I Love You

A reflection based on Isaiah 43:1-7

In a sermon the first Sunday of Advent,  I spoke about Leon.  I told you that I felt like he and his wife, Katy, embodied hope.  But I also think that they shared one of the most powerful love stories that I have had the privilege of witnessing.  I spoke about his time in Italy during WWII, driving pack mules through the mountains and wondering if he would live to get back to the base.  They were shelled going up the mountain with supplies and shelled going back down the mountain with empty packs. And we talked often about his time in Italy, and his concerns about making it home to her.  But the time passed while she waited at home and he longed to get back to her.  One day she received his telegram, “It’s been a long stretch from no man’s land back to you but I made it well and safe.  See you soon.  I am on my way to you and will never leave again.  Love, Leon.”

That would be an impressive story if it ended there.  But it doesn’t.  After 70 years of marriage, through the good times, and through the bad, they were side by side.  Then Katy fell and hit her head on the concrete of their garage.  It was a few days before Thanksgiving one year.  She had massive tissue and cranial injuries.  She never fully recovered from that. But she lived another year and half – much of that time she was unresponsive though she slept and woke.  Finally, though, they had to put in a feeding tube, because she quit eating when it was offered, gradually growing less responsive.  But for a year and a half, Leon got up every morning at 6 am, as he had always done, and by 7:00 he was at the nursing home, where he spent the day with her.  When it started to get dark, he would head home – he had macular degeneration and couldn’t drive after dark.

In a year and a half, I don’t think he missed a day.  So when someone asks me about love, I think of Leon and Katy, who shared a love that braved the difficult times, that weathered the storms, and that was faithful and true until the very end.

Many of us probably have a story like theirs somewhere in our families.  And in fact, some of us may be that story; we may be living out now.  But this kind of love is not easy – people who are living that kind of love story will usually attest to that.  I often tell couples who are doing premarital counseling that this kind of love is only possible when God is present in the midst of it; it is God’s Spirit that helps us to keep our focus on each other instead of self, and that is what enables us to weather the difficulties of life.  For on the road of life, we will find twists and turns, roadblocks, potholes, hills, mountains, and valleys.  And it is only our love for each other, supported by the love of God, that will sustain us.

Shortly after I received my mid-life call to ministry, I was called to Leslie’s bedside.  He was the first person I was to minister to who was dying.  And I don’t need to tell you that of all the difficulties of life that we have to face, this is probably the most difficult, to be dying and to know it – of all the dark shadows in the valleys of life, this one is probably the darkest.  Leslie had cancer – it had started as prostate cancer and metastasized.  During the final few days, his wife and children by his side, I was to see the depths of his love – not just for his family, but for his friends, his church, his minister, and above all for God.  For Leslie, the song, “Jesus Loves Me” was a song that deeply resonated with him.  He had a gentle spirit that even while dying embraced the deepest love for God and showed a new minister the power of faith.  It was several years later that I encountered another story, one that reminded me of Leslie. 

His name was Steve, and he, too, was dying of cancer.  He received a card from someone in his church – a card that, I am sure, was supposed to encourage him and was almost certainly sent with the best intentions.  But the handwritten note in the inside cover of the card suggested that if he had more faith that God might yet heal him.  Steve was hurt, but with the help of his brother (he no longer had the strength to write), he sent a reply:

“I share your faith in the power of God to heal and sustain us.  There may be times though when God’s greatest miracle is not the miracle of physical healing, but the miracle of giving us strength in the face of suffering….

As I read the Bible God’s promise is not to remove all of our suffering in this world, but in the next.  In this one, we will sometimes weep, suffer, and die.  But in the next we are promised that “God will wipe away all tears…and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former things are passed away” (Rev. 21:14).

I sincerely hope that if my cancer continues to grow; no one will see it as a failure of my faith, but that they might see me as faithful even in the face of death.  I do not claim to understand God’s will, but I do know that God loves me and I am in the Lord’s hands, whether in life or in death.”

And I think that Steve expresses a profound truth here about the relationship between love and faithfulness.  It is a truth that I saw in Leslie, and one that I saw in Leon and Katy.  So, I ask us to consider:  can we truly claim to love our spouse if we are unfaithful?  Can we say that we love our family when we are not faithful in providing for them?  Can we say we love our church and our church family if we are not faithful in being present for them on a regular basis?  Can we say we love God if we are not faithful to God, to respond to his call, and to embrace his grace?  And can that faithfulness be only in the good times, or must it also be when things are rough and the road ahead is rocky and uncertain?  And what about God, who states that he loves us, can we say that God has been faithful?

Louis Cassels used a parable in one of his books that he called the parable of the birds.  It is really popular around Christmas, and I would like to paraphrase it for you this morning.  A man refused to go to church one Christmas Eve with his family.  He claimed that God couldn’t love him, because God couldn’t understand him – an all-powerful God couldn’t know anything about his situation. So his family went on without him. 

Shortly after the family drove away in the car, snow began to fall. He went to the window to watch the flurries getting heavier and heavier. Then he went back to his fireside chair to read his newspaper. Minutes later he was startled by a thudding sound. Then another and another — sort of a thump or a thud. At first he thought someone must have been throwing snowballs against his living room window.

But when he went to the front door to investigate, he found a flock of birds huddled miserably in the snow. They’d been caught in the storm and, in a desperate search for shelter, had tried to fly through his large landscape window. Well, he couldn’t let the poor creatures lie there and freeze, so he remembered the barn where his children stabled their pony. That would provide a warm shelter, if he could direct the birds to it.

Quickly he put on a coat and boots and then he tramped through the deepening snow to the barn. He opened the doors wide and turned on a light, but the birds did not come in. He figured food would entice them. So he hurried back to the house, fetched breadcrumbs and sprinkled them on the snow. He made a trail to the brightly lit, wide-open doorway of the stable. But to his dismay, the birds ignored the breadcrumbs and continued to flap around helplessly in the snow.

He tried catching them. He tried shooing them into the barn by walking around them and waving his arms. Instead, they scattered in every direction, except into the warm, lighted barn. And then he realized that they were afraid of him. To them, he reasoned, I am a strange and terrifying creature. If only I could think of some way to let them know that they can trust me — that I am not trying to hurt them but to help them. But how?  Any move he made tended to frighten and confuse them. They just would not follow. They would not be led or shooed, because they feared him.  “If only I could be a bird,” he thought to himself, “and mingle with them and speak their language. Then I could tell them not to be afraid. Then I could show them the way to the safe warm barn. But I would have to be one of them so they could see and hear and understand.”

Our passage from Isaiah this morning comes from a section of the book that many scholars call ‘2^nd Isaiah.’ This prophet who also calls himself Isaiah may have actually written from Babylon.  Israel’s captivity is coming to an end and they are celebrating, preparing to return to their beloved Jerusalem.  But Isaiah cautions them:  their life will not be easy.  God tells them, and us, through his prophet that life will be difficult, we will encounter times of fire – representing difficulty and struggle, stress and fatigue – as well as times of flooding and rushing waters – representing chaos and uncertainty, failing health, loss, and grief.  God doesn’t say “if” in the prophet’s words.  He says “when” – still, he assures us that he loves us.  And it is a love that is marked by faithfulness, a love that will offer a ransom for the people who call on his name.  God will give nations for us; God will pay just about any price for us.  But it won’t be good enough will it?

So God will pay the ultimate price, becoming one of us to demonstrate his love.  You are mine; I have called you by my name.  You are precious in my sight and honored and I love you.  Amen.

Why did the turkey cross the road?

In a rather campy TV show (now a motion picture) one of the prominent characters used to remark, "I love it when a plan comes together." I agree.  Unfortunately they do not often come together for me in the precise way that I imagine. 

Christmas can be such a stressful time.  But I was determined this year to have a relaxed Christmas.  It started out well enough.  Morning coffee with cinnamon roles, the family opening gifts, and a little Bing Crosby on the stereo.  Pleasant enough.  It continued well as I made stuffing and stuffed my turkey - extra stuffing placed in a Corning Ware dish to bake later.  By 9:30 the bird was stuffed and in the oven, extra stuffing in a dish in the fridge, and I was relaxing with hot tea in front of a fire.  It was going well - perhaps too well.

That's when it happened.  The power went out.  For years the electric companies have sought to convince us that electricity is inexpensive and reliable as a power source.  So, yes, our house is all electric.  Christmas morning, 24 degrees outside and the turkey and two pies in the oven and the power is out.  At least we had the fireplace for warmth.  But after an hour, I was concerned about the status of the turkey sitting partially cooked (it had cooked about an hour when the power went off) in a rapidly cooling oven.  With no signs that the power was coming back soon, I made an executive decision.  I told my wife that I thought I ought to carry the bird up to the church (about 5 minutes away) and put it in the oven there until our power came back.  How did I know the church had power?  As it turned out there was a large area of our fair town without power, but no, the church had power - I called the office on my cell phone and the answering machine picked up (it's electric).  So I bundled up, covered the turkey roasting pan, and armed with plenty of potholders, I set off for the church in my truck.

I had only had the turkey in the church oven for about 20 minutes when I received a text message: "the power is back on." Wonderful.  But what to do?  Just sit there by myself and allow the turkey to finish cooking in the church oven (another 2.5 hours or a bit more) or take a chance, take it home, and hope the power remained on.  What would you do?  It was Christmas after all, and I wanted to be with my family.  So, the turkey made the trek back to the house, bundled in its roasting pan and nestled into a bevy of potholders.  With the turkey safely ensconced in our oven, I had just settled into my favorite chair with another cup of tea and my new book when, you guessed it, the power went out again.

After about forty-five minutes of mounting anxiety about the power, I decided I could cook the turkey on the grill.  I built a fire and stoked it high, letting it begin to settle into a nice even bed of coals.  Then the tom moved from our oven to the grill.  Alas, it was very cold outside that day, with a stiff wind creating additional wind chill, and while the grill was working, it wasn't able to maintain even heat.  As I was losing my religion and my wife was suggesting taking the turkey back to the church, our eldest daughter arose from her nap and asked what all the fuss was about.  She has moved into her own place recently and assured us that she had power at her house.  "I want to shower and change anyway (she'd spent the night with us despite the fact she lives only a few blocks from us), so I can take the turkey and put it in my oven while I do that and then bring it back when I come." Problem solved.

Again bundled in its roasting pan and nestled in potholders, I sent the bird to her house.  Of course, about 15 minutes later the power came back.  I texted and told her the power was back but thought she should just keep the bird there until she was ready and then bring it back.  By then, it should be fully cooked.  I turned back to preparing the other items of our feast, my heart much lighter.  About fifteen minutes later, our youngest daughter who had left to visit friends came back in and asked if I would hold the door while she brought the turkey in. 

"How did you get the turkey?"
"I stopped at Em's on the way back and she sent it with me?"
Wow. Okay.

Sooo, once again the turkey took up residence in our oven.  But thanks be to God and the power company, the power stayed on and the rest of the meal preparation was uneventful.  Despite the turkey's many travels, it came out very well and the meal was excellent (even if I do say so myself).  Sometimes there are ups and downs and unexpected difficulties on the path we must travel.  It can be frustrating, maddening, and we can feel helpless and at the mercy of the cosmic chaos.  But if we trust in our God, if we trust that God is in control, then we must be confident that, in the end, it will turn out to be what God wants it to be.  Max Ehrmann writes in his poem "Desiderata" that "whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should."

In Isaiah 43:1-7, the prophet assures us that when (not if, but when) we encounter hardship, chaos and difficulty the Lord will be there to keep us.  My Christmas adventures with the turkey taught me a valuable lesson - one that I do really know, but sometimes forget - God is present in the world working in all things to achieve the purposes that serve Him.  No matter how tough the road we travel, the Lord is still there to bring us to the place we belong, in Him.

Blessings for the New Year!!

Time to Start Singing...

"Now when these things begin to take place, stand up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near." 

Luke 21:28                                                                           

  

Beginning on Thanksgiving day or the day after (and some even begin before) many radio stations start playing Christmas music.  While I realize that everyone, including the radio stations and their advertisers, is trying to capitalize on that 'magical' feeling of Christmas, I wonder about that practice.  After all, there is a limited playlist and it is about 30 days from that point until Christmas.  Still, it is one way that people begin to prepare for Christmas.  And I hear people beginning to hum or sing along with their favorite, familiar carols as they play on the radio or in the stores.  They are preparing for Christmas.  As Christians, as we prepare for Christmas, we should also be preparing to celebrate and worship the Christ child.  Advent is the beginning of that preparation for the community of Jesus that we call church.

The Lukan text for the first Sunday of Advent comes from the portion that is often referred to as the "Little Apocalypse" and speaks, many believe, of the end times.  When the disciples, just as curious as the rest of us about the timing of that event, ask when it will be, Jesus replies cryptically that we should watch for the signs, as our "redemption is drawing near."  And in a way, some of the early signs of Christmas, the radio and stores playing Christmas music, are a sign that our redemption is near as we begin the Advent journey toward Bethlehem and the celebration of the birth of Christ.  For the coming of Emmanuel, God with us, is the signal that our redemption has arrived.  It is a journey that, for us, begins at Advent and takes us through to Lent and finally culminates at Easter where our redemption is fulfilled in the resurrection of our Lord.

There is an old story of a minister who encountered a young boy who was carrying a rusty old cage with several birds fluttering around nervously inside.  The minister inquired of the boy as to where he got the birds and what his plans for them were.  The boy told him he had trapped them in the field.  He thought he would take them home and play with them for a while and then, probably, feed them to their cat.  At that point the minister offered to buy them - $5 for the cage, birds, and all.  The boy protested, "They're not worth much, they don't even sing well." But the minister said it didn't matter he would still give him the money.  The boy worried that he was cheating a man of God, but finally reassuring the minister that he was making a bad deal, he took the money.  He handed the cage to the man of God and walked away whistling, happy with his new income.  The minister walked around to the back of the church, opened the cage and let the birds fly free.  The boy had said the birds wouldn't sing, but winging their way heavenward, they sang mightily - they had been freed - redeemed.

It is easy to forget in the midst of living each day that we have been freed from our burdens of sin, fear, and despair.  In the day to day busy-ness of living, of family, and of work and play, we can grow tired and become focused on the struggles of life, instead of celebrating our blessings.  We become trapped in a cage of our own making.  Jesus comes to free us from that cage.  At Advent we begin our preparations to receive our Lord again.  It is a reminder in the midst of the ordinary of everyday that we cling to a special hope that is eternal.  It is fulfilled in the promise of God through the coming of Jesus.  Advent is here, Christmas is coming, our Lord is born anew and again in our waiting hearts, a promise of hope and redemption.  It's time to start singing....

Where does God go when we turn out the lights?

"We seldom, if ever, allow the Holy Spirit to interrupt our plans and lead us to worship so that we might see Jesus." Max Lucado in When Christ Comes

A friend shared a thought with me the other day. He suggested that the mark of a deepening spirituality was allowing things to happen instead of making them happen. I think this is an excellent understanding for us to embrace as the people of Christ. Too often we are intent on a purpose defined and goal driven life. Even in our faith, we live with a goal: get to heaven. Now I am not saying that it is wrong to desire a place in heaven. I am not suggesting that it is somehow inappropriate to set goals or to work with purpose. It is not. But if we truly embrace the grace filled love of God that we claim as followers of Jesus, then do we need to pursue heaven? Is it not freely given as part of the grace we receive upon our confession of faith in Jesus?

Goal oriented, purpose driven faith is counter productive to a deeper spirituality. "Wait a minute, Pastor Al, what about books like Purpose Driven Ministry and Purpose Driven Life?" I believe these have value to us as we shape the way we live, and I am not suggesting that either goals or purpose are bad. Rather, I suggest that there must also be a time and place when those are set aside to further our spiritual growth - a place and time where we allow things to happen instead of striving to be in charge and to create events. If we go full throttle all the time, with our eyes fixed on the goal, then what do we do when the Spirit interrupts our plans and our purposeful path? Do we allow the Spirit to distract us so that we might encounter God in a real way, or do we begrudge the distraction from our own goals.

Do we stop and interact with the God who has overtaken us, or do we relegate his Spirit to some attic corner of our spiritual house in order to stay focused on our own goals, desires, and purposes?

As you read the gospel writers' accounts of Jesus it is difficult not to notice that Jesus goes away by himself from time to time. He goes to the quiet places to pray, we are told. And while none of these writers actually say it, it is not difficult to infer that the quiet places are where God overtakes him, where God speaks into the depths of his Spirit.

We have all heard the old saying, "Stop and smell the roses" or Lennon's admonition that "Life is what happens when you are busy making other plans." We learn from a very young age to set goals and fix priorities and to focus on achieving our goals. This is defined as success. But do we understand that faith suggests that we must also take time to stop and to find the secret, quiet place so that we allow God to overtake us?

Our modern fast paced world makes it easy to put on spiritual blinders so that we can stay focused on our own goals, objectives, and plans. Lucado's statement should haunt us. Do we allow the Holy Spirit to interrupt our plans and lead us to worship, at home, at school, at work, at the stop light on Main Street or waiting in the checkout lane at the big box store, so that we might see Jesus? Do we find a quiet place where God can overtake us and the Spirit can speak to us?

One of my daughters once asked, as I was turning out the lights to the sanctuary after the Sunday service, "Where does God go when we turn out the lights?" I think the question is a good one for us to reflect on. Does God go to sleep in the darkened sanctuary until the next worship session, or does God go with us into our lives? Do we relegate him to the dark corners until next week, or do we allow him to tap us on the shoulder from time to time so that we might truly worship God with our hearts and our lives?

I pray that we will allow God to overtake us and the Spirit to distract us as we strive to live our lives each day. I pray that when we turn out the lights in the sanctuary on Sunday morning that the Lord will accompany us into the world so that we let Jesus lead us to worship in a variety of ways, every day.

Review: Christians and the Common Good

Our founding fathers established a constitutional provision regarding the practices of religion and government in our country, effectively, in the first amendment, providing for a separation between church and state. But as Christians, don't we have an obligation to live out our faith, not just in our individual lives and corporately as church, but also in the way we govern? If we are truly government of, by and for the people, then shouldn't government reflect the common faith that we purportedly share (about 75% according to some polls claim either belief in Christ or in God)? But this can be a slippery slope - we are a nation that celebrates freedom of religion and recognizes itself to have a pluralism in the larger faith community, celebrating a diversity of religious beliefs as part of our culture and heritage. Our founding fathers also recognized the danger in a particular faith or specifically, faith tradition, exercising too much influence on the government, or even becoming the government. The Puritans, the Pilgrims, Quakers, and Catholics, to name a few, all left England for the New World to escape the dominance of the Church of England, culturally, religiously, and politically. So how can we, as Christians, then exercise both our faith and our good citizenship? This is the topic that Chuck Gutenson explores in his book, Christians and the Common Good: How Faith Intersects with Public Life.

A brief disclaimer is in order before I proceed, however. Dr. Gutenson was one of my seminary professors, and I confess that he was, and remains, one of my favorite professors. His classes featured not only wonderful biblical exegesis, but he also brought that exegesis to bear on our modern culture, economics, and politics, pushing us to think about what God had to say to us in the ancient text about our modern world. He challenged us to think and explore, and in this book he continues that tradition that I first encountered from him in seminary so many years ago. Gutenson suggests that we avoid proof-texting the biblical passages (deciding what we believe about a topic and then searching the Bible until we find a text that supports that belief, or reading a short piece of scripture and ignoring the context of the writing to use it to support or affirm a specific policy or theology). Rather, he suggests, we should consider the outcomes that God desires for His creation. Then we should consider how a particular passage and its context contribute the outcome that God is seeking to achieve.

Many of us approach Scripture primarily to find out how God wants us to live, and Scripture becomes primarily about what we are to do. But it is only by grasping God’s character and nature that we begin to discern what God expects of us. In many places in Scripture, we are instructed to be imitators of God. However, if we are to imitate God, we must first know what God is like. Only then can we give serious attention to imitating God. We must approach Scripture realizing that it is the story of God’s interaction with humanity, and this story constitutes the disclosure of God’s nature.

Once we begin to grasp the overall story and to start to discern the nature of God, then we can begin to see what God desires, and yes expects, us to achieve as part of the Kingdom that has come into being in Jesus Christ:

God's expectations mostly relate to outcomes. In other words, we will come to see that God does not so much care whether we have this or that form of public institution. Instead, he is most concerned that certain things are accomplished, for example, that the poor and the marginalized are properly cared for and that the powerful are not left free to exploit the weak.

Gutenson begins his conversation about the Christian's responsibility for the public good by exploring various biblical passages, their context, and what outcomes God is seeking to form. The exegesis is sharp and well defined and Dr. Gutenson challenges his reader to think more deeply into the contexts and history of the texts and then prompts us to see the outcome that God wanted then and still wants from us as His people. He also challenges our common habit of focusing on just a few issues, not only to the exclusion of others, but in effect even ignoring the overall outcome that God desires.

Unfortunately, given the complexities of public life and the wide-ranging expectations God has for us, there is a remarkable degree of temptation to simply ignore issues. If one believes that God is only really concerned with a couple of issues, it becomes easier to ignore others. But human life, particularly our common public life, is just too complicated for this kind of reductionist approach.

Of course this approach leads us to reduce not just our focus, but also our faith,

Quite simply, a major reason for the increasing irrelevance of the church for today’s culture is its inability both to envision and to demand an alternative way of being in the world.

But Gutenson also maintains that we cannot simply rely on the public institutions to accomplish the task of the Kingdom. While government, he says, is ordained by God and can be used to accomplish Kingdom outcomes, we mustn't rely solely on government to accomplish the tasks that have been given to the body of Christ. For governments rely on power to function and hierarchy to manage, but the Kingdom is founded on sacrificial love. What Dr. Gutenson refers to as "a firm commitment to the common good" requires a balanced approach between government and and Kingdom. It also requires an acknowledgment that we have privatized religion in our culture and that we need to recognize that the public discourse must fundamentally involve our faith. As an adjunct history instructor I commonly suggest to students of early U.S. History that it is not possible to separate the faith traditions from a discussion about the beginnings of our nation. It the same way we must move away from the idea that faith is not part of the discussion around issues such as health care and gay marriage. However, I agree with Gutenson's assertion that rather than promote individual public policies in some of these arenas, we need to consider, as a people of faith, what outcomes God desires for us and seek a balanced approach to achieving the common good.

Let me begin by saying that I am sympathetic to those who say that help for those on the margins ought to come from the church first. However, I have to part company when some take the next step and suggest that such help can only come through the church. While we should be happy to see churches taking on ever increasing roles in the alleviation of the suffering of those in crisis, we simply cannot preclude government from being involved in this work. This is particularly true when churches are simply unable or unwilling to take on the enormous task. Human lives are just too precious and important. Poverty rates are too high for government not to be involved.

The general tendency to either try and mold the government into a biblical role, or to argue against any government involvement in social policy are both to be avoided. Some of our issues are too far ranging and too extensive to be alleviated by the church alone. And again, we must ask ourselves what the role of the Kingdom is in a government of, by, and for the people.

As we have argued throughout, trying to identify the biblical role of government is the wrong place to start. Rather, we must begin our inquiry by trying to discern the general contours of how God intends for us to live together. Of course, the answer to that question is not one that can be answered by appealing to a handful of popular biblical texts. There are numerous reasons why this approach is inadequate and will likely lead us to faulty conclusions. Instead, we must seek to develop an understanding of what would constitute a biblical view of community...

Gutenson avoids offering specific policy suggestions, but offers questions and reflections to begin a larger conversation around the ways to shape public policy to achieve the outcomes that God desires for His people. The book is well written, with very good biblical exegesis that will not weigh down the lay reader, but is in depth enough to hold the attention of the trained theologian. The dots are all connected as he explores the biblical mandates to build a just society and draws the reader into our modern public arena to bring those outcomes into the present. His writing style flows smoothly and continues to draw us forward from biblical foundations to modern politics and policy making and finally to considerations about specific challenges that currently lay before us as a nation and as the people of Jesus Christ.

Now its us up to us. Like Elisha before us, we are challenged to take up the mantle of the prophet and seek to find ways to dialogue around faith and public policy to create the outcomes that God is calling us to create. We are created in the image of God - creators - to make a difference in the world. Gutenson challenges us to take the dialogue to the next level. How will we respond?

Reflecting on Joplin - a year later

As we approach the anniversary of the May 22nd Joplin tornado and remember the devastation and those who were injured and those that died, we are often plagued by the question of why. I think this is a normal human emotion/reaction - we want to understand, we want to find meaning in the massive destruction.

Eugene Peterson in his introduction to the book of Joel in The Message writes that our understandings of God are at risk when disaster strikes - whatever it is. Natural disaster or illness, war or death, violence or a national catastrophe, we tend to cast God in the role of cosmic bad guy - "God is angry" or "God has abandoned us" or "God is judging us" or "God is punishing us for our sins." And while there may be some biblical precedents for these comments, often this is not the case at all. Enter the prophet Joel.

When the locusts attacked the crops of Israel, I suspect that many of them threw some of these same statements around like a blanket over the grieving shoulders of starving people. Sometimes we seem to want to be able to point to the responsibility of the victims, because if we can claim this to be their fault, then we can be certain it won't happen to us. But Joel disputes this idea. The locusts had destroyed major portions of crops creating an agricultural disaster. People were starving. Joel compares the devastation of the locusts to an invading army destroying everything in its path. The job of a prophet is to proclaim a Word from God. It is to turn people to God in the midst of such disasters. It is to point people to the presence of God in places where it seems as if God is absent. Joel does this admirably.

I would remind us that Joel speaks to us still - reassuring us that natural disasters happen not because of sin or judgment, but because of the natural order. In Romans 1 and 2, Paul goes to great lengths to remind us that God sees no degree to sin - no distinction in sin. All of the many 'sins' he lists in the 1st chapter of Romans are, he says, symptoms of the ONE sin which is a failure to honor God. All of us fall short in this regard and despite our best efforts to the contrary we continue to do so even as followers of Jesus. So if there is no degree to sin, why then would God punish some and not others? Why would a loving God choose to express anger through destruction that would devastate the saints along with the supposed sinners?

No, Joel reminds his people, and us as well, that we live in a world where natural cycles create disaster. Summer heating creates hurricanes over the ocean and thunderstorms on land. The clash of pressure zones creates thunderheads that can spawn tornadoes. Snow falls and blows, insects swarm, rains flood, and despite all the advances we have made scientifically we are still unable to stop or control these things.

But they are not a reflection of our sins or God's judgment.

Rather, I echo Joel in suggesting that the way we respond to these is important. In the midst of the disasters, how do we see God and how do we embrace each other? A crisis can devastate us, or, it can move us to a deeper faith commitment and draw us closer as a community. This is what I saw in Joplin - people who lifted each other up, who embraced each other, and who reached out in the name of the Trinitarian God to help each other. I saw people who found encounters with the divine presence in the midst of the rubble of ruined lives. I saw a community grow closer to God and to one another. I saw brothers and sisters from across the country pour in to bring whatever aid they could offer. I saw the face of Jesus in literally hundreds of thousands of people helping each other through the devastation and the crisis.

I continue to see that everyday in Joplin as we rebuild together. Like Joel, what I saw in Joplin was not an angry, judgmental God who was striking down saints and sinners alike. I saw a God who reached out in love and compassion to surround a broken community in the divine spark of love.

Interpretation: Jacob-wrestling God

When I was doing my undergrad work, I had a fellow student in one of my religion classes who was a purported Biblical literalist (purported because, in my opinion, no one truly reads the Bible literally, we pick and choose what texts we want to use literally and which we don't - but that's a topic for another day). He struggled through much of the semester because the instructor was not a literalist. Additionally, he struggled with the fact that she was female and an ordained minister (see 1 Timothy 2:11-15 for his dilemma). I began a discussion with him, that was extracurricular to class, regarding the role of women and the probable interpretive influences on some of the language, as we looked specifically at Romans 16:1 where Phoebe is declared to be a 'diakonon' (in Greek) in the church. The KJV (and the NIV still) translates this as servant or slave, where in other places when used for males it is translated "minister." Now the word is, at times, translated servant or servants, but when used as an adjective for a man, it is translated minister. So why, when used as an adjective for a woman, is it translated "servant"? My point for him, was that this was an interpretive choice. Someone chose how to interpret this word "diakonon" which has multiple interpretations into English, including, yes, servant, but also deacon, minister, and administrator. Why is Phoebe a servant, while Paul and Apollos in 1 Corinthians are ministers when described with the same word? It is an interpretive overlay based on the bias of the interpreters.

In his recent blog, my e-friend Christian Piatt, writes about the blow back being created by the new bible translation called "The Voice" because the interpreters have chosen not to use the word, 'Christ' but instead to translate the Greek word as "the Anointed One" - a perfectly acceptable interpretation of the Greek text. This is an interpretive choice made by the person or persons who are creating the translation; the word in Greek, Christos, can be interpreted as Christ or Messiah, or as Anointed One.

Several years ago, the newest translation receiving attention was "The Message." It was from Eugene Peterson, a minister for many years, as well as a linguist and a seminary instructor. I am a big fan of Peterson's books, of which there are many, and I am constantly impressed by the depth of his faith, the strength of the Spirit's Presence in his life and writing, and by his ability to tease out the meaning and context of so much of the original biblical texts. One of the criticisms from some, as I recall, was his use of the phrase, "Jacob-wrestling God." It is a phrase the speaks to me and it is a reference to Genesis 32 where Jacob wrestles with a "man" who turns out to be the angel of the Lord. Jacob actually wrestles a blessing from the Lord and because he does he receives a new name: "Israel - one who strives with God." So while the term is not one that we see in most mainstream translations there is something to the idea that the God of Israel is Jacob-wrestling God. Additionally it speaks to me in the metaphorical sense that we, too, at times wrestle with God. It is an interpretive overlay that is a choice made by the translator(s).

I remind people in Bible studies and in sermons on a regular basis that we are reading translations and therefore interpretations. The translators made choices and often the choices grew from their own biases. This is not a bad thing, but is simply the way it is. Marcus Borg suggests in the book he co-authored with N.T. Wright, "The Meaning of Jesus," that all of us have a lens that we look through. We cannot remove the lens, we simply need to recognize it is there. Piatt suggests in his blog that the King James Bible translators "had a specific human agenda" and that is true. It does not make the translation invalid, but we need to recognize that it exists. I agree with Piatt's conclusion that even if we read it in the original texts (assuming the Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic are the original texts - many scholars suggest that Matthew, Mark, and Luke used a common source that they dub "Q" - indicating the possibility that there are texts we do not have), we would still be interpreters, by virtue of the fact that we speak English (mostly) and have been raised in a culture that is completely foreign to what their cultures were like.

I again quote Piatt's conclusive thoughts, that for "some, these agendas folks brought (and bring)...are problematic and should be eliminated.... For me, the agendas are, in many ways as important as the word's on the page." I agree. We need, like Jacob, to wrestle with the Divine presence. We need to reject the notion that every answer has already been revealed and laid out in perfect order. The value of the journey lies in the journey and not in the arrival at the destination. Like Jacob, I believe that we receive the blessing when we have to wrestle with God - when we have to wrestle with the text and not just accept a literal reading of an interpreted text.

When we wrestle with the text, we also wrestle with our own agendas that we bring to the text as well. Like Borg, I believe that all of us have a lens we look through and it is important to understand what that lens is - not to simply deny its existence. When we read other translations and interpretations, it can give us opportunity not just to wrestle with God, but to wrestle with our preconceived notions of the text, of God, and of what we understand ourselves to be as followers of the Way. It is my belief that God is big enough to endure our questions, to withstand our challenges, and to wrestle with us as we strive to find our place in the world and in the body of Christ and to understand our relationships to one another and to the Divine.

Like Israel, we should welcome a Jacob -wrestling God and wrestle as well.