Category: Faith and Politics

Critics Welcome? Amos 6:1a, 3-7

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

I was back at Northwest UMC this week for a sermon in a series called “From Tablet to Table.” The table metaphor for community reminded me of sitting at the kids’ table when my large extended family gathered for holiday feasts. Kids sat at card tables in the kitchen or living room while the adults got to fly first class in the dining room. I remember the first time I got invited to move up to the big table. I was scared to death I would screw up and spill my milk or break some rule of dining etiquette that I didn’t even know existed and get sent back down to the minors.

Who do we confine to the kids’ table when it comes to the faith community or other groups we belong to? People who are different? Certainly people who irritate us or just plain make us mad. The unspoken rule at many family gatherings is that there are two topics that are taboo – politics and religion–because those emotionally charged issues can start a family feud. That’s really unfortunate because those two subjects are so central and important to how we order our lives as individuals and as a society that we really need to have meaningful dialogue about them. Amos of course breaks both rules. He stops preaching and goes to meddling as soon as he opens his mouth to warn Israel about their sinful, unjust lifestyle.

I began my sermon by repeating a story I used two weeks ago at another church (see post from July 12, 2015). It was the one about a preacher being a real “pane.” The prophet Amos certainly qualifies as one who delivers painful words that afflict the comfortable. The prophets remind me of teachers and professors I had over the years that were demanding and critical–the ones who kept putting on my report cards in grade school that I “didn’t work up to my potential.” Or the homiletics professor who dared to flunk me on the first sermon I preached in class! They were not candidates for my favorite teacher of the year award. My knee jerk reaction to their criticism was anger and looking at the course catalogue to see if I could drop the course. Fortunately in most cases that was not an option, and with the benefit of many years of life experience I know now that those teachers were the ones from whom I learned the most because they challenged me with the truth.

My wife and I were eating at a super market recently that offers free food on Friday nights to entice shoppers into the store. As we were moving down the buffet line we saw one of the servers refilling a large salad bowl with his bare hands – no gloves, no tongs. Diana made a comment to him that he really shouldn’t be doing that with his hands. He reacted very defensively, as we often do when we know we are in the wrong, and his words as he dramatically dumped the entire bowl of spinach salad into the trash we very telling. He said, “Lady, this is free food. Either accept it graciously or refuse it graciously.” I was angry at his response; so the irony of what he said didn’t strike me until later. He talked about graciousness, but the way he accepted her criticism was anything but gracious.

Do we welcome and encourage dissent at our table and accept honest criticism with grace and gratitude, or are we more like the people who say, “My mind’s made up; don’t confuse me with the facts?”

Here’s the context for Amos’ criticism of Israel. Amos was the first of the classic Hebrew prophets. He doesn’t get top billing in our Bible because the creators of the canon apparently gave more weight to quantity than quality. The books of Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel all are much longer; so they are traditionally known as the Major Prophets, and Amos, Hosea, Jonah and others sit at the kids’ table as the Minor Prophets. But chronologically Amos was the first to voice concerns about the direction that his people were going. He lived in the first half of the 8th century BCE during the long and peaceful reign of Jeroboam II (788-747 BCE). This was the golden age of Israel, the height of territorial expansion and prosperity never again reached. My NRSV introduction to Amos contains a sentence describing the socio-economic situation that I had to read several times because I thought I was reading a current event headline. “Through manipulations of debt and credit, wealthy landowners amassed capital and estates at the expense of small farmers and robbed them of their inheritance and liberty.” Amos understood that situation all too well because he was a small farmer and herder from a little village in Judah.

This was the period after Israel had split into two kingdoms, Israel in the north, sometimes referred to as Samaria, and Judah in the south where Jerusalem was. Amos is from Judah, but he feels compelled by God to travel to Israel and warn them about their decadent opulence and immorality, their abuse of the Lord’s table. In one of the most famous lines he tells them God says, “I hate I despise your festivals and take no delight in your solemn assemblies… I will not listen to the melodies of your harps. But let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an overflowing stream” (5: 2).

To paraphrase the text from chapter 6, if Amos were at our table today, he would probably be saying something like this:

“1Alas for those who are at ease in Dublin,
and for those who feel secure on Mad River Mountain,
4 Alas for those who lie on sleep number beds,
and lounge on their recliners,
6 who drink wine from fine crystal,
and anoint themselves with the finest oils from Bath and Body Works,
but are not grieved over the ruin of America!
7 Therefore they shall now be the first to go into exile,
and the revelry of the loungers shall pass away.

Those are hard words to hear. How do you suppose Amos was received at the table? Not well. He tells us in chapter 7 about the reaction of Amaziah, chief priest of the royal sanctuary at Bethel. Amaziah says, “O seer, go, flee away to the land of Judah, earn your bread there, but never again prophesy at Bethel, for it is the king’s sanctuary, and it is a temple of the kingdom.” Notice that it is not God’s sanctuary, or God’s kingdom, but the king’s. That one sentence tells us all we need to know about what was rotten in Israel. Their priorities were 180 degrees out of whack. Amaziah doesn’t want to hear that so he says to Amos, “Shut up and go home – back down to kids’ table where we don’t have to deal with you.”

Amos went home, but he wasn’t exactly quiet. He wrote down his prophesies so we can still benefit from them 3000 years later if are willing to listen. You can’t silence the word of God by ignoring it. When Jesus was entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, the authorities told him to silence his crowd of supporters, and he said, “If they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.” (Luke 19:40)

Welcoming words of criticism is not easy or natural. When we go to a party or a dinner or church, most of us gravitate toward people we know and enjoy. We don’t usually seek out people who are different from us and certainly not people who irritate us or just plain make us mad. So if we are to have honest dialogue and benefit from criticism and diversity we have to intentionally invite people to the table who can bring those gifts.
I was fortunate to be part of two such intentionally diverse communities in my life. They didn’t help me as much as I wish they had since welcoming criticism graciously is still very hard for me. The first model of what communication scholars call cooperative critical inquiry that I was privileged to be a part of from 1989-2007 is the Interprofessional Commission of Ohio.

The ICO is an organization housed at The Ohio State University whose mission is to promote and teach interprofessional collaboration to students and practitioners in the helping professions. The model for accomplishing that goal is offer graduate level interdisciplinary courses in collaboration, ethics, and community organization that include students and faculty from a wide range of professions: law, medicine, nursing, allied health, education, social work, and theology. It also includes sponsoring continuing education conferences for practicing professionals in all those fields on a range of topics from Aids to Urban Sprawl and Smart Growth.
The content of those courses and conferences is important, but more significant is the fact that they are vehicles for bringing all of those individuals together around tables where they can share ideas and concerns and get to know each other in ways that would not otherwise happen. Misinformation and stereotypes about what other professions do and what they can bring to the table to help solve complex problems that are too much for any given profession to address alone are shared and lines of communication are opened.

Even further back in my past, when I was an undergraduate at Ohio State in the 1960’s, I lived in a rooming house sponsored by the Wesley Foundation, the United Methodist campus ministry. There were two houses actually, one for men and one for women, but they were not ordinary rooming houses. They were intentional living communities of about 20 residents each, and in order to live there you had to make two commitments. The first was to participate in a house meeting every Sunday evening facilitated by two pastors trained in group dynamics and conflict management. The agenda each week was to simply air any grievances and talk about any issues that were affecting life in the house so we could manage them before they became bigger issues.

The second commitment had to do with roommates. We changed roommates every quarter, and the process for doing that was to have each person submit a list of 2 or 3 people that he was having the most trouble relating to for whatever reason; and roommates for the next quarter were chosen from that list. It was an intentional way of effectively addressing problems and expanding our ability to relate to a variety of other people. It wasn’t a perfect system, but it was better than the way we usually deal with conflict by ignoring it until it gets too big to deal with.

People who live together and socialize get to know each other as people with common dreams, fears and problems. It’s probably too much to hope that the Trumps and McCains and Boehners and McConnels could all move into the White House and learn to live together, but it is true that part of the partisan problem in Washington is created by the fact that representatives and senators no longer live in the DC area with their families the way they did a generation or two ago. It is so easy to fly back home on weekends that many of them do that now, and the consequence is they do not socialize with each other across the aisle as they once did. Stereotypes and ideologies therefore are all they know about each other, and we see the results of that unfortunate situation which prevents dialogue and compromise to address critical problems.

Sharing dissenting opinions is a way of bringing hidden or taken-for-granted assumptions about life out into the open where they can be examined. We all tend to automatically do things the way we’ve always done them, and we assume that’s just the way it should be. But we change and life changes, and it’s good to bring those assumptions into awareness so they can be evaluated and either kept or changed. Prophets break open old ideas and prejudices that hold us back and limit our ability to learn and grow.

Prophets never win popularity contests. Galileo and Copernicus were thrown out of the church for proposing new and radical ideas about how the universe is put together. But they were right, and the old assumptions were wrong. We often feel like critics are judging us personally and have trouble separating our identity and worth from our behavior and ideas. God does not send Amos to Israel to judge or condemn but to warn the people that the consequences of their current behavior are going to lead to destruction. Those words are not easy to hear, especially for those who are comfortable and benefiting from the way things are.

We are facing major problems in our nation and world today that are not easy or simply solved. Climate change, fixing health care and social security, saving our education system, stopping the insanity of gun violence, dealing with immigration—all of those problems are going to require sacrifice on the part of us who have so the have nots are given a fair and just opportunity to live better lives. We don’t want to hear about sacrifices; so we keep kicking the can down the road and those chickens are going to come home to roost probably sooner than later. That’s what Amos was trying to tell Israel. They didn’t listen. Do we?

Genuine criticism is a gift to be embraced, not rejected, not just tolerated, but welcomed and invited to the table. It is a way to learn and grow and be challenged by different perspectives and experiences. And if it is shunned or ignored by sending the critic back to kids’ table, the consequences can be tragic.

The rest of the Amos story illustrates that point. 30-40 years after Amos tried to warn Israel of the consequences of their unjust lifestyle, in 711 BCE, the armies of King Sennacherib of Assyria invaded Israel, conquered them and the Exile of God’s once proud people begins. Judah lasted 136 years longer, but they didn’t listen to the prophets either; and in 586 BCE Jerusalem fell, the temple was destroyed by the Babylonians, and the nation of Israel has never been the same again.

When God’s prophets speak uncomfortable words of truth, it pays to listen.

Radical Hospitality through Empathy

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

“15 Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. 16 Live in harmony with one another; do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly; do not claim to be wiser than you are. 17 Do not repay anyone evil for evil, but take thought for what is noble in the sight of all. 18 If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” (Romans 12:15-18)

This has been a remarkable and historical week in our country. In fact the two decisions handed down by the U.S. Supreme Court in a 24 hour span are some of the most dramatic events ever in a city that thrives on drama. Yesterday the court upheld the Affordable Care Act by a surprising 6-3 margin, and today same sex marriage was ruled a constitutional right in all 50 states. To be clear, I agree with both decisions. If I were a member of the court I would have voted with the majority on both cases. The two decisions are cause for great joy and celebration by those who agree with the court. For many others they feel like a bitter defeat and cause for great alarm and concern.

Knowing those two radically different perspectives exist, the verses above from Romans 12 have been running through my head all day, especially verse 15, which says “Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” Notice Paul is not saying we have to agree with others or embrace their views; we just need to empathize and understand the feelings of others. These verses are in a section with the heading “Marks of a True Christian” in the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, and they lift up a high standard of radical hospitality. It’s easy to rejoice with those who rejoice if we agree with them. Everyone loves a good party. Likewise it is easy to weep with those who weep if we share their grief.

Where the hospitality gets radical is when we disagree, when we don’t identify with those who are celebrating or mourning something we don’t agree with. To have empathy for those with whom we vehemently disagree is very hard, but without respect and understanding for those we differ with, there is no hope to “live in harmony with one another” or to “live peaceably with all.” Those qualities of living in community define the very essence of Jesus’ teaching and of the early church described in Acts 2. So whether you are rejoicing or weeping over the recent Supreme Court decisions, the bigger goal of unity and peace in our diverse nation and world depends on our ability to be empathetic and understanding of those on both sides of the issues.

Empathy requires some creative imagination. I have been blessed with the good fortune by accident of my birth as a white male in a prosperous family and country to never suffer oppression. I have never been without adequate health care and my freedom to marry the person I am in love with has never been questioned or denied. So I have not experienced the realities that the people most affected by these court decisions have. Empathy requires me to make the effort to imagine what those experiences have been like, and even more so it requires me to get out of my comfort zone and spend time with people who have lived that life. Only then can I overcome my fear of those who seem different from me and discover and embrace the common humanity we all share if we can get past the exterior differences and stereotypes. Easy? No. Necessary? Yes, and we are privileged to be living in an historical moment when radical hospitality and empathy are calling us to live into the love of Christ.

Almost forgotten with the big news out of Washington is the latest terrorist attack at Emmanuel A.M.E. church last week. The 24/7 news cycle threatens to overwhelm us with input. Much has been said and will be said about the Charleston tragedy as the 9 victims are buried this week. I personally went through at least 5 stages of grief when I heard that news—disbelief, anger, sorrow, fear, and finally a resolve to move forward speaking out for justice, facing my own racism and prejudices, and refusing to let the forces of evil go unchallenged. Praying for the victims and the killer and his family and for our nation and world is good, but it is not enough. We must find ways to live our faith as disciples of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, who lived and died and rose again for all of God’s children.

I do not believe it is a coincidence that the name of the church in Charleston is “Emmanuel.” Emmanuel means “God with us.” It is a name we use to describe the incarnation of God in Christ. Most of all today it is a reminder that no matter what the tragedy or where we stand on controversial issues, or how divided we may seem as a nation and world, the one constant truth is that God is still with us, always, forever, and anchored in that presence we move forward with confidence and faith. Thanks be to God who gives us the victory.

Look, We CAN Communicate: Pentecost, Part 2, Acts 2:5-13

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

My Ph.D. in Communication is both a blessing and a curse. The curse is that when people know I studied communication at the graduate level they actually expect me to be able to communicate. My excuses that my research was theoretical and in rhetoric and public speaking, not in “normal” interpersonal discourse always fall on deaf ears. I sometimes feel like the undergrad who signed up for a course in interpersonal communication only to be very disappointed the first day of class when he discovered that the course catalogue description of a course about “human intercourse” was not exactly what he expected.

You don’t need a doctorate to know that communication is hard. Words are just symbols that represent objects or feelings or relationships. As symbols they can only point to the reality they represent. Communication goes through different filters of both the sender and receiver of the communication, and those filters are unique to each person. And of course communication occurs on multiple levels – verbal, non-verbal, emotional, rational, and all of those are culturally conditioned and affected by other environmental and genetic factors. This explains the popular success of John Gray’s book, Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.

Sometimes the challenges of communication produce humorous and embarrassing results. For example, “The V-for-victory sign was immortalized by Winston Churchill in the early, dark days of World War II, and the proper form is with the palm facing outward. But, a simple twist of the wrist puts you in dangerous cultural waters. Throughout much of Her Majesty’s realm, the palm-in V sign is the equivalent of the more infamous middle-digit salute.” (See the article by William Ecenbarger of the Philadelphia Enquirer for many other valuable tips on cultural competence, http://articles.philly.com/2009-02-22/news/25280966_1_taxi-driver-mumbai-desk-clerk.)

The Hebrew Scriptures explain the origins of different languages in various parts of the world via the Tower of Babel story in Genesis 11. In that story it is human pride, a belief that humans could build a tower tall enough to reach to the heavens and establish their importance that leads to this judgment from God: 6 And the LORD said, “Look, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do; nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. 7 Come, let us go down, and confuse their language there, so that they will not understand one another’s speech.”

That story is a mythical way of explaining the reality that languages are unique to different cultures, countries and ethnicities. While I don’t believe God would throw that kind of monkey wrench into the communication machinery as a punishment for our pride, the language barrier is a major challenge to communication. There is a joke that defines “multi-lingual” as a person who speaks 3 or more, “bilingual” as a person who speaks two languages, and someone who speaks only one language as “an American.” That unfortunate state of affairs was demonstrated in a grocery checkout line when a woman finished a cell phone conversation in her native tongue. The man behind her in line said to her, “Excuse me, ma’am, but this is America and we speak English here. If you want to speak Spanish, go back to Mexico.” The woman calmly replied, “Sir, I was speaking Navajo. If you want to speak English, go back to England.”

The task of bridging cultural differences and communication challenges in our global village is very daunting. Technology offers help through on-line language lessons, apps and programs that automatically translate text from one language to another, and systems like the one at the United Nations where people from all over the world can hear a translation of a speaker’s words into their own language through a set of headphones. But those technologies do not solve the deeper spiritual divisions at the root of human suffering that manifests itself in prejudice, racism, economic injustice, terrorism and full scale war.

The on-going cultural and religious conflicts in our world are proof that we’ve a long way to go to overcome our failures to communicate. The Pentecost story in Acts 2 addresses those concerns, not from a technological or academic perspective, but from a spiritual point of view. Acts 2: 5-13 describes it this way: 5 Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven living in Jerusalem. 6 And at this sound the crowd gathered and was bewildered, because each one heard them speaking in the native language of each.7 Amazed and astonished, they asked, “Are not all these who are speaking Galileans? 8 And how is it that we hear, each of us, in our own native language?9 Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, 10 Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya belonging to Cyrene, and visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes,11 Cretans and Arabs—in our own languages we hear them speaking about God’s deeds of power.” 12 All were amazed and perplexed, saying to one another, “What does this mean?” 13 But others sneered and said, “They are filled with new wine.”

Jews and non-Jews from all over the world hear the apostles sharing their faith story in their own language. This is not some ecstatic, unintelligible speaking in tongues, but genuine communication made possible by the power of the Holy Spirit. These apostles are not educated linguists. They are common fishermen and tax collectors. They have not suddenly been empowered by Rosetta Stone; they are filled with the only force capable of overcoming human fear and division. At Pentecost the confusion of tongues from the Tower of Babel story is reversed and the response of those who have ears to hear the Gospel is both amazing and confusing.

People from all over the world have come to Jerusalem for the Pentecost Festival and some are apparently there on other business – Romans, Cretans and Arabs. The story shows us that as insurmountable as our communication barriers are, be they religious, cultural or political, we cannot just throw up are hands and say “we can’t do that!” Whatever happened in Jerusalem that day, this story makes it very clear the “this is impossible, we give up” excuse simply will not fly. It is easy to despair and say the hatred and divisions in our world today between Islam and the West, for example, are not amenable to any simple communication skills. Anyone who thinks so must be filled with new wine or smoking those funny weeds.

But this story counters with evidence that the Acts 2 audience is exactly like our multi-cultural world. A cross section of the whole world, people from Asia Mesopotamia, Judea, Egypt and Libya are identified; and the message is clear. Because they have received the gift of God’s spirit, a spirit of unity and love that is universal and offered to all of God’s creation, these apostles are able to overcome all of the cultural and communication barriers and share their amazing transformation stories in ways that are heard and understood.

That is a word of hope that our war-weary world desperately needs to hear. We may see no hope for peace and justice because we rely too much on human ways of dealing with our problems. We still think we can build towers or systems or networks that will make us the heroes and heroines of our story. The problem is it’s not our story. And when our best efforts fail, in desperation and fear we think destroying our enemies will bring peace in spite of centuries of evidence that violence and death only beget more of the same.

God’s answer that is blowing in the wind of Pentecost is that the transforming power of the God of the whole universe is the only hope for overcoming human differences and conflicts. The God of Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and residents of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia is still the God of Americans and Syrians, of Islam and ISIS, of every soul that breathes; and those who dare to believe that are not crazy or filled with new wine. We are filled with the Holy Spirit of the Source of our being, and we speak a language of peace and grace that everyone can understand because it is the message that the world is longing to hear.

Peter’s summary of that message follows in Acts 2:14-36 and will be addressed in the next segment of this series on Pentecost.

(All Scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version)

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.”

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.

Let Justice and Righteousness Flow

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

Many advocates of church growth argue that politics and controversial social justice issues should be kept out of church pulpits and classrooms because they will produce conflict and drive prospective church members away. The resulting prosperity gospel/cheap grace messages may indeed increase attendance in the short run. Praise services that resemble rock concerts more than worship services entertain attendees and may produce a feeling of spiritual euphoria, but do they also challenge participants to examine their lives, confess their sins, individual and corporate, and deepen their faith in ways that address human need in relevant and effective ways? That seems to me a question the Jesus I know would want us to ask ourselves regularly.

Those who argue that political and social issues don’t belong in church simply have not taken seriously the Hebrew prophets, the liberation history of God’s people from slavery and political oppression, nor Jesus’ own confrontation of the powers and principalities of Rome and the established religious authorities of his day.
A clergy colleague of mine told me recently about his experience at a 50th high school reunion in a wealthy suburban neighborhood. Asked to offer a prayer before the reunion dinner, he took the opportunity to reflect briefly on how much the world had changed since he and his classmates had graduated. Among other things he pointed out that the total population of the world has doubled in the last half century. So far so good, but then as they say he stopped preaching and went to meddling. He said, “That means there are a lot more poor people in the world that we who have been blessed with a good life and good education need to be concerned about.” While some of his classmates appreciated that observation, many others were upset and expressed anger that he had spoiled their celebration by asking them to think about unpleasant things.

I don’t know what my friend said in reply, but here’s what the Hebrew prophet Amos says God would say to them: “I hate, I despise your festivals, and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies. Even though you offer me your burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them; and the offerings of well-being of your fatted animals I will not look upon. Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream.” (Amos 5:21-24).

The Hebrew word for justice is “mishpat,” a much more inclusive term than what we often mean by our English use of the word “justice.” We have departments of justice, and we talk about justice being served or people getting their just desserts, all of which are about retributive justice or retribution, i.e. getting even for a wrong that has been committed against a person or society. The Judeo-Christian concept of justice, however, is also about distributive justice, meaning a fair and equitable distribution of life’s necessities to all of God’s children. Those necessities include not just material items required for survival, but basic human rights. It is both kinds of justice that human nature at its best strives for in memorable words to live by like “liberty and justice for all” in our U.S. pledge of allegiance and in Jesus’ Golden Rule encouraging us to “do unto others as we would have them do unto us.” (Matthew 7:12).

Like all important matters, concern for justice requires balance. Many years ago I heard Bishop Peter Storey from South Africa preach a sermon on the need for a balanced approach to theology and how we do church. His advice is even more relevant 30 years later. The image he used that has stuck with me all these years was of a bird with one wing. He said that a church that emphasizes either evangelism or the social gospel to the exclusion of the other is like a bird with one wing that simply goes around in circles.

As main line churches decline in membership at a frightening rate there is understandable concern for the survival of the church. But concern must not be allowed to grow into panic that clouds judgment. Desperate people do desperate things, and far too many desperate churches and church leaders water down the gospel to the point of irrelevance in an ill-advised attempt to survive and “grow.” My mother used to say that the church is only one generation from extinction, and while there is some wisdom to that observation, Amos reminds us that God is more concerned about the quality of our faithfulness to God’s will than the quantity of church members or the size of our church buildings or budgets.

Church growth advocates will argue correctly that the Gospel needs to be proclaimed to the vast numbers of people in our nation and world who have not heard or have not responded to it, but it is the whole Gospel that is needed, not the one-winged bird of either extreme in the theological debate between liberal and conservatives within the church. All of us, regardless of our theological or political convictions need a personal relationship with God that casts out our fears in whatever form they take. That’s the assurance of personal salvation for all eternity offered in Christ’s death and resurrection. It is also the first meaning of the cross and the foundation of Christian faith upon which the rest of the household of faith must be built. But the foundation of a house is not a whole house, just a necessary first step in a much larger process.

Assurance of eternal life is such a powerful promise that the temptation to embrace that gift and stop there on our faith journey is very strong. The desire for heavenly peace alone is the false hope and danger that Amos points out for those who are eagerly awaiting “the day of the Lord.” In a classic “be careful what you wish for” warning, Amos offers these ominous words: “Alas for you who desire the day of the Lord! Why do you want the day of the Lord? It is darkness, not light; as if someone fled from a lion, and was met by a bear; or went into the house and rested a hand against the wall, and was bitten by a snake.” (5:18-19).

Why such harsh condemnation? Read the earlier chapters of Amos to understand why Amos believes God has lost all patience with Israel and other nations for their disobedience to God’s will and especially their unjust treatment of the poor. Is Amos exaggerating to get Israel’s attention? Is he like an exasperated parent who loves a wayward child so much and fears for his/her well-being so deeply that emotions overflow?

Context is always critical in Scriptural interpretation. The Hebrew understanding of the nature of God in the 8th century BCE was far more legalistic and judgmental than the God of grace Jesus proclaims 800 years later. But let us not be lulled into a cheap grace sense of complacency by an overreliance on God’s mercy. I am as grateful as anyone that the God revealed in the New Testament grades on a curve, but that doesn’t change the fact that the Gospel makes very serious demands on anyone who wants to follow Jesus.

Amos warning that a just and righteous life is expected of us is not discounted by Jesus in the least. Jesus invites any disciple to “take up a cross and follow me” (Luke 14:27). The cross of the resurrection is also the cross of sacrifice and service on behalf of God’s kingdom and God’s children here and now. (The examples of what this looks like in Jesus’ teachings are too numerous to mention here, but would certainly include the difficult standards of loving one’s enemies (Mt. 5:43, Lk. 6:27), turning the other cheek (Mt. 5:39), forgiving 70 x7 (Mt. 18:22), “what you do to the least of these you do unto me. (Mt. 25:45), and if someone demands your coat, give him your cloak as well (Mt. 5:40).

Righteousness is the other quality demanded by God in Amos 5:24. Righteousness means being in a right relationship with God and all creation. That’s raising the bar very high. In fact none of us gets there. Even Jesus says, “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God” (Mk. 10:18 & Romans 3:10). So if Jesus can’t even meet that standard, what hope is there for the likes of you and me? Are we asked to do the impossible? That would be an unjust request, and we do not serve an unjust God. It’s also why we all stand in the need of grace. But what it absolutely does not mean is that we throw up our hands and give up. Our own human limitations are not an excuse for ignoring the hard parts of the Gospel but a reminder that we can and must do better than we are doing when justice and righteousness are but a trickle instead of an everflowing stream.

We Americans live in the richest nation in the history of the world and in one where 10% of the people control 75% of wealth. No one but the 10% could possibly consider that just. President Kennedy once said, “When we make peaceful revolution impossible we make violent revolution inevitable.” We are seeing rumblings of such revolution today in the streets of Hong Kong. Students of history know about labor riots inspired by injustice in our own country in the 1890s (Google the Haymarket riot or the Pullman strike, or Coxey’s Army). Our economic history is like a roller coaster of bust and boom cycles because we fail repeatedly to learn the lessons Amos was warning us about 3000 years ago.

Someone smarter than I will have to figure out the economic and political details, but what I do know is that as long as the driving values of our lives are comfort and prosperity and not justice and righteousness, we’d better not be longing for the day of the Lord/judgment day/the second coming.

“How Can We Ever Do That?”

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

I have preached over 800 times in my ministerial career. Of all those sermons, none has stuck in my memory as much as the one I preached on September 23, 2001, 12 days after 9/11. As I was reflecting on that horrible event and the continuing scourge of violence in our world today I decided to revisit that sermon, and I found the words of Jesus that inspired that sermon as relevant and as troubling now as they were 13 years ago. So as I pray for peace for a world seemingly bent on destruction, I share these reflections again. The sermon was preached at Jerome United Methodist Church on the text from Matthew 5:38-48 on loving one’s enemies.

This week was harder for me than last week and not just because I was struggling with what to say here this morning. The suffering and agony of the whole terrorist ordeal became personalized and real for me this week. 3000 victims in the abstract last week were more than my mind could wrap itself around. But as individual stories emerged of real people with real names, victims and families and heroes and heroines, my already bruised and battered heart was broken over and over again.

But from the very first hours of the tragedy my greatest pain and fear was not for the damage and suffering that occurred on September 11, as unbelievably horrible as it was. My greatest pain and fear has been for the inevitable escalation and perpetuation of violence that I knew these horrible acts would generate in retaliation that will inflict more suffering on more innocent people.

A friend of mine told me just after the attacks that he had forgotten how easy it is to be a Christian in times of peace and prosperity. And he is very right. We turn to God and scripture for comfort and reassurance in times of distress, as well we must and should, but some of the most important words of scripture also challenge us and are hard to hear.

And that’s why I have been engaged in a lovers’ quarrel with Jesus for the last 12 days over what to say this morning. I have tried every trick I know to avoid the difficult words we just heard from the Sermon on the Mount–these words that are high on the list of those we wish Jesus hadn’t said, but they would not let me rest. They have forced themselves into my consciousness over and over again, pleading, demanding, and crying out to be proclaimed.

“You have heard it said…” O, have we ever – all the public opinion polls confirm in spades that those who want revenge are legion, and I include myself in those who are angry. Getting even is a natural human reaction, and we’ve all been there many times this month. “You have heard it said, an eye for and a tooth for a tooth.” Sounds like good advice. In fact, at the time those words were written, they were designed to limit revenge; so victims would not demand two eyes for an eye, or a whole mouthful of teeth for a tooth. But as someone has said, if we follow the eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth philosophy to its logical conclusion, we end up with a world full of blind, toothless people, and the cycle of violence and pain continues forever.

“But I say to you…” Look out whenever Jesus starts out with that phrase and brace yourself for a zinger. “But I say to you, love your enemies. If anyone strikes, you on the north tower, turn the south tower as well.” O, Jesus, you’ve got to be kidding! We can’t do that! You can’t be serious. How can we possibly love those responsible for such horrific acts of death and destruction?

But Jesus isn’t alone on this one. I’m not sure to whom this letter was written, but a copy of it was circulating on the internet this week; and it contains a very similar thought from a leader of another of the world’s great religions, the Dalai Lama. He writes, “It may seem presumptuous on my part, but I personally believe we need to think seriously whether a violent action is the right thing to do and in the greater interest of the nation and people in the long run. I believe violence will only increase the cycle of violence. But how do we deal with hatred and anger, which are often the root causes of such senseless violence? This is a very difficult question, especially when it concerns a nation and we have certain fixed conceptions of how to deal with such attacks. I am sure that you will make the right decision. With my prayers and good wishes, the Dalai Lama.”

I couldn’t agree more with this analysis, and I have been pleased to hear more of these sentiments this week than I expected, but practically it’s not all that helpful. Of course violence begets more violence. Those who live by the sword die by the sword. We know that and want to believe peace is an achievable ideal. We’ve seen the failure of wars to end all wars and we want to be faithful Christians and follow the ways of the Prince of Peace. That’s all well and good in the abstract, but the question I want Jesus or the Dalai Lama or somebody smarter than I to answer is, HOW do we love our enemies? How do we love someone who can do to our nation what these terrorists have done?

Jesus says a bit earlier in the Sermon on the Mount, “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.” By whom? Not by their enemies or by most of their peers. Peacemakers, cheek turners, are more often called “yellow” and “coward” or “chicken,” but seldom even “children of God.” We would much rather go with Moses on this one wouldn’t we, but are we followers of Moses or Jesus?

It is hard to find silver linings in some clouds, but even in tragedy there are some benefits. We see it in extended families that rally around each other when there is a death of illness. And in a similar fashion, the outpouring of patriotic spirit and resolve in the last two weeks has been amazing. One could certainly argue that this tragedy has created a sense of community that has been sorely lacking in our nation for many years. But Jesus asks us to take that sense of community one giant step further–to include even our enemies in the circle of God’s family.

I had a flashback to Jr. Hi youth fellowship this morning. One of those awkward moments when we were circling up to say the benediction at the end of a meeting, and I found myself next to a girl and was afraid I’d get her cooties if I had to hold her hand. And some wonderful adult counselor saw the problem and stepped in between us to close the circle. That’s just what Jesus does when he asks us to love our enemies. When we can’t bring ourselves to take that hand, Jesus steps in and completes the circle.

This doesn’t mean that justice and order are not necessary for us to be able to live peaceful, secure lives once more. It simply means that our attitudes and methods of seeking justice and peace need to be just and peaceful and loving; so that we do not fall into the trap of perpetuating the very kind of behavior we deplore. The Christian way to the goal of peace and security must be prayer and dialogue, not bombs and bullets. We follow the way of compassion and love and forgiveness. It is not an easy way, but it is necessary. And the best news is that success is guaranteed–guaranteed by the one who walked the talk of that love all the way to the cross to show us once and for all that love is stronger than death, that nothing in all creation, not terrorism or fear or death itself, can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Jesus did it. He practiced what he preached. But how can we love our enemies, even while we deplore their horrible deeds?

I certainly don’t have all the answers–not even all the questions; but it seems to me there are two or three things that are necessary for us to have any hope of following Jesus down this path of loving our enemies.

1) We need to understand who are enemies are and who they aren’t so we don’t over-react in fear against all Muslims or all Arabs, or against everyone who looks different and therefore suspicious.

2) We need to study and learn and discuss so we understand better the complicated political and religious realities we are caught up in. We don’t dare oversimplify or stereotype. Afghanistan is not our enemy – it is a nation in ruins from previous wars and conflicts. Neither Bin Laden and the terrorists nor the Taliban are representative of the Afghan people, and they cannot be equated.

Tamim Ansary, a writer and columnist in San Francisco, who is a native of Afghanistan, writes this interesting and chilling portrayal of his homeland:
“The Afghan people had nothing to do with this atrocity. They were the first victims of the perpetrators….Some say, why don’t the Afghans rise up and overthrow the Taliban? The answer is they’re starved, exhausted, hurt, incapacitated, suffering. A few years ago, the United Nations estimated that there are 500,000 disabled orphans in Afghanistan–a country with no economy, no food. There are millions of widows. And the Taliban has been burying these widows alive in mass graves. The soil is littered with land mines; the farms were all destroyed by the Soviets. These are a few of the reasons why the Afghan people have not overthrown the Taliban. We now come to the question of bombing Afghanistan back to the stone age. Trouble is, that’s been done. The Soviets took care of it already. New bombs would only stir the rubble of earlier bombs. Would they at least get the Taliban? Not likely. In today’s Afghanistan, only the Taliban eat, only they have the means to move around. They’d slip away and hide. Maybe the bombs would get some of those disabled orphans, they don’t move too fast; they don’t even have wheelchairs. Bombing Kabul would only make common cause with the Taliban –by raping once again the people they’ve already been raping all this time.”

3) Perhaps most important, we must practice forgiveness. Someone has written that forgiveness is the key to happiness. The pursuit of happiness is one of our most cherished American ideals, and forgiveness is what it takes to be free of the burdens of anger and hostility that make happiness very illusive.

One of the young widows of this tragedy was interviewed on ABC this week. Her husband was one of the passengers who apparently resisted the hijackers on the Pennsylvania flight and helped keep the tragedy from being even worse than it was. When Diane Sawyer asked this young widow with two small children and a third on the way if she wanted revenge, without batting an eye she said, “No, I don’t want any Arab women to have to go through what I’m going through.” And then to support her position she quoted the Sunday school song we sang this morning, “Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world. Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight…” If she can forgive when her life has been altered forever, can we do any less?

I’ve always assumed that forgiveness was for those who have wronged me, but I realized in reflecting on this tragedy that forgiveness is a two-way street. Forgiveness needs to be given, but before it can be given it has to be received; and to receive it, we have to confess our own sin and examine our own contributions to misunderstanding, prejudice, and injustice. To assume we are good and they are bad is far too simple and counterproductive and leads us in the direction of a blind toothless world once more.

To understand why anyone has so much hatred toward our nation, we need to get to know these enemies–to understand what we may have done that we need to be forgiven for. And that dialogue can’t take place over the barrel of a gun or under the shadow of a cruise missile.

How can we love these enemies, or anyone who has done us great harm?

My favorite story about that kind of love comes from another period of unspeakable terror and suffering in human society, the Holocaust. After the war, a young Christian woman traveled around Europe proclaiming the good news of God’s grace and love for everyone who would repent and give their life to Christ. Corrie Ten Boom was a death camp survivor. Her entire family had died in the Nazi death gas chambers, and yet she was filled with God’s love and anxious to tell her story. Until one night when she was giving her testimony and looked out into the congregation where she saw a face that made her blood run cold. Sitting there staring at her from the pew was one of the former Nazi concentration camp guards who had helped to execute her family. She could barely finish her talk and hurried toward the side door of the church as soon as she was finished, hoping to avoid any further contact with this awful man.

But he was anxious to talk to her and met her at the door. He extended his hand as he told her that he had repented and become a Christian, but, he added, it was so good to hear someone like her proclaim the unbelievable good news that God’s love was available even to such a terrible sinner as he had been. His hand was there, waiting for Corrie to take it in Christian fellowship. But her hand was paralyzed, frozen at her side for what seemed like an eternity. The silence was awkward, and even though she knew she should shake his hand, she could not. Finally, she said a prayer. She said, “Lord, if you want me to forgive this man, you’re going to have to do it, because I can’t.”

And just then, Corrie said her hand moved of its own accord. She took the former Nazi’s hand and says she felt the most amazing surge of warmth and power pass between them that she had ever felt in her life.

How can we love our enemies? On our own, we can’t. But with God’s help as followers of Jesus Christ, relying on and empowered by God’s Holy Spirit, we can, we must, and we will.

Thanks be to God who gives us the victory!

THE FAMILY QUILT: SHARING FAITH and PEACE

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

I was inspired again by the quilt making of my daughter and another friend to post this story which is included in my book, Building Peace from the Inside Out.

“One generation shall laud thy works to the next.” Psalms 145:4

“The lame I will make the remnant, and those who were cast off a strong nation.” Micah 4:7

I was teaching a Jr. High Sunday School class one Sunday morning during Lent a few years ago. In one of those rare moments of quiet in such a class, I heard a familiar voice from across the hall say, “we still need a volunteer for the crucifixion.” I was worried because I knew the voice belonged to a Sunday School teacher who could be a bit off the wall sometimes. I wondered what in the world Vince was up to. I couldn’t leave my class unattended, but I worried the whole hour about what was going on in that class. When that Sunday school hour was over, I hurried across the hall to the 4th and 5th grade class, praying that I would not have to explain to some irate parents why their child was hanging on the old rugged cross. Much to my relief, I discovered that the class project for that day was to make a mural of the events of the last week of Jesus’ life. The teacher had not been asking for a volunteer to be crucified, but for someone to paint the crucifixion.

The tendency for peacemakers to end up getting crucified got me to wondering how it is we always seem to find people willing to continue the faith, even at great risks to themselves. My mother used to say that “Christianity is only one generation from extinction.” While I don’t believe that, because I know God will find a way with or without our help to keep God’s reign moving forward, it does give me pause. How do we pass on the word of God from one generation to the next against all kinds of odds that the forces of evil can muster?

The Hebrew Bible has 82 references to the word ‘remnant.” A remnant is a leftover, a scrap, an unlikely item to be of any useful purpose, and yet, time after time, in spite of unbelievable unfaithfulness, God finds a faithful remnant to carry on God’s work – thru flood, pestilence, famine, greed, stupidity, violence, exodus, exile, and dispersion.

That concept of the remnant reminds me of an old family quilt my grandmother seemed to be working on throughout my entire childhood. I don’t remember much about the quilt when I was really young, except Grandma always seemed to have it on her lap working on it while she and the other adults sat around in the living room and “visited.” It always sounded a lot like gossiping to me, but they called it visiting.

When I was 6 or 7, I was at Grandma’s, outside playing with my cousin, Dave, who was a couple years older than I, and the grownups were talking in the living room while Grandma was quilting away. Dave found a garter snake under the woodpile and was chasing me around the barn yard with it. I know they say snakes are more afraid of us than we are of them, but I find that very hard to believe.

Well, after making several laps around the house, my little legs were giving out, and I made a tactical decision to cut through the house to try and get away from Dave, and that darn snake. It wasn’t a bad plan, but as I ran through the living room I accidentally stepped on the corner of the quilt and got some of the mud (or something worse from the barnyard) on the quilt. That was when I learned how important that darn quilt was to my grandma, and to my mother.

A couple of years later, when I was staying overnight at Grandma’s, she was working on the quilt late at night. I knew it was almost my bedtime, and I thought, “hmmm, maybe if I can get Grandma talking about the quilt she’ll let me stay up longer.” So I said to her, “Grandma, why are you sewing all those little scraps of material together? Wouldn’t it be a lot easier to go out and buy a piece of new material?”

She got a knowing smile on her face, like she had been asked that question before—or maybe even asked it herself. “Yes, it would be a lot easier, Steve, but then I wouldn’t be able to sew all the memories into the quilt.”

Well, of course, I saw my opening, and immediately asked her about the memories. She put me up on her lap and began to tell me the stories represented in the quilt.

She showed me first a square of tattered muslin. It was from the original family quilt that came over the Alleghenies in a covered wagon when our ancestors first came to Ohio to homestead.

I noticed a piece of material next to the muslin that I recognized. It was from the apron Grandma always wore when she had the whole clan over for Thanksgiving dinner. Just seeing that material made me smell the turkey and dressing cooking. I could almost taste the pumpkin pie and see the homemade noodles spread out to dry on Grandma’s bed.

Next to the muslin there was a yellowed piece of once-white satin, and Grandma ran her hand gently over it. It was a piece of her wedding dress.

And close to the satin was a square of taffeta. She told me it was from the material she made the baptismal gown from that all seven of her children wore when they were baptized.

Down in that part of the quilt there was a faded beige square of cotton. It looked pretty old and was warn almost thread-bare when I touched it. “Oh my, those were exciting days,” she said. She explained to me that when she was young women weren’t allowed to vote, and that wasn”t right. So she and lots of other women marched and carried signs till the men in Washington changed the rules. Even as a young mother with several kids, Grandma found time to be involved in community affairs because it was important. I realized later that my grandma was a feminist before we even had that word. Oh, she let Grandpa think he was in charge, but we all knew she was the glue that held the whole extended family together.

I asked her about a bright blue piece of wool. She got kind of a tired look in her eyes. She told me that my uncle Frank had rheumatic fever when he was a little boy, and he was very, very sick. She sat up with him all night, praying and putting wet compresses on his forehead – hoping he’d be OK. When he got well, the doctor told her that everything should be burned – pajamas, bed clothes, toys, anything he had with him in the bed. She said she burned almost all of it, but she cut out a corner of the blue blanket that was on his bed. She washed it really well several times, and kept it for the family quilt.

Catty-cornered from the blue wool was what looked like a plain white sheet, only it had a hole in it, like maybe for an eye in a ghost costume for Halloween. But when I asked her if that was what it was, she shook her head sadly. She told me when uncle Frank was older she found out he was about to be initiated into the local KKK. Well grandma put a stop to that right now. She told him that in our family we treat all of God’s children like our sisters and brothers, no matter what color their skin or how much money they have.

I spied a khaki colored piece next and asked her if it was from my Boy Scout uniform. A big tear ran down her cheek and she got very far away and quiet. I’d never seen Grandma like that before. She told me, “No, I wish it was. That’s a piece of the uniform your Uncle John was wearing when he was killed in the Battle of the Bulge.”

She was quiet again, and I tried to think of someway to cheer her up. There was a red and white polka-dotted square over on the far side of the quilt; so I asked her about it, hoping it would have a happier story. And it did. I learned for the first time that Grandma used to dress up like a clown for all her kids’ birthday parties, and that polka dot material was from her baggy clown pants.

Close by was a multicolored tie-died piece. Grandma said it was from a shirt my cousin Bob wore to some place called Woodstock. He was our family’s hippie, and when he went to Canada to stay out of Viet Nam, everyone was real upset with him, but not grandma. She missed him like crazy, but she supported his decision to be a conscientious objector and reminded anyone who would listen that Jesus was a pacifist too.

Well, it was really getting late by now. I was even beginning to feel sleepy, and I saw Grandma glance at the clock. But before she could tell me it was way past my bedtime, I asked her one more question. There was a big green and white star right in the middle of the quilt; so I asked her why it was there. She said, “Oh, that star is from the hospital gown your Aunt Ruth wore when she was in the hospital with polio. I prayed so hard that God would let us keep Ruthie. Don’t tell anyone, but she’s always been my favorite. (We all knew that anyway.)

“That polio is the reason she still walks with that terrible limp – but I’d sure rather have her with a limp than not at all. So when God let us keep her, I decided to put that star right in the middle of the quilt to say thank you.”

When Grannie was getting ready to tuck me in for the night I asked her if I could sleep under the quilt. She started to say, “no, it was only for very special occasions….” But then she changed her mind and said she guessed it would be OK. But she’d have to take the pins out first. Which was fine with me. It gave me more time to stay up, and I’ve never had a great desire to be a pin cushion anyway.

Then as she put me to bed, Grandma told me one more story about the quilt. She said during the big blizzard of 1950 she and the kids were home and Grandpa was stranded at the gravel pit where he worked for three days. They ran low on coal and fire wood to keep the stove going, and one of the things they did to keep warm was to huddle up and wrap that old family quilt around them.

I asked her, “Grandma, you’ve been through a lot of hard times. How do you keep going?”

“Oh,” she said, “I don’t know. I just ask God to give me strength to do whatever’s necessary; and so far he’s never let me down.”

I had trouble going to sleep that night. I kept thinking about my uncle John and the war. I don’t know if I was more afraid of having to go to war and getting killed – or of having to kill someone else. But the thought of war really bothered me — still does.

But then, I wondered if it would help if I thought about some of the happy memories in the quilt. And sure enough, the next thing I knew I smelled bacon and eggs on the stove for breakfast.

While we ate our eggs, I asked Grandma, “How long do you think it will take you to finish the quilt?”

“Oh,” she said, “the quilt isn’t something you really ever finish. You just keep patching it up and adding to it, and then you pass it on to someone else.”
[pause]

“And one generation shall laud thy works to another.” (Ps. 145:4) From remnants of insignificant and unknown saints, God weaves together a tapestry of truth that is from everlasting to everlasting. In the face of all odds, faithful peace seekers and peacemakers continue to pass on the good news.