Ministry to the Me-Me's

Not trying to put young people in a box...

The Boston Globe called them “entitled”. Time Magazine called them "lazy, entitled narcissists who still live with their parents." The national study of Youth and Religion found that 60% of them turn to “what feels right” when making moral decisions. They are the largest generation since the Baby Boomers. They are the unique generation that has grown up with smart phones, social media and reality television. They are the millennials, people born between 1980 and 2000 and they are 80 million of them.

I picked up the recent Time Magazine issue to learn more about this generation that many label arrogant, self-absorbed and entitled. What I found was a solid affirmation that Olivet’s inter-generational, cross-cultural, creative ministry of the God Squad is timely and necessary as we adapt to a world quickly changing around us.

  The Millenials, according to some,  are the most adaptive generation of Americans yet. They have  incorporated the use of technology into their daily life, seemingly with little effort. They complete school work on the computer as soon as kindergarten. They prefer to text rather than have a face-to-face conversation. As a parent, as much as I want to yank my kids away from the ipad -their comfort with technology can be a blessing. Who hasn't desperately turned to a neighbor kid to solve a problem with a laptop, to reconfigure a cell phone, or simply reset a basic digital clock? Certianly their  comfort may worry us - as they naively share personal information on-line, post photos and visit websites without parental consent. It is a big scary world out there – but not to this generation, it seems. 

  When my daughter started downloading virtual pet games, I honestly didn’t think much of it. Then one day I got an alert on my phone that her virtually puppy had not been fed in days. Evidently I was being contacted  as next of kin to save it's life.  With a virtual world of pet horses, tigers and even cute monsters, there is much to connect and engage her, but without the living breathing element of God’s creation.  For example, my daughter was absorbed in the ipad, grooming and feeding her virtual jaguar while her real life housecat was clawing at the couch. What a reality check. We have two worlds happening simultaneously and a wedge is quickly being driven between children and nature, between generation and generation.

The Christian church has always wrestled with how to understand the gap that exists between cultures.  “We must be in the world, but not of it,” we say. The apostle Paul struggled to bridge the gap between the Jewish and Gentile believers. Rather then condemn the yonger generation for their "love" of smart phones, lets learn from each other. Let's join in partnership  as the God Squad this summer: We will both embrace technology while enjoying the simple joys of fishing, crabbing, hiking, gardening. 

The God Squad is intergenerational and cross-cultural because the church must work against the "Relationship Wedge" that is growing in our culture. Studies show that young people who connect via social media lose the interpersonal component of face to face interaction. They are more connected to their peer group,  but less connected to people of different age groupings,economic backgrounds and cultural backgrounds. The God Squad seeks to be God's movement of bridging older adults and the young persons, to bring together urban and rural because the benefit from these relationships are holy. 

  The relationship wedge is a real one. Have you ever ever seen young people hanging out together but each looking at their phones? Young people are both more connected while at the same time less connected. Communication has changed, but the church can adapt with it - embracing both the social media and the traditional face-to-face community building.  What would it look like if we helped kids use their phones to share their faith along with their ideas and experiences?

Our church is at a place in history where we may choose to either passively allow a cultural wedge be driven or instead claim ourselves as “repairers of the breach” in advance of a great loss. God Squad is aimed toward  being the church in a new way. We are partnering with an urban, African-American Church in mission and ministry. We are connecting people to God’s creation with boating trips with Captain Rachel Dean’s boat The Roughwater. Children and youth will enjoy the crabbing, fishing, art project at Ann Marie Gardens, the farming project with Barbie Ritter and Annette Milling. Our partner church has received funding from Home Depot to do urban beautification around McKendree-Simms-Brookland United Methodist Church.

Sign up and join the God Squad. We need adults who are interested in going to DC for the urban gardening or who just want to come up for dinner and tour. We need adults who can fishing with a young person off our neighboring dock in Olivet. We need cooks, photographers, chaperones and persons to pray for the work of this special venture.

  The movement of God in the lives of the next generation is sure to look different from our own times, but it won’t happen if we don’t connect to each other in Jesus name.  When we gather on June 25th for a meal with our partner church and a tour on the Old Town Trolley, we are answering Jesus’ prayer that “we may all be one.” Despite our diversity, we are all one body of Christ unified by Him. When the kids turn their smart phones into tools of evangelism and they blog, tweet and create digital messages of their experiences in Washington DC – we are witnessing them express their faith in their unique mode. Be sure to  watch for photos and stories from them as they participate in what is certain to be a first ever cross-cultural mission trip between United Methodist Churches. 

  Our young people are not any lazier, more self-absorbed, or narcissistic than any previous other generation. But let the church be the place where every generation will know that we are all children of God, redeemed by His Spirit and made One through Christ Jesus...to be the God Squad - in formation for serving others before ourselves!

A Fool for the Sake of the Gospel

Praying in public can be embarrassing. Especially, when you are desperate to find  a missing wallet.

My two daughters and I were riding the metro in Washington DC, when I casually reached for my wallet and couldn’t find it. I looked in every pocket of my bag. No Wallet. I pulled out books and papers, to see if it was tucked inside. No Wallet. I began to panic. I said, “Girls, my wallet is gone.” We set off to the security booth where I explained the situation. They were helpful, asked for a description and suggested that maybe it was left on the train before we had transferred. They sent someone to search for it.

We stood by the booth waiting. Panic was rising within me, I said to my daughters, “We have to pray. Now. They have to find that wallet.”  The three of us grabbed hands, sat on the concrete floor and prayed while commuters rushed through the turnstiles.

In a circumstance like that, most anyone is prompted to pray. I thought about just praying on my own, but I was so worried, I wanted all of us to pray together. We did.  We prayed that the wallet be safe. We prayed that nobody take anything from it. We prayed that whoever is looking for it be assisted by angels to help them find it. Lastly, I asked God for forgiveness for having been irresponsible and I said I was sorry for losing it. We closed with "Amen." Then we waited. I continued to panic as I got on my cell phone to put a hold on credit cards. 

Sometimes prayers get answered just as we expected. But sometimes, they don’t. This time they got answered in more ways than I expected.

Our spoken prayer was that God send an angel to help the person find my wallet. But the one who received that divine help was not one of the metro workers. It was my daughter. After praying, she was quiet for several minutes and then and went into Problem Solving Mode. While I was on the phone, she began firing off questions, “Did you look in your pants pocket?” “Did it fall out of your pocket?” It was a bit irritating actually as I was trying to press "3" for customer service etc. Part of me wanted to stop her as she grabbed my bag and began methodically going through it, yet again. 

But low and behold, she found it. My wallet was tucked in a zippered pocket of the bag. Yes,  I had forgotten to check that zipped pocket.

We jumped up and down. We squealed with delight. A prayer had been answered. What was lost was found! Sophia declared that the angels had helped her sister. We all were dancing with joy. The metro security workers were mildly amused and put a stop on the wallet search.  

For the girls, the joy was that their spoken prayer was answered. But for me, what was answered was also an ongoing silent prayer. 
I had been praying the silent (rambling) prayers of a mom who worries about her children's faith. I see them becoming aware that most people don't go to church, don't believe in God and don't know the stories of the bible.  I get discouraged that they don't have what I had growing up - a large church with  multi-age Sunday School classes, junior choirs and an elementary school filled with "church kids". Sophia asks me why her teachers and friends are allowed to say "Oh My God" when the bible says we aren't supposed to. It breaks my heart because to say "We believe in God, we are different." With a mom who is a pastor, will they think that faith is reserved only for those who are called to ministry,  have the name faith, or make no mistakes in life.

I pray to God continually that they have their own relationship with God - one that can ask God for forgiveness and receive God's love and grace throughout life.

I think that my rambling prayer was answered in that Metro station. I was humbled that day by God's power t in the middle of rush hour in the nation’s capital. When i asked God to forgive me for losing the wallet, I felt I had demonstrated an important reality of Christian living that is not just taught in the Sunday School class. When we sat on that dirty concrete floor and huddled to pray,  we were all relying on God in a way that was more real than a reading a bible story. We even laughed that we didn’t care that people looked at us when our screams of rejoicing echoed through the train station. We were unashamed in our faith.. and were were glorifying God for the miracle he had done.

Interestingly, teaching my children repentance, forgiveness, and humility was a lesson learned when I was most ashamed and embarrassed of my shortcomings. Looking back, I see that the Missing Wallet Situation taught me more than I can recount. 

For me, God answered the prayer of a praying mom who wants to model faith as well as teach it… even if it means making a fool out of myself. 

For them, God answered the prayer of the lost wallet.  

Either way, it was the power of God to save us.

Can I remarry after the death of my spouse?

This question was asked of me most recently by a young woman who tragically lost her husband at an early age. I wrote my response, and I share it now with others:

 On that hopeful, joyful wedding day, none pay too much thought to the implications behind the lengthy vows of ….richer and poorer, sickness and health… and especially the concluding… “til death do us part”. As we start out our marriage, we are focused on the strength we will need to navigate the years ahead – which is a good way for us to begin.

I have met with couples before their the wedding day who have been honest enough to ask me if it is not contradictory to quote 1 Corinthians 13 “Love never ends” while at the same time take a vow “til death to us part.” I appreciate this question because it does hold us in a peculiar tension of our faith.  Love is indeed everlasting. So why put an "end cap" to the marriage vow?

I can personally testify how I know for certain that love never ends.  Love doesn’t stop when two people are separated by geographical space or time. Love doesn't end when we say goodbye. Love doesn't end when death separates us. That is a tenet of our Christian faith:  Nothing can separate us from the love of God. The veil between heaven and earth is a holy mystery where love crosses both ways. Indeed, love has no end.

So why take a vow at marriage that defines an ending? The reason is not to declare an end to love – but rather to give blessing to your spouse that if we are parted by death, our earthly commitment to fidelity is released with a blessing of peace and freedom. Old Testament law and New Testament scripture permits (and in some cases encourages) widows to remarry.

The question becomes not a legal one “Am I allowed to marry again” but really becomes a more personal one regarding the spirit of love that is everlasting – Our question becomes “Am I able to love again? Am I able to remarry?”

To answer this I would invite you to consider two things: (1) what scripture tells us about heaven (2) the blessing behind the words of the marriage vow.

Regarding Heaven, this is a lengthy one but I will pull together some basics.

•           Heaven is the place where everyone will be in close relationship to God. We will not have sorrow or pain. Revelation 7:17 and Revelation 21:1-4
•          Our loved ones in heaven can see what we are doing. Those who love us are cheering us on as we live out our days on earth. Luke 15:7, Hebrews 12:1

When a loved one dies, we know their love remains, but scripture shows that they continue to be aware of the loved ones who are still on earth. This was a hard one for me personally because when my mother died, my siblings turned against each other. All I could think of is how this woman who sought peace could now see the bitter fighting of her children. I concluded she must certainly be upset. But then I realized that in heaven, she doesn’t weep for us, rather like it says in Hebrews 12, she is joined with others in heaven who  “cheer on” us still living out the days we have. Like watching us run a race, she is on the sideline encouraging us to do right, to chose love, to turn from fighting. She can indeed see, but she knows that the finish line is peace and reconciliation with God and one another.

Take some time to consider heaven and the life that your spouse now has in this place. It is a place where the earthly obstacles that kept us from loving fully are gone. He has no more sorrow, guilt, shame, struggle – so he can love you more widely and from a place of everlasting love. At the same time, consider that he wants you to “run the race that is set before you” – to believe that life is worth living, that love is worth finding and hope is worth seeking even in the darkest of days.

Finally, I go back to that day when you stood before one another and took the traditional vows. That vow is a powerful source of strength. We know it is the vow that kept us yoked through difficult times – but it is also a vow that gives a blessing of benediction. By saying “til death do us part” it permits our spouse to indeed live the life that is set before them in the event that one person dies first. What a gift you gave each other - that if one of us is left on earth, we may have a blessing to live out our days with wholeness and peace while at the same time proclaiming that our love is everlasting.

Come & See

Inside the sanctuary of McKendree-Simms-Brookland

In a recent set of essays published in The Connection, a variety of pastors reflect on the mission and vision of the conference to make disciples of Jesus Christ. I encourage you to read them as you will discover many insights and ideas about what it means to be the church. In my essay, I suggested that the Church’s task is not to make disciples, but to invite people to experience the living-reality of the Risen Lord. The power of invitational discipleship is that Jesus himself enters our relationships and sends us into our culture as disciples.

In the last months, I have extended a simple invitation for our church to know Jesus better by entering into a cross-cultural, mission relationship with McKendree-Simms-Brookland United Methodist Church in DC. (pictured at left and above)

Our churches are very different. While Olivet sits at the quiet cross section of two country roads – McKendree is on the busy intersection of South Dakota and Rhode Island Avenues. One sanctuary has woodwork – the other ornate stonework. 

McKendree-Simms-Brookland Church in Washington DC

McKendree is known for it’s pipe organ – Olivet is known for worship with dulcimers and stringed instruments.  While we differ in our expression and geographical location -  we are suprisingly alike.
We have the same red pew cushions, UM hymnals, and a love for fellowship meals! We are also alike in that both churches have seen decades of membership decline and struggled to adapt to the changing population around us. Yet, we both have experienced new growth and vitality in the last years. 

Hospitality is the heart of the biblical witness. To welcome the stranger is to “entertain angels unaware”. Jesus himself comes to the disciples as a stranger, surprising us in the breaking of bread and sharing of a meal. As hosts to our DC guests, the blessing will be the suprising way Jesus shows up in these times together.

Since the beginning of the year, several of us have visited the people of McKendree Simms Brookland Church  In January, our youth groups met each other for the first time during lunch at the ROCK retreat in Ocean City. Our lay leader Bob Evans and church secretary Bonnie Chaffee also visited over a meal. Read what these folks are saying about their experiences.

"I felt like I was home, they were so open and welcoming. They practically waited on us hand and foot during lunch. With their meal ministry, they have fed over 6,000 people since January! They are getting ready for us to stay there - offering us a beautiful 4 bedroom parsonage and getting it all ready for us!" Bonnie Chaffee

"Having lived near there in Brookland and worked near there for Old Towne Trolley I was interested to see things I hadn't experienced in Northeast DC before. I enjoyed the fellowship of the meel, meeting the pastor and his wife. I especially like what Reverend David said that Nobody Here Will Go Hungry, referring to the meal ministry." Bob Evans 

  In the biblical account of the call of Nathaniel, Philip gave up persuasion and finally just said to the skeptical Nathaniel, “Come and See.” I will not try to persuade you to know the benefit of being on a mission trip, taking time to visit another ministry setting or explain the value of getting to know a fellow Christian. I will just simply say to you Come and See. 

Enter into this relationship with McKendree-Brookland-Simms in your personal way. Our next road trip Wednesday, April 24. You may decide to become part of the overnight mission work from June 24-28^th. Or perhaps you will want to help host the group that comes to Olivet July 28 – Aug 1. We will be signing people up to help teach the kids fishing, crabbing, and more.

"Come and see" and be suprised how Jesus himself will appear in our midst. 

A Fake Kind of Clean

Matthew 23:26 "You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also."

Participants in the commercial were guided into a smelly room  treated with airfreshener. 

There is a series of commercials for an air/fabric freshener in which people participate in an experiment. With eyes blindfolded, they are led into a filthy room and invited to sit on a terrible looking, ripped up couch. Without being able to see the condition of their surroundings, (imagine overflowing litter boxes at their feet) they are asked to describe where they are. They describe the place based on smell: "It's floral" "It's beachy" or other such depictions of refreshing, pristine cleanliness. Of course, when they remove the blindfolds a look of disgust comes over their face.  "Where are we?". Certainly, it is a shocking discovery:  they are sitting on a dog hair covered couch holding a raggedy pillow up to their face and huffing in a fake kind of clean. 

This shock may be akin to what the to the pharisees felt when Jesus sought to remove their blindfolds. His ministry was continually one that pointed out how they were hypocritical, not holy. He described their lives as rotten on the inside, but clean looking on the outside.  

Follow Jesus around long enough and we all begin to discover we wear blindfolds, I think.
If we are growing in our faith, God will pull off our blindfolds and show us how the inside of our lives doesn't match the outside. God's loving grace stirs in us spiritual renewal of the deepest parts of our heart and soul. 

If we are not growing in our faith, we are content to keep the blindfold on. We are ok with masking the odor of our ugliest thoughts behind the perfume of pretending. 

Unfortunately some will convince us that this is what God wants. The pharisees certainly thought they were living out their faith in the most proper fashion. Christians can be like the pharisees, too - hiding our real emotions, telling ourselves we can't go to church unless we are in a good mood and ready to smile and praise God. The result? We don't see each other for who we are. We don't see the world around us. Worship becomes pretending life is floral and beachy when really we are sniffing in a mildewed pillow from the basement.

When I see those air freshener commercials, I just think to myself, wouldn't anyone prefer  a clean room that smells "the way it smells" over a filthy room that smells like a lilac garden in springtime?  No matter how difficult, I would rather take the time to pick up the old pizza boxes and vacuum the dog hair than spray the room and continue to sit on cat pee. 

It's not just pretending with others. Jesus teaches us that we pretend with ourselves. The inner condition of our souls needs to be cleaned out. Not by acting "holy" but by finding true "wholeness" in God.The way to do this is to intentionally turn to God. Take off the blindfold. Look critically at our life  and honestly get "real" with ourselves before God.

The Christian Church sets time aside for this Getting Real with the season called LENT. This is the 40 days of self-examination and prayer that prepares us for the renewing Spirit of God at Easter. This is the forty days of taking off the blindfolds and discovering we have been sitting on a trash heap of old stinky sins that need to be tossed out.

In Psalm 51, we pray for God to create in us a clean heart. Certainly we are asking for the real deal and not a fake kind of clean. We don't want a cleaner looking heart that is actually corroded with bitterness. No, we want the heart of a follower of Jesus. And only God can  create this type of heart within us by putting a new and right spirit within us. He's not spraying a perfume on us, he is cleaning us from the inside out.

The Lenten season of Soul-Cleaning begins Wednesday February 13. We will meet at Olivet in the chapel at 7pm for a time of reflection, returning our selves to God and handing over our blindfolds.

If you are unable to make it to the Olivet Ash Wednesday Service, see if there is an Ash Wednesday Worship service near your work (some places will hold a noon service) The Ash Wednesday worship service is a beautiful service designed to get each of us to handover our selves to God as we go forward on the forty day journey to Easter. 

Ringing the Bell in Memory & Honor

The Governor has asked every church in our state to ring their bell 26 times at 9:30 am in Friday - a week following the tragedy in CT. 

Of course we want to do this......but would you believe that we have no way to ring the bell as of today?

On the first Sunday of December,  the rope to the bell broke. I asked a child to ring the bell to start off worship and when she pulled on the rope it rang once and then snapped. The rope dropped through the small chiseled hole in the ceiling.  We both were surprised. With a limp rope in her hand, she looked at me sheepishly as if she wasn't sure if I would scold her for pulling to hard. "Wow! You are strong!" I exclaimed. We laughed together and worship began without the toll of the bell.

"How can we reattach the rope" I asked John Davis and Bob Watson. They investigated to see if the rope could be reattached or if it would need a new rope, etc. The best solution was to get up in the tower (again) and install a new rope. Sounds easy, except that the tower is 60 feet high. It is easy to get to the roof of the church, but still a climb into the "portico" where the bell hangs. 

A smart mother of three told me to call the fire department. A neighbor suggested we use the cherry picker that she is renting in January when they "undecorate" the neighborhood Christmas Tree. John said he might have a friend with a ladder in the meantime. None of us want to send John up on a 60 foot ladder. None of us want to wait for the safer solution of a cherry picker in January. So we go back to the suggestion posed by the mother of three children under age 5. She was right. Call the fire department.

And in light of the Governor's call to communities, we all felt that the fire department would be more than willing to come out. The Fire Chief has said he is coming out tomorrow with the ladder truck. 

When we gather on Thursday Night as a community for the Olivet Tree Lighting and Community Dinner, we will  have a time of ringing the Bell  as well. At about 6:30, we will conclude our dinner with the tolling of the bell. 

Then on Friday, at 9:30am, we will join others around the state and possibly the nation in this solemn act of remembering.

Where ever you are, remember to go outside and listen for the bells.

The Nightmare of Yesterday

            Yesterday I was like most every parents across the nation -  hurriedly getting the children to school. Dealing with their excitement about a Friday so near Christmas vacation. Talking to other parents about the many things we must do to get ready for Christmas. Stressing but enjoying the hustle of a holiday coming up.
            But by the afternoon, everyone one of us were changed. The day began like any other; with certainty.  It ended in uncertainty.

We started the day trusting the world, trusting that Christmas would be like any other. The day ended with my own questioning of God and humanity. 

It was the worst shooting, they said, in our nations history. In talking to my friends, we all questioned the safety of our own community and schools. The day started with confidence but by the end of the day, we wondered if safety was just an illusion.

            As I held my children last night, it felt unfair that parents would not be able to do that because of this unspeakable act. As I went to bed, I had tremendous heart ache for a world that our children now live in. Our world was probably never completely safe but now all I could picture is the school now instituting not just fire drills and tornado drills but shooter drills as well. Even down to the age of kindergarten. Juli was so afraid of fires in kindergarten because of those fire drills. What fear would be upon Sophia if we now had the added discussion that a shooter may enter her cheerful kindergarten class?

Like most people, I went to bed after seeing so many images of panic from that horrible scene in Connecticut. Later that night, I awoke from a nightmare. I can’t explain it completely but at the center of the deep sorrow I felt was a closet. Yes, a closet.  When I awoke I was crying about the closet where I hide the Christmas presents (and other surprises) for my kids through out the year. I was crying because I thought about the closets that these parents must have. The gifts planned for their children to find under the tree this year. The smile that they expect that is so joyful at that young age when they believe in the miracles and joys of this world.

Every parent has a closet. Literally and figuratively we have a place that holds those experiences we look forward to sharing as a family; the smile that you count on seeing, the joy that you count on when they one day will score a goal, or graduate from school. The tragedy of yesterday is not just the loss of life, but the loss of a future. In my unsettling dream, this closet became meaningless as I realized it was the death not just of a person, but of a future. A future for the child and a future for the parent who had her closet robbed forever.

            As your pastor, I want to tell you that I am still rattled by the tragedy. I still cry when I read more about it. But I am also still seeking God’s comfort and peace to make sense of this massacre. I keep talking to God and asking why. I keep talking to God asking what can we do. Perhaps you are in the same place. Perhaps you have lost a child and are in a much deeper pain than I as you can relate to these parents even more.

            What I do imagine though – is that if I, an earthly flawed human parent have a closet of unknown gifts of joy for my little girls, than certainly our heavenly parent must have this also. I do not know what is behind the door. On this side of the door, there is pain, fear, distrust and sorrow. But our Heavenly Father has promised us peace on the other side. I must place my trust in Him for he has a future for each of us that cannot be robbed from us. May this keep our hearts in expectation of his peace even in the midst of turmoil and confusion.