bearings… “Yes, Jesus is God.”

“But you said Jesus was God’s Son.”

“Yes, I did. And Yes, he is.”

“But…”

“I know… It’s confusing. I’m confused, too!”

These kids don’t miss a beat. And they are asking the exact same question their parents and grandparents are often afraid to ask. Questions that simply can’t be answered in twenty minutes when we need to tell a story, pray, memorize a bible verse, and hit home the point of the theme for the night.

“How do we pray?”

“How does God answer my prayers… will God talk to me? How long will it take? Do I just wait until I hear him?”

“What is the Holy Spirit?”

“How did Jesus die?” (as I’m holding up the empty wooden cross… try explaining capital punishment to a three year old in thirty seconds!)

“If Jesus is God, then did God die on the cross, too?”

“If Jesus forgives me, why do I still have to sit in time-out?”

“Are angels real?”

Those kids kept me on my toes! They wracked my brain, theologically speaking. Especially one little girl who had lots and lots of questions about prayer. We talk a lot about praying to God and praying to Jesus, and she had just reached this stage in her development where saying a wrote prayer wasn’t enough. She wanted to know how prayer worked – how it could change her life – how it could really and truly make her feel better when she was scared. We talked about how prayer is a conversation, how we can close our eyes and clasp our hands to pray or stand outside and shout to the skies. But then she wanted to know about how God answers… what does God do to make us feel better? Does he talk to us? Does he fix things? Does he send people? I wanted to wrap her up in my arms and thank her for all of her amazing questions and sit and talk with her for hours…

I learned from Vacation Bible School that we have some amazing little kids in our community.

I learned that the simplest questions are the hardest.

I learned that I felt very uncomfortable trying to use substitutionary atonement (the predominant theology of the materials) to explain why Jesus died for us to the little ones and did much better with the “Christ as King” metaphors… although it took me two classes to get to that point.

I learned that with a few sheets and some plants and ceramic animals, a basement can transform from a lake to a field to a desert… and that the kids will go right along with you.

I learned that telling stories is a lot of work and exhausting for my body and my voice.

I learned that there have got to be better ways of teaching prayer to kids than having them close their eyes and clasp their hands and repeat after us.

I learned that I have a lot to learn about teaching children.

I learned that dried allium makes excellent tumbleweeds and a card table with some pillows and a blanket makes a very convincing bear/lion cave.

I learned that kids would much rather be sheep and lions and camels than kids.

I learned that the allure of a “bear cave” or an open tent flap is just too much for some little ones to take 😉

I learned that even at four and five, we have a hard time admitting that we are sometimes bad and make mistakes and get into trouble.

I learned to be grateful for all of those people, everywhere, but especially in Marengo last week, who teach our little ones.

GC03: Restructuring and the Four Areas of Focus

Posted on April 2, 2012Leave a comment

Over the past few months, conversations, posts, articles, videos, etc. have been flying around about the Call to Action and the Interim Operational Team proposals for restructuring. As a reserve delegate for General Conference, I probably won’t be someone voting on this, but I’m still going to be there. I am meeting with my delegation and we are looking at all of these pieces together. I did the Call to Action Study with my church. I’m reading as much as I can. And I have to say, I’m not sure how I feel about all of it. Tomorrow I want to talk a little bit about the need for distinction between CtA and the IOT proposals (because they are different things), but for now, I just want to think about the idea of restructuring our general boards and agencies.

Most people who know me would say that I’m not someone tied to the past. If something isn’t working – by all means, scrap it and start afresh. I often work by trial and error until we find just the right fit. I like to take risks and push the envelope and be bold. So the fact that I’m a little uneasy with all of the change proposed here means something.

I’ve had a few people ask me pointedly in the past month what I think about all of this restructuring. Here is my first response:

I’m still pretty torn. I think there are some benefits to the ways they want to realign the boards and agencies, but talking with the boards and agencies folks, they have already made significant cuts and some of the ways they benefit the church would be severely restricted by having to cut more. I worry about our continued GBCS presence in the capital. I worry about whether we will have the resources in place to support the local churches if we diminish any more GBHEM and GBOD and the like. I understand the $ benefit to a smaller board, but think the diverse representation in so many places is one of the awesome things about the church and wonder if we couldn’t use technology and more web conferencing to cut back on some of the cost. I worry that with only a 15 member board, we just will not have a diverse representation of the United Methodist Church as a whole. I’m not necessarily worried about power consolidation or anything like that – but I would HATE to be on that board – that is a lot of responsibility and time, for such a small group to be overseeing all of the boards and agencies in that way. On the other hand, our own local church just consolidated all of our committees into one church board and its working just fine.
That probably doesn’t help.. does it? lol.

My friend Gary’s response: Katie, help the Church think beyond either/or options. Thanks

*sigh* Gary… I belatedly, and with great humility and not a small amount of uneasiness accept your challenge.

And as I think more about that restructure our own church just did, what I realized is that when we did so because we didn’t have enough people who could sustain that large of a leadership structure. To have four required committees that needed 6 people + our ministry committees of education, worship, outreach… that would be 6×7= 42 people!!! Not to include the chair of our council and our lay leader. We average 50 in worship on a Sunday. And so our large leadership structure certainly involved people, but people also felt like they were simply filling holes. There was a lack of engagment. Our structure was too big. I’m not sure that with a global membership of 11-12 million has large problem with a leadership board and agency structure that involves around 650 lay and clergy representatives on boards/agencies.

Second, we did consolidate our work around three primary goals for our congregation. Which sounds a lot like consolidating around the four areas of focus. But we did so and have actually funneled MORE money into those three teams in our local church. They have more to work with now than they did in their respective disjointed committees. If we truly want those three things to be the focus of the life of our church, then we have to put our money where our mouth is. It feels like the restructure proposals are in order to save money to be sent somewhere else – to local churches perhaps, to reduce apportionments so resources stay on the local level, who knows – to be honest I haven’t seen anything about WHERE the extra resources will come from or WHERE they will go. That seems like an important piece of the puzzle that is missing.

I completely understand restructuring for missional reasons to help us refocus our attention on the four areas of focus that we as a global church have named as important: global heath, ministry with the poor, new places for new people and revitalizing existing congregations, and developing (young) leaders. But have we actually given these four areas of focus time to settle in with our churches yet? And will a restructure help us to focus on them if we do so at the expense of diverse and abundant representation (when we have so many capable and talented people we can use in our global church) and with cuts to the funding for said ministries. In fact, we might be chopping the legs out from underneath ourselves if we do not provide the resources in people and dollars and institutional weight behind those four areas of focus.

So if I’m thinking both/and, I want to ask the questions:

What would a restructured church look like with larger boards than the proposal entails?
What could it accomplish with the resources to really make a difference?
What kinds of bold risks could our boards and agencies take if they felt like we as the church trusted them and didn’t see them as an excessive growth that needed to be trimmed away?
What would we say to the world if we not only realign our church around these four areas of focus, but back it with our time, energy and resources?

I’m not saying that vital congregations are not important… in fact, the other materials we have been given by IOT and the Council of Bishops and the Connectional Table and Call to Action all seem to point to the idea that we need to develop more young leaders and create new places for new people and that a vital congregation is defined by its fruits – which includes its participation in the redemption of the world (global health and poverty seem to fit here). If we continue to focus on these four areas and put both our larger institutional AND local resources towards this focus, I think we are heading in the right direction.

Toby and the Church

Posted on November 29, 2011Leave a comment

I think one of the saddest moments I have witnessed on NBC’s “The Office” is seeing Toby Flenderson stand alone outside of a church.

The whole gang is gathered at a local Presbyterian church for the baptism of Jim and Pam’s daughter Cece. But no Toby is to be found.

That’s not actually that unusual. Toby doesn’t fit in well with the others at the office. Being the HR guy, he has to enforce rules and regulations and it doesn’t help that Michael Scott, the boss, makes him EXTREMELY uncomfortable by always hating on him in front of others. He’s not the most social guy in the world, so you just imagine he might be somewhere else that day.

But then, there is a cut shot to Toby standing outside of the church doors. Overhead, carved in stone, it reads “All are Welcome.” And Toby can’t bring himself to go in.

He’s been through a divorce. And he’s Catholic, so I’m sure there is a layer of frustration and exclusion that he has felt from his own tradition around things like communion. He struggles to have a meaningful relationship with his daughter. No one really sticks up for him when Michael picks on him. He broke a bazillion bones in Costa Rica when he finally got the chance to get away from it all and ended up right back at Dunder Mifflin. The woman he has had a crush on in forever is now inside of that church, baptizing her daughter. Life has not been the best for Toby.

I saw in his eyes as he stood outside of those doors a deep sense of disappointment. He doesn’t feel good enough, worthy enough, loved enough… but at the same time, he knows that he deserves better than what he has recieved.

When he finally walks in the doors, that pain in his heart leads him to the front of the church where he stares at the cross and asks, “Why do you have to be so mean to me?”

There are points in each of our faith journeys where we and the “big man” upstairs have our problems. We look at the situation we have been handed and we think its unfair. We don’t understand why we have to deal with all of this pain and frustration when other people seem to have it easier.

And there are days when we, like Toby, find ourselves at the foot of a cross, or on the corner of a street, or alone in our bedrooms and we cry out, Why?

There are some who would be quick to denounce these cries of doubt and disbelief, but Toby and those of us who cry out find ourselves in good company. The psalms are full of these emotional outbursts and cries:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Why are you so far from saving me,
so far from my cries of anguish?
My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer,
by night, but I find no rest. (Psalm 22:1-2)

LORD, do not rebuke me in your anger
or discipline me in your wrath.
Your arrows have pierced me,
and your hand has come down on me.
Because of your wrath there is no health in my body;
there is no soundness in my bones because of my sin.
My guilt has overwhelmed me
like a burden too heavy to bear. (Psalm 38: 1-4)

How long, LORD? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I wrestle with my thoughts
and day after day have sorrow in my heart?
How long will my enemy triumph over me? (Psalm 13:1-2)

We are human. And the weight of this world can be heavy upon our shoulders. Especially when all around us we see darkness and not the light.

It is okay for us to cry out. It is perfectly alright for us to scream at God – How long? Why? What is going on here?

But like the Psalmists, we can’t stay there. Each one of those psalms concludes with a reminder that God is good and steadfast and full of mercy and love. With a reminder of the power of our creator God to overcome our darkness and sorrow and pain. Because rain falls on the just and the injust. Sun shines on us all. And mixed in with those cloudy days, we have to remember that there has been sunshine too… If we are going to blame God for everything bad that has ever happened to us, then we need to give him credit for the good, too.

So go ahead, cry out with Toby and ask, “Why?” Express your frustration. But maybe do so with the Psalms in your hands. Use the words to help you let your pain out… and then carry you into praise and thanksgiving for a God that never leaves our side and never forgets us… no matter how far away we think God is.

putting your money where your mouth is… even if it hurts

Recently there has been a call on some of the social media outlets I follow… a call to take money out of the big banks.

As a part of the larger “occupy”movement, people are being asked to put their money where their mouth is… literally… and close their accounts with the the big guys on Wall Street and to move that money to local banks and community credit unions. A link to the pledge can be found here: http://www.rebuildthedream.com/move-your-money/

I like this idea. I appreciate local businesses. I like the accountability that comes when you are in personal contact with the people who take care of your money. I like that it is more than just feet on the ground complaining about things they don’t like, but people willing to make changes in their personal lives based upon the message they are preaching.

I don’t like what doing this would do to my personal credit rating.
When the pledge first crossed my desk, I immediately went and started searching for information on the statewide United Methodist supported credit union. I looked at loan rates and credit card rates and started doing the math to see what kind of a personal financial impact it would have if I closed my accounts with the “big banks” and moved my debt and my checking account somewhere more local.

My Bank of America credit line has been around for over 11 years. As a freshamn in college, I caved to the credit card pressure… but it was a “Working Assets” card – and they donated 1% every year to non-profits that you get to choose. At the time, I justified my decision, thinking it was the “conscientious choice”… if I was going to have a credit card, that’s the one I wanted. But they were bought out by the big guys and I’ve been with BoA ever since. Because I have been with them for a while, and pay my bills faithfully, it is also my largest line of credit.

The only line of credit I have with Citigroup is fairly new… and I opened the card to transfer some balances with no interest so that I could work on paying off debt from college/seminary/long-distance-relationship-plane-tickets…

To close the first account and to open a new one would drastically reduce both my average age of open credit lines and my open card utilization percentage… thereby significantly affecting my credit score (especially since I have that newer line of credit from only a year ago).

To transfer balances would involve fees and especially with the Citigroup account, I still have another year of no interest and would rather spend that time paying off that little amount, rather than incurring another fee and having to pay interest.

Argh…

Sometimes, doing something that is seems right, hurts. Taking a stand involves personal cost. Finding the courage to literally put our money where our mouth is… priceless.

(sorry, I couldn’t resist).

But we should spend time wrestling with financial questions.

Where is my money invested?
Who benefits from my money/debt?
What kind of transformative change does the power of a single dollar have?

Does my bank align with my values?

What kind of damage does debt do to my spiritual life?

What does your spending say about your spiritual life?
All sorts of thoughts are rolling around in my head, all as a result of a little tweet.

Where is Peter Bishop?

Posted on August 24, 2011Leave a comment

I honestly think that the closest I am ever going to come to experiencing what the disciples experienced after the crucifixion and burial of Jesus Christ is the summer hiatus of Fringe.

It is absolutely crazy that I have not yet posted on my favorite television obsession, Fringe. It is a visual feast, has some of the best acting on the small screen – nay, anywhere, and never ceases to gross me out and string me along and blow my mind every single week. Two of the main characters have played at least five versions of themselves in various universes and times… its out there, and it is fantastic.

In May, season 3 ended with one huge, gigantic cliffhanger. Seeing the result of the course of action their world was currently on, one of the main characters, Peter Bishop, made a sacrifice… to bridge the worlds, he somehow wiped himself from existence.

As fans, we sat there with our mouths hanging wide open, screaming: WHAT?! That doesn’t make sense! How can that be?! Did he die? Did he never exist? What does this mean? Is he coming back? Why would the writers do that? But we loved Peter Bishop! Joshua Jackson is awesome, how could you do this?! What on earth is going to happen now?

Theories started flying around the internet. It didn’t help that the people who were actually employed by the show as cast had no clue what was coming next either. Confusion, chaos, despair, curiousity, set in.

Some thought maybe he would reappear as an observer, but then that theory was blown out of the water when Mr. Jackson appeared at Comic-Con in observer gear, making fun of us all.

Somehow he will be back… we know the question has changed from “Who is Peter Bishop?” (as in, what are you talking about, that guy never existed) to “Where is Peter Bishop?” But that doesn’t necessarily set our minds at ease until we actually see the character reintegrated into the show. He is part of the trinity of the core cast and the relationships he has formed with the other characters, especially his father, MAKE the show what it is.

Those final two minutes of the season finale were, in a miniscule way, comparable to the final days of the disciples with Jesus. Things were going well, but were difficult. Uncertainty was in the air, but you knew you were in good hands.

And then all of a sudden, wham-bam, the whole universe falls apart.

I know that this is a stretch. But in our lifetime it is always going to be a stretch to imagine what it would have been like to be a disciple at that time. Nothing we experience can compare to the confusion and despair they must have felt to watch their teacher – their messiah – brought up on charges, beaten, and killed. Those agonizing days would have been utterly heartbreaking. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. They didn’t know what was going to happen next. And every possibility seemed impossible.

The world of entertainment tries to capitalize on those moments of uncertainty. Every single narrative arc relies upon those natural breaks in the story that leave you wanting more, that have you hanging on by the seat of your pants because you need to know what happens next. Every 23 minute comedic episode uses the commercial breaks to leave you guessing as to the punchline that inevitably awaits at the end. We all want our loose-ends tied up… but the ride is so much more fun when we have some moment of sheer panic in between.

That particular season finale: “The Day We Died” was superb. Narratively speaking, it pulled all of the right strings… or all of the wrong ones, if you want to think about it that way. It left you simply aghast and what this could possibly mean in the context of a story you wanted to immerse yourself in.

Yes, it’s television.

Yes, it is only a story.

But for someone as far removed from the crucifixion of Christ as we are today, sometimes that too, feels like little more than a story.

And as I wait in anxious anticipation for the season to start again in September… I realize that I do so with much more hope than the frightened disciples huddled together in a room.

In Fringe, the worlds will never be the same again after that ending.

For the disciples and for us, the world would never be the same, either.

I find myself at times incredibly jealous of the gifts of writers on some of these shows. They capture, week in and week out an intensity of emotion and pathos that truly brings the words and the narratives to life.

My only hope is that as a pastor, as someone who tries to live these scriptures and teach these scriptures, I might help bring to the words the same kind of intensity and longing and doubt and confusion as some of my favorite television shows do every episode.

what to do when your faith is shaken

Posted on August 14, 2010Leave a comment

On a television show like “Bones,” faith and reason, science and religion, seem to be inevitably at odds. That is part of the beauty of the chemistry between Booth and Brennan – this dynamic interplay reminds me that just because something appears to be contrary doesn’t mean it has nothing in common.

While there could be many places to start with an episode called, The Devil in the Details, an episode about a body found lit on fire in the middle of a Roman Catholic sanctuary, it was the last few minutes that caught my eye.

Brennan asks Booth a simple question – how is your faith not shaken after a case like this one? And his simple answer is, it is. He’s going to lie awake tonight and toss and turn and question and doubt. But he trusts that his faith will come back as much as he trusts the sun will rise the next morning.

My mind immediately went to the philosopher Hume, who took empiricism to its farthest limits when he posited that just because the sun has come up every other morning is no guarantee that it will come up on the next morning. Cause and effect is not something that we can see or touch or taste.

Brennan’s response lies somewhere between Hume and faith. She is concerned with causes and effects and when she sees an effect, like a dead person, and cannot determine the cause – her ability to trust in the basics of science and reason is tested. But throughout it all – even when she can’t see what she is looking for, she can trust that 2+2 = 4. “There are mysteries that I will never understand, but everywhere I look I see proof that for every effect there is a corresponding cause… even if I can’t see it. I find that reassuring.”

I was once told that our faith needs to be strong enough so that if one of the pillars of that faith is shaken, the whole thing won’t come tumbling down. The question always seemed to me – what are the pillars that are okay to be shaken? And what are the immovable and unshakable tenants of our faith?

For Booth and Brennan – it was the simple things that provided the grounding. The sun coming up. A simple mathematical equation. Something that we can see with our eyes, something that will never possibly be untrue. We may not know why… but we simply know.

Despite all of the questions of theodicy and good and evil and causes and effects… what are the things that we KNOW? what are the things that never go away – no matter how much our faith is shaken and how we are tossed about? what is your grounding, your anchor in the midst of a storm?

Whether it is rational or not – or biblical or not – I always go back to the simple premise that God is love. No matter the tragedies in the world, I trust that God is love and that God is present with those who are hurting. I trust that whatever evil has befallen us, that God is love and that love will conquer all. It is as true for me as the sun rising in the morning or a mathematical equation. Throw in all of the clouds and variables that you want… the earth will keep spinning and God will still be love.

the intersection of God and my remote control

Posted on July 28, 2010Leave a comment

I can’t deny that I am a fan of television. There is something about a 42 minute episode that pulls me in, wraps me its little nugget of truth, and then sets me free to think and ponder.

It is the storytelling that does it. The way the larger arc of the narrative unfolds over a season or a series, but each episode also is its own self-contained tale. It’s the conflict and the resolution of a good drama that keeps me coming back for more. Maybe I am so intrigued because I find it to be an excellent model for preaching… a consistent message that unfolds over time – yet also succinct morals and takehomes that get you by from week to week. I want to be a better storyteller in my preaching, and television is one of the main ways that we wrap ourselves up around common narratives.

During the regular season, I would sit at home in front of my television and would be connected with friends and colleagues all across the country who were enjoying the budding romance between Rachel and Finn (Glee), or who were tearing up as Sun and Jin sunk together in the submarine (Lost). The age of technology has made it possible for us to laugh and cry with people far away over twitter and facebook.

But it is not only about the creation of a shared story and narratives to enjoy. Woven into these entertaining episodes are also deep questions that we need to wrestle with. What is the nature of good and evil? What happens to us after we die? What is the relationship between science and religion? What can we truly know? Do the ends justify the means? What makes me a good person? What is faith? Where is God in medicine? How do we make difficult ethical decisions? What is family? Who is God?

Over on my other blog, I occasionally take time to write down some of the thoughts that pop into my head after a television show – but that isn’t the sole purpose of “salvaged faith.” So, I needed a new space to gab about those horrific and awe inspiring moments that catch me off guard from time to time. I needed a new space to really spend some serious time reflecting on the images of God and of humanity that we find on television… a space to navigate with others these entertaining, enlightening, and challenging stories. Let’s turn the dial… and begin!