At our annual congregational meeting back in December we were asked during the course of dinner to name barriers to engagement in our mission. I happened to be seated next to four middle school youth. I eagerly awaited their insights. What would these youth say prevented persons from being immersed in our life in Christ?
These youth without hesitation declared two factors: people had better things to do; it wasn’t cool to go to church. When I inquired about their answer these youth focused on being cool. Whatever their understanding of coolness, it was likely outside of church. “Are you cool?” I inquired. To a person they loudly affirmed their coolness.
Whew! And they were in church, at a meeting no less.
We know coolness has a way of cooling off. Justin Beaver and Taylor Swift are likely now seen as cool. Next year they could register zero on the coolness meter.
When I was in college I accidently tested my coolness. I purchased a new pair of ‘unstylish’ shoes. In that day to be cool meant wearing desert boots or sandals. My new shoes were apparently reserved for people over 60. Get this—those shoes received more comment than any other clothing I’ve ever worn…negative comment.
It’s a good thing that church isn’t cool. If we blow with the winds of the day, we’ll likely never stop turning. Marry yourself to the latest trends and you’ll be widowed soon.
Is there a slogan in all this? Something we could present for all who pass by our church? How about this from Flannery O’Connor: ‘The truth will make you odd!’
Cyber Schluppe
It’s common for sports players and coaches to cover their mouths when speaking. I’ve noticed it among baseball players. If the pitcher on the mound is in conversation with another player or a coach, that pitcher places his glove over his mouth. The same with football coaches on the sidelines—they, while talking into their head gear, will place a barrier in front of their mouths. What they have to say is privileged. And evidently what they have to say could, if detected by the opponent, give an undue advantage. So cover your mouth.
Do we Christians have any privileged information? Is there something we don’t want overheard? Would it matter to us if our greatest, best ever ministry idea showed up in another faith community?
Years ago word of a pastor’s sermon got around such that other clergy asked for a copy. Come to find out this pastor’s sermon ended up published. That’s great, except it was published under someone else’s name! Plagiarism. Was he bothered that another pastor took credit for his work? Sure. But then he said, “The good news is that other people received that message.”
In the movie The Way four strangers end up walking a pilgrimage in Spain and parts of France known as the Camino de Santiago(The Way of St. James). One of them played by Martin Sheen doesn’t want anyone to know about him. He has placed a glove over his whole life even though he’s on a shared spiritual pilgrimage. Those who walk with this wounded man allow him the space to be. They find out he’s in great grief over the unexpected death of his son. In the course of being with others he’s allowed the space to heal. It’s beautiful!
We have no right to force ourselves into other’s lives; we have every right to disclose our love for them. People may let down their guard.
Such connection is so very holy.
Cyber Schluppe
These days Almost Pastor Grover hangs upside down in my office closet. (For the uninitiated Almost Pastor Grover is a small, fuzzy puppet, whose 25 years in seminary render him ‘almost.’) On certain weekdays just before pre-school Almost Pastor Grover receives a visit from a little fellow named Evan. Evan waits by the closet door expectantly. When that door opens the glow on Evan’s face is full. He is radiant. If you could bottle up that look, pull it out when you need it, life would be so peaceful.
We can’t find peace in a bottle. And yet, to know peace, is to yearn for more of it. We are made for just such desire, a holy longing. For example, those times when you are safely and securely present to loved ones these can become the ‘I want to stay here moments.’ Norman Rockwell puts them on canvas. We want to put them in our smart phone calendar. When the holidays work for us emotionally, it’s little wonder the after holiday blues snatch us by the heart. Why can’t all our days be framed in such peace? Let’s hang upside down.
Peace, so elusive.
When our spiritual ancestors were banished from the community of peace, Eden, they lived very aware of what they’d lost. Made for Eden but living just east of it. Caught between what is and what ought to be. The raw data of our lives—an almost peace; the real yearning of our lives—lasting peace, what ought to be.
The Gospel News is that Eden has been born among us. The very delight of God, Jesus, comes to offer Himself. Peace. Like Grover, we are almost. Our peace is tentative. Two steps forward, one step back. So what? Jesus comes without reserve to be our peace. He comes all the way to us. He gives peace where it’s absent. He plants His peace precisely where we believe it won’t stay…in us. As the scripture says, ‘The peace of God that surpasses all human understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.’ (Philippians 4:7)
It’s enough to make you want to hang upside down.
Peace be with you!
Cyber Schluppe
Two words stand tall. These two words capture so much that is unsaid; they evoke among the best things ever said. They carry tremendous freight. Yet, we hardly notice them. Those two words are grace and peace.
You often hear them from the mouth of clergy: “Grace and peace to you from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.” (A sign that the preaching is about to commence.) Grace and peace are the fullness of God’s gifts. To receive grace, to encounter peace is to dwell in God’s riches.
What is grace? It is the very heart of God’s love. It’s who God is. Not something our Lord doles out—a little grace here, a bit over there. Not something God withholds. God is gracious and merciful.
Let this description of grace wash over you:
“Grace’s empowerment is present in all true healing and in any movement
toward wholeness and love and freedom. It is present in every physical and psychological healing, in social and political reconciliation, in cultural and scientific breakthroughs, in deliverance from evil. It is present where love really grows….God’s grace is present intimately within us, inviting and empowering us toward more free and full exercise of our will and responsibility.” Gerald May, Addiction and Grace
Unpack that! Grace present in the fight to end malaria. Grace present in the Arab Spring. Grace present in justice for children abused. Grace present in that broken arm reset. Grace present in the voting rights act. Grace present in a teenager’s resilience against the bully. Grace present in the voice of “I’m sorry.” Grace present inside you pushing you to become more alive and available.
It’s winter. It’s cold. Nope. Never cold. We live graced! It’s enough to make you want to set aside every coldness in your heart.
Grace to you!
Cyber Schluppe
Many summers ago my wife Sally and I ran a week long program at Agape Camp where NC Lutheran youth gathered with adults with developmental delays from Murdoch Center, near Butner, NC. Seeking relief from the August heat each afternoon we swam in the camp pond. (This was before Agape had a swimming pool.)
One of our guests from Murdoch was a young man named Brisker. As I recall Brisker hadn’t spoken while attending camp. On this particular day, Brisker started walking on the dock toward the deep water. When the dock ended, Brisker just kept on walking. He immediately sank beneath the pond’s surface. Several of our youth went after Brisker and brought him to safety.
When he gathered himself, Brisker finally spoke, “That’s cold!”
Immediately many of us dove head first into that section of the pond. We all hoped that Brisker spoke the truth. He did! Thanks to Brisker we were surrounded with cool refreshing water!
That was some 32 years ago. I don’t recall anything else said at that camp– just those two, well timed words from Brisker. They stuck. When you’ve been hungry for someone to speak and they finally do, their words resonate. They have staying quality.
Our words are to have efficacy. They can cause others to dive in. I once heard a man give testimony to the importance of gleaning crops. He was convincing. His whole self was comported into those words. When he was done speaking all I wanted to do was glean.
Amidst the cacophony of gibbering, of incessant breaking news breeding noise, there is the plaintive, thoughtful gift of a well timed word.
Try it!
Cyber Schluppe
In the Ackland Art Museum at UNC-Chapel Hill a clay frog sits in a display case. Yes, a frog! It couldn’t be more than a ½ inch. To see it you almost need a magnifying glass. Observing its simple lines requires leaning way over. This tiny green frog looks like it could fit on any charm bracelet. Next to the display case the estimated age of this diminutive creature is identified: 2500-2000 BCE (Before the Common Era).
Sitting there before you is a 4,500 year old frog. What mystifies me is how this little creature managed to make it intact for that long. It never got knocked off the night stand in ancient Egypt? Wasn’t swept up with the litter on a sandy floor? Never dropped overboard while fishing in the Nile?
Unfortunately, this frog comes without any story revealing the passage of 4,500 years into a display at an American University Museum! There it is sitting virtually unnoticed on a museum shelf.
One of the great spiritual plagues of our day is loneliness. Maybe plague is too anemic a word. Loneliness could be the hidden scourge of our day….so pervasive we don’t even notice it. Years ago someone wrote about our culture as ‘the lonely crowd.’ Recently one observer of our society described us as ‘bowling alone.’ Whatever the descriptor, we are accustomed to traveling down a lonesome highway. My first encounter with a large city as a young adult covered me in loneliness: nobody knew me there; nobody cared to know me there! I felt about the size of that museum frog.
Listen. One of the best ways to break the silence of loneliness is training in the art of listening. Such training is offered by Stephen Ministry. This intentional Christian care giving ministry helps us learn and re-learn availability to another person, to seek to understand them, to know them without judgment. This is our day’s greatest need. Tweeting and texting have increased; listening has dissipated. When we break through the deafening silence to connect with another we tap into the stream of God’s intention. When such connection occurs, it’s akin to heaven. For the one who knows us as we are, yearns for us to live intimately, in communion. God doesn’t want us walking like Adam alone in the garden.
For someone to receive anything you have to utter and not reject you….it’s an avenue to renewed life. It starts with the simple, prayerful desire to notice and honor this other.
Frogs can be preserved in display cases. Children made in God’s image are preserved through community.
Cyber Schluppe
Peter Lovenheim was shocked to learn of the death of his suburban New York neighbors, whose death was avoidable. A mother of two was shot and killed by her husband, who then shot himself. The husband had been mentally imbalanced. On the night this man shot his wife, she had spent the whole day calling her best friend, who lived 20 minutes away, leaving plenty of messages to ask if she and her children could stay over. The best friend never got the message. The woman went home.
“Why hadn’t the woman gone to her neighbors? Why hadn’t she knocked on the door of a nearby neighbor and said, “I don’t feel safe”? Why had she called one friend over and over again, but not called on the help closest at hand, a neighbor?” (The Christian Century, August 9, 2011)
Troubled by these questions Lovenheim could only observe that suburban living creates isolation. He wanted to swim against this tide of anonymity. What Lovenheim did was ask his neighbors, one at a time, if he could sleep over. Many refused; many didn’t. Lovenheim learned that inside those fine homes was the full range of human need—couples contemplating divorce, a single mother with terminal cancer, a retiree suffering from loneliness.
He got to know his neighbors. In a book about this experience (In The Neighborhood: The Search for Community on a American Street, One Sleepover at a Time) Lovenheim raises a profound question: Could we, in the busyness of our lives, be missing out on the very people that God intends for us to meet?
“Love your neighbor as you love yourself,” declared Jesus.
There’s a group of people we will love with very little effort—our family and friends. But we are told to do something harder—love our neighbors.
Are the people on your street, your condo, your apartment the ones you are intended to neighbor?
Cyber Schluppe
“Wag more; bark less.”
It’s a great slogan. It’s an empty slogan unless you have someone to wag at. Wagging involves recognizing that person whom you are glad to see. Watch how a dog wags—a 90 mile an hour tail, a mid section swaying to and fro, jumping and panting. Often the whole body is involved except for raised hairs on the back. When hairs are raised on a dog a bark, not a wag, is forthcoming.
Who gets the wag? Now days someone on the screen gets the wag: Justin, Scottie, Phillip and Kate, Lady Gaga to name a few. People magazine remains popular because it helps us peer into the lives of those in Tinsel Town or Wall Street. Social conversations sputter around the characters in beloved TV programs. I’ve been hooked to a TV series before. Watching my favorite character navigate the next crisis got me wagging.
These are not real relationships.
One Lent a man gave up TV. For six weeks he abstained from his favorite programs. When Easter arrived he made two significant discoveries:
1. he realized he knew more about the people on TV than the people with whom he lived;
2. he wanted to correct that hole in his life.
He was beginning to wag in the right direction!
It is the season for wagging. Our Lord Jesus so desiring to know us and be known by us plops down in our midst. It is his singular mission, to be in relationship with us, drawing us to the life that is life. Seeing you, seeing me puts him in a wag.
The more we live in communion with Jesus, the more we live in communion with others, wagging all the way.
Cyber Schluppe