Monday Morning Music Ministry

2-23-15

All the time, all the time, I hear the phrase, “It’s a God thing.” And, frankly, I dislike it — because half the time people are explaining (that is to say, NOT explaining) horrible things. Explaining away, as it were. Sometimes it is not a “God thing”; sometimes it’s a Satan thing.

“Why? Why?” my kids, and friends I pray for, and strangers, would ask, as kids and friends have asked throughout history (not always of me). “Why me?” “How can a God who loves me…”; “How could a loving God…” Even skeptics and agnostics and atheists pose that question; in fact it is a question with which they frequently begin their arguments. Well, there is sin in the world. It’s all very clear. Mosquitoes suck, and so do a lot of other things. The Bible calls life a vale (valley) of tears. God DID promise a time free of care and a place of perfection – Heaven.

Until then, He promised comfort, wisdom, acceptance, encouragement, and faith. Not a bad group of second-choices. Especially when promised by the Lord of the Universe. Especially since His plan for us provided the Holy Spirit to deliver comfort. Thou shalt not whine.

…I shalt not whine; we shalt not whine. As with all my messages, and all proper sermons, this is directed at myself as well as anyone with eyes or ears. So you may eavesdrop.

Bad things happen to nations and to individuals. We need only the most cursory glances at recent headlines to know what the world is experiencing: wars and rumors of wars; natural disasters; slavery; genocide; revived practices of barbarity. We see that religions are suffering prejudice, oppression, and persecution; innocents are murdered in the name of faith, and people die for their faith.

Individuals no less than nations, races, and institutions are experiencing bad things. I do not think that matters are especially worse than at other times in history – or better, either – but, as is natural, for a spell I have been more aware of bad things endured and sustained by family, friends, and self. Sometimes I think a definition of “Happiness” is when, by circumstance, we merely are less aware of the distress of others.

This is not gloomy pessimism; it is reality. I think it is consistent with God’s nature, not to cause suffering, but occasionally to allow it – for a variety of spiritual reasons. The poor we will have with us, so we should cultivate charitable impulses in response. People with spiritual needs cross our paths so that we might comfort them. We are sensitized to the horrors of war, in order that we have clarity to do battle for righteousness and peace. And we, ourselves, might suffer anguish, insecurity, or even doubt, until we are receptive to the ministrations of friends. That we see the Jesus in each other.

My heart has fairly been breaking lately for people in my immediate circle who experience anguish in various forms, from various sources. A friend from church grows progressively sicker, and in pain, and her doctors are unable to determine a cause, much less a cure. A friend’s husband has had a heart transplant and another friend is listed for a kidney transplant. My wife went through both: so if I cannot minister better, at least I can pray more wisely; or at least join that mystical bond of fellowship that sufferers share.

My sister, after losing her daughter, having her apartment ruined by Hurricane Sandy, recently escaped the new apartment’s ruination by fire… and now she has been given a short prognosis for life, several serious illnesses having overtaken her. A dear friend’s grandson just attempted suicide. Another close friend has had some professional frustrations and economic hardship, on top of family distress. Usually an encourager, my friend feels like Bad Things are piled on his plate, not only professionally and financially, but emotionally and spiritually.

Nevertheless, while all these circumstances might not be strictly “God things,” God can work through circumstances when we let Him.

That is the exegesis of Romans 8:28 – “All things work for good to those who love God and are called according to His purposes.” This doesn’t mean that all things ARE good. Surely, they are not. But it is our job to turn the bedevilments of Bad Things around on their source, to MAKE them “God things,” and slay those dragons. And to accept wisdom and comfort from, often, unexpected places. My friend confessed to finding comfort in the companionship of another friend who in turn said, no doubt compassionately, that he would be given his space. So to speak. But then, almost immediately, a virtual acquaintance appeared and assumed a burden of caring and sharing.

Is that a “God thing,” or a “Life thing”? Neither… if we are not open to such things in the first place. George Eliot wrote: “What greater thing is there for two human souls than to feel that they are joined… to strengthen each other… to be at one with each other in silent unspeakable memories.”

To finish the look at Romans 8:28, its mystery becomes a reality when every word is appreciated. “All things work for good…” We have noted that this does not say that all things are good. They WORK for good.

For whom? “To those who love God…” Let us whisper a prayer of thanks that God is not a dispenser of fortune-cookie promises – worthless pastries. We should love and honor God, surely not a burden but a sweet privilege.

How will this work in our lives? “… and are called…” This is the conversation with God; answered prayer; His leading; the inspirations of the Holy Spirit as promised. We will know that we know that we know His call on our lives when we earnestly seek Him.

What is our confirmation? “… called according to His purposes.” We know that God cannot contradict Himself, either in promises or what He allows for us. A God we can know, never changing or causing doubt, is a solid rock on which we can stand.

Before we know it, problems shrink, and we realize the blessings we have, and can expect. Our perspectives change; we no longer see through a glass darkly. Old things are made new. All things work together for good. Bad things become good things; “God things” we see, indeed, as good things. We love God, and accept the call, according to His purposes.

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Nearer, My God, To Thee

2-16-15

President’s Day, 2015. I’m not sure I could have written this a year ago; certainly five or 10 years ago I would have considered even my pessimistic and alarmist self straining credulity. The events of our time; the lack of leadership from the presidency; the transformed nature of our civic culture… remind me of my warning only months ago, now a reality. America looks for wishbones, when we should be finding backbones.

Never have the men who filled the presidential chair seemed more historical – that is, remote.

Regular readers will expect me to invoke Theodore Roosevelt, and I shall. Not a reflexive habit, but I think this year, more than most, he stands in starkest contrast to the current resident of the White House. Also, of TR’s many wise words that thunder down through the years to guide us, two topics he addressed resonate today.

In some ways Roosevelt was very private about his faith – odd for this most extroverted of men – but he nevertheless quoted scripture, referred to God, cited Bible verses, and lived the life of Christian faith as much, if not more, than any other president. When in college he organized Sunday School classes; when he was a young hunter in Maine he slipped out of his camp on early mornings to read his Bible (that spot is now a designated landmark, Bible Point); when he retired from the presidency he shunned lucrative offers from many quarters to serve as an editor of a weekly Christian opinion magazine; he called his most significant speech in the heat of the Bull Moose campaign “A Confession of Faith” (“We stand at Armageddon and battle for the Lord!”); he titled two of his books from Bible verses.

Even so, he was private about aspects of his faith. Yet to his diary he confided after the death of his father: “Nothing but my faith in the Lord Jesus Christ could have carried me through this.”

TR soft-pedaled theology, and stressed the personal and social benefits, of church attendance in an article for Ladies’ Home Journal. Here is my point: imagine an American president today writing in a high-circulation magazine, urging church attendance. These were his words:

There are enough holidays for most of us that can quite properly be devoted to pure holiday-making. Sundays differ from other holidays, among other ways, in the fact that there are 52 of them every year. On Sunday, go to church.

Yes, I know all the excuses. I know that one can worship the Creator and dedicate oneself to good living in a grove of trees, or by a running brook, or in one’s own house, just as well as in church. But I also know as a matter of cold fact the average man does not thus worship or thus dedicate himself. If he strays away from church, he does not spend his time in good works or lofty meditation. He looks over the colored supplement of the newspaper.

He might not hear a good sermon at church. But unless he is very unfortunate, he will hear a sermon by a good man who, with his good wife, is engaged all the week long in a series of wearing, humdrum, and important tasks for making hard lives a little easier.

He will listen to and take part in reading some beautiful passages from the Bible. And if he is not familiar with the Bible, he has suffered a loss.

He will probably take part in singing some good hymns.

He will meet and nod to, or speak to, good quiet neighbors. He will come away feeling a little more charitably toward all the world, even toward those excessively foolish young men who regard churchgoing as rather a soft performance.

I advocate a man’s joining in church works for the sake of showing his faith by his works.

Church work and church attendance mean the cultivation of the habit of feeling some responsibility for others and the sense of braced moral strength, which prevents a relaxation of one’s own moral fiber.

The man who does not in some way, active or not, connect himself with some active, working church misses many opportunities for helping his neighbors, and therefore, incidentally, for helping himself.

In the actual world, a churchless community, a community where men have abandoned and scoffed at or ignored their religious needs, is a community on the rapid downgrade.

“On Sunday, go to church.” Good advice for TR’s time, our time, all the time.

Another contemporary topic where Roosevelt’s words thunder through the years, grabbing our attention, are from his book – note again the title – “Fear God and Take Your Own Part” (1916):

“Christianity is not the creed of Asia and Africa at this moment solely because the seventh century Christians of Asia and Africa had trained themselves not to fight, whereas the Moslems were trained to fight. Christianity was saved in Europe solely because the peoples of Europe fought. If the peoples of Europe in the seventh and eighth centuries, and on up to and including the seventeenth century, had not possessed a military equality with, and gradually a growing superiority over, the Mohammedans who invaded Europe, Europe would at this moment be Mohammedan, and the Christian religion would be exterminated.

“Wherever the Mohammedans have had complete sway, wherever the Christians have been unable to resist them by the sword, Christianity has ultimately disappeared. From the hammer of Charles Martel to the sword of Jan Sobieski, Christianity owed its safety in Europe to the fact that it was able to show that it could and would fight as well as the Mohammedan aggressor.

“The civilization of Europe, American and Australia exists today at all only because of the victories of civilized man over the enemies of civilization… The Christians of Asia and Africa proved unable to wage successful war with the Moslem conquerors; and in consequence Christianity practically vanished from [those] two continents… During [a] thousand years, the Christians of Europe possessed the warlike power to do what the Christians of Asia and Africa had failed to do – that is, to beat back the Moslem invader.”

The lessons of Roosevelt’s history were hard; the truth often is. Today, evangelists have done what warriors did not: advance the gospel in Africa and Asia, bringing light to millions. But, of course, they sustain persecution, torture, and murder in their defense of Christian faith.

But on President’s Day 2015 we must come face to face with the possibility that Western Civilization – “Christendom” – has lost that pride of heritage and reverence for the traditions of our faith, for the first time in 1500 years. Are we to bear the shame, invite the obloquy, of all those previous brave and faithful generations?

Our precious communities and nations, claimed for the gospel and open to its free exercise, were sometimes established amidst strife, and sometimes were opened freely to believers. All, however, tell inspiring stories. Can this all be slipping away in our lifetimes, so quickly before our eyes? Where is our responsibility? Is this not the Land of Beulah?

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Click: Is Not This the Land of Beulah? / Beulah Land

2-9-15

Today I will continue the theme of a couple recent essays, and the credit, or blame, goes to the president of the United States. In recent essays we have visited the clash of Islam and Christianity and Western civilization. It is a history that goes back farther than 9-11. By my mail I know that many people are surprised to learn that physical and military assaults on Europe and Christianity by Mohammedans began almost 1500 years ago. Indeed, during the first generations of that faith.

After the recent murders of magazine writers and cartoonists (two of whom I knew) in Paris, I wrote an essay for the website RealClearReligion discussing the response of Western civilization in general and Christianity in particular to militant Islamic extremism.

We should understand and clarify the issue to an even greater degree.

I do not need to be disabused of the fact that President Obama is not among my readers. Or that, if he were, I should expect him to be converted either to Christianity or to my views on certain issues. I realize that questioning the president’s devotion to the Christian faith is presumptuous. And I also mean to be provocative.

My concern (Yes! it IS a concern, for his soul, and the nation’s) grows as weeks and months pass; with each speech; and with his policies. Some policies are enunciated; some are quietly put into effect. Some people see anti-Christian sentiments. Some people see principles that are inimical to exercises of faith. Some people see pro-Islam actions. And I don’t mean to employ the “passive” mode: I often find myself among the “some” in those camps of observers.

He invites these suspicions and observations.

Christianity is under attack. There are scarcely other items in the news since forever, it seems, except for the perennial scandals in the federal government. It is under attack, not from, say, the Dalai Lama, who was a guest at this week’s national Prayer Breakfast in Washington. No, even the dullest nitwit knows that Islamic Extremists lately have been bombing, hijacking, kidnapping, torturing, and killing. They have been reviving the ancient modes of beheading, stoning, burying alive, and immolation. They are proud of these things, using modern technology to brag to the world of ancient barbarities.

It must be noted that, surely, some of their quarrels are with co-religionists who decline to subscribe to their levels – that is, depths – of savagery. But, except for targeting an ancient Zoroastrian sect called the Yezidis in their neighborhood, their hatred is reserved for Christians.

Christians. Have we heard of Hindus or Buddhists or followers of Confucius or those who follow the Shinto practices, have these people been kidnapped and slaughtered? Even the recent Japanese victim of beheading was a convert to Christianity. Atheists are not targeted, and you would think the Prophet might despise them more than any others.

Curious – with Israel so close to ISIS territory. Jews have not been targeted in these recent campaigns. Jews, with whom the Arabs and their religionists have contended since the infancies of Esau and Jacob. Look it up. Jews, whose establishment of Israel has so inflamed the Middle East for almost 70 years. Is it not curious that ISIS has withheld its holy fury from them?

Most people think, properly, that one reason might be the absolute certainty of a massive, obliterating response by the magnificent defense capabilities of Israel.

There is always a back story to every controversy and news event; and one day we might know why Israel chooses not to be preemptive; or why Obama insults Israel at every opportunity. Anyway, the fact remains that so far, ISIS has been as hostile to Jews as card-carrying members of the Anti-Defamation League.

That leaves the question of the assault on Christians, which, of course, not a question but a fact, as I hope we agreed a few paragraphs ago. And when this fact is clear (as not all facts are) to virtually everybody – notably violent Islamic extremists themselves, as per ISIS press releases – the real question is why the president averts the truth. If that question is a little ember that glows in your mind, let it become, rather, a Burning Question.

That the president, acting for us (in fact, committing all of us: this is the sometime unpalatable aspect of democracy) does not call Islamic terrorism Islamic terrorism, although Islamic terrorists do; and Islamic leaders like King Abdullah does. While Rome – so to speak – is burning, Obama fiddles with pronouncements about “hijackers of the religion of peace,” as a jerkwater professor would do. Meanwhile Islamic terrorists are hijacking cars, trucks, planes, and land.

Christians must stop thinking this man is oddly misguided or sadly mistaken. He is not stupid. At stake is not an election cycle but the lives of millions, the preservation of our culture, the future of our civilization.

At the National Prayer Breakfast this week, noted above, President Obama had a chance to seize an appropriate platform to deliver unambiguous words about this nexus of religion and statecraft. And he did! Yes, there were words about biblical injunctions to love, and to serve. I never regret the citation of Bible verses, even if they are selective. The president acknowledged the presence of missionary Kenneth Bae, who had been imprisoned (“held,” the president parsed) by North Korea for two years; no embarrassment that the mighty USA could not effect that release sooner. He noted that a Christian convert, Pastor Saeed Abedin (no: he did not note Abedin’s conversion to Christianity) is still in Iranian jails, variously condemned to death and then pardoned and then back again; and that he met with the pastor’s wife and children – cornered in Boise, Idaho, after years of attempts for an audience with Obama.

After those niceties, the president summoned his rhetorical arsenal. He lectured those assembled (who convened in the Name of Christ) about the sins of Christianity. He called himself a “person of faith,” not a Christian. He warned believers not to mount “high horses,” and then tarred Christianity with thousand-year-old specters of the Crusades; and ancient atrocities perpetrated by the Inquisition; and the Christian sanction of “slavery and Jim Crow” laws in America.

No one spoke up there – can we do so now? – to note that the Crusades were a reaction to offenses; and that both sides sometimes acted cruelly as well as nobly. And that the Inquisition, even witch burnings, did take place… but also were localized, brief, and well in the past, without ameliorating our stipulation that they were horrific.

We are dealing with very current threats, not passages from textbooks of ancient history. When Obama says “persons of faith,” presumably even about himself, one gets the feeling that he is a bureaucrat talking about a sociological classification, and not a confession.

The major take-away that should animate our reaction and resolution is that the dark moments of our collective past… all right, let’s take the predictable topic, slavery. It existed throughout humankind’s history; and still does. But in the United States it was instituted by Christians, but not as a Christian imperative. It was instituted out of greed, yes; and cruelty, and severe insensitivity. BUT NOT BECAUSE SLAVE-MASTERS THOUGHT TO PLEASE CHRIST. Some of justified themselves by quoting ancient Bible history. But that cart was well after the horse: a futile rationale.

That is the opposite of the Islamothugs: they claim to be following and therefore serving the Prophet.

But a worse offense, because sin we will always have with us, and we need leaders who can organize our defense: Obama cited ancient crimes committed by Christians WHEN HE COULD HAVE PRAISED CHRISTIANS FOR ENDING THEM and numerous examples of Christian persecution, and Christian service, charity, bravery, sacrifice, persecution, and martyrdom TODAY.

This deliberate distortion of history, and conscious perversion of proper priorities is a menace, a national crisis. In his entire speech, Obama mentioned the name of Christ twice, each time damning the sins of the past committed “in the name of Christ.” Never once even the name of Jesus. Several times, though, the word “humility” – an attribute that was in short supply, when Christians at a Christian event were being lectured about how bad Christians are.

May God help us.

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Click: Carl Orff: Fortuna Imperatrix Mundi – Carmina Burana

2-2-15

If the world survives long enough to look back and reflect on recent historical trends, I think we have an inkling that Posterity might view the past half-millennium as the Age of the Individual. (How’s that for “recent”?) By my estimation, individual rights and individual responsibilities reached their apogees sometime in the 1700s, about the midway-point since Luther and now, and I regard Luther’s “Here I stand” defiance of arbitrary church threats as the trumpet-blast of Individualism.

But rights have been taken for granted of late; responsibilities are being surrendered to entitlement mentalities. In spite of individual initiatives in commerce, industry, and the arts, it was our 20th century that saw new solutions in anti-individualism: Marxism; Leninism; Syndicalism; Socialism; Communism; Fascism; the Corporate State. Hardly humanity’s nostalgia for boots on their necks, but, likely, a mob psychosis arising from Individualism run amuck (“WE know better than you”)… or a subconscious insecurity about the duties that are incumbent upon Individualism.

Last week I was asked, after a speech, whether there has been a time in history when an individual (or, perhaps, a movement or even a nation) has made a difference in policies regarding life, respect for life, ugly policies like genocide or (specific to this query) about the issues we collectively call Sanctity of Life.

The great founders of religions around the world, through history, often were quite comfortable with, say, infant sacrifice. Mohammed engaged in bloodbaths before he was himself consumed in one. Luther was indifferent to Jewish persecution. Catholics, including “reformers,” made a sport of torture and death; so did Calvinists and Covenanters, et al.! Christian reformers who came to the Colonies more often escaped persecution than exercised toleration; the land was broad and empty enough to accommodate sects, here and there, not dissolve the differences between them. Mary Dyer was hanged in Boston for being not only a Quaker, but a Quaker preacher; and a woman preacher.

The Aztec and Incan cultures practiced infant sacrifice; and to a lesser extent did the Mayans. To a greater extent, around the world and at another time, ancient Carthage practiced it actively. But no individuals or reformers succeeded in cultivating the consciences of those groups. I don’t think there are records of anyone trying, actually. It is only when the societies disappeared that the practices disappeared.

It is troubling that religions generally practiced these horrible practices more than governments did – or, when governments exercised such practices, it was often with the initial sanction of the prevalent religious establishment. Religious reformers who argued against, say, genocide or infanticide were either a) quickly dispatched themselves (i.e., not successful in the efforts); or b) simply unable to persuade their societies of such horrors.

Indeed, persecution and even slaughter very often are adopted, rather than vanquished, when cultures and nations collide. In the frontier wars of the American colonies, white men (colonists; British troops; French settlers alike) became adept and brutally casual about scalping the natives. It was not revenge as much as adopting local customs.

If my intimations of pessimism are justified, then at least we can see a ray of sunshine – and only in these latter days – that are fruits of Individualism. Not often, in history, have individuals or nations “made a difference” when basic societal attitudes have been prodded and needed change. And it is in things happening right now, most notably, in areas as Right to Life and the Sanctity of Life. Not a complete U-turn! – but evidence of change.

Abortion has been legal for a generation in the United States, codified in court decisions, and virtually set in stone, yet this week’s polls say that 84 per cent of Americans now oppose abortion after 20 weeks, maybe sooner. A major turnaround; a harbinger.

A different topic… but of the same flavor: Cruelty to animals (including wanton slaughter, such as of the buffalo) used to be commonplace. In the world’s history. The same with cruelty to children, which still remains a major problem, but now widely condemned. In Dickens’ time it was as common as oatmeal, a virtual “right” of brutal parents and employers. That is changing, and among other agencies we can point to is the SPCA and the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.

Another different but related topic: the fall of Communism. It was the cancer of the 20th century; we have witnessed its downfall in so many countries, largely bloodless. Similarly, the rock-ribbed, entrenched apartheid system fell in South Africa. Battles continue in our world against hunger and disease, and – I am not a Pollyanna – against religious persecution, more brutal than ever. So, the sanctity of life is not yet universally embraced. But let us return to my point about individuals.

Latter-day reforms, attitudinal improvements to the human spirit, changing views about life before and after birth, have come from INDIVIDUALS. Some analysts say that Communism fell because Gorbachev decided to “ease up” the system. No, that viewpoint is an insult to thousands or millions of individuals who resisted: those who were willing to die, or did die. For freedom. Also, usually, for their faith. Martyrs.

And so with the changing attitudes toward abortion, which was the focus of the question I was asked. God knows (literally) that it was not politicians or judges – they are the villains. It was thousands of protesters, like the people in DC last week (the anniversary of Roe vs Wade); you know, the multitudes ignored by the Mainstream Media. Christians, almost all. Henry Bergh, founder of the SPCA – Christian activist. Founder of the Salvation Army, Gen Booth, and so on – Christians all. Mother Teresa, Samaritans Purse: not revolutionary figures and movements… but arguably more efficient as individuals working together.

Maybe for the first time in history, INDIVIDUALS are making a difference. Humanity is wising up? Better technology / communication? Maybe. But things are different these days. I think, and hope, and pray.

These successful reformers have been Christians. Some other religions, but frequently Christians. And I recognize that sometimes the reforms needed to be made against institutions FORMED by other Christians, but that makes the fight ironic, not less worthy, or holy. Individual Christians.

Why is this? We need to recognize that the only honest, bedrock, challenging, successful, and demanding “voice” in human history, against such horrors like infanticide, genocide, persecution, and hatred, is the Voice of Jesus.

This is not only religious apologetics; I believe it is a statement of fact.

Secularists will scoff, but the historical evidence is preponderant, as is recent history. The voice of martyrs, the faith of martyrs, the witness of martyrs, the sacrifice of martyrs. Many martyrs who sacrifice comfort, family and friendships, careers; not only their lives. Any other “motivation” than the Voice of Jesus is futile when it confronts the darkness of human nature, even the Culture of Death that threatens to consume us.

That darkness – sin – scarcely changes down the pathway of human history. But love, even the love of individuals, like single candles that can pierce the blackest darkness, slowly, slowly enlightens humankind’s often stumbling steps.

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Music video: Monks performing a somber masterpiece by Henry Purcell (1659-1695).

Click: Funeral March for Queen Mary