Driving home last night I was listening to a local Christian radio station -- something I don't do so often because I'm a huge CBC fan.
Anyways, because I'm in the habit of actually listening to song lyrics and reflecting on what they mean to me, a song from the band "Switchfoot" was playing. The chorus goes as follows:
this is your life, are you who you want to be
this is your life, is it everything you dreamed that it would be
when the world was younger and you had everything to lose?
I went for a walk with my little family, watched as my wife patiently waiting for our toddler to inspect every single item of interest along the pathway, and played 'googly eyes' with our baby.
We made supper together, and each tried different ways to get an obstinate toddler to eat, while at the same time plying a starving baby (by his facial expression) with assorted arrowroot cookies and bananas.
Then bathtime, and bedtime. We prayed together with our little family, and I kissed my boys and sent them off to bed. I read and put together a Adult Education lesson for Sunday until they were asleep, and then the co-Director and I picked the hymns that our church will sing on the Sundays in Advent.
Then, later, to bed.
And all I could think was yes, this is my life. Yes, this is where I want it to be, and yes -- it's what I hoped and prayed it would be when I was younger.
I am lucky. I am happy. I am a man most richly blessed.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Sunday, October 26, 2008
now you know...
What I'm reading tonight.
A very good friend of ours breeds and raises Devon Rex cats. Incredibly nice animals. Docile, kind.
Except that the first time I was over at their house I asked how their cat survived the farm accident.
Ouch. I mean, luckily their looks grow on you -- well, they kinda have to. But now, I've seen an uglier cat:
update: now the 'Devon Rex' link actually links to their site, and I've added it to the links on the left.
more animals
A very good friend of ours breeds and raises Devon Rex cats. Incredibly nice animals. Docile, kind.
Except that the first time I was over at their house I asked how their cat survived the farm accident.
Ouch. I mean, luckily their looks grow on you -- well, they kinda have to. But now, I've seen an uglier cat:
update: now the 'Devon Rex' link actually links to their site, and I've added it to the links on the left.
more animals
Thursday, October 23, 2008
remembering....
For quite a while, I provided worship leadership to Christ Church Anglican in Nanton, Alberta. A wonderful congregation in a 100-year-old church. Dedicated to the Book of Common Prayer. Like, the old version.
One Thanksgiving the leadership they'd organized fell through, and I volunteered to supply, from the old BCP.
Things were running smoothly until I was leading the congregation in the Nicene Creed, whereupon I made a small s-related mistake. The line was supposed to be "who sitteth at the right hand of the Father."
Not what I said.
Later, when I was sitting talking with my own pastor, one Reverend Kevin Powell by name, I admitted my mistake and mentioned that it was entirely likely that Jesus did not shitteth at the right hand of the Father, after all.
He ruminated for a minute. Nodded sagely.
"Very incarnational." was all he said.
One Thanksgiving the leadership they'd organized fell through, and I volunteered to supply, from the old BCP.
Things were running smoothly until I was leading the congregation in the Nicene Creed, whereupon I made a small s-related mistake. The line was supposed to be "who sitteth at the right hand of the Father."
Not what I said.
Later, when I was sitting talking with my own pastor, one Reverend Kevin Powell by name, I admitted my mistake and mentioned that it was entirely likely that Jesus did not shitteth at the right hand of the Father, after all.
He ruminated for a minute. Nodded sagely.
"Very incarnational." was all he said.
5 Influences
Kevin tagged me to list any five people -- living or dead -- who have influenced me spiritually. So, here goes:
1. The Rev. Reg Berg. Pastor and friend from my teens. His gentle guidance and wisdom showed to me that ministry was a possibility in my life.
2. Les and Carol Ferguson. Close friends of my family for as long as I can remember; a model for myself of lives lived wholly committed to Christ.
3. Bernice and Richard Friesen. Because if my marriage can be as strong as theirs is with its foundation in faith, I will be able to call myself successful in life.
4. the Rev. Erin Phillips. Campus Chaplain at the University of Lethbridge and Lethbridge College. Because she lit the Refiner's fire. Though I don't nearly talk to her as often as I need to, or should.
5. Rev. Dr Martin Luther. Because I too struggle with legalism and have to continually remind myself to find freedom in grace.
(and 6, because Kevin only listed 4. I'm stealing his #5.)
6. Rev. Kevin G Powell. Beer and incarnational theology 101. 'nuff said.
So, I tag Kristie, Kristen, and Gunfighter.
1. The Rev. Reg Berg. Pastor and friend from my teens. His gentle guidance and wisdom showed to me that ministry was a possibility in my life.
2. Les and Carol Ferguson. Close friends of my family for as long as I can remember; a model for myself of lives lived wholly committed to Christ.
3. Bernice and Richard Friesen. Because if my marriage can be as strong as theirs is with its foundation in faith, I will be able to call myself successful in life.
4. the Rev. Erin Phillips. Campus Chaplain at the University of Lethbridge and Lethbridge College. Because she lit the Refiner's fire. Though I don't nearly talk to her as often as I need to, or should.
5. Rev. Dr Martin Luther. Because I too struggle with legalism and have to continually remind myself to find freedom in grace.
(and 6, because Kevin only listed 4. I'm stealing his #5.)
6. Rev. Kevin G Powell. Beer and incarnational theology 101. 'nuff said.
So, I tag Kristie, Kristen, and Gunfighter.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
don't feed the bear!
Thanks in part to the 'feed the Vicar' program at church and combined with my own passion for stuffing my increasingly pudgy face, I've gained 15 pounds in two months.
Oof.
My new weight-loss program is as follows:
1) buy straightjacket.
2) wear at mealtimes.
3) eat what is accessible with a straw.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Sermon for Sunday October 12, 2008
Text: Matthew 13:44-52
Our cousins to the south paint a portrait of Thanksgiving that most of us here are probably familiar with. I remember when I was just a wee lad in school at the beginning of October we – a Canadian elementary school class – learned about the Mayflower, about pilgrims, and about kind, beneficent Natives who hosted a feast in the brutal cold.
So we too gather together to celebrate a harvest. The harvest of food, certainly, as now most of the fields surrounding the city lie fallow and empty. In about every culture in the Northern Hemisphere there’s some form of autumn harvest festival.
But there’s another element, here, in this place, as well.
Because part of our Christian walk is the time that we take to give thanks back to God for our selves, our time, and our possessions – all signs of God’s gracious love towards us. We give thanks that the kingdom of heaven has come near to us and that we have seen some of its splendours.
So we return the first fruits of our labours back unto God, as each of us chooses to give: not because we’re ordered too, but in the recognition that everything we have comes from God, that God “provided us with every blessing in abundance.
Though it’s often easier to find what’s wrong with our lives than what’s right. Maybe there’s a place for that – after all, there are Psalms of Lament, even a whole book of the Bible is called ‘Lamentations.’ Laments pop up quite often in Scripture, when the heroes of our faith find themselves in dire straights and it seems to them that the Almighty is conspicuously absent. As a Psalm begins, “by the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept.”
Yet there’s something interesting about those psalms – they often shift into praising God at the end, as if the writer remembered that even having a God to which one could complain is something to be thankful for.
A wise friend of mine read a letter that his uncle had written him many years before: “always remember,” it said, “you are the blessings for which your ancestors prayed.” For the most part, it seems, a lot of people over the years have given thanks for things that hadn’t even happened yet.
Consider Isaiah. Isaiah 24 and 25 form part of an eschatological text – it deals with a vision of the end of time. Of course, Isaiah begin chapter 25 by reminding God of things past: “for you have done wonderful things, plans formed of old, faithful and sure.” God had done marvellous things for Isaiah – and even more wonderful things for the poor and oppressed of the land.
But God is going to do even more wonders. “And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever!”
Because you see, for Isaiah and his people, death wasn’t an abstract thing. Death – or mot in Hebrew – was a noun. A person, place, or thing. So Isaiah isn’t concerned that the Lord of Hosts is going to pull a new-age mamby-pamby “crossing over” trick.
No. For Isaiah, DEATH WILL BE DONE. No more death, no more pit. No more condemnation to a kingdom other than God’s. No more tears, for that is his promise – “then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces.”
No substitutions, exchanges, or refunds. Now, that is something to be thankful for. The death – no, the absolute destruction – of death itself.
Too many of us here – quite possibly even all of us – know all too well that death still plays the end of our lives. We’ve held the hands of loved ones, little ones, and tried valiantly to will away the end of their lives. In our hands we’ve held our hearts and tried to share some of our own life. We’ve prayed, Lord, how we’ve prayed. And it seems that death still comes, relentless.
Death came to Isaiah, as well. In fact, it may seem sometimes like we scramble to find an insurance policy against death – we stop drinking alcohol and caffeine, we exercise, we eat better. But death still catches us. But in Christ, this is not the end.
We give thanks for the kingdom of heaven. Matthew records that Jesus told us that the kingdom of heaven is like a pearl of great value, and if we can sell everything we own to possess it, then we may hold a small piece of the kingdom. But how big a picture is that small piece of the kingdom? We may sell everything we own to possess it – although, to be certain, church giving touches about 1.7% of the average income throughout North America – but we bring our children to be baptized, and come here on Sunday morning to remember our relationship to God.
Like all good parables that Jesus tells, I think that the pearl of great price has two messages. The first is meant for people – to find that small piece of the kingdom, and cling to it. But the second…well, the second is meant to show us just how big that kingdom is.
The life of faith begins with accepting that God’s love is already in our hearts, minds, and souls. Without that, we are nothing. With God’s love poured into our hearts we become Pearls of Great Value. Rather than being something for us to possess, we become most valuable to god.
And all pearls start as but a grain of sand. All mustard seeds are tiny.
Episcopalian Bishop Tom Shaw noted: “their shared secret is that a humble beginning and an almost secret presence are not inconsistent with a great and glorious conclusion. But the parable of the pearl of great price also reminds us of where we choose to place value upon objects. The world’s chief values are not intrinsic but extrinsic; they reside in the God who is above the world and within the world and waiting at its end.”
And that’s what we wait for. That end. As North American Christians – really, as residents of the western half of the northern hemisphere – we automatically place value on what we possess. Buildings, land – what we cunningly call ‘equity’ is what God calls ‘mammon.’ Now having things of value isn’t the problem; it’s when their value becomes what defines us as men and women that we start to lose OUR own value. In the end, God wants us – not our possessions.
The greatest value that we share is our Christian identity; the love of Christ Jesus in which we live, and move, and have our very being. And the Good News of the kingdom – the news that we need, more than ever, to proclaim to the world – are the words of Paul in Romans chapter 8 verse 25:
For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
Because we are indeed, through the grace of God through the sacrifice of Christ Jesus, pearls of great price.
One thing I will share with you: you, each and every one of you, is a pearl of great value. It is for you that God sought high and low, it was you that Jesus Christ loved so much that he, in fact, sold out everything he had – even his very life – because you are that pearl. Because to possess you, to hold you in the love of God for eternity, Christ finally accomplished what was promised through Isaiah:
He swallowed up death forever.
Jesus Christ gave everything – even unto the point of death – for you. Not because you did something grand. Not because you worked to become a shinier pearl. But because you simply are. You are beloved of God. That’s it. That’s all the training you need.
And there is a ‘therefore’ attached to that…because we possess the kingdom;
Because we are God’s beloved;
Therefore we are like the householder who brings out of his own abundance the gifts for the whole people of God: the old –
- which is the ancient tale of salvation
and the new –
- which is the grace of Jesus Christ.
Because we have been called as disciples of Jesus Christ, because we have been baptized and brought to the Table, therefore we are bound to turn to our neighbors and share what we have with them – share our time, our presence, share ourselves.
All that we have is gift. All that we really – and truly – have is Jesus Christ.
As you gather around your meal this afternoon or tomorrow – remember: thanks be to God for that indescribable gift.
May this be so among us. Amen.
Our cousins to the south paint a portrait of Thanksgiving that most of us here are probably familiar with. I remember when I was just a wee lad in school at the beginning of October we – a Canadian elementary school class – learned about the Mayflower, about pilgrims, and about kind, beneficent Natives who hosted a feast in the brutal cold.
So we too gather together to celebrate a harvest. The harvest of food, certainly, as now most of the fields surrounding the city lie fallow and empty. In about every culture in the Northern Hemisphere there’s some form of autumn harvest festival.
But there’s another element, here, in this place, as well.
Because part of our Christian walk is the time that we take to give thanks back to God for our selves, our time, and our possessions – all signs of God’s gracious love towards us. We give thanks that the kingdom of heaven has come near to us and that we have seen some of its splendours.
So we return the first fruits of our labours back unto God, as each of us chooses to give: not because we’re ordered too, but in the recognition that everything we have comes from God, that God “provided us with every blessing in abundance.
Though it’s often easier to find what’s wrong with our lives than what’s right. Maybe there’s a place for that – after all, there are Psalms of Lament, even a whole book of the Bible is called ‘Lamentations.’ Laments pop up quite often in Scripture, when the heroes of our faith find themselves in dire straights and it seems to them that the Almighty is conspicuously absent. As a Psalm begins, “by the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept.”
Yet there’s something interesting about those psalms – they often shift into praising God at the end, as if the writer remembered that even having a God to which one could complain is something to be thankful for.
A wise friend of mine read a letter that his uncle had written him many years before: “always remember,” it said, “you are the blessings for which your ancestors prayed.” For the most part, it seems, a lot of people over the years have given thanks for things that hadn’t even happened yet.
Consider Isaiah. Isaiah 24 and 25 form part of an eschatological text – it deals with a vision of the end of time. Of course, Isaiah begin chapter 25 by reminding God of things past: “for you have done wonderful things, plans formed of old, faithful and sure.” God had done marvellous things for Isaiah – and even more wonderful things for the poor and oppressed of the land.
But God is going to do even more wonders. “And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever!”
Because you see, for Isaiah and his people, death wasn’t an abstract thing. Death – or mot in Hebrew – was a noun. A person, place, or thing. So Isaiah isn’t concerned that the Lord of Hosts is going to pull a new-age mamby-pamby “crossing over” trick.
No. For Isaiah, DEATH WILL BE DONE. No more death, no more pit. No more condemnation to a kingdom other than God’s. No more tears, for that is his promise – “then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces.”
No substitutions, exchanges, or refunds. Now, that is something to be thankful for. The death – no, the absolute destruction – of death itself.
Too many of us here – quite possibly even all of us – know all too well that death still plays the end of our lives. We’ve held the hands of loved ones, little ones, and tried valiantly to will away the end of their lives. In our hands we’ve held our hearts and tried to share some of our own life. We’ve prayed, Lord, how we’ve prayed. And it seems that death still comes, relentless.
Death came to Isaiah, as well. In fact, it may seem sometimes like we scramble to find an insurance policy against death – we stop drinking alcohol and caffeine, we exercise, we eat better. But death still catches us. But in Christ, this is not the end.
We give thanks for the kingdom of heaven. Matthew records that Jesus told us that the kingdom of heaven is like a pearl of great value, and if we can sell everything we own to possess it, then we may hold a small piece of the kingdom. But how big a picture is that small piece of the kingdom? We may sell everything we own to possess it – although, to be certain, church giving touches about 1.7% of the average income throughout North America – but we bring our children to be baptized, and come here on Sunday morning to remember our relationship to God.
Like all good parables that Jesus tells, I think that the pearl of great price has two messages. The first is meant for people – to find that small piece of the kingdom, and cling to it. But the second…well, the second is meant to show us just how big that kingdom is.
The life of faith begins with accepting that God’s love is already in our hearts, minds, and souls. Without that, we are nothing. With God’s love poured into our hearts we become Pearls of Great Value. Rather than being something for us to possess, we become most valuable to god.
And all pearls start as but a grain of sand. All mustard seeds are tiny.
Episcopalian Bishop Tom Shaw noted: “their shared secret is that a humble beginning and an almost secret presence are not inconsistent with a great and glorious conclusion. But the parable of the pearl of great price also reminds us of where we choose to place value upon objects. The world’s chief values are not intrinsic but extrinsic; they reside in the God who is above the world and within the world and waiting at its end.”
And that’s what we wait for. That end. As North American Christians – really, as residents of the western half of the northern hemisphere – we automatically place value on what we possess. Buildings, land – what we cunningly call ‘equity’ is what God calls ‘mammon.’ Now having things of value isn’t the problem; it’s when their value becomes what defines us as men and women that we start to lose OUR own value. In the end, God wants us – not our possessions.
The greatest value that we share is our Christian identity; the love of Christ Jesus in which we live, and move, and have our very being. And the Good News of the kingdom – the news that we need, more than ever, to proclaim to the world – are the words of Paul in Romans chapter 8 verse 25:
For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
Because we are indeed, through the grace of God through the sacrifice of Christ Jesus, pearls of great price.
One thing I will share with you: you, each and every one of you, is a pearl of great value. It is for you that God sought high and low, it was you that Jesus Christ loved so much that he, in fact, sold out everything he had – even his very life – because you are that pearl. Because to possess you, to hold you in the love of God for eternity, Christ finally accomplished what was promised through Isaiah:
He swallowed up death forever.
Jesus Christ gave everything – even unto the point of death – for you. Not because you did something grand. Not because you worked to become a shinier pearl. But because you simply are. You are beloved of God. That’s it. That’s all the training you need.
And there is a ‘therefore’ attached to that…because we possess the kingdom;
Because we are God’s beloved;
Therefore we are like the householder who brings out of his own abundance the gifts for the whole people of God: the old –
- which is the ancient tale of salvation
and the new –
- which is the grace of Jesus Christ.
Because we have been called as disciples of Jesus Christ, because we have been baptized and brought to the Table, therefore we are bound to turn to our neighbors and share what we have with them – share our time, our presence, share ourselves.
All that we have is gift. All that we really – and truly – have is Jesus Christ.
As you gather around your meal this afternoon or tomorrow – remember: thanks be to God for that indescribable gift.
May this be so among us. Amen.
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