Faith Challenges: It Ain't All Comfort

We have some popular misconceptions about prayer. They come from a host of places other than the Bible and Jesus’ teaching. Yes, prayer on some level includes pleading with God. Prayer is not asking God to perform our will. At least, that is not effective prayer, nor what Jesus teaches us in regard to petitioning God. If all prayer is for us is rubbing a magic lamp to gain access to our three incontrovertible wishes, we have missed the boat. That is the essential purpose behind magic and the fertility cult practices from the backdrop surrounding Ancient Israel. Yes, we are to make our desires known in prayer, but then we are to back off from them as Jesus portrayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, “Not my will, but Thine be done.” The gospel reading in the lectionary for next Sunday is another case in point. The disciples come up to Jesus, saying, “Please say ‘Yes’!” Jesus does not fall for than any more than the wise parent of a preeschooler does. Once they have presented...

A female colleague was recently told by a leader of her congregation that he felt more comfortable with a male pastor. Unfortunately, that is not a highly unusual comment. I have heard something akin to it several times myself. We hear such comments, but we don’t really stop to consider what is behind them. It got me to thinking. Why would someone comment to anyone that they feel more comfortable with a male pastor? I came up with a lot of questions, but very few answers. Is it because men are more prone to be sexual abusers than women? Is it because men are more likely to view power and authority as weapons by which to control others? Is it because men are more likely to be seen in society as authority figures? Is it because our culture tells us that women should not be leaders? Is it because we tend to view the position of pastor as one of authority rather than the service of a shepherd? Is it because we are still reeling from a history in which...

Trust is easily broken. It is not easily mended. On one level we know that all too well. On another level, we ignore how that same principle causes mayhem on an organizational and social scale. If we find it hard to trust, we also find it hard to get along, to work together, to create something beyond ourselves, to jointly become the body of Christ according to the charge laid upon us. We live in a society that has weaponized distrust. Perhaps, I should state that we are one of many such societies. After all, distrust has often been weaponized throughout history. I remember having a conversation with a highway patrol officer in Brazil about what was then a new slate of traffic safety legislation that had just passed into law. It was built upon European and North American traffic standards, laying out a host of sweeping reforms for driving safety, including seat-belt usage, limiting vehicle occupancy to the number of properly installed seat belts, DUI regulation, and so many th...

I've read the entire Bible in three languages & in various versions beginning in 6th Grade. (I lost count of how many times after the first 8 systematic readings.) I've studied, translated, and taught it for decades. I've read commentaries, taught Sunday school, preached, listened to sermons, gone to conferences, graduated from seminary, and gone back for further study. The Bible does not jive with conservative ideologies. Yahweh's economics place people over profits. Yahweh's welcome is for outsiders. Jesus was killed by those clinging to the status quo of power structures, heritage, and culture. Jesus tells us to love one another, then goes beyond that, saying #LoveYourEnemies. The Bible is not about propping up power structures, upholding cultural traditions, or clinging to the old ways. It consistently calls us to embrace new categories of people we have yet to see as loved by God. It consistently demands that poverty be seen as an evil for wh...

Luke’s birth narratives are much more theological interpretations of the meaning of Jesus’ birth, the Incarnation of God, than any transcription of history after the manner of a court stenographer. Rather than giving us “just the facts,” Luke puts words into the mouths of Elizabeth and Mary to let us in on the wonder unfolding in the story he has begun to tell. Along the way, he liberally quotes from Hebrew prophets about Yahweh's Messiah coming to set justice and equity in motion, establishing the long-forgotten basis of national economic security in which those at the bottom receive a full measure of the bounty from Yahweh's land. All too often, however, we get so ensnared by recreating the events of that birth that we miss the message it should convey. There are lots of things we should set right in our retellings of Jesus’ birth, simply from traditions of misreading Luke’s account. There was no angry innkeeper pushing Mary and Joseph out into the cold. The manger ...

We were ready for 350 people at our community Thanksgiving drive-by meal. We didn’t plan for quite enough. One car beat Ervin to the church, even though we had posted we would start handing out food at noon. I don’t know what time Ervin got here, but he was putting turkeys in the oven as early as 4:15 last month. You don’t simply beat Ervin to church on a day like our Thanksgiving meal. I had told Ervin we would have people showing up early, but neither of us expected anyone to be waiting when he arrived. We had planned to go ahead and deliver plates as we had them ready, so as to keep down the number of cars in line. By noon, when we were supposed to start, we had sent 150 plates out the door. I made a few trips to Food Lion, as did Karen and at least a couple of others. We ran through our 550 clamshell take-out plates and Buckey managed to requisition us some more. Those 10 turkeys Ervin had cooked, cut, and heated up to serve were gone by 1:00 pm. Three extra hams and so...

I turned on my computer this morning to a message from Microsoft to the effect of, “If you are seeking to educate yourself on issues of race in the US, we have put together a list of resources.” Normally, they are trying to encourage me to check out their search engine concerning some geographic location, geological formation, or culturally significant image. I normally ignore the suggestion, but today I was intrigued. I was intrigued mainly because here was a major US corporation prompting discussion on a social issue which is very important to many people, an issue we really cannot afford to ignore as a nation that is very divided. Clicking on today’s option sent me to images of the covers of the following 23 books: How to Be and Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi; Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehesi Coates; So You Want to Talk about Race by Ijeomo Oluo; Me and White Supremacy by Layla F. Saad; Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by ...