Tod Bolsinger

The ‘S’ word

One night at dinner, my daughter said to me, “Daddy, my teacher said the ‘S’ word.”  “Really?” I asked, “Was it an accident?” Thinking of how easy it is for profanity to come flying out of my own mouth if I stub my toe or break something unexpectedly. “Maybe she just slipped or something.  That happens you know.”

“I don’t know.”  Ali said.  “But she said it.”  Beth was smiling.  “You better ask her what the word was.”  Ali leaned over and whispered “She said, ‘stupid.’”

Oh.  That’s right. When the kids heard the teacher muttering “I am so stupid” after doing something, some thought that she had said a “bad word.” ‘Stupid’ is a bad word to some people.  Because it’s considered a bad word, we often avoid it.  And that is probably appropriate.  But to other people it’s just a coarse description. 

Well, today I am going to talk about another “S” word.  It’s considered a “bad” word to some.  It’s considered demeaning, derogatory, oppressive and archaic.  Most of us never use it around the house, nor would we ever talk about it with anyone else. It’s the word, “submission”. 

Now granted, that the idea of submission has been used in harmful ways.  It’s often been used by stronger people to make weaker people do their bidding.  It’s been used by religious leaders who wanted to claim God’s authority to do what they wanted without being questioned.  It’s been used by abusive or oppressive men who wanted their wives and children to give in to their demands. 

But the Bible actually teaches and models a way of living where submission is part of a wiser, more interconnected, more mutually dependent way of living.  To submit to another person is to voluntarily “sit under them”, to voluntarily give them authority in your life, or to accept the influence of another person.  In the Bible, we learn that the Christian life is a life of freedom, but a life of freedom that comes through choosing to live interdependently with each other as we live completely under the authority of our Lord. 

Ephesians 5:21 describes how people who are filled with the Spirit of God live: “And further, you will submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” (NLT)

That is the biblical understanding of submission: Mutual submission to each other as an expression of our complete submission to Christ. 

This week in our Lenten study on taking the “gentle yoke” of Jesus, we will be exploring together the “communal spiritual discipline” of “sitting under” by looking together at Luke 10:38-42. When Jesus arrived at Martha and Mary’s house, and Mary sat down at Jesus’ feet.  As we begin this discussion, let me ask you to consider these questions:

• What does it mean for you to sit under, to “submit to another” Christian, to accept influence from someone else as part of your acts of reverence for and devotion to Christ? 
• Who has God put in your life that you need to listen to in order to hear Christ?
• Who has God put in your life that you need to learn from in order to grow in Christ?
• Who has God put in your life that will remind you that what you are so concerned with is not as important as you thought? 
• Who has God put in your life that will continue to lead you back to the feet of Jesus? 

Will pick up this discussion tomorrow  by looking at the first of three aspects of the communal spiritual discipline of “sitting under.”

Live Like a River

“Rivers know that there is no hurry.  We shall all get there one day.”

--Winnie the Pooh

It’s probably not a coincidence that my recreational yin and yang are snow skiing and fly fishing.  And while I try to spend as much time as I can on ski slopes in the winter, I try to spend as much time as I can wading trout streams in the summer.  I need to balance my need for speed with the contemplation of wetting a line, watching a fly and trying to fool fish while standing in a river.

There is a lot you can learn from a river and mostly that it just flows.  Rivers don’t slow down or speed up, they simply do what the terrain demands.  The greater the snow melt, the more rocks in the river bed, the narrower the banks, the faster it flows.  But when the terrain mellows, the rocks disappear and the banks flatten, the river simply slows down. 

In many ways, I think we’ll better learn this spiritual discipline of hastening slowly if we’ll let ourselves live like a river. 

Recognize that there are going to be stretches of rapids, (even long stretches) but look for the wide spots to level out and run slowly.  Linger in those spots. Resist the temptation to add hurry to your life. Learn to "go with the flow."  There are different seasons where life will go faster, so we don’t need to add to that by making life even more hectic to fulfill our own unconscious needs.

In Mark 6:30-34, Jesus' disciples had so much ministry going on that they couldn’t even find time to eat.  But for them this was not some badge of honor, some affirmation of their importance, it was a simply a reality to face. 

The ministry was picking up speed, the flow was beginning to race down hill, the needs were like boulders that they had to roll over, their lives were like crashing rapids, bouncing back and forth.

So Jesus tells them to come away and rest.  They cross the sea on a boat to get some time alone, to slow the flow.  But the crowd and all of their needs followed.  So much for their time to bask.  So much for their sabbatical, their time for rest. 

The crowd was like sheep without a shepherd, and he has compassion on them.  Jesus interrupts their retreat and cares for them.  It was not a moment where the pace would slow. 

But! Twelve verses later, after one more act of ministry, Jesus himself pulls away to rest and pray. 

You know what?  This is Jesus’ usual pattern.  Five times in three different ministry events in a brief period of time he slows down.  What we learn from this passage is that life, even as Jesus lives it, is a rhythm of both rest and racing. 

How is that rhythm in your life?  Are you busy or are you hurried?  Is there a rhythm of both rest and racing, or it is just all just rushing from one thing to the next.

Usually when we are hurrying, we are trying to do one too many things that are more inspired by our anxiety, fears or competition than anything else. 

Hasten slowly.  Let the banks determine the pace, but be the same in the middle.  Let the terrain speed up the flow of life, not anxiety.

Be a river that stays with the banks, not a flood or swamp that insists on overrunning the boundaries, doing too much, going too far.  Know your limits and live within them.  That will be fast enough.

In my book, Show Time, I used the metaphors of rivers and snow skiing to talk about the benefits of developing the virtue of self-control.  In many ways, we who struggle with slowing down, also need to consider how much we need to develop genuine, freeing self-control in other areas of our lives.

Add Basking to your Busyness

Continuing our exploration of the "spiritual discipline of slowing down," we move from a slow beginning to each day to the warp and woof, the demands and details of the day itself.

I understand that during certain seasons of life, the pace quickens.  It’s hard not to feel as if you are always on the move when you are chasing down toddlers or teenagers.  I am not trying to make you feel guilty for being busy.  I really do understand.  Instead I simply want to encourage you to not be ONLY busy.  To add basking to your busyness.

To add basking to our busyness means to look for moments in the middle of each day, when we can just stop and take in the universe, tune into the Creator, to pray without moving.  In his, Abandonment to Divine Providence, Jean Pierre de Cassaud called this celebrating “The sacrament of the present moment.” 

When we bask, we adore.  Taking in the taste and smells, feeling the wind and the sunlight, noticing the smiling faces and sad eyes of others.  Taking the time for a lingering hug of a loved one, to hear a good joke, to look at the sunset.  We sit and be.

If you are ever down at the San Clemente pier at sunset, you can see people who have come just to bask in the moment.  It’s quite amazing to watch how just as the sun touches the horizon, a number of people just fall silent and take it in.  Then when the sun is out of site, they resuming walking, talking and getting on with life.  But those who bask for just a moment, go back to life a bit more gingerly, a little more tenderly than those who were too distracted to notice the sunset.

Very often we need each other to practice these things.  (This is the "communal" part of the disciplines.) We need others to point out the sunset, to invite us to have a cup of coffee in the middle of the day, to pause to sit and pray.  At least I do.

In December, I ran my first marathon with two friends.  Fortunately for me, one of the guys had run seven of them before so it was like having a personal coach the whole way.  His strategy was that we would walk for one minute each mile.  Basically every mile there is a water station, and we’d simply slow down, grab some water, walk for one minute and get going again. 

I have to tell you that for me that whole walking part was excruciatingly difficult.  I had time goals I wanted to accomplish.  Runners that I had just passed in the last mile were now racing by me while I walked a minute and frankly, it felt like I was losing time and wimping out. 

But when we hit the 20 mile mark, the wisdom of his walk-a-minute-per-mile strategy was so evident.  The 20 mile mark is considered by most marathoners as “the wall.”  It’s where the body runs out of fuel and has to struggle the last 6 miles on fumes. 

But not me, not this time.  I sailed right through the so-called wall.  (Well as much as a guy my size ever “sails.”) By simply walking one minute a mile all the way through the race, we had so much more left in the tank that I actually ran a way faster time and a way more comfortable race than I imagined possible. 

Adding basking to our busyness is learning to walk a minute each mile on a marathon.  In the end you go faster without hurrying, by hastening slowly.

If you'd like to read one more post I wrote on "busyness" click here .

Tommorrow, one more suggestion for "slowing down."

Slow Starting

“If you must be in a hurry, then let it be according to the old adage, and hasten slowly.” --St. Vincent de Paul

Hasten slowly.  That is the paradoxical spiritual discipline that I want you to consider practicing with me this Lenten season: Practice hastening slowly.

So, what do I mean by this?  I mean that we should pay attention when the race of life turns into the rat race.  (As Lily Tomlin said, “Even if you win the rat race, you’re still a rat.”)

We should pay attention to the difference between hastening to what is important, and hurrying after what is not.  Between hastening to hug, to care, to forgive and to serve and hurrying around frazzled, distracted and spent.  Between being busy as an outward reality and being hurried as an inner state of being. As John Ortberg wrote: “Jesus was often busy but he was never hurried. Being busy is an outer condition; being hurried is a sickness of the soul.”

So, let’s consider how we add breath to our haste, how we create a rhythm for living--even when busy--that includes slow, focused, lingering moments of prayer, of attention, of love. 

First, begin the day slowly…

Many of us start our days by hitting snooze.  By the time we get out of bed we are already 15 minutes late.  The rest of the day is nothing but a rush to catch up.  I have begun thinking about my day ahead.  And if it is particularly busy, starting it even more slowly.  I begin most of my days a good hour before any one else in our house wakes up.  This is my time to putter, to pray, and to ponder.  I get up, I make myself coffee, I check my email.  I then settle into my favorite chair to read, pray and doing some writing.  This slow start is the key to my whole day.  When I skip it, I spend the day rushing from one thing to another.

This idea of beginning the day slowly was reinforced for me when I started doing in endurance training for triathlons, marathons and century bike rides last year.  I soon learned that longer you are going to ride or the harder you are going to run, the slower and easier you needed to begin that ride or run.  In endurance training the rule is if you want to go fast later, go slow earlier.  Build a strong base, warm up, start slowly. In many ways, that is what the group of us who fill our church's Stephen's Chapel each Friday morning in Lent are doing.  One day a week, we are coming together in a candlelit chapel, spending 30 minutes listening to music in prayerful contemplation.  And then for 30 more minutes we practice Lectio Divina together, considering the sermon text for the following Sunday.

So, here is the first thing to practice: begin the day slowly.  And let me add, even if you have to start the night before.  Start slowing down as the sun goes down.  Think of your day as starting at sun down the night before. 

This is, as some of you know, the Jewish way of counting a day.  Sabbath starts on sundown and continues until the next sundown.  It is a deeply biblical way of thinking about our days.  It means that the day begins with going to sleep.  The day begins with resting.  God is the one who works all day and then stands guard all night.  Only God.  Humans have to have a rhythm of rest.  Indeed, when God became a human, Jesus slept just like the rest of us.)

Psalm 121:3
He will not let you stumble and fall;
       the one who watches over you will not sleep. (NLT)

Psalm 127:2
It is useless for you to work so hard from early morning until late at night, anxiously working for food to eat; for God gives rest to his loved ones.

Hastening Slowly through the Rain

I am in the middle of a longer series on "communal spiritual disciplines" and the focus this week is on "the spiritual discipline of slowing down." 

In southern California this week, the El Nino storm pattern is both reminding me of why I don't live in Portland or Seattle and also helping me to practice "slowing down".  I can't even get outside for a long run. Sheesh.

To get this conversation going, here's an excerpt from yesterday's sermon. I'll hit some practical steps for the spiritual discipline of slowing down over the next few days.  The storm's going to stay around, so there seems no need to rush through this.

A couple of years ago, one of my neighbors was driving past my house and stopped his car and rolled down his window.  A genial guy whose kids have long been involved in our church programs, I can always count on this guy for a friendly smile and hearty wave. 

Seeing that he wanted to chat a bit I walked down to the curb and said hello.  “Hey,” he called out, “Pastor Tod, do you know what your nickname is around our house?” 

I shook my head, wondering if I really wanted to know.  “We don’t call you Pastor Tod, we call you ‘Faster Tod’ because of the way you drive by our house when you take the kids to school.” 

We chuckled and his tone was light, but his point was made.  I really needed to slow down.  Today, I want to talk about the spiritual discipline of “slowing down”. 

And as that little story told you, I am probably the most in need of hearing this talk of all.  I am confessing this up front, because I don’t need any of the guys who have skied with me to think I am a hypocrite. 

I admit it.  I drive fast, I ski fast, I eat fast.  Heck, people tell me I even talk fast.  The truth is: I have a need for speed.

I love riding my bike with the wind at my back and feeling strong and sleek and powerful.  Taking turns in my private peleton of partners, drafting and pulling and going faster together than I ever could alone.

I love the feeling of careening down a powdery slope with nothing but the sound of the wind through my helmet and the squeeking of dry snow under my skis.  I love when my eyes water and my nose runs, when my lip are frozen in a wide smile on my face and the endorphins are pulsing through my veins. 

But I hate when I have to rush out the door just to squeeze in a bike ride in an already overcrowded day.  I hate rushing through the parking lot of a ski resort, trying to get kids and equipment to the lift lines, trying to get gloves on hands, and boots on feet and snacks in stomachs all the while the time is slipping by.  I hate the feeling that I am on vacation and all I am doing is yelling at my kids "Hurry up! We're going to be late for all the fun!". 

I love to race through life.  But I hate being rushed.  I have a need for speed, but I hate being in a hurry.  And what one pastor calls “hurry-sickness” is I believe one of the spiritual diseases of our day. 

In what is now a classic article in pastoral circles, John Ortberg, the preaching minister at Menlo Park Presbyterian Church wrote of a conversation he had when he called an older, wise spiritual friend:

“What did I need to do, I asked him, to be spiritually healthy?
Long pause.
"You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life," he said at last.
Another long pause.
"Okay, I've written that one down," I told him, a little impatiently. "That's a good one. Now what else is there?" I had many things to do, and this was a long-distance call, so I was anxious to cram as many units of spiritual wisdom into the least amount of time possible.
Another long pause.
"There is nothing else," he said. "You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life."

That is the next spiritual discipline that I want us to learn from Jesus as we go through this Lent.  Jesus himself had a lot to do, but he was never in a hurry.  So again, we can take his yoke and learn from him.  Listening to his Word, yielding to his Spirit with in us, encouraged by his people around us, we can learn a deeper, healthier rhythm of living.

A hurried life is a harried life.  Rushing through our days can become addictive and that our spiritual lives requires rhythms that include deliberate slowness.

I understand that we are busy, active people who are packing a lot of life into living, who want our lives to matter, who want our days to count, who want to make a difference, who want the time spent on this earth to be significant and meaningful.  I understand that we are busy. 

We can’t just eliminate the responsibilities and opportunities that necessitate our moving so quickly.  We don’t live in an environment where the pace is slow.  And many of us are in a season of life that is just going to move more quickly than even we would like.  So, how can we “ruthlessly eliminate hurry from our lives”?  How can we practice and be changed by the spiritual discipline of slowing down?

Try on this maxim from Saint Vincent de Paul, the 17th century French priest whose name is synonymous in Catholic circles with an ardent zeal and a passion for helping the poor:  “If you must be in a hurry, then let it be according to the old adage, and hasten slowly.” 

Trying to practice "hastening slowly" is what this week will be all about.  Hope to see you tomorrow.

The Spiritual Discipline of Slowing Down

"Hurry is not of the devil; hurry is the devil."—Carl Jung

Mark 6:30-34
30 The apostles gathered around Jesus, and told him all that they had done and taught. 31 He said to them, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. 32 And they went away in the boat to a deserted place by themselves. 33 Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they hurried there on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them. 34 As he went ashore, he saw a great crowd; and he had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd; and he began to teach them many things. (NRSV)

In a now classic article in Leadership Journal, John Ortberg wrote a reflection on the text for my sermon Sunday.  It serves as a fine introduction to a longer discussion of our next Lenten spiritual discipline.

During one hectic season of ministry, Mark notes of the disciples, "For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat."
Far too many people involved in ministry think of this as a life verse, as if God will reward the hectic one day with, "What a life you had! Many were coming and going, and you had no leisure even to eat. Well done!"
Not quite. Jesus was aware of this problem, and he constantly withdrew from crowds and activities. He taught the same to his followers. In one instance, when they returned from a busy time of ministry, filled with adrenaline, he told them, "Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while."
If you want to follow someone, you can't go faster than the one who is leading; following Jesus cannot be done at a sprint. Jesus was often busy but he was never hurried. Being busy is an outer condition; being hurried is a sickness of the soul.
Jesus never went about the busyness of his ministry in a way that severed the life-giving connection between himself and his Father.
He never did it in a way that interfered with his ability to give love when that was what was called for. He observed a regular rhythm of withdrawal from activity, for solitude and prayer.

Exploring that rhythm is exactly what the “communal spiritual discipline of slowing down” is all about. Hope you'll join me this week.

Real and Regular Religion

Another excerpt from Show Time: Living Down Hypocrisy by Living Out the Faith on "Showing up Regularly and Really".  Show Time was just honored by The Discerning Reader as one of the top 50 books of 2004. 

In college, I had a writing professor who said that in order to be a good writer one had to be religious about grammar.  He believed that unless you bound yourself to the rules of grammar, and practiced then every time you wrote something, then you would never develop the clear prose and clean syntax that makes for effective writing.  My writing prof understood that to be a good writer, one needed to bind one self, to commit oneself to the rules and discipline of writing, and that those rules and discipline needed to be practiced regularly, religiously. 

Let me ask you something: Based on what you do most regularly, what are you most religious about?  Some of us are religious about work, some of us are religious about exercise, some of us religious about reading the Wall Street Journal, and hopefully all of us are religious about hygiene.  Whatever you do regularly, whatever you order your life around, what ever sets the pattern of your life or binds your time is frankly, according to this definition, your religion. 

So let me challenge you to this binding commitment.  Be religious about this, let this order your life and regulate your living.  Make it a rule of your life.  A regular part of everything you do: Show up.  Show up, religiously.  Show up regularly. 

Once we realize that our religious life is nothing but a humble response to God wherever we are, then we understand that God is always, always, always reaching out to us, calling us to him, inviting us to listen and learn from him.  And godliness is nothing more than answering the call and showing up. 

Now I don’t just mean showing up to worship, though that is a pretty clear Biblical command.  And I don’t mean showing up with false fronts and fake prayers, and church manners.  What I mean is that for faith to work, we must show up before God as we really are as often as possible.  We must come before him and hold nothing back.  Whether we come with doubts and struggles, whether it is in public or at church, make the habit of bringing your real self before the real God regularly in worship, in prayer and in confession. 

In Hendrick’s Exit Interviews we learn that when people leave the church it most often because they are unable to find some genuine community, and they are going looking for it.  People desperately want an authentic spiritual community.  They want to be part of a place that is real, humble and devout.  They came to church to be with true believers, those who are genuinely and authentically devout. 

And that is why it is not enough to focus only on our own character, our own inner faith.  For faith to make a difference in a world of people looking for real encounter with God, the entire church must be different. 

In her ground-breaking book, The Shelter of Each Other, psychologist Mary Pipher tells of how the “toxic” culture that is fueled by the media, consumerism and the breakdown of extended family has led to the widespread and pervasive pain of the same dysfunctions that are rampant in urban centers.  Pipher believes that the remedy is not just helping individual people work through painful issues, but is the restoration of a sense of community where we “shelter each other” through deep relationships, authentic commitment and a commitment to stand together to challenge the destructive values of our culture. 

As a pastor, I believe that this is exactly the role of the church.  We are not just to be a hospital for broken people, but also a Community of health and wholeness.  The church is not primarily a institution, but an organism where we are “members one of another” (Romans 12:5).  What we have to offer the world is not just right doctrine, or life-changing experience, but a Community grounded in the truth, experiencing the encounter of God and sharing the support to live differently in a the world that is “corrupted by lust.”

At this point in the journey we are intentionally beginning to acknowledge that Christianity is not a solo endeavor.  And those who make the most difference in the world are not just individual saints, but godly communities. 

“Just as I am, Just as We are”

Imagine the difference if those of us who have learned to come to Jesus “just as I am” started coming to church “just as I am.”  Imagine how different would be the quality of worship, the sincerity of our fellowship, the authenticity of our friendships, the care for our guests, if each of us was dedicated to coming before God “just as I am.”  No fakery, no desire to impress anyone else, just our humble real selves living before God’s face whether at church or in public all the time.  Let what we sing about Jesus be true about Jesus’ people...

“Just as I am, tho tossed about with many a conflict, many a doubt, fightings and fears within, without, O lamb of God, I come."

That seems pretty real to me.

Tomorrow we start preparing for our next spiritual discipline in the series: "Slowing Down"

The Puritans and Prayer

On Friday mornings in Lent we at SCPC offer a service of contemplative prayer and Lectio Divina from 7-8 AM in our Stephen's Chapel. It is meant to be a nice quiet, but "social" place for prayer as the Puritans would say.  I am SO using this on Friday. As someone with a great love for the Puritans (I received a minor in historical theology writing on the Puritans when I got my Ph.D.) I was thrilled to come across this poem at the "Rebecca Writes" blog .  Rebecca uses the Puritans in a number of posts, so now I will be linking to her site from my.  Thanks for reminding me, Rebecca. Go by and say thanks to her for giving us such good stuff, ok?

On Opening a Place for Social Prayer

Jesus, where'er thy people meet,
There they behold thy mercy-seat;
Where'er they seek thee thou art found,
And ev'ry place is hallow'd ground.

For thou, within no walls confin'd,
Inhabitest the humble mind;
Such ever bring thee, where they come,
And going, take thee to their home.

Dear Shepherd of thy chosen few!
Thy former mercies here renew;
Here, to our waiting hearts, proclaim
The sweetness of thy saving name.

Here may we prove the pow'r of pray'r,
To strengthen faith, and sweeten care;
To teach our faint desires to rise,
And bring all heav'n before our eyes.

Behold! At thy commanding word,
We stretch the curtain and the cord;
Come thou, and fill this wider space,
And help us with a large increase.

Lord, we are few, but thou art near;
Nor short thine arm, nor deaf thine ear;
Oh rend the heav'ns, come quickly down,
And make a thousand hearts thine own!

---William Cowper.

Real Religion Part 1

In my sermon on the Spiritual Discipline of Showing Up, I said, “If you are going to be sticking your neck out and taking on Jesus’ yoke, for his sake, don’t fake it.  Bring your real self to God.”

For the next couple of days, I want us to consider what it means to bring our “real selves” to God by offering some excerpts from my book Show Time: Living Down Hypocrisy by Living Out the Faith.  You see, I found when I was researching and writing the book that the biggest concern of both Christians and non-Christians when it comes to our faith is the amount of hypocrisy that is evident in Christianity.  So how do we “make it real” and “live it out”?  What does it mean to “Show up ‘really’” for Christ?

2 Peter 1:3-10 lays out for us a path of steps for Christians to cultivate the kind of character that is respected even by unbelievers, to live a life that is commendable by any reasonable standard. 

And faith that produces a life commendable to unbelievers includes—no, requires—a religious life.  Faith alone is not enough, individual character is not enough.  Faith that works, produces religion that works.  And religion that works reflects well the very character of God to a searching world.

The word “godliness” in 2 Peter 1:3-10 is also translated in other verses like 1 Timothy 3:6 as “religion.”  It refers to the personal and corporate commitments that we make as a sign of our devotion to God.  Godliness is both our piety and practice, both our inner spiritual life and our corporate worship life.

In this text, we learn that our faith—if we truly want it to be respected by those in the world—must not only produce character, but also consistent acts of devotion.  Now this may seem strange to us.  Why would anyone in the world, care about my church life?  Why would secular people give a hoot about the way I practice my religion?

Reconsidering Religion

Since the word religion comes from the Latin word that means “to bind, or to commit” we could say that godliness means demonstrating our inner devotion to God in acts of binding commitment.  It is our worship life, our church life, our ethical life.  It is our faith at work in church. 

What is interesting here is to remember is that this is a list of what we would call “secular” virtues from Greek culture.  What the popular culture of the day found commendable.  And one of the character qualities that was considered most commendable was sincere, devout godliness or religion.   And I believe that this is still the case today. 

In Gallup’s annual poll of the most respected people in the world, Billy Graham has been named more than any other person in the last 50 years.  Pope John Paul the II is always mentioned, and until her death, the reigning most admired woman in the world was Mother Theresa.  Even in such potentially anti-religious institutions as professional sports, Hakeem Olajauwon, a devout Moslem was called by Sports Illustrated as the “most widely respected player amongst his peers” in part because of his well-known devotion to his religion even undertaking the month-long fast of Ramadan during the basketball season. 

In other words, even non-religious people respect and admire those who are devout, sincere and dedicated to their religions.  And this is exactly what this passage refers to.  It is telling us that if faith works, then it must not only produce personal character, but that character must be expressed in committed devotion and consistent practice of our faith.  The world wants to see if we can “walk our talk.”  Unbelievers want to see if it is possible to live bound to other believers in shared commitment.  And I believe this is exactly why very often the single biggest stumbling block to unbelievers seeking God, is not Jesus but Christians; not faith but church.

In his book titled Exit Interviews, William Hendricks revealed the results of interviews with people who have left Christian churches.  Now, their reasons for leaving were varied, but a common theme was evident. When people leave the church, they are not trying to leave God.  When people leave the church, they are usually deeply disappointed in the people of the church. They came looking for genuine community of people committed to their convictions and they left saying that the church was little different than any other group in the world.

Even people who are exploring the faith are looking to see if what we believe really makes a difference in the way practice our faith.  Is our faith demonstrated in godliness, do our beliefs produce genuine religion.  Or is this really all just some kind of perfunctory social game?  The people interviewed told story after story of the disappointment between what people said they believed and how they acted—even at church. 

So here is the next step on following Jesus into the real world of Monday to Friday: pause and consider how well you are doing on Sundays.  A genuine and vibrant faith results in an authentic and real church.  And “godliness” is both. So, how do we produce this godliness? 

Tune in tomorrow…. (In the spirit of my conviction that spiritual disciplines are best practiced communally, I included a series of questions for a group discussion at the end of each chapter of Show Time.  A number of small groups are using this short biblical exposition of one passage for their small groups.  A good price for buying the book in bunches is found here.)

I Read with Dead People…

For this series, I am offering a different kind of list of spiritual disciplines, a communal way of “training, not trying” that will encourage a shared spiritual life, a yoking to Christ through the body of Christ. In my sermon last Sunday, I launched this new series calling it, The Gentle Yoke: Spirituality for Stubborn Souls.  Drawing from the imagery in Jesus invitation to take his “yoke” upon us and “learn” from him, for the remainder of this Lenten series, I will be exploring what it means to be yoked to Jesus. I am suggesting that to be yoked to Jesus today is to learn from the Spirit of Christ through the Body of Christ.  It is to learn from the Spirit through the Word in communion. 

Today, one more take on Showing up by "reading in communion." 

“Daddy, do you understand everything about what we read in the Bible?” my eight-year-old daughter asked me.  “Because I sure don’t.”  I laughed aloud.   “Oh no, Ali, I just know where to read so I can learn from those who do.” 

Since New Year’s my family has been attempting to have a little Bible Study every time we sit down for dinner.  One person reads a SHORT passage from the Bible (we are reading the book of James currently), another prays.  Then we answer two questions:  What does this mean?  And What should we do about this? It’s simple enough.  And often profound. 

It has been a gratifying thing to have a Bible study as a family.  But when we are sitting down for dinner and talking about a passage of the Bible, I sometimes envision us being surrounded by literally hundreds of Bible teachers, scholars and commentators. I think of us having this conversation about “loving our neighbors” and about treating the poor well with Henri Nouwen, John Calvin, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Mother Theresa, St. Augustine, or the Desert Fathers. 

Of course, I don’t name drop in front of the kids.  But really it’s all the dead people that I read that make me seem so smart.  And of course, there are a lot of smart, godly, still living people who are also “there” through their writings.  NT Wright, Richard Hays, John Stott, Dale Bruner….and the list goes on.

One of the reasons why I love to teach and preach the Bible is that it gives me an excuse to read the Bible with faithful saints of every time and place.  I have been well-trained to do so with relative ease and that responsibility and calling is also one of my great joys.  (It is also the reason why the “teaching office” of the church remains an integral part of “priesthood of all believers.”)

Many of us struggle with reading the Bible because we have never taken the time to read it with the great teachers of past and present.  (And frankly many of our current inductive Bible studies and small groups become little more than collective pools of ignorance when we ignore the great teachers of the church.) 

This Lenten season, consider taking some time to read the Bible with some dead (and living) people.   Pick up an easy to read commentary and read for yourself.  I wholeheartedly recommend NT (Tom) Wright’s “Bible for Everyone…” series  (and the good bishop seems to be very much alive).  Wright draws from and writes the very best in historical and scholarly commentaries and yet has the uncanny ability to bring that scholarship down to our “everyday” level.  (When I grow up as a scholar, I want to be like him.)   

Then bring what you’ve learned into a Bible discussion with your friends.  Challenge your pastor with good questions, think and talk and post something on a blog.  Enter the great on-going conversation about the Word of God and the world.

People will think you’re really smart.