tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-144544032024-03-07T14:20:48.520-05:00From Bryan’s Office...Where we're out to lunchbryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comBlogger447125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-73549155396271094132021-03-07T08:35:00.000-05:002021-03-07T08:35:02.709-05:00By Your Side Lord, I Will Seek Other Seas<div><i>Lord, You have come to the lakeshore<br />Looking neither for wealthy nor wise ones<br />You only asked me to follow humbly<br />O Lord, with Your eyes You have searched me<br />And while smiling have spoken my name<br />Now my boat's left on the shoreline behind me<br />By Your side I will seek other seas</i></div><p>I knew this pastor. Good man. When he first arrived a church it was like catching lightning in a bottle. With his leadership, the congregation began to realize some of her potential, and she grew in every meaningful way she could grow.</p><p>Professions of faith. Acts of service. Attendance. Giving. Spiritual development. Fellowship.</p><p>But over time the spiritual energy that fueled that congregation's rise began to wane. It took years, but it happened. The world never stands still. It's always changing. And so soon enough, the congregation, while not struggling, got stuck. </p><p>Previously in his career, the pastor had gone through a terrible season at another church. Things had gone so badly that upon finally leaving a congregation who didn't want him, he vowed to find one that did, and never leave so he'd never have to go through that terrible experience again. </p><p>And so the pastor ignored all the signs of slow atrophy because the church loved him, and he her. And while he did eventually retire from that congregation, his long tenure created a lot of problems. It made people fearful of change and possibilities. It made it hard for a new pastor to bond with the congregation. It deceived people into thinking the best days of the church had already passed.</p><p>I resolved a long time ago that I would not become that pastor, which in my experience has been a number of pastors. Pastors who twisted themselves into knots, while not doing due diligence to the congregation they loved, out of a misplaced sense of duty and fear of what might come.</p><p>And so it is with both fear and trembling, but also hope, that I announce that Bishop Palmer of the West Ohio Conference has made a new appointment for me at Westwood United Methodist Church in Cincinnati, Ohio beginning July 1st. </p><p>I am excited about the possibilities at Westwood. I've never lived in that neighborhood, and know little about that part of Cincinnati, but the few things I've gathered excite me. It's a diverse community in every sense of the word. The church is part of the fabric of the neighborhoods, longing to be connective tissue that brings life and light to all live there and pass by. My hope is to be a catalyst to help that congregation continue to do that in an era where it's becoming increasingly difficult for churches to make those kinds of inroads. My prayer is that together, new creativity will unleash new possibilities.</p><p>And as for Shawnee, well this is the second time I've had to say goodbye to her. The first was in 1997, and it almost killed me. I was young, talented, clueless, and simply still unprepared for what ministry, and life, would bring. My return to her in 2004 in many ways scratched the itch that I had left too soon, and missed the full potential that could have been reached if somehow I had stayed seven years earlier.</p><p>But I was naive in that thinking. Nothing had remained the same, because nothing ever does. And while I had been in ministry many years as an associate, much about being a lead pastor I still had to learn. As with most things, I tend to learn to hard way. So while there were many inroads and gains made, there were also setbacks and a price to be paid.</p><p>Shawnee's best days of ministry in Christ's service are in front of her. No matter what those along the way have had to say about her "glory days" - whenever they thought those days were - this community still needs Jesus just as badly as she ever did. The realization of the Kingdom of Heaven in its totality is still yet to come to this part of Northwest Ohio.</p><p>It would be safe to stay. This congregation has been very protective of my family and I. I'm so appreciative of their love and patience. But in my heart I know the Bishop and Cabinet are right. A new voice is needed so this wonderful, unique community of faith may continue to fulfill the call of Romans 12, to overcome evil with good.</p><p>My last Sunday at Shawnee will be June 20th, and my first Sunday at Westwood will be June 27th. As I pray for these faith communities, the retiring pastor at Westwood (well done, Pastor Strawn.... go enjoy your time as a VIM Nomad), and the incoming pastor at Shawnee (which will be worked out with the Leadership Board by District Superintendent Barry Burns in the coming weeks), I ask that you please pray for my family, as we navigate the coming transition.</p><p>In closing, there are no guarantees. In this life things don't always turn out well, and there isn't always a happy ending. But no matter what we must continue to plant seeds yielding fruit we will never eat. And so may we all continue faithfully to scatter the life-giving message of Gospel of Jesus Christ so the fruit of the spirit - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, goodness, thankfulness, and self-control - may be made manifest in our lives, families, communities, and the emerging Kingdom of Heaven.</p><p>Thank you Shawnee for you love and support. And to Westwood, see you soon.</p><p><br /></p><p><i><br /></i></p><div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-80589139652987082742018-09-25T18:36:00.001-04:002018-09-25T18:36:22.004-04:00Five Reasons Centrists and Progressives Should Support A Gracious Exit <a href="https://um-gracious-exit.com/" target="_blank">Recently a group of clergy (including myself) issued an open letter to General Conference delegates calling for the passage of "Gracious Exit" legislation</a> that would allow congregation to leave with property, and clergy with their pension, under a uniform set of criteria pending changes in the Book of Discipline in 2019. This is designed to protect local congregations regardless of their size (and mortgage debt they might hold) and sway, and assure clergy they can go forward without losing the benefits they've earned with service. Clergy and laity alike are welcomed to endorse this letter online, all of which can be done if you <a href="https://um-gracious-exit.com/contact/" target="_blank">click here</a>.<br />
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As I've watched names be added to the list, I've noticed the names of many influential traditionalists being added, as well names from conferences that might lean more in that direction. Progressives and centrists, however, seem to be withholding their support. As I've been asking around it seems the main reason for this is that clergy and laity are under the assumption that if they endorsed this language, they'll be encouraging folks to leave the denomination while personally supporting the cause of our unity. I respect this, but I personally disagree with the argument. Supporting or not supporting a "Gracious Exit" will make no discernible difference in whatever is coming down the pike this February.<br />
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There will be a split, or splintering in the wake of our gathering in St. Louis. It is unavoidable. That's why I believe a "Gracious Exit" is necessary. Let me give you five reasons......<br />
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<b>1. The United Methodist Bishops Aren't Going To Lead A Push For Unity In St. Louis</b><br />
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This summer hasn't been a good one for our bishops. After receiving the work of the Way Forward Commission, a joint statement of support for the "One Church Plan" was quickly undercut by a press releases by bishops who opposed it. Confusion rained supreme as we wondered if one plan, or three, would be introduced at General Conference. The "Gracious Exit", which was promised by the commission, was stripped out by the bishops, only to be included in one of the three plans. Conflicting reports regarding how overwhelming, or underwhelming, the vote for "One Church" within the College of Bishops came from multiple sources. Leaks regarding which plans the bishops worked on and didn't work on now have created suspicion that the "Traditionalist Plan" didn't come from the Way Forward Commission, but rather from a conservative caucus one of commission members represent. Dates came and went when promised communication updating us on this work didn't appear, and when it finally did wasn't translated into the languages promised, but rather only English.<br />
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In short, in a time when United Methodists were hungering for clarity, the bishops couldn't provide it even in the simplest terms.<br />
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<a href="http://s3.amazonaws.com/Website_Properties/news-media/press-center/documents/Africa_College_of_Bishops_Learning_Retreat_2018_statement.pdf" target="_blank">Now the bishops representing the African conferences have released their own statement, and following the example set this summer, did so without bringing any further clarity to our current situation.</a> Issuing a stand for the traditional view of marriage, but refusing to endorse the plan that would champion that position, or the plan the bishops said they endorsed last summer seems calculated and cautious. It mirrors the muddled communication received from all the bishops last summer, and is forcing us all to speculate what the bishops really want, at a time when all we want from them is leadership.<br />
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Rest assured that if you had any hope that somehow in St. Louis all the bishops would band together, rise above their differences, and lead us to unity, you can pretty much set that aside. Two years have proven they are as balkanized as the rest of us.<br />
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<b>2. The Statement of the African Bishops Is Most Likely Still An Affirmation of a "Traditionalist" Understanding of Unity, And Thus the "Traditionalist Plan"</b><br />
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I don't think it's any coincidence that when the African bishops stated their position, they referred back to the statement regarding marriage they crafted together back in 2016. Two years, they tell us, has changed nothing. They want unity, but it will be around the reaffirmation and enforcement of a "Traditionalist" understanding of marriage. The 2016 General Conference in Portland was heading toward this definition of "unity": doubling down on traditionalist language, closing loopholes for enforcement, and expelling those who violated the Book of Discipline. Their desire to keep moving in this direction appears to have not changed at all.<br />
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If the bishops from Africa haven't changed their stance, what is the likelihood the delegates from the African conferences have? The math in 2016 seems to be lining up to be the same math in 2019. The path we were heading in 2016, unity by law and order, still seems very likely to win the day.<br />
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<b>3. If "One Church", Or Nothing, Gets Passed, The WCA Is Going To Walk </b><br />
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The WCA has made it clear that the current state of the denomination is for them, untenable. The only reason there hasn't been a walkout over Bishop Olivetto's election is the looming special session of General Conference in 2019. And at that, there's only been patience practiced because the WCA knows regardless of the outcome, that they won't be living inside this current version of the denomination after next February. They'll either put the newly passed "Traditionalist Plan" into effect, or leave. They haven't wavered from this promise. They've been very consistent.<br />
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If a sizable body of people go to the trouble of filing all the paperwork necessary to enable them to become a denomination across the country, hire an attorney to represent their interests, put out information and propaganda to fill their ranks, and say again and again that they won't remain in the denomination if they don't get what they want, why wouldn't we believe them? The WCA has effectively asked for a divorce.<br />
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If you've been through a divorce, you know that at some point the only grace-filled thing you can give your spouse is an agreement to part. For the good of all involved - family, friends, and each other - it is better to part amicably than seek new, awful ways to punish one another.<br />
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<b>4. Pragmatically Progressives and Some Centrists Need To Start Planning For The Possibility Of A World After The UMC And They'll Need A Good Start</b><br />
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There's a possibility (and it's a good one) that the "Traditionalist Plan" is going to be the new discipline of the United Methodist Church. Some churches and clergy will end up getting tossed out on the other side of this reality. But there are others who simply will have no desire to live out what these changes are going to require of them. They will want to get out.<br />
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When a church leaves a denomination there's much to consider. Loss of denominational affiliation requires the filing of new incorporation papers with your respective state, and modifying your deed to eliminate the the "trust clause" language. Leaving the UMC means giving up the tax-exempt status under the blanket exemption from the IRS. Polity and self-governance decisions are going to have to be made. The loss of the itinerant system could thrust churches who have clergy who don't go with them into the rare place of having to find their own clergy. All of these changes, and more, will be required to keep the church operating.<br />
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Clergy too who turn in their orders, will need to seek alternative means of credentialing. They will be faced with potential changes in their health insurance and pension plan. Without the rules of their conference or the Book of Discipline, their role will very much have to be re-defined. There's a lot that will need to be done for a former United Methodist congregation to continue to do her work.<br />
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While traditionalists could land easily with the Free Methodist or Wesleyan denominations if they so chose, United Methodists who favor inclusion don't really have a clear cut option. Some have talked about trying to work with the UCC to open a "Wesleyan Wing". Others have talked about opening up talks with the ELCA or Episcopalians about creating some sort of landing place. Still others have talked about filing the paperwork to mirror what the WCA has done and create a contingency plan for a "new" denomination or association if the need is there. Still others are looking at the possibility of going out on their own as independent congregations.<br />
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In any case, refusing to think about the "unthinkable" is an option, but it probably isn't a good one. A "Gracious Exit" would allow progressives and centrists to move forward with as little upset and interruption as possible doing the work of making disciples of Jesus Christ who change the world.<br />
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<b>5. We need a "Gracious Exit" so we can make plans for the future with as much grace and love as possible. </b><br />
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I know this kind of talk is upsetting to people. Nobody likes change, and the degree that could be coming will be significant. But regardless of whoever it is that'll be looking at leaving, if we care about the ministry of each and everyone of our local congregations, mutually we should agree that the journey shouldn't start with costly litigation. It shouldn't favor churches with greater mortgage debt and the financial means to hire their own attorneys. It shouldn't jeopardize the pensions of retirees who count on that income, or be done without giving thought about the impact on our missional outreach all over the world. It shouldn't jeopardize the function of each of our congregations, and it should give clarity to clergy as they navigate their future.<br />
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In a bad situation, this is most grace-filled and loving we can be to each other. There's no need to create more suffering than need be as the Spirit leads us into the future. Creating a way for churches and clergy alike to be faithful to what they earnestly believe regardless of whether they remain in the denomination or not is the best chance we have to continue to facilitate good ministry in our local congregations. To continue the work of making disciples of Jesus Christ, who change the world.<br />
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So once again, <a href="https://um-gracious-exit.com/" target="_blank">please consider signing on our open letter calling for a "Gracious Exit" to be included in the work of the special session of General Conference in 2019</a>. Your voice could make all the difference.<br />
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<br /><div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-33882268517463102142018-05-30T16:40:00.000-04:002018-05-30T16:40:11.054-04:00Why I'm Not Afraid of the "Gracious Exit"One of the reasons I ended up becoming a United Methodist Minister is that I'm not all that great at math. I can add and subtract well enough. It's just that in the 8th grade when I hit algebra and they started introducing letters into the numbers, everything kind of went downhill. My lack of math prowess was one of many clear indicators that God wasn't calling me into civil engineering as a vocation. Ministry seemed like a much more viable option.<br />
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But you don't have to be an actuary to understand United Methodist math. Barring an appeal from the most trusted and respected American United Methodist in all of Africa (thank you George Howard), the era of Book of Discipline "fuzzy enforcement" would have been over. Parts of the A&W Plan, which is essentially the new "Accountability Option", were speeding toward consideration on the floor of General Conference, while the previous forms of the "Local Option" and the more-complicated-than-algebra "Autonomous-Affiliated-Jurisdictional-Or-Whatever-It-Is Option" languished in committee. Only George's motion, which swung enough African delegation votes after Adam Hamilton's motion failed, stopped that train from reaching the station.<br />
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Which brings me back to the subject of United Methodist math.<br />
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In 2019 virtually the same delegations from all the various conferences from around the world will convene in St. Louis to take up what George Howard's motion delayed for three years. At that gathering the same three options - accountability, local, and the other one - will finally come up for vote. Only this time, the progressive wing of the denomination is more defiant and the conservative wing is more organized and determined.<br />
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The math will be the same.<br />
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When the WCA first started, and the news that it essentially had incorporated itself in such a way that it could be a new denomination in all fifty states, I'd have bet the conservative wing of the church was leaving. Why deal with two entire jurisdictions who were simply not going to enforce the Book of Discipline, and force you to exit each clergy member one trial at a time? Why tussle with the entrenched institutionalists who sat on the various boards and worked on the staffs of the various General Church agencies? Why try to face down bishops, the majority of whom are ready for some sort of compromise to move forward? I personally thought the WCA was angling to negotiate a "Gracious Exit" requiring an "exit fee" to protect the fiscal health of Wespath, and go start a new thing.<br />
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But the closer we get to St Louis next February, I'm not so sure. The conservative caucuses haven't indicated that they're up for anything other that total victory when it comes to matter of the Discipline and the future of the UMC. In fact, given a favorable Judicial Council, and <a href="https://peopleneedjesus.net/2018/05/19/denominational-pain-the-way-forward-part-one/amp/?__twitter_impression=true" target="_blank">estimates like this one </a>where only a small percentage of the denomination are projected to leave if the Accountability Option were passed, I'm gathering that there's a heated discussion going on inside the WCA about whether or leave, or stay.<br />
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As a committed centrist who has been working toward a compromise where all people would be welcome in the United Methodist Church, I've dealt enough with various members of WCA leadership to know that there will be no compromise. This is a matter of principle upon which they will not budge. No scenario that would permit an ordained gay and lesbian clergy or an elected lesbian bishop to be in any way affiliated with them will be entertained. <br />
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Down the road, these same leaders I fear will become as hard-core about other issues as they are about LGBTQ exclusion. For those who stand for any "leftist" sounding cause (Health care reform? Gender equality? Compassionate immigration reform? Reasonable gun control?) or continue to call those to accountability for rejecting infant baptism, confirmation, and female clergy leadership, I have a hard time believing that eventually a target isn't going to be on your back too. If the denomination starts heading "right", my centrist colleagues agree that LGBTQ exclusion isn't where things will end.<br />
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It won't be enough if you've already affirmed the Book of Discipline and sought to uphold it. New litmus tests like the affirmation of the Nicene Creed (which hasn't been an issue in 1600 years) will be established to enforce a more literal view of scripture designed to align us with other evangelicals and the neo-con agenda in Washington. On-line sermons, I'm certain, will be reviewed, with anything deemed objectionable on the table for possible charges. Given the continued rhetoric, I expect the worst if the math from 2016 holds in 2019, and the road to 2020 leads toward greater restriction.<br />
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For these reasons, and others, I support the inclusion of "Gracious Exit" for any congregation or clergy who will not be able in good conscience to abide by the changes coming in our Book of Discipline. While there are currently no "winners or losers", and the future remains unwritten, this would insure the most practical and equitable criteria for any interested church or clergy members to follow.<br />
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To go further, I'd invite members of the WCA to an theologically inclusive table to discuss a "Gracious Exit" that would be fair and equitable to all. I'm sure the prospect of a world where a "Local Option" has won the day is as unappealing to you as the previous scenario is to me. Quite honestly, after years of fighting I just want to see our churches go forward as healthy as they can be, positioned to do the ministry of Jesus Christ to the best of their ability. If there truly is no middle way, I'd like us to be gracious as we take steps forward into the future.<br />
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While I will continue to pray for a unified United Methodist Church, I'm not going to ignore the math. Either way though - United Methodist or whatever is on the other side of it - I'll work toward a denomination that puts the local church first, and aims to make disciples of Jesus Christ equipped to change the world for the better. That's my prayer for all, whether walking together, or on separate paths, that we keep making the journey toward Kingdom of Heaven, following Jesus.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-3414450676250842222016-07-18T15:25:00.001-04:002016-07-18T17:33:50.386-04:00The Bridge Is OutWe had a professor at Miami University named B.H. Smith who started every class he taught with the same question: "Why do we study history?" Of course us students knew the answer, and every hand rose to make a good first impression: "So that we don't make the same mistakes made in the past." Smith would look at us, pause for dramatic effect, and with great emphasis reply, "Most of us will never be important enough to make the mistakes made in the past. For us history is about two things - dates and dead people."<br />
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It would get a big laugh, but there was an air of truth to the man's words. Most everyone reading this will never be in the position of making a bad treaty with some nation or propose some economic program that led to hyper-inflation. But if you are a United Methodist know that this last week, you were all a small or large part of a repeat of our denomination's history. One-hundred and seventy-two years after we split into the M.E. North and M.E. South over the election of a bishop, we're on the verge of doing it again.<br />
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I have no idea exactly how it will all go down but I am certain that some progressives won't go forward without an openly gay or lesbian bishop, and some traditionalists won't go forward with one. We've reached a dead end, and the bridge so many of us prayed would get built, spanning our divide to allow us to go forward together, isn't even in the design stage.<br />
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As a centrist it would be easy to point my finger at the traditionalists or progressives for this position were in right now. The traditionalists in my opinion, never came to the table in good faith to discuss some sort of compromise. In fact, compromise that resulted in any change in our Discipline as it relates to human sexuality to many traditionalists has always been non-negotiable. So whether it was accomplished by taking a majority in General Conference or via a schism, the end game for traditionalists always seemed like total victory without compromise. But all that said, what other arena of work on the face of the planet are you considered the "bad guys" because you follow the rules?<br />
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I can't blame traditionalists for this place we've arrived.<br />
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I could wag my finger at the progressives. Years of both peaceful protest and civil disobedience to finally get a substantive conversation on the place and role of LGBT persons in the denomination, and just as we are on the cusp of this happening they give half-a-peace-sign to both traditionalists and the growing number of centrists who worked to make this possible. Seven non-compliant conferences and one elected bishop later, the hopes for the special commission aren't dead, but like in the movie "The Princess Bride", you could call them "mostly dead". Short of "Miracle Max" coming up with an eleventh-hour magic chocolate pill (go back and watch the movie), the prospects for maintaining unity where traditionalists, centrists, and progressives could make peace AND reach out to all as their conscience allowed and the Spirit led.... are thin.<br />
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But all that being said, with no door or window to open, why should any of us be surprised that the question of inclusion was forced through a new hole in the roof? These are sons, daughters, mothers, fathers, and friends who the progressives see themselves standing up for. I can't lay my dismay this at their feet either.<br />
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In the end centrists have nobody to blame but themselves. We kept turning a blind eye to the ills that bedevil us. Not just a blind eye to the ever-growing divide as more prohibitive language was added to the BoD, parallel mission societies were formed, thirteen bishops wrote a letter, a challis was shattered, Elders were getting drummed out, time was wasted in Tampa, and the letters "LGBTQ" couldn't even be uttered on the floor in Portland. <i>We turned a blind eye to more than forty years of decline and increasing irrelevance by largely just settling for the status quo.</i><br />
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We turned a blind eye to forty years of cultural, demographic, racial and geographic shifts. We turned a blind eye to a growing group of increasingly ineffective Elders and underprepared Local Pastors. We turned a blind eye to the local church which was hemorrhaging even as we forced her to give more blood to a bureaucracy that's only grown more bloated and ineffective. We turned a blind eye to the "death tsunami", the corrosive influence of partisan politics via the IRD, and generations of Americans who thought it better to be "nones" than "United Methodists". We turned a blind eye to the escalating cost of seminary and a growing distaste for itineracy among younger clergy even as locationalism has made it less viable.<br />
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We turned a blind eye to changing attitudes toward LGBTQ persons, and refused to use our influence to heed the wisdom of Gamaliel to open up pathways of inclusion so see if this was a movement of the Spirit. We turned a blind eye to the frustration of our conservative colleagues and congregations who felt increasingly like they were the "villains" even though they largely just upholding the Discipline.<br />
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I blame us.<br />
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And while there have been successes, pockets of spiritual growth across the connection, for every one of these great stories I can point out ten examples of congregations we've managed into obsolescence. The writing was on the wall. We just decided it was better to keep the prophet locked up in prison and pretend the writing was for somebody else.<br />
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We've been reactive. We asserted our influence to keep the boat from rocking. We didn't take seriously Bishop Schnase's assessment that the church needs to engage in "risk taking mission" to be considered healthy and growing. Instead of organizing and forcing hard discussions between bitterly divided parties so that a clear vision could emerge, we just let the ship sail until it absolutely had to turn... and now it's listing near the rocks.<br />
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So at this late hour, my prayer is that the bishops to act quickly. Please don't wait to nominate the special commission but please have them in place by Labor Day, their work completed by next year, and the special session of General Conference meeting in 2018. The denomination cannot withstand four more years of resolutions, counter-resolutions, pronouncements, and acts of defiance. Further, if the failure of the "Connectional Table Plan" has taught us anything, it's that under-representing folks in the connection will most likely result in a solution that in real terms, has no chance passing General Conference. So please consider proportionally representing the global connection on the commission as they're represented at General Conference.<br />
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Centrists, as we think about being proactive, given the reality of our current situation, as the special session of General Conference nears, let's keep everything on the table. We can introduce restructuring plans which would essentially create multiple apartments under one roof. But we also need not avoid planning for a possible future where "live and let live" cannot be abided by a significant number of clergy and congregations. Since the "trust clause" and the sustainability of the pension system are poor reasons for us to stay together, let's not be afraid to explore a potential pathway where money on litigation isn't wasted on lawyers, and a mutual respect for those who served before us can still be honored, even if our unity cannot.<br />
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In closing, in this season of uncertainty we all need clarity to effectively plan for future ministry. It's not reasonable to allocate funding for new church starts or recruitment of new clergy when funding streams could be upended abruptly. It's not sensible to keep working the itinerant system as if all things will likely remain same, when great upheaval in our local churches is now more than just speculation. It's not ethical to keep promising retirees that we will live up to our obligations when so many things are in the air.<br />
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And it's no longer acceptable for those of us in the center to keep expecting things to just work out. You can't a build a bridge people don't want, to keep the illusion of familiarity and "sameness". Hard choices will need to be made about what may have to be dug up and pruned so a new season of planting can begin.<br />
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In our prayer and devotional lives, local church ministries, communities, conferences, nation, and denomination it is time to heed the words of 2 Chronicles 7:14; to humble ourselves, pray, seek the Lord's face, and turn from the wickedness of worshipping the idol of "not rocking the boat because we're so close to retirement and it might reduce revenue". Then and only then, if we're truly earnest and faithful, we will be forgiven our sin of turning a blind eye, and through us God will heal our church, and our land.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-58261092596173616402016-04-16T22:19:00.001-04:002016-04-16T22:19:05.496-04:00Three Thoughts And One Plea To My Traditionalist Friends In the United Methodist ChurchA couple of weeks ago, <a href="http://www.ministrymatters.com/all/entry/6795/a-plea-to-my-centrist-friends-in-the-united-methodist-church" target="_blank">Talbot Davis on the "Ministry Matters" blog</a> made a post entitled "<a href="http://www.ministrymatters.com/all/entry/6795/a-plea-to-my-centrist-friends-in-the-united-methodist-church" target="_blank">A Plea To My Centrist Friends in the United Methodist Church</a>". As one of founders of what we call <a href="http://umcm.today/" target="_blank">the United Methodist Centrist Movement</a>, he seemed to be reaching out to all my colleagues who proudly will serve GC 2016 under the centrist moniker. I pondered his thoughts, and decided that it might be a good idea to respond back. So before General Conference begins in a month or so, here are <b>three thoughts and one plea as a Centrist I'd like our Traditionalist friends to ponder. </b><br />
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<b>First, traditionalist friends you don't have to panic about GC 2016, or any future GC because math is on your side.</b> The ever-growing African delegation assures a traditionalist majority at GC perpetually. So when it comes to human sexuality there are really only two likely outcomes at GC 2016. The most likely outcome is that the current language (and all the legal wrangling that goes with it) in the Book of Discipline will be maintained. Maybe this doesn't bring you much comfort given the all the upheaval the past four years, but at least in principle your desire for the BOD language to remain the same is secure.<br />
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The other less likely - but still possible - outcome is that the current BOD language will be replaced with a proposal written by four of our colleagues entitled the "<a href="http://covenantalunity.org/" target="_blank">C.U.P. Plan</a>". I say this is "less likely, but possible" because you have a simple majority this year, but you'll need a few of us centrists to lean your way for the "CUP Plan" to see the light of day.<br />
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In case you don't know what the Cup Plan is, here's a summary. It will...<br />
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<li>strengthen the current BOD language around the prohibition of same-sex marriage and same-sex ordination </li>
<li>end our current practice in the United States of maintaining order in our respective conferences usurping the authority of our respective conference Board of Ministry, order of clergy, cabinet, and bishop on matters of human sexuality</li>
<li>mandate suspensions and expulsions without what we in western civilization would recognize as "due process" for those who conduct same-sex ceremonies, essentially creating an entirely new class of offense above and beyond all others</li>
<li>allow those churches and clergy who have had enough of the United Methodist Church to leave with property and pension in tact after a "discernment period" of sixty days (remember this one... we'll talk about it more later)</li>
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So at least from an institutionalized perspective, traditionalists have nothing to worry about. And given the long-term prognosis both for membership growth in Africa and membership decline in the United States, you will always have this advantage. <i>You only need centrists to vote for a more punitive form of discipline. </i></div>
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<b>But that's isn't likely.</b> Let me explain why. Here's my second thought.</div>
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Three out of the four authors of the CUP Plan are ordained Elders here in my conference. Despite the fact they were all running, and heavily endorsed by the traditionalist caucus which for 20 years had dominated our elections, <b>none of them were elected as full delegates to GC 2016</b>. Want to know why? </div>
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The CUP Plan. Or to be more specific it's less punitive predecessor, the A&W Plan. </div>
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The A&W was recognized by centrists as a fraudulent call for "unity" masking a demand for "uniformity". Unity implies we stand together despite our differences. Uniformity is tossing anyone out who can't pass a very narrow, focused, unnecessary litmus test. For traditionalists to not, under any circumstances, entertain the possibility that the passion of so many United Methodists regarding inclusion was anything more than just individualism run amok was disappointing and disrespectful to a lot of people we admire and respect. The A&W Plan just hammered that disappointment home.</div>
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Centrists don't like trials. They don't like kicking people out. They believe unity can be achieved on matters of vital importance while differences exist on the rest. They seek compromise. They don't want mandatory minimums. They have no respect for those who continually threaten to leave or try to force their way by refusing to pay their apportionment unless they get what they want. As Wesleyans who learned the Quadrilateral in seminary our love for free will extends to our desire to be in a denomination that encourages free thought, discussion, reason, pragmatism, and putting aside our differences to do the important things: make disciples of Jesus Christ, and together serve others as He would will it.</div>
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If it makes you feel any better we aren't interested in the didactic demands of the Love Prevails crowd either. After all Paul said it best.... love doesn't demand it's own way. Good News, the IRD, Love Prevails, the Reconciling Movement and MFSA in our opinion major in the minors. It's just that the most radical traditionalist voices in that choir actually have the power to put the rest of us under their thumb. <a href="https://juicyecumenism.com/2014/10/30/time-united-methodists-move-forward/" target="_blank">Heck, it's their dream</a>. And to that vision we will not bow.</div>
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That's why in West Ohio, at least, we rejected this vision for the future of our denomination while we still can.</div>
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Third, not speaking for any other centrist but myself, when I read Davis' article I couldn't help but be troubled. Of course I was troubled by an Elder who was single boasting about her active sex life and the unmarried-but-engaged ordinand candidates boasting the same. Know that us centrists believe in the Book of Discipline. We follow it. In fact we probably follow it better than you traditionalists do. On the whole we generally practice infant baptism, both sprinkle and dunk, pay all our apportionment as best we can (even when we don't agree with our bureaucracy), seek inclusivity in our leadership circles, and have no issue with the institutional empowerment of females. </div>
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Your crowd's record in those areas, you have to admit, is a little spotty.</div>
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But I was equally as troubled by something else Davis wrote: <i>"I want you to know your vote is not simply about homosexuality and it’s not about justice. It is instead about dismantling the entire sexual ethic that has helped define the Christian faith for two millennia."</i></div>
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The church has been wrong about a lot of things, some of which were taught for hundreds and hundreds of years (and in some corners are still being taught). I was reminded of this just this morning when <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/17/us/georgetown-university-search-for-slave-descendants.html?mwrsm=Facebook&_r=0" target="_blank">I read an article in the New York Times</a> about the effort Georgetown University - a Jesuit school - is making to find descendants of 242 persons who the school sold into slavery to pay their debts in the 1850's. The church taught slavery was a defendable institution for over 1800 years.</div>
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I was reminded of this again when I stumbled on a quote by our first female bishop, Leontine Kelly:</div>
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<i>"[On ordination of women:] We must recognize the kind of culture in which Jesus and his disciples lived. It was a very male-dominated culture. However, Jesus did violate the customs of the culture in that he talked with women, shared with women. Women were part of the entourage of Jesus Christ. God calls whomever God would call."</i></div>
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The church taught for over 1900 years that women had no place in the institutional leadership of the Christian movement that involved having any authority over men.</div>
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And I was reminded of this again when I thought of Copernicus and I looked at a globe.</div>
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What seems to define us as centrists is the Holy Spirit moving amongst us in the form of pragmatism and practicality bending to what Dr. King called an "arc toward justice". LGBT persons and their families are active in our churches. Many of these good folks have exhibited the kinds of spiritual fruit that are helping create vitality in our congregations. They are highly ethical and committed to the cause of Jesus. They have witnessed the destruction sexual immorality has wrought within both the straight and LGBT communities and are rejecting that kind of practice for something committed and stable. As they raise children and get certified as foster parents, they are looking to us. They are helping us work with LGBT teens who are suicidal to give them hope for the future. They believe in monogamous, life-long commitments between two consenting adults, and are just as appalled at the destruction "sleeping around" creates. They challenged us to treat them like regular old people - regular old sinners - just like the rest of us. </div>
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And we as pastors are serving many, many traditionalists who are becoming "former traditionalists" or "modified traditionalists". They've been challenged by the people they've met, the studies they've read, and reflection in which they have engaged. They searched the scriptures and prayed for direction. And while maybe they (and many of us centrists) aren't really sure what to do with all of this, they know that growing more punitive right now makes little sense. They're ready for a new season.</div>
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We can work with this! Let us. We'll leave you alone as we do so. We promise.</div>
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<b><i><u>Which leads me to my plea</u></i></b>..... traditionalists, if you are delegates to GC 2016, or can lobby someone who is, know that <b>the least you can do is reject the CUP Plan</b>, while<b> the most you can do is work with us and willing progressives to find a "third way"</b> for our denomination. </div>
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I know you have the Rob Renfroes and Maxie Dunnams of the world warning you that a change in BOD language to allow a "third way" will result in churches leaving and endless litigation just like it did in the Lutheran, Presbyterian, and Episcopalian denominations. But same-sex marriage wasn't legal when those folks made those choices, and the attitude of the nation - particularly young adults - has shifted significantly in that same time period. I venture a guess that vast majority of you reading this who call themselves a traditionalist don't harbor any ill-will toward to the LGBT community, and maybe over the last decade or so yourself have had your heart slightly soften on the matter of inclusion.</div>
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We can do this differently, but traditionalists only if YOU choose to do so. Come to the table. Tell the hardcore traditionalists and progressives to chill out and give your own willing traditionalist, progressive and centrist brothers and sisters a way to stay together and maintain their own convictions. We won't find a perfect solution, but we will find a workable one. Give it a chance. </div>
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<b>And one last thing... </b>about that CUP Plan. Know that we centrists are rule-followers. Progressives will most likely stick around and fight til the bitter end of the denomination or you kick them all out (which ever comes first). But as for us centrists, well we'll just follow the rules. </div>
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A few of my centrist friends and I were sitting around one evening drinking cold beverages and talking about what a post-CUP Plan UMC might look like for us. None of us were all that encouraged. </div>
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I mean the status quo isn't exactly paradise. Everything already seems to take more energy and stamina than it did when we first started in ministry. And as for our denominational leadership, there appears to be great resistance to the kinds of radical change that's necessary to make sure the local church has what it needs to do good work in the current climate while not getting dragged down by a status quo that's not working. </div>
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Now factor into this discussion the CUP Plan, which none of us as centrists are in favor of. The denomination will come apart at the seams. Progressive conferences will ignore it. Traditionalists will use the leverage of the BOD to enforce it. The rancor will only grow, and we'll do all we can to shelter our congregations from the mess. </div>
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And yet the CUP Plan DOES allow for pastors and churches to leave with property and pension in hand after a sixty day period of reflection. This got us wondering, <u style="font-weight: bold;">what if the opportunity, legally, came along to form a new denomination?</u> It could be...</div>
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<ul>
<li>One built on the doctrine of the Wesleyan movement, but leaves behind the deaf-to-change bureaucracy who only really seemed to care about us in terms of "nickels and noses" and the preservation of their own position/power. </li>
<li>One that assigns the decisions of marriage and ordination to each of it's local churches and pastors to work out as best for their context.</li>
<li>One that only seeks pastors strong in character and committed to creating healthy local churches where they can be effective in partnership with laity in all different types and kinds of settings </li>
<li>One that asks for, say, 3% of General Operating Expense as the only apportionment. </li>
<li>One that, without layers upon layers of denominational staffing and an impossible decision making process, can focus it's available resources on new church starts and church revitalization toward the end of what is the heart of any denomination - strong local churches </li>
<li>A denomination without bishops or a method for assigning church leadership that was perfect for an era when the horse and walking were the main modes of transportation </li>
<li>One that would insure you wouldn't need a boatload of debt to become a pastor</li>
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We could call it the American Methodist Church. We've even got an idea for a logo for it. We think the hipsters will love it!</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf-XrS4BHrmFZ9_3J9f37sStwHns4cI6N3rx5mUz7GlGO7GE0OmzUpwRRmSE4N501hpXLERr4e9yZtJNeVrB0BX_yO-xD84XrvdLJ_2tAFEkNVun5B2ZtudfU0aQ2UJGePyc0DhA/s1600/1974_amc_gremlin-pic-33111-1600x1200.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="178" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf-XrS4BHrmFZ9_3J9f37sStwHns4cI6N3rx5mUz7GlGO7GE0OmzUpwRRmSE4N501hpXLERr4e9yZtJNeVrB0BX_yO-xD84XrvdLJ_2tAFEkNVun5B2ZtudfU0aQ2UJGePyc0DhA/s320/1974_amc_gremlin-pic-33111-1600x1200.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(you have to be kinda old to get the joke... not "Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show old", but still, Millennials you'll need to go ask your parents)</div>
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Traditionalists, we don't want to do this. We're the ones killing ourselves trying to keep this thing together. But if you change the rules you give us the ability to put that energy to work in more constructive endeavors. Again, it's not what we want, but traditionalists, we've been asking for a compromise and you won't listen. You won't take us seriously. You want to use us to your own ends, but besides us doing a lion-share of the work and paying the bills, you don't seem to want us around.</div>
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We could arrange that. It's your choice. Choose wisely at GC 2016.</div>
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-38134881202522489242016-03-21T21:12:00.002-04:002016-03-21T21:26:47.214-04:00It's Late. It's Late. But not too late... for kindness? Was listening to internet radio when unexpectedly this song came on...<br />
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It's not exactly one of Queen's bigger songs. I only know it because it's on "News of the World", which was the first "album" I ever bought with my own money, album being in parenthesis because I actually bought an 8-track tape (millennials, ask your parents). I'm sure as a kid I made the purchase solely for "We Will Rock You" and "We Are the Champions" but 8-Tracks didn't rewind or fast forward (at least mine didn't), so I'd just listen to the rest of the album passively til it came back around to those two songs.<br />
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Now let me say this... <i>I really liked those two songs</i>, so I heard the rest of that album plenty. Songs like "Sheer Heart Attack", "Get Down, Make Love", and "All Dead. All Dead (a very sad song written by Brian May about the death of his cat) are imprinted on my brain.<br />
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(And yes, my parents let me listen to a song like "Get Down. Make Love". It was the seventies, baby! But I digress....)<br />
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Despite the hundreds of times I'd heard "It's Late" I never paid much attention to the lyrics, so I looked them up. They were written by Brian May supposedly with the idea that it's a three-act scene or something (I don't know... <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It%27s_Late" target="_blank">Wikipedia did it's best to explain</a>) with two different women, one whom the protagonist is in a long-term relationship with, and another who he takes consolation in when the long-term relationship seems to be on the rocks.<br />
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(Once again, it was the seventies)<br />
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But putting that all aside, this is a tune about a couple who are having trouble holding a relationship together.<br />
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<i>The way you love me</i></div>
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<i>Is the sweetest love around</i></div>
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<i>But after all this time</i></div>
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<i>The more I'm trying</i></div>
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<i>The more I seem to let you down, yes</i></div>
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<i>Now you tell me you're leaving</i></div>
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<i>And I just can't believe it's true</i></div>
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<i>Oh, you know that I can love you</i></div>
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<i>Though I know I can't be true</i></div>
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<i>Oh, you made me love you</i></div>
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<i>Don't tell me that we're through</i></div>
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<i>It's late - mmm, and it's driving me so mad</i></div>
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<i>It's late - yes I know, but don't try and tell me that it's</i></div>
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<i>Too late - save our love you can't turn out the light</i></div>
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<i>So late - I've been wrong but I'll learn to be right</i></div>
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<i>It's late - It's late - It's late</i></div>
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<i>But not too late</i></div>
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Pretty sad lyrics. Anybody who has had trouble in their relationship or marriage can relate. These lyrics paint an accurate picture of everything going on in the moment when two people are on the verge of wondering whether or not their love is going to survive. There's a lot of questioning the intentions of each other. A lot of begging and pleading to keep the relationship going, while simultaneously wondering if the investment needed to be made will save the relationship (or even worth making). A lot of guilt and anger at yourself, or your partner, or both for not having made better choices. And there's sadness. Sadness that can only come when something that at one time was so alive, <i>so good</i>, is now in real trouble... or even done.<br />
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Years ago I came across <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/lasting-relationships-rely-on-2-traits-2014-11" target="_blank">an article</a> about a study <a href="https://www.gottman.com/" target="_blank">The Gottman Institute</a> did seeking to define the key factor in marital success. Not surprisingly, the researchers found that couples who initially respond positively toward one another were more likely to pick up on cues that enabled them to relate better over the long term, than those couples who tended toward a "fight or flight" response geared to manipulate control in the relationship. As the article states simply....<br />
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<i>"People who give their partner the cold shoulder — deliberately ignoring the partner or responding minimally — damage the relationship by making their partner feel worthless and invisible, as if they’re not there, not valued. And people who treat their partners with contempt and criticize them not only kill the love in the relationship, but they also kill their partner's ability to fight off viruses and cancers. Being mean is the death knell of relationships." </i></div>
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In short, the most important trait in a healthy marriage according to Gottman is kindness. Marriage partners who seek to be kind to one another tend to fair better than those who aren't. What's more Gottman goes further in stating that the key to kindness is the way you think about it. </div>
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<i>"You can think about (kindness) as a fixed trait: either you have it or you don’t. Or you could think of kindness as a muscle. In some people, that muscle is naturally stronger than in others, but it can grow stronger in everyone with exercise. (Those who navigate marriage successfully) tend to think about kindness as a muscle. They know that they have to exercise it to keep it in shape. They know, in other words, that a good relationship requires sustained hard work."</i></div>
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The most successful marriages are ones where those involved seek to not just show kindness, but actively work to become increasingly more kind. I think that's good news for any couple who find themselves in a difficult marriage, or in a good one they seek to improve. The way out and up from where you both are is to begin exercising "kindness muscles". Gottman gives a number of examples of practical ways to do this:</div>
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<li>Offer small acts of generosity </li>
<li>Be generous in regards to your spouse's intentions</li>
<li>Seek every opportunity to share and celebrate your partner's joy</li>
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While I see the direct application of Gottman's work in marriages, I have hope that if those of us who are United Methodists took his advice, we might be able to fare better in the future than we are now in terms of the fortunes of our local church, and the future of the denomination.<br />
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At the local church level, if a church in decline is looking to turn it's fortunes around, or a church doing pretty good is looking to do better, figuring out ways to begin exercising "kindness muscles" is the way to go. I'd gather, for example, that at the heart of "Missional Christianity" (which are buzzwords denominational leaders have become so fond of and yet unable to really define) is the intentional collective exercising of "kindness muscles". To become so attuned to being kind toward others that it becomes instinctual and automatic. Kindness not defined by who is or isn't or might become "a member" of the church, but rather the church being kind to one all whom they encounter. That seems to be heart of the "missional movement". Given that Jesus called us to love each other, as an expression of our love for the Lord, this makes sense.</div>
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To think about this further, in the life of the denomination beyond the local church, I wonder if the vitriol we've spewed against one another has been so great for so long that we've forgotten how to be kind to one another? Kindness, it seems, has taken a backseat as the caucuses representing the polar ends of the denomination seek to destroy each other.<br />
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Progressives, as an example, hear evangelicals talk about "loving the sinner and hating the sin" and just roll their eyes. There have been far too many examples of "love" which resulted in rejection and expulsion on the part of evangelicals particularly toward LGBTQ persons for progressives to take that rhetoric seriously.</div>
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I had one of these experiences at an event recently sponsored by our conference where there were two presentations by two opposing speakers regarding scripture and homosexuality. The evangelical presenter laid out what was essentially a hard-core-take-no-prisoners perspective that left little, if any, hope both for inclusion now in local church and in the "great hereafter" for LGBTQ persons. Even though he did end his presentation with a "but we're all sinners" and "no sin is greater than another" grace statement, by the time he reached his conclusion the air was out of the room. Those seeking inclusion and those who stand with them were "all out of listen". They had heard it before. The attempt to "soften the blow" seemed to have the opposite effect. It came off as condescending and dishonest. </div>
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On the flip side, I know evangelicals hear progressives talk about following Jesus' lead by welcoming all and wonder what chaos will be introduced into the community if everybody gets to play by their own rules, or at least new rules as a whole we don't all understand. Why, they wonder, if someone points out that we need to have some basic ground rules so we can live peacefully together, and those ground rules have been well-established for centuries, do they get painted as bigots and haters when they attempt to live them out? Since when did trying to be faithful to scripture and what the denomination has determined to be her Discipline warrant being painted as "evil"?<br />
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I know that at the same presentation, when the progressive speaker gave her more nuanced argument it seemed to the committed evangelicals in attendance that the "black and white" presentation of the evangelical was a lot easier to understand. The clarity offered by the evangelical is really the trump card when many UM's are presented with the progressive justification for full inclusion. How do you explain these changes in light of the traditional understanding of scripture? How do you explain these new ethics to your children and grandchildren? How do you stand before a congregation that's always more or less unilaterally agreed that the old ways are the right ways, and tell them that they've been wrong and make a change? <br />
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Leaning on history and tradition is much easier and understandable than a new reality where behaviors that had never been condoned, now would be. Accusations of "watering down" the Gospel, "trampling on scripture", and an unwillingness to adhere to our mutually agreed upon Discipline create specters of demonizing the "other" and making it impossible for little more than superficial conversation to take place among people who disagree with each other. </div>
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In the end so much time and energy has been invested in the two camps beating on one another it has made their "relationship" so toxic nothing short of Maxie Dunnam and Amy DeLong washing one another's feet at General Conference could begin to move them toward some resolution to even "agree to disagree". Kindness could pave a way forward for all us United Methodists, and begin breaking this stalemate, but I'm pretty sure the polarized caucuses won't let that happen.<br />
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It will take those of us who believe unity isn't uniformity, but rather meeting the demands of sacrificial love toward all, to stand up, speak out, and work toward keeping our denomination together. <br />
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Just to go ahead and show my hand, I believe that the only role those of us who are sympathetic toward full inclusion, but also realize that there is wisdom in moving deliberately and wisely so as to not too quickly throw out church tradition is to advocate following the advise of Gamaliel. Create a pathway where folks willing to prop the door wide open can do so, and wait and see what the Lord does, or doesn't do, with their work at least for a season. We also need to simultaneously stand for the committed traditionalist and allow them to live out the Discipline as it's been understood historically until such a time where we can see if in this new arrangement we can continue to live together, or seek a peaceful separation.<br />
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In any event, we have to keep encouraging those diametrically opposed to show a little grace to one another, even if they vehemently disagree. Evangelicals need to love the LGBTQ much more sincerely than many of them have been willing to do so historically. Progressives, while not moving off of their sincere commitment to include all, need to concede that you can't legislate into existence something that generally takes personal relationships and loving conversations to change.<br />
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We need to stand for unity, and not as some critics state just for unity's sake. But rather unity seeking in love to call all standing at every point of the theological spectrum to raise their own bar of personal holiness, so we might have great capacity for both grace and justice. Unity rooted not in uniform understanding of a few particular points of church tradition, or a disdain for those who have been "oppressors", but unity which seeks to live out the Great Commandment, the Great Commission, and Great Requirement - to love justice, offer mercy, and walk in humility in the presence of the Lord - with the intent that al of us begin acting more like servant leaders in the footsteps of Jesus Christ in all of our unique, yet necessary, expressions.<br />
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Unity which makes us a true light of the world. Not a taillight burning dimly as an afterthought, or a flashlight used for interrogation, but a beacon of hope for all people. People who know that in the storm, there is a port, and that port is the United Methodist Church.</div>
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In any event let's figure out simple ways we can begin exercising those kindness muscles in our personal relationships, local churches, and across the United Methodist connection as we keep making the journey of following Jesus. Cause love is a long road, and we need to be in better shape than we are now if we hope to make a journey that ends with the words "well done, good and faithful servant". </div>
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All the while, please join me in praying that's while it's late... maybe VERY late, it's not too late for a new season of vitality for the people we call Methodists. </div>
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-48054290392416069182015-09-26T14:17:00.001-04:002015-09-26T14:17:22.971-04:00Why?<i>(This is a rough edit of the eulogy for Jon Andrews)</i><div>
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As we conclude this service I just have a couple of thoughts I want to add. Promise not to keep you much longer. Just wanted to leave you with this...</div>
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First and foremost, I want to thank this community for all the ways they've come together. All the Shawnee students who have been praying, taking time to visit, light a candle, let loose a balloon, write a #6 on their wrist, wear red, leave memorial flowers at the soccer field..... I know that you have been a tremendous blessing to the Andrews family during this most difficult week.</div>
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And all the students from the area high schools who have shown their support... wow! All I can say is wow! The pictures of students at LCC, Lima Senior, Wapak, Bath, Elida, other WBL school, and schools from all over wearing red in Jon's honor... you have no idea what that's meant. The teams that came last night. The football team on it's way to O-G. The Shawnee soccer team dressed to the nines last night. All the area high school soccer teams who came in their jerseys yesterday evening. The swimmers... there were literally hundreds of swimmers, coaches, and officials from all over the region who came to pay their respects. Thank you all.</div>
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Thank you to the administration - Superintendent Lamb and Principle Cox - faculty, guidance counselors, and staff at Shawnee. Thank you for leading this school with a grace grounded in love for your students. </div>
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Thank you to all the clergy and church staff in the community. Thank you to Pastor Shane Crites of Shawnee Alliance Church, who as Chaplain to our "First Responders" tended to these brave heroes, as well as those grieving last Sunday night. Thank you to Angie Soules, Director of Life Teen, the youth ministry for the area Catholic churches for all the work you've done with students this week. For Father Dave Ross and Father Steve Blum and their good work and support. Thank you to those first responders, as well as the West Ohio Crisis Team who worked with the Mental Health Board to come serve the students and staff. </div>
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Thank you to all the parents... all the adults. to any adult who has done anything to help or comfort others, the family, I know, appreciates everything all you have done during this most trying, difficult week. </div>
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And just to take a moment of personal privilege, I just want to thank this congregation I serve. I have the most amazing staff. All they wanted to do was help in any way they could. And our lay pastors and all our servants... I'm so thankful to all of you. You proved to me once again that "Serve Like Jesus" isn't just a tagline or hashtag at Shawnee United Methodist Church. I want to personally thank all of you. </div>
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Once again, thank you, everyone, for everything you have been doing, especially praying, so Shawnee could stand strong, and show the Andrews how much their family, and in particular, Jon, meant to you. You have truly loved your neighbor, and served as the hands and feet of Jesus.</div>
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I hope that covered all the thank you's. If I missed someone, my apologizes.</div>
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As I sat down to put this together, there was only one question I had on my mind. Why? Why are we here today, mourning the loss of Jon Andrews?</div>
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I mean he was gifted in a multitude of ways. He was a good student. he had good grades. He understood the material. He was known to help other students with their studies. </div>
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He was a gifted athlete. You heard Coach Quatman. He was a leader on the soccer field who fought for every possession. A captain of the team. And did you see the pile of swimming medals out there in the hallway? Even as a little kid swimming for Sherwood Jon just cut through the water. He was fun to watch. A tremendous athlete. </div>
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He was well-rounded. As a hunter, he bagged a buck the very first time he ever went deer hunting. His dad had to beg a pickup truck on the fly to go pick up a deer that by the time he arrived Jon had already skinned. The mounted duck you might have just seen in the hallway? Jon got it the first time he ever went duck hunting. It literally fell out of the sky into his uncle's arms. </div>
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He loved wildlife. As a child he kept reptiles as pets. Snakes. Didn't make his mom too happy when she'd be folding his laundry in his bedroom and his pet ball python, would hang on the mirror and give her an unexpected jolt. I bet they could hear Julie scream all up and down Lochloman Way. Jonathon Scot Andrews!!! Put that snake away mister or there's gonna be trouble. Trouble! </div>
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As an artist he had quite a flair. There's a whole table of pottery here that's Jon's. Pottery. That's a skill that takes years to master, and Jon's work, as a teen, is just outstanding. </div>
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Why?</div>
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Certainly it wasn’t a lack of love from his family. Scot and Julie adored Jon, they’re youngest. They went to games and meets. They chuckled when they saw him, up early, reading the paper and drinking his coffee like a little old man. Jon’s parents loved him and did everything they could to help him. Everything. Stephen and Sarah got to enjoy their younger cute-but-annoying little brother turning into a great friend with whom they could have adventures… the stories of which someday they may have the courage to tell their parents.</div>
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I think the family has a million Andrews and Greenes, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins upon cousins abounding. Plenty of dinners to enjoy together. Someone always stopping by. It’s a big boisterous, loving family who loved watching Jon grow up from a tiny ring bearer to a handsome homecoming date. </div>
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It wasn't from a lack of friends. Certainly he had a tight circle of good friends, but I can't count all the stories I’ve heard this week of people who said Jon helped them with this, or Jon did that with them. You were either this friend, or if you saw him walking down the hall or across the field or driving his beloved truck, you wanted to be his friend.</div>
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He had a great sense of humor. He wasn't above the occasional practical joke. Whether it was an escalating TP war with a friend,or eluding the township 5-0 during an evening of hijinks with friends in Indian Brook he was up for some fun. On the first night, for example, he and Avery went out he brought her to his home, asked her to stay in the kitchen and be absolutely quiet. In the next room was his mother, so he rounded the corner.</div>
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"Hey mom, I'm home. I finally got rid of that Avery Shirk girl."</div>
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"Jon, what was wrong with Avery?"</div>
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"Oh, I don't know, she just talks too much. She's really annoying."</div>
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"Well, I thought she was sweet."</div>
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"That's a good thing, cause she's here and standing just around the corner. Aren't you glad you didn't call her a witch?"</div>
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Yeah, he really did that. He could make you laugh.</div>
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And he wasn't one to give up. Jon wasn't a quitter. His dad remembered a baseball game when Jon was little. A 3rd grader pitching to 5th and 6th graders, and he was just getting shelled. Eventually little Jon put his glove up over his face began to cry. So Scot went to mound to see if he was OK, and since there weren't any more pitchers, he asked him if he could grind it out. And he did until he got out of the inning.</div>
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Jon could grind it out. He was grinding it out.</div>
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So, why? </div>
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Have you ever been lost? I remember - maybe my earliest surviving memory - when I was a really little kid, three years old, our family moved to Charleston, West Virginia from Columbus. My parents were helping get all the stuff moved into the house with the movers, and I wandered off. Soon I realized that I had no idea where I was. I started to scream and cry, thinking I’d never see my parents again. </div>
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Now, I was standing at the end of our driveway, about 50 feet away from the house. I wasn’t actually lost, but I thought I was. Feeling lost is terrible.</div>
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All of us, from time to time, feel lost. We struggle to make sense of this world we live in, with all it's complexities. Life can often scare us. It’s hard, difficult, chaotic... and we're supposed to be able to make sense of it... </div>
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crack the code... </div>
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figure out the answer... </div>
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not burden others with our problems. </div>
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And when we can't, it's exhausting. It's humiliating. It's defeating, and we forget that we are a precious child of God. We believe lies that echoing in our head, that if we said them out loud to others who know and love us, would be rebuked. </div>
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This is not a rational, understandable, predictable world we live in. It is beautiful and it is broken, just as we are beautiful and broken. Broken even as the world's brokenness is thrust upon us. </div>
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Why are we here today? Because life is difficult, doesn't come with a clear-cut road map, and we get lost. And being lost is no fun. In fact it's terrifying. Lost leaves you scared and angry and frustrated.</div>
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Which is why I love Jesus. The One who seeks the lost. The One who'll leave the ninety-nine to go find the one out in the wilderness. I mean, that's the point of John 14. Not even death, apparently, keeps Jesus from seeking us out, seeking out the lost. </div>
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I am coming to you, to take you to my Father's house, to a place I've especially prepared for you. And if you've experienced the love and grace that is mine, that is at the heart of why all things have been made, then you will know my voice, and you will know you're home. </div>
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I wish, with all my heart, that the love and grace Jon Andrews was so capable of extending to others, the love and grace of Jesus that is at the heart of all created things, he could have extended to himself. </div>
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Love and grace greater than all our sin. Greater than all our flaws. The love and grace which binds us together as a community. Love and which seeks to serve first, and judge later. </div>
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When Jesus came seeking Jon, that love and grace washed over him like rolling waters of a flowing stream, and he knew it was his. It always was his, It always will be his. It’s just hard, from time to time, to figure that out on this side of paradise. </div>
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So as we prepare to leave this place, to rebuke the darkness, to chase away the chaos, to crucify the lie that we are no more than our shortcomings, we must engage in practicing love and grace to one another. Love and grace which allows for honesty among us in the community. Love and grace which allows us to admit our flaws and seek those willing to walk the journey with us. Imperfections and all. Love and grace which rebukes the tempter, who seeks to deceive us into believing we are isolated and alone. Rebukes the author of lies, who would seek to distract us from the Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ, who has come to bring us peace.</div>
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Whatever the demons are that haunt us, that haunt our homes and our families, let us seek to make earth more like heaven, like we pray in the Lord's prayer, and confess our shortcomings, our sins, so as we find the Lord's forgiveness as we forgive each other. It is in that divine forgiveness we might find new ways to defeat the tempter, and be delivered from evil that would deceive us into falsely believing that we deserve to feel isolated and lost.</div>
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May the grace and love of the Living God rain down on this community. May it rain down as you tell others that you love them. May it rain down as we step out of a feeling of helplessness and ask others for help. May it rain down in our willingness to listen. May it rain down as we embrace the gifts of those who are skilled healers, as we continue to pray for healing. And may it rain down as we understand that if we are to love our neighbor as yourselves as an expression of our love for God, that fundamentally we need to love ourselves. Flawed, mortal, imperfect, and yet still capable of being loved. </div>
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And may grace and love rain down on Scot, Julie, Stephen, and Sarah in the form of our continued prayer and concern. May it rain down as we refuse to let one dark moment define the life and meaning of Jon Andrews as we remember his friendship, his gifts, his humor, and love he had for others. </div>
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May you find hope in the Risen Christ, who nails our sins to the tree standing on Calvary, so that we may rise again as new people, ready to overcome evil with good.</div>
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Amen and amen.</div>
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-87136607726809640762015-01-30T01:28:00.000-05:002015-01-30T01:28:03.040-05:00Bill Croy - Three Personal MemoriesIt's growing late, but I can't sleep. A good friend of mine, Bill Croy, died today after a long, hard 4 1/2 year battle with ALS. So, if you don't mind, as a means of simultaneously paying tribute and clearing my head, I'd like to share some memories (actually, three) with the world. Hopefully they'll make you smile, and maybe understand what a great guy Bill Croy was.<br />
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First, a little background. I met Bill as a kid who moved to Lima, Ohio at the age of 10. My parents attended Trinity largely because 1) my mom could sing for her high school choir director (Ron Richards), 2) my Dad's boss (Henry Hollinger) invited us to come check the church out, and 3) at the time they had the reputation of having best children and youth program in the city. That last one was all thanks to Bill's leadership as he was the Associate Pastor of Christian Education.<br />
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Bill left either at the end of my eighth or ninth grade year (I really don't remember), but as a United Methodist Elder ordained in 1995, I was able to stay in touch with him. I got the gift of not only having him as a pastor, but then a mentor, and ultimately a great friend.<br />
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In any event, here are three (of many) memories I have of Bill.<br />
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<b>Memory One: Death By Green Bus</b><br />
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Bill taught my confirmation class, and let me tell you it was a doozy. I can't recall every single classmate, but I remember the class was somewhat large (17 or 18 of us I believe), and we were a handful. I just remember Bill always looked much older after spending an event with us than he did before. We really made him appreciate High School ministry.<br />
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This was never more true than on our confirmation class trip to Dayton. Bill was a proud alum of United Theological Seminary and he liked to take the confirmation classes there to see where the United Methodist church minted fresh pastors. As a part of the day we also visited a UM-related mission and an urban UM congregation. We wrapped up the day swimming at a YMCA and returned home.<br />
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This was the early eighties - or as I like to think of it, the era of the "boom box". Just so happened that Jeff Gluck and I owned identical Panasonic boom boxes, and we could be link them in tandem using stereo jack cords. We called our paired tandem the "Wall of Sound", and it was loud, man.<br />
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I mean really, really loud.<br />
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So we spent that day on an old school bus painted dark, forest green (hence the nickname, "The Green Pickle") with Bill at the front driving and seventeen of us listening to the Wall of Sound pound out songs from the J Geils Band as far in the back as we could sit. I don't know how many times Bill had to listen to Freeze Frame, Centerfold, or Piss On The Wall that day, but they had to be many. It was his own personal Highway to Hell (which probably got played once or twice also).<br />
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So we go all the places we're supposed to go, including the Y where a bunch of clueless 13 year old boys were ogling the 13 year old girls. I'm sure inappropriate things were said and done all day (as is generally the case regarding 13 year old boys) and after getting yelled at by Bill many, many times, we finally headed back to Lima.<br />
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Along about Troy, Ohio was the point the bus quit. Centerfold pounding out of the Wall of Sound above the din of a bunch of teenagers cackling at one another, and the bus just dies. And all I can remember, was Bill, looking in that big mirror above the windshield so he could see us, and hearing him shout,<br />
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<i>"Turn that damn radio off!" </i>Only time I ever heard him cuss.<br />
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And I remember, distinctly, thinking that maybe (just maybe) his job, which meant he got to hang out with the likes of us <b>all day</b>, was not exactly always "rewarding". It even, occasionally, might have - in the vernacular of that day - "sucked".<br />
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I thought about that moment on the side of I-75 in Troy often over the years. I thought about it while stuck in a van with a bunch of teenagers on a 15 hour drive to the deep south. I thought about it while I was in an office with a parishioner who was chewing me a new orifice for something I said in a sermon. I thought about it the night I arranged for police to bust a pot dealer working the parking lot outside our youth meeting (true story... happened in Goshen). I thought about it again and again and again.<br />
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I've thought about that moment a lot, and all I can say is that I can't ever claim I didn't know what I was getting into when I chose to do this ministry gig. Horny teenagers blasting terrible pop music on unreliable ancient school buses, or even worse. Much worse. That's probably why when I told Bill I was thinking about the ministry, he encouraged me to think twice, or maybe go to law school first.<br />
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Ministry isn't for sissies. Bill Croy was as tough as they came.<br />
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<b>Memory Two: Thinking Differently</b><br />
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I wasn't happy when I left Shawnee for Epworth in 1997. It wasn't that I didn't need a change of scenery. As my wife reminds me now, I was pretty restless my last year at Shawnee, and most likely was itching for a new challenge. It's just they moved me over my own objection. I mean after I told my DS, L. Cean Wilson, "no" to a move, she took <i>my wife out for dinner</i> and based on that conversation decided we need to go elsewhere.<br />
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Has that happened to any of you Elders out there? I'm guessing not.<br />
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So I went to Epworth feeling very torn about the itinerate system and whether or not I belonged in it. As a result, my 18 months in Toledo were an unsettling time. I chafed at being in a "high steeple" church. My wife was a high school band director who worked 90 hours a week, so since we never saw each other, our marriage was strained. We bought this house that should have been condemned in the Old West End, with neither the money, time, nor expertise to restore it, so it looked like the British had bombed the inside of it until the day we sold it (to a guy who advertised "I Buy Houses" on the back of a city bus). It was a tough time, and I was in a poor frame of mind to handle it.<br />
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But one good thing about my Epworth experience was that my approach to ministry began changing for the better. After replicating at Shawnee the youth ministry I remember Bill Croy leading at Trinity - which was kind of a "one man show" - I found myself at a church with a slew of adults willing to help with pretty much anything that had to be done. At first, to be honest, I just didn't know what to do with them. I was so used to pulling things together with not much more than spit, a ball of twine, and a Rubik's Cube, that I remember the leader of those volunteer adults - Bob Knowles (who is now the youth director at Epworth) - getting rather angry at me for not sharing more responsibility. I mean, here they finally had a lot of kids (which I guess, hadn't been the case right before I arrived) but the goofy youth director was still just kinda winging it, week to week. I just didn't know any other way.<br />
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So, I called Bill, and that's when he explained to me that at Worthington as an associate he had led ministry with a far different philosophy than at Trinity. He talked about the need for fostering relationships between adult leaders and students, and crafting an environment where those relationships could succeed. He gave me a sketch of what empowering servant leaders looked like, and to everyone's relief I started implement this strategy at Epworth.<br />
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I didn't realize the full scope and effectiveness of empowering adult leaders in youth ministry until my five year stretch at Goshen First. That's when I was able to witness what good ministry work could happen when 22 adult volunteers and a couple of underpaid college interns could focus on discipling hundreds of teenagers. Admittedly, I'd love to figure out how to do this more effectively with adults discipling adults. It's really the only way to do ministry well by centering it on Jesus, and not your own personality and talent.<br />
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All that to say that Bill was a great pastor, but inside of that he was one of the best strategic thinkers I ever came in contact with. Can't tell you how many times over the years I gave Bill a call to pick his brain, and how more often than not, the guidance he gave was spot on.<br />
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He was really good at what he did, and he loved sharing that experience with the rest of us.<br />
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<b>Memory 3: Living Down Your Past Life</b><br />
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For those who don't know, in 2004 I returned to Shawnee as an associate, with the chance (not a promise, but a chance) of becoming the next Senior Pastor. It's kind of a long story as to how this came to pass, but the short version is this: Churches with long-term pastors (15 years or longer) tend not to do so well after they leave. I actually did the numbers on this historically in a few UM conferences, and they were just downright scary. Statistically, most successors to a long term pastor don't last more than two years. If they aren't named as interims, they become de-facto interims.<br />
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Given that my predecessor was an exceptionally charismatic leader but not as strong systems creator, the powers-that-be in the West Ohio Conference were greatly concerned about what was going to happen to Shawnee after he left. That's where I came in. The cabinet and the senior pastor liked that I had a history at this church, but had also served as an associate at two other churches that were much larger than Shawnee. I had seen how that sausage was made so the hope was I'd get Shawnee off the plateau it had been on (around 400 in worship) for years and years. Even though I'd never been "the big kahuna" I'd seen a couple of them in action.<br />
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Having a past history at a church, I discovered though, is a mixed bag. When you're younger you make a lot of mistakes, some of which are pretty memorable, or worse, legendary. Legends take on lives of their own, and after eight years gone, a few of mine had taken on Paul Bunyan-esqe proportions. By the time I left Shawnee I was neither as reckless, nor disorganized as the legends recalled me to be, but that didn't matter. In the minds of many, I was still just a kid out of a college finding my way, as opposed to a married-father-of-two-sons who had just had a distinguished stint at what was one of only a couple of UM teaching churches in the midwest.<br />
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In any event, among staff and laity both, I found this was a significant barrier I had to get over both before, and after the transition. But, like most everything else I'd encountered in ministry up to that point, Bill had already gone through this professionally. In 1993, he'd been re-appointed to Trinity as the Senior Pastor, about eight years after leaving there as an associate. So I leaned on him pretty heavy to find out what he had learned in his experience. There's been more than one phone call, email, text, or PM that was made between Bill and I as I looked for advice as to how get out from under the shadow of not just my predecessor, but also myself.<br />
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Even after he got sick, I kept looking to Bill for guidance. And Bill kept looking out for me. Not too long ago he saw something I posted on Facebook, and PM'ed me to find out if I was OK. He's dying of ALS, and he wants to know if I'm OK.<br />
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Bill was a rock. He was solid. Pastor, mentor, teacher, and friend.... he was great.<br />
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And so, <i>with a good many other stories left untold </i>(not the least of which involved Croy sticking me in a cabin as the counselor to this son, Jeremy... he did that with a twinkle in his eye), <i>a number of epic battles on the basketball court left to recount</i> (on days we had off from school I'd always call him about using the gym at Trinity to run a game or two, and I learned he always said yes if I let it drop that I was bringing an odd number of guys and we'd need him to run as our 8th guy for 4-on-4), and <i>much, much respect</i>, I gotta wrap this up.<br />
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Grace, peace, and love to his lovely wife, Dort, his kids, Jeremy and Megan, and all his family who I know he loved with all his heart. My heart breaks for you all.<br />
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Godspeed, my friend. I'm gonna miss you. See you on the other side of the river, in the place where there is no darkness. May you rejoice this day as you find the place prepared for you at our Father's House.<br />
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-33108016223002341502015-01-24T22:29:00.000-05:002015-01-24T22:30:10.599-05:00The New R&R Plan? Not A Fan. Not A Fan At All.Late last year in a gathering of "Centrists" and people investigating us "Centrists" who formed the United Methodist Centrist Movement, we welcomed Chris Ritter - an Elder from the Illinois Great Rivers Annual Conference - to share with us a possible "way forward" for the United Methodist Church. For those who don't know, our denomination is heading toward a possible (some say "probable") schism over the issue of homosexuality. While the Book of Discipline is clear in regarding homosexuality to be sin, prohibiting the ordination of "self-avowed practicing homosexuals" (that's the actual Discipline language), and also prohibiting ordained and licensed pastors from conducting same-sex marriage and covenantal unions, these matters are creating great consternation in the denomination as clergy and laity alike. <br />
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You see, we United Methodists are not of one mind on the issue. Some believe the Bible and the Book of Discipline are clear. Others believe a grave injustice has been via misunderstanding of the Bible, translated into the Book of Discipline. And still others, mostly us Centrists, are still working their way through the question, understanding that there is a lot at stake.<br />
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In any event, we invited Ritter into our conversation on the strength of a "reorganization plan" he had authored called <a href="http://www.jurisdictionalsolution.org/" target="_blank">The Jurisdictional Solution</a>. This proposal essentially split the denomination into new "jurisdictions" that aren't drawn geographically like our current jurisdictions. Instead, two jurisdictions are created and split via theological orientation. Essentially, one jurisdiction would exist for conservatives and moderate conservatives, and another for progressives and moderate progressives. The details for this plan are too numerous to go into here (hence the link above). Since Maxie Dunnam and Rob Renfroe of Good News - who had <a href="http://goodnewsmag.org/2014/11/editorial-the-tale-of-two-narratives/" target="_blank">only been beating the drum for schism</a> - had unexpectedly<a href="https://www.blogger.com/%22Quitting%20While%20Ahead:%20%20Why%20Some%20United%20Methodist%20Evangelicals%20Suggest%20a%20Split,%20Even%20though%20Thier%20Side%20is%20Winning%22.%20%20%20Written%20by%20Sarah%20Zylstra" target="_blank"> expressed interest in the TJS as a possible way forward</a>, we gave folks the opportunity to interact with the TJS author as possible "way forward" to keep our denomination together.<br />
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After talking with Ritter, on the whole the UMCM thought The Jurisdictional Solution was worth further discussion, as do also a number of others possible plans laid out (and not yet laid out) to restructure the UMC do also. But nobody thought in its current form it was workable as it's fraught with problems for a place like our conference (West Ohio).<br />
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Geographically, the South and the coasts match up well in this proposal. Given the fact we are "sent" by our bishop and cabinet to our church, and these appointments are generally made within conferences that have geographic boundaries, given the theological affinity within churches and pastors both in the South and on the coasts, not much would change. A church and pastor, here and there, would stick out like lonely a cactus in the middle of the wilderness (say, a progressive church in Atlanta, or a conservative church in Orange County), but on the whole not much else would change.<br />
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For us, however, in a state where we decide presidential elections, the lines are not as clearly drawn. In TJS, each church has to vote on which jurisdiction to join. Church by church in West Ohio, we're not sure we could draw these lines clearly within almost all of our larger and midsize congregations. This aspect - the individual church votes - is a potential disaster in our part of the country. It will split churches wide open. And who knows, maybe there's more theological diversity among United Methodists in the South and on the coasts than we realize.<br />
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Conservative UM's don't like to hear this, but the truth is that we're starting to see shifts in our local congregations in regards to their attitudes toward homosexuality. In what was a decade ago - shoot, maybe five years ago - a taboo subject few dared to address, now is something we now talk about in Bible Studies, sermon discussions, ad board meetings, and in the parking lot after worship. The combination of people having familial or personal relationships with LGBTQ persons, coupled with the growing belief that everyone should be protected equally under the law (or at least not discriminated under it) is slowly breaking down age-old stigmas and stereotypes.<br />
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This is even true out here in the soybean fields. As a pastor in a small city in Northwestern Ohio, I've counted more than 40 families in our congregation who have a family member who is "out of the closet". A grandmother in her 90's regularly shows me pictures of her grand-daughter with her wife and their children. A sizable percentage of our members and attenders have a friend or colleague they work with who are LGBTQ. Gay and lesbian couples sit together with their friends in our pews. People who were once considered "exotic" and "unknown" are now just neighbors. And while certainly not everyone feels comfortable with LGBTQ people here in Allen County and in our congregation, on the whole people have become a lot more affirming, and more willing to "let and let live". And this in a community that's voted Republican in virtually every election since Abraham Lincoln was president (Roosevelt might have stolen an election or two here, but that's probably it).<br />
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So, The Jurisdictional Solution, which counts on churches "voting" and pastors making choices about which jurisdiction to affiliate with is a complicated matter in a state like ours. As a chair of the UMCM Steering Committee, <i>I'd be happy to table questions relating of homosexuality for our 2016 General Conference, and commission a seriously talented and faithful group of laity and clergy to study TJS, among other suggested plans as a possible pathway for the United Methodist Church to be introduced in 2020</i>. And I'm for a proposed time limit (General Conference in 2020) where if we can't find a "way forward" together, or sense we could do so with a little more time, we could an amicable split. Maybe we can't go forward as one. It's sad to me, but it is possible.<br />
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But why bring this up today?<br />
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Well, a friend of mine texted me a new proposal Ritter has put together. The <a href="https://peopleneedjesus.wordpress.com/2014/12/15/the-restore-release-plan-an-affiliate-progressive-jurisdiction-in-the-umc/" target="_blank">Restore and Release Plan</a> is one Ritter has - I'm guessing - put together as a response to the situation regarding Bishop Talbert.<br />
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For those who don't know the story, Talbert is a retired bishop who officiated a same-sex ceremony over the objection of the presiding bishop in the conference where the service was held. He was brought up on charges by that bishop, and his case was heard by a member of the College of Bishops which is how it's outline in our denomination's rules. The end result of that case was something the <a href="http://www.umc.org/news-and-media/just-resolution-achieved-in-complaint-process" target="_blank">UM Book of Discipline calls "A Just Resolution"</a>.<br />
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"A Just Resolution" is established when the person who made a complaint, the person they made a complaint about, and the presiding Bishop hearing the case mutually agree on a course of action, or actions, short of some punitive punishment, that all can agree settles the difference between the parties. <i>I am very much generalizing here</i>, but in the case of Talbert, he admitted that he had "caused pain" in this situation but did what he believed justice demanded, the bishop presiding felt the Discipline had been maintained by hearing Talbert's case and reaching a just resolution, and the other bishop who made the complaint (Wallace-Padgett) felt too that her complaint had been dealt with adequately in the terms reached by all parties in the Just Resolution. The terms of which stated that all parties agreed that taking away a pastor's orders for violating the Discipline in regard to LGBTQ inclusion as the ONLY means of outcome isn't really adequate, and new possibilities need to be discussed within the College of Bishops and introduced to the denomination as a whole in the future. They all promised to work together to further this effort.<br />
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As you might imagine, conservatives are outraged. Break the Book of Discipline as blatantly as Talbert did, and the punishment should be swift and clear. Of course, given what the Discipline has to say about baptizing infants, empowering women in ministry, and paying our apportionment - all matters some of these same conservative evangelicals have no problem ignoring in their congregational settings - it seems that attitudes toward enforcement of Discipline in that tribe is a little "uneven". But, I digress....<br />
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As a Centrist, speaking only for myself, I agree with The Just Resolution in the Talbert case. There's got to be a better way to find our way through these important questions.<br />
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Further, I am mindful we have allowed ourselves to be on the wrong side of history as it relates to the inclusion of women, culture and race. As someone in the "middle" I don't want heavy-handed discipline as the only pathway available in the matters involving LGBTQ inclusion. At least for the next five years, why not pause, pray, and let the Holy Spirit guide us as we conference together, before we go forward, business as usual? While Centrists aren't unanimous for full-inclusion OR the current status quo, I think there is a growing understanding that the Holy Spirit MAY be very well doing something new in our midst. As those who don't just embrace "tradition", but also continue to weigh equally "experience" and "reason" in our understanding of scripture. There's enough evidence of the Spirit working to give things a hard, hard look.<br />
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Which is why the Restore and Release Plan is for me, a non-starter. Unlike the Jurisdictional Solution, which gives everyone in all jurisdictions a say and vote in denominational matters, the R&R Plan sets up a jurisdiction for progressives which marginalizes them in terms of representation in the denomination. While progressives are still able to participate in the pension program, the reality is that they have no voice, vote, or presence in denominational matters. There's no opportunity to conference together on these issues in an R&R Plan world because all the voices wouldn't be at the table.<br />
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Ritter says in a recent post he's concerned that some would view this new separate jurisdiction which would have no voice, vote, or representation of progressives in the denomination <a href="https://peopleneedjesus.wordpress.com/2014/12/19/africans-the-big-se-jurisdiction-and-centrists-the-abcs-of-reform/" target="_blank">as something akin to a 21st Century Central Jurisdiction</a>. He claims this is unfair because membership in it would be voluntary, as opposed to the old Central Jurisdiction which forced persons of color and the churches they served into a separate entity, apart from the rest of the denomination.<br />
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But, from where I'm sitting that's pretty close to what Ritter has proposed. Without voice, vote, or presence, it's just a matter of time before the progressive wing is cut off, left to float out to sea. And with conservatives firmly in place, organized around caucuses like Good News and <a href="http://juicyecumenism.com/2014/10/30/time-united-methodists-move-forward/" target="_blank">IRD, how long will it take before orthodoxy and orthopraxy are narrowed</a> to the point that moderates get the same treatment now as they did in the Southern Baptist Church back in the 1980's (<a href="http://www.religionnews.com/2014/06/04/southern-baptists-meet-membership-baptism-decline-continues/" target="_blank">a denomination that isn't doing too well now</a> I might add)?<br />
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Chris Ritter is a good man, devoted follower of Jesus, and someone who has worked very hard looking to do the same thing we're looking to do in the UMCM (keep us together) I appreciate his work, and I think his is a valuable voice in helping us find a way forward. But the R&R Plan just isn't the right idea. It just isn't.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-13405475552684705252015-01-23T16:33:00.000-05:002015-01-23T16:52:04.274-05:00Are You On An Adventure?I've never preached on a stranger piece of scripture than Nehemiah 3. At first glance, it's one of those sections of the Bible that you end up skimming. A bunch of complicated names of people, born to other people, hailing from locales you either need to be a scholar, or a really dedicated Bible student, to track down. And quite frankly, most of these people - whoever they really were - have been lost to the succession of years since their passing.<br />
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I mean at one point there would have been people who read this who would have recognized these people outside of this particular context.<br />
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<i>Oh yeah, Zakkur. I didn't know him but I went to high school with his dad, Imri. </i><br />
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<i>Joiada. Had that falafel place over on the east side he ended up selling to his brother.</i><br />
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<i>Shallum.... should have seen those daughters of his back in their prime. Hubba, hubba!</i><br />
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But at this juncture in time all that info has been lost. Just as someday nobody will no longer remember me because of that one season I played on Lima Senior's Sophomore Basketball team, or for the year in elementary school I was in the all-city recorder choir, or even as the father of that Xavier kid who was a good actor at Encore Theater, this fate has befallen all of the people on the list of who helped rebuild the wall. Really, it could be easily argued that the ONLY thing we remember these people for is their work on (or refusal to work on) the rebuilt walls of Jerusalem. So - as you might normally expect from the guy who almost ended up teaching high school history for a living - I don't have any clever little facts or stories about any of those folks or that time period. They are all unrecognizable, and largely forgotten by history.<br />
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But, there is something else about them that did capture my imagination.... how many professional "wall builders" do you see on that list? Far as I can tell, zero. Where is the list of the three bids for a contractor to do the work, the process in which those bids were measured, the qualifications of the various contractors, and then the process the contractor used to rebuild the walls? Doesn't exist.<br />
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And so while I am sure that the walls of Jerusalem were rebuilt, and there had to be some people there who knew what they were doing, it was largely rebuilt with amateurs. Priests. Levites. Goldsmiths. Politicians. Servants. Merchants. Some guy in conjunction with his daughters. A few "nobles" felt like they were too good to their hands dirty, but the upshot is that a hodgepodge of people, most of whom weren't builders, were lead by a cupbearer to a king - also not a professional builder - to put the walls of Jerusalem back together.<br />
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But the masses were being prepared by God for this work. Maybe not the actual work of building the wall, but their hearts were being prepared to take on the task. To commit to the labor, sacrifice, and expense necessary to make this vision a reality. They had heard the stories of Abraham and Sarah, of Joseph and Moses. They knew of King David and the wisdom of Solomon. They had practiced Passover. They knew that God, when they were slaves, had heard their cry and he delivered them. Set them free. And while they also had heard God's disappointment with them through the message of the prophets, they also heard the promise that a new thing was coming. They just had to commit, together.<br />
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We talk about the importance of "TEAM" right? When we coach our kid's team or whatever, we make sure everyone knows there's no "I" in "TEAM". Of course I was the smart-alleck who pointed out that was true, but "TEAM" does have an "M" and an "E". But this idea that we have to band together, put aside our differences, and unite under something bigger than what we can do ourselves, is something we drill down into every generation.<br />
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And I'll bet if you really think about it, most - or maybe all - of the most meaningful memories you carry forward with you are moments when you triumphed, or didn't quite overcome yet while still striving valiantly, in lockstep with others. Maybe you had a work project. Or were a member of a sports team. Or maybe you had a study group in school or were part of a service organization or club. Or maybe you accomplished something with your family, or significant other.<br />
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I saw, for example, on my Facebook newsfeed a post from someone commemorating their one year graduation from boot camp. He talked about how the experience was the most fun you could have that you'd never want to do again, and then thanked everyone with whom he went through it. I've heard - which is all I can say because I never served - that boot camp doesn't just test your physical limits, but ultimately is designed to bind you next to the people serving next to you. It's designed to orient you to taking care of one another by stressing the importance of doing your job properly while watching your neighbor's back. Because in the end that's what will keep you alive.<br />
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Shared experiences are generally at the heart of what gives our lives meaning. We aren't created to be alone. We're created as social creatures who need to be relationship with others. Even the most introverted of us still need at least one contact. One shared experience. Someone who cares. That's how God made us.<br />
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This is especially true when it comes to faith. Nehemiah rallied the city of Jerusalem, those who loved the city of Jerusalem, those who desired to heart of the city/community/nation/people - the Temple - be rebuilt. What started with brokenness, admitting that brokenness in prayer to Lord, compelled Nehemiah to humble himself to God's will for his life, and be obedient to this work. Work that will always be ultimately - as we see sometimes obliquely through the biblical text, and clearly in the person of Jesus - the creation and re-creation of relationships through the power of sacrificial restoration and reconciliation. Hence the plan for our lives, and the plan for Nehemiah's life, was a subset, a small piece, of this greater work God is doing. Creating and re-creating relationships through sacrificial restoration and reconciliation.<br />
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But the plan is never carried out singularly. When we talk about sacrificial restoration and reconciliation, we aren't just talking about Jesus on the cross. We're talking about us, carrying our cross. Jesus has shown us the way, dying unto self on behalf of the Kingdom. We each then make the sacrifice for others for the sake of God's plan. Reconciliation and restoration. The creation and re-creation of everything.<br />
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If you really think about it, what an adventure!<br />
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You know when Jesus called his first disciples - a few fisherman according to Matthew - to come and follow him so they learn a new "thing".... fishing for people, I'm sure they had no idea of what they were getting into. And maybe that's the problem with many of us as we practice our faith. It is the expected we want (even demand), but not the unexpected. I think Vince Antonucci - founder of The Verve Church in Las Vegas - puts it best in this video:<br />
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<a href="http://www.recycleyourfaith.com/2009/10/26/follow-me/">Follow Me</a>
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You know I've been responsible for facilitating hundreds of people over the years going on mission work experiences. I've heard the same reactions of people who participate over and over. A sense of shared purpose. A realization that whatever was given paled in what was received. That they were meant to go. Ordained to go. Prepared to go. Not prepared maybe for what they encountered, but prepared to take a major step of faith that ended up looking like this very encounter. And God showed up. Over and over, God shows up. And often it's in the most onerous and difficult circumstances that God seems to show up in most real way.<br />
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Why is this so often limited to the retreat experience? I mean I see churches trying to practice the presence of God through the power of the charismatic experience, and I don't doubt that the Lord shows up in the context of prayer and collective praise, but so much of the Gospels is Jesus impacting others and the world around him for the cause of fulfilling his mandate of "Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven". We're taught that all it takes is faith the size of a mustard seed to bring to fruition what is necessary to provide others with rest and shelter. We're told that if we ask, it will be given, knock and it will be opened, but I'm not sure that we really understand what this kind of faith entails.<br />
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All authority in Heaven and Earth has been given to Jesus. Why should it be a surprise when in the midst of the most unexpected circumstances, where people step out in faith, that the Lord shows up in a big way? Maybe, if you're in a spiritual desert, the answer is making the journey out of safe place you are, toward the unknown in the wilderness.<br />
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Amateurs, scattered up and down that wall, had to trust one another. They had to agree on what they would accomplish, and hold others accountable to what they would accomplish. They had to get out of their comfort zone. Goldsmiths moving stones and levites affixing gates. Not everyone was willing to bear the work. Nobles, we're told, wouldn't deign to humble themselves to put a rock upon another rock in a broken wall, but the price of this, we're told, is that they had no part of rebuilding the wall. No part of the work accomplished.<br />
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The daughters of Shallum, on the other hand, could look upon the rebuilt walls, remember the hard work and toil, recall the challenges and opposition of those who didn't want to see Jerusalem back on her feet (even to the point, we'll find out of facing random planned attacks), and experience the sore muscles in places you didn't know you had muscles, and see what the Lord had accomplished through their faithfulness. They were surely pushed out of their comfort zone, and probably at one time or another wondered what in the world they were thinking, believing they could help rebuild the part of the wall between the Broad Wall and Valley Gate.<br />
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But they did it, together, with the Lord's leading.<br />
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I'll be honest, there was a time I measured a church's effectiveness with the normal numbers.... nickels and noses. I still am guilty of sinking back into the nickels and noses mindset. Income and attendance as the end all be-all of our existence. And while those things on some level are necessary, the moments I've been proudest of the congregation I've served had virtually nothing to do with attendance or the offering.<br />
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I think about that first Big Drop, at the bottom of the recession, so many hurting people, and 1000 families served with food in what was about 30 minutes. The Lord called us, we responded to the call, and it was obvious that's what was needed in that moment of time. And I think the moments people needed prayer or visitation. The folks who needed others to help them get through a tough stretch in their lives. The moments people not only gathered around to lay on hands for prayer, but then made the follow up to do their part to help that prayer be answered. I remember in Bible studies and theology discussions moments of break thru. People turned off by what they thought the church was all about - nickels and noses - and suddenly impacted by the reality of Jesus' message. I remember all the attempts to address poverty, the need for education, racial reconciliation, cultural differences, and other huge challenges in this community... even the movements toward faithfulness that didn't end the way those seeking God's will would have wanted them to.<br />
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I think of all the moments where the risk to do what we believed what God wanted seemed great. Dangerous. Opened unwritten, unexpected chapters in the course of God's continued ministry which revolved around the church who (mostly) own a building at 2600 Zurmehly Road. We were being prepared. God was getting us ready. We'd heard the stories of Peter walking on the water toward Jesus, if only for an instant. Of Paul blinded on the road to Damascus, his life forever changed as an agent of healing and new life. God was getting us ready.<br />
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Is the time at hand for you now, to do a new thing? A new thing in your life? A new thing in this world? Has God been been speaking? Is God whispering, "seek justice but do so humbly", and you think maybe you know what that means?<br />
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If God is revealing some sort of new adventure of reconciliation and restoration, of creation and re-creation in your own life, or out there somewhere in the world, the questions I want to challenge you to ask are these:<br />
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1) Who do believe God has prepared, or is preparing, to make the journey with you?<br />
2) What is being demanded of each of you to do the work of reconciliation and restoration, creation and creation?<br />
3) What are willing to commit to in order to make this vision a reality?<br />
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The journey is not made alone. It just isn't. And the chapters yet to be written aren't what you've come to expect. It's time to let God shake things up for the cause of creation and re-creation. Restoration and reconciliation, through our blood. Our sweat. Our tears. And most importantly, His grace.<br />
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-58140247342592656532014-09-10T00:47:00.002-04:002014-09-10T00:47:38.515-04:00Nobody Move That Book<object height="270" width="480"><param name="movie" value="http://www.wingclips.com/embed/player.swf?config=http://www.wingclips.com/player/219/1038/config.js" /><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><embed src="http://www.wingclips.com/embed/player.swf?config=http://www.wingclips.com/player/219/1038/config.js" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="270"></embed></object><div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-31692094291789300332014-05-15T20:11:00.002-04:002014-05-15T20:32:28.149-04:00The Appointment Game, the Coming Schism in the United Methodist Church, and How This May Effect UM Pastors(No sermon to put together this week - Charlie Dray and youth ministry are taking charge this Sunday - so I'd thought I'd just blog. You know... for old times sake.)<br />
<br />
This appointment season has been the strangest for me in many a year... and I'm not even moving. It's been strange for two reasons:<br />
<br />
First, as I'm getting ready to start my 11th consecutive year here at Shawnee/Community - 3 years as an "associate in waiting" (that's another blog post in and of itself) and now my 8th year as Lead Pastor - my appointment amongst my colleagues has been the subject of great debate. The longer a United Methodist pastor stays at his or her church, the greater the speculation as to whether or not "this is the year" they are going to move. I mean the UMC isn't known for long appointments. 11 years in one place in my tribe is pretty unusual. Hence, every church (or bureaucratic position) that comes available (particularly if it's larger than this church) inspires a little speculation as to my future whereabouts among my colleagues. In our circles we call this "The Appointment Game"... guessing "who" will go "where".<br />
<br />
I haven't been concerned with the appointment game in long, long time. See, my appointment journey has been different than most. The only time I truly was moved by the Bishop and Cabinet was in 1997 when I was appointed as an Associate Pastor to Epworth UMC in Toledo. Since then I applied for and received a conference staff position in Illinois (1998), was recruited to an associate position in Goshen, Indiana (1999), and then was recruited once again to come back to West Ohio and Shawnee (2004). Most UM pastors never leave their conference, let alone serve in three. In my experience when you cross those conference lines you don't know what churches are "desirable", what pastors have served how many years at whatever appointment, or any info you need to know to play "the appointment game".<br />
<br />
Then last year I found myself engaged in the appointment system in a more conventional way. Didn't end up going anywhere, but when you get "the call"gauging your interest in doing something new, it's a strange experience. It's shocking. It not only forces you to think about what you've been doing, but what it is you should be doing.<br />
<br />
It also forces you to think about everyone else who would be effected. I have a wife with a good job and career ambitions (ambitions she put off while I got established in the ministry and we expanded our family). Our kids all still live at home. The oldest has friends and girlfriend and all matters of connections here in Lima. We've been here so long that outside of the year we were on campus at Asbury, our kids have never been enrolled anywhere but Shawnee. This thing just doesn't effect me. It effects us.<br />
<br />
And there's another dynamic.... my call isn't fully my own. When you become an Elder in the United Methodist Church, you are examined by Elders and then voted upon by Elders. The Bishop lays the hands in a symbolic gesture representing the handing down of power through "Apostolic Succession" (google it), but it's your colleagues who determine when you are in, and if you need to be cast out. We hold our call together in a trust, and we are responsible to one another. A decision made by one of us, effects all of us. So you can't be so selfish in this denomination to just unequivocally say "I'm not moving anywhere" or "I'll only go to ________ church." If you turn a move down, it has consequences for somebody else. We are in this together, and we need to remember that, always.<br />
<br />
In any event, hearing rumors about where you'll be living and what you'll be doing is unsettling. For the first time, this year, I was the subject of much chatter. No calls from anybody who mattered in the process... just chatter amongst us plebes (which is maybe another lesson... unless it's a DS who calls, just ignore whatever is said). I've never been subject of any chatter before, so this was strange, and I'll admit, difficult to block out.<br />
<br />
However, while the appointment game isn't new, this would not be the case for the other reason this appointment season has been strange, and very troubling: Thinking about where you'll be serving when the denomination splits. <br />
<br />
A split coming in our denomination. Believe it. 2016 or 17, the United Methodist Church will most likely split. As the coasts, Rocky Mountains, southwest and some of the European conferences become increasingly more progressive, the South and non-European overseas conferences are decidedly not. Especially in sub-Saharan Africa, the issue of homosexuality is a non-starter. It's just culturally taboo. Thus as the two polarized factions are becoming increasingly hostile and less interested in dealing with one another, the reality of schism becomes increasingly real.<br />
<br />
The coming division in the UMC will be about homosexuality. Nothing else. I mean there are people out there who will tell you that it's about scriptural authority or size of the bureaucracy, but that's not what is really at stake here.<br />
<br />
On the one side you have literalists who take key portions (but not all) of scripture literally. There's not much more to say about this. Some of the literalist arguments are more sophisticated than others. The writings of scholars like Dr. Ben Witherington III and Dr. Bruce Arnold are much better than many of the arguments I've seen, for example, on various Facebook pages of clergy and lay-people. But the various positions always originate out of the literalness of scripture.<br />
<br />
On the other side you have people who have seen movement in Christian circles on issues like slavery, race relations, the role of women, the origin of governmental authority, and numerous scientific issues (nobody, for example, is arguing that the earth is still flat.... not anybody worth listening to anyhow) who realize that while the church's understanding of scripture has changed, scripture hasn't. Hence, they're diving into the hermeneutics (history and goings on during the time the scripture was written) and the various literary studies academics use to look inside of what is being said in the Bible, to understand why it's being said in this particular way, at the particular time in history it is written.<br />
<br />
In any event, if you live on the coasts and the south, the coming split isn't going to change very much. If you are a progressive pastor serving on the coasts, you're probably already serving a progressive congregation. Same goes in the south for conservative pastors who are most likely serving conservative congregations. When the denomination becomes two denominations it'll be (for the most part) business as usual and probably a feeling of "good riddance" as people who disagree don't have to be yoked together any longer.<br />
<br />
But here in the good 'ol Midwest, the situation is more complicated. I'd gather that my conference - West Ohio - is probably the most polarized as any that exist on these issues (hence Ohio always being an "up for grabs swing state" in political elections). Churches in the bigger cities tend more toward progressive theology. Churches in the smaller hamlets tend toward conservative.<br />
<br />
And so it goes, for the first time ever, that I wonder about the church I'll be serving when the schism comes <i>and if we'll make the same choice of the two denominations which will exist. </i><br />
<i><br /></i>
I know where I live. We moved to this town when I was 10. The community has a long history of conservatism, and not always the good kind which protects personal liberty and freedom. In our past, the Catholic Churches formed CYO sports leagues because their children weren't permitted to play in the ones sponsored by the YMCA and public schools. The Bradfield Center was opened because black kids weren't allowed at the YMCA. All of that has changed of course, but historically we're not real open to change here, so it comes pretty slow. The only truly liberal congregation in the entire county is a church located in a college town, on that college's campus. The rest of us are just either in the "middle", or most likely, somewhere on the "right. People here tend toward keeping things as they are.<br />
<br />
As I keep reading authors like Brian Zahnd, Tony Campolo, Rachel Held Evans, Steve Chalk, Jim Wallis, Shane Claiborne, NT Wright, Brian McLaren Alan Hirsch, Michael Frost, and Phyllis Tickle, and listen to the sermons of UM pastors like Andy Hamilton and Rudy Rasmus, I know I am continuing to drift in directions that many people in this part of Ohio aren't interested in going.<br />
<br />
That being said, certainly after being here so long this congregation has become very supportive of us and we love each other. And it's not like my tenure here hasn't been tested. People have left, loudly, on a couple of different occasions over displeasure with either what they saw was a denomination leaning too far to the left, or their pastor doing the same. It certainly would have been easier to have been a conservative evangelical in this part of the world, and definitely an easier ticket toward building and funding a ministry. But somehow, at least up to now, we've accepted one another. We see eye to eye on issues of racial reconciliation, poverty, peace with justice, hunger, education, and most importantly, on the centrality of love and grace in the message of Jesus' gospel.<br />
<br />
But if the church were forced to choose between a denomination that was openly welcoming of all people wherever they were at in their lives, and one that professed that standing strong on certain issues of sin was a greater witness of God's love than blanket acceptance of everybody..... well, I'm just not sure how that discussion would go. And this lends myself to wonder if the church went one way, and I went another, what would that mean? Would I have to relocate? Would I be commissioned to start a new congregation in this area? Would there be a possibility of a "cross-denominational" appointment and we'd just stay here?<br />
<br />
None of these questions have I ever entertained before, but "schism" always seemed like one of those things we'd talk about late night over ice cream at Annual Conference, then the 2012 General Conference happened (the one where nothing got done because everybody was too polarized),<br />
<br />
then pastors and bishops starting openly defying the Discipline on Covenant Service and Same-Gender Marriage,<br />
<br />
then Frank Schaffer got the boot for officiating the marriage service of his own son (kind of watershed moment for me, personally),<br />
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then some bishops started actively ignoring those who violate the Discipline as acts of civil disobedience over what they perceive to be injustice much to the anger of other bishops, pastors, and laypeople,<br />
<br />
then both the conservative churches and progressive churches throughout the connection are holding "secret meetings" about potentially leaving the denomination<br />
<br />
and so, in this appointment season I'm becoming concerned about what is coming, and how that might effect this church, our family, and the relationship we have meted out together.<br />
<br />
I'm still here. I didn't go seeking another church. The PPRC didn't go looking for someone to replace me. But in the coming years I do expect to see pastors seek appointments with what they deem to be "like-minded" congregations. And for those of us in places where there is mutual love and acceptance, and yet still disagreement, harder questions are going to have to be asked, and harder choices are going to have to be made.<br />
<br />
Strange days these are. Strange days, indeed.<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-69779587391703509202014-03-08T13:31:00.000-05:002014-03-08T13:31:04.059-05:00A Word From Pastor Bryan to our Students, Parents, and Friends of our Student Ministry<div style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">
Students, Parents, and Friends of our Student Ministry</div>
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Earlier this week I received a letter of resignation from Charlie Dray, our Director of Student Ministries. Charlie will remain with us through the end of June. Charlie will be stepping back from ministry for a season as he and his wife focus on their future and family. We wish the Drays all the best as they seek God's will for their lives and look forward to still seeing them in the community in the coming year.</div>
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There will be a few changes in the youth ministry for the remainder of this school year. First, <b>on Sunday, March 16th, 7pm in the Solid Rock Cafe</b> I'd like to invite you all to meet with John Kopilchack (Pastor-Parish Relations Committee Chair) and myself to discuss our Student Ministry. As PPRC looks toward the future, this is a chance for us to hear your ideas and hopes for the future. We will also have information for Senior High Lakeside available, a "Scene 75' trip on May 18, and some tentative plans for a 3-day mission trip to Chicago in July. </div>
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Through May 18th, 6-8th grade will continue to meet 11am, Sundays in the Solid Rock Cafe. Also beginning March 23rd <b>8-12 graders will be invited to meet on a new day and time, 6:45-8pm on Sunday nights </b>(excluding Easter)<b> in the Solid Rock Cafe</b>, 6:45-7pm we'll have food available in the Solid Rock Cafe as a time to "hang out", with some singing beginning 7ish. Leigh Ditto and I are coming out of retirement to join Charlie and his team as we worship, do a little Bible Study, eat, and have a good time. </div>
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May 18th will be Graduation Sunday. All High School graduates will be recognized, youth will take a lead in the 11am worship service, and Charlie Dray will be preaching. We'll also have a reception for Charlie and his family following the service. </div>
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Enclosed is a calendar of everything happening until the end of the June. If you have any questions, please call the office <a href="tel:419%20991%204806" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank" value="+14199914806">419 991 4806</a>. We appreciate your cooperation and patience in this coming transition.</div>
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God Bless,</div>
<div style="color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">
Bryan Bucher</div>
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Lead Pastor</div>
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Community UMC</div>
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<b>Shawnee Community UMC Student Ministry Schedule</b></div>
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<b>March-June 2014</b></div>
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<u>March 16th</u></div>
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<i>11am</i> Junior High Student Ministry (6-8th Grade - SRC)</div>
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<i>7pm</i> All Student/Parent/Friends of Student Ministry Meeting (SRC)</div>
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<u>March 23rd - May 11th </u>(Excluding Easter Sunday)</div>
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<i>11am</i> Junior High Student Ministry (SRC)</div>
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<i>6:45pm</i> Senior High +8th Grade (SRC)</div>
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<u>April 23rd </u></div>
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<i>7pm</i> Pick up Tables for Mom to Mom sale (meet at church)</div>
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<u>April 24th</u> </div>
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<i>6pm</i> Set Up for Mom to Mom sale (Centrum/Commons)</div>
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<u>April 26th </u></div>
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<i>1pm</i> Tear Down for Mom to Mom sale (Centrum/Commons)</div>
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<u>May 18th</u><br /><i>11am</i> Graduation/Youth Sunday</div>
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<u>May 18th</u></div>
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<i>1:15pm</i> Leave for "Scene 75"</div>
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<u>June 22 - 28</u></div>
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Lima District Institute at Lakeside</div>
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-52691904408400980712014-02-22T22:06:00.000-05:002014-02-22T22:07:07.166-05:00Blessed Are the PeacemakersWhen I was in first grade, I somehow attracted the attention of a fourth grader, David Bentley, who decided I'd be a great little kid to bully. When the bus dropped us off at the front of the Shoals Elementary School, we had to walk outside around the perimeter to the rear portion of the building to get to the door that led to our particular classroom. To do this you had to walk along a long brick wall on a side of the building where there were no windows and doors. Turns out that was a perfect place for a kid to get bullied.<br />
<br />
David never actually did hurt me. He pulled a butter knife on me once, but mostly he just like to pin me up against the wall and threatening me with all kinds of bodily harm that never was applied. In fact, the only punch ever thrown between the two of us was by me. My father, upon being told his son was being bullied, made it clear that I'd better defend myself for I'd face a worse whooping at home. Taking that advice to heart, pinned up against the wall one day, I punch David Bentley in the stomach, and when he doubled over, I ran like the devil chasing me.<br />
<br />
But that didn't stop the bullying. Just made it worse. Thanks for nothing Dad.<br />
<br />
It was only after I was so miserable that I talked to two older boys at our church, Tim Jesse and Fritz Weigle, what was going on that the situation got under control. You see, Tim and Fritz were safety patrols. They got to wear an orange sash and belt. You could only cross the parking lot, and then SR 119, when they said it was OK. They had the power to stop traffic.<br />
<br />
And so one day, Tim and Fritz, in full safety patrol regalia, escorted me around the building, and when we hit that long blind sidewalk, you can imagine David Bentley's surprise when he saw the three of us. The two patrols explained to David that he was scaring me, that I wanted it to stop, and in the interest of safety he should leave me alone.<br />
<br />
Don't underestimate the power of a safety patrol. After that, David Bentley never bothered me again. In fact, he'd wave and say hello most every time he saw me.<br />
<br />
Of course not every story turns out like this. Peace in many corners of this world we live in, is elusive. Difficult.<br />
<br />
This morning in Kiev, after much bloodshed there is a parliament back in session, and elections for a new president scheduled, but nobody knows what the future really hold for the Ukraine. Will the Russians intervene? The EU? Will those who wish to move the Ukraine into a more fully integrated position in the western world carry the day, or will Ukrainian nationalists, some neo-nazis, convince people that isolation is the better course?<br />
<br />
Such, it seems, has been the case over the last five years or so across the Arab world. Nobody knows what the aftermath of the Arab Spring will be across the Middle East in places like Libya and Egypt. And as we speak Syria still is being torn apart.<br />
<br />
I wish we could just send in a couple of safety patrols.<br />
<br />
But I'll say this... the most revolutionary teachings of Jesus are the ones that touch on the topic of peace. I heard a rabbinical scholar not long ago say that nothing Jesus taught during his life couldn't also be found in the Old Testament, except for one thing:<br />
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<span class="text Matt-5-38" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">38 </span>“You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’<span class="footnote" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="[<a href="#fen-NIV-23273a" title="See footnote a">a</a>]">[<a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5:38-48#fen-NIV-23273a" style="color: #b37162; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: top;" title="See footnote a">a</a>]</span><span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23273A" title="See cross-reference A">A</a>)"></span></span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-39" id="en-NIV-23274" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">39 </span>But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23274B" title="See cross-reference B">B</a>)"></span></span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-40" id="en-NIV-23275" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">40 </span>And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well.</span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-41" id="en-NIV-23276" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">41 </span>If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.</span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-42" id="en-NIV-23277" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">42 </span>Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">and then Jesus takes it even further...</span><br />
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<span class="text Matt-5-43" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">43 </span>“You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor<span class="footnote" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="[<a href="#fen-NIV-23278b" title="See footnote b">b</a>]">[<a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+5:38-48#fen-NIV-23278b" style="color: #b37162; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: top;" title="See footnote b">b</a>]</span><span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23278D" title="See cross-reference D">D</a>)"></span> and hate your enemy.’<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23278E" title="See cross-reference E">E</a>)"></span></span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-44" id="en-NIV-23279" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">44 </span>But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23279F" title="See cross-reference F">F</a>)"></span></span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-45" id="en-NIV-23280" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">45 </span>that you may be children<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23280G" title="See cross-reference G">G</a>)"></span> of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23280H" title="See cross-reference H">H</a>)"></span></span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-46" id="en-NIV-23281" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">46 </span>If you love those who love you, what reward will you get?<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-23281I" title="See cross-reference I">I</a>)"></span> Are not even the tax collectors doing that?</span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-47" id="en-NIV-23282" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">47 </span>And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?</span></span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> </span><span class="text Matt-5-48" id="en-NIV-23283" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span class="woj"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">48 </span>Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.</span></span><br />
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<span class="text Matt-5-48" style="background-color: white;"><span class="woj"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The heart of the Old Testament law is "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth", and yet here's Jesus, at the outset of his ministry, telling everyone that this isn't the ethos he is going to embody in his life. And true to his word, Jesus never leads an armed uprising. Never calls for a sword to be drawn or a battle to be waged. In fact, he chooses the ultimate turning of the cheek - his own death - instead of calling down hosts of angels to destroy those who oppose him. </span></span></span><br />
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<span class="text Matt-5-48" style="background-color: white;"><span class="woj"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">And the course of the early church follows this lead. Christians are to varying degrees persecuted, imprisoned, tortured, and put to death, and never fight back. </span></span></span><br />
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<span class="text Matt-5-48" style="background-color: white;"><span class="woj"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">That sounds strange to us. But I want you to reconsider this. It's not that strange. </span></span></span><br />
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<span class="text Matt-5-48" style="background-color: white;"><span class="woj"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">"Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called the children of God."</span></span></span><br />
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<span class="text Matt-5-48" style="background-color: white;"><span class="woj"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Jesus wasn't just simply slaughtered, and cast in a tomb to be forgotten for all history. Jesus dies, but he is my no means passive or weak. His is not the death of a coward. On the other side of Jesus death, stood with Him a group - not a big group, but a group - of people so committed to creating a new Kingdom, a peaceable kingdom, they to become willing to stand for this strange new teaching, as they turn the other cheek, but refuse to back down on behalf of God, and those who need to experience his grace. Jesus death is the pathway to God's grace, and it leads through his people, committed to living out that grace in this world. To living as if Jesus is their king. </span></span></span><br />
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<span class="text Matt-5-48" style="background-color: white;"><span class="woj"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">You see if you read the Old Testament, you find out that God's people don't end up faring all that well living out "an eye for an eye" kind of existence. Just like in the case of David Bentley and myself, the party who is weaker, after experiencing a few blows and a lot of threats, becomes desperate for peace. Israel's heyday in the aftermath of Joshua leading the people back into the promised land, and is capped by David unifying the 12 tribes and securing the borders to the degree that his new kingdom would be recognized by others... an art that his son, Solomon perfected later. But those victories over the Philistines were long in the rearview mirror when, after the fall of Israel, and then the fall of Judah, the prophets, battered by war and destruction, began to see a new day. A new place. A new kind of world:</span></span></span><br />
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<span class="text Isa-2-2" id="en-NIV-17688"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">2 </span>In the last days<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17688C" title="See cross-reference C">C</a>)"></span></span></div>
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<span class="text Isa-2-2" style="position: relative;">the mountain<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17688D" title="See cross-reference D">D</a>)"></span> of the <span class="small-caps" style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span>’s temple will be established</span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-2" style="position: relative;">as the highest of the mountains;<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17688E" title="See cross-reference E">E</a>)"></span></span></span><br />
<span class="text Isa-2-2" style="position: relative;">it will be exalted<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17688F" title="See cross-reference F">F</a>)"></span> above the hills,</span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-2" style="position: relative;">and all nations will stream to it.<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17688G" title="See cross-reference G">G</a>)"></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="text Isa-2-3" id="en-NIV-17689"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">3 </span>Many peoples<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17689H" title="See cross-reference H">H</a>)"></span> will come and say,</span></div>
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<span class="text Isa-2-3" style="position: relative;">“Come, let us go<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17689I" title="See cross-reference I">I</a>)"></span> up to the mountain<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17689J" title="See cross-reference J">J</a>)"></span> of the <span class="small-caps" style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span>,</span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-3" style="position: relative;">to the temple of the God of Jacob.</span></span><br />
<span class="text Isa-2-3" style="position: relative;">He will teach us his ways,</span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-3" style="position: relative;">so that we may walk in his paths.”</span></span><br />
<span class="text Isa-2-3" style="position: relative;">The law<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17689K" title="See cross-reference K">K</a>)"></span> will go out from Zion,</span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-3" style="position: relative;">the word of the <span class="small-caps" style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span> from Jerusalem.<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17689L" title="See cross-reference L">L</a>)"></span></span></span><br />
<span class="text Isa-2-4" id="en-NIV-17690" style="position: relative;"><span class="versenum" style="display: block; font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; left: -4.8em; position: absolute; vertical-align: top;">4 </span>He will judge<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17690M" title="See cross-reference M">M</a>)"></span> between the nations</span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-4" style="position: relative;">and will settle disputes<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17690N" title="See cross-reference N">N</a>)"></span> for many peoples.</span></span><br />
<span class="text Isa-2-4" style="position: relative;">They will beat their swords into plowshares</span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-4" style="position: relative;">and their spears into pruning hooks.<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17690O" title="See cross-reference O">O</a>)"></span></span></span><br />
<span class="text Isa-2-4" style="position: relative;">Nation will not take up sword against nation,<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17690P" title="See cross-reference P">P</a>)"></span></span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-4" style="position: relative;">nor will they train for war anymore.</span></span></div>
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<span class="text Isa-2-5" id="en-NIV-17691" style="position: relative;"><span class="versenum" style="display: block; font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; left: -4.8em; position: absolute; vertical-align: top;">5 </span>Come, descendants of Jacob,<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17691Q" title="See cross-reference Q">Q</a>)"></span></span><br />
<span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks" style="font-family: monospace; font-size: 0.42em; line-height: 0;"> </span><span class="text Isa-2-5" style="position: relative;">let us walk in the light<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-17691R" title="See cross-reference R">R</a>)"></span> of the <span class="small-caps" style="font-variant: small-caps;">Lord</span>.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The power in visioning visions and dreaming dreams is that become a powerful tool in charting the course of history. We begin to mold our lives so those visions will come true. I was just reading an article about about an American Longboarder in the Olympics. If you don't know what long boarding is, join the crowd. It's essentially a competition where you ride down a mountain on a long snowboard and you try to go as fast as your bravery, or fear, will let you. Our long boarder lived in his truck so he could afford to train. That's power of vision. It will compel you to do things NOW in the belief of what results will yield later. And this is Isaiah's vision. Tired of wars and battles, Isaiah envisions a place where the wisdom of the Lord, the light of his grace, would be that which would settle all disputes and differences. And he knew that this kind of world wouldn't be made manifest through armies and generals and politics. It would have to be made manifest through the hearts of God's people.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">A vision that becomes embodied in Jesus. We are h</span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">is children, the peacemakers.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">When you take the initiative to end the dispute, to put down the weapons that have been employed. When you admit a prejudice that made you do stupid destructive things, and seek a new way to live that's smart and constructive. If you decide it would be better to die with your honor and integrity, in tact, for the sake of something greater without taking another life, well I don't know if there's anything more powerful out there. And that's not weak or passive. That's what changes the world. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">One of the better movies I've seen in recent years was "The Butler". For those who haven't seen it, you should. It's the story of a man who rises up from the pain of a hard upbringing in the cotton fields of the deep south, to becoming a long-time butler in White House. Cecil Gaines served for 34 years in the White House, living through Civil Rights era, Vietnam, and even until the day the Berlin Wall came down. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">A shadow story in the movie, however, was that of Cecil's oldest son, Louis, who enrolls in Fisk University, and instead of getting the education his father dreams of so that he can have a professional career, gets involved with the Civil Right movement. He volunteers for training in non-violent protest with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and engages in sit ins at lunch counters, the Birmingham Childrens Crusade, and the marches in Selma, Alabama which led to Voting Rights act being signed in 1965. Louis eventually gets a degree, but also is repeatedly arrested simply seeking dignity and respect for all. He receives another education. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">And the movie is this study in how two men, both flawed, both non-violently but firmly and directly, defy expectations and seek the make the world better. More just. More peaceful. The father by showing class, dignity, and loyalty, which in turn earns the respect of all so that on important issues he can be heard. The son in becoming part of a movement seeking to stand up for what is right. And together, in their own way, sometimes at odds, move the needle the justice.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">You see peace starts in your own heart. It begins with treating with others the way you'd like to be treated, but then actively seeking to create a world where others are treated fairly through living out your convictions, even if it means paying a price standing up for the only Kingdom that will last forever. It begins knowing that beyond a shadow of a doubt you are God's child, but then seeking create a life that radical hospitality beacons others to join in this community of Jesus where they can discover they are children also. </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Sowing peace will involve....</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">- Seeing Others As God's Children (Love your neighbor)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">- Refusing to Look Past Injustice (act better than the tax collectors who just love who love them)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">- Prepare To Do What's Right (Ponder what it means not to resist an evil person)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">- Expect To Pay The Cost (go the extra mile, turn the other cheek)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">- Wrap It In Prayer With Other Disciples</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">- Keep your eye on the dream (live as if swords will be bent into plowshares)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">So, where are you being called to sow peace, now, in your life? Where is God calling you? If you seem alone, who can you pray about this with so that will no longer will be on your own? What are you willing to give up? </span><br />
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-57800391799889787102014-01-13T15:56:00.000-05:002014-01-13T15:56:18.735-05:00Blessed are the poor in spiritLast week I talked a little bit about the Year of the Jubilee, and how we as Christians need to take it seriously. The jubilee, as a quick refresher, was a year in Levitical law that was supposed to come every 50 years. In that year all debts owed by Israelites to one another were to be cancelled. And even if you had sold or traded your land to settle a debt, it had to be given back.<br />
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This was significant. Significant to a people who had been slaves in Egypt. Slavery that was made possible - as speculated by some biblical scholars - by an ever-growing debt that Israel - who had once been free - owed to Pharaoh. Debt is a tool that's been used again and again, and is still being used today, to keep one group of people oppressed. Captive. Slaves. </div>
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It was important to freed slaves that they'd never be enslaved, or slave owners, again. Hence the year of the jubilee, a piece of the law not only talked about extensively in the Torah, but over the course of the prophetic texts, and then even by Jesus himself who quotes Isaiah 61 to announce his ministry. He, Jesus, came to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. The year of the jubilee.</div>
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So, we'd better take this scripture seriously. But if the early church still had rich and poor, slave and free, what exactly does this mean for us today? The clue, I think, is in this thing Jesus called the Kingdom of Heaven, which is anyplace God's will is in place. Not just after we die, but here... on earth. Jesus was AT LEAST as concerned about this life as the next. And so, going forward we need to understand the nature of the Kingdom of Heaven. To do this we're working through the "Blessed are" part of the Beatitudes, one "blessed are" at a time. The thinking is if we take a look at who is blessed by Jesus coming, that will give us clues as to what the Kingdom looks like, and hence how to celebrate the Year of Jubilee.</div>
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The first "blessed are" is "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.". Poor in spirit is actually a translation of one Greek word, Ptochos. Ptochos is basically everyone who isn't connected. Powerful. Wealthy. Important. They can even be destitute or needy. These are essentially ordinary people. Everyone who has no say, or sway.</div>
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Remember, the Roman Empire is a world where only a few people, at the top, have any power. Any say. The vast majority of people living in the Empire are not citizens, but rather subjects of it. A subject in an empire exists to serve the citizens. It's not a great existence. There are stories in the Gospels, for example, of pig farms in Israel. Israelites don't eat pork. They're not even supposed to touch it, and yet there are still pig farms to feed those who had been sent by Rome to rule over Israel. A governor with a bureaucracy and all their families. Roman soldiers. Didn't matter if you weren't allowed to touch pigs. You're a subject. Not a citizen. </div>
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A strange thing to say, I think.... blessed are the subjects. </div>
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You ever felt like a subject? A "less than"? I remember a few years ago we were in Haiti looking for a possible place to house a team. Somebody suggested we go visit a missionary couple who had a large house where other teams had stayed. Our friend and ministry partner, Pastor Marius, took us out to this place. I remember we climbed out of the truck, and one of the missionaries invited us into their home. We had called ahead so they knew why we were coming. They were going to show us around the place. So we got out of the truck, and went into the house to start the tour, but before we could get out of the living room, one of them made it clear that Pastor Marius wasn't welcome to come with us. He wasn't allowed in the house. </div>
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"We don't let those people, the Haitians, in our home."</div>
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I'm sure they had their reasons. We started the tour. Pastor went back and stood by the truck. We ended the tour, left, and never went back. </div>
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He was a subject, not a citizen... and it just felt, wrong. </div>
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I think that's why the text in Luke 14:7-14 is so powerful. Jesus is at a dinner party, and he's watching (I'm supposing with a little amusement) the scribes and Pharisees jostling for position around the table. For the place of importance. And in the midst of this, he just simply says that the person who takes the seat of least honor, can be honored when the host offers them a better seat, which is way better than taking a great seat, and then being moved by the host so the seat can be given to someone else. </div>
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And then, he lets everyone there in attendance - everyone in attendance largely to hear him speak - know that for their next dinner party they shouldn't invite friends, family, and people of importance in the hopes of reciprocation or to receive some sort of favor. Instead invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind and you will be blessed. Maybe not today, but someday, then the righteous finally win the day, you will get your reward. </div>
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Invite your subjects.</div>
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I don't like to think about myself having subjects. I'd like to think I could invite anybody. Anybody. But would I really invite the recently emancipated foster child who had lived an impossible for me to imagine hard life into my home? The homeless man? The woman with the strange skin disease? The recently released prisoner? Who do you consciously or unconsciously place yourself above? Who, in the way you think about them, have you made your subject.</div>
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I'm just going to say this.... the church has never fared well when she's tried to put herself at the head of the table, and try to keep others in the kitchen or servants quarters or outside looking in the window. That always seems to fail us. When white churches refused communion to blacks. When men consciously try to marginalize women. When the young or the old are shorted and compromised. </div>
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The church makes a lousy bouncer manning the front entrance at the velvet rope. Might have a lot of reasons - some of them might even sound good - when we try to make others feel "less then", as subjects, but it never looks good. And it's never resolved easily. </div>
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And I understand. I get it. It's easier to make limits. Place boundaries. The poor in spirit aren't always easy to get along with. They aren't always reasonable. They're behavior and choices can seem strange to us. There are too many of them. They eat up all the resources and take up all our time. We can't manage them, and they wear us out. </div>
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But the Kingdom is theirs. They're citizens. Our banquet is supposed to be laid out for those who can never pay us back. It's supposed to make us feel uncomfortable. It's supposed to feel backwards and wrong. It's a clarion call to just how out of whack the earth runs, compared to the way God wants it to run. </div>
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It's a wake up call to new priorities, where inconveniences are begging us to lay ourselves down. To let ourselves die unto ourselves, to find a new reason for living. And what it makes more than bearable. What makes it joyful, is that we learn how to do this together. We experience it together, so we're not in it alone, as we show others they aren't in it alone either.</div>
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Yesterday we were at a swim invitational in Celina. Maybe you read about it in the paper. There were a lot of teams there. Hundreds and hundreds of swimmers, and for most of the events the swimmer couldn't enter if they hadn't beaten a certain time. Like if you hadn't swam the 100 meter breast stroke faster than 1:30, you didn't qualify for the race. And this was true in every single event except for the 50M freestyle and the 100M freestyle. </div>
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The freestyle, for those who don't know, is the most common stroke. It's the one where your hands kind rotate around like a couple of windmills while you kick your feet. And here's something most people don't know.... in the freestyle, you can swim any way you want. If you want to do the butterfly, the back stroke, the breast stroke, even the doggie paddle you're allowed. In the 50M (which is up and back in the pool) and the 100M (which is up and back, up and back) freestyle, there was no minimum time. </div>
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The pool could swim a maximum of six swimmers at one time (what they call "a heat"). Six swimmers could swim in one heat. To accommodate all the swimmers who wanted to swim in the 50M and 100M freestyle races, it took 83 heats. 83 heats. My kid isn't in a single one. </div>
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The fifties were first. I went to lunch (a cup of chicken and noodles). I talked with some of swimmer and the parents. I walked around the facility. I surfed the internet on my phone. I took my time. The natatorium was packed and was heated to about 289 degrees. I thought I was gone a really, really long time.</div>
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I was. Just in time for the 100M Freestyle races to start. I'd only missed half of them.</div>
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Incredulous and a little bitter, I took my seat back in the bleachers. First were 25 heats of girls 100M freestyle. </div>
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And then we got to the boys, and that's when I met Ian.</div>
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Ian was in the 1st of 18 boys 100M freestyle heats, which would be the slowest. But he was locked in. Focused. He was about a foot shorter than all the other swimmers. And he had Down's Syndrome. </div>
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Nothing mattered. Then the buzzer buzzed, Ian was good to go. </div>
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He didn't as much dive as he belly flopped. Belly flopped to the degree that an audible "ooh' rose up from the crowd and 500 people started rubbing their belly in sympathy pain. And his stroke wasn't the smoothest. Kind of a combination of the freestyle and butterfly. And his turns weren't the sharpest and he wasn't the fastest, which is why by the time he had gone up and back, and up again, the rest of the heat had finished.</div>
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But it didn't matter. Ian kept plowing through the water. And as we got closer and closer to the final wall, first there were a few cheers and a few claps. And then there were more. And then more. And then more. Until the whole place was cheering to Ian. To the point that when he finished, the whole joint just broke out into cheers and applause. </div>
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And surly, inconvenienced, disdainful ol me, was thankful they had scheduled every single one of those 83 heats of freestyle. </div>
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So I think the first secret of the Kingdom, of the jubilee, is you stop thinking so much of yourself. Make yourself a little less important in your own mind. Shift seats at the dinner table. Maybe even move over to the kids table where all the plates are plastic and their have the Flintstones printed on them. Because if the point of church is simply to make you feel good about the choices you've made or recharge you to do what you are going to do, then maybe we've missed the point. We've told Ian "no heat for you", and in the process we'll miss the highlight of the day. The moment when a YMCA is turned into a temple, into holy ground, into a classroom where we learn something essential about what matters. </div>
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And on the other side of things, sometimes we don't just need to find humility in service, but the humility to be served. To be unflinchingly real. No pretense. No bull. No putting up the best front. And trusting that the people who have decided to open the door a little wider so everybody has the chance to come in, will even let you in, and serve you, like a citizen even when you don't have much to offer. </div>
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Even when your spirit, is poor. </div>
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-39643701727430927372013-11-16T22:02:00.002-05:002013-11-16T22:02:35.082-05:00ContentI don't know about you, but I like stuff. All kinds of stuff. Just bought, as an example a Martin Backpacker guitar a couple of weeks ago. I have other guitars, but this one is different. It's small. It's easy to play. It's a Martin.<br />
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Stuff man. I like stuff.<br />
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I think other people like stuff. All kinds of stuff. Monitored a Facebook post that took on a life of it's own as people started weighing in on area eateries, particularly the newer local ones that opened downtown. Lots of passionate arguments for the wine here or the steak there or the mediterranean dip over there.<br />
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I don't own a gun but I have friends that talk a lot about guns. And ammo. I thought all bullets are just bullets. I am apparently wrong. Bullets, I have been told, are different. I have heard bullet arguments.<br />
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Stuff.<br />
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Charlie Dray is partial to flat billed caps. He owns a lot of flat billed caps. I personally think you should never trust a person in a flat billed cap. But he tells me that this is because I'm old. Apparently we only had straw or a big leaf to cover our heads back in the olden days to hear Charlie tell it. Anyhow, he likes flat billed caps.<br />
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When my Uncle Dennis comes to town we go to Cabella's or the Bass Pro store up by Toledo. There are at the Bass Pro store a million fishing poles for sale. They apparently all do something different. I could listen to my Uncle Dennis talk all day about fishing poles, because to choose the right pole, you have to know something about fish. He knows a lot about fish, so he knows a lot about poles.<br />
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Stuff.<br />
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When I've been to your house I've seen your stuff. Buckeye stuff. Commemorative plate stuff. Some of you collect something specific. My mom collects apple stuff. Other people collect pig stuff or puppy stuff. I spent a whole afternoon once walking around Beverly Hills with three doctors who did nothing but look at watches and pens. Watches and pens. Ridiculously expensive watches and pens. Pretty ironic. Doctors. Can't keep a schedule or write legibly to save their lives, and there we were looking at watches and pens.<br />
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Maybe you like clothes. Dresses. Socks. Shoes. Or tools. Maybe you dream of a trip to Lowes. Power sanders and socket wrench sets. Cutlerly. Skis and snowboards. Golf clubs. Jewelry. Coins. Quilts. Electronic gizmos.<br />
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Stuff. Lots of stuff. People love stuff.<br />
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That's probably why the scripture this morning is so jarring. It's a scripture about stuff.<br />
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<span class="text Luke-12-13"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">13 </span>Someone in the crowd said to him, “Teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me.”</span></div>
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<span class="text Luke-12-14" id="en-NIV-25474"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">14 </span>Jesus replied, <span class="woj">“Man, who appointed me a judge or an arbiter between you?”</span></span> <span class="text Luke-12-15" id="en-NIV-25475"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">15 </span>Then he said to them, <span class="woj">“Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; life does not consist in an abundance of possessions.”<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-25475N" title="See cross-reference N">N</a>)"></span></span></span></div>
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<span class="text Luke-12-16" id="en-NIV-25476"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">16 </span>And he told them this parable: <span class="woj">“The ground of a certain rich man yielded an abundant harvest.</span></span> <span class="text Luke-12-17" id="en-NIV-25477"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">17 </span>He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’</span></div>
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<span class="text Luke-12-18" id="en-NIV-25478"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">18 </span>“Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store my surplus grain.</span><span class="text Luke-12-19" id="en-NIV-25479"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">19 </span>And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of grain laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”’</span></div>
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<span class="text Luke-12-20" id="en-NIV-25480"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">20 </span>“But God said to him, ‘You fool!<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-25480O" title="See cross-reference O">O</a>)"></span> This very night your life will be demanded from you.<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-25480P" title="See cross-reference P">P</a>)"></span> Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’<span class="crossreference" style="font-size: 0.65em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;" value="(<a href="#cen-NIV-25480Q" title="See cross-reference Q">Q</a>)"></span></span></div>
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<span class="text Luke-12-21" id="en-NIV-25481"><span class="versenum" style="font-size: 0.75em; font-weight: bold; vertical-align: top;">21 </span>“This is how it will be with whoever stores up things for themselves but is not rich toward God.” (Luke 12:13-21)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Jesus, it seems, has something against stuff. It's Jesus who tells the rich man who says he's kept all the commandments to give away all of his stuff, and come follow him. It's Jesus who says you can't serve God and money, you gotta choose one or the other. Jesus, in fact, talks more about money and stuff than he does anything else, except the Kingdom of Heaven. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Why is that? Well, apparently stuff can get in the way of our being "rich in God". </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">And why might that be?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">I have this theory. Based on what I see Jesus talking about, I have this theory that it's a lot easier to to be successful in accumulating stuff than it is to be rich in God. To be rich, in fact, in any kind of relationships. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">I mean when we were young, Aimee and I, just kids. 21 and 19, married and clueless. We barely got by. We were in college, both us, working part time jobs and relying on the generosity of our parents to make our rent, utilities, tuition, groceries.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">One time, at the end of the month when we were totally broke, Aimee searched around the kitchen for something to eat, and only found a can of spinach. To this day we have no idea why we had a can of spinach in our house. Neither of us likes spinach. It had to be some mistake, but there was nothing else in the house to eat, and nothing in our bank accounts, so my wife, hungry, is staring at this lonely can in our pantry when her mother calls her. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">"Aimee, it's Mom. How are you doing?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">My wife starts bawling. "I'm hungry and all we have is a can of spinach."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Her mother, God rest her soul, hung up the phone, grabbed Aimee's dad, and went grocery shopping. It was like manna from heaven when that 280Z pulled up, loaded down with food. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Now we look around us. We can provide for our family. What's more all those years we lived on one income, to now have two good ones, the end of the month isn't bleak like it used to be. When we first got married I owned a used push mower. Now I'm in the market to for zero turn.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">We want to measure our progress in terms of stuff, or our career, or our portfolio. We're better at that than we are relationships. Workaholics thrive on work because it's something they can do. They can master. It gives them a sense of self-satisfaction, a high, that they can't find anywhere else. It's easier to measure a life by a zero turn mower and how far we've come in terms of promotions or positions at work. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">I said this in a sermon a couple of months ago, and I still mean it. There's a power that we feel when buy something. Even if nothing else in our life is going quite right, we can still buy something, anything really, to make us feel better. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">I think Jesus, recognized the truth in an agrarian, pre-industrial economy that people find it's easier to develop a love affair with stuff, and that's not healthy. That's not life. Things might make us feel alive, attached, rooted. But it's a lie. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">You can almost hear Jesus wonder aloud, "Why worry about an inheritance? Why would you use me to get you money, to get you stuff? What's the stuff really worth? Wouldn't you rather be rich in brothers? If you'd use me to compromise, to leverage your brother for stuff, then, what hope do you have to know God? Why don't you leverage me, leverage all you have, to reconcile with your brother, so you can be reconciled with God? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">As someone once told me, in a moment when he felt very alone, all that stuff is just dirt. It's just dirt. And that's the danger. We can make so many compromises, even for good reasons, like providing the basics for our family, that we can begin to deceive ourselves in thinking that what others really need from us is stuff. The stuff we earn. The stuff we bring. And we work hard for our stuff, so it's easy to justify using a little of it here, and a little of it there, to make us happy. To satisfy us. To remind us why we work so hard in the first place. To mark our success. To measure it against someone else. </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">Is that the way it works?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Well, what if one day, one day, you woke up completely alone. No family. No friends. Nobody on the planet knew who you were. You have no obligations or responsibilities to anyone else, but if you get hurt, who is going to pick up from the hospital. Or who are going to spend Christmas with. Or who is going to celebrate your birthday or any day for that matter, with you?</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">I mean if stuff is so important, so vital for us to survive, then right now we should be happier, more satisfied, and better adjusted than in any time in human history. There has never been more stuff available more cheaply than right now. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">And yet relationships with others, relationships with God….. if stuff is so doggone important, wouldn't it correlate that the greater the abundance of stuff the healthier our relationships would be? The greater the overflowing of God's presence and power? </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The church is growing fastest in sub-saharan Africa, Central and South America, and Southeast Asia, the poorest places in the entire world. That's where they can't build churches fast enough. Can't raise up pastors quick enough. People got nothing but one another and God.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">And here, in the abundant land of stuff, in the land of IPhones, Elves on Shelves, and Keurig coffee makers we're trying to figure out how to get people out of their warm, comfortable homes on Sunday morning, and into church. To slow prune their lives so they can share time together. To learn to take care of one another. To pray for one another. Out loud. </span><span style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Hear, we're selling church? Like a commodity, in a world where everything is for sale, and everyone is completing for your time and attention.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">"Hey… over here! Look at meeeeeeeeee! Remember us?" And people think we're heading to hell in a hand basket faster than we ever have before. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Fools, rich in things, and poor in God. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">I did a funeral for a woman this week. She was 67 years old. At 44 she had a massive stroke, and lay helpless on a the floor of her home for days until a paper girl, seeing the papers pile up, decided to call the police. It's a miracle she survived, but as you might imagine, her life changed, immensely. She's was institutionalized for 23 years. In the end, only her immediate family and a few friends stayed connected with her. They said that for a time, in the nursing home, she loved to sing hymns. They were the songs, I suppose, emblazoned in her brain, something the stroke couldn't take away from her, so she'd sing. Sing hymns of praise, paralyzed in a wheelchair, and later, bedridden. It's all she had left that she could do.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Her greatest hope, her sister told me, was the Lord. Her greatest joy was her family and close friends. I mean, she knew they were in, because so many others had not been, physically, in her life. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">What has to be taken from us before we learn this same lesson?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Dirt. What you think you have - your stuff, your talent, your position - is dirt. You'd be shocked how quickly it can disappear. And then, on the other side of that illusion, what do you have left?</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">How many people recognize the song that Jeff sang earlier? It's a song from the greatest era of pop culture ever…. the 80's. The song was made popular in a movie called "Say Anything", an 80's movie (which are the best, ever) where a young John Cusack played a character, a graduated senior named Lloyd Daubler, who pines for the class valedictorian, Diane Court. And while Diane had a whole life of education and success her father had planned out for her lined up before her, Lloyd wanted nothing else but to be a kick boxer, a kick boxer in love and married to Diane Court. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">The famous scene is Lloyd, holding up a boom box with a cassette tape in it, playing this song. I'd demonstrate this for you, but we no longer own a boom box. And I haven't touched a cassette in decades. Now Lloyd would have to hold his IPhone above his head and text Diane Court the lyrics. But he lifts up the boom box, and plays the love song, because Diane has dumped him because her father doesn't think Lloyd can provide the life he wants for his daughter. A good life, with lots of success, and lots of stuff. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">And yeah, the scene was corny. It was the stuff of adolescent romantic fantasy. But in the end of the movie, after her father is caught embezzling money, stealing money, in the name of getting a "better life for his family", all the family assets are seized, and he is in jail, guess who ends up with Lloyd. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Rich in God. Stuff, success, isn't the pathway to richness in God. When we make the pivot, from me to we, from I to you, stuff is nice, it's a blessing, but it's just a tool. A tool that tests our integrity when we have much, and when we have nothing. A tool to be used to draw us closer, or a something we can concretely reject so we can drawn closer together. It is the place where Jesus is, in the point of greatest need where we can risk ourselves, risk loving someone else, and meet their point of greatest need. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Our denomination's founder said it best: Work all you can, to earn all you can, to save all you can, so you can give all you can. Stuff should first and foremost, be a tool to draw us into deeper relationships with others, and a place where our trust in the living God is most at stake. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Will we really take care of one another? Will we really care for one another? Will our lives, shared mutually, dedicated to making God's will manifest in this world, become the center that hones the center of who we are? </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Are you just a fool, sitting in the middle of a pile of stuff, or is your stuff drawing you deeper into the heart of God?</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">One last story.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">When I was a kid, there was a guy in our church, Dan Powelson, who whenever an impromptu sermon was needed, always volunteered, or was volunteered, to tell one story. The same story. It was a story we'd all heard - men and women, old and young - again and again, about Mr. Give and Mr. Get.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Mr. Get owned a huge house. He needed it. He had a lot of stuff. He'd clip his coupons and hit sales and be the guy who bought ten razors for a penny or a six Thanksgiving turkeys at pennies on the dollar the day after Thanksgiving. As a consequence, his house over flowed. Freezers filled with turkeys. Closets filled with razors. A storage rooms filled with soda pop. The place was busting with stuff, because Mr. Get was always worried he wouldn't have enough?</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">What if there's a turkey shortage? What if all the razor factories exploded? What if all the soda pop was stolen by terrorists? Mr. Get was always packing in more and more into that house, until only small pathways existed between piles and piles and piles of things. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Mr. Give lived next door to Mr. Get. he never seemed to have as much stuff, I mean not even close to as much stuff as Mr. Get, but there were always a lot more people. People hanging around on his front porch. Kids playing in his front lawn. There always seemed to be a carry in or cook out at Mr. Give's house. And people knew if they were short of something, Mr. Give would share it with them if they he could. A cup of sugar. A cup of milk. If Mr. Give bought cheap turkeys he'd see if anyone needed one. I mean he only really needed one, and even if he gave a couple away he still came out ahead. Besides, whenever Mr. Give needed anything, it seemed like the other neighbors were quick to share with him too. He didn't worry if the razor factory blew up. He'd just have a beard growing contest with his friends. And he enjoyed nothing better than sharing a glass of soda pop with a friend. He didn't fully understand why, but Mr. Give, while he didn't have much, never seemed to want for anything. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">One day a kid from the marching band came around selling nut bread to raise money for a band trip, and both Mr. Give and Mr. Get both decided to buy a few loaves. Mr. Get noticed that as soon as he bought the loaves, Mr. Give shared them with his friends. There was a big congregation on Mr. Give's front lawn, and as he watched it, Mr. Get laughed. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">"His nut bread will soon be gone, but I'll have plenty." And so in a corner of his pantry, he wrapped it and put in tupperware, balanced the nut bread on top a pile of other tupperware containers... and soon forgot it.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Until many, many months later, when he got a hankering for some nut bread.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">He went into his pantry, fighting through many more tupperware containers than had been added over that time, and after hours of looking, finally found the nut bread, tucked in the corner. He open up the tupperware, and inside, there it lay, moldy, crusty, rotten, and ruined. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Just then, across the lawn, he heard noise. It was another crowd of people gathered again on Mr. Give's lawn, and Mr. Get found himself getting angrier and angrier. All of his nut bread was rotten. In fact his pantry was filled with spoiled and stale food that had been sitting there forever, and there was Mr. Give, laughing. Mr. Get got angrier and angrier and angrier.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Until finally, he could take it no more. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">He came bursting across the lawn. "Why must you always be so loud? Why must there always be so much laughing and screaming and talking and singing over here? Here. Look at this. Look at my nut bread. It's stale and it's ruined. And I wanted some, and now there isn't any. And CAN'T YOU ALL JUST BE QUIET!"</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Everyone got dead silent. Nobody could say a word. It seemed like an eternity, as they all stood there staring at him, and he began to feel foolish, embarrassed. </span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">"Hey", Mr. Give said, "I'm really sorry about that, but we're eating dinner together and it just so happens I made a great nut bread to share with everyone. Would you like to come eat with us?"</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">And as they filled his plate, filled it to overflowing until he needed a second plate, filled with nothing but nut bread. As he ate his fill of nut bread, as he found himself thirsty, he excused himself, went home, and came back, with two liters, cans, and bottles of every kind of soda pop imaginable. And while much of it had to be thrown away, the rest was wonderful. And from that day on, if anyone needed anything, they could stop by Mr. Get's house. The house that was once filled with stuff, but was now filled with friends.</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">Wouldn't you rather be rich in brothers? Wouldn't' you rather be rich in sisters? Wouldn't you rather be rich in God?</span></div>
<div style="background-color: white;">
<br /></div>
<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-27748856838205716212013-09-19T14:05:00.002-04:002013-09-19T14:05:50.141-04:00Get Out Your Wallets - Be a Hero To Some Heroes through the Hands for Heroes Half-Marathon/5k<form action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post" target="_top">
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Hello All,<br />
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It's that time of year again. The Hands for Heroes Half-Marathon/5k is coming up, Saturday, September 28th here at Shawnee Community UMC. As in years past, proceeds from the race will buy lunch for school-children at Victory Christian School, located at Borde', a little village in northern Haiti, and medicine for those who can't afford it it at a medical clinic in Labruyere.<br />
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This year a portion of the proceeds will also go to support "Team Red, White, and Blue", and organization who, through sport, rehabilitates mind, body, and soul of veterans who were injured serving their country. A number of these folks will be running with us that morning. Their stories and TRWB's work is inspiring. For more info on TRWB, <a href="http://teamrwb.org/" target="_blank">click here</a>.<br />
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In order to make this a success (i.e. raise a lot of money) we need your help. In years past I've asked you to sponsor me as I walk the 5k. This year I want to do something a little different. In the race there are "Mile Markers" that can be sponsored for $100 apiece and water stops that are $250. I'm going to give you a choice. Instead of sponsoring me, I'd like to donate to honor somebody else. You have three choices:<br />
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- <b>Sponsor the "Honoring our Haitian Heroes Water Station" (any $ amount)</b>: Pastor Marius through his dedication and sacrifice has made life for the people of Borde', Haiti, better. His faithful work has educated hundreds of children, started dozens of small businesses, taught young people a trade, and provided clean water for the village. He's also baptized hundreds of new believers in the power of Christ's love and grace. Pastor Marius is just one of our Haitian Heroes, make a difference in the poorest nation in the western hemisphere. Make your donation towards the $250 that will sponsor a water station to serve runners, just like Pastor Marius and others in Haiti are providing "living water" to those in need. In the PayPal special instructions box, or in the memo of your check just put "Haitian Hero", if you want your hero's name on the sign (I'll have my crack staff take care of that), and their name.. <br />
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- <b>Sponsor the "Honoring our Military Heroes Water Station" (any amount)</b>: Some men and women served bravely in our nation's military and safely returned home. Others were not so fortunate. This is a chance to remember those who serve, and served. Those who made it home safely, others who came home needing our help, and still others who lost their life. Include the name of a soldier or vet you'd like to honor, and I'll make sure my crack graphics team. Make your donation towards the $250 that will sponsor a water station to serve runners, just like our soldiers serve their nation. In the PayPal special instructions box, or in the memo of your check just put "Military Hero", if you want your hero's name on the sign (I'll have my crack staff take care of that), please add their name.<br />
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- <b>Sponsor a "Standing Stone Mile Marker" (minimum of $100): </b>We'll have 150 or more runners/walkers here on Saturday. Put a word of encouragement to them on a mile marker. You can choose your own scripture verse or some other encouraging saying, and we'll put it on the sign RIGHT FROM YOU, or if you wish, in honor or memory of someone else you love. If you need help with a scripture here a few good ones:<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
Psalm 23</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Romans 12:1-2</div>
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Romans 12:21</div>
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Hebrews 12:1</div>
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I Corinthians 9:24</div>
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John 3:16</div>
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Jeremiah 29:11</div>
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Proverbs 18:10</div>
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Philippians 4:13</div>
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<span style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">In</span><span style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"> </span><span style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">the PayPal special instructions box enter "Mile Marker" and whatever verse/saying you want us print, and if you desire, who the "Mile Marker" is in memory or honor of. If you send a check, just enclose the same info on a sheet of paper, or email me at bryan@commumc.tv. Make all checks payable to "Community UMC" and put "Mile Marker" in the memo. All checks can be mailed to:</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><br /></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">Community UMC</span></div>
<div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Hands for Heroes </div>
<div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">
2600 Zurmehly Rd.</div>
<div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;">
Lima OH 45806</div>
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Hope to hear from you. Be a hero to some heroes!!!!!<br />
<br /></form>
<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-11198153765611948652013-07-06T19:05:00.000-04:002013-07-06T19:05:11.571-04:00Stop and Go (part 1)<div>
I was a youth pastor for a long time. Long relative to how long youth pastors usually last, anyway. The benefit of this is that now, more than 20 years when I first started working as a youth pastor, I've had the chance to see how my work, long ago, continues to play out. Since I've been out of that kind of work for almost a decade, even the youngest middle school students I worked with are now in their early twenties, and as for the oldest ones.... well, I had a senior from my first year at Shawnee who just turned 40 (which is to say that I was only four years older than she as a pastor, which probably as a Lead Pastor I would never be OK with today.... but then again, when I was a kid, we were never buckled in the backseat and we could ride our bikes halfway across town without any supervision, so I come from a different age). Via mechanisms like Facebook, you are able now to get some sort of feeling for where all these young people are at now.</div>
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Some are active in churches. Others aren't. Some have left Christianity altogether, either for another faith or atheism. Some have taken on all the trappings of modern evangelical Christianity - conservative socially, theologically, and politically. Others are much more open and progressive. Some are spiritual, but not religious. Most have been married. Many are divorced. Some have come out of the closet, and are living openly at gay and lesbian adults, many in committed relationships. Quite frankly, where they are spiritually is all over the map.</div>
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It's been a fascinating study. </div>
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When I've asked, I've found in the majority of these adults the experiences they had as teens has helped shape the course of their faith journey. For most the experiences they had as teens were important and positive. If asked most list a camp or mission trip or a leader from that time and place as an influencer on the direction their faith life has headed. While the number of these folks isn't exactly replete with pastors, missionaries, and seminary theologians, these ministry experiences got people thinking about God. Who God is, what God wants, and what that might mean for them. And they've continue to wrestle with this question as time has passed and they discovered too, who they were. They've changed over the years, and as a consequence so has their relationship with the Lord. </div>
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The book of Ecclesiastes is the journey of a person who was trying to figure out both who they were and who God is, and where those two questions meet. He's a person who has tried to find meaning and hope in both austerity and excess. In selfishness and holiness. He's run the whole gamut. He's been everything you can be socially, emotionally, and intellectually. And in Ecclesiastes 3, we get a little bit of that wisdom he's discovered through experience shared with us.<div>
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<i>1 There is a time for everything,</i></div>
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<i> and a season for every activity under the heavens:</i></div>
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<i>2 a time to be born and a time to die,</i></div>
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<i> a time to plant and a time to uproot,</i></div>
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<i>3 a time to kill and a time to heal,</i></div>
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<i> a time to tear down and a time to build,</i></div>
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<i>4 a time to weep and a time to laugh,</i></div>
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<i> a time to mourn and a time to dance,</i></div>
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<i>5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,</i></div>
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<i> a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,</i></div>
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<i>6 a time to search and a time to give up,</i></div>
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<i> a time to keep and a time to throw away,</i></div>
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<i>7 a time to tear and a time to mend,</i></div>
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<i> a time to be silent and a time to speak,</i></div>
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<i>8 a time to love and a time to hate,</i></div>
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<i> a time for war and a time for peace.</i></div>
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Pretty striking if you think about it. The author has found that contrary to the platitudes he's heard in his life, that he's found there were times that required him to be engaged in all of these things. Killing and healing. Destroying and building. Giving his everything and giving up. Life he discovered had called him to all of these moments. Sometimes extreme moments. But those moments never last. At some point, they cease, and a new time for something else arrives. It's when you've refused to acknowledge the moment has changed, and so should you, you can you end up in some real trouble.</div>
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Balance. To realize both the character and competency of Christ, we are called to a life of balance. Work and rest. Ebb and flow. And what's more, to not be surprised that life will be this way. To not feel disappointed or abandoned in those times that are difficult, especially, but to realize they are just a part of living. A part of being a disciple.</div>
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I'll be the first to admit this isn't easy. Fortunately, I don't have to be. The Apostle Paul beat me to it. We tend to think of Paul as a single-minded, driven individual whose every waking moment was focused on how to spread the Gospel to the Gentiles. But Paul paints a different picture. He tells us Romans 7 that his inner life is split. That some things he knows he should be doing, he does, but that there are other things he knows he needs to do that he just can't bring himself to. On the other side of the ledger, Paul acknowledges there are those things in his life he ought not to be doing, but he does anyway. He acknowledges too that no matter how much he tried to make himself obedient to divine law and order, that he found himself failing. It was only in Christ he found he could begin to bring this together. </div>
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And maybe that's because Jesus, it would appear, in what by all accounts was an extraordinary life, doesn't let relationships with others get him imbalanced with the relationship he has with his Father. He has moments when thousands come to hear him preach and other moments when people want to throw him out of town. He's tested by those not sure of who he is. He's pushed by those who think he's dangerous to the good of the order. He's overwhelmed by huge crowds who want something from him. He's visited in the middle of the night by someone who is worried how it would look if he came to him as a seeker in the middle of the day. </div>
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And yet Jesus continues on. He goes to the big crowds willingly, and he withdraws to be alone to pray to God. He feeds the masses, and then when they come back looking for more he refuses to feed them again physically, imploring them to seek a different kind of bread from the Lord. He always goes back to the fundamental relationship he has with God, and works out of it.</div>
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His life was an ongoing ebb and flow of being sustained by a different kind of bread. We see this, and yet can't seem to work this much into our own spiritual life.</div>
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I mean for example, let's just talk about prayer for a moment. If we keep saying that it's important to seek the Lord's presence, and that prayer historically has been foundational to God's presence in the form of a a new understanding of purpose, or a new resting place where peace can be realized, what does it say if it's hard for you to pray? </div>
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Is your schedule too busy?</div>
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Are you afraid of silence?</div>
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Do you just not know where to begin?</div>
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If there too much clutter in your life?</div>
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Is there some unresolved anger at someone else, or at the Lord, that is dominating your thoughts?</div>
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Would you do better with a set time and place for prayer that would inform the prayer life for the rest of your day?</div>
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Are you not convinced your prayer is being heard by anybody? </div>
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Have you honestly just not actually, really ever tried to pray?</div>
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All of these possible responses, and others, gives us a window into who we are. How we define our relationship with God, and how maybe the times and our experiences have defined our relationship with God. But if we are unable to pray in a way that's really meaningful, what does that really say about the nature of our relationship with God? And you can begin to do this with every and all relationships with others, our relationship to our possessions, job, wealth, those who are different..... </div>
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Is our life so out of balance, that in the end our relationships are suffering, and as a consequence so are we?</div>
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John Wesley always believed himself to be destined to do something great for God. It's a path he could have chosen or not chosen to take, but from an early age he felt this burning in his bones that God wanted to use him mightily. That belief was born from his mother, Susanna, who upon John being saved from a fire that was consuming the family home (a fire John believed was set by parishioners who disliked his father, who was their Anglican vicar) as a child, felt God spared her son for this reason. We don't have any record that she felt the same way about any of his 18 other brothers and sisters, but considering that nine of her children died as infants, John being spared probably for her took on even greater significance. Something she bore down into him as she raised and educated him as a child. </div>
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John's destiny in many ways was set for him, but he still had to wrestle out what this meant. He tried by sheer will and the force of his own effort to grow into this destiny placed upon him. He completed his studies as Oxford and was ordained in the Anglican Church. While at Oxford he mapped out a disciplined life that marked out every moment of his day in times of prayer, study, service, worship, and even a little bit of rest. Others joined him in his systematic pursuit of God, and the number of these methodical Christians - Methodists they became known - continued to grow. He even took a pastoral appointment to the colony of Georgia, seeking a greater challenge of evangelism to Native Americans and slaves, far outside of the limelight that the work of Methodists in England could have brought him. </div>
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But the peace Jesus promised in the book of John (My peace I give you. My peace I leave you.) was not his. It bothered him that despite all he was doing for the sake of the Gospel, he still wondered whether or not he was truly accepted and forgiven in the eyes of God. It forced him home to England, and for a time not doing much in the way of ministry. It was only in the silence and quiet of Aldersgate that Wesley heard God speak on his own terms.</div>
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Work and works had to give way to rest and listening. </div>
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We have to pay attention to these movements. Movement in our lives. Movements in our times. And seek how we feel about them, what they say about us. About who we are, and where we're going. </div>
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If we find all of our identity and purpose in our work, is that good? Is that bad? What is God trying to tell us?</div>
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If our core relationships are broken, what is required of us? Do you move further away, or do you make some changes to draw closer and make some repairs?</div>
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If you never feel like you are enough, but yet you are told that God loves you, what does that say about you? About God?</div>
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In the midst of a discipling relationship, where we are seeking to become like Christ by putting ourselves under his authority by receiving a little help from someone of integrity to help guide us, as we learn who God is and what God wants, we will learn much about ourselves... and it might not always be very pretty.</div>
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I started being discipled by a pastor who lives and works in Ft. Wayne via Google Plus and the folks at 3DM sometime early last fall. To be quite honest, I would have never have chosen this particular individual on my own to begin helping learn how to walk around the circle, which involves us...</div>
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Listening for God.</div>
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Sensing when God has spoken.</div>
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Reflecting on what has been said, and figure out what now is required from me.</div>
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Sharing this word with others.</div>
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Making a plan to be obedient to what God wants.</div>
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Being accountable to others to follow thru.</div>
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Listening to how that plays out with God later.</div>
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Being in a group with this leader and five other guys, as I listened to how their lives were being navigated professionally, personally, in regards to their family and friends, their health.... I didn't feel so great about my own life. Certainly I had something to offer but starting with the most fundamental of all my relationships with others - namely my wife and kids - I began to realize just how much God wanted me to grow in Christ's character and in his competence. </div>
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It scared the crap out of me after more than 20 years of marriage, and being a father for 14 years, how much more I didn't know than what I really did. How much I took for granted and how fundamentally how much growing I still had to do. I began to realize how much my identity and self-worth were tied up in being Pastor Bryan, and how little I thought about being "Aimee's husband" or "Max's dad". </div>
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It started to really mess me up. Call it a midlife crisis. Call it the bottom of defining my worth by working my tail off for since I was in seminary. Call it whatever you want. All I knew was that by January, I knew and those who truly loved me knew, I had to get away and start sorting some things out... which is why the first week of January I found myself chanting Psalms with the monks who are brothers together at the Abbey of Gethsemane in a remote part of Kentucky. </div>
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Everything for me just stopped, and I had to go to a place where I my title or history meant nothing, and the only thing I could do was wait and listen to God on God's schedule and God's terms. </div>
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You at the heart of this Christian faith is the relationship we have with God, and the greatest gift we can give one another is to help discover how to live that relationship out authentically. Not perfectly. Not in some pre-packaged sort of way where we say all the right things and do all the right things as it seems to have been determined by a few influential preachers, lobbyists, and writers. But authentically in a way that shapes all our other relationships. To know when we need to set aside something else, and move closer to someone who needs us. To draw away from the hustle and bustle, and seek a place of solace and peace in the presence of God, and God alone. To spur one another on in this journey so that the peace and purpose and joy promised, is theirs. </div>
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To learn the rhythm of how the Lord wants us to live, and become obedient to that rhythm. Which leads me now to ask you three questions:</div>
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- Do you have someone of integrity in your life you can be completely real with who you know seeks only that you would know the movement of God in your life?</div>
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- Are you sensitive to the way you are using your time, energy and resources to accomplish that God wants to accomplish though you in your life and the lives of others?</div>
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- Are you sharing what you are learning with somebody else?</div>
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So this week, I leave with those questions, as we keep thinking about living a life in God's rhythm, and next week we seek to confront the possibility that if we take this seriously, something, or things, might have to be pruned out of our lives. </div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-19517272879800747392013-05-25T15:12:00.000-04:002013-05-25T15:21:09.385-04:00Finishing Their Work<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/qCXUbQ4JjXI" width="560"></iframe>
<br />
<br />
It's Memorial Day weekend. The practice, who those who don't know, began in the aftermath of the Civil War in the south with something called "Decoration Day". Those who remembered the death of their loved ones in the war began going to cemeteries and decorating the graves of the lost. Over time the practice spread, and eventually it became tradition not just to decorate the graves of soldiers, but to commemorate anyone you loved who has gone to their "great reward".<br />
<br />
My uncle, for example, will go to the grave of my grandfather this weekend. My grandfather is a vet. He fought in WWII. Was at the battle of the bulge as a 17 year old kid. But that's not why my Uncle goes. Every year on Memorial Day he leaves a golf ball on the grave. It's a simple tribute, but for a son who spent hours and hours with his Dad on the golf course, it's appropriate. It's a tribute to a great dad.<br />
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Tomorrow, in Gettysburg, there will once again be a memorial service at the national cemetery at which President Lincoln spoke so eloquently during it's consecration. Two minutes the Gettysburg Address lasted. Lincoln thought it was a failure and the words would be lost to obscurity.<br />
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How many of you had to memorize it when you were in school? I know I did. Probably the most famous two minute speech ever given.<br />
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The words are captivating, I think, because the Great Experiment - democracy - of which Lincoln spoke is still not that old. Certainly it's grown since the Civil War, but we need to remember that for the nations of the world at the time, democracy was odd... even threatening. Most of the nations of Europe at the time were still monarchies in one form or another, and they ruled most of the world as colonies. Colonies that had the same say in their governance the American Colonies had with Britain before the Revolutionary War. Democracies were the things of rebels and rabble-rousers. And I'm sure that many at the time wondered whether or not the cost of the Civil War was really worth it.<br />
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58,000 men had died at Gettysburg, and many, many others had been wounded at that battle. The townspeople from the area had to bury all the bodies. It was their backs that had dug the graves, and their hands who had cared for the wounded. It was those people who listened to Lincoln's speech that day, and all as the war raged on.<br />
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Lincoln's declaration, his address, was that the cost of the battle for the cause at hand was both dear and necessary. So dear and so necessary that it was worth further sacrifice of time, energy, money, and blood. Blood Lincoln himself would ultimately have to shed as part of the cost. And we keep teaching the Gettysburg Address to our children, because in the 150 years since Lincoln uttered those words more time, energy, and money have been spent. More blood has been spilled and more graves have been dug. We don't want our children to forget it, and we want to remind them that maybe, someday, it will be their turn to carry this Grand Experiment forward themselves.<br />
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Our nation isn't perfect. Our intentions haven't always been purely nobel. Such is the reality of democracy. It's a human institution practiced by humans. That's why we have elections. If the last bunch did things we didn't agree with, if they turned out to be bums, we vote in a new bunch. It's not perfect, but given the alternatives I think we can all agree that even with all it's flaws, democracy has been, and will be, worth the cost. That's the idea we want to pass down to our children. This idea that has become the way we govern cost something. It's been consecrated with blood. Care for it as a trust, and never forget what has been sacrificed so that you might have the chance, one day, to be entrusted with it's care.<br />
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The book of Hebrews is different than the other Epistles. Nobody really knows who wrote it. Authorship wasn't really ascribed to Paul until the 4th century, and while the translators of the King James Bible continue this tradition, it's writing style, grammar, and even subject matter is unlike anything else Paul wrote. Some people think one of Paul's students wrote it. Others have thought it might have been Priscilla, the woman Paul speaks of who raised Timothy to the faith. If, in fact a woman wrote Hebrews, afraid of the scandal of female teaching in a patriarchal world, it was all the more reason scholars speculate the early church buried the authorship. In the end, it might have been Paul, or it might not have been Paul.<br />
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But most scholars agree that the purpose of Hebrews was "encouragement". Encouragement to early Christians who were being persecuted, even slaughtered, and beginning to wonder if in the delay of the return of their Messiah, Jesus - which they had been promised was immanent - wasn't a delay, but rather a sign. A sign that he wasn't who others had been saying he was. Hebrews is a letter to people asking the questions, "Is our continued faith in Jesus worth the price?"<br />
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Much of Hebrews is a reminder of all of those who have suffered so that the faith could be carried down through the ages to us. Of course the author spends a lot of time talking about the gift of Jesus, the gift of his blood. But the author also speaks of Abel who dies at the hands of his brother because of the sacrifice he makes to the Lord. Of Enoch, the only man we are given account of who God takes without tasting death because of his faithfulness. The author speaks of Noah, Abraham and Sarah, Issac, Jacob, Joseph, and Moses. He mentions Rahab, the prostitute at Jericho who risked her life so sneak the spies of Israel into the city. He lists judges like Gideon, kings like David, and prophets like Samuel. People of high and low places who when their moment came, their moment of truth, did what they had to in order to keep the faith alive.<br />
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And what a faith it is!<br />
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A faith which aspires to the last being first. A faith which ascribes the highest moral order to a person giving up his or her life for their friends, and defining friend as anyone who was created by God. A faith that calls us to serve the least of these, and overcome hatred with love. It's a faith that often puts us at odds with the ways of this world. The way the world is organized and managed and ordered. It's a faith that isn't afraid to speak out to presidents, prime ministers, kings, queens, generals, or dictators. Industrialists, bankers, stock brokers, or venture capitalists. The professional or totally unskilled. The sober and drunk. The wife and her child, and the widow and the orphan. Nobody is exempt from the demands of it. It's a faith which asked:<br />
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Do you love what Jesus loves?<br />
Do you love who Jesus loves?<br />
Do you love like Jesus loves?<br />
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A faith that aspires to restore what we believe was intended in the first place: a world where we hold one another and all that the Lord has created for us, in trust, with care and responsible stewardship. A world where justice isn't arbitrary, but fixed on something so deep it's at the foundation of everything created. A world where that justice is tempered with mercy, and we judge others slowly remembering we aren't God. A world where God is present. A comforter. A provider.<br />
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It is this faith, Hebrews tells us, that has been handed to us by Jesus, but has been intended for all since the beginning of the world. A faith that calls us to struggle against the sin of death and disease. Against those who seek to take advantage and wreak havoc upon others, particularly the innocent and those who can't protect themselves. A world where hearts seek to do the will of Jesus first.<br />
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Love. Love. Love.<br />
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And so in chapter 12, to those losing heart, losing faith, we are introduced to a new concept. In animistic religions both then and now, people engage in the practice of elder worship. That being the idea that those who have gone before us, now in some form shape our way forward now. Some elders in these traditions are agents on our behalf. Others are out to get us.<br />
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Hebrews though gives us another view of those who have gone before us. They are a part of the "great cloud of witnesses" who have already passed down the baton of this great race of faith, who now stand along the course of the race we now run, rooting us on. Figures of hope. Figures who carried the faith of love and grace down to us. <br />
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"We made it. So can you. We knew in part, but now we know fully. This reward is yours also. Don't give up. Come join us. Not just as one who is here solely by grace, but as one who helped carry that grace to others."<br />
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These are those who have helped carry the faith of love and grace to others. Some you've read about. Some you know. Some handed that grace to you, hand to hand.<br />
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I typed out this sermon on a MacBook that belongs to the church. It's a fancy shmancy machine that's probably more computer than I'll ever need. It's one of many laptop computers I've had over the years. Too many for me to remember, really.<br />
<br />
But I still remember my first. It was manufactured by a company called Ultra and it had Windows 386 and some version of DOS loaded on it. That's so old that now Windows just uses one number - currently 8 and nobody uses DOS anymore. It had a black and white screen, and it came with one of the first mobile printers. It didn't have an ethernet port or was wifi capable because the internet was something we only heard about in the movie War Games.<br />
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(Remember that movie? Matthew Broderick, pre Ferris Bueller, as a teenage hacker who hacked into a defense computer that threatened to blow up the world with nuclear missiles? Kids, that was back during the Cold War and Berlin Wall, both of which you can read about it in your history books.)<br />
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It was the first laptop I had ever seen and it cost $3000 back in 1991, which adjusted for inflation is just over $5000 now. $5k for a laptop computer. Can you imagine? And there I was, a snot nosed kid toting around for what was at least a couple of years the only lap top anybody ever saw on the campus of the seminary where I was student. Not even the professors had one.<br />
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And all because my grandmother bought it for me. She thought I needed it to be the best seminary student, and eventually the best pastor I could be.<br />
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She took her turn carrying grace. Now she's in that great cloud of witnesses.<br />
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She's standing there with her grandfather, who - after her father, before his drinking days were up temporarily abandoned his family to life of booze and pool on the road - stepped into her life and brought stability and love. A grandfather so close she called him "Dad". It was he who she called out to on her deathbed earlier this year. The one who helped her know that she was coming home.<br />
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He took his turn carrying grace. Now he's in that great cloud of witnesses.<br />
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He's standing there with her. He and the drunk, my great-grandfather Po-Po, who came home, started going to this new thing called Alcoholics Anonymous so he could be a father and husband. An old drunk who found grace, and then sponsored countless others to learn how to live responsible lives in the world by following one simple rule: Don't drink.<br />
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He took his turn carrying grace. A drunken sinner. Now he's in that great cloud of witnesses.<br />
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Helen Dornette, a retired school-teacher, never married, who inherited a large sum money, but never saw fit to spend it. She invested it, plus that which she saved herself, and at the end of her life started giving it away. Some she gave to me in the form of a scholarship that enabled me to carry that insanely expensive lap top around that seminary campus.<br />
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She took her turn carrying grace.<br />
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There are so many for me... my paternal grandmother. Carol. Sherman and Henrietta. Joe and Weezy Myers. The Hersheys. Helen and Pat Price. Stan and Betty Weller. E Larry Moles. Dr. and Mrs. Flickenger. The Connors and the Reeves. Fred Blosser. So many others....<br />
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I'll bet you now some of those faces along the side of the road. Witnesses who carried the faith in grace and love, and helped hand it down to you. Maybe you need a moment, remember, and give thanks.<br />
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It is they, these good people, who line the course which ends at the foot of a cross. Cheering you on. Their cause... his cause... is worth the sacrifice. Today, we remember them. Tomorrow, let us finish their work, carrying the faith of grace and love so that one day we too will stand, cheer on those whose day is still yet to come.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-1501498295226039672013-05-19T21:15:00.000-04:002013-05-19T22:30:08.284-04:00How Can You Support our Haiti Ministry in 2013-14? Well, Glad You Asked! Here's How....<form action="https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr" method="post" target="_top">
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<br />
Have had a few inquires online as to how people can support our Haiti ministry. Thought I'd reproduce the information sheet we gave the congregation this morning that breaks down cost, and give folks some idea what they might want to contribute to and at what amount.<br />
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First, let me describe the opportunities:<br />
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<b>Victory Christian Church Primary School (K-5) Tuition and Fees</b><br />
On the average there are about 120 children enrolled at our sister congregation's primary school. There is state provided education in Haiti, but 1) it is not universally available to all children and 2) it very competitive to get into. A child who has the opportunity to get a primary education not only becomes literate (which is good no matter where you live) but has a fighting chance to get into a secondary school where they can continue their education. There have been a number of kids during our association with VCC (led by Pastor Marius and Pastor Maccine) who have been able to make the leap to a secondary education, and some of those to college. The school provides on average about 10-15% of it's own financing (families pay what they can), but without our partnership, the vast majority of children could not afford to be enrolled by the their parents. Education gives a parent, a child, a church, and a community hope. We like being in the "hope business". Here is the breakdown of cost:<br />
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Education and fees:<br />
- $0.48 day/ $2.60 week/ $9.60 month/ $86.40 year - PER STUDENT<br />
- $57.50 day/ $288 week/ $1,150 month/ $10,350 - 120 STUDENTS<br />
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<b>Victory Christian Church Primary School Lunch Program</b><br />
For the past ten years, Community UMC has providing a warm lunch to every student three out of every five days of the school week. The lunch usually consists of rice and beans, bread and something to drink. For many children these are the only meals they can count on receiving each week. Led by long-time CommUMC member and a true champion of the children of VCC, Flora DeVoe, this year we are seeking the necessary support to feed all VCC students every school day. The cost includes not only the food, but the cooks who are paid to prepare the meal and properly clean the plates/utensils, and cooking fuel. Here is the breakdown of cost for a daily lunch, all five days of the week:<br />
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Lunch<br />
- $0.36 day/ $1.80 week/ $7.20 month/ $64.80 year - PER STUDENT<br />
- $43.20 day/ $216 week/ $864 month / $7,776 year - 120 STUDENTS<br />
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<b>Labrauyer Medical Clinic (Living Hope Mission)</b><br />
The village of Labruyer is about 20 miles from CapHaitien, but the journey to get there take about 90 minutes. A hub for trade (they have one of the largest rural market days in all of Northern Haiti), Labruyer is a service center for the villages and farms that surround it for miles. The Labrauyer Medical Clinic is a ministry of Labrauyer Christian Church, which has been led by Pastor Doleon since the late 1980's. The clinic, which is was started with Pastor Doleon by a nurse from Nebraska, lost it's primary forms of funding when that nurse retired, and returned to the United States. Now, partnering with our friends, <a href="http://livinghopemission.org/" target="_blank">Wilbert and Meg Merzilus of Living Hope Mission</a>, the clinic - which now employs a bright young Haitian physician Dr. Odrigue Norestine - is seeking to re-open the clinic five days a week. The clinic which addresses all issues related to basic health care is held in such high regard that the Haitian Ministry of Health funds a vaccination program for children through LMC to serve the community. Our medical professionals were able to see Dr. Norestine at work, and are all immensely impressed. Here's our proposal of support for the clinic:<br />
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LMC Staffing, Overhead and Medication Cost<br />
- Partial Underwrite of One Average Office Visit (including meds): $2.50<br />
- 20 Patients Per One Typical Day: $50/ per week: $250/ per month: $1,000/ $12,000 per year<br />
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<b>Living Hope Mission Water Ministry</b><br />
Our friends at Living Hope Mission are working with many committed servants (including our own Don Knepper) to host teams 6-10 times a year who do nothing but repair broken water well pumps. Nothing improves the health of a community faster or more effectively than clean water. With each pump serving hundreds - sometimes even thousands - of people, a broken pump forces people to walk further to find a source of clean water, or choose instead to pull water out of an area stream or river. With water-born illnesses, like Typhoid and Cholera, still very much a danger in Haiti (particularly to children and elderly) and other water ministries focused on digging new wells, Living Hope Mission has found an opportunity to improve the live of Haitians by repairing existing wells that have been broken. With a goal of $100,000, this new well pump repair ministry will be able to buy containers of well-parts, as well as equipment and transportation, to repair wells all over Northern Haiti. Here's the breakdown of cost:<br />
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Water Ministry<br />
- Average cost to repair one pump: $250<br />
- Two pumps: $500<br />
- Four pumps: $1000<br />
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<b>Ministerial Support</b><br />
Pastors in Haiti work hard. Long hours for uncertain pay. You can help us support a pastor and in turn, the continued sharing of Christ's Gospel of love in Haiti by helping a church fund their salary:<br />
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Pastor's Salary Partial Underwriting:<br />
- $150 per month<br />
- $1,800 per year<br />
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Got all that? Also, you can make an undesignated gift and trust us to use your gift for Haiti wisely. Follow these simple steps to make a one time donation:<br />
<br />
1) Review the options listed above.<br />
2) Choose the amount you'd like to donate.<br />
3) Click the "Donate" button above<br />
4) Enter the amount you would like to donate.<br />
5) Send an email to Cathy Dempsey (cathy@commumc.tv) who does all of our posting, with your name and address (so we can send you a statement - all gifts are tax deductible) detailing how you'd like to direct your donation. If you have no preference, simply just email us your name and address. If you aren't interested also in a statement, don't bother email us if you don't want to.<br />
<br />
For a donation that repeats monthly or quarterly, simply call us at 419 991 4806 or email Cathy, and we can make arrangements to send envelopes or arrange e-withdraws.<br />
<br />
<br />
Community UMC takes no "administrative fees". 100% (after the 2.7% fee PayPal takes) of all directed funds will go directly to the school or mission of your choosing. Undesignated funds not used to meet the needs of the work listed above will be used for things like shipping donated medications, school supplies, customs costs, and other needs which arise only in relation to our Haiti mission work. No funds will be used for Community UMC general fund expenses or other endeavors. <br />
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If you don't like the idea of giving PayPal or don't like using e-commerce, feel free to drop off or mail a check to our main office at our Shawnee Campus:<br />
<br />
Community UMC<br />
2600 Zurmehly Rd.<br />
Lima OH 45806<br />
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Make all checks out to Community UMC, and put in the check memo in what ministry you'd like your donation direction (if you have no preference, enter "Haiti Undesignated"). If you have any questions, feel free to contact the church office via the email address above, or by phone at 419 991 4806 ex.111.<br />
<br />
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-13306164743044170792013-02-02T21:32:00.000-05:002013-02-02T21:32:14.035-05:00Better To Have A Good Name(sermon thinking for Sunday... enjoy)<br />
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I first want to thank everyone for their love, prayers, and support during my spiritual leave. I naturally supernatural ways I felt God' love through you. Whether or not it was a shout out on Facebook, a phone call just let me know you were thinking of me, or the folks who told me they were going to pray who I have been assured supernaturally followed through..... thank you all. Now that I've returned jut about everywhere I go I get greeted with hugs and hoorays. It's good to be loved. I guess absence really does make the heart grow fonder. Know the feeling is mutual.</div>
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The topic for today's sermon is "Better To Have a Good Name". One of my heroes in ministry is a now retired pastor in our conference who is regarded as being one of the most liberal or progressive pastors West Ohio has ever known. While we don't see eye to eye on every theological or social issue what I've always admired about this pastor is that he has always backed up in both word and deed what he's said and what he believed. </div>
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He didn't just say that health care in Haiti for the poor was substandard and borderline nonexistent... he started a health organization that runs a children's hospital and a series of clinics throughout the country. </div>
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He didn't just say that he believed that people together needed to engage in racial reconciliation. He, as a white man, volunteered to step away from a position of institutional power at a pay cut to serve in a cross-racial appointment, and even succeeded in making it grow.<br />
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He didn't just say that the church should be open and available to ALL people. He opened the doors of that church to the entire community, standing up to those who would believe that you had to pass some litmus test before you could sit in a pew.</div>
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He even at the age of 70, forced by Discipline to retire, not feeling like God was done with him yet, sought a part-time appointment nobody else seemed to want, the demands of which would wear out a younger man. Years later, he's still going strong, convinced that as long as he has breath that he not only must preach the Gospel, but demonstrate it. </div>
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He engages in service, not lip service. His beliefs and actions are aligned and as a result he's one of the few people who everyone, even very conservative people in our conference, respect. Through a witness and life dedicated to proclaiming and living out the Gospel of Jesus Christ, his name has been made good.<br />
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Better to have a good name.</div>
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Proverbs 22:1 drops this pearl of wisdom: <i>"A good name is more desirable than great riches; to be esteemed is better than silver and gold".</i></div>
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I think there's a good reason Solomon passed on this nugget to us. It gets at the core of both what leads to us developing a legacy where our name is good. To look at this in more detail, let's turn our Bibles to Luke 4:1-21. In the scripture, we read that Jesus full of the Holy Spirit, is led by the Spirit into the wilderness. There, he encounters "the devil", which is translated from the greek word "Diablos" which means "slanderer" or "gossip" or "one who make false allegations". And in the desert, Diablos seeks to get dirt on Jesus by tempting him in three ways: he appeals to his appetite (4:3-4), which Jesus resists. Then he appeals to his ambition (4:5-8), which Jesus again resists. And finally, he appeals to the need Jesus has to find approval (4:9-12). Diablos wants an example of Jesus turning his hunger, a need to succeed, and a desire to be adored and accepted sideways, so that nobody will take him seriously.<br />
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He fails. Notice the difference in 4:1. Before he resists these temptations, Jesus is both filled and led by the Spirit. But after he resists Diablos, verse 14 says he's been empowered by the Spirit. It's one thing, for example, to want to be a police officer. You can even be led to apply for the position and go somewhere to receive training for the job. But it's another thing to be empowered with a badge and gun. Somewhere in that resisting, the Spirit gives Jesus sway, influence, authority over people who before, maybe wouldn't pay him much mind. His name can't be sullied or gossiped about - although it is repeatedly, even by people who should know better - because he lives an authentic life dedicated to the will of his Father. </div>
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This is the reason I think Luke conveys to us that Jesus resists the temptation to allow his appetite, his ambition, and the need he has, and we all have, to feel approval from someone who would use those needs he has to destroy him. To channel our efforts and energies behind Jesus to hunger first and foremost for righteousness, to make known the Kingdom of Heaven, and seek the words "well done good and faithful servant", and mutually encourage one another to do so, empowers us. I'd venture a guess that more than one person's good name has been destroyed when they've cut corners or ran over others in an attempt to satisfy their appetite, ambition, or fulfill that need to be validated as a success.<br />
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It's the difference between being led by faith, and being empowered by it, day by day, slowly, with greater authority as we leave a legacy of grace.</div>
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I think now in our day instead of calling it an appetite, we'd call what Jesus resisted as crass consumerism or materialism. The attempt on our part to principally find satisfaction and happiness through the physical or material. I think that's why on every extended mission experience I've had to place like Haiti, the folks who go with me - old or young - are generally humbled, and maybe a little bit shamed by the joy they see in others who have very, very little. How often in your life has "enough" just not been "enough" to the point of comedy, or even tragedy? "I did what I had to do" might carry us in justifying what we did to get what we needed or wanted but if the cost resulted in creating fear, anger, resentment, or derision on the part of those who were watching us closely, it won't take out the sting.<br />
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And worse yet, what if in getting what we want, we still aren't DIRECTLY satisfied? I'd guess there a lot of people out there carrying around regret over sacrificing their integrity and principles for stuff that in the end, still didn't make them happy.</div>
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To carry this forward, ambition too is a killer. Ambition that overwhelms us, consumes us. Ambition that leads to workaholism.... working past the point where your effort and energy expended in pursuit of "doing right by yourself and others" actually does right by others. Unrealized ambition that has made us bitter about how we've spent our lives. Ambition is a cruel master.</div>
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You know I was gone three weeks, and not long after I got back I was taking my oldest son, Max, to one of his many activities and events. He was asking about my trip, what the highlights were, and we got around to me talking about how the hardest part of being away so long was being away from Aimee, his brothers, and himself. </div>
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"Yeah", he said, "I'll bet you didn't miss Eli and Toby (our two youngest) half as much as they missed you."</div>
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And I'm like, immediately, all over that.... what about you and Xavier? </div>
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He assured me they missed me also, but when I talked to my wife about it she was just honest.... "Honey, for the first week they didn't even realize you were gone. You're gone a lot."</div>
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(Can somebody pull this knife out of my heart?)<br />
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Now I don't know about you, but I work long and hard and I justify the time I'm working (among other things) by doing what I do to feed my family. And yet, my family, all things being equal, would rather I was present and involved in their lives. Our drive to succeed and quest for power often bends our values.<br />
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Often too, just like satisfying our appetites with things that don't matter or last, too many people wake up one morning after years of devoted to their ambitions still unfulfilled, wondering what they traded all the time, energy and effort for the end.<br />
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Finally, I think the last temptation Jesus resists to feed the gossip mill, approval, is particularly interesting. Never at any time in history has it been as easier to collect fans than it is right now. People can become famous for being famous. It you are geek like me, you know that this how ultimately, Anakin Skywalker became Darth Vader. Each poor choice he makes to grow in power as a means of control, which he justifies as being necessary to protect his family, drives his family from him. I get the sense that more than one person in this world has had their name sullied because their ambition drove them to make choices that in the moment seemed wise, but in retrospect came at a dear, dear price.<br />
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Our need for approval, too, can erode how others feel about us, and the clout we have with others to be an effective witness and servant. Maybe at no other time in history are those with an outsized need for approval, for fans, been as easily fulfilled than right now. You can even be famous just for being famous. To attract and collect devoted fans for no other reason than you have other fans.<br />
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I watched an interview with one of those famous for being famous people not too long ago. At one time she was everywhere - TV, radio, billboards, websites, social media... you name it. The interview was done in the wake of multiple underperforming projects the celebrity had just launched years now after she had appeared on the scene and done all she could to stay in the public's eye. A TV show had been cancelled. An album hadn't sold. A product launched hadn't been bought. And the interviewer asked this celebrity a simple question, "With so many new celebrities like you coming onto the scene, do you worry that your time has passed?"<br />
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The celebrity began to cry, threw a tantrum, and ended the interview.<br />
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There is a part of us that is still the little child who begs mom and dad to watch him ride his bike or wants her art project to be put in the place of honor on the front of the refrigerator. I've watched unmet desire for approval destroy marriages, careers, financial portfolios, and generally drive a life spent making poor decisions in the quest for personal affirmation. It's a reason, I think, you see so much bizarre behavior in the world today. People will do just about anything for, and to keep, a fan.<br />
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I think that's maybe why we see so many celebrities who get famous ending up really messed up. Either the approval becomes suffocating and overwhelming, or it eventually dies down and is withdrawn altogether. Maybe the only thing worse than not getting approval, is getting it in spades and then have it withdrawn. In any event if we ever craved approval, particularly from someone who mattered a lot to us, and it wasn't received, it can hurt. Deeply.<br />
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Solomon in all of his wisdom knew when he wrote that verse in Proverbs that we are built to receive satisfaction, accomplishment, and assurance. These are needs deep within us that have to be fulfilled. But we can't let those needs warp the choices we make. To sell out something more important - summed up by Jesus as loving God and loving our neighbor - than our hunger, need to succeed, or receive applause just so we can feel a moment of temporary peace, will only lead to moments of temporary peace.<br />
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I think that's why for so many there's so much power just in the word, "Jesus". Somebody who stopped by my office not long ago talked about how in the aftermath of a family tragedy, in the depths of despair, all they could do was just repeat the word, "Jesus" over and over. Jesus, who was led by the spirit into the wilderness, but after resisting the temptation to give into his appetite, ambition, and need for approval, came out of that wilderness empowered by the spirit (v.14) to accomplish over the next three years, with each teaching, miracle, and in the example of his life, what he said he came to do:<br />
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The Spirit of the Lord is on me,<br />
because he has anointed me<br />
to proclaim good news to the poor.<br />
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoner<br />
and recovery of sight from the blind,<br />
to set the oppressed free,<br />
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor (v.18-19)<br />
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Jesus, who hungered for the Father and his kingdom, who lived so that the work of that Kingdom would be accomplished, and in the cacophony of voices sought only One from whom he needed approval, was single-minded enough fulfill that promise made. A promise that took staying within the discipline the empowering Spirit demanded from him, and us.<br />
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That's how he built his good name. That's why his name continues to live on, and carry weight of authority and power for people.<br />
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But here's the problem... it's one thing if the sum total of someone's life, all we know of it, sought to seek the fulfillment of appetite, ambition, and approval from the Lord, first and foremost. It's something totally different if your life has meandered from that purpose... maybe far away from that purpose. To a degree every single one of our names has been sullied... spoiled. We've failed by letting our appetites get the best of us, letting our ambitions - realized or not - get out of control, and our need for approval to drive us to do things that now we regret.<br />
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So, if that describes you, now what?<br />
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Well, as we prepare for communion this morning, I'd share one last thought on this matter that was shared with me by one of the leaders at a conference I recently attended. As he has been pondering all of this, he's started coming to realization that maybe, in all of his years of ministry, his own insatiable appetites, ambitions, and need for approval might have been drivers in his ministry, as opposed to the leading and calling of the Lord. And as he began to unpack the reality that maybe even the good things he was trying to do came out of a place that was less than Heaven directed, he began to be filled with guilt and shame.<br />
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And then, he remembered Jesus', hanging on the cross, uttering the words of the Psalmist:<br />
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<i>"My God, my God. Why have you abandoned me?" </i><br />
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Jesus, who lives rightly and out of the right motivations, experiences the sting of an appetite going unfilled. An ambition being extinguished. And probably most devastatingly, approval withheld.<br />
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And then this leader at this conference said these words I'll never forget....<br />
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"Knowing Jesus did everything right and still felt that terrible sting of rejection upon the cross, crucified the sting of those failures in my life."</div>
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Not that that man, that day, speaking to us, doesn't know or understand any longer the ways his sin has hurt others and sullied his name. It's just now he doesn't have to be trapped in an endless cycle of regret, beating himself up for what was done or done, said or not said. When Jesus rises from the dead, that sting on the cross is now healed. He doesn't have to wonder about God's attitude or opinion regarding his life. He is secure in those words, "This is my son with whom I am well pleased".<br />
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Jesus invites us into experience so that it should be with us.<br />
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Nothing you have has destroyed God's love for you, or altered the course of history for you or anyone else for that matter, that will deny that same divine love and acceptance from being available and encountered by others. Even if we are a little late to the game of realizing that the only legacy we have is how we've protected our good name, and that by walking with Jesus, doing what he did, loving who he loved, that name is made good, nothing we've done to this point needs to defeat you. In fact, it can be offered to Christ, who can use it for victory.<br />
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Just ask this broken man who found mercy in the words of a leader at a conference they both just attended.<br />
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And so, this day, I invite you, if there's something that's left a sting. A failure to properly satisfy your appetite, ambition, or need for approval to place it at the feet of Jesus, and let it go. Give it up. Let it drive you deeper into His arms and Kingdom, and away from your despair.<br />
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<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-87080121535353630172013-01-17T16:50:00.001-05:002013-01-17T16:50:40.233-05:00"As My Grandmother Sleeps"My grandmother is 86 years old.<br />
86 years of books and letters.<br />
86 years of experiences, good and bad.<br />
86 years of being.<br />
<br />
She sleeps a lot now.<br />
It's part of the dementia.<br />
Slowly she is drawing away.<br />
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When she awakes I like to sit with her.<br />
I make jokes about commercials with elephants in them.<br />
"You don't need medicine for an elephant. You need a zookeeper."<br />
She laughs.<br />
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She asks me to explain what's on the news.<br />
I make up crazy explanations.<br />
"He's really a Martian. That's why Oprah wants to interview him."<br />
She laughs.<br />
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Mostly we are quiet.<br />
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I give thanks for the time we've had together.<br />
Time talking about politics.<br />
Time talking about religion.<br />
Time talking about our family.<br />
Time listening to learn about my past.<br />
Time spent over ice cream and instant ice tea.<br />
Time spent timelessly.<br />
<br />
Valuable time.<br />
I did not know how valuable the time I had with her was.<br />
Now.... I do.<br />
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If now were then, she'd listen.<br />
She'd offer advice.<br />
She'd ask questions and clarify.<br />
She'd encourage and build up.<br />
She'd tell me to do good and help people.<br />
Through her God would heal.<br />
<br />
But now is now.<br />
Now is different.<br />
Time is short.<br />
I am here for her.<br />
Because she "is" and we "are" I am here.<br />
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So I sit quietly and wait for my grandmother to awake.<br />
Soon, we will sit together.<br />
I'll will make her laugh.<br />
Mostly we'll be quiet.<br />
That is enough.<br />
<br />
Through her God does heal and I give thanks.<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-4221818443007935682013-01-11T11:49:00.000-05:002013-01-11T11:49:25.767-05:00A Life Worth Imitating (21st Century Monks)<b>A Life Worth Imitating (21st Century Monks)</b><br />
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I just ended a three day sojourn with Cistercian monks at the Abbey of Gethsemane located near Bardstown, Kentucky (and also near the birthplace of Abraham Lincoln, which was unfortunately closed the day I went for a visit). I hadn't been to the Abbey since my Beeson experience, and had always longed to go back. I had always remembered the place as being quiet and had enjoyed singing the Psalms with the monks. However, since there were a few loving-but-somewhat-closed-minded members of my Beeson Class freaked out about all the Catholic religious imagery (not to mention the veneration of Mary, an image of the "feminine divine" which always makes virtually all Protestants uncomfortable on some level), I wondered what it would be like to go by myself without others unpacking their theological baggage (because Heaven knows I have enough of my own).</div>
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Verdict: It was a good experience. </div>
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There's something about the monks singing (or chanting in the Gregorian sense.... we didn't sit around going "ohm, ohm, ohm") those Psalms on a regular schedule that's calming. Reassuring. Maybe even hopeful. There's something about knowing those guys are singing Psalms each and everyday that's reassuring. It's a sign of "groundedness" in a world that's ever changing. A mark of God's never-ending devotion to us via the monks' devotion to the world on behalf of Christ. It was just good. </div>
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My favorite service of the day is "Compline", the final service of the day. I told my wife that my impression of Compline is the monks are singing lullabies to one another, the world, and the Lord. In addition to the Psalms, the monks sing this prayer: </div>
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<i>Before the ending of the day</i></div>
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<i>Creator of the world we pray</i></div>
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<i>that with thy gracious favor thou</i></div>
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<i>wouldst be our Guard and Keeper now</i></div>
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<i>From fears and terrors of the night</i></div>
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<i>defend us Lord by thy great might</i></div>
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<i>and when we close our eyes in sleep</i></div>
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<i>let hearts with Christ their vigil keep</i></div>
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<i>O Father this we ask be done</i></div>
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<i>through Jesus Christ thine only Son</i></div>
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<i>who with the Paraclete and thee</i></div>
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<i>now lives and reigns eternally</i></div>
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<i>Amen</i></div>
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My last sermon before I left was all about imitation. Are you imitating the life of Christ and are you discipling someone else so their life might be imitating the life of the Christ? I was thinking about this as I worshipped the Lord with the monks. Monks are all about imitating one another as they seek to imitate Christ. This is their attempt to be just like the disciples: They are seeking to imitate His disciplined simple lifestyle, prayer life, dedication to the Father and world, life of reflection, and even the fellowship he experienced with others. </div>
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I'm not saying that Jesus acted, dressed, and ate exactly as the monks do today. The lifestyle of the monk is Jesus' lifestyle re-imagined into a particular context and for a particular purpose. Jesus and disciples seek to unfold the Kingdom of Heaven into the world. The monks are in their own way and specific place, attempting to live out into that Kingdom. They readily admit that their particular lifestyle isn't the only concrete example everyone should follow. Theirs is a specific calling, just as we are called in some specific kind of way. But the object of their calling is the same as the calling of every other disciple of Jesus: Through faithfulness and devotion to the way of Jesus, create the opportunity for others to find the rest, grace and peace made real in the Kingdom of Heaven now and forever. The monks follow the example set for them for the sake of the Lord and their neighbor, hence the opportunity for anyone to come and retreat with the Lord and from the pressures of the world. So should it be with us and others everyday in our home, in our presence as the church.</div>
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It's really the question of what example I have been setting that I take with me on this journey, but it's the question of what example I want to set I need to bring back home. </div>
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This is what really drove me into this current journey - all that's comforting and everything else that vexing about how I'm imitating Christ - to a monastery (and beyond) for some unpacking and reflection. Because just like the abbot of those Trappist monks, I have a responsibility in some way, shape, or form set an example and create an environment where people can both imitate Christ ultimately for the sake of God and others. Somewhere along the way what this looks like for me personally in the specific context of where I live and work has gotten muddled and confused. </div>
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So I suppose on some level I'm looking for some variation of the order the monks live out every day. And while it probably doesn't mean singing Psalms and praying prayers seven times a day (eight, really, if you also count their daily Mass), wearing a robe, and making a fudge, the idea that everything in our life should be designed to bring honor and glory to God by creating a place of hospitality for all restless souls makes a lot of sense. Or as my friend (and current host) Paul Rebelo puts it, "a life built on serving 'The Other'". A place created through holiness, helpfulness, prayer, grace, mercy, and a vision focused on imitating a life dedicated to the restoration and liberation of others in a Kingdom built on love and not force, should be the essence of every church, every home, and every heart that calls Jesus, "Lord". </div>
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The world needs some 21st Century monks. What that order looks like is what I'm chasing.</div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-25285961769472770522013-01-11T11:42:00.003-05:002013-01-11T11:42:58.517-05:00A House Re-Purposed for Hospitality<b>A House Re-Purposed for Hospitality</b><br />
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On the first day of my journey heading toward the Abbey of Gethsemane after eating dinner with Nevan, I stayed at a bed and breakfast, <a href="http://www.tuckerhouse1840.com/">Tucker House</a>, located in the Louisville Metroplex. I took advantage of the "Traveler's Special" which made the stay more expensive than a night at a Motel 6, but a lot less expensive than a night at a Holiday Inn Express. Since I had my fill of sketchy hotels during the research period of my dissertation (Example: I stayed in a Howard Johnsons in Dallas where apparently someone was shot in a drug deal gone bad, a fact I learned in a newspaper the day after I checked out), I opted for the Tucker House.</div>
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If you are in the Louisville area I couldn't recommend the place any higher. It's very nice and clean. The house is decorated to the period it was built (the antebellum south). The breakfast, which was made by the proprietors, Devona and Steve Porter, was killer... absolutely fantastic. And it was nice and quiet. Will definitely take Aimee there someday.</div>
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I had the opportunity to interact with Devona during breakfast. They serve the meal in what I can only describe is a large Sitting Room framed with large windows overlooking their property equipped with a dining room table. It's adjacent to the kitchen and you can see the person cooking at the stove through a serving window. As Devona made my veggie omelet, cherry-nut scones, and gourmet bacon (told you the breakfast was killer.... they also served a grapefruit which was halved, sectioned, the top coated with turbinato sugar, and warmed on high under a broiler for five minutes.... sprinkle a few blueberry on the top and give it a try) she told me a little bit of history of the house. Apparently original owners who built the home, the Turners, were slave owners, and the wife, Nancy Jane Turner, was known to be a brutal master. </div>
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To be honest, that bit of information creeped me out, and truth be told would have deterred me from staying in that building had I known it in advance of booking. As a Christian I don't believe in karma (the concept of which, as I understand it, in Hindu culture is more about the supernatural measure of a life as opposed to the "what goes around, comes around") but if there was such a thing, a place with a brutal slave owner I'd think would be thick with bad vibes. </div>
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But upon further review, a couple of things occurred to me. First, the Porters, given their understanding of the home's history, make sure people of all cultures and races are made to feel welcome (and in fact all different types and kinds of folks have stayed in that home under their care and watch). Since they purposed the home to provide hospitality, that's what it does now (and they do it very well). The history of the place, which is pretty sinister, isn't determining it's future. The current owners, after much painstaking and extensive restoration, have restored the structure to it's former glory, but have redeemed its purpose. In a place which was oppressive, now there is a welcome for everyone. There's a good sermon in there somewhere.</div>
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And the other reflection I might share is that while Tucker House is now living out as a "second act", so too are it's owners. Devona talked about how one day while working in a marketing company in a job she hated, one day she just snapped and without provocation indicated to her boss that she was quitting. A month later, after wrapping up her work and handing off her assignments, she was unemployed, wondering about her future. At the time recently remarried, Steve asked her if she could do anything professionally what would it be, and she answered, "Own and operate a bed and breakfast". Now she's living the dream. </div>
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Of course I'm sure it's not all roses and cream as a B&B operator. They might occasionally, for example, get a boarder who when asked if it's OK for breakfast to be served at 8am, will look at them like they have three heads (I'm on retreat, man) or drink all the diet ginger ale in in their hospitality fridge. But at least the new problems that are now hers are different than the old problems she could no longer carry. That, and she carries them with someone else whom she loves and loves her back. For Devona, I think there is a grace manifested in the reality of her life each and every day just by waking up. </div>
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And so it should be for all of us.</div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14454403.post-45529811515981671542013-01-11T10:33:00.001-05:002013-01-11T10:33:38.562-05:00Dinner With My Publisher<div>
<b>Dinner With My Publisher (Sounds Kind of Hoity-Toity Doesn't It?)</b></div>
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The first day of this journey I stopped in Louisville to have dinner with my publisher, Nevan Hooker. Nevan not only owns Minister's Label Publishing, but he is also the man behind <a href="http://only144.com/">ONLY144.com</a>, which is a website making available resources of all kinds for children's ministry. While I can't say either one of us got rich trying to ride the coattails of Bob Russell, we both learned valuable lessons from the experience. I hadn't talked to Nevan in a couple of years, so this was a chance to figure out what those lessons were (beyond me not ever wanting to go though the process of writing a book again in someone else's voice).</div>
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I won't get specific in regards to Nevan (his story will someday make a pretty good book itself) but in the case of this book, his willingness to be entrepreneurial not only closed a few doors, but opened a few new ones. That's what we talked a lot about over a nice dinner. If you are willing to, as Nevan so aptly put it, "throw some spaghetti up on the wall to see what sticks", life is bound to get a little bit messy. Nothing ventured is nothing gained, but everything gained has a cost, and sometimes the price paid is pretty dear. The price might just be money or time, but it could be a relationship, profession, and even the threat of your sanity. That's way life works sometimes, I suppose. When you think outside of the box, some chapters in relationships and institutions close, and while pages turn to reveal a new chapter of growth, hope, and opportunities.</div>
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In Nevan's case one door closing (working in a huge church in Louisville) because he was seeking to open a lot of new doors, led to new doors being open (or namely, the creation of ONLY144.com). For Nevan there have been rewards and costs, but ultimately it's enabled him to do what he set out to do. It was interesting and informative to listen to him reflect on all the changes this has meant in his life. It was also interesting to find out for the first time the degree of risk he took to publish that book as he was seeking to make things happen. </div>
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Leaving dinner I couldn't help but reflect on the chances I've taken, and both the cost and reward of those risks taken. Giving up on law school meant getting the chance to go to seminary. Giving up on taking a small church meant getting to take advantage of the opportunities that come to staff people and associates in larger churches. Walking away from the WOC meant learning a lot about myself in the pressure cooker that was the IGRAC, and ultimately getting to live and serve in Goshen at First UMC. Giving up the chance to go to Indianapolis meant getting the chance to find out what it's like to live and work in Lima in my current capacity. On and on it goes..... the road not taken and the journey made.</div>
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In any event, it was great to see Nevan and here how well things are going for him. Here's hoping a national fascination with Bob Russell sweeps the country and our book gets downloaded by the millions. But in the event that doesn't happen, you'll be in my prayers Nevan. Can't wait to see what your next adventure holds.</div>
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<div class="blogger-post-footer"><a href="http://easyhitcounters.com/stats.php?site=bryanbucher" target="_top"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/index.php?u=bryanbucher&s=scoreboard" ALIGN="middle" HSPACE="4" VSPACE="2"></a><script src=http://beta.easyhitcounters.com/counter/script.php?u=bryanbucher></script>
<br><a href="http://www.onlinedegrees.net/" target="_top"><font color="#666666">Online College Degree</font></a></div>bryanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01178824346246815163noreply@blogger.com