Love Equals Stuff? and "Coraline" Thoughts

A 2008 report (that I read about here) shows a correlation between rising divorce rates and increasing toy sales. It's simple math really, one kid plus two sets of parents equals twice the toys.

The same report also notes that toy sales are high because parents are having kids later in life, therefore they have more disposable income to ... well ... dispose of on their kids. And finally, since grandparents are living longer and staying active, they are more involved with their grandkids and therefore buying them toys, also.

What does this have to do with love? (Or perhaps, what's love got to do with IT?)

I'm not sure, but one thing I know is that my kids have way too many toys, and I'm afraid that they are being conditioned to think that love equals stuff. Or more specifically, love equals stuff being given to them.

Have you seen "Coraline"? If so, read on. If not, be warned that there may be spoilers contained herein:

The other mother, who is no doubt a presentation of evil, tries to get Coraline to love her by giving Coraline everything her heart desires. More to the point, the other mother gives Coraline everything that her real parents do not - delicious food, an opportunity to play out in the rain, neat-o clothes, and such.

She does so because she thinks that Coraline will consequently love her. Or maybe she does so because she thinks Coraline will (mistakenly) believe that such attention is, in fact, love, and reciprocate.

But it's not love, it's a noisy gong and a clanging cymbal.

Let me stretch a metaphor. I may not even fully agree with it myself, but I'm going to put it out there and see what happens. Here it is:

Sometimes the church is the "other world" from the movie Coraline. People are intrigued and bedazzled by the shiny stuff and all, but the church's true agenda is to get them in the door and keep them there forever. The church sometimes mistakenly thinks that giving people exactly what they want is all there is to it. The thinking goes, If we (the church) can just have the ideal set of programs that meet every single person's need exactly as they want it too, then they'll want to stay here.

And that's all the farther we think sometimes, just getting people through the tunnel and into the door so that they'll stay. And once they do, we sew buttons on their eyes and force them to smile all the time, preparing the shiny stuff again for the next victim. We sometimes make the mistake of thinking that stuff (in the form of programming, curriculum, technology, and yes, stuff itself) is somehow a substitute for love.

So that's the metaphor. It's pretty harsh, and I'm still mulling it over to see if it works or not. I think it does part of the time, at least. Here's how:

Rather than this metaphor (however harsh it may be), the church truly should be a set of relationships grounded in divine love that empower people to go out as ambassadors of that love, offering it to others.

Like in the final scene of Coraline, when the real residents of the Pink Palace apartments (the church?) are having a garden party (a worship service? ) to which they have invited Grandma and Wybie (the neighbors?) to come and share a glass of lemonade (communion?). Nothing shiny, no magic piano, just plain red tulips.

But it's real - it's love - and maybe it's even church.

True Love

First Corinthians 13: It’s not just for weddings anymore!

Sometimes I feel the need to make this assertion. There is a great danger in relegating this powerful passage to some lovey-dovey, cutsie little newlywed poem, intended only to describe that gushy sentimentality that makes us all tear up at weddings, providing us a polite chuckle when we come to the “love does not insist on it’s own way” line, remarking after the ceremony that Uncle Joe “did a wonderful job” with the reading, and forgetting that this passage is intended to describe how all of us are supposed to be living our lives, for heaven’s sake!

Not to put too fine a point on it; this passage should kick our fannies.

I don’t have anything personal against weddings, you understand, though my initial paragraph may make it seem like they are for me an experience akin to pulling teeth out with rusty pliers. Not at all. I am simply lamenting our cultural tendency to rob 1st Corinthians, chapter 13 of its enormous convicting power, its profoundly hopeful promise, and the offer of a new way to live contained therein.

So go ahead and enjoy it at the next wedding you attend. The chances are good that it will be included, since it is included in roughly 98.7% of all weddings in the U.S. (based on thoroughly unscientific research conducted by me and me alone). But this Sunday we will consider it NOT in the context of a wedding, but in the way that it might apply to anyone’s life at any moment.

“What is love?” is more than an early ‘90s dance track that Will Ferrell and Chris Kattan used to dance to on Saturday Night Live. It is an important question that we all should ask ourselves from time to time. How do we know love? How do we discern between true love and surface level attraction? How can we tell when love is “real” and lasting, and what does that even mean?

In worship Sunday, we’ll think together about real love, whose source is God and whose expression should mark every aspect of our being.

Doubt and Faith

Faith in God.

It means trusting the promises that God makes without needing proof.

Doubt.

It means to be uncertain about something. It can also mean to distrust.

So are faith and doubt compatible? Can one live while the other survives? Does the presence of doubt at all mean a total absence of faith?

Sunday I'm preaching about doubt and faith. In Mark 9, the father of a boy who is in need of healing utters what can only be a paradoxical expression of faith. Jesus tells him that all things can be done for one who believes, to which the father replies, "I believe; help my unbelief." (pisteuo, apistia - for you Greek scholars.)

So does he believe or doesn't he? John Wesley thought that this verse indicated the man's faith was there, but in so small an amount that it seemed to not be there at all. I think Mr. Wesley had to do a few too many interprative leaps to get to that conclusion. But far be it from me to come right out and disagree with Wesley, of course!

I think the statement is best left right where it is. The answer is yes, he believes; and no, he doesn't. And there it is. And there we are, most of the time, if we are completely honest about it. Living in the paradox.

Have you ever known a person with a sick loved one, and the person prayed for that loved one who then made a complete recovery, and the person subsequently thanked God for answering prayers? And on the other hand, have you ever known a person with a sick loved one, and the person prayed for that loved one who then did not get better but actually died, and then ... well, then what? Would you ever dream of saying to that person, "If you had only had more faith..." "If you had only prayed harder..." "If you had only..." Of course not!

The truth is that stuff happens to us that shakes our faith - i.e. causes doubt. The most faithful thing we can do at such times is to acknowledge the doubt, bring it to the surface, and deal with it. If we do, God will give us the grace we need to move through it and get on with life. The most dangerous thing we can do at such times is to ignore the doubt, or worse still to deny it. It is an unhealthy person who claims absolute certainty in absolutely every situation.

Salvation is a journey and there are times we are a lot closer to the destination than other times. But wherever we are, God's grace is there, ready to draw us closer. Doubt, then, is not a bad thing inherently. It's what we do with it that counts.

Orbiting the Giant Hairball - Thumbs Up!

I've just finished with "Orbiting the Giant Hairball" by Gordon MacKenzie. It's great. It is written with respect to the business world but is very illuminating for any organization, including school or church.

The hairball is the organization, which may have started out as a dynamic movement but has inevitably become an entagled mess of policies and procedures and rules and committees and ... basically a giant hairball. The book is NOT about how to unravel the hairball, an improbable if not impossible task.

The book is about how to use the graviational energy of the hairball to propel yourself into a creative orbit around it, neither being sucked in to its tangly fibers nor launching off into the vacuum of space beyond it. It is about valuing creativity and genius and spontaneity in and of itself, without demanding an accounting in the "proper" channels of the hairball. Consider this snip:

...in the eyes of any Anal Retentive worth his salt, anything that cannot be measured is of doubtful value - and even of doubtful existence.

...the Anal Retentives...lust for the fruits of creativity ... but mistrust the act of creativity, which remains invisible and elusive.

Only the Renegades in Orbit, removed from the Hairball's obsession with quantifying everything, are free to ream the unpredictable bounty of the inscrutable creative process.

MacKenzie worked for Hallmark, a corporate giant that started out as a creative impluse. It is a great case study, actually, because Hallmark is a giant hairball of a company that still tries to specialize in creativity, and the juxtaposition of organizational grey and the creative spectrum is very apparent.

Seems to me there's a lot the church can learn from this approach. The church has become in many ways a giant hairball of organization, bureaucracy, and self-sustaining archaism. But I do not want to dismantle it - not in the least. The key then, is how to use the hairball's gravity to attain orbit.

To me, becoming upset by the existence of the hairball is what gets me sucked in to the hairball itself. So the key is to just let the hairball be what it is without getting upset about it, and at the same time fly around in a creative orbit around it. To me the hairball is attendance figures, membership lists, budgets, insurance issues, pointless committees, overly numerous committees, overly numerous pointless comittees, and that kind of stuff. It is a part of the hairball if it exists solely for the perpetuation of the hairball itself, with no other purpose.

For me, this book is a refreshing counterpoint to the "Bull's Eye" books, which articulate hairball thinking quite eloquently. It takes a really gifted person to so succinctly describe the hairball while all the time professing to be anti-hairball through and through. And even more, to decry the current state of the hairball and offer up a replacement hairball as if it will somehow make everything okay takes (ironically) a healthy dose of creative genius itself.

But I just don't see it that way. The hairball is the hairball, and we're not going to get rid of it. Removal of even one strand is a major undertaking, because of the entaglement and mess it's in down below. Rather, let the hairball be! Dance around the edges of it. Flirt with it. Maybe even skip off of its surface. Just don't get sucked in. And don't leave it's gravitational pull either, finding yourself in a place where you have to generate all of the energy yourself. That's just crazy.

MacKenzie uses the metaphor of water skiing. The leader is driving the boat and the follower is holding on to the rope. If the leader will keep the boat steady and straight, the follower can pull and lean, jumping far outside of the wake, then zoom back in by pulling and leaning the other way, jumping high over the wake in the process. If they get going just right, the follower can actually pull even with the leader, and perhaps get ahead for a moment or two.

A good leader keeps the boat going at an even speed and basically in one direction, always letting the follower know if a turn is coming up. A good follower uses that energy to do amazing tricks on her water skis, often far outside of the wake. The one thing the follower does NOT want the leader to do is stop the boat.

It's a great metaphor, isn't it? That leader keeps things going to allow the follower to do those great tricks, and that follower trusts the leader to provide the momentum to do them. That sounds like a pretty cool church!

I am grateful to Bishop Schnase for introducing me to the Giant Hairball book, and I give it a high recommendation.

Back Home Again

What a great vacation!

Missouri > Illinois > Indiana > Ohio > West Virginia > Pennsylvania > West Virginia again > Maryland > Washington, D.C. – spread over three easy days of meandering.

Then five great days in D.C., all the monuments, museums (Native American, Air and Space, Natural History, American History), worship at the National Cathedral, Arlington Cemetery, Capitol tour. We stayed in a hotel in Georgetown and saw George Stephanopoulis on the street. We visited Claire McCaskill’s office and ran into Kit Bond walking between Senate office buildings. We called up some old friends from Kansas City and spent the afternoon with them at National Harbor. It was great.

We took a side trip to Williamsburg, visiting the Fredericksburg Battlefield along the way. We went to Jamestown and to Yorktown, and enjoyed two trips to beaches, one in Norfolk and one in Virginia Beach. On the way home we made a stop at Monticello, which is awesome, and a stop in St. Louis to visit family and see Harry Potter 6, which is also awesome, except in a different sort of way.

We picked up the foster kids from respite care and had a great reunion with them; they did just fine and we are so thankful for good foster families who are willing to provide respite care.

And now we are home and catching up with life. It is good to be home, as always, even considering the great time we had on vacation. It’s always nice to come home.

Vacating

For the next two weeks, we're doing the good, old fashioned, "family vacaction" thing! Piling in the mini-van and heading out across the country to visit Washington D.C. Along the way we'll meander a bit, taking three whole days to travel and see some sights between here and there. I can't wait!

We will be placing our two foster sons in respite care for the time we'll be gone. Thank God for respite care providers! Every foster family gets a certain number of days per year of respite care. As rewarding as it is for us to provide foster care for our kids, it is very nice to reconnect with just the four of us every now and then.

But at the same time we're concerned for them. We know the respite family is really good; the boys' case worker knows them and has worked with them a lot. She recommends them. So its not that. Its just being away from them for that long, we'll be worried. So if you don't mind, say a prayer or two for our boys and us in these upcoming days!

I don't think blogging will be a high priority for me for the next couple of weeks. So don't be surprised (or chagrined ... or relieved either) if you don't see anything posted here until July 21st-ish.

Washington, here we come!

Our Lives, Our Fortunes, Our Sacred Honor

"And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor."

This is the ending of the Declaration of Independence, right before the signatures. I am much more familiar with the first part, about the self-evident truths. But after that part, and after explaining how governments should secure those unalienable rights, and then very carefully explaining how the current government has not done so, and in fact has abused its power at the expense of the people, and even after declaring therefore that the united Colonies are now free and independent States - that's when this line appears.

Theological reflection on this sentence leads to a conversation about "Divine Providence." If Divine Providence is the sovereignty of God to order earthly events toward realization of God's purposes, one necessarily must place the concept in tension with "Free Will." This conversation has been repeated numerous times in Christian history, and faithful Christians hold diverse beliefs about what it really means.

Not to diminsh that conversation, but what caught my eye when I read the Declaration this time was the final clause: "...we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor."

What a beautiful idea. The idea of freedom was so important to the authors of the Declaration, they promised one another their very lives.

They promised one another their fortunes, from which I infer they meant their material resources. I wonder what they would think of the greed so blatantly on display these days.

They promised one another their honor, which to me says they "had each others' back." Like, "When you're a Jet you're a Jet all the way from your first cigarette to your last dying day."

What an exciting time it must have been. It still captures my imagination, to think of the atmosphere in the colonies 233 years ago! It was risky, scary. It was fresh, new. There was such energy and passion. It was this energy that made it possible for them to make this pledge, I suppose. They were caught up in the revolutionary spirit, and deeply unified.

Their unity transcended their differences, which at times were very strong (here's one essay among many making this point). The revolutionaries had unique individual perspectives on the situation, and made their opinions known. And yet to dissent was not condemned, it was encouraged. It is one of the most important aspects of our national story, in fact; the freedom to dissent against the British crown was the cornerstone of the revolution.

I wish sometimes that we would revisit the last line of the Declaration of Independence as a nation, you know? Maybe just once skip the part we had to memorize in school, skip the list of historically contextual complaints against the king, and just focus on the end.

What would it take for the United States of America to once again "mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor," instead of so often thinking first and only of one's self, jealously clinging to one's own possessions, and fomenting divisiveness in the guise of dissent?

I guess that sounds pretty cynical, and I'm not - really. I am happy and proud to be a citizen of the United States of America and I celebrate the freedom that living in this country affords me. But neither am I naïve about people, some of whom take unjust advantage of their freedom for selfish gain at the expense of others.

Independence Day, for me, is a day to reclaim the revolutionary spirit. It is a day to remember that my rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are the same rights given all people. It is a day to celebrate freedom. And it is a day to once more pledge to one another our lives, our fortune, and our sacred honor.

Look at God's World

Psalm 8 seems to have a phrase missing. It reads

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established;
what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them?

Grammatically, it seems to me to lack a linking phrase that says why the initial observation leads to the subsequent question. The reader is left to infer the connection.

It might mean, "When I look up at all the stars that you made, it is so unbelievably big that it makes me feel small, so I wonder, what are we people worth to you?"

Or maybe, "When I look out into space, it seems so infinite compared to my finite experience, it makes me wonder how I could possibly matter at all."

Or it could be, "When I think about all of the beauty that you created, then realize how plain I am, how do I possibly compare to that?"

Or even, "The universes you created are unimaginably complex, and I am so simple by comparison, you must not think much of me."

But I think the best way to read it is just to leave the pause in there and just let our minds wander over it for a few moments before we go on: "God, when I think about the immensity of all you have made, every single star in the cosmos ... (pause) ... what are we to deserve your attention at all, let alone your love?"

It is a staggering claim, isn't it? To say that the One who created all that is has a particular concern for you and me is audacious! Maybe even impudent? And yet that is precisely the claim this Psalm makes. Not only that God pays attention to human beings, but it goes on to say that God elevates human beings to a kind of "favored creature status" by giving us the rest of creation to care for.

My prayer yesterday was, "Are you sure that's such a good idea, Lord?" I mean, we don't do so well at taking care of things given to us sometimes. If we need a power line there, it doesn't matter that a tree is growing in the same space, just cut apart the tree and make room for the power line. If we need a development there, it doesn't matter if there is a hill in the way, just flatten the hill to level the ground for the development. If we need more parking there, it doesn't matter that there is a beautiful green space in the way, just pave it over so we can cram more cars in.

Humanity's callousness with the environment lends even deeper incredulity to Psalm 8. "What are human beings, that you are mindful of us?" Truth be told, we're not all that great. I know that there are those who will minimize humanity's impact on the earth, and they have a retinue of scientists to quote that back up that viewpoint, just like there's a whole slew of scientists saying the opposite. But simple observational common sense goes a long way in this particular conversation. We simply don't do a good job of caring for the natural world a lot of the time.

It starts with looking. "When I look at ..." When was the last time you did that? When was the last time you just sat and looked at a tree, the stars, another person, birds at a bird bath, or something else in God's wonderful world? To look with no agenda other than observation is to begin understanding the pause in the middle of Psalm 8.

When I look ... What am I?

Cori's Random Thoughts On a Monday Afternoon

Hi! I like Pie!! Llamas are cool animals!!! Cow is a funny word! Pencils have erasers. French Frys are weird! Balloons are good to eat!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! glue is sticky! how come fish don't have ears?! Wall - e. I don't like bacon. summer school is bad for you. hi! the world is round. Why R smily faces yellow? bubbles pop! hang ten!!!!!! 3 x 3 = 9!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1 hi!

"Hunger Can Be a Positive Motivator" - My Thoughts

There has been a bit of a blow about Representative Cynthia Davis of the 19th District here in Missouri and her comments about a summer food program for low-income children.

Click here to read her remarks in full.

The catch phrase many are jumping on is, "Hunger can be a postive motivator." She actually wrote that line to emphasize that children who are at least 16 years old can get jobs during the summer to pay for food instead of getting it from this program. In fact, she helpfully points out that "If you work for McDonald's, they will pay you for free during your break." She is not talking about little kids, but teenagers.

So in context that line is a little less blatantly cold-hearted as it first appears. It is still pretty ignorant of conditions in the world. As if a bunch of 16 year olds not applying to work at McDonald's is the source of all poverty in our nation.

There's nothing really that shocking in her commentary, to tell you the truth. It is a pretty good summary of a conservative perspective on a social program. She doesn't like it. She thinks it represents the government trying to do too much. She thinks individuals should take more responsibility and rely on government less.

It's pretty standard fare, as far as that particular viewpoint is concerned. And it happens to be a viewpoint with which I disagree.

For example, she writes a couple of things that I have some pointed issues with. First, she writes, "I represent many fine families in District 19 and I am proud of all of them for doing what is best for their children." I wonder. There are no children that have to be taken into foster care in the 19th district? No neglect? No abuse? She really knows that all of them are doing what is best for their children? I'm sure it's not quite that simple. I mean, I think I know what she's trying to say there, but it is a statement with multiple interpretations. Like this one: she doesn't represent all the families in the district, only a percentage of them, only the "fine" ones who are taking care of the kids. As for the other families... I wonder who is representing them.

Later she writes, "Laid off parents could adapt by preparing more home cooked meals rather than going out to eat." Again, were it only that simple a solution. In her world, not going out to eat for meals and cooking at home instead works great, I'm sure. She writes a lot about the delicious strawberries that her family has. Wonderful. But not all that realistic. Poverty is insidius, and simply eschewing restaurant food in favor of grocery store food is not the answer.

Actually she confesses, "While I have not seen this as a problem in my district, it is entirely possible that this program is designed to address problems that exist in other parts of Missouri." So apparently Missouri District 19, which includes O'Fallon, St. Peters, and St. Charles, is immune from hunger issues. Again, that would be wonderful, but I am skeptical as to how realistic it is. And anyway, how selfish is it to not support something because it doesn't affect anyone you live close to, albeit you confess it might affect others? It would be a little like saying, "I know racism is an issue, but I only know white people so I'm not going to do anything about it."

So the bottom line of this deal is that Representative Davis's opinions are not scandalous or extreme. I think that they are a rather mainstream, party-line set of opinions for conservatives. I happen to disagree with her position, but many do not. (Although it seems to really, really irk Olbermann, which is a real kick in the pants.)

I've decided that I'm not going to waste much energy worrying about Rep. Davis, because I need all the energy I can muster to provide foster care for two kids whose mom was having a really hard time feeding them appropriately at the time they were taken into care.

The Power of a Touch

I love kids! I had such a great time at Vacation Bible School last week, hanging out with a couple hundred kids every morning, singing together, dancing, praying, laughing, joking, making faces, and sharing in the story of the Exodus.

Needless to say, there were times when things got a bit wild and crazy, but for the most part everything went quite smoothly. There were some times when an individual kid needed a bit of extra attention so as not to detract from the experience of the whole class. Sometimes this even involved one of the adult volunteers chasing a kid around or perhaps taking them out of the room.

But a few times, when a kid was creating a disruption during a time I was teaching, all I did was make my way over to where they were sitting, and calmly continue what I was doing while simply putting my hand on a shoulder. I just got close to them, didn't even make eye contact, and reached out to touch them.

In doing so, I was telling them, "I know you're here. I am acknowledging you, and I value your presence. You are a part of this group." I was giving them the attention that they were seeking without detracting from what the rest of the kids were doing. All of this was accomplished by simply touching them. And inevitably, the attention-seeker calmed down and the class carried on.

People have different comfort levels with touch. For some, it is a severe violation of personal boundaries to do more that shake hands. Some are much more comfortable with touch and will hug and hold hands and pat shoulders with no thought at all. So we must be very sensitive to individual responses. There is definitely "good touch" and "bad touch."

With that in mind, there is something very meaningful about human contact. I remember in pastoral care classes in seminary being taught that people in hospital beds with tubes and wires coming out of them all over the place are often longing for a simple touch, a hand to hold or a gentle pat on the shoulder. A touch can be a healing gesture.

There's a great story in the Gospel according to Mark about touch. It's actually two stories woven together, one about Jairus' daughter and the other about a woman with severe hemorrhages. The woman approaches Jesus from behind, reaches out, and touches just the hem of his clothes. She is immediately healed. Jesus then goes in to Jairus' house, reaches out, and takes his daughter by the hands. She is immediately revived from death.

In both cases, healing happens in the touch. There is a reason that a powerful emotional response is called feeling touched. Something miraculous happens in a good touch.

"Become Like Children"

Seems to me there's three parts ...

"Unless you change"

"Become like children"

"Enter the kingdom of heaven"

... of Matthew 18:3, the scripture I'm preaching about this Sunday. But it also seems to me that there is a whole boatload to say about each of those three parts. Like it could be a series of three sermons.

So I'm going with that middle part this week - "Become like children." In response to the disciples' question, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven," Jesus tells them that they're not even going to GET IN if they don't become like children. And as for being the "greatest"? Forget about it.

I read in a couple commentaries this week that in the time of Jesus, a child was most definitely not in a position of earthly greatness. Children were not valued intrinsically, they were considered property, they had neither power nor control. And yet in order to enter the kingdom of heaven, according to Jesus, this is the position that we must assume.

Now some people think "become like children" means be all innocent and pure. (Obviously these are people who do not have much experience with real live children.) I don't think so. That just wouldn't follow from the literary context. That interpretation doesn't make sense in response to the disciples' provoking question.

To yield all power and control of your life, to confess your utter dependence upon God, to become like children in not conforming to earthly definitions of power and success - these are the characteristics I believe Jesus was referring to in this passage. That matches up with other places where Jesus is teaching about the "greatest." The greatest is the least, the servant of all, the humble one.

I'm preparing this sermon in the middle of Vacation Bible School week, with 250 kids running all over the building. There has been all of the energy, excitement, and barely controlled chaos that usually accompanies VBS, and I am loving it. I have been reminded numerous times that I am not really in control of things!

I feel like when I am talking with the kids, I am definitely entering the kingdom of heaven.

Economic Quiz Answer

Yesterday I asked about the significance of this dollar amount:

$3,036,258,899

There were some fantastic guesses. Thanks for playing. Unfortunately, no one came up with the right answer, so no one will take home the cornucopia of prizes I had prepared.

My addition might be wrong, but I looked at this list of Major League Baseball salaries for 2009 and added them up. I just added once and may have missed a million or two, but according to that sloppy research (of which I am quite proud), that amount represents the sum total of the MLB payrolls for this season.

Three BILLION, thirty-six MILLION, two hundred fifty eight THOUSAND, eight hundred ninety nine dollars.

Starting with the Yankees whose payroll is $201,449,289, an average of $7,748,050 per player, and down to the lowly Florida Marlins, who shell out a measly $36,814,000 for their team, on which each player scrapes by on just $1,314,786 on average. (Poor guys, how do they manage?)

Okay - let me just say that I really am a baseball fan and I am not bashing professional sports or anything. So this is definitely not an anti-sports thing.

I just think it kind of puts things in perspective somehow. I'm still working out exactly how. Three billion dollars. I'm just saying ... that's a lot of dollars.

An Economic Quiz:

Hi kids! The number of the day is:

$3,036,258,899

Here's a quick quiz. What is the signficance of this number?

Is it a stimulus related figure perhaps? Maybe the gross domestic product of a country? Could it be the budget of a major charity, putting all those dollars to work to help people in need?

That's three BILLION, thirty-six MILLION, two hundred fifty eight THOUSAND, eight hundred ninety nine dollars.

I can't wait to read your guesses ...

... the answer will be revealed forthwith.

Annual Conferece Wrap Up 2009

I had a great time at Annual Conference last weekend.

The change we were talking about was more substantive than in years past. It was a change of heart, a change of atmosphere, a change of ethos – not just a change of programming or a change of mission statement or a change of structure.

The shift we talked about was more about turning the ship and less about rearranging the deck chairs (to use a weary cliché). It is in many ways a more complex, more fundamental, and much more difficult change.

There was less panic and more hope. To be sure, the “change or die” attitude was still there, and even breached the surface a few times. This attitude is not only not helpful, it is actually counterproductive to Christ’s purposes. But it was minimized this year, and for that I am grateful.

The catch-phrase was “Somewhere Out There” (cue Feivel) which ended up feeling just about as corny as I thought it would feel, but gave a new focal point to evangelism that was very refreshing. There still are those whose only concern is filling up pews, but the overriding message was not one of numbers, but of people. The theme affirmed for me that sharing grace with just one other person is effective ministry, whatever the result.

(As a side note, I cannot describe how much it grinds my gears when someone says, “Of course it isn’t about numbers, it’s about people” and then proceeds to talk only about numbers and never mentions people.)

The gist I took away from that “outwardly focused” theme was that, if a congregation is doing what congregations do, and doing it faithfully, people will respond to that and want to become a part of it. This is what I’ve been saying all along. Focus on growth is not healthy; focus on being church in a healthy way will result in growth, like a healthy tree bears fruit.

Bishop Schnase’s teaching hour on Monday morning was remarkable. He was at his best. There were a few moments when … yes, I believe so … the Bishop was … I’m pretty sure I saw it … a bit … well … fired up. You kind of have to know Bishop Schnase in order to appreciate how cool it was to hear him and see him allow himself that moment of fervor. It was great!

He talked about ministries of mercy and justice. He talked about Methodism and celebrated a Methodist identity. He talked deeply about why we do this thing we call church, and I loved it. He talked about sharing grace with people and then not knowing how the story ended, in other words, not knowing if the person “gave themselves to Christ” or even started going to a church or anything. Sometimes planting seeds is all you can do, and that’s okay.

I’m going to order the video of his presentation and show it to the congregational leaders. He was sharing personally, not just ecclesially. That hour, more than any other thing I’ve seen in a long time, gives depth and nuance to a new brand of evangelicalism that I hope the church embraces. I want Methodists to claim an evangelical identity again, without having to worry about the political baggage that goes along with it. The way Bishop Schnase talked about it Monday shows a way that we can do that.

So I left Annual Conference energized and excited. There are still people who are rearranging deck chairs and calling it change, but I was convinced this weekend that the transformation that I am hoping for in the United Methodist Church may not be as far (somewhere) out there as I once thought.

Church Business

The Church has been using business models for a long time. It has been quite fashionable for church leaders to borrow jargon, organizational structures, mission and vision foci, and leadership styles from the business world in recent memory. In this paradigm, making disciples of Jesus Christ is equated with selling a product or service.

And so I’m wondering, now that GM has gone through bankruptcy and plans to come out smaller, more efficient, more specialized, “leaner and meaner” (whatever that means) will the church follow that model, too? GM is not the only company to realize that being a giganto-normous behemoth may not very well be the best business model to follow, but definitely is one of the most apparent.

GM has decided to eliminate some car lines, reduce its workforce, and close a bunch of factories. So, will the church now eliminate some ministries, reduce its staff, and close a bunch of congregations?

Are we supposed to follow business models when unlimited growth is the goal but eschew them when that goal proves unsustainable?

It seems to me that there may be a pattern that goes something like – a business starts out with a great idea, then people start loving that idea so much that it becomes really popular, so the business grows in order to meet that demand, and as the business grows it adds bureaucracy to handle the growth itself, then eventually the bureaucracy outweighs the idea and the whole mess begins to implode. The bureaucracy, the growth itself has replaced that great idea as the focal point of the business, and lacking that impetus there is no outcome but collapse.

Unless you see the pattern and catch it before the implosion starts.

So what if the great idea in question is God’s love? This is the greatest idea of all! And it’s a pretty popular idea, too, right? So because it is so popular and so many people are drawn to it, the church grows, and some bureaucratic structure has to be created in order to facilitate all of that. I mean, someone has to be in charge, right? So the institution of the church adds a little structure here, a little hierarchy there, all for the sake of encouraging growth. Until eventually we notice that the focus has shifted from the great idea (oh yeah – it’s about God’s love!) to the bureaucracy, to the growth itself. When that happens, it is not long before the implosion starts.

By the way, I think the pattern can be expressed at multiple levels: a congregation, a conference, a denomination. Like a fractal kind of thing.

So what now? Seeing the implosion happen to GM, having followed business models adapted for church growth, are we to continue following them knowing that eventually there will be no way to sustain the unwieldy structure, no matter how great the original idea was?

Are we to take a couple of steps back on the “life cycle of an organization” and rethink vision, mission, and strategies in order to avoid the impending collapse, only to enter into the cycle once again at some time in the future?

Or maybe the problem was when we thought that it would be a good idea for the church to follow business models in the first place. Maybe what we should do is stop trying to be like the business world and start trying to be the church. Maybe God has a better model for the church than a market-driven consultation firm.

Or maybe we just go with it, declare some version of “bankruptcy” like GM did, and come out the other side with the ecclesial version of “leaner and meaner.” What would denominational bankruptcy look like? Tossing the Book of Discipline out and starting from scratch?

What would a simpler, smaller, and less cluttered church look like, and what would we be able to do for the sake of the greatest of all great ideas?

More On Saving the Church

"The truth is I feel tremendous pressure to save the United Methodist Church."

So says Rev. Eric Van Meter, director of the Wesley Foundation at Arkansas State in a column for the UM Reporter. And so say we all. It is a pressure from within, driven by our love for the church and our deep desire for the church to flourish. It is a pressure that he says many young adults feel, and I count myself as one of those many. So I really resonate with what Eric is saying, and commend his column to you to read in full.

I have written before about the ministry of young adults; I have led a couple of workshops; it is one of my favorite topics. Among other things, my underlying feeling is that young adults are being objectified by the church as "savior" figures, rather than being valued intrinsically.

It seems sometimes as if young adults are valued as long as they can be useful in reanimating the dying denomination, and by "reanimating the dying denomination" I mean acting like younger versions of the people currently populating the pews. But not if they're just being themselves.

The problem, as Eric sees it, is when the church does things that "give church insiders something to rally around, [but have] little impact on most folks who populate Sunday morning worship or Wednesday night council meetings." And a lot of that complicated (and expensive) navel gazing has exactly the opposite effect that was intended. Let me explain.

Trendy programs and slick websites sometimes give the impression of trying too hard, especially when the true life experience of the church just doesn't jive with what is being presented. Or as Shane Raynor puts it (as only Shane can), "Let's face it...some of our churches stink. Why should we spend money advertising them?"

I might not want to say it exactly that way, but I fully agree with the sentiment. When a young adult (or any adult, just about) looks for a church, they go online. Based on what they find there, they'll attend a worship service or two or three. But if they do not experience a connection, something that resonates with what they have seen in the ad, they'll head somewhere else in a hurry.

As I see it, the way to "save the denomination" is to stop trying to save the denomination and focus on the church's identity as the body of Christ in the world today. The early church grew amazingly quickly, and it did so with an anti-publicity campaign that actually kept everything secretive and subversive, meeting at night and communicating with codes. They basically just cared for one another, ate meals together, and talked about Jesus. What would be the 21st century equivalent?

I love church, and I would like to see the United Methodist denomination flourish by being the body of Christ in a distinctively Methodist way. And I think that if we do, we will grow. Eric Van Meter asks, "Does wanting to save my church mean that I should fight to keep her young, or let her die and trust in the hope of resurrection?" I think that is a false choice; there is another way to think about it.

I think that wanting to save my church means that you have to abandon all thoughts of saving your church, and simply be the church as best you can. God will save the church if God will. In the meantime, we just live faithfully.

Chasing After Wind

Better is a handful with quiet
than two handfuls with toil,
and a chasing after wind.
(Ecclesiastes 4:6)

This verse from Ecclesiastes called out to me this week, begging to be reflected upon.

It makes me think of Jesus saying, "Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest."

It reminds me of a part of my sermon a couple of weeks ago, from 1st John 5, "God's commandments are not burdensome."

It makes me think about so many people I know who work until 6:30, 7:00, 7:30 at night, or even later, relating to their families like the proverbial ships passing in the night. Chasing after wind.

It makes me think of a lot of pastors I know who work 60 hours a week or more thinking they have to work themselves into worthiness. How many of them burn out early and spend the last years of their ministry cynical and bitter?

Why do we tend to place unqualified value on hard work? We wax on about a high work ethic as if people who work hard are to be emulated without critique. There's nothing inherently wrong with working hard, to be sure. But there's nothing inherently right about it, either.

Better is a handful with quiet ...

(Give us this day our daily bread ... just enough for today ... a handful.)

...than two handfuls with toil.

(Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin...)

I mean, sure. You've got your two handfuls, but at what cost? Love your house! Great car! But have you worked so hard that you are unable to enjoy it? Wouldn't it be better to have a handful and be able to enjoy life in the meantime?

I know that some with the metaphorical "two handfuls" are content with life, even happy. I'm not saying that those who have done materially well in life are automatically sad work-a-holics who never spend any time with their family. I'm saying that it is all about balance.

When the scales tip over to the side of material gain and work to the detriment of contentment and harmony, then you've got problems.

And it doesn't have to be just affluent people affected by this insidious condition. Pressure to work hard and produce results affects us all. I feel it. Middle managers feel it from their bosses. Every day working people feel it all the time. The expectation of hard work is pervasive.

And a lot of it comes from within, to tell the truth. Much of the pressure we feel comes from expectations we place on ourselves. Although those self-expectations are learned from somewhere, likely imprinted upon us at an early age.

In an environment of pressure, expectations, and hard work, a verse like Ecclesiastes 4:6 is refreshing. Better a handful with quiet - in other words, a happy life with just enough - than two handfuls with toil - in other words, a miserable life with excess. How much time are we going to waste chasing after wind?

I for one have better things to do.

Nice Is In

Great news everyone! Apparently use of the word "idiot" in blog posts is down by nearly 50% in the last 6 months.

The New York Times opinion piece where I read this fun fact is saying that it is now "in" to be nice. Actors like Paul Rudd, advertisements like the latest Volkswagen campaign, and websites like Operation Nice dot com are evidence of our new found era of niceness, according to the piece.

There is a critique, however, offered by Professor Eric G. Wilson of Wake Forest University. Niceness, he thinks, results in mediocrity. The attempt to be agreeable and polite leads us down "predictable and vaguely reassuring" paths like "easy listening radio or greeting card sunrises or Tom Hanks." (When asked for comment, Hanks reportedly said, "What an idiot.")

On the other hand, I happen to think that we can be nice without drifting into mediocre fluffiness. I do not see the two as mutually exclusive, I guess. Being nice to one another doesn't preclude disagreement, dialogue, and even argument.

So I for one applaud the social trend toward niceness. Especially as so much of what is happening in the world seems to trend toward fear, tension, and suspicion, simply being nice to one another can lighten the atmosphere considerably. A smile, a heartfelt handshake, a hug, holding the door open for someone, allowing another person into the line ahead of you - simple gestures of kindness can convey a lot.

I love watching what happens to a foul ball hit into the stands. People get pretty excited about it, and it's fun to see their celebrations. But what I love most is that inevitably, if a grown up catches the ball and a kid is nearby, the grown up gives the ball to the kid. Nice! In fact, if the grown-up doesn't do so, there are almost always a few "boos" from the crowd. Being nice to the kid is the norm, and keeping the ball for yourself is socially unacceptable.

It's easier to be nice than mean, anyway. Being mean sucks too much energy. Being nice somehow seems to generate energy of its own. Being nice to one another makes everyone feel a little bit better, including you.

So be nice - everyone's doing it.

Have a nice day.

Can I Get a Witness?

One of the last things Jesus says to his disciples just before he ascends to heaven is, “You will be my witnesses…” (Acts 1:8). What is a witness?

Sometimes we carry a perception that “witnessing” must by definition involve publically telling an emotional story to a group about how the speaker was living a horrible life and turned 180 degrees around after accepting Christ. The experience is quite cathartic; there are almost always tears, uplifted hands, and “Thank you Jesus”-es.

This is indeed a way that witnessing can happen, but by no means the only way. In fact, sometimes our misperception (that this way is the only way) prevents us from witnessing ourselves. Since not many people have the kind of dramatic, emotional life stories that tend to define the caricature of witnessing, we might fall into the trap of thinking we cannot be witnesses ourselves.

We may even think our own testimony unworthy, after hearing an especially touching story. “Well,” we might think, “my life isn’t all that bad. Surely anything I have to say about my relationship with God would be pretty pathetic compared to his.” We therefore minimize how God has been and continues to be active in our lives in a myriad of ways.

The thing is, if you say you are a Christian, you ARE a witness. For Jesus’ disciples, “witness” is the default mode of living. Everything you say, everything you do, every conversation you have, every purchase you make, the kind of house you live in, the kind of car you drive, the amount of time you spend with your kids, the attitude you assume toward your co-workers or classmates, etc. – everything that you are gives testimony about Jesus.

More specifically, everything that you do/say/are gives testimony to who you think Jesus is. Remember, testimony is neutral; in that it can say something negatively just as much as something affirmatively. So for example, if you treat a person with contempt, that says something about who you think Jesus is to those who are watching you. And that wouldn’t be a good thing.

Conversely, knowing Jesus to be loving, compassionate, forgiving, and just, our actions and words and being should testify to that knowledge. Christians ARE Jesus’ witnesses, in our families, in our churches, in our communities, and “to the ends of the earth.”