Month: May 2018

I skipped church last Sunday.

There. I said it. As hard as it was for a retired pastor (who always encouraged church attendance by his flock) to admit it, I skipped church. They say that confession is good for the soul, which I hope is the case, since I am confessing that to you now.

Of course, even in the midst of confession, the rational (and sinful) mind slips in a few rationalizations, or what is referred to in the legal system as “exculpatory” reasons for my absence. The first is that I attended a church service on Friday afternoon for one of our late church members, and though I did not lead it, I did listen intently to the sermon and even joined in singing the Lord’s Prayer at the close of the service (which singing may require further confession and repentance). Then, on Saturday, I participated in our church’s monthly senior luncheon, where I got to fellowship with a number of members and visitors and even got to lead the mealtime prayer. That should count for something!

But the real reason for skipping church was the onset of a head cold with sneezing and coughing, which I decided was my duty not to pass on to our members who might be in attendance. So actually, you could say I did something righteous by skipping church!

Or not. But what about this matter of attending or skipping church? What do we as Christians understand to be God’s will and our obligation in this matter? Because there can be some confusion due to different denominational teachings, I’d like to share a few ideas about what I believe the Bible, and the Church, teach on this matter.

1: First, our practice and beliefs about weekly worship go back to the act of creation itself, when God created all there is in six days, and rested on the seventh. Genesis 2:2-3 tells us, “And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.”

2: The commandment to institutionalize man’s observance of God’s creation and rest is given in the Ten Commandments, found in Exodus 20:9-11, “Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.” This command is repeated and expanded slightly in Deuteronomy 5:12-15. Obedience to this command became one of the chief hallmarks of the Israelites/Jews over the millennia and regulated their weekly lives.

3: Regulations regarding weekly Sabbath observance multiplied over the centuries as devout religious leaders developed rules to ensure compliance with the general command to keep the Sabbath holy. Some of the rules were excessive and burdensome on the people, extending even to food prep, bathing, distances you could walk, etc.

4: Jesus and his disciples ran afoul of some of these extra rules by doing such actions as healing the sick and blind, casting out a demon, and eating some wheat grains while walking through a wheat field (Matthew 12:1) – all on the Sabbath. He was harshly criticized by the Pharisees for doing so, to whom he replied in three ways:

• First, by comparing his acts of mercy with other Sabbath-permissible acts such as circumcision (John 7:22-23) and rescuing one’s son or ox from falling into a well (Luke 14:5). He even compared his disciples eating wheat grains on the Sabbath with the time David and his starving men entered the Tabernacle and ate the holy show-bread (Bread of the Presence) that sat there (Matthew 12:2-4).
• Second, by explaining that God’s purpose for establishing the pattern of Sabbath rest was to benefit mankind. Though it was a law, the purpose was according to God’s grace. Thus the need to serve/help people trumped the need to keep strict rules (many of which man had invented anyway).
• And third, Jesus proclaimed that he himself was Lord of the Sabbath, and therefore he had the authority to determine what was proper or not: “And he said to them, ‘The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.’” (Luke 6:5).

5: Of course, Jesus, the disciples, other Jews, and the first Christians (most of whom were Jewish) observed the Sabbath day on what we call, Saturday, the seventh day of the week. After Jesus’ death and resurrection, his followers also observed Sunday, the first day of each week, as “The Lord’s Day,” in celebration of Jesus’ resurrection. Specific references to Sunday gathering and worship by Christians are made for Resurrection Day itself, the following Sunday (when Thomas showed up), and the Day of Pentecost. Acts 20 tells of believers gathered to break bread on Sunday (at which a man named Eutychus fell asleep during the sermon, fell out the window and died – a warning against falling asleep in church! Actually, Paul immediately raised him back to life . . .). Also, in Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians, he told his readers to set aside an offering on the first day of each week (which may have been during worship). Finally, we read that John received what he recorded in the Book of Revelation while he “was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day.”

6: As time went on, as the Church increased and spread among the Gentiles, and as separation from Judaism grew, Sunday became the Christian Sabbath. Apparently Pope Sylvester (AD 314-325) made the change official in the Western Church, though the practice was already common. Most Christians have kept the Sunday Sabbath ever since, except for certain groups like the Seventh-Day Adventists, the Seventh-Day Baptists, and many Messianic Jews.

So, now that we have reviewed the basis for our weekly worship services, the question comes to mind: “Do we have to go to church each week?” and from that, another question: “Is it a sin to skip church?”

To answer that, we need to go back to Jesus’ own statements about the Sabbath (and here I am accepting the Lord’s Day – Sunday – as our Sabbath). He said two essential things: first that he is the Lord of the Sabbath, and second, that the Sabbath was made for us. The Apostle Paul explained what this means in terms of observing the Sabbath by two critical verses in his letter to the Colossians. In Chapter two, verses 16 and 17, he wrote, “Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink, or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come, but the substance belongs to Christ.” Sabbath was the shadow; Christ is the substance to which it points.

Keeping the Sabbath is law; but we can only keep it perfectly by faith in Christ. He is our Sabbath rest, he has fulfilled the demands of the Law and is the Sabbath personified. Therefore, if we are in him, we have kept the Sabbath, just as we have kept all the Law by believing in the One through whom grace and truth came into the world (John 1:17). Do you believe in Jesus Christ? If so, you have already fulfilled the Law, which without Christ would have condemned you for imperfectly keeping its letter and spirit. If you ever did any work on a Sunday, missed one worship service, ever felt reluctant to go to church, checked out during the sermon or scripture readings, let your mind wander to impure thoughts toward or against fellow worshipers, or failed to tithe when the offering plate came around, you have broken the commandment and have sinned! Except, the Son has set you free, so you are free indeed (John 8:36); Galatians 5:1 says, “For freedom Christ has set us free.”

Therefore, our freedom in Christ sets us free from the condemnation facing all who break any of God’s commandments, by graciously forgiving our sins and removing the burden of fear and guilt. We can skip church without fearing that we will go to hell, for the Lord of the Sabbath is taking us to heaven.

But that brings us to the second part of what Jesus said, that the Sabbath was made for us. Therefore, though we can skip church or violate the prohibition against working on Sunday, when we do we miss out on the blessings that God has in store for keeping that command. What blessings are those? On the one hand, there is the benefit of physical and mental rest, of “down-time” from the daily rigors we face at work or around the home. A day of rest gives us a “time-out” but in a good way.  On the other hand, there are the significant blessings that come from gathering with fellow Christians to worship our Lord. Besides the fellowship we share with each other – a not insignificant blessing – there is the hearing of God’s Word, the explanation and application of God’s Word in the sermons, the call to confess our sins and receive absolution, being joined with others in prayer, the reminders of Christ in the church’s furnishings and symbols (such as the altar, the candles, the crosses, etc.), and the receipt of the sacrament of Holy Communion with its promise of forgiveness.

When we gather we are strengthened and we strengthen each other – weekly, or else we may face our daily challenges weakly. Even if we don’t feel we need church (a self-delusion), other people do; our participation in worship gives testimony and support to all who are there with us. Our faithfulness is a blessing to others.

Doing so follows the pattern of the first church recorded in Acts 2, beginning with verse 42:  “And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” Such corporate worship is so important, the author of Hebrews exhorts us in Hebrews 10:24-25, “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”

Martin Luther said of keeping the Sabbath: “The spiritual rest which God especially intends in this commandment is that we not only cease from our labor and trade but much more-that we let God alone work in us and that in all our powers do we do nothing of our own.” How much more could the Sabbath be made for us, than that we receive God’s spiritual blessings as well as physical and mental rest? He also condemned both a rigid legalism that focused on obedience, and a despising of the Sabbath by those who would ignore or reject it. He said we had evangelical freedom regarding the Sabbath, but should not abuse that freedom by staying away from church.

Most significantly, Luther detached Sabbath keeping from being a particular day, to the hearing and learning of God’s Word. Thus, every day was to a Sabbath, for each day we are to hear and learn from God’s Word. To give God just one day a week diminishes his role in our lives, and reduces the blessings he would give us when we recognizing him daily as our Creator and Redeemer.

So where does this leave me, a week after skipping church? I guess I’ve talked myself into making sure my absence doesn’t become a habit, for in missing church, I would be missing a lot, not worshiping and receiving blessings from the Lord of the sabbath himself.

See you Sunday!

And now may the Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you, the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen.

Read: Matthew 12:1-12, John 9, Acts 2:42-47

 

 

 

Once again, I have several different thoughts bouncing around in my skull that occasionally hit some gray matter and take hold; as in Jesus’ parable about the soils, some of these thoughts take root and grow to produce fruit, while others wither away or are snatched away before they can do any good. So here are some of those thoughts; I’ll let you be the judge as to which are useful crops and which are just weeds . . .

Brain Surgery Post-Op: My recent post about “cultural appropriation” (titled, “It’s Not Brain Surgery“) was timely, because no sooner had I posted it than I read about the flap that was occurring over a high school girl’s choice of prom dress. The girl found a very pretty used Chinese dress, and posted pictures of her wearing it to her prom. To which some people responded in social media that the girl had no business wearing that dress because she was white, not Chinese, and therefore it was “cultural appropriation.” The point of my post was that not only is the adopting or “appropriating” of someone’s cultural trait a compliment to that culture, the practice is inevitable and actually necessary; we cannot have common practices or even communication without sharing useful cultural tools such as language. Well, as it turns out, the vast majority of actual Chinese responses to the furor were positive; one Chinese official said that the girl was not showing “cultural appropriation” but rather, “cultural appreciation.” I couldn’t have said it better (but wish I had used that phrase in my post!). By the way, that dress style was itself appropriated by the Han Chinese from the Manchurian people, and only became popular in the 1920’s and 30’s after Western influence grew in China.

One of the things I wrote about was Y-Indian Guides and its positive impact on my life and my relationship with my dad. Since writing that, a couple men have told me about their own Indian Guide experiences, and what the program meant to them. Thanks for the feedback! Again, I told about Indian Guides as an example of “cultural appropriation” that did a lot of good and was intended to be complimentary to aspects of Native American cultures. I also pointed out that at times the Indian theme was misused, or “misappropriated,” when some participants were disrespectful toward the very people they claimed to imitate. I also told how Native American representatives had confronted the national Y-Indian Guides with their concerns.

What I forgot to mention was that a similar event took place at the Promise Keepers national pastors conference, held in Atlanta in 1996. Among the 40,000 pastors who attended from all over the country and many different denominations were some Native American pastors. During one very moving moment, some of the Indian pastors got up before the crowd. Their leader reminded the crowd that the White man had come and taken their land, driven them away, killed many of them and destroyed much of their culture. The crowd hushed. Then, the speaker said, “But we forgive you, because if you hadn’t come, we never would have learned about Jesus Christ.” Wow. The ultimate “cultural appropriation” was the acceptance by many Native Americans of the faith which was brought to them by the believing European Christians who had invaded their land; and for that they were eternally grateful! What they said echoed the words of Paul in Philippians 3:8, “Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ.”

Nothing to do but pray! One of the common phrases that Christians often hear and are annoyed by, is a statement such as, “There’s nothing left to do but pray!” The meaning is that someone has done all he could in a situation but without success, and now can only hope and pray that things turn out well. The implication is that everything is really up to us, and we must rely on our own strengths first; only when something is beyond our control do we turn to God for help. Worse yet, I suspect that many people who say that are not really intending to actually pray; they’re just expressing their hope that things turn out the way they want.

I was reminded of this phrase once again thanks to a new commercial for an online job site, which shall remain nameless here. The announcer touts their service as being much more effective at finding qualified job candidates than other job sites, or than “posting your job and just praying” for the right candidate to come along. I know the commercial is using “praying” and a synonym for “wishing,” and not making a theological statement, but that actually makes it worse. The announcer is really saying that praying equals no more than wishing, and that praying does no good. The implication is that even if there is a God, praying to him won’t help you. You may be thinking, “Okay, Rich, lighten up. It’s no big deal. He’s not really talking about praying; it’s just a commercial!” You’re right in that it’s just a commercial, but the subtle effect on us each time we hear prayer is not effective or even desirable can accumulate and bias us against something that should be a central part of our life. Hear it enough and we begin thinking that way, and eventually may start saying it ourselves.

In the Church, and in our personal lives as Christians, prayer is essential. Essential, as in being the essence or necessary part of life. Not just to accomplish something, as in praying for a favorable outcome, but to actually be a child of God. Prayer is about our relationship with God, before and beyond anything he does for us. Thus, not only did Christ pray to the Father when he did his miracles (e.g., John 11:41-44), he was in constant communication and could say that he and the Father were One (John 10:30), and that everything he did and said came from the Father (John 5:19, 8:28).

To illustrate the difference between a job site that recommends you not just “post and pray” when seeking an employee, and the Church, consider how big a part prayer plays when we seek to hire someone. At every stage of the process, we pray, because we recognize that we are not just seeking the most qualified candidate nor even the best candidate, but the right candidate, the person “of God’s own choosing” (from A Mighty Fortress by Martin Luther). Therefore we form the search/call committee by prayerfully selecting the committee members, gathering them for prayer for the process, praying for candidates, praying for and over each candidate, praying for the decision, and then asking the candidate to pray over his or her acceptance of the offer. In the case of a pastoral call, we can add prayers by our national church leaders and the assembled congregation. For the Church, it’s not “just post and pray”: it’s “pray, post, pray and pray again.”

The key to prayer is to recognize that we are calling on, depending on, and submitting to an actual, all-powerful personal being, the God of the universe who created us and invites us to come to him with all our wants and needs (Matthew 7:7-11). In other words, the God of the Bible. While prayer does change us, it is not our power that makes things happen. What changes in us is a humbling of self as we recognize our utter dependence on God, and our willing submission to his will for us. When he answers our prayers, we praise him and recognize that all good comes form him and from nothing else; Luther said this recognition is part of keeping the First Commandment, that is, to have no other gods before the true God. This does not mean that we never strive for good outcomes or use our (God-given) strengths and abilities for good purposes; it does mean that we acknowledge God’s will and power in all things.

One example of God’s power at work in response to prayer is the deliverance of Europe from the Mongol hordes in the 1200’s. In 1242 the Mongol army, 130,000 soldiers under their leader Batu, swept across Russia, defeating the Rus, the Poles, and the Hungarians. All Christian Europe lay defenseless before them, their armies having been annihilated. The people of Europe put aside their quarreling differences, gathered in their churches, and prayed for deliverance from certain destruction. The invasion stopped. The great Khan back in Mongolia had suddenly died, and in order for him to be proclaimed the new Khan, Batu had to return to the homeland. So he stopped the attacks, and returned to the East. When the Mongols resumed their attacks toward the end of the century, the Christian kingdoms had rearmed and were able to mount an effective defense, eventually pushing the Mongols out of Eastern Europe. You could say that the 13th Century Christians of Europe had “nothing left to do but pray. . .”

Update on my sister: Just a closing note to thank all of you who have been praying for my sister during her recent medical crisis. She did suffer the amputation of her remaining leg, and had several weeks of difficult recovery due to the effects of the anesthesia and other medical conditions. Thanks to answered prayer, she is now back in her home with her beloved doggies, thinking clearly, and in much better spirits. Thank you for your prayers, and to our Lord for his gracious provision!

That’s all for now. As you celebrate Pentecost tomorrow, may the Holy Spirit give you peace in knowing God’s love and forgiveness, and strength to meet your challenges – both daily and special.

May the Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you, the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen.

Read: Matthew 5-7 (The Sermon on the Mount)

 

 

 

 

 

There are special days in our lives that we find significant enough to commemorate with anniversaries. What are some of those that you celebrate loudly or mourn quietly? This week is full of significant days for me and my family: yesterday was my sister’s 60th birthday; today is Karen and my 44th(!) wedding anniversary (and Star Wars Day – May the Fourth be with you!); tomorrow is Cinco de Mayo (156th anniversary of the Mexican victory against the French at the Battle of Puebla) and our town’s annual Western Day parade and festival.

Every day is an anniversary of something for someone – a birthday, a wedding anniversary, a job or promotion anniversary, a graduation, a sobriety milestone, or the remembrance of the death of a loved one. And then there are those anniversaries celebrated nationally as holidays: Christmas, New Years, Presidents Day, and Mother’s Day, to mention just a few. Some entail big gatherings and parties, such as Thanksgiving; others are marked with  community parades and sporting events, like New Years. Some are more somber in tone, such as Memorial Day, others more celebratory like July 4th.

Each occasion has become almost ritualized into being remembered in certain ways – you wouldn’t expect to see a Mardis Gras style parade on Veterans Day, or hear a bugler play “Taps” at a New Years Eve countdown, or have the Blue Angels fly over my house on my birthday (though they did fly overhead on my birthday, once!). So, commemorations of significant days’ anniversaries have become important to almost all of us.

But is it a good and proper thing to do? I can hear some objections to annually celebrating anniversaries or remembering more somber events:

1. Don’t anniversaries keep us mired in the past? We can’t go back and change the past, so let’s live in the moment and be fully present for those around us. Look forward and build new memories rather than trying to hold on to past glories or feelings.
2. Most such anniversaries, especially at a national level, change or lose their meaning and reason for existing over time. Do Cinco de Mayo celebrants really even know about the 1862 Battle of Puebla when they lift their glasses of cerveza? Do people think about the end of World War I on Veterans Day (which used to be called Armistice Day)? Then there’s Columbus Day, which doesn’t quite have the support it once did. And what about St. Patrick’s Day, which is named after someone who wasn’t Irish or Roman Catholic? Unfortunately, the same can be true about our most important Christian holy-days, Christmas and Easter: what do Grinches and bunnies carrying eggs have to do with the birth and resurrection of Jesus Christ?
3. There’s also the cost of such celebrating. Think how much we spend on costumes, decorations, and vast quantities of party food – money that could go to pay bills or feed the needy. Are we being good stewards of our resources to blow our money on New Years parties or Mardis Gras beads?
4. And there are so many different days to remember! Who can keep them all straight? (Asked by a guy who forgot his wife’s birthday . . . no, not me . . . I took my wife on a trip for her birthday . . . I’m just saying . . .).
5. There are some, such as the Jehovah’s Witnesses, who say birthday celebrations are a pagan practice not celebrated by believers in the Bible. Only two birthdays are mentioned in Scripture, both involving non-believers and both ending in murder. (Genesis 40:20-22 – Pharaoh; and Mark 6:21-29 – Herod).

So then, what about remembering the anniversaries of special days and events? Right, or wrong?

The answer for me comes from Scripture, regardless of the bad actors like Pharaoh and Herod whose problem was corrupt life-and-death power, not celebrating birthdays. God has not only allowed us to hold anniversary celebrations, he actually commanded it!

1. Right from the beginning, God established order in the cosmos, for the purpose of people being able to mark the timing of events. In Genesis 1:14, God created the celestial lights “for signs and for seasons, and for days and years.” Then he established the Sabbath Day as a day of rest for people to remember that he rested on the seventh day of creation: “So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation” (Genesis 2:3).
2. When God gave the Law to Moses and the Israelites, he codified the celebration of the Sabbath (Exodus 20:8-11 and Deuteronomy 5:12-15).
3. Most importantly, when God acted to deliver his people and save us from enemies or from our own sins, he commanded us to remember what he did for us. He freed the Israelites from the Egyptians at the Passover, which he commanded them to celebrate every year (Exodus 12:14,17 -“And you shall observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for on this very day I brought your hosts out of the land of Egypt. Therefore you shall observe this day, throughout your generations, as a statute forever.”) The Israelites and then the Jews celebrated important feasts throughout the year to mark what God had done.
4. Even our Lord, when he instituted Holy Communion at the Last Supper, commanded that we are to do this, “In remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19), and Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11:26, “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.”
5. The Christian church year is comprised of one anniversary celebration after another: Christmas, Epiphany, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter, Ascension Day, Pentecost, Reformation Day, All Saints Day and so on. Each remembers some special work of God on our behalf through his Son, Jesus Christ.
6. Speaking of whom, the weekly Christian worship on the Lord’s Day (Sunday) is actually a miniature Easter celebration. We can rightly proclaim, “He is risen! He is risen indeed!” every Sunday – actually every day, because he is still risen!

Okay, so celebrating the works of God through Christ in creation and redemption are worthy of celebration; but what about those special days in our personal lives? What about birthday and anniversaries, for example? I believe they are important days. too, and rightfully celebrated. Not only are they important in our life stories, markers of significant events we want to remember, they also are part of Christ’s story in us. We remember our baptisms, our confirmations, our conversions; we celebrate our marriages (blessed by God who gave our first two parents to each other in marriage, and who blessed the wedding feast at Cana in John 2); we remember the promises of resurrection and eternal life when we commemorate the passing of someone we love.

Christ became one of us, and lived life as one of us, in order to redeem us and reconcile us to the Father. Why would he not celebrate the good days in our lives, and weep with us at the sad days? He rejoiced when someone showed faith in him, and he wept at the death of his friend Lazarus, even though he knew he would raise him. And Scripture says the angels in heaven rejoice at the salvation of even one sinner (Luke 15:10).

Oh yeah, and the Bible even tells us Jesus’ age at two points in his life. (Luke 2:42 and Luke 3:23) Do you think his parents might have had birthday celebrations for him?

So, go ahead and celebrate those special days in your life: birthdays, anniversaries, and holidays, especially those days that mark what Christ has done for you and me. Those are days worth remembering!  As for me, I’m thinking maybe tacos for tomorrow . . . Happy Cinco de Mayo!

The Lord bless you and keep you, the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you, the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen.

Read: Genesis 40, Mark 6, and Colossians 2:16-19