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PRAY

If there’s one thing I want you to do especially for me // Then it’s something that everybody needs…// Each night before you go to bed, my baby, // Whisper a little prayer for me, my baby, And tell all the stars above – This is dedicated to the one I love.

Dedicated to the One I Love, written by Lowman Pauling and Ralp Bass, 1957

I haven’t posted in what seems like forever – I think September of 2021 was the last time. Taking a stab at self-defense, the fall of 2021 into the spring of 2022 was a whirlwind of busyness and distraction as I was juggling three jobs – property manager for my home church, managing our food panty and serving, albeit part time, the good people of a local church as their interim minister. It was crazy, exhausting, and at times, maddeningly frustrating, as I struggled to write a sermon on Saturday, lead worship on Sunday, spend that afternoon writing next Sunday’s service – it was due Monday to meet bulletin production deadlines imposed by the administrative requirements dictated by a limited budget. Then Monday morning rolled around and…well, I hope you get the picture. It was a blessed time. No, really….it truly was.

But that is all changing. I have resigned from my role as a sexton and food pantry director to accept a full time position as the interim minister of a church around the corner from my home. God has asked me to help a congregation whose long time pastor recently departed. It is a congregation in mourning and one that is very anxious as it navigates the uncertainties that comes from transition. I am excited to embrace the tasks that  await and I am under no illusion that the challenges are very real and very difficult. But since it is God that has asked, then I know that God is in this and that’s the only comfort I need.

I suspect that too many of us often lose sight of God’s presence as we struggle with the uncertainties and pain that is part of our daily lives. The pandemic has been a very difficult period for all of us and the clergy have not gone unscathed: the pastorate is hurting as well. It was in that context that I delivered the homily that follows to a gathering of the ministers and elders from a group of churches in my neck of the woods. And while my audience may have been the ordained, in a manner of speaking, all disciples of Christ are “ordained,” so I thought I’d share with all of you what I had to offer to them…

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At a recent ordination service, while we were waiting for things to get underway, one of our pastors shared a story with a few of us from his ordination. As hands were laid on him, the minister at the time kept pressing down on his shoulders to impress upon him the weight of what being ordained felt like – the understanding that we are being, like the sailors of old, tied to the mast, so as not to be washed overboard by the raging seas of life in which we pastors embark daily.

And those seas are raging. Eugene Peterson, in Working the Angles, describes this in terms of wreckage – wrecked bodies, wrecked families, wrecked marriages, wrecked friendships and so on. It is into and through that wreckage that our ordination calls us to step – to walk into the ruins and witness to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

I might be the newbie on the block, but I have lived in the back stair cases of the house long enough to appreciate how difficult and exhausting this work can be. Pastoral burnout is at record levels. If I remember correctly, it was in acknowledgement of this, that the Lilly folks created grants that underwrote sabbaticals this past year.

Jeremiah knew fatigue. Jeremiah knew burnout. Early in his career, he wants to throw in the towel and walk away from the wreckage that surrounded him and the persecutions that challenged him: Lord, he prays- “So drag them away, and butcher them like sheep. Prepare them for the slaughterhouse” (12:3, CEB). That is one tired, angry and burned out dude!

Hey Jeremiah, I ordained you, the Lord tells him. Before I created you in the womb, I picked you out, set you apart as a prophet to the nations. I anointed you to run with horses, and you are tired out by the foot runners? Are you going to quit when you discover that there is more to this work than a 9-5, dinner and television life style? It’s tough stuff that I ordained you to do, but do not forget you are an iron pillar and bronze wall because I am with you. You can do it with me at your side.

I have no idea how long it took Jeremiah to respond, but we know he did – “From the thirteenth year of Judah’s King Josiah, Amon’s son, to this very day—twenty-three years—the Lord’s word has come to me. I have delivered it to you repeatedly, although you wouldn’t listen” (25:3, CEB). He sticks to it – he is still at it for 23 years, in spite of death threats, moments of despair and discouragement, being whipped in a stockade, thrown into a well, and daily ridiculed, his message ignored because he doesn’t buy into the lifestyle, the fads and whims of the secular life that was rotting away around him.

How did he find the courage? How did he find the deep abiding faith to live fully into what God was calling him to do? How did he meet the challenge to run with horses? Persistence. Every morning, every afternoon, every evening he awaited to hear the word of the Lord. He prayed.

Prayer was the action that Jeremiah rooted his entire day with. For 23 years he prayed to hear the word of the Lord and for 23 years, he heard it. He heard it because for Jeremiah, it wasn’t faith in prayer – it was faith in God. It wasn’t a technique that he used as a way to get things done: his were not prayers of oops, wow, gimme and thanks. Prayer for Jeremiah was a way of coming to God in faith and trust. Scared, worn out, lonely, hurt angry, discouraged, Jeremiah came to prayer with the desire to listen to God firsthand, to speak to God first hand because God had primacy in and over his life.

But what did Jeremiah’s prayer look like? How did he pray? I am indebted to a section from Peterson’s work, Run with the Horses, for his terrific exposition of chapter 15 of Jeremiah for the following.

Jeremiah prays his fear – You understand, Lord!  Remember me and act on my behalf…(15:15, CEB) You got me into this stuff and I’m counting on you to see me through it.

He prays his loneliness – When your words turned up, I feasted on them; and they became my joy, the delight of my heart, because I belong to you,  Lord God of heavenly forces. I didn’t join the festive occasions; I took no delight in them. I sat alone because your hand was upon me (15:16-17, CEB). Jeremiah lived the truth – he delighted in receiving God’s word but when he turned around, no one else was there – they were on the golf course, at the shopping mall, watching television.

He prays his hurt – Why am I always in pain? Why is my wound incurable, so far beyond healing? (15:18a, CEB) He hurts because he cares – he cares about the flock that God has charged him with and their refusal to listen to the love of God that he preaches every Sunday, hurts.

He prays his anger – You have become for me as unreliable as a spring gone dry! (15:18b, CEB) The man who once preached that God was “the spring of living water” (2.13, CEB), now accuses him of deceit. You didn’t walk the talk, God.

We all have our moments of doubt, when the pits of despair seem insurmountable, when the dark nights of the soul is so black we can’t see our own fingers in front of us. Dealing with Peterson’s wreckage day after day is not an easy thing – we are only human. Pray your anger, pray your fear, pray your hurt, pray your loneliness. Pray your love. We need to hear and rehear God’s promises, made to us in our ordinations, over and over again. Simply carrying around some memory verses in our pockets isn’t enough. We need that daily encounter that comes in prayer. The world is changing all around us – changing faster and faster it seems – but God’s word never changes. In prayer, we encounter the word that renews and reaffirms and my prayer tonight is that Jeremiah’s example may be one that guides all of us as we try to run with the horses. Pray.

Artwork: “Jeremiah Lamenting the Destruction of Jerusalem,” Rembrandt, 1603, Public Domain

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Growing up – What do you want to be?

It took me more than forty years to finally listen to the hound of heaven’s answer to that question that seems to be asked so very early and often in life – what do you want to be when you grow up? Working for my church brings me into constant contact with the cherubs of our nursery school, and I can tell you, they are being asked to answer that question at the age of four – fire fighter, police officer, doctor – the standard answers that we always hear from our children at that age.

But the question is always lurking just beneath the surface for most of our lives and it shows up in this one  – “what do you do?”  – “what do you do?” What do you do is one of the first questions that comes up at any cocktail or dinner party when we meet new folks. What do you do? Not who are you, but what do you do? I’m a lawyer, I’m a teacher, I’m dog catcher, a plumber, baker and a candle stick maker. We claim our identity and that of others in a job description as if that is the sum total of who we are.

In the post Eastertide of Pentecost, these are important questions for us to be reconsidering in the light of the risen Christ who has called us to follow him – to be something more than what our secular career choices claim to say about our identity and the subconscious desires that drive us to believe that the good life is found in another shopping spree and bigger house. We are called to an identity that is something far greater and enduring – Jesus calls us to be the people of God.

“Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus told them to go. When they saw him, they worshipped him, but some doubted. Jesus came near and spoke to them, “I’ve received all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything that I’ve commanded you. Look, I myself will be with you every day until the end of this present age.” Matthew 28.16-20, NRSV

The Great Commission – There are couple of pieces in these verses that I want to look at just a bit more closely for a moment.

Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee – The number 11 is a monkey wrench in the gears: it is not the perfect 12. Yet Matthew sees Jesus sending an imperfect church, a fallible church, a less than perfect bunch, into the world to do his perfect work.

Disciples – It is important to see that those commissioned are not called leaders, church officers, elders, deacons or even apostles, but simply disciples. That’s all a Christian should ever want to be: a disciple.

Went to Galilee – The eleven have obeyed the command relayed by the faithful women. The call to come to Galilee, is a call to believe the Lord and his resurrection enough, to make a trip to see him – a trip that took 3 days from Jerusalem if you went THROUGH Samaria – add a couple of days if you went around Samaria. It was a call to trust, much like Abraham’s trusting God when he was told to go, because it is a call to meet someone who has died and may very well not be there. It’s what we call faith: the faith of discipleship is the risk of daring to believe that the Lord will be there when he calls us. By coming to Galilee, the disciples have returned to the place where Jesus’ earthly ministry got underway, the place where they faced their modest beginnings and in that place, their lives break out into a huge worldwide horizon. That they meet Jesus as a group –  not in private one-on-one breakout sessions –  shows that this is a meeting that honors community and worship services, all of which shows us that Jesus meets his disciples in a special way in the fellowship of his believing people.

They worshipped him, but some doubted – Some doubted – we really don’t know if they all doubted or just a few, the Greek is ambiguous at best, but how can they worship Christ if they have doubts? And how could any of these eleven, having just seen the risen Jesus, doubted at all? From a theological and spiritual perspective, the notion that the disciples who worship and yet doubted is evangelical and deeply profound. Worship and doubt, together in the same sentence.

Just as Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil, so we Christians live in a war between the spirit of worship and the spirit of doubt – the spirit of worship as God’s people and the spirit of the world’s people, McDonalds and Amazon Prime. Jesus doesn’t correct, exorcise or otherwise attack this doubt as he instead quietly overlooks it, as if it is normal. By his great commission, Jesus is teaching that the disciples will win their war on doubt by following his command. Somewhere, I once read that Albert Schweitzer once said: “Follow him and you will know Him,”  and while I am at a loss to properly cite the source, it is true no matter who said it. Doubt is part of our human imperfections this side of the resurrection and Matthew’s good news is that doubt and worship can and do coexist. Doubting worshippers are Jesus’ material in mission – Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven – blessed are those who worship the risen Lord and who still struggle with their doubt.

All authority has been given to me, so go out there, baptize and disciple. Baptize: it’s Christian evangelism. Go out and live and talk with people until people believe and seek baptism into Christ: that’s discipling. Disciples live and talk with people in such a way that they teach them all of Jesus’ commands: that’s Christian education. And it is these people that Christ promises to always be with. The great commission – the great commission to be – to be disciples of Jesus, united to him in the waters of baptism by the power of the Spirit – a relationship that makes us the children of God, the very people of God. I’ll have more to say about this in another post.