Ah! Ha!

I was attracted to a commercial for Turner Broadcasting "The Closer." The star of this series was relating how in every good drama there is an "Ah! Ha!" moment. That moment when everything comes together. It is a moment of clarity. An instant when everything makes sense. I realize that she is talking about fiction. I know that it is only a Television Show. However, is this not also true of a good novel, a good story that is well told?

This moment occurs in a good crime drama or any mystery it is when all the clues, like pieces of a puzzle fit together to form uniform picture of the entire event. It has been said that a picture is "worth a thousand words." Is it possible for "a thousand" well placed or phrased "words" to paint a picture? These word pictures so well drawn that they convey these mental images. Images so bold as to be seared into our minds for eternity like Icon's on a computer screen. When we double click upon the Icon there is an immediate recall of story the image represents.

Then it came to me like a flash of lightening. Should there not be such an "Ah! Ha!" moment in the sermon? When the "Greatest Story Ever Told" is retold and the grandest drama ever written unfolds. When the most profound mystery is revealed for every ear to hear and every eye to see. Why would there not be a picture so bold, beautiful and breath taking that we all cry out in wonder and awe, "Ah! Ha!" May be we have "ears but do not hear," or have "eyes but do not see?" Or may be it is something else altogether.

Could it be that something is lost in the telling which has nothing to do with the story itself? I have heard and preached more sermons than I care to remember. Many are good stand up comedy routines. Some are more like reciting of a concordance with scriptures quotations strung together to fit the speakers agenda. Others would make good after dinner or motivational speeches. A sermon should be something more and even something different. It must be more than what the listeners want it to be, a message that is what we think it is. While it is communication it must be much more. It must produce transformation. It must contain an authentic word from God.

There must be a moment when we hear the voice of God. A wondrous moment when we experience the Spirit of God in such a profound manner that we will forever be changed. That glorious "Ah! Ha!" moment when his story becomes our story and we can never look at the world or its inhabitant's the same again.

This might require some serious reevaluation of preaching by both preachers and those who are preachee's (I know I just invented a new word, forgive me).

Just some things to think about along the way. "Ah! Ha!" I hope I will see you a little farther down the road.

Bob

"A Christmas Story"

A Radical Retelling of the Christmas Story?

Let me be so bold as to begin by suggesting that the story we are so use to telling this time of year may not reflect an accurate reading of the scripture. We remake Jesus in our own image so that we often end up with a “blond blue-eyed baby boy.” We are not alone in this every culture recast Jesus into their own image. Rather than being transformed into his image humans tend to recreate Jesus in their own image. Is it possible that we are guilty of reading scripture our cultural and sociological “rose colored glasses?”

The Christmas story has become so sanitized and purified that one must wonder it those who first heard it would even recognize it as the same story they heard and retold repeatedly. It is a magnificent story, which is from its earliest days orally handed down from one believer to another. However, what if we have become familiar with the story that we have missed something? What if the story has become so commercialized, culturalized and categorized that it has lost something in the retelling? Could it be that the story has lost its edge? Is it possible that most people fail to see the relevance of this story to their all too real life?

Have we scrubbed squeaky clean the story and sanitized it to the point that we have removed the scandal? For it is the scandal, I would suggest, that was and is at the heart of the story. The Nativity scenes, so popular everywhere today, presents Mary with an angelic look, a serene smile and an appearance seemingly completely at peace. How real is that? She just gave birth to a full term baby without anesthesia. To say nothing of the journey she has just undertaken under the most primitive of circumstances. The hay that is the baby’s mattress looks more like tinsel just bought in modern Christmas store. It looks nothing like the hay that was soaked in urine, mud and manure from the stable in which he was born. His bed was a feed trough not a cradle or something that looks more like a child’s safety seat than something that animals would have been eating from only a short time before his birth.

They may have been ancient people but they knew where babies came from. Joseph knew this and he knew that the child was not his. Matthew tells us that because he was a righteous man he had decided to put her away. He was within his rights as the fiancé of Mary to do this. However, he was a good man so he wanted to do it privately in order not to shame her. He is the only one who is privy to the words of the angel, “the child is from the Holy Spirit.” If that is going to be your story, you had better have tough skin and be prepared for most people to not believe your story. We need to remember that only a few people in this entire story are privy to the message of the angels.

Not only could Joseph count but also so could all his neighbors. How many of us have smiled to ourselves at the nine-pound babies born two months or more early. We snicker to ourselves and at least think, “that’s a good story.” One can only imagine how many times Jesus must have heard the insults hurled at him, or spoken to his back. Words such as, “there he goes that b……. son of the carpenter.” Could this be implied in the local people's statement, "is this not the carpenter's son?" We dare not remove the scandal from the retelling. He was born in Scandal.

Joseph was a carpenter. He had a trade. He was skilled as an artisan. He was probably what we would consider lower middle class. However, one must remember that the baby was not born in his hometown but in a strange town considerable distance from family and friends. The census required Joseph and his nine months pregnant wife to travel to a place far from hearth and home. Luke records for us this and includes this one line that speaks volumes about his life, “there was no room in the Inn.” He was born in a stable not an Inn or a house. He was born into abject poverty. His birth announced and welcomed by the lowing of cattle, bleating of sheep and clucking of chickens not by the palace full of servants or heralds of the king. Again, we must remember that only a select few and those of us who read the story today know the words the angels spoke. It is in Poverty and not in a Palace that the newborn King is welcomed.

Not long after his birth, the angel tells Joseph and Mary to flee to Egypt because Herod wants to kill the child. The volatile and vindictive ruler is angry and he strikes out at the helpless children. All males two years and under are killed in Herod’s feeble attempt to hold on to his power. In a cruel and violent exercise of power as Matthew records for us the quotation from the Old Testament, that tells us “Rachael is weeping for her children….” In addition, the fulfillment of the scripture that says, “out of Egypt I have called my son.” One can only imagine what that next Christmas must have been like for the mothers weeping for their children. Jesus was born into a world of Violence and a Violent world.

One must wonder if the story might not have a broader appeal and impact if we shared with the world this story of Scandal, Poverty and Violence. To a world filled with Scandal, Poverty and Violence, this could be a truly transforming story. This is no sanitized, sterilized story for a perfect world. This is a story that must be told in all of its brutal realism. Real people must come to know the real love of the Savior. “For unto us today a Savior is born, Christ the Lord.”

1. Born in Midst of Scandal.
2. Born in Abject Poverty.
3. Born in a World and Time of Violence.

This does not sound much like "Joy to the World!" "Silent Night!' or "Peace on Earth." But, then those are just lines from Christmas songs that present an idyllic view of the Christmas story.

Just some things to think about along the way. I will see you on down the road.

Bob

"On Any Given Sunday"

Some Not So Random Thoughts On Church Attendance!

In a recent sermon by Dr. Randy Harris, he shared with us some sobering numbers. Most of us have heard and some of us have even quoted the statistics for regular church attendance in the Untied States. Preachers are fond of reminding us of these numbers to prove that America is a "Christian Nation." Since religion is all about feeling good church members leave worship feeling good about themselves because we are winning the war. I am not sure which war it is that we are winning. The war against evil, liberalism, the pagan hords at the gates or what ever the current righteous war might be.

The numbers are often quoted at between 40 and 45% (dependent again upon who is quoting the numbers) of the population of the United States. That sounds like we are winning the war. It sounds like we are truly missional. These numbers, which are so frequently quoted, were derived simply by asking people if they attended church regularly. Of course we all know that people would not lie about a matter as important as church attendance. It is somewhat like calling someone in the middle of the night and asking them, "did I wake you up?" People would not actually lie and say "no," would they?

What the researchers have discovered is quite interesting. Their results were similar to those election officials found when they asked people if they voted in the last election. The numbers they discovered were somewhat inflated, to put is mildly. When people were asked if they voted the number who said they voted was always higher than the numbers the records actually recorded. Someone offered the intriguing proposition, “what if it is just possible that this same phenomenon is true of church attendance.” Someone (I am not sure who) suggested, “why not count attendance” rather than asking if they attended. What an interesting approach, just count the numbers.

What they found when they actually counted the numbers was that the 45% number we were all using was nowhere near correct. The actual number is about 17.5% of the population of the United States attends church regularly. The steady decline is projected to continue into the future so that by the year 2050 that number will be about 10%. If in fact Dr. Harris is correct (and I have no reason to doubt him) and these numbers are accurate then we should be alarmed by this trend. “On any given Sunday” (not simply the title to a bad movie) over 80% of the population of the United States chooses not to attend service with a local body of Christ.

First, I would suggest that the United States like Europe before it is rapidly becoming a post-Christian culture. Second, I would offer the suggestion that we (all of those who profess Jesus Christ as Savior) are failing miserably in the mission that Jesus has given into our hands. Third, I would simply ask a question of us. Have we (the church) become irrelevant, inconsequential and ultimately unimportant to the world in which we live? To ask these questions is not suggest that I have the answer to the dilemma that confronts us. It is simply an attempt to sound an alarm and seek to open a dialogue on a subject about which I care deeply.

Just some things to think about alone the way. I will be seeing you down the road.
Bob