We Are All Preachers

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Short ArticlesLeave a comment
Barbara Brown Taylor
Barbara Brown Taylor

Our Nehemiah Bible Study this past week reminded me of something Barbara Brown Taylor wrote in wonderful meditation called The Preaching Life.  In it she stresses the need for all Christians to rediscover their preaching vocation.

Somewhere along the way we have misplaced the ancient vision of the church as a priestly people—set apart for ministry in baptism, confirmed and strengthened in worship, made manifest in service to the world.  That vision is a foreign one to many church members, who have learned from colloquial usage that “minister” means the ‘ordained person,’ in a congregation, while “lay person” means ‘someone who does not engage in full-time ministry.’  Professionally speaking that is fair enough—but speaking ecclesiastically, it is a disaster. Language like that turns clergy into purveyors of religion, and lay persons into consumers, who shop around for the church that offers them the best product.

Taylor writes of the need to revive Martin Luther’s vision of the priesthood of all believers, who are ordained by God at baptism to share Christ’s ministry in this world.

All we have to do is sit down and study he scriptures to understand that this is just how our God works in this world.  Nowhere in the scriptures do we find God saying, “Go into the world and make Christian lay people out of people.  Bring them into the church so they can sing some hymns, pray and listen to a sermon about being good, moral people.  Form a type of club.  Hire a full-time club president who is going to be there for the club members.  Her job will be to hold their hand and pray for them in the hospital, marry them, and one day bury them.

No, what we do find in scriptures is Jesus instructing us to go into the world and make disciples .  And what do disciples do?  Sit on a pew every Sunday?  Sing, pray, try to be good, religious?  No, they do what Jesus did.  They preach, teach, heal and exorcise demons.

But you say, “I can’t do those things.  I can’t preach.  That’s why we call you “preacher!”  “That’s why we pay you!”

Barbara Brown Taylor continues writing:

While preaching and celebrating the sacraments are two particular functions to which I was ordained, they are also metaphors for the whole church’s understanding of life and faith…Preaching is not something that an ordained minister does for 15 minutes on Sundays, but what the whole congregation does all week long; it is a way of approaching the world, and of gleaning God’s presence there.

Many of you are preaching every week, and you don’t even realize it.

Grace and Gratitude: Remembering Ronnie Avery

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn MemorialsLeave a comment

The Second Miraculous Catch of Fish

From Ronnie Avery’s Memorial Service February 8, 2004.

Luke 5:1-11 NRSV

“Grace” and “gratitude.”  The two words come from the same Latin root and belong together.  Grace is when God does something for us that God did not have to do.  And the only way to respond to God’s amazing grace is with humble gratitude.

The soon-to-be disciples were in a boat with Jesus just offshore.  Jesus asked Simon, who had been fishing all night without catching a thing, to drop his nets out in some deeper water.  When he did they filled up the boat with so many fish that the boat began to sink!  They signaled another boat to come over to help.  Then they filled that one up!  They barely got back to shore before the boats sank under the weight of the fish.

These fishermen had never seen anything like it before. It was a miracle. It was also grace. Jesus did something for these ordinary fishermen that Jesus did not have to do. That is the definition of grace. And the fisherman responded with humble gratitude as they “dropped everything” to follow Jesus. They left their old lives behind on that beach, to worship and to serve Jesus for the rest of their lives.

The disciples responded to grace the same way Ronnie Avery responded to the grace that he received.  Ronnie would be the first person to tell you that he was on a road in the summer of 2003 that was leading him to a place that he did not want to go.  When he was hospitalized in July of that year, gravely ill with congestive heart failure, he realized this, and was filled with fear.

That day in ICU Ronnie said that he prayed a prayer that went something like this: “Oh God, not now.! Please don’t let me die now!  Please save me God, and I promise I’ll get myself right and start living for you.”

He said when he opened his eyes from that prayer, he saw me standing there in front of him for the very first time.

I had a short prayer with him and said, “Ronnie, I sure am glad to meet you, but I am sorry that it had to be under these circumstances here in the hospital.”

I will never forget how he responded. He said, “You’re getting ready to see a lot more of me, because I am going to be sitting on a pew in your church the first chance I get, and I am going to be sitting on one every Sunday that I possibly can!”

Ronnie told many people that on that day, in that moment, his life miraculously changed forever.  Not only was he suddenly and miraculously healed of a disease which had plagued his entire adulthood, it was in that moment that he began to live his life like those fishermen—fishermen who one day dropped everything, left their old lives behind them, to live a brand new life following Jesus. And this was the real miracle.

The very first Sunday that he was able, Ronnie was sitting on a pew in church, just like he said. A little over a month later, Ronnie joined the church.  He came every Sunday and every Wednesday night he could.  He gave faithfully our church’s budget.  He contributed generously to the fund set up by the church to help pay the tuition for my doctorate.  He loved his wife more sincerely.  He loved his siblings more deeply.  He loved his children and stepchildren and family and everyone he knew more earnestly.  Although he was weak and tired, he spent the entire first day of 2004 loving his sister-in-law, Donna, in the emergency room of Wake Forest University Hospital in Winston-Salem.

He repeatedly told me that he wished he was well enough and strong enough to do more.  However, the truth was, Ronnie did more for the Lord in six months than most people do their entire lives.

Ronnie would tell people that I changed his life.  He even said that I saved his life. However, we all know this was not true.  And deep inside, Ronnie knew that was not true.  God saved Ronnie’s life. God changed Ronnie’s life. I just happened to be the one who happened to be standing at his beside after his fearful prayer to God.  God used me to give Ronnie something that God did not have to give Ronnie: grace. Amazing grace: free, unearned, undeserved and unmerited.  And Ronnie responded like fishermen with humble gratitude and sincere thankfulness.

God also used Ronnie’s family members the same way God used me. God used so many people through the steadfast love they had for Ronnie.  They loved Ronnie with a love that was unwavering.  Each of his siblings, Steve, Dianne and Shirley, loved Ronnie with the steadfast love of their mother, Mary.  With his faithful wife, Becky, they never gave up on him. They showered Ronnie with the grace of God—unearned, undeserved and unmerited.

At Ronnie’s funeral service on February 8, 2004, I shared something that I had never shared with anyone before.  I tried to share a little of it with Ronnie on the way back from Winston-Salem on January 1, 2004.

Ronnie told many that I changed and saved his life.

What many did not know was the extent of which Ronnie changed and quite possibly saved me.

There is a disturbing and alarming statistic concerning pastors.  After just ten years of ministry, 30% of pastors drop out of the ministry.  After ten years, many pastors wake up and just decide that being a pastor is simply not worth all of the heartache and heartbreak. Trying to please people is a very demanding and stressful job. Not to mention, impossible. Many pastors decide that the burden that is placed their families is simply not fair. And many come to a place where they feel they are ceasing to make a difference. So they drop out and leave the ministry all together. You will find many of them selling insurance or real estate.

Personally, since I have been a pastor, I have always experienced a strong call to pastoral ministry. There was never any doubt in my heart or mind that serving as a pastor is what God was calling me to do, until 2003.  That marked my eleventh year of ministry.  I was at the point where 30% give up and drop out.  The first six months of that year were the most difficult six months of my entire ministry. The heartache of trying to please everyone and the heartbreak of failing to please everyone was wearing me down. The church was taking in fewer new members, and we were failing to meet our budget.  Church attendance was down, and I was at the darkest point in ministry wondering if I was really making a difference in anyone’s life.  I was contemplating joining the 30% of my colleagues by seeking another profession.

Then came a hot day in July. I went to the hospital to visit with the family of Howard Evans and Venetia Kue. I got off the elevator on my way to see Venetia and ran into Donna Mosley. She told me about Ronnie and sent me directly to see him in ICU.  And I have never, and I will never be the same.

For you see, on that day God showered two people with grace. Amazing grace—unearned, undeserved, unmerited. God was not finished with Ronnie, and God was not finished with me.  After ten years, God was still using me and calling me to be a pastor.  God may have used me to save and change Ronnie, but I will thank God the rest of my life that God used Ronnie to save and change me–as God used Ronnie to change so many others.

Ronnie continually told me that he wished he could do more for the Lord through the church.  I tried to tell him in the car on the way back from Winston-Salem  just a month before he died, and I hope to God that God has told me now, that he did more for the Lord than he ever knew. Ronnie saved my ministry and quite possibly my life.  And I will thank God for Ronnie Avery the rest of my life, as will many others.

In that ICU room, Ronnie said, “You’re getting ready to see a lot more of me, for I am going to be sitting on a pew in your church the first chance I get and I am going to be sitting on one every Sunday that I possibly can.”

Now I hate to admit it, but deep within my sometimes cynical self, I thought, “Sure you will.”  I didn’t graduate from seminary yesterday.  I had been a pastor for eleven years.  I know how most people work.

When most of us are given a gift which is completely undeserved, unearned, and unmerited, a gift that changes our lives, at first we are grateful.  But then our gratitude begins to wane. I expected to see him on a pew one Sunday, maybe two Sundays, but I certainly did not expect to see as much of him as I did, and I never expected that he would have the impact on my life that he did.  That’s the way grace and gratitude works with most people.

But thank God, Ronnie Avery was not most people.

Like fishermen dropping their old lives in the sand to leave them behind for a brand new life, Ronnie Avery certainly dropped his old life in exchange for another.

How did he do it?  Why didn’t his gratitude wane like most people?

Because Ronnie lived everyday of the rest of his life acknowledging that God had done something for him that God did not have to do. God had showered Ronnie with grace. Amazing grace—free, unmerited, undeserved, unearned. And Ronnie was grateful.

Think of what the church of Jesus Christ could be and what the church could do, if all of us made this simple acknowledgement: That God has given us something that God did not have to give us.  The gift of life.  The gift of friends and family.  The gift of himself.  The gift of resurrection.  The gift of life everlasting.

Think of the difference we could all make if we woke up each morning with the prayer that I believe was Ronnie Avery’s prayer everyday:  “Today God has given me something that he did not have to give me, something that I did not have coming to me—something completely unearned, undeserved, unmerited.”

I believe our lives will truly bear witness to the love and grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. We will be the people God is calling us to be.  We will be the church God is calling us to be. And there is no telling how many people, and even pastors, may be changed along the way.

Actin’ a Fool

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year ALeave a comment
Thomas Campbell, Alexander Campbell and Barton Stone
Thomas Campbell, Alexander Campbell and Barton Stone

1 Corinthians 1:18-31 NRSV

As some of you know, I am taking an online class on the history of our denomination. It has been exciting to read how the forbearers of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) stirred up thousands of people in the late 18th and early 19th centuries with their writings and sermons.  Some people estimate that when Barton Stone held his revival at Cane Ridge, Kentucky in 1801, nearly 30,000 people showed up—10% of the entire population of Kentucky at the time. [i]

What were these folks preaching that started a movement that would later become one of the largest denominations in North America?

They simply had the audacity to preach messages that called for a return to taking the message of the Bible seriously. They denounced all man-made creeds and confessions and committed themselves to following Jesus at all costs. And in so doing they were continually bucking the system, going against the doctrinal grains of the Church.

They preached against slavery, preached for the inclusion of all Christians at the communion table, stood against the power of the clergy over the laity, the power of Bishops over the clergy and anything that did not jive with Jesus. And for doing so, many were excommunicated, labeled heretics, radicals and fools. In fact, The Fool of God is the title of a novel based on the life of our forebear Alexander Campbell.[ii]  

But here’s the thing, people responded to these fools. And by 1960, the movement they started had grown into a denomination with 1.6 million members.

Now here’s some troubling news. In 2012 we only had 625,000 members. Since 1960 our denomination has had a 60% decline in membership.[iii]

There are many complex reasons for this decline. However, this morning, I want to suggest what I believe is at least one of the reasons, and here it is: We stopped actin’ a fool.

In fact, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) has been labeled by many as “a moderate, mainline, mainstream protestant denomination in North America.”[iv] Did you hear that: moderate, mainline, mainstream! 

Barton Stone, Thomas and Alexander Campbell would roll over in their graves!

token

While Alexander Campbell was studying at the University of Glasgow in Scotland, the time had come for communion at his Presbyterian church. Communion was only observed a couple of times a year, so it was a pretty big deal. His church had a custom, like many Presbyterian churches of that day, to pass out these “communion tokens.” You would line up, present yourself to the minister. If the minister believed that you were worthy that day to participate in communion, he would hand you a token, a little coin. This was your ticket to the table. When you arrived at the table, you would present your coin, and then and only then, could you receive communion. If the minister did not think you were worthy, he would not give you a token, and thus, no communion for you. It also implied there may be no heaven for you either!

With his communion token in hand, Alexander Campbell approached the communion table. When he was handed the plate where he was to place his token, it is said that Campbell, “threw” the coin onto the plate, publically refused the bread and the wine, and then walked out of the sanctuary as a “free man” in Christ.[v]

Now, does that sound mainstream, mainline and moderate to you?  

Alexander Campbell was anything but a mainstream Christian. He would say that he was an upstream Christian, swimming like a salmon against the mainstream currents of his day. And many said he acted a fool.

This is what I believe we must regain as a church. We need more people like Alexander Campbell who are willing to humbly walk with Jesus, kindly love all people and do the justice of Jesus even if it makes them look foolish.

The Apostle Paul very clearly and outrageously writes:  “The way of the cross is foolishness” to the world.  We proclaim “Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles.” “God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong.”

But this is a hard message for us to get. Because there is a part of all of us that does not want to look foolish. When I was trying to help a family at Christmas, someone asked me, “Are you sure they are a deserving family?” She didn’t want me to do anything foolish.  And it did make me pause, because I didn’t want to do anything foolish either.

A recent survey by Bill McKibben reveals that three-quarters of Americans believe the Bible teaches that “God helps those who help themselves.”[vi]  However, that statement is from deist Ben Franklin; not the Bible.[vii] “God helps those who help themselves” is in fact one of the most unbiblical ideas. It is Jesus who made the dramatic counter assertion: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”  But, deep down we prefer Ben Franklin don’t we?  Doesn’t sound so foolish.

There is a large part within all of us that yearns to be moderate, mainline and mainstream. However, when we stop actin’ the fool in the eyes of the world, I believe we stop being Christian, we cease being disciples.

Søren Kierkegaard, the great Danish theologian, writes: “Christianity has taken a giant stride into the absurd. Remove from Christianity its ability to shock and it is altogether destroyed. It then becomes a tiny superficial thing, capable neither of inflicting deep wounds nor of healing them. It’s when the absurd starts to sound reasonable that we should begin to worry.” He goes on to name a few of Jesus’ shocking and absurd assertions: “Blessed are the meek; love your enemies; go and sell all you have and give it to the poor.”[viii]

And you know the others: “forgive seventy times seven, turn the other cheek; someone takes your coat, offer them your shirt, pray for those who persecute you; blessed are the poor; visit the imprisoned; to save your life, you must lose your life, take up your cross and follow me.”

And then there is the entire foolish story: The foundation of his arrival was laid by a murderer with a speech impediment and a bad temper named Moses; his advent was promised by prophets who did not deserve to be prophets; he was born to ordinary peasants in a cattle stall and laid in a feeding troth; worshipped by loathsome shepherds; his family on the run in Egypt like illegal immigrants; a triumphant ride into Jerusalem to liberate the world on the back of a donkey—and then there is the most foolish part of it all—the arrest, the trial, the desertion of the his friends, the cross and those shocking words: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”

Then to add audacity on top of audacity, foolishness on top of foolishness, Jesus is resurrected by God and given right back to the very ones who nailed him to a tree.

There is nothing moderate, mainline or mainstream about this thing we call ‘Christianity,’ this thing we call ‘church.’ It is all so radical, so reckless, so shocking, so undeserving, so unconditional and so inclusive. It is a love that is so socially unacceptable, that it can only be described as foolish.

Henri Nouwen was a priest and brilliant teacher at places like Harvard and Yale. However, wanting to truly follow Jesus before he died, many say that he did something absolutely foolish. He left the Ivy League to spend the last decade of his life serving as a chaplain within a community of people with severe emotional, mental and physical disabilities.

L'Arche Community
L’Arche Community in Edmonton

In one of his many books, Nouwen tells a story about Trevor, a man in that community who was dealing with such severe mental and emotional challenges that he had to be sent to a psychiatric facility for an evaluation. One day Henri wanted to visit him, so he called the hospital and arranged for a visit.

When those who were in authority found out that it was Henri Nouwen, the renowned author and teacher from Yale and Harvard who was coming, they asked if they could have lunch with him in the Golden Room—a special meeting room at the facility. They would also invite doctors and other clergy to the special luncheon. Nouwen agreed.

When he arrived, they took him to the Golden Room, but Trevor was nowhere to be seen. Troubled, he asked about Trevor’s whereabouts.

“Oh,” said an administrator, “Trevor cannot come to lunch. Patients and staff are not allowed to have lunch together. Besides, no patient has ever had lunch in the Golden Room.”

Henri Nouwen with another resident
Henri Nouwen with Linda Slinger

By nature, Henri was not a confrontational person. He was very meek and gentle—much unlike Alexander Campbell—but so like him in many ways. Being guided by the Spirit, here was the thought that came to his mind: “Include Trevor.” Knowing that community is about inclusion, Henri thought: “Trevor ought to be here.”  So, Henri swallowed hard, turned to the administrator and said, “But the whole purpose of my coming was to have lunch with Trevor. If Trevor is not allowed to attend the lunch, I will not attend either.”

The thought of missing an opportunity for lunch with the great Henri Nouwen was too much, so they quickly found a way for Trevor to attend. When they all gathered together, something interesting happened. At one point during the lunch, Henri was talking to the person to his right and didn’t notice that Trevor had stood up and lifted his glass of Coca-Cola.

“A toast. I will now offer a toast,” Trevor said to the group.

Everybody in the room got nervous. What in the world was he going to say?

Then Trevor, this deeply challenged man in a room full of PhDs and esteemed clergy, started to sing, “If you’re happy and you know it, raise your glass. If you’re happy and you know it, raise your glass…”

No one knew what to do. It was awkward. Here was a man with a level of challenge and brokenness they could not begin to understand, yet he was beaming. He was thrilled to be there. So they started to sing. Softly at first and then louder and louder until all of the doctors and clergymen and Henri Nouwen were practically shouting, “If you’re happy and you know it, raise your glass.”

Henri went on to give a talk at the luncheon, but the moment everyone remembered, the moment God spoke most clearly, was through the person they all would have said was the least likely to speak for God.[ix]

This is what the entire Bible is all about. This is what the cross, the gospel and our faith is all about. God uses the foolish things of the world to shame the wise.

This morning, after the hymn of commitment, we are going to install our officers that you have elected for 2014. We are going to ask them to commit themselves to following Jesus. And as Frederick Buechner writes: “In terms of human wisdom, Jesus was a perfect fool. And if you think you can follow him without making something like the same kind of fool of yourself, you are laboring not under the cross, but a delusion.”[x] So we are going to ask them, in the name of First Christian Church, in the name of God, to act a fool, to shock this community with the grace of God revealed in the life, the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Lord.  And then we are going to promise them our support which makes us just as foolish.

Are you ready? I hope you are. If this church is to continue to grow and thrive in this community, continue to make a difference, continue to be the church God is calling us to be, I pray you are.

[i] Duane Cummins, The Disciples: A Struggle for Reformation (St. Louis: Chalice Press), 2009.

[ii] Louis Cochran, Published October 18th 2002 by Wipf & Stock Pub 

[vi] Bill McKibben, “The Christian Paradox,” Harpers Magazine, July 7, 2005.

[vii] Deism is a religious and philosophical belief that a supreme natural God exists and created the physical universe, and that religious truths can be arrived at by the application of reason and observation of the natural world.  Deists generally reject the notion of supernatural revelation as a basis of truth or religious teaching.

[ix] John Ortberg, in the sermon, “Guide.” Preachingtoday.com.

[x]Frederick Buechner, as quoted by Joe Roos, Sojourners Magazine, “The Foolishness of the Cross,” Aug. 2007.

Happy Birthday, Carson! Ah, 19

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Just a ThoughtLeave a comment
Carson
Carson with his sister, Sara

My son Carson, who many say favors me, turns 19 today. Ah, 19.

I do see myself in him in a few ways: in his smile, in some of his mannerisms, in his creativity, and in his public speaking.

Then he possesses many traits that I can only pray to God to one day obtain: an unwavering confidence, uncompromised ethics and a maturity that does not match his age. Maybe those traits came from his mother!

And then there are those attributes that I can only envy. After all, he is 19. His entire life is before him. There is so much hope and promise. A clean slate of adulthood awaits him. He has yet to burn a bridge, amass debts, disappoint loved ones and make costly mistakes.

Ah, 19. If I only knew then what I know now. If I could only go back. Do some things over. Make some different choices.

When Jesus suggested to Nicodemus that he could be born anew, Nicodemus asked if he could physically go back. Although he was being sarcastic, perhaps he was thinking about being 19 again.

Jesus responded by saying something like: “If you are born of the Spirit, the Spirit will make you anew in ways that you’ve never imagined!”  John 3:1-10 NRSV

Nicodemus could not physically go back, but he could spiritually go forward, anew, enveloped in grace.

With faith in this Spirit, maybe I favor my 19-year-old son more than I thought. With faith, perhaps we all do.

Snowflakes from Heaven

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Just a ThoughtLeave a comment

snow-covered-road

J.B. Priestley once wrote: “The first fall of snow is not only an event, it is a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of world and wake up in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment then where is it to be found?”

Yesterday, Stantonsburg Road was littered with empty Natural Light cans, leftover trash from Bojangles and McDonalds, and the carcass of a possum or two. This morning it is a majestic, untarnished pathway through a winter wonderland.

Yesterday, my lawn was brown, covered with ugly winter weeds and strewn with fallen tree limbs and dog droppings that I have been too lazy to pick up.  This morning it is glistening white, void of a single blemish.

Yesterday, the flaws and faults of this fragmented world were all too apparent. This morning everything seems to be forgiven, blanketed by grace. And although this world is still a very dangerous place to drive and to even walk; this morning, the hopeful wonder and potential beauty of this world is obvious.

Yesterday, my excited facebook friends posted prayers for snowflakes to fall, believing that they somehow come from heaven. This morning there is no doubt that heaven is exactly where they come from.

Why Should I Join a Church?

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Just a Thought1 Comment

why-join-a-church

To entice people to join the church, I once heard a minister tell a group of prospects that members of the church enjoy special member “benefits.” For example, he said: “You have the benefit of a pastor to visit you or pray for you when you are sick or hospitalized.  You have the benefit of programs that are designed to meet the needs of you and your family. And you have the privilege to use the church’s facilities for weddings or funerals without a fee.”

However, I do not believe this is what Jesus ever intended the church to be. Church membership is not like an American Express Card membership, a Sam’s Club, a country club or gym membership where membership has its privileges. The gospel truth is that it is quite the opposite.

Church is not some place to come and receive, but is a dynamic opportunity to go and to give. Church is a chance to fulfill the greatest commandment of Jesus to love God and our neighbors as ourselves.  Church is an occasion to deny and lose one’s self in sacrificial service to others. The purpose of church is not to meet your needs, but to transform your needs.

And the gospel truth is that church membership will not eliminate fees. On the contrary, church membership, if it is about following Jesus, will cost you dearly.

When Life Kicks You, Let It Kick You Forward

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Just a ThoughtLeave a comment
Mary Scott (right)
Mary Scott (right) with Julie Warren

Former North Carolina State Women’s Basketball Coach, Kay Yow, who passed away on January 24, 2009 after a courageous battle with breast cancer once said, “I felt like I had zero control over getting cancer, but I have 100% control of how I will respond to getting cancer.” She then said something that was absolutely inspiring: “When life kicks you, let it kick you forward!”

These words became even more magnificent to me this morning after running with my dear friend, and breast-cancer survivor, Mary Scott. Today, January 23, 2014, marked the two-year anniversary of her last radiation treatment. We ran five miles at 5:30 am before she put on her US Army fatigues and combat boots and drove to her National Guard post in Raleigh. It was 14 degrees. Mary has run every day since Thanksgiving, including a day that she had a surgical procedure to remove a suspicious lump that, thankfully, turned out to be benign. That is fifty-seven days straight totaling 200.5 miles.

In Mary’s determination and perseverance, I can hear the voice of Kay Yow: “When life kicks you, let it kick you forward!”

Old Testament professor, Walter Brueggemann, once put it this way, “In life, we can never go back to the ‘good-old days,’ but with faith in Christ we can go forward with God into ‘good-new days.’”  The Apostle Paul said it like this: “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God.”

Five years ago, Kay Yow died. However, the way she courageously lived out her life, and the way people like Mary Scott continue to press forward today, rekindles a great hope within our souls. A hope burns eternally, as we begin to know that we can and will always go forward, even when our very life is one day kicked out of us.

As I think about running with Mary, I am reminded of something Bernice Chambers once said about cancer:

Cancer is so limited.

It cannot cripple love.

It cannot shatter hope.

It cannot corrode faith.

It cannot eat away peace.

It cannot destroy confidence.

It cannot kill friendship.

It cannot shut out memories.

It cannot silence courage.

It cannot invade the soul.

t cannot reduce eternal life.

It cannot quench the Spirit.

It cannot lessen the power of the resurrection. Amen.

When life kicks you, let it kick you forward.” With faith in the God who makes all things new, it might be easier than you think.

A Personal Thought on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Just a ThoughtLeave a comment

martin-luther-king-on-pulpit-robert-casillaWhen I moved to southern Louisiana to preach the gospel, my church had a policy to close the church office on Fat Tuesday (the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday), but not on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. I immediately changed the holiday policy stating: “I believe that churches should especially honor the MLK holiday. After all, he was a preacher who was martyred for preaching the gospel of Jesus!”

So, for me, today is a day to remember not only the sermons of Martin Luther King, Jr., but to also reexamine my own preaching, or lack thereof.

I have always believed that there is a lot of correlation between what happened in Memphis in 1968 and what happened in Jerusalem 2,000 years ago. I truly believe that if you love all people, and live your life trying to convince others to love all people, then there will always be some people, probably religious, who will want to kill you.

Today, I am reminded that if my preaching does not take grave risks by offending and outraging those who do not believe that God’s love expands past the lines of race, class, religion, nationality and sexual orientation, then I am not preaching the gospel of Jesus.

It’s Time to Get Personal

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year ALeave a comment

adam

Isaiah 49:1-7 NRSV

1 Corinthians 1:1-9 NRSV

John 1:29-42 NRSV

The season of Epiphany is the time the church traditionally talks about the revelation of God to all of humanity.

It is the time to ask some of the most difficult questions of our faith. Who or what is God? What is God like? What does God feel? What does God want? How does God relate to and interact with us and the world? How does God reveal God’s self to us?

These are very difficult questions, because with our mortal minds, I do not believe we can ever answer them completely. And as I said last week, I am okay with that. In the words of Fosdick: “I would rather live in a world where my life is surrounded by mystery than live in a world so small that my mind could comprehend it.” I am very comfortable living, as the Apostle Paul wrote, in a world where I “see through a glass dimly” (1 Cor 13).

I love the way we begin each service with the Lord’s Prayer praying, “Hallowed be Thy name.” For the name of God is so above our mortal comprehension it always evokes reverence, awe, and respect.

And I believe that one of the problems with religion these days is that, for many in the church, there is no mystery. Too many people have the world and have God all figured out. They are know-it-alls and listen to a sermon or attend a Bible Study not to learn anything new, not to be challenged, but to have what they already know reaffirmed. They have all of the answers and never have any doubts.

A parishioner came to see me one day almost in tears. She was so upset that she was shaking. A friend of hers was dying. She said that she was not sure about her friend’s faith so she asked her: “Without any doubt, do you know that if you died today that you would spend eternity in heaven?”

Has anyone ever asked you that before?

The dying woman responded, “I hope so.”

Well, that response tore her friend completely out of her frame!  For she wanted her to respond: “Yes! No doubt about it, I know! I know unequivocally, for absolute certainty!”

But her friend’s response did not sound that troubling to me. She may not have responded with absolute certainty, but it sounded to me as if she had faith.  She hoped. She believed. She trusted.

To be honest, I tend to get along better with people who are honest enough to admit that they sometimes have their doubts; that they do not always know absolutely. And I am often wary of those who have no doubts whatsoever, because it has been my experience that those are the ones who are the quickest to judge and are the first to belittle, even condemn, others who hold different beliefs.

A member of a pastor search committee once asked me if I believed the Biblical account of Jonah and the whale should be taken literally. She asked, “Did it actually historically happen the way the Bible says it did?”

I responded, “I believe that God can do what God wants to do. I have no trouble believing that God can use a whale to actually swallow man and spit him out on the beach of God’s choosing. However, if I die and get to heaven and find out that it was just a fictional story to reveal a great truth about the will of God, then I am not going to get angry and ask for a transfer!”

I believe the problem with the church today is that too many church people are so closed-minded they would opt for the transfer. They are so convinced, so right, so certain about the things of God that they leave no room for mystery and thus no need for faith, hope or trust.

One of the great things about our heritage as Disciples of Christ is our individual freedom to interpret the scriptures and to understand God and God’s relation to the world. We are encouraged to have open-minds when reading the Bible. No one was more of a free-thinker or had more of an open mind than our forefather, Barton Stone. That is why I believe he was so inclusive, welcoming all people to the Lord’s table. And that is why I believe we are such a non-judgmental, non-self-righteous, accepting people today. We do not presume to have all the answers. And we are not even close to having God all figured out.

Now, I wished we could just end the sermon right here. I wished we could just stand now and sing our hymn of commitment, pat ourselves on the back, and then go get some lunch. But, we can’t do it. We can’t do it, because now, now the sermon is just beginning.

We open-minded, free thinkers have to be very careful, that while embracing the mystery of God, we do not completely depersonalize God. While we accept broad views and opinions, while we practice widespread inclusivity and acceptance, we do not make the mistake and generalize God.

In emphasizing God as mysterious Spirit, a Spirit that Jesus says is comparable to the wind, blowing when and where it wills, in stressing God as Light in our world working in mysterious ways, we must be careful not make God into some sort of generic, vague enigmatic force.

In church, we say very specifically, “May the Spirit of Christ be with you.” We do not say very vaguely say, “May the force be with you.” That’s from Obie One Canobie and Yoda; not from the Old and New Testaments.

I have noticed, especially over the last decade, how Christians, in their attempts to find common ground with other faith groups, talk more about following a general God and less about following a specific Christ. When relating to Hindus, Muslims and Jews, I have heard Christians say things like: “We have our differences,” “but we all believe in God.”  But in our attempt to find common ground and unity, I believe we sacrifice God as a distinct, particular, and very personal being.

You hear a lot of talk today about spirituality.  More and more people are calling themselves “spiritual” instead of “Christian.”  There are far more books at Barnes and Nobles on Spirituality than are on Jesus. William Willimon says he can understand why this sort of reasoning is so attractive. “The more vague, indistinct, mushy, and impersonal we can make God, the better for us!” Willimon says that if God is so mysterious, “Then we can make God just about anything we want. We can render God into a projection of our sweet sentimentality and we will never have to grow, change, or be born again.”[i]

And when we depersonalize God we ignore about almost everything said about God in scripture. Take, for instance, today’s lectionary lessons—every one of them. Each of them, in their own way, speaks of a very personal God who sees, speaks, acts, moves, feels and intrudes. In the Old Testament Lesson for the day, the prophet Isaiah recounts how, even before he was born, God knew him personally and intimately and had special plans for him.

In the Epistle Lesson, Paul, when challenged by some dissidents at one of his early congregations, defends his authority as leader on the basis that God Almighty, the creator of all that is, had reached down and touched him, personally authorizing him as an apostle. The Greek word apostle, literally means “someone personally sent from God.”

And in our Gospel Lesson that I read this morning, John the Baptist looks at Jesus and sees in him the very presence of God in the flesh, the personification of God among us.  And Jesus himself said, that if we know him, we know his Father as well (John 14:7).

I believe we should think of this hour on Sunday morning as our attempt to get personal with God, to give that word “God,” which can be terribly abstract and general, some specific concreteness. Sunday morning is the time when we tell God who we are, but more importantly, it is the time when we listen to God tell us who God is.[ii]

Our God is not distant, aloof, some indistinct concept or some abstract idea. Our God is a personal being who yearns for the most intimate of relationships with each one of us. Our God is one who continually rips the heavens wide and swoops like a bird when we least expect it, calling us by name, affirming us as God’s beloved children. God reaches out and reaches in and touches the places in us that most need touching. And our hearts, our very souls burn with love.

Let me just stop my sermon for a moment and just look at you. As your pastor, part of what I love about you is not your vague generalities, but your very personal ways: the particular ways you love, the intimate ways you care, the unique ways you act, the peculiar way you share, the specific you give, the distinctive ways you serve, the certain ways you accept, the special ways your forgive.

I love you not for your generalities, but for your personal uniqueness.

“Humanity in general” does not move me.  A congregation “in general” does not energize me, evoke me, persuade me or love me—but you specifically can. You particularly can. You explicitly and certainly can.

The same is true with God. Here in this season of Epiphany, it is time to get personal, to get down to the specifics. We believe, that in the personal specifics of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, we have seen God. We have seen not some general, vague idea, not some mysterious force, but we have seen a person, a person walking among us, calling us, urging us, challenging us, loving us, forgiving us, changing us, and one day resurrecting us revealing the true life of God—revealing who God is, what God is like, how God feels, and how God relates to us and our world.

No, we do not have all of the answers. And as I said, I am comfortable not knowing all of the answers. I fully embrace the mystery of all that is.  I believe that there is a very good reason that each Sunday, we unite our hearts and pray, “Hallowed be Thy Name.” For His name is so beyond our fragile minds, so above our finite understanding, so outside our mortal comprehension, so utterly mysterious, that it is a name that is to always be revered and respected and sanctified.

However, that name just so happens to be “Father”—a word that cannot be any more personal. And the good news is, we pray, not merely “Father” but we pray very intimately and very specifically and personally “Our Father.”

No, when it comes to God, we cannot know it all, but what we can know is certainly, absolutely, unequivocally, undoubtedly enough.

[i] William Willimon, Pulpit Resource, 2006.

Heaven on Earth

On By Rev. Dr. Jarrett BanksIn Sermons Year A1 Comment

DoveMatthew 3:13-17 NRSV

I have a confession to make to you this morning.                                                  

The truth is: I really don’t know what I’m doing half the time I’m standing up here behind this pulpit.  And if I don’t know what I’m doing, I feel certain that some, if not most of you, do not know what I am doing. This preaching thing is probably the hardest things about church. It’s hard on me, and I know it’s hard on you. I don’t know what is more difficult, preaching a sermon or listening to one.

After preaching for over nearly thirty years, I’m really not that certain if I really know how to preach. I’ve tried every technique.  Every once in a while I’ll try to be creative. Try to tell some good stories. Embellish a few if I have to. Robert Fulgum called it “making up necessary facts.” 

But it’s just so hard to talk about, and I know it’s hard to hear about the things of God.  And how do you really talk to people about God’s relationship to this mystery that we call life. How do you talk about Christmas, Epiphany, and the way God reveals God’s self in this world? I am in full agreement with Harry Emerson Fosdick when he said:

“I would rather live in a world where my life is surrounded by mystery than live in a world so small that my mind could comprehend it.”

So if I cannot comprehend any of it, nor even want to comprehend any of it, how can I begin to talk about it?  

And here’s the real difficult part: How do you speak in such a way that people don’t just hear about God, but are brought to God or experience God?  How do you get people to get a sermon?  

After all, you have so many distractions.  There are so many obstacles to successful communication in this place.  First of all there are the people around you. I remember how hard it was when I was growing up trying to get something, anything out of a sermon! There was always somebody was always playing with a candy wrapper, getting up to go the restroom, some coughing, some sneezing, some biting their nails, some whispering, some dozing off, some even snoring. And today you have all of these electronic gadget distractions. There are ipods and ipads and iphones.

And then there are all kinds of entertaining observations. “His hair sure is thinning.  Her hair sure is graying.  What is he wearing?  And my, hasn’t she packed on the pounds!  She must have really enjoyed herself some Christmas!”

Then there’s the temperature.  It is either twenty degrees too cold or twenty degrees too hot. 

Then there are all of those other obstacles that you bring with you—attention deficit disorder, up too late the night before, too many things on your plate, a whole slew of problems and shortcomings, and then there’s that thing called, “sin” that is so much a part of all of us.

Let’s be honest:  It is an absolute miracle that anyone ever gets anything out of any sermon.

But sometimes, people do.  Sometimes, people undeniably hear.  Sometimes people do get it.

William WilIimon, who has written more books about preaching than anyone I know, once said that he suspected that the reason that most of you keep coming back here is “because having had the lightening to strike once, it could well strike again, and you want to be here for it.  Having once shuffled in here—distracted, unfocused, unsure—you have despite everything, irrefutably heard.”  You once came in here and caught a glimpse of something, and that something was undoubtedly from God.

You know what really annoys me about preaching?  It is when I preach a sermon that I had intended to be good sermon, a sermon that could have been a good sermon if I had a little more time, perhaps a been little less distracted and  a little more prayerful. It’s when I preach one of those sermons and you, you have the audacity to look at me on the way out of the church, grip my hand and say, “Thank you for that sermon. God really spoke to me today.”

You walk away to your car leaving me shaking my head thinking, “How did that happen?  How did anyone get anything out of that sermon?  Who pulled back the veil between us and God?  I know it wasn’t me.  It sure wasn’t anything that I said.”

It was just another ordinary day down at the river. John was down there baptizing people. At that time, baptism was a ritual that Jews sometimes went through, a kind of purification rite to prepare for the Advent of the Messiah.

“The Messiah’s coming!” John preached.  And as the people were going through the motions, wading into the water, some of them would ask John, “Are you the Messiah?”

“No,” answered John.  “I could not even tie the shoelaces of the one who is coming after me.  I baptize with water; the one who is more powerful than I, will baptize with fire!”

John keeps baptizing.  Then this one from Nazareth comes—and then, all of a sudden—a miracle happens—a dove swoops, the Spirit descends, a voice echoes, the heavens are ripped open, the veil is torn asunder!

This dove, this Spirit, and this voice is the biblical way of saying that heaven had come down to earth, and God’s Spirit was inexplicably but undeniably present. 

And this voice is of “heaven.”  It is not of the earth.  It is not from John.  John, unworthy to tie the laces of the Messiah, would be the first to admit that.  It has come from some other place. It has come from God.

I don’t know how many heard the voice that day.  I’m just glad that somebody heard it, experienced something like a dove, felt the Spirit and had the foresight to tell us about it.  Because maybe then we, with all of our distractions and obstacles, all of our doubts, all of our shortcomings, and yes, all of our sin, just maybe then, we may be open to such a voice and such a vision.

Professor Steven Vryhof writes about visiting a Lutheran church in a small village on the coast of Sweden where only fourteen congregants had gathered.  The blonde-haired minister was very young and somewhat nervous, right out of seminary.  Vryhoff struggled throughout the service with the Swedish hymns and the Lutheran tendency to stand to pray and sit to sing, the opposite of what he was used to.  He joined the others at the front for communion, taking the bread and the wine and then returning to his seat.

While the minister had his back to congregation, putting away the elements, a parishioner, a middle-aged woman, returned to the front, but this time pushing a very elderly woman, presumably her mother, in a wheelchair. 

He described the mother has having the “classic nursing home look: slumped to the right, thin, scraggly, colorless hair, vacant eyes, and a slack-jaw with her tongue showing just a bit.”  She was there for communion.

There was an awkward minute as they all waited for the minister to turn around and notice the two waiting at the front.  He finally did turn, perceived the situation, and then proceeded to retrieve the elements.  He carefully administered the bite of bread and the sip of wine to the old woman. And then he paused.  

It was then that Vryhof held his breath, because he knew what was going to happen next. The minister looked at the old woman, physically a wreck of a human being, and he said to her the most important words that one human being can say to another human being. The minister looked her straight in the eyes and said to her in Swedish:  “Our Lord Jesus Christ, whose body and blood you have received, preserve your soul unto everlasting life.”

Vryhoff writes:  “I suppose it was a coincidence, but it was a God-given coincidence nonetheless. At that precise moment, the bells of the church started pealing, ringing and resonating and resounding and reverberating through the church and through me, making the hair on the back of my head stand up.  Heaven touched earth and it seemed that Jesus Christ, himself was saying, ‘Yes, I will do that!’

And then the Father and the Spirit joined the Son, and using the same words given to Julian of Norwich [in fourteenth century England], the Triune God proclaimed loudly over the ringing of the bells, “I may make all things well, and I can make all things well, and I shall make all things well; and I will make all things well, and you will see yourself that every kind of thing will be well!”[i]

No, the reality is that I can’t preach God’s Word to you.  Forgive me when I try to explain Jesus or attempt to talk you about faith, God, epiphanies and this mystery life.  I can’t do it. And it’s not because I’m a bad preacher. It’s not because I lack the experience or the training.  It’s because true revelation, authentic recognition—when it’s about God—is always a gift from God.  It’s always a miracle.  It is always “from heaven.” The truth is, I can’t preach.  And the truth is, you can’t hear, except as a miracle, except a gift of God’s amazing grace.

I’m not saying that the baptism of Jesus happened with a literal dove descending and with an audible voice. I’m not saying that visions like this happen every day.  Because I really don’t know. I am saying that if we keep the faith, I believe it can and it will happen to you and to me!

You might be being baptized or receiving communion or listening to a sermon or a choir.  You might be kissing a child on the forehead, holding a puppy or sitting on a front porch with a friend. You might be taking a shower, driving to work or just staring off into space doing absolutely nothing, and then, when you thought you’ve got your world all figured out, the once hushed heavens open up, and something like a bird swoops down.  Heaven comes so close you can feel the breath of God.  A voice speaks. It’s inexplicable but undeniable.  Warmth fills your soul.  And you know beyond any doubt whatsoever that you are God’s beloved child.[ii]  Thanks be to God.  Let us pray together.

Lord Jesus, rip open the heavens and come to us, reach down, reach in, disrupt, touch, embrace, speak to us.  Do not leave us, O Lord, to our own devices.  Abandon us not to our own voices.  Speak to us, miraculously appear to us, and give us the grace to see and listen and the courage to follow.  Amen.

[i]Crash Helmets and Church Bells, Perspectives, August/September 2000, p. 3

[ii] Inspired and adapted from a sermon by William Willimon in Pulpit Resource, Logos Productions, 2009.