It is possible, on that day, that Abram was just beginning to feel his age. Perhaps he had gotten out of bed that morning and his joints were just a bit too stiff, his bones seeming to ache with the dull ache of overuse, his feet sore. Perhaps the long days of traveling, day after day, had become too much and he was just tired of constantly moving. Perhaps he had begun simply to do the math and realized that he was much closer to the other side of the Jordan than he was his mother’s womb. Maybe it was the few more gray hairs in his beard, maybe a few less hairs on his head, maybe he was just getting tired. But one way or another, Abram was beginning to feel his age.
No Man Is An Island
I grew up in a period of time a few years before the advent of screens appearing in everyone’s hands, wrists, backpacks, and bedrooms. And I should say, being the broken child of God that I am, I can both lament this fact and live into it at the same time. But as a kid, in a time before Netflix or HBO, in order to see the latest movie, you actually had to get out of your house and drive to the local movie theater where you invariably order crazily expensive popcorn and a soda the size of a jug of milk and sit in a darkened room with 100 other folks and watch a film. And I remember going to see at least most of the biggest movies from the 1980s in one of Lumberton’s two theaters with my parents or my friends. And like I said, being of a certain age, before video game systems and cellphones overtook the lives of our children, these movies would always fuel some amount of imaginative play whether that was Han Solo flying the Millennium Falcon, Superman using his laser eyes and superhuman strength, or my favorite, Indiana Jones using his bullwhip to get out of all kinds of scrapes.
Teacher, What Must I Do to Inherit Eternal Life
He loathed being on this road as he traversed the Judean countryside from one major city to the next. Each moment felt as if he living on borrowed time, unsure around which corner he would find danger. He knew the talk of other travelers like himself. He heard them say, don’t go down that road, you won’t come back unscathed. He had heard about bandits and robbers lining the road on either side. Each twist and turn leading to his certain demise. And so as he went he held his meager resources just a little closer to himself. He stared as far as he could into the gathering dusk trying to perceive some sign of what he knew must have been coming next. It was only luck that had been his companion thus far, a kind twist of fate that was certain to unravel at any moment. He knew it. And so it was as he went along on this path, this path that he had trod so many times before, each time felt increasingly uncertain.
Foxes Have Holes
On October 14, 2012, I presume seeking to traverse the tightrope in between adventure and crazy, an Austrian skydiver named Felix Baumgartner climbed into a capsule tethered to a large helium balloon and began going up. And Baumgartner would not stop going up for around two and a half hours or some 24 miles above the surface of the earth. And having come to a resting place somewhere on the edge between the biosphere and space, when I would imagine you come close to beginning to test the power of gravity, as well, Baumgartner, dressed in at least what looked like full-on space suit stepped out onto the platform of the capsule, looked directed into the camera that was beaming a live video back to earth, gave a quick salute to the crew on the ground and stepped off the platform. And, as it turns out, even 24 miles above the earth, gravity still works. It works really, really well and in no time Baumgartner was making a descent much quicker than the trip up had taken. To add some drama to the whole episode, some 35 seconds into the descent Baumgartner became stuck in a spin that if you watch the video of it, it is the craziest thing you have ever seen as the curved horizon of the earth below him begins spinning like a really fast top that one of my kids might play with. Mercifully, after a minute and a half of spinning like that he regained control of himself and continued on his way down.
We Are Created. We Are Redeemed. We Are Sustained.
It was called the “chocolate milk lecture” and it was one of the first lectures in the first class that everyone at my seminary takes—a course spanning two semesters on Church History and Theology taught by every member of the theological faculty at one point or another during the year. In it, students were walked through all the doctrines of the faith and the history of the church. For many of us it was the first experience any of us had had reading a lot of the foundational theologians and they had wrestled with different aspects of Christianity. So it was that we began with the doctrine of God and learned how a number of historical and contemporary thinkers conceived of God as the creator of all time and space and ultimately humanity. We studied original sin and about humankind’s fall from glory, tumbling out of the Garden of Eden and the perfect relationship that we had shared with God. We had a section on the class with readings of the way different thinkers had conceived of God’s son, Jesus Christ, and about the redemption of the world that was accomplished by his life, his death, his new life, and his resurrection. And we learned about the Holy Spirit. About how this spirit of God moves chaotically throughout creation, inspiring and giving courage to those who seek to faithfully serve God. And then came the chocolate milk lecture.
Tongues of Fire
A few weeks ago, while bemoaning the sorry state of my chef’s knife, Jennifer Smith suggested that I take it to a lady she knows who sharpens knives in Birmingham. She told me the lady had a booth at the Market at Pepper Place. Now, I should say that I had heard whispers of this Pepper Place since I moved to Trussville but I had no idea where it was or really even what it was. Now, if you’ve never been, it’s quite a sight to behold. In addition to being where near as I can tell everyone in Birmingham goes on Saturday mornings, there are also vendors of all kinds. There are folks who make local art and folks who make local cheesecake. (You don’t have to imagine which booth my boys made a beeline for!) There is jewelry and coffee and cheese and something called Pudding Amore Gourmet Banana pudding which I can only imagine tastes heavenly. And so, yesterday, we all loaded up and went to Pepper Place and after getting my knife sharpened, which, by the way, knife sharpening for $5 is a great deal, and after my boys had sampled the aforementioned cheesecake and Lesley had tried and procured some halloumi and gouda. I focused in on Pepper Place’s actual purpose, that of being a farmers market. And I found some beautiful bib lettuce and Japanese Eggplant and green tomatoes for frying and peaches. And all returned home happy.
On the Way Up
The disciples gathered around him trying to take in every sentence, every word, every syllable, every last bit of wisdom that he could impart on them. After all, they had already lost him once and now that they had him again the surely were not going to let him out of their sight. He had been their leader, their teacher, their friend. He had pulled there out of the menial, the mundane, the fleeting. He had shown them all the power and abilities that children of God possessed when they wanted to touch the souls of other children of God. He had helped them see the holy realm erupting all around them. And yet now they had these new images in their minds to contend with as well. Because, if they closed their eyes each of them could still replay the whole scene in their mind. The trial before Pilate, the crowds turning, the scourging, the crucifixion, Jesus’s lifeless body declaring, “It is finished,” before the last of his spirit was commended back into the hands of God. The sadness and fright that had overwhelmed them that Saturday. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. Holed up in a room for fear that those who had taken Jesus’s life would return for theirs as well.
Life and Death and Life, Anew
Mount Everest, the world’s tallest mountain above sea level (Jameson would want me to add that “above sea level” part) has been in the news a lot the past few weeks for all of the wrong reasons. At 29,009 feet or 5 and a half miles above the oceans, Everest is a challenge in and of itself for adventurers—wholly different from any of the other tallest peaks in the world. Over the past two decades, Everest has become an incredibly popular destination for climbers who wish to summit the highest point on the globe. This year, the reports have centered both on the amount of trash that has accumulated at the various stations along the climb and more recently, the number of people who have died trying either to get to the top or to return to the bottom. An image tweeted out by a British outdoor journalist from near the peak showed an almost dystopian reality of climbers in heavy coats, with oxygen tanks, all waiting to summit the mountain but spending a long time in what climbers call the “death zone” above 26,000 feet where oxygen deprivation and frostbite can quickly become deadly.
Out of Our Comfort Zone
I was a freshman in college when I first encountered a traveling preacher named Rev. Gary Birdsong. And each subsequent year, without fail, Rev. Birdsong would come to campus on a mission to start some kind of a religious renaissance in the upstate of South Carolina. I should say, being of a certain age and from a certain region of the country and having grown up in a small town, I saw some version of this guy pass through my hometown fairly regularly and the fervor that his presence always caused for a brief period before and after his arrival. And setting aside the fact that I would guess that rural South Carolina has to be one of the two or three most religious places on the planet, Rev. Birdsong was convinced that Clemson was a target rich environment for someone trying to convert college kids to Christianity and so it was that every few months or so, Rev. Birdsong would set up on the stage of the outdoor amphitheater that sits in the center of campus just in front of the library, and with a cheap microphone and speakers that were turned up way past what should have been their actual capacity, he would proceed to yell at all the students that passed him by...in the name of Jesus, of course.
Every Tear From Their Eyes
My grandmother passed away without much warning when I was 13 years old. It was almost exactly a calendar year since my granddad had crossed the Jordan and there were not a lot of signs, at least as I remember it, that she was getting close to the end. She was an incredibly active woman with connections in my hometown that spanned generations of Lumbertonians and she was beloved within the community. Almost immediately, my house was inundated with visitors, most bringing casseroles of one kind or another, some bringing dessert, all wishing to take care of, to offer love to my family as we prepared to release her into the arms of Jesus. And if I close my eyes, I can still cast my sights back to the visitation, back to the seemingly endless line of mourners and well-wishers that had gathered at Biggs Funeral home
Receiving the Spirit
A few years ago, I banned Easter grass from our house. Easter grass, you know, the thin strips of plastic or paper that you put in the basket for the bunny to fill. Yeah, I had had my fill of that stuff. And while there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth over this decision it was not without merit. What I am quickly learning as the father of now three boys (and something to which I imagine my father will attest, as well) is that there is a chaotic nature to the energy that surrounds the annual arrival of Easter morning, the excitement around the baskets, the charging out into the yard to find and retrieve eggs left hidden by the aforementioned bunny, the bubbling vibrations that surround trying to get now three boys into seersucker and bow ties, their hair brushed, their faces washed of any remnant of chocolate.
Risen, Indeed
In those moments between dark and light, in that time in the morning in which, at least some of the time, the chill of the morning breezes still can cut straight to your soul, under a canopy of stars and moonlight, Mary Magdalene begins the horrific task of making what she must imagine is the first of many pilgrimages to the tomb of her departed teacher and friend. It is not hard to imagine the swirl of emotions that are pulsing in her mind, darting back and forth from one side of her brain to the other as she relives the previous week’s events.
At the Table
You know every week at my church, I preach right after my choir has sung an anthem and each week I think, I have to follow that? And then I get here today and the sound of that old gospel sound was filling the sanctuary and I thought maybe I should get out of the way and let the singers keep doing their thing. I want to first thank Pastor Steve and the whole of the First United Methodist Church for blessing the community with this series of noontime worship services in the midst of Holy Week and for allowing me to be a small part of it. In addition, I want to thank all the ladies of my church who worked so hard to feed us lunch. I will put up the cooking abilities of my church members against any church in the town, though, I imagine others might take me up on that offer.
Hosanna in the Highest
Undoubtably, for a great many of us, some of our best memories of church have to be centered around this day in the Christian year, each year. In the midst of an otherwise dreary time of darkness and mourning, of giving things up and maybe taking a few extra minutes a day to consider the path that Jesus had walked, was walking, towards his own death, Palm Sunday was a marked respite from all of that—a brief period of unbridled jubilance in an otherwise bleak period of the Christian calendar. Perhaps if you looked back upon the story of your own faith you can remember years past when children, adults, young and old proudly marched into the sanctuary, bearing palms and declaring their allegiance to Christ with shouts of “Hosanna!” Perhaps you can remember you yourself doing the same thing. This day resides in my memory of growing up as the only time I was actually encouraged to yell in the sanctuary, my commitment to the cause of Jesus being evidenced by my hearty crying out of, “Hosanna!” Of all the choirs (back in the day when there were multiple choirs) processing in together, from the youngest to the oldest waving branches and singing, “All Glory, Laud, and Honor!”
Down in the Valley of Dry Bones
This Sunday seems to come about the same time in Lent each year—the time in which maybe we have all grown a little tired of the waiting, of the watching, of the dying and we just need to have some kind of reminder of where our final destination actually is. The time in which the darkness has wholly subsumed all that can pass for light and we need to begin see some spark of illumination to pass over world that, at least, seems to be stuck in perpetual twilight. And it is a time in which we are tempted, as is human nature, to cast our eyes past the impending Maundy Thursday, past the devastation of Good Friday, past even the waiting and the wailing and the lamentation of Black Saturday, and just go straight to Easter morning that we might glimpse just a moment of hope arising from the despair that often accompanies our Lenten practices. Because, the truth is, it is hard to dwell in this space that we find ourselves for too long. It is hard to sit in between Jesus turning his face towards Jerusalem for the last time while also residing on the precipice of what comes next. It is hard because we know that the hardest part, the part for which we have been preparing this whole season is drawing so close.
Rowing in the Same Direction
When I cast my mind back to the recesses of my memories and my childhood, there are few instances that are so cherished as those times I spent with my paternal grandparents. Moving back to my beloved hometown about the time that my youngest brother was born, they were a fixture in virtually every episodic event in my youth until the moments when both of them were called home to be with the savior. And I imagine that this was very much by design. For more than any stuff that they might have given my brothers and I, more than Werther’s Originals at church or pineapple upside down cakes on birthdays or coca-cola floats on hot Carolina summer afternoons, more even than stories and legends that wove the tapestry of our family or the historic tales of the Clan McLeod from Dunvegan on the Isle of Skye, the clan crest, the clan plaids, more than any of the little pieces of life that they offered each brother in equal measure, they, perhaps to a greater degree than anyone I have ever met, knew the ultimate value that accompanies the gift of time. So it was, whether I was out with my grandfather helping him do his “business” (which really just amounted to visiting his old friends at the gas station, the barber shop, the bank) or whether it was sitting outside on the back steps of their house helping my grandmother snap field peas or shuck corn there was an incalculable value to the time that they gave their grandchildren.
Blinded by the Light
There are moments that occur in this space once every few weeks that transport me back to my hometown church and my childhood. Moments in which a hymn will begin and for a few minutes I am no longer bound by the limitations of space and time and I am, at least in my mind, and I imagine, my soul, back in the sanctuary of my youth. Back to the second pew back from the front, on the left side, that place where most Presbyterians don’t sit but my father ushered us into each Sunday of my youth. Back to a time where an adult choir that spilled out of the two lofts in which they sat led the congregation in singing some of the great old hymns of the church. Where we would sing Holy, Holy, Holy (Lord, God, Almighty) and Ms. Carolyn Snow, already an older woman, would pierce the firmament between heaven and earth with a descant that sat on top of the last verse of the song. Where we would sing Joyful, Joyful, We Adore Thee and the great pipe organ would fill the whole of the space with Beethoven's Ode to Joy as we, with one voice, offered our sincerest praise to God for the life and light and love that swirl all around us. A light and love that seemed to, in that moment, in that place completely envelop all of us and bring us all to the throne of glory, the gates of heaven, the table of the great feast of God.
An Ash Wednesday Meditation
The journey that Jesus began when we are told by scripture that he turned his face towards Jerusalem, is the same journey that we are gathering here to commence and will take over the next 40 days. And just as Jesus took those first few steps towards the holy city, so, too was he force to face the prospect of his own end. On this night in the Christian calendar, all Christians are united in the same praxis. A practice in which each of us will also begin to look at our lives—both individually and collectively—and ponder our own deaths, ponder that part of us and our religious community and faith that needs to die to allow Christ to grow in us, and to allow us to grow in God. And we all know, this time, this ritual, this experience of exploring the mystery of death can be scary because it reminds us, more than anything of the fleeting nature of each of our lives. Moreover, it can be even scarier, more humbling, to think that there is a part of us that we need to let go, that we need to sever from ourselves, in order to get out of the way of the Spirit move in our lives. And it is difficult. It is difficult to be a follower through this part of the story. It was much easier when Jesus was doing healings and feeding 5,000 and walking on water and raising folks from the dead.
Who Is For Us
A couple of years ago, right before we moved to Alabama, in fact directly in between the moving trucks getting our stuff and the moving trucks delivering our stuff, we took an Alaskan cruise with my wife’s family. Now, for those of y’all who have never been to Alaska or had the chance to cruise the state, let me report that it is more immense with more sights to take in than one could possibly accomplish in a lifetime. The icy peaks are so much larger than I could have ever imagined that they could be. The glaciers spanning miles and miles of land and sea. The forests were tall and dense and seemed to have grown undisturbed since that mystical moment that God brought together seed and earth and the whole of the trip was really just a long chain of moments and experiences that will remain with each of us for as long as we live. And thinking back on that trip as I did this week, one of the things that really stuck out in my mind was actually one of the first excursions that we took upon our arrival in Alaska before we even boarded our boat. We had spent the night in town of Seward and had really not even gotten our bearings yet. Nor, for that matter, had we found good coffee, which it turns out for all of Alaska’s majestic beauty and greatness, there were very few places that served or even sold good coffee. But I digress…
Middle of the Night
I remember the first time I saw him. It was the 1985 Super Bowl between the Chicago Bears and the New England Patriots. This was a kinder a time, a gentler time, a time before the Patriots won Super Bowls almost out of habit. I was, at the time, a Bears fan, as much as an 8 year old is a fan of any team. But the Bears had William “Refrigerator” Perry, a D-lineman known as much for his weights as for his football skills, who had played for Clemson before being drafted by the Bears and so we liked them. Chicago also had the quarterback, Jim McMahon, a brash player who in later years would display the dangers of taking a few too many shots to the head, but who, at the time, at least, I liked a lot. The game itself was pretty good at least as I remember it, with the Bears trouncing the Patriots 46-10 and the Fridge going in on a goal line play and scoring on offense. But, more than the game, it was seeing him as they showed one of the teams kick a field goal that sticks in my memory. The man’s name was Rollen Stewart and what I later discovered was that he wore colorful wigs and outfits and always placed himself behind one of the goal posts at NFL games so that his sign, his visage, his message to the world might be captured each week for the millions of football fans around the country and the world. And after each score, there he was standing up with a sign written in sparse yet bold letters with the word “John” and the numbers 3:!6. This messenger of God to the people of the world carrying the singular message from above, For God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whosoever believed in him might not perish but have ever last life.” I haven’t seen that guy in a while, though I confess I haven’t watched much NFL ball in quite a few years, but his message continues to be spread in the same sparse word and numbers on commercial billboards and homemade signs, along country roads and commercial highways, in the major cities and the rural hollers and everywhere in between, the whole of the Christian message boiled down into a singular phrase. John 3:16. And because it has been such an integral piece of the Christian message to the world, I want to take a few moments today to try and place it in the context of the whole of the passage.