Category: Christian Discipleship

Good News from Good Friday Zombies?

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Values, Lectionary Texts

Sometimes God opens our ears to hear something we’ve missed dozens of times before. Last Sunday morning our church choir’s cantata included part of the Good Friday narrative from Matthew 27 and I heard words from verse 52 that I do not remember hearing before. Matthew describes three world-changing signs at the moment of Jesus’ death, and for some reason the second one has escaped my notice for all of these sixty plus years I have been observing Holy Week.

That verse says, “The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised.” That seems like a rather significant event for me to overlook, but I feel better after discovering that none of the other three gospels mention it either. My next thought was, “Why would anyone be surprised that Jesus arose from the dead on Sunday if all these other people had already done it on Friday?” Matthew answers that question for us in verse 53: “After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many.” The New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary explains that this way: “Since Matthew wants to connect the raising of the Israelite saints with the death of Jesus… but also wants Jesus’ own resurrection to be primary this results in the peculiar picture of the saints’ being resurrected on Good Friday but remaining in their tombs (or in the open country) until after the Easter appearances of Jesus. That we have theology in narrative form, and not in bare historical reporting is clear.” (Vol. VIII, p.493)

I have not had time to do any other serious research on this, but since I wanted to share it on Good Friday, here are my thoughts about this on the day when Christians remember the gruesome death and suffering of the Christ and reflect on what his life, death and resurrection mean for us today.

First, I have to move beyond the literal, historical filter my mind wants to use to understand this story. If a lot of once dead Jewish saints were walking the streets of Jerusalem, I’m sure someone would have made a zombie movie about it by now. So, there must be a deeper, symbolic meaning to this startling detail that only Matthew includes.

The other two signs Matthew describes before and after the tombs being opened may help; so here’s the three in context:
“51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. 52 The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised.53 After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many. 54 Now when the centurion and those with him, who were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were terrified and said, “Truly this man was God’s Son!”

The curtain of the temple refers to the barrier in the temple that separated the most holy place from the rest of the temple. This imagery foreshadows the destruction of the temple in 70 BCE which Matthew would have known about by the time these words were written. Symbolically they show how the death and resurrection of Christ destroy the barriers of the law and religiosity that separate the omnipresent spirit of God from human kind. God is not confined to the temple but is everywhere and always available to us all. The opening of the tombs shows that not even the final barrier of death itself can stop the life-giving eternal power of God.

And then, the more familiar third sign is the conversion of the Roman Centurion, the part of this narrative that is included in Mark and Luke’s gospels as well. That this Gentile is the first Christian believer to be liberated, not just by Christ’s sacrificial death, but by the faithful, calm, confident way he accepted and overcame his cross tells us that no false human barriers of race, creed, ethnicity, ideology or lifestyle can stop the love and power of God.

Jesus lived and taught and died and lives for all of God’s children. No matter what exactly happened on that hill far away 2000 years ago, the spirit of grace, love and mercy for us all lives and reigns for any and all who hear, see, and feel the power of resurrection and believe.

May whatever barriers are holding you back this day, whatever walls divide you from God or from your fellow human beings be blown away this Good Friday.

Giants vs. Grasshoppers, Numbers 14:1-10

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Values

“Giants vs. Grasshoppers” is not a metaphor for Kentucky vs. Hampton in the NCAA tournament, and yes I know there is no mention of giants or grasshoppers in Numbers 14 – but I promise you they will show up soon.

We are still in the murmuring/complaining section of the Hebrew’s wilderness journey, but before you complain about how long we’ve been there during this Lenten season, let me assure you that we’re almost finished. The Hebrews are now on the banks of the Jordan River, in sight of the land God has promised them – but that has not stopped the complaining, it has in fact raised the level from murmuring to murderous threats against their leaders.

To understand this new level of frustration, we have to go back and see what happened in chapter 13. When the Israelites finally near their destination after 40 long years in the wilderness they discover that there are already people living in their promised land. And just as the Israeli’s and Palestinians today have very different opinions about whose land this is, we’ve got a problem. So Moses and Aaron decide to send some spies across the river to scope out the situation and see how big a problem there is. They pick 12 men, one from each of the 12 tribes, to do reconnaissance, and when they return from their mission, the spies have good news and bad news. The land is indeed fertile and beautiful, just as God has promised, but the bad news is the current occupants are very powerful. And here’s where we hear about the giants and grasshoppers. The vast majority of the spies agree that the people living in the promised land are an overwhelming foe and to take them on would be like grasshoppers going battle against an army of Giants.

And that’s where Chapter 14 picks up the story. The whole congregation we are told raises a loud cry and weeps. They ask Moses, again, “Why have you brought us here to die by the sword? Our wives and children will become booty. Let’s choose a captain and go back to Egypt.”

Isn’t that how we often feel in the wilderness? When we think we’ve almost achieved a hard fought goal and someone else gets the promotion, or a serious illness derails our plans for retirement, or a tragic accident turns a family’s life upside down. Granted we may need to cut the Israelites some slack. Remember these poor people have been traveling in difficult circumstances for 40 years! To realize how long that is, think about how long ago 1975 was. Diana and I were on a trip two years ago to China and our return trip involved flights from Shanghai to Beijing to New York, and then an 11 hour bus ride back to Columbus. All tolled we were traveling without a break for 36 hours, and I can tell you we were not the happiest of campers. I can’t imagine 40 years!!!

Sometimes when a goal seems impossible – when the mountain is just too high to climb, when our patience and endurance are at the breaking point, we just want to throw in the towel and give up. Take us back to Egypt – things were better there. Really? Sometimes memory plays tricks on us. There was a book out a few years ago titled The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap, by Stephanie Coontz. One of the things Coontz says in her book is that while we tend to romanticize the 1950’s as a period of peace and prosperity before all the turmoil and conflicts of the 60’s and 70’s, we forget how oppressed women and minorities were, and that beneath the façade of domestic tranquility there was a hidden unrest. Coontz’s evidence for that is that valium and other popular drugs for depression and anxiety came into widespread use during that decade. It wasn’t all “Ozzie and Harriet” or “Leave it to Beaver.”

Fear distorts our memories of how things were in the past. As the theme song from the movie “The Way We Were” says, “What’s too painful to remember, we sometimes choose to forget.” That’s what happens to the Hebrews. They are so disappointed and fearful about the challenges and obstacles they see before them, they are ready to give up when they are so close but so far from their goal. Someone once told me that there are no trophies for running a 99 yard dash – you have to finish the race to win the prize.

We’ve also noticed in these murmuring chapters in Numbers that complaining is contagious. The text says, “The Whole Congregation” is ready to give up. When I was a kid and wanted something my friends had – a new toy or the coolest clothes – or if I wanted to go somewhere that I knew my parents probably would not approve of, I would often tell my mother, “But everybody else has one! All the other kids at school are going!” Her response was often, “Name Three.” And more times than not I couldn’t. End of discussion. So do you think “the whole congregation” might be an exaggeration?

Actually we know it is, because among the 12 spies there is a minority report. Two of the twelve, Caleb and Joshua, have a different take on the situation. They have seen the same evidence as the other 10. They all agree the land is flowing with milk and honey and would be a great place to settle. They all agree the people living there are a formidable problem. But Joshua and Caleb come from a perspective of faith instead of fear. They say, “If God is pleased with us – if we don’t rebel against the Lord, God will deliver on his promise. If God is on our side, nothing else matters.”

And how do the people respond? Verse 10 says, “The whole congregation threatened to stone them.” Dreamers, visionaries and prophets often meet with that kind of reaction – think Copernicus or Galileo. Psychologists explain it this way. When someone has a vision of reality that is very different from ours it creates what is called cognitive dissonance, which is just a fancy way of saying discomfort because things don’t line up the way we think they should. That can create fear and the need to do something to relieve the dissonance.

For example, we can choose to just ignore the problem, as in denial of climate change. Or we can remove ourselves from the situation–end a relationship, quit a job, move to a new home, etc. But on rare occasions where the dissonance is extremely high, things can turn violent, and history is full of martyrs like Jesus, Gandhi, and Joan of Arc, Lincoln, Martin Luther King and many less famous ones who have met that fate. And that’s what Caleb and Joshua are facing on the banks of the Jordan. If you read on in Numbers you will discover that God is much happier with Caleb and Joshua’s faithful response than the 10 other spies and the rebellious congregation. Because of their fear and complaining none of the latter group will be allowed to enter the promised land, but Caleb and Joshua are rewarded for their courage and faith and lead the new generation at last to their new home.

I was talking with a woman a few weeks ago who was dealing with a terrible family crisis. She was feeling like a grasshopper facing gigantic new challenges. When I suggested she just take things one day at a time and break the problems down into smaller pieces, she said, “I know, Steve, I tell other people that all the time. But I can’t live that way. I have to be in control and know what’s going to happen.” That’s the way we all would like life to be, but it simply isn’t.

And because it isn’t we all need faith and the support of others who are facing the giants with us. One of the problems with us rugged individualistic Americans is that we aren’t good at showing our own vulnerabilities and letting others in. We keep up a good front even when we’re dying on the inside. Another old Barbra Streisand song, “People,” describes that situation very well:

“We’re children, needing other children
And yet letting a grown-up pride
Hide all the need inside
Acting more like children than children.”

I was listening to a webinar the other day about transitions in life and was struck by a comment from Robert C. (Bob) Atchley, Distinguished Professor of Gerontology (emeritus) from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, who said, “All of life is Assisted-Living.” Think about how true that is. We use that term “assisted-living” to describe a level of care for elderly people, but it describes all of life. None of us would have come into life or survived infancy and childhood without someone to care for us and teach us. But somewhere along the line we get the notion that we don’t need parents anymore telling us what to do. We move out into the wilderness of adolescence and adulthood on our own, yearning for independence and self-sufficiency. That personal quest is a necessary part of growing up and sometimes it feels great, but when faced with giants, it feels oh so very lonely.

Feeling alone and isolated in the wilderness is a major theme in the movie “Into the Woods.” The song “No one Is Alone,” sung by the Baker and Cinderella, both of whom have suffered terrible losses in the woods, addresses that issue this way:

“Maybe we forgot: they are not alone.
No one is alone.
Hard to see the light now.
Just don’t let it go
Things will come out right now.
We can make it so.
Someone is on your side
No one is alone.”

People of faith know who is on our side. And people of faith also know that we need to be there for each other. Jimmy, a little boy was scared one night by a thunder storm raging outside his bedroom window. When his father came into his room to comfort him he assured him by reminding him that he had learned in Sunday school that Jesus was always with him. Jimmy said, “yes, I know that Dad, but sometimes I just need someone with skin on them.” We need to be those skin-covered people for each other, especially in the wilderness times of life, but if we pretend we don’t need each other, thinking that we can avoid our problems by ignoring them – we cut ourselves off from the very support we need.

I want to finish today by talking about another kind of wilderness experience – one that is voluntary. When we think of the wilderness we often think of it as times of crisis, dealing with unexpected problems, but the wilderness can also be a time of intentional withdrawal from the distractions of daily living to get a better perspective on life – to see the bigger picture. Lent is a good time to do that, but any season of our lives will work. Someone once told me it’s hard to remember that your goal is to drain the swamp when you are up to your waist in alligators. Times of solitude for prayer and refection are needed when we get out of the swamp and see the bigger picture to remember or clarify what our purpose in life really is.

That’s not easy. We are all busy with multitudes of responsibilities. We need to intentionally build time into our schedules regularly to stop and evaluate where we are on life’s journey, to make mid-course corrections, to let go of regrets, guilt, grudges and other burdens that weigh us down. This is especially important at critical times that are rites of passage from one stage of life to another – adolescence to young adulthood, mid-life crises, career changes, new relationships, empty nesting, and retirement. Rather than jumping from one phase of life to another the way our culture says we “should,” taking time off to reflect on what God wants us to be and do is critical.

There is no need to be afraid of choosing to go to the wilderness because no one is alone. We journey with an eternal God who ultimately conquers all giants. Time in the wilderness is time to sort out priorities about the legacy we truly want to leave for future generations; to remember our real goal in life isn’t more stuff and wealth. The legacy we want to leave is faith and values for a life that is truly abundant in the deepest meaning of that term. Our real promised land is a life of peace that passes human understanding, and reaching that goal comes from saying “no” to the majority, who let fear rob them of their goal, and trusting and obeying the still small voice of God that says “put your money on the grasshoppers.”

Preached at Northwest United Methodist Church, Columbus, Ohio, March 22, 2015

Lenten Prayer

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Values

O Gracious God, we pause to pray on this 4th Sunday of Lent, knowing that we are drawing ever closer to the dark days of Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. Jesus’ wilderness time takes on a whole new level of intensity in the upper room, in the Garden and at the place of the skull. We approach that suffering tentatively, wanting to follow him through that lonesome valley, daring to sing boldly, “Lord We are Able, our spirits are thine.” But when we open our mouths we hear Peter’s words instead, “Who me? No, I’m not with him.”

When life gets tough, they say “the tough get going.” But far too often we murmur and complain instead. Remind us again, O Lord, that many challenges and disappointments in life are simply beyond our control – and it has always been so. Our faith tradition was born and refined in the crucible of wilderness wandering and wondering. When we are suffering from broken relationships, grief, or loss of our sense of purpose and direction in life, we know our ancestors in the faith have all been there and done that before us.

When we fret over obstacles that we must face at school or work or home – when things aren’t going the way we thought they would – help us draw strength from Moses and the Hebrews in the wilderness and Jesus’ temptation by Satan or his night of trial in the Garden of Gethsemane. When things are bad, remind us to compare our problems in life to the generations before us who survived the Great Depression and two world wars. When faced with our own Jordan Rivers to cross, we can draw inspiration from brave souls like those who crossed the Atlantic to settle this promised land, or those who crossed the Edmund Pettus bridge in Selma to keep the torch of freedom burning, or all the anonymous saints who simply overcome the challenges of life with daily random acts of kindness to their fellow wilderness travelers.

O God, you know what is on our hearts today and every day. Hear our prayers for ourselves and others we know who are hurting. Pour the balm of Gilead on our broken lives and divided world. And as we share our needs and desires, our hopes and our fears, remind us again O God of resurrection, of all those who have gone before us to show us how faith can take our wilderness journeys and transform them into a time of spiritual renewal.
Remind us that we are never alone in the wilderness as we offer together the prayer of our risen Christ.

Northwest United Methodist Church, Columbus, Ohio, March 15, 2015

Cruising with a Mission

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Values

Some people think I’m “at sea” most of the time, but as I started to write this I was literally. It was 80 plus degrees on the Western Caribbean on a late February morning, and I was feeling a twinge of guilt when I thought of my friends back home in “snOwHIO” – but only a small twinge. A much bigger guilt pang came from the memory of our brief time in Trujillo, Honduras, the final port of call on our 7-day cruise.

After a brief introduction to the history and culture of this poor Central American country from an amazingly well-informed and friendly tour guide whom we were surprised to learn is a 16-year-old high school student, we enjoyed lunch and time on a lovely private beach before heading back to our ship. The contrast between our ride in an air-conditioned bus to a luxurious cruise ship and the living conditions we saw from the bus were even starker than I expected. We knew from reading and from friends who have been to Honduras on mission trips that it is one of the poorest countries in the world, but seeing women doing their laundry in a river and crowded, dilapidated homes with dirt floors packed together on muddy dirt streets adds a dose of reality that left my wife and I wondering what to do with that experience.

The situation is even more dire because we learned that there is no public education in Honduras. That means poor families who cannot pay to educate their children have no viable means of ever breaking out the cycle of poverty. Little children as young as 5 or 6 trying to sell us sea shells or bananas as we walked by have little hope of a better future and are vulnerable to being seduced by drug dealers and human traffickers.

Is it wrong for those of us who can afford to travel to visit places like Honduras just to escape the discomfort of northern winters? Do our brief stops in places like Trujillo do more harm than good for people who need tourist dollars to improve their economy? Those are complex questions, and Trujillo is a fascinating case study. Cruise ships have only been stopping in Trujillo and its new port called The Banana Coast, since last October. The amenities in Trujillo suffer in comparison to those in well-established cruise stops, but some fellow passengers on our ship who had been on the very first cruise ship to stop there 4 months ago were amazed at how much improvement there had been in such a short time. The residents of this small city on the north coast of Honduras seem genuinely excited and pleased to welcome tourists. In the city and on rural roads children and adults all waved to our bus as we drove by. They need and want tourism to flourish there as it has done in other Caribbean countries.

I had a wide range of feelings in the 7 short hours we were in Trujillo. There were selfish and petty thoughts because of the inconveniences–like being crammed into small tender boats for transport to and from the cruise ship because the port is unable to handle large ships, or delays in our trip to the beach because of narrow streets and bumpy rural roads not ready for prime time vacationers, or simultaneous irritation and compassion for persistent street vendors trying to make a living, and admiration for Denison, our young our guide who works days and attends high school in the evenings–all topped with the aforementioned helping of guilt.

Before leaving on our cruise we were blessed to be able to spend a week with some of our kids and grandkids in Houston. While we were there I was struck by a conversation one evening at the dinner table between our bright 11 year-old granddaughter and her parents. They were talking about a situation she had experienced at school, and her parents asked her if she knew what “integrity” is. She thought for a minute before saying, “I think it’s one of the seven deadly sins.” We got a good laugh at her expense, and a good discussion of what integrity means followed. I am the last person to criticize and in no way mean this to be critical. I doubt that I had any idea what integrity was until I was twice Katilyn’s age. But her response has stuck with me because it sometimes seems like far too many adults in our world fail to grasp the critical meaning and importance of integrity or avoid it like it is indeed a deadly sin.

Asking the integrity question about our experience in Honduras reminded me of a line from one of my favorite movies, “Bull Durham.” There’s a young brash pitcher in that classic baseball movie named Eby Calvin “Nuke” LaLoosh, played by Tim Robbins, and Susan Sarandon’s character, Annie Savoy, describes Nuke at one point by saying that he “isn’t cursed with self-awareness.” Self-awareness, of course, is not a curse but a basic life skill, but at times, like when it spoils your vacation with feelings of guilt, it can feel like a curse.

What does living in integrity mean for disciples of a Lord who tells us that how we treat the least of our brothers and sisters is how we treat him? If I say to Jesus, “But when did I see you in poverty or in need of safe drinking water or adequate education?” (cf. Matt. 25:31-46), will he say, “Remember that vacation in Honduras?” Integrity and self-awareness do not come with on-off switches. We can’t turn them off while we go on vacation.

One of the benefits of travel to other parts of the world is learning more about other cultures. Never in human history has cross-cultural awareness and appreciation for our rich diversity been more needed. For better or worse we are world citizens and our global village is getting smaller and smaller. The information age has wiped out barriers like distance and geographical separation that once made cultural or sectarian and ethnic differences more separate and distinct. Today integrity cannot mean cultural purity and myopic prejudice against beliefs, customs and ideologies other than our own. Different does not equal wrong, and the only way to overcome those attitudes is through understanding. Some of that understanding can come through education and learning critical thinking skills, but it is better learned through direct human interaction.

The good news is that we humans don’t come into the world with innate prejudices. As the great song from Rogers and Hammerstein says “You’ve got to be taught to hate and fear” (see my post “Life Lessons I Didn’t Learn in Class,” (Feb. 24, 2014) for more about that song and the musical “South Pacific.” My point is that because cultural biases are attitudes we learn from others they can also be unlearned. Cruise ships are a wonderful place to improve cultural understanding and competence because they are a microcosm of the world. On our ship, the Norwegian Jewel there were over 60 nationalities represented in the 1000 member crew. Add 2400 passengers, all living in close quarters, and you have a captive audience with the potential of being transformed from strangers into a multicultural community.

Having been on several cruises I have learned that passengers can either treat the people who feed us and clean our cabins as servants or get to know them as people. Because the cruise staff works very hard and have many responsibilities there isn’t a great deal of time to talk with them, but my wife and I have learned that taking the opportunity when we can is a great way to learn from servers in the dining room or cabin stewards about their personal lives. On this cruise we were especially touched to hear about the sacrifices and loneliness these people experience from two servers. Nashley (Columbia) and Maricel (Philippines) are both single moms who leave their children at home with grandparents for 8-10 months of the year while working long hours on the ship. Both of them said they enjoy their work, but when we asked if they wanted their children to work on cruise ships when they are adults they immediately said “no.” They want something better for their children.

On one of our final nights on board, Jamie, our cruise director, after introducing many representatives of the crew commented on her desire to create a feeling among crew and guests of being a “family” on board. She said she thought the U.N. could learn from their crew how to live and work together. My desire is to learn from Norwegian Cruise Lines what they do to create that community within their crew and how to share that experience more intentionally with guests. Our impression is that something is being done there that we have not felt on other ships and should be affirmed and expanded.

Coincidentally (or was it a God-incident?) the same evening I was writing about this and the cruise director mentioned it, we stopped by one of the lounges where a musical group was doing a tribute to the Beatles, and one of the most powerful songs they did was “Imagine.” As the audience joined in singing the powerful words to that great old song, they seemed more relevant and needed in our broken world than ever, and in that small sample of our global village much needed and appreciated words of hope.

“Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, too

Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you will join us
And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions
I wonder if you can
No need for greed or hunger
A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people
Sharing all the world

You, you may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you will join us
And the world will live as one.” – John Lennon

It’s tempting to end on that idealistic note, but just as cruises end and life returns to reality, so must this reflection. On one of the final days of our cruise I overheard a fellow passenger talking about his time in Honduras. He said he enjoyed it, but then added, “I saw too much poverty. Once you’ve seen that don’t want to see it again.” He’s right. Witnessing human suffering is not pleasant and not something we go looking for on vacation. But it’s real and it’s not going away. Jesus told his disciples, “The poor you will always have with you, and you can help them any time you want.” (Mark 14:7). The question is do we want to enough to figure out a way.

Spiritual Euthanasia

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Politics, Faith and Values

Recent debates about the Affordable Care Act and Physician-assisted suicide have prompted important ethical discussion about rationed care, death panels and euthanasia. These are unavoidable issues as long as we treat health care as a commodity to be traded in the market place instead of as a basic human service deserved by all regardless of economic status. A related but different concept is that of triage, a necessary strategy for dealing with emergency or critical situations where difficult decisions must be made quickly about which victims of a disaster or epidemic should be treated immediately with the limited available resources, who can wait for care, and who unfortunately is beyond saving.

Making such choices is necessary because of the limits of what modern medicine, as amazing as it is, can do and because of the unavoidable truth of human mortality. I have become painfully aware recently of a similar phenomenon in the church that is as unnecessary as it is misguided, an oxymoronic philosophy of church growth I have labeled “spiritual euthanasia.” I imagine this deadly virus is contagious across denominational boundaries but I can only address my own United Methodist Church from personal experience.

In our United Methodist conference the latest church growth cure all for what ails the church is called the Missional Church Consultation Initiative, and I was serving on a church staff where this program was adopted 2 years ago. The foundation document for this initiative is a book by John Edmund Kaiser, Winning on Purpose: How to Organize Congregations to Succeed in Their Mission. Kaiser is an Evangelical Baptist, a telling and strange choice for the far more open and theologically diverse non-doctrinal United Methodist Church.

Kaiser’s basic model for church structure and governance is one of a lead pastor who has total control over the membership and operation of the church board and staff. As one reviewer of the book says, “no one leads that way anymore.” Apparently that is not true for desperate church leaders more concerned with saving their institution than with sound theology.

If it were not so fundamentally wrong I would admire the clever strategy this initiative uses to stage a coup that overthrows the long-established democratic system of church governance in the Methodist Church. Instead of respecting the basic Protestant principle of the priesthood of all believers, Kaiser’s structure of the church is intentionally designed to eliminate all dialogue, disagreement, criticism and collaboration. Staff members are told their function is to carry out the mission of the Sr. Pastor and are required to sign a covenant pledging obedience and loyalty to the directives of the Sr. Minister. Such a hierarchical structure may work well in the military or with a staff of unquestioning people; but it will never produce the kind of creative and dynamic thinking that a diversity of opinions and open communication requires for dealing with the ambiguities and mysteries of theological inquiry and spiritual growth. Having spent 18 years teaching and promoting collaboration at Ohio State University, it is very clear to me that Kaiser’s leadership model violates every basic tenet of collaborative organization and leadership.

And that brings me to Spiritual Euthanasia as one very important result of uncritical thinking. Spiritual euthanasia occurs as a form of collateral damage when pastors and congregational leaders accept what the church growth experts and consultants say as gospel just because they say so, namely that all resources must be focused on reaching new young families at the expense of providing ministries and care for existing members of the church. One consultant told our staff that we shouldn’t worry about devoting resources to the older people in the congregation because “they won’t be around in 20 years.”

I understand the emphasis on reaching and discipling new people, but making disciples is not a one-and-done strategy and must include continual spiritual growth and nurturing, prophetic and pastoral preaching and teaching and opportunities for mission work for those already in the church family. Any strategy that emphasizes one aspect of a holistic and healthy Christian life is out of balance and a formula for losing existing members out the back door as fast as we bring new ones in the front.

Our consultants told us that the 55 and over segment of the population is one of the two largest and growing groups in the demographic data they shared about area, but that same older population is being taken for granted or overlooked by the same consultants’ recommendations for the congregation’s ministries. I understand the obvious importance and emphasis on reaching younger people for building for the future, but to fail to also appreciate and utilize the wisdom and life experience of the elders in the congregation and minister to the needs of seniors in the church and community is not only theologically unacceptable but foolish. From a purely pragmatic perspective, to alienate a large segment of any organization that has the most resources and time to support the work of the organization and the most institutional memory and loyalty is simply not a sound strategy for survival. Nor does a narrow focus on young families address the critical need in our society to help all ages learn about intergenerational relationships, caregiving, and end of life issues. Given the realities of increased longevity and the weakening of extended family support systems, the church can ill afford to ignore this opportunity for important ministry.

One church board member, when asked about the strategy to put all of our eggs in the outreach-to-young-families basket responded by repeating the spiritual euthanasia company line, “it has to be one or the other – we can’t do both.” Why is ministry to the young and old an either/or question? Even the state of Ohio has more faith than that according to our state motto which quotes Matthew 19:26, “With God all things are possible.”

Two years into this initiative the results of Spiritual Euthanasia in the situation I know best are predictably painful. Yes, the church has attracted some new members and is providing more ministry and programs for young families, but at what cost? Long-established mission programs are suffering, the church has lost many faithful long-time members, a very successful youth ministry has lost two dedicated leaders with decades of loyal service to the church, half of the former staff has resigned, and reduction in financial support has forced drastic cuts to the church budget and depletion of financial reserves.

The Spiritual Euthanasia strategy reminds me of the quote from an unnamed American Major in the Viet Nam war who explained a particular military operation by saying, “We had to destroy the village in order to save it.” That is not to judge those Viet Nam vets who were doing what they believed was the right thing in a bad situation. Nor is it to judge pastors and denominational leaders and congregational leaders who are under tremendous pressure to stem the tide of frightening declines in church membership and giving in mainline denominations. These are desperate times when our world and nation need the Christian Gospel of peace and justice more than ever. But desperate times must not lead us into desperate actions that do more harm than good.

My dear departed mother used to quote a familiar adage that “the church is only one generation from extinction.” The urgency of that warning is well-intended and always worth noting, but it is not totally true. The church may be one generation from extinction, but the truth of the Gospel is eternal. As we look forward to another Holy Week, let’s remember how Jesus was ordered by authority figures on his way into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday to silence his crowd of cheering fans. But Jesus took his marching orders from a higher authority, and he replied, “If they keep quiet the stones will cry out,” (Luke 19:40). The Romans and Jewish authorities didn’t believe him of course. They tried their evil best to silence him, and guess what? It didn’t work then, and it won’t ever work. As our friends in the United Church of Christ like to remind us, “God is still Speaking,” and no matter what we do, God will keep speaking. The question is who’s listening?

As we enter the Lenten season of repentance again this year, I am grateful I am no longer on the front lines of this struggle, and I have great respect and offer prayerful support for those who are. My prayer is that all of us, especially pastors, congregational and denominational leaders will use this Lenten season to prayerfully consider the dangers of Spiritual Euthanasia. May these 40 days of Lent be a time of healing and discernment of a balanced, compassionate Gospel that values and serves the needs of all of God’s children in a church that is called not to be successful by worldly standards, but faithful to the one who is the “way and truth and life.”

Thanks for a Spiritual Giant, Bill Croy

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Values

Today I was privileged to attend a magnificent celebration of the life of Rev. Bill Croy, a colleague and friend. We all knew Bill was dying, but that didn’t stop him from living to the end. He planned his own service, and I again vowed to do the same, as soon as I come to grips with my own mortality or at least quiet my fear long enough to think about it. Bill helped me get a good start. He chose some of my favorite Scriptures – Micah 6 and Matthew 25 – about justice and mercy and humility and service. He also picked some of my favorite hymns, including a jazz version of “Amazing Grace,” “Great is Thy Faithfulness,” “It is Well with My Soul,” and ended the service with “Hymn of Promise.”

We were challenged today to give ourselves away and use all the gifts God has given us, as Bill did all his life, even as ALS slowly took away most of the tools he had used before to share his love for all of God’s children. These last few years Bill refused to give in to ALS and just found new ways, mostly Facebook and the internet, to keep inspiring and supporting others. He humbled me and shamed me when I was tempted to throw a pity party for some minor problems in my life which were laughable compared to what he and his family were dealing with.

One of Bill’s colleagues, Rev. Laurie Clark, described Bill well as a Spiritual Giant who lived a life of integrity that had authority because he embodied the Gospel. (She said it much better than that.) I came away inspired from Bill’s service but also humbled, wondering and maybe a bit jealous, if people would say anything half so great about me when I die. I am reminded of reading somewhere that when I come to that great transition time in my existence, God won’t ask me why I wasn’t Bill Croy, or Mother Theresa, or Martin Luther King, or Gandhi. God will only ask if I was the best Steve Harsh I could be.

The answer to that question for me today would have to be a resounding “NO.” But I am grateful for days like today when I am reminded of that and for the tomorrows I still have to change my life so I change that answer.

Rev. Clark closed her remarks today about Bill with the observation that when a spiritual giant no longer walks among us, he or she passes on the torch to those left behind. Bill, I may have to carry a small torch or a candle compared to yours, but if we all live a life that gives away all of whatever gifts God has given us, together we can brighten the darkest corners of our world.

Well done, good and faithful servant.

What Are We Full Of?, Jonah 3:1-5, 10

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Politics, Faith and Values, Lectionary Texts

This sermon was written for a Sunday emphasis on what it means to live a missional lifestyle, and our case study from Scripture is one of those negative examples of how not to do that. I asked my son once how it was that he is a better golfer, skier and basketball player than I am when I introduced him to all those sports. He smiled and replied, “Oh, I just watched you, Dad, and saw how not to do it.” I think he learned a lot of life lessons that way from me. And we can all benefit in the same way from the story of Jonah.

Before we get to Jonah, I want to tell you about a pastor who decided one day it would be good for his parishioners and his son to take the 5 year-old with him to visit a local retirement community. The little fellow was fascinated by all the new things he saw – walkers and canes and especially the power wheel chair when one of the residents took him for a ride down the hall. But he was most interested when he went into one room with his dad. Pointing in amazement at a set of dentures in a glass on the bedside table he said, “Dad, the tooth fairy is never gonna believe that!” Some things are hard to believe – and the story of Jonah is one such tale.

Ask most people what they know about Jonah, and you will get “Jonah and the whale” as their response. It’s a familiar story kids learn about in Sunday school, but it is much more than a big fish story (which is what the Hebrew says, not a “whale” per se) if we ask some basic questions, like what was Jonah doing in the water and why was he swallowed by the big fish? And please don’t get hung up on the feasibility of a grown man being swallowed by a fish. This is about theology, not biology.

Jonah is a very short story, only 3 pages, and it makes more sense if read in its entirety. So here’s the abridged version of the whole story to put it in context:
1. God calls Jonah and tells him to go on a mission to Nineveh.
2. Jonah doesn’t want to go and jumps on a ship headed for Tarshish (in the exact opposite direction) instead.
3. God is not pleased and causes a storm at sea, and when the sailors learn that Jonah is the reason for God’s displeasure, they throw Jonah overboard to save themselves.
4. God appoints a big fish to swallow Jonah. (Not to punish him, by the way, but to save him and give him time to reconsider God’s offer.)
5. After 3 days God has the fish spit Jonah out; and Jonah decides this time he’d better listen to God, heads for Nineveh and delivers God’s message that they should repent or else bad things are going to happen.
6. The people of Nineveh heed Jonah’s warning, repent of their sins, are forgiven and saved from God’s judgment on them. You’d think any preacher would be thrilled if thousands of people changed their lives based on one short sermon, right? Not Jonah.
7. Jonah pouts because he really wanted God to destroy the Ninevites, not save them.

So there’s a lot more going on here than Jonah and the fish. It’s a story about a refusal to say yes when God’s mission is very clear. The message from God to Jonah couldn’t be more straightforward and direct: The 2nd verse of chapter 1 says, “Go at once to Nineveh,” and those orders are repeated verbatim in our lesson for today. There is no failure to communicate here – just reluctance to obey. Frederick Buechner says, “Lying to God is like sawing the branch you’re sitting on. The better you do it, the harder you fall.” Saying “no” to God is pretty much the same thing; so why would Jonah even try? And why do we?

We all have different reasons and excuses for failing to live missional lives. To consider Jonah’s rationale for disobeying God requires a little history lesson. Nineveh was the capital of Babylon, a hated enemy of the Hebrew people that had overthrown Israel years before and carried many of their people off to Exile. So what Jonah was being asked to do was take a warning to the people of Nineveh so they could be forgiven and spared from God’s wrath. It may help us to identify with Jonah to know that Nineveh sat about where the modern city of Baghdad is today.

Put yourself in Jonah’s place. Fill in your own favorite enemies: Democrats, Tea Partiers, Islamic extremists, the religious right or left, your bitter athletic rivals, unethical business competitors, lawyers, former spouses – whoever it is that you would like to be the very last people God would forgive. That’s exactly who Jonah is being asked to save and why he dares to defy a direct order from God.

I have been blessed by hearing good preaching this month. Pastor Tom Slack started the New Year off right for me with a sermon on the prologue to John’s Gospel. What struck me that day was the verse that says “The word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth.” And just 2 verses later, “From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.” I’ve been journaling and praying ever since about what it looks like for us, for me, to be full of grace and truth. Our other fine preacher, Mebane McMahon, added to the dialogue with her sermon the next week on the baptism of Christ and how we are all beloved children of God. She added another piece to the puzzle the next week’s sermon on the story of Eli and Samuel and how being beloved children means listening when God speaks.

In Jonah we have someone who doesn’t just fail to listen to God, he rebels and does the exact opposite of what God tells him to do. Why do we do that? It never turns out well. Reflecting on those January sermons my take on why Jonah and I and many of you fail to live a missional lifestyle is because of what we’re full of – or NOT full of. The Scriptures don’t tell us for sure why Jonah ran away. Chapter 1 says he tried to flee from the presence of the Lord. He needed to read Psalm 139 which asks the very question, “Where can I flee from God’s presence?” The answer is nowhere, because there is nowhere in all creation that God isn’t.

We aren’t told but we can imagine why Jonah does what he does. Maybe fear – he was being asked to go into enemy territory. Are there places or people God is asking us to be in mission that we are uncomfortable with or afraid to go? Maybe Anger – Jonah admits in the end of the story that he’s mad at God for forgiving his enemies. He says, “I knew you were a God of mercy who would repent and forgive these slime balls. They don’t deserve it.” (That’s a loose translation, by the way.) Are there people we don’t think deserve God’s grace and mercy? Do we hoard the good news of the Gospel – thinking if we share it there might not be enough for us?

It seems pretty clear to me that Jonah is full of anger or fear or vengeance or judgment, or some combination of those poisons. And that’s why he can’t obey God’s call. When we are full or even partially full of guilt, jealousy, doubt, insecurity, bitterness, pain, there’s no room for us to be full of grace and truth. Those negative feelings are like an anchor that keeps us stuck where we are and unable to go where God wants to send us.

It’s like this story about a blacksmith with a seemingly insurmountable problem. He just didn’t fit the macho stereotype of a blacksmith. He was strong and very good at his craft, but he was very, very short of stature. As a result, he was very unsuccessful in the dating game and was quite lonely. Until one day a beautiful young woman appeared in his blacksmith shop with a horse who had thrown a shoe. It was love at first sight for the smithy, and he could tell the feelings were mutual. So he took all the time he could and did the finest job he had ever done on shoeing a horse. As it was drawing time for his new love to leave, he desperately wanted to kiss her and could tell she would welcome that. But there was a big problem. She was a full head taller than he.

Just as he was about to give up yet again on romance, the blacksmith had a brilliant idea. He led the young woman by the hand to the corner of his shop and jumped up on the anvil where he had just hammered her horse’s shoe into perfect shape. Standing on the anvil, he was able to look into her beautiful brown eyes and kiss her.

The two of them fell madly in love and were inseparable for weeks and then months. Everyone in the village assumed they would soon announce their engagement to be married, and the young woman was waiting expectantly for her little beau to pop the big question. Instead, without warning, he announced to her one fine spring afternoon that he was going to have to end their courtship. She was devastated and confused. She asked him why? Didn’t he love her? Was it something she had done or said, or not done or not said? To each question he just shook his head until she was begging him to explain his sudden change of heart. Finally he said, “My dear, I do love you very much, but you see, dragging that darn anvil around everywhere we go is killing me!”

Like that anvil worry, fear, guilt, anger – whatever you are full of is an unnecessary burden that no longer needs to drag you down. And we don’t have to break up with God. Just get rid of the burden. We can give those things to God. That’s the truth that sets us free to say yes to God’s mission and purpose for our lives! No matter what our excuses have been none of us are beyond God’s redeeming love. If God can forgive the enemies of his chosen people who destroyed Jerusalem and carried God’s people off into Exile, then God can certainly forgive our reluctance to share our faith with the least and lost. And your Nineveh may not be as far away as you think. The person sitting next to you may need your support. Your mission may to someone in your own family or neighborhood or it may be somewhere further away.

Be open to surprises about where God leads you to discover your mission. In 1997 Bill Gates thought he was on a mission to bring computers to people in developing countries until he visited Africa and saw firsthand the abject poverty and the ravages of malaria and tuberculosis. He realized there were far more critical needs there than internet connectivity. He found a new mission and he and his wife Melinda started their foundation which has for 17 years donated millions of dollars to build hospitals and schools for impoverished people all over the world.

When wrestling with a call to a new mission, remember that it’s natural to feel nervous and fearful whenever we try something new and different. They call it moving out of your comfort zone – because it is! Susan Jeffers has written a very helpful book called Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway. That’s easier said than done, but very good advice. I saw some good advice on Facebook recently about working out early in the morning before your brain realizes what you’re doing. In a similar vein, I’ve also found that it helps me when tackling a new challenge to do it quickly before I have time to realize I’m afraid.

So what does Jonah do after his mission in Nineveh is over? We don’t know. At the end of the story he’s pouting, caring more about a dead gourd plant that had been shading him from the sun than 120,000 people in Nineveh. Like many Biblical stories, the ending of the story is left up to us. That’s because more important than an old fish story from long ago is your story and mine, and the next chapter of those stories is waiting to be written.

My wife and I were participants in a very intense personal growth seminar a few years ago, and something there stirred up some anger in me which I directed at one of the workshop leaders. She listened to me rant awhile, and then she said very quietly to me, “You know, Steve, you don’t have to be angry. It’s a choice.” It was one of the best Aha moments of my life – to realize for that I don’t have to be controlled by my emotions. I can choose to respond differently. Is that easy? Of course not. My wife can tell you I still have a long way to go in changing that 60 year-old habit. But old dogs can learn new tricks; it just takes us awhile. We can change and allow ourselves to be filled with grace and truth that empowers us to live the mission God has for us – whatever that is.

Let me share something that has worked for me lately. When facing a challenging situation I try to remember to pause and ask, “How would I respond to this situation if I were filled with grace and truth?” It’s a form of “faking it till you make it,” a small way of practicing a missional lifestyle; and if I keep trying, with God’s help, to live AS IF I am full of grace and truth, that lifestyle will eventually become a new habit.

What are you full of? If you don’t like the answer to that question, the good news is you don’t have to spend time in a fish’s belly to turn your life around. All you have to do is say yes every day to the one who is Grace and Truth.

[Originally preached at Northwest United Methodist Church, Columbus, Ohio, January 25, 2015]

A Prayer for Living the Dream

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Politics, Faith and Values

As we honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. it is a good time to renew our commitment to follow Jesus and all the prophets who call us to lives of peace and justice. Today we pray for all of our sisters and brothers who live in fear of violence and terror in Africa and Europe, or the Middle East and here at home.

O Creator and Sustainer of all, we ask you to speak words of comfort and hope to us today. With depressing news bombarding us about climate change, racial tensions, and violence in all parts of the world, we hunger and thirst for the strength and renewal of our spirits that you alone can provide. When so much of the terror and violence we see is fueled by misdirected religious fervor fed by insecurity and self-justification, it is easy to despair and wonder if Dr. King’s dream is still alive.

Remind us, O God, of how far we’ve come since Selma, even as we struggle with how far we have yet to go. And especially remind us again that the dream Dr. King articulated so beautifully with his words and his life was not just his dream. It was a dream of liberty and justice for all that echoes through the ages: from Deuteronomy’s hospitality for aliens and strangers, to Isaiah’s lions and lambs lying down together and Micah’s swords beaten into plowshares, to Jesus’ command to love one another, even those who persecute and revile us. It is a dream preserved by more recent prophets like Jefferson, Lincoln, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Sojourner Truth, by Gandhi, and Mother Theresa and Pope Francis and millions of unknown saints who witness to their faith by daily random acts of kindness.

Parents and teachers, mentors, coaches, nurses and caregivers, missionaries and friends—all doing a small but vital part to pass on the torch of freedom that violence and fear can never extinguish – because it is not our dream. It is ultimately an eternal dream for all of creation that springs from an infinite source of Hope and Trust in the author of that dream.

It is undying faith in you, eternal God, that enables us even in dark times to know with confidence deep in our hearts that with your help we shall indeed overcome – overcome the forces of hate and violence someday. And in that assurance we dare to pray and live in the name of Jesus Christ, who calls us all to keep his dream alive. Amen.

Northwest UMC, Columbus, OH, January 18, 2015

Freedom to Speak the Truth in Love

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Politics, Faith and Values

The killings and demonstrations in Copenhagen, cyber attacks and threats in response to Sony’s movie The Interview and the recent massacre at Charlie Hebdo’s offices in Paris have put the issue of freedom of expression on the front burner of media coverage and public discourse. Freedom of speech and freedom of the press are so critical to Western and American values that they are number one in the U.S. Bill of Rights. The international outpouring of protest and sympathy captured in the “Je Suis Charlie” movement is further evidence of how close to home this tragedy has struck.

Emotions run high when core values are threatened. As much as I believe in non-violence, even I am tempted to despair that we are on the brink of a horrible and perhaps inevitable violent confrontation between radical Islamists and the West.

In hopes of tempering emotional reaction with reason, I am reminded of two favorite quotes as I try to sort out my thinking on these complicated issues. I was introduced to the first many years ago in a book by Frederick Buechner entitled Telling the Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy and Fairy Tale. Buechner likens the task of preaching to the final lines of Shakespeare’s King Lear where Edgar says, “The weight of this sad time we must obey; speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.”

As one who grew up in a family with the “unspoken” (of course) motto “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all,” saying what we feel is a radical notion and essential to freedom of expression. Saying only what one ought to say may be polite and tactful, but it is also a subtle form of censorship.

The question that must be addressed in this debate is where does one cross the line between freedom of expression and disregard for the feelings and values of other human beings. In the global information age where words and images circumnavigate the world in seconds what one says has far wider impact than ever before in human history.

The Sony and Charlie Hebdo cases provide excellent examples of that point. Unrestricted freedom of expression says we can make a movie about the assassination of a foreign leader or publish satirical ridicule of a figure considered to be a holy prophet by millions of people, but does the freedom to express those feelings justify the damage done to human relationships already stretched to the breaking point in our world?

Let me be perfectly clear that I am not saying that taking offense to any form of expression ever justifies violent reprisals. I am merely calling for more reflection on potential consequences of what we say and how we say it. Anger and conflict are natural human realities. (See my blog post “Prince of Peace,” April 1, 2014 for a more detailed discussion.) And because the Information Age makes interaction between different cultural values inevitable, it is imperative that we find non-violent ways to manage conflict while protecting basic human freedoms.

One way to do that is found in Ephesians 4:14-15, “We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming. But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ…” To “speak the truth in love” means a mature balance that is necessary between freedom of expression and consideration for other peoples’ feelings.

That does not mean failing to speak the truth, but it adds the critical dimension of thinking about how the truth is presented. Fred Craddock, another of my preaching mentors, says the preacher’s job is not to get things said, but to get them heard. That is true for all human communication and requires sensitivity and respect for one’s hearers to guide the choice of words and images we share with the world – and every tweet, whisper, Instagram, post and conversation has the potential for that kind of global sharing.

One of the lies many of us were told as children is that “sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” Not true. Words and images have tremendous power to hurt and to heal; so use them wisely. Yes, the weight of these sad times demands that we say what we feel, but the peace and well-being of our world depends on our ability to learn to deliver that truth wrapped in love, even for those who call us enemy.

Unbroken: The Rest of the Story

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Values

My wife and I saw the movie “Unbroken” last night. My advice — save your money and read the book. The movie spends too much time on Zamperini’s wartime experiences, as important and inspirational as they are, and does not do justice to the even more remarkable rest of Louie Zamperini’s life story. Spoiler alert – if you plan to read the book stop reading here, but if you don’t know the rest of Louie’s story and don’t have time to read the book; or if you’re just impatient and want the peacefullyharsh synopsis, what follows is a part of a sermon (“Consumed”) I posted here on June 24, 2013 after I read Laura Hillenbrand’s excellent book.

“I recently read a biography of Louie Zamperini. Louie was a very promising runner in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin and expected to be the first man to break the 4-minute mile and bring home several gold medals in the 1940 Tokyo Olympics. Except there were no 1940 Olympics. Louie’s life and dreams were derailed by the demons of fascism and World War II. Much of this biography by Laura Hillenbrand describes in almost unbearable detail the 2 years of inhumane brutality Louie and others suffered as Japanese POW’s. Against all odds Louie survived that ordeal only to encounter much stronger internal demons that haunted his dreams for years after the war. Those demons drove him to self-destructive behavior and alcoholism once he was back in the U.S. No amount of therapy or pleading by his wife could break the chains of the demons that consumed Louie. But, here’s the good news again, and this time not in ancient Galilee or Gentile Gerasa, but in Los Angeles in the mid-20th century.

The title of Zamperini’s biography is Unbroken, and like all good titles it is a multi-faceted description of Louie’s life. He was not broken by the death of most of his crew when his B-24 crashed in the south Pacific; unbroken by 47 days adrift at sea, unbroken by the extreme cruelty of his captors who singled him out for torture because of Louie’s celebrity and strong spirit that were a challenge and an affront to them; and unbroken when his war injuries ended his dream of Olympic gold. But when he was consumed by nightmares and hatred and alcohol that were destroying him and his family after the war, Louie was almost broken by the fear of his own salvation.

When a Billy Graham crusade came to L.A. in 1949 Louie’s wife went and heard the young evangelist preach about Jesus’ power over all demons. She went home and urged Louie to go back with her to hear Rev. Graham. Louie refused her pleading over and over again, but as spouses often do Cynthia Zamperini persisted and Louie finally gave in to shut her up. He listened skeptically to Graham’s message and when the invitation came at the end of the sermon to come forward and receive Christ, Louie didn’t walk, he ran the other way and out the back door. This happened not once, but several times; but Cynthia didn’t give up on Louie and neither did God. In God’s good time Louie did finally surrender his demons to Jesus one night at another Graham crusade. Miraculously the demons and nightmares and anger and alcoholism that had consumed him were gone for good – they never returned. You may be skeptical, as I often am, about such instantaneous miracle healings, but this one was real. Louie went on to live a productive long life of ministry to countless young men at a camp he founded and as a motivational speaker. He was truly unbroken and restored to wholeness by a power greater than all the demons known to humankind.”

Louie Zamperini died in 2014 at the age of 97. Read the book to get the full benefit of his inspirational life story. You’ll be glad you did.