Monday Morning Music Ministry

11-23-20

We have just been through a presidential campaign like no other. In other breaking news, the sky is blue – that is to say, it is evident to almost everybody that this election was far from ordinary.

But I am speaking as a trained and published historian when I point out that there have been contested elections almost as bitter. The elections of 1800, 1824, 1876, for instance, had delayed results, “rotten bargains,” and probably fraudulent outcomes. In 1960, John F Kennedy’s father called his vassal, Mayor Daley of Chicago, to “discover” Democrat votes in Illinois to take that state’s electoral votes away from Republicans. On that razor’s edge, Richard Nixon lost the presidency. In 2000, the national results seemed to come down to hundreds of votes in teeter-totter Florida. After Al Gore ran to courts here and there, in 37 days he lost the presidency to George W Bush.

Those elections are only anomalies regarding the contested results. There also were campaigns of dirt, sleaze, scandal, bribery, lies, and slander… much rougher, actually, than in 2020. Washington, our sainted Founder, was treated horribly in the press, and his rival Jefferson (and his rival Hamilton) even worse – moral turpitude and such. Andrew Jackson was libeled for having killed a man and married his wife illegally (she died, partly in shame, about the time he took office). Abraham Lincoln was called a baboon, frankly throughout his presidency.

U. S. Grant’s problems with alcohol were joyously portrayed by opposing cartoonists. Grover Cleveland was accused of fathering a child out of wedlock, in the Victorian days of 1884; he admitted to the fact but was elected anyway. During that campaign, correspondence soliciting bribes written by his rival, James G Blaine, when Speaker of the House, were exposed. In 1896 Democrat candidate William Jennings Bryan was regularly depicted as a demented anarchist. In 1912, Theodore Roosevelt called President William Howard Taft a “fathead” with brains “less than those of a guinea pig,” and Taft called former President Roosevelt a “dangerous egotist.”

In contrast, one might think that 2020 was beanbags.

But there has been a difference, and a serious difference. It is a difference that exposes a possibly fatal malady in our Republic; a challenge to all citizens but to Christian patriots especially.

It is not the nature of discourse that should trouble us or, as I have pointed, is that different than disgraceful, quadrennial mud-fights of the past. It is a barely redeeming aspect of American democracy that in the past, the partisan enemies have dusted themselves off and civilly conducted their business. Government by Hypocrisy.

In our times, however, peoples’ basic humanity is questioned and slandered. Platforms, motives, standards, beliefs, sincerity, honesty, and actions are not merely questioned but disbelieved and ridiculed. For what Donald Trump promised in 2016 – and mostly delivered, in itself a departure in presidential politics – his enemies considered him worthy of being destroyed. Not defeated, but destroyed.

A further departure from historical tradition is that these vicious schemes were more personal than partisan; and they began, not in the post-convention season of 2020, but the moment President Trump completed his oath of office four years ago.

It is very important – and very difficult in our contemporary news-cycle and sound-bite culture – for citizens to realize how different this situation is from any time in the American past. How profoundly poisonous. How deep-seated in origin. And how difficult it is to return from. God forbid that we have not passed the point of no return in these civic cancers.

I address Christian patriots above because we are not the only segment of society to be concerned about moral drift. Some on the other side, in fact, think they have a monopoly on morality, and that becomes an excuse for rebellion, subversion, and violence.

As Christians we are aware of Higher Morality, and the necessity of calibrating that to all of our convictions, decisions, and acts. I am outlining a political essay that would in effect ask liberals and radicals, “For four years you have tried to teach us how to treat a president with whom we disagree. Shall I now adopt your methods?” Of course that would seem to be a child’s game of tit-for-tat…

Wouldn’t it? But how should we then act? This question addresses near-term questions about ballot fraud, and long-term attitudes toward government policies on abortion, education, free speech. And more.

“Rules are made to be broken.” That is a sarcasm thrown about informally. There is more determinism than morality in the proposition, as in “mangers are hired to be fired.” But for Christians, rules – adopted or broken – are the types of formulations that are meant to be in flux; adaptable; open to comment, challenges, and change; understood to meet the exigencies of the moment.

Mature discernment, when exercised with responsible citizenship, persuades me that situations allow for rules to be broken.

“Obey the law.” Yes, render unto Caesar. …the things that are Caesar’s. Submit to authorities. Even Jesus went to jail. Disciples went to prison. If the laws, “right” or wrong, sent them there, they complied. But they opposed certain laws, and when the Holy Spirit sent an earthquake the Apostles walked out. There was no democracy in the first-century Roman Empire. There is, today, or supposed to be, in America. In a democracy you obey the law… or submit to the consequences.

Mature discernment, when exercised with responsible citizenship, persuades me, like Martin Luther and Martin Luther King alike, that unjust laws must be challenged.

“Keep the Faith.” Friends, let this become our watchword… but only the first half. An annoying aspect of Obama’s 2008 campaign was the vagueness of his slogans. “Hope.” “Change we can believe in” – changing what, exactly? And “Yes we can!” – can what? The meanings were deliberately elusive, as he gambled on a pliant, gullible electorate.

The same is a danger of “Keep the faith.” Never share that with a complete, intentional meaning. Demand of yourself: Faith in Jesus? Faith that God answers prayer? Faith to pray without ceasing? Faith that our opponents may change their hearts (as we change the laws)? Faith that God is in control?

Faith that if we are forced to go the route of civil disobedience in the next years, God, who protected those in the fiery furnace?

Faith that as we walk through the shadow of death – because we might – God will be with us?

Faith enough to pray, not only that God be on our side, but, as Lincoln maturely discerned, that we be on God’s side?

The Holy Spirit brings gifts of discernment. We can not proceed without it. Especially in these next four years.

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Music Vid: “Help Me” (For readers with hand-held devices, click or paste: )

10-21-19

Recently I have visited churches, worshiping away from home, and have been reminded of when I lived in California. What rang bells in my personal belfry is not exclusive to the Golden State. (And Larry Gatlin had it right about all the gold in California, but that’s for another time…)

There is a “trendency” in the American church that probably began in California, probably with the “Jesus Movement” of the late 1960s and early ‘70s. It is the stranger side of the welcoming “Seeker” type of worship. Come as you are… God does not require three-piece suits and long dresses and heels (for women and men, respectively… although we do have the California context)… dress codes can be intimidating… God is interested in your heart, not your wardrobe.

You have heard these things; maybe even believe them or have been persuaded; or, of course, might bristle at the non-rules. The other extreme is formalism that makes formality a form of Godliness, more extreme than dress codes. I have been in churches where women (in head coverings) are segregated from male worshipers; where my son and I were forbidden Communion because we had not first met with the church’s pastor (our actual denomination, but a different synod).

As I say, God knows our hearts after all. But in the church I visited last Sunday, the pastor who introduced himself already stood out… as the person in the dirtiest flannel shirt; in the jeans with the most rips in them; in the most beat-up work boots. In many churches today, leaders nor worshipers dress formally, despite perhaps clean T-shirts or jeans. Many pastors perch on stools, wear Hawaiian shirts and cargo shorts. “Worship leaders” seem required to wear uniforms of grunge.

Is all this a reaction against a generation of pastors and televangelists who wrapped themselves in three-piece suits and blow-dried hair? Perhaps. Is it legitimate to resist formalism? I say yes… as long as it is not confused with formality.

Taking that further, there are differences between formalism, as I say, and formality… a difference between rules and the law, and legalism… a difference between liberty and license… a difference between unity and uniformity… a difference between reverence and rudeness… a difference between respect and dirty jeans when worshiping Almighty God.

The fact that God does not require you to wear ties and jackets, or modest dresses or slacks, does not mean that you have to dress in your cleanest dirty shirt, to quote Kris Kristofferson
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Will these things keep you out of Heaven? Of course not. But I just wonder at the level of respect – I despair at the disappearance of reverence – when we have lost the impulse to approach God, and God’s people, in a little different manner than we do people in the supermarket, ball field, or work weekend.

Does the Bible have a suggestion for a dress code? As with everything else… yes. Stick with me:

Take up the full armor of God so that you may be able to stand your ground on the evil day, and having done everything, to stand. Stand firm therefore, by fastening the belt of truth around your waist, by putting on the breastplate of righteousness, by fitting your feet with the preparation that comes from the good news of peace, and in all of this, by taking up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

These are well-known words from the sixth chapter of Ephesians, and only partly are dispositive here. The advice is for a spiritual wardrobe, not how you would show up to church, clanging breastplates and swords. Metaphorically, what a well-dressed Christian will wear the remainder of the week.

However, there is one more item whose preparation is important to how we present ourselves before others… and before God.

How about your heart? Is it right with God? As Bennie Tripplet wrote in that great Gospel song,

People often see you
As you are outside;
Jesus really knows you,
For He looks inside.

Those are the rules for the Believer’s fashion show.
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Click: How About Your Heart

5-1-17

Recently we noted that throughout history, pagan observances and celebrations often were co-opted by the Roman church, roughly conterminous with the expansion of the faith. And when expansion was not tractable in lands or with peoples, organized-Christianity found ways to incorporate the names of tribes’ festivals, or certain practices, or pagan gods with new names. Theories abound about the word “Easter,” for instance, and the calendar-date of Christmas.

Such traditions of organized religion better can be filed under “marketing” more than theology; ecclesiology more than evangelism.

Christendom since the Reformation has split in two ways in this matter too. Generally, Protestant peoples of northern Europe have revived Springtime pagan observances, often calling, and sometimes believing, that they are mere celebrations of Renewal, Nature, and Fertility. Holidays run the gamut from countryside dances to dedications of animals, seeds, and celebrants’ resolutions for the year ahead. Catholic lands often have named or invented saints who overlook the prospects of farmers and planters; Harvest Festivals in advance.

From back in hazy pre-history, May 1 was the date agreed upon as the appropriate day, regarded as the beginning of Spring (advent of Summer in some ancient cultures). It is roughly halfway between the Spring equinox and the Summer solstice.

The fertility goddess Maia, a figure in both Greek and Roman mythology, inspired the name “May” and other related words in many languages. Springtime celebrations of fertility were common to all societies. Singing, dancing, special pastries, and the presence of flowers, as in the May Pole, were common to all. So were bonfires, whose smoke was deemed to have protective properties. Faces were sometimes washed in the day’s morning dew.

In Nordic lands, Walpurgisnacht festivals still are held – nighttime activities including bonfires, wreaths of flowers, planting of seeds, and burning of branches, lending a pagan veneer that even an attempt to retroactively honor a patron saint cannot dispel (Saint Walburga is claimed to have introduced Christianity to German lands… but history bestows that honor on St Patrick). In countries like Estonia and Poland, May 1 – Walpurgis Fest – is a national holiday. In Germany, people still gather around bonfires and dance around May Poles festooned with Spring flowers.

In Ireland and nations of Celtic origin, “Beltane” is honored still, even in sight of ancient churches. Neopagans and wiccans have revived the old practices, often adding incantations. Italians harken to pre-Christian days, celebrating Rebirth in its larger senses as “Calendimaggio,” but retaining pagan rites of the ancient Etruscans and Ligures… whose languages are lost to us, but whose superstitions endure.

In Catholic lands, statues of Mary frequently are adorned with wreaths of Spring flowers. (She is the “Queen of May,” to the uninitiated.) In Britain, Morris dancing, decorating May Poles with garlands of flowers, and such outdoor rituals date back to Anglo-Saxon fertility fetes when May was called the “Month of Three Milkings.”

There is another May Day with which we are all too familiar. Known alternatively as International Workers Day, many people assume its own origins are also shrouded in the musty past and in obscure lands, or at least as a holiday of Socialists and Communists, the progeny of Karl Marx or Soviet conspirators.

The red May Day, however, was inspired by an event in America, as recently as 1886, thereafter adopted by Bolsheviks around the world. Disaffected radicals – workers and farmers, anarchists and socialists – agitated for a national strike in 1886, but in Haymarket Square, Chicago, things turned ugly when a bomb was thrown by persons unknown. When the smoke cleared, police and strikers were dead, many injured. The radical Industrial Workers of the World, the IWW or “Wobblies,” was founded there soon afterward. The Haymarket Riot inspired Communists to commemorate it with labor’s May Day.

From the Soviets’ Moscow to Beijing to Havana to Pyongyang to Harvard and Berkeley, that traditional has continued.

The other May Day we know about is the international distress signal. It is only about a century old, displacing wireless telegraphy’s SOS soon after it was first implemented by the sinking Titanic. “May Day” was the vocal shorthand, as the Morse Code was superseded, for emergencies, probably the transliteration of the French “m’aider” – “help me.”

I am not sure whether towns and schools, in the US anyway, have May Day events any more – at least not like when I was a schoolkid, when there actually were dances around Maypoles, threading garlands of flowers; and assigned essays about Spring, and we were allowed to mention God. Now, in this brave new world that is realizing the dreams of Socialists, from Europe on the brink to major forces in the US, every day is May Day.

But the May Day that has the most relevance – that is, immediate import – to Patriots and Christians, is the international Distress Signal.

We are indeed adrift and in distress. As a society, as a culture, we need help. We need to be rescued. “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land (2 Chronicles 7:14).

IFs aplenty. We need revival, but we cannot pray for God’s magic wand. He has never worked that way. We cannot effect it without the Holy Ghost; but God will not bring revival if we do not repent.

Unlike the distress call that went out when the Titanic was sinking, we have the ability to influence our rescue. We can save our lives as He heals our land. But May Days will end sometime. Help us, Lord.

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Click: Help Me

10-24-16

Democrat Vice-presidential candidate Tim Kaine grew up in Kansas City KS. Recently, that city’s Archbishop, Joseph F Naumann, described the senator as a “Cafeteria Catholic” for picking and choosing the Church doctrines he chose to respect.

Kaine, who has a rare lifetime Zero rating from the American Conservative Union – which I realize is not a religious organization – favors abortion, and voted for its legality, extension, and federal funding; among opposing other teachings of the Church.

There are Protestants who have conflicts, too – claiming belief in the God of the Bible, but denying large portions of the Bible of God. “Pick and choose Christianity” is a cancer in Protestant (and Evangelical and Pentecostal and mainstream and post-modern) churches too; a cancer that metastasizes rapidly.

Kaine, and others, predictably fall back on the crutch of Relativism and say, “I am personally opposed to abortion, but I will not impose my view on others.” You have heard such things. Maybe you have said such things.

Some Day, these nominal Christians will answer for their hypocrisy. Abortion, death penalty, whatever the issue, if you believe something… stand up for it. If, further, your opinion is informed by your faith – if you believe it involves God’s will – then I worry for your soul if you fail to share His truth in public.

“Whoever disowns Me before others, I will disown before my Father in heaven.” That’s Jesus, quoted in Matthew 10:33.

Hey, politician – Hey, neighbor; Hey, person in the mirror – if you “personally oppose” abortion but tolerate it in society, how were people wrong to “personally oppose” slavery back in the day, but permit its practice? Slaves were private property, it was argued – who would you have been to interfere? Hey – what about the persecution and slaughter of Jews during World War II? It was argued that Jews were sub-human, after all; and how would have it affected you? Was it your business?

Since babies who are murdered up to hours before natural birth cannot speak for themselves, I will make their plea: Why are their lives less important than babies one day old? Or two years old and disabled? Or… why are their lives less important than your life?

The administration and party whose power Mr Kaine wants to perpetuate frequently has shown less compassion, and expended less political capital, on behalf of little victims of infanticide, and uncountable Christians martyred for their faith around the world, than toward trans-sexual persons who claim that landlords don’t like them; or sexual predators who demand free access to women’s restrooms in malls.

America, 2016.

Republicans are not off the spiritual hook. The Supreme Court that has written offensive rulings, and “discovered” rights that were not enumerated in the Constitution, have largely been Republican courts. Republican Congresses have been Big-Brother enablers since the 1930s. Conservatives, let’s admit it, have become mere foot-dragging liberals.

Speaking personally – c’mon, that’s what we all do – when Donald Trump, for all his many flaws, said that he is opposed to abortion; describes “late-term” abortions in graphic detail; and promises that any Supreme Court nomination he makes will be committed to overturn Roe vs Wade… that did it for me. No matter what other promise he makes or breaks; no matter what Hillary advocates and pledges… Trump deserves the vote of Christians and those who respect life (including descendents of slavery and holocausts).

Can we step back and realize that as few as four years ago, even most Republicans, conservatives, and “faith-based” candidates, refused to voice approval of Roe vs Wade being overturned? to dare to admit that they had a “litmus test” for judicial nominees? Mr Trump does. It is a political earthquake few have noted. In his Gettysburg speech, he further committed to positions — school choice, for instance — that conservatives and people of faith have wished for in living-room discussions and Republican “leaders” have failed to commit.

To those many people of faith, so-called, who lament our spiritual crisis, and the moral swamp wherein we slog: I am often among you, and hear many prayers for God to “bring revival to this land.”

I am not optimistic about a response that you people pray for. God could send revival; He is sovereign. Of course. But just as He did not send ten thousand angels to pluck Jesus from the cross… so He will not cause the Supreme Court building to spontaneously combust; or The New York Times building to float into the Hudson River and sink.

True revival comes less from God, and more from the hearts of His people.

And, when it comes, things are directed to Him, and not to rulers or candidates or politicians.

Everything else – everything – will fall into place when we seek revival as a people. Be not deceived, God is not mocked (Galatians 6:7). Do you believe God wants a relationship with a people who snap their fingers so He can clean up their holy mess?

Until and unless true revival comes, we deserve the mess we have created. I will support any candidate who commits to core biblical principles (apart from generic “caring” and compassion” as even the heathen do), and who is forthright about it.

We have sunk so low in America that I actually am grateful to have spiritual straws to grasp.

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Click this Johnny Cash performance: Help Me, Lord

8-8-16

Have you ever called out to God in a moment of crisis? Or, better put, how often have you cried out to God in a moment of crisis?

Of course we have all been there, and it will not change. God, after all, did not promise to keep us from life’s troubles. He just promised to be with us through them.

Christoper Hitchens, famous as an apologist for atheism, once wrote, “What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.” Hitchens, who died of esophageal cancer soon after writing those words, wrote books and articles against God, and debated across the continent with the fervent Christian Dinesh D’Souza. None of us can evaluate the emotional wrestling-matches he endured with himself (and his God) – he evidently was touched by a widespread “Pray for Christopher Hitchens Day” in September of 2010. But I shudder to contemplate if he was tempted to cry to God… but was deterred by pride.

If a reliance on God (please: no “higher being”; no “man upstairs” – I mean the God of the Bible) is a basic yearning of every person’s soul, then we must admit that pride is a universal stumbling-block to exercising that reliance. How common is the realization that we turn for help… when we need help? The logic of it does not mitigate the embarrassment: “God, it’s me again. Sorry it’s been awhile…”

Too often we pray fervently in times of crises, and pray casually – or not at all – when blessings are flowing. Human nature.

God knows it is human nature. That is why He provided ways to counter that aspect. Communication, constant communication, which He calls “prayer.” And the testimony of our hearts, which He can read, and knows better than we ourselves do.

God seeks communication with us – and half of that is hearing from us. He takes joy in every manner of our turning to Him. He is grieved when we do not. In Micah 6:3 we have the picture of a God who is offended and hurt when we ignore Him: “O my people, what have I done to you? How have I wearied you? Answer me!”

So. If God receives pleasure when we seek Him and communicate through prayer, and if we generally tend to seek Him and pray only when things go bad… wouldn’t it be in the nature of a loving God to “allow” some “bad” things to buffet us?

I do not believe that He sends sickness or disease on His children – the Lord of the universe is not a child abuser – but in order for us to see Him as “an ever-present help in times of trouble,” there must be trouble. Following that, He will answer, and help, and communicate what we need to know: “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise” (Psalm 51:17); “Thou, LORD, hast not forsaken them that seek thee” (Psalm 9:10).

Is God at work in our lives when crises and problems beset us… when those happen to be the only times when we seek fellowship with Him? Is this good theology? I don’t know. Just sayin’…

Think about it. If God desires to hear from us, but we ignore Him except when trouble comes… Well, my advice is to not tempt God. Keep those lines of communication open. The voice of experience: then blessings can flow your way.

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Here is a heartfelt spiritual song that briefly illustrates the anguished call to God we all experience at times. It is one of the very last songs that a feeble Johnny Cash recorded, but one of the most powerful of messages about asking God’s help:

Click:  Help Me, Lord

4-18-16

We should always be growing as Christians. In fact we should grow in all aspects of our lives: a dead curiosity, an atrophied sense of adventure, are mere reflections of a life winding down. We SHOULD keep growing in our life activities, but our faith MUST keep growing.

Faith is not the destination, after all. We recently shared that “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” This verse that opens Hebrews 11 – the “Hall of Fame of Faith” – confirms that we keep hoping as we keep believing.

In the six years or so that I have been offering these blog essays, and have been carried by RealClearReligion.org, which sadly is closing up shop, I have not so much lectured, as learned. That is how ministry is supposed to work. You gain insights more than fashion them; you are blessed more than you bless; the responses from random readers, usually unknown to me, have kept me humble, and have strengthened my faith.

Humility is one of the bedrocks – one of the cornerstones – of Christianity.

To be used of God is what we must seek, fervently. There is a seduction to compose mighty messages and memorable sermons. We – the contemporary church, especially in the West – have a frequent sense of urgency to seize the moments. To gather everyone we can into church or small groups or para-church or youth ministry. To “close every deal.”

In fact that is the job of the Holy Spirit. Jesus said so. It is our job, rather, not to subvert the work of the Holy Ghost, but to plant seeds. Let the Spirit nurture and harvest.

Humility.

How often do we realize that, in our scrambling to “reach” others, that maybe God grieves that we neglect ourselves – our own souls, our own spiritual growth, our very salvation? Jesus died and rose for us… not our programs, our ministries, our notches on a spiritual belt.

Humility.

How often do we realize that for all the good we do, for all the myriad aspects of our spiritual lives, that God’s call on our lives – one Mission that is pre-eminent in His eyes – might be ONE encounter, one person, one circumstance where He has placed us?

Humility.

In that sense I have come to an increasing awareness that we all are “mere” stones. Rough-hewn, seemingly not significant, almost interchangeable, in life. But in God’s view, indispensible! Mighty, God-glorifying cathedrals are built stone upon stone upon stone. Usually rough, or seemingly indistinguishable one from another.

But after the cornerstone who is Christ, those stones, piled correctly, and high, and interlocking, ultimately make a cathedral.

But if some are defective, or arranged wrongly, or missing… the cathedral collapses. Our profiles are humble. Our roles, however, are vital. We must see ourselves in this perspective. God resists the proud, but exalts the humble. Just as importantly, however, we must see others, and all of life’s work, in this manner also.

I always reminded my children that not every student who does scales becomes a great violinist; few do. But EVERY great violinist, without exception, began by doing scales. There is a humble way to “do” life that our contemporary culture fights against. Try-it-all, taste-it-all, do-it-all is not a formula for success… nor happiness. The Bible warns against the allure of “wine, women, and song.” You know the rest of the verse: “… for tomorrow you die.”

So, fellow “stones.” In humility let realize our roles, and not exalt ourselves or our meager efforts, even on behalf of the King. Later in that chapter of Hebrews we are reminded of Abraham, who properly “looked for a city, whose builder and maker is the Lord.” In humility let us anoint our writing, our ministries, our… appointments God has arranged for us.

In humility let us rejoice in the work we can do. It’s is God’s work, after all; not our own. Some day, here or on the other side, we will look up, and look around, see what a mighty spiritual edifice we have been blessed to be part of.

And keep in your mind that Jesus said that even if the world withholds its praise of Him, “even the stones would cry out”!

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This is a valedictory of sorts to Real Clear Religion, which has seemed to many people an indispensible part of their daily fare: news, sermons, surveys, essays, so much more. Jeremy Lott and Nicholas Hahn were superb editors, and generous to share MMMM every week for years.

For those who have followed us on RCR, please continue to receive our weekly essays by Subscribing to Monday Morning Music Ministry. (See link under “Pages” at right.) May God bless all you “stones”… even pebbles, such as “who am I.”

Click: Who Am I

10-12-15

As most of you know, Dr. Pangloss was a character in Candide by Voltaire. As with many characters in fiction and literature whose sayings (“Something will always turn up,” said Micawber in Dickens’ David Copperfield) and very names (Mrs. Malaprop in Sheridan’s The Rivals) have entered the language, Pangloss manifested the universal tendency to accept what life dumps on us: “This is the best of all possible worlds.”

It is very seldom that anyone who believes he or she really is living in the best of all possible worlds says so. Usually we are whistling in the graveyard; that is, putting up a confident front, trying to convince ourselves (and anyone else who will listen) that we are not as bad-off as things seems.

The saying, and the attitude behind it, is more than resignation to life’s vicissitudes. At its best it is a temporary surrender in one of life’s battles, a choice not to respond or fight or overcome. At its worst it is a false sense of security that replaces wisdom and joy; a counterfeit theology that rejects the rescue-and-recovery operation laid out for us by God.

The counterfeit theology is deadly… and common. Many Christians, deliberately or unconsciously, employ it. It is, really, saying “no thanks” to God when He offers comfort, solace, wisdom, understanding, strength, hope.

Truly, superstition. If we utter it, we think it will become so, and our troubles will be calmed.

The deadliest aspect of believing that “This is the best of all possible worlds” is on people who, ironically, are relieved from reaching low-points, feeling desperate, realizing that they must run to the Lord. Knowing they must run to the Lord. Having to crawl to the Lord, if necessary. It sounds hard, but we are talking about those hard moments we all face.

Seeking the Lord (who, always, always in these circumstances is closer than we think) is not a bad thing in the end. It is, in fact, the Best Thing. It is where He wants us. What a shame that it takes horrible situations – or that we let ourselves be so separated – that we have to experience that desperation.

But what a wonderful thing that we seek and arrive at the foot of the Cross, before the Throne of Grace.

“This is the best of all possible worlds”? The phrase is often said after a death, an accident, a disappointment that we cannot explain. Personal sorrow, economic distress, dashed dreams. “Oh, well, maybe it’s for the best…” is a denial-fed mantra. Its efficacy is self-swindling balm, because many people will then say, “Anyway, I have to believe that; it helps me get through.”

This puts the saying in company with wishing-stones, rabbit’s feet, lucky charms, necromancy. What a waste of the joy unspeakable, full of glory, that God offers. If this – in the larger, non-specific sense – were the best of all possible worlds, there would be no need for prayer, spiritual guidance, the Gifts of the Holy Spirit; indeed, no need for a Savior.

There is sin in the world. Sometimes, often, we sin; we fall short of the glory of God. Our problems are always some result of sin, corruption, junk in the world around us. And sometimes the result of our own actions. Whatever. God provides a refuge. Jesus is the cleft in the rock during life’s storms. The Holy Spirit is the Comforter.

“Come to Me, weak and heavy-laden,” Jesus invited. “Peace that passes understanding,” we are promised. “I am the bread of life,” when our very souls are starving. “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

Understand me: the Sovereign Lord declares that without Him, this is NOT the best of all possible worlds.

If you are a believer and you find yourself falling back on that empty mantra, shake that dust from your sandals, and learn again how to walk with the Lord through this imperfect world.

If you are casual about your faith, or a nominal believer in God, or have a “universal” trust in the goodness of a supreme being – and you find yourself trusting, when “necessary,” that this is the best of all possible worlds – realize how empty this is. It is as sad, horribly sad, for people to decline God’s gifts as it is to defy Him.

And be more spiritual than to refer to “the man upstairs.” That “man” has moved out. In fact he was never home.

The Creator of the Universe not only is “upstairs,” but lives right next to you. He knows your answers; He has your answers; He IS your answer.

And He is your guide to the best of all possible worlds.

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Johnny Cash sang a song, late in his life, that captures the desperation we sometimes feel.

Click: Help Me, Lord

12-9-13

If you had a child playing at the edge of an ever-widening sinkhole – and sinkholes lately have been in the news, including ones that swallowed people as well as houses – you would call that child to move back. If your friend were eating something poisonous without realizing the dangers, you would advise that friend of the fact. We do the same, some of us, with people, even strangers, who smoke. “Intervention” today increasingly is employed on behalf of people with drinking problems.

Followers of Christ, who subscribe to the beliefs that all of us make mistakes and are sinful at heart; that therefore a wide gulf separates us from a Holy God; that this God nevertheless desires eternal fellowship with us and offers forgiveness and salvation; and that “accepting” Jesus – believing in our hearts and confessing with our words – these Christians cannot do anything else than have the same regard for other people’s souls as we do their health and comfort.

How often do contemporary Christians fit that last puzzle-piece in place?

Failing this, we condemn ourselves; and we are implicit in sending others to the cold darkness of eternity, separation from God. How often do we avoid sharing even the smallest portion of Jesus with someone because we might “offend them”? Hurt their feelings? “Hey buddy, don’t smoke in your apartment, but I don’t care if you go to hell.”

It’s not always comfortable, but neither was that splintery cross. Living in a multimedia culture makes it easy to assume everyone thinks like we do, or has access to the same facts that we process. Not so. When the Apostle Paul arrived in Ephesus, word-of-mouth about the Savior had already led to the establishment of several Christian communities. But not every word had been shared by every mouth:

“…he reached Ephesus, on the coast, where he found several believers. ‘Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?’ he asked them. ‘No,’ they replied, ‘we haven’t even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.’ ‘Then what baptism did you experience?’ he asked. And they replied, ‘The baptism of John.’ Paul said, ‘John’s baptism called for repentance from sin. But John himself told the people to believe in the one who would come later, meaning Jesus.’ As soon as they heard this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. Then when Paul laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they spoke in other tongues and prophesied” (Acts 19:1-6, NLT).

Paul wrote letters to local churches and church leaders, sharing the good news, and answering questions. These letters comprise the majority of the New Testament. We shared last week how papyrus letters from a generation or two after Paul are extant. Before Christ’s time, spiritual news and God’s words were shared by Torah scrolls, inscriptions, sacred texts. After him we have the successive march of letters, manuscripts, tapestries and stained-glass picture stories, parchment books, printed books, mass-production, tracts, evangelistic crusades, recordings, radio, short-wave, television, and the internet.

The SHARING of the good news is central to the good news itself. “Go into all the world…” Jesus said, commissioning His disciples. Romans 10:14-15 argues: “How can they call on Him to save them unless they believe in Him? And how can they believe in Him if they have never heard about Him? And how can they hear about Him unless someone tells them?  And how will anyone go and tell them without being sent? That is why the Scriptures say, ‘How beautiful are the feet of messengers who bring good news!’ (NLT) Like much of the Book of Romans, this is like an advocate summarizing his case. How can they hear about Jesus unless someone tells them?

Right about in the middle of humankind’s list of ways to share the good news – not in a timeline, but in the numbers of methods and technologies – is the radio. After its invention it was available to almost every community on the earth. And much of its message, especially today on short-wave broadcasts, is Christian. I went to Sunday school as a child, but it was preachers on my AM transistor radio from whom I really heard the first hard (and sweet) truths of the Gospel; and came face-to-face with decisions to make, or avoid, regarding Jesus Christ.

Albert E. Brumley was an American gospel songwriter of the past century. He wrote more than 800 sermons-in-song, many of which are favorites today in churches, hymnbooks, and recordings. Among them are “I’ll Fly Away,” “If We Never Meet Again (This Side of Heaven),” “I’ll Meet You In The Morning,” “Jesus, Hold My Hand,” “I’d Rather Be An Old Time Christian,” and “Rank Strangers to Me.”

He told a story about another of his classics… and the role of radio in spreading the gospel:

“I wrote ‘Turn Your Radio On’ in 1937, and it was published in 1938. At this time radio was relatively new to the rural people, especially gospel music programs. I had become alert to the necessity of creating song titles, themes, and plots, and frequently people would call me and say, ‘Turn your radio on, Albert, they’re singing one of your songs on such-and-such a station.’ It finally dawned on me to use… ‘Turn your radio on’ as a theme for a religious… song.”

Like the poor, radio we will always have with us. In the words of the song, “turn your radio on and listen to the music in the air; Turn your radio on and heaven’s glory share…”

Are you tuned in… to what God is saying to you? Don’t touch that dial! You can broadcast (as it were) a brief public-service announcement, or a personal message, every once in a while yourself.

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Many folks’ favorite version of Brumley’s classic song is by the great Ray Stevens. Fun, upbeat, infectious… meaningful. Here he sings at the piano, surrounded by friends who sing along, as you might, yourself.

Click: Turn Your Radio On

3-11-13

This is the Christian story: The Lord of the universe was pleased to create the earth and populate it with human beings. An aspect of His love was to imbue His children with free will, which no mortal has ever failed to use toward rebellion and sin. God delivered laws and commands to His Chosen People, called so because in His plan, when the Law would be recognized as insufficient for a rebellious humanity to be reconciled to Him; that from them, a Messiah would arise who would provide the means of that salvation.

These basics are widely known, even if non-Christians shrug their mental shoulders; even if Christians cease to be in awe of God’s plan, even taking for granted their astonishing inheritance. It has been calculated that the odds of all the Old Testament prophecies fulfilled in the birth, life, locations, miracles, and other circumstances surrounding Jesus (most not disputed, even by enemies of His and His disciples at the time) exceed a hundred million to one.

I sometimes wonder, given all this, why the Christian population of the world is approximately 3-billion; more than one-third of humanity. History, threads of religious traditions, logic, the personal testimonies of those who lives have been supernaturally touched – I wonder why 95 per cent of people do not claim Christ.

An answer has come to me. A very 21st-century outlook might be a matter of packaging, or “branding.” Just as, to me, the upcoming end of Lent will feature too much Bunny and not enough Easter, it might be that the church insufficiently communicates the reality of Holy Week as we look ahead.

Most of us know the stories, and the pictures, of Jesus humbly entering Jerusalem on a donkey, amidst adoring crowds. We know He was falsely accused; He was betrayed by one follower, and denied by another; He was chased down and arrested; He was tortured and abused; He was humiliated perhaps as no man ever has been; He died on a rough cross between two criminals; He was carried to a borrowed tomb; on the third day He rose, conquering sin and death.

As scripture prophesied, He was led like a lamb to slaughter.

But can it be that we place too much of our attention on His submission? Jesus could have called down ten thousand angels to lift Him from the cross, to strike His accusers dumb, to spare Himself the pain, humiliation, and (worst, in my book) the abandonment of His friends and disciples.

We must understand that Jesus was born to die. And to overcome death. He knew the Father’s plan to become the sacrificial lamb, to take the sins of the world – our sins, through history to you and me – upon Himself. From the wrath of God, everything we deserve for our rejection and rebellion, He spares us.

So in this view, I have another image. I know it is VIRTUAL, not the way the Bible describes it. Nevertheless it is true. I ask you to see Jesus, not ambling on a donkey into Jerusalem, but galloping full speed. I remind you that Jesus, at the Passover seder, did not stop Judas from ratting Him out, but hurried him on his way. I suggest to you that Jesus, silent before accusers in the temple and before Pontius Pilate, was virtually shouting, “Come on! Do your worst!” That, until He collapsed, a Man of sorrows and a man painfully bleeding, on the via Dolorosa, He carried His cross as if to say, “Let’s do this! For this I came to earth!”

… and that, instead of being stretched and nailed to a cross, it is spiritually the case that Jesus virtually scrambled up that cross. For us. “Forgive them; they know not what they do.” But Jesus knew what He was doing, and despite the portion of humanity with which we can identify (“if it be possible, let this cup pass…”) He was there for us. He was there. For us.

And then, looking forward to what we call Easter Sunday, we read the accounts of the risen Jesus appearing quietly to Mary, to pedestrians on the road, to His old disciples, to many hundreds of others – accounts recorded by the Jewish historian of the era, Josephus, and by the historians Origen and Eusebius. He quietly appeared and witnessed to people. But let us realize that Jesus metaphorically burst forth from that tomb. In that sense he ran out, shouting to everybody, “I’m Alive!!!” In words of Anthony Burger’s little son, ad libbing in a Sunday School pageant, “Here I come, ready or not!”

Then, and now, Jesus runs up to every person and says, “I live so that you may live also! Believe on me, and you shall have life for eternity!”

Let us return from the virtual and metaphorical. These truths, no matter what the details of their playing out, cannot leave us unchanged. We can make the life-changing decision to ignore Him, or the life-changing decision to accept Him. There simply is no middle ground.

If we see Jesus in this different way – that He was Savior not just willing to die for our sins, but EAGER, such is God’s love for us, and that He excitedly confronts us daily – then we might see Lent in another light. And the rest of the year. And the Lord Himself. And the condition of our souls.

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Humanity’s response to God’s plan, and the sacrifice of His Son so that we might be reconciled by the acceptance of Jesus’ substitutionary death, has taken myriad forms through the centuries. Indifference, sadly; to revelation about the availability of a personal relationship with our Savior; to expressions in art and music. The awesome mystery of this salvation plan often is met by the question, “Why Me, Lord?” We know the answer is “Because I love you,” yet our souls scarcely can comprehend the enormity of God’s love. A contemporary song is Kris Kristofferson’s classic plaint, “Why Me, Lord?” Here he explains to some friends how he came to write it, after he had a life-changing experience.

Click: Why Me, Lord?

3-4-13

A friend of mine posted a note this week: “I just received a phone call from a friend asking for prayer for another friend whose daughter is likely caught in a human trafficking ring… We must know that it is around us! It can happen to any of our families. Please keep spreading the word and educating our kids and teens in preventive measures.”

My friend, Cheryl Hults Meakins, is doing great and necessary work, currently as Chair for Ministries of Compassion, Mercy, and Justice for the Women Ministries of the Evangelical Covenant Church’s Midwest Conference. Important work that inspires me when I hear of it. And so many others. I admire the work that people do to serve others.

… and then I stop and grieve, sometimes, because I realize that entire professions exist because the need is so great. Servant-hearts are at work because there is so much sorrow and heartache and pain and abuse and hurt and despair – so much hatred, so much sin – in our midst. Counselors and ministers do all they can, responding (in effect) to the laws of supply and demand. What a cursed world.

Human trafficking is not new. Neither is it rare in the world… nor in America. Abuse of all sorts is common. And it is an equal-opportunity offender, of children and the elderly, of women and men. Abuse at its base is a demand for power, manifested in hatred, and therefore is basically a spiritual fight. And that requires spirituals answers! Jobs and education cannot cure what the prince of darkness incubates. Only the love of Christ can cure what ails humankind.

It is then no surprise that good people, everywhere, suffer for their faith, more and more of them tortured and slaughtered. For Christians, in greater numbers now than at any time in history; more, proportionally, than in the time of Roman emperors.

I realize I am writing as if I think I am interrupting some program with breaking news. But I know the chances are that among those who read this, a vast number of you will be thinking: “I heard about ‘this’ down the street’; or “I have a relative who experienced ‘that’”; or… “I know about these things. They happened to me.”

It can seem like a cliché – or perhaps a hopeless sentiment – to ask whether we all can’t give up hating, for Lent.

But couldn’t we all try to give up indifference to hatred, even only occasionally?

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A link to resources and programs of Cheryl’s ministry can be found through her personal website www.MeakinsSpeak.com and at www.covchurch.org/what-we-do/mercy-justice. I commend the music video here linked, “Which Way To Pray,” sung by T. Graham Brown to a group of friends. Touching words about dirty little secrets in our midst. You know, I believe that sometimes we can have such open minds that our brains fall out. Not a good thing. However, the same is not true of our hearts! We can never be too open-hearted, too compassionate, too moved not to respond to the hurting amongst us.

Click: Which Way To Pray