Waldron United Methodist Church

Lord, Hear our Prayers

2008-05-03T14:00:00.001-05:00

As a community of faith, we regularly pray for one another. Please keep the following persons in your prayers.
Mark Smith and family, Kathy Hunt, Joy Newberry, Jerry Hunt, Eloise Lankford, Jamie Wright, Cheryl (Elkins) Arnold, Beth George, Leon Richmond, Eunice Zenz, Pat Wendorff, Don Frost.

If you desire prayer or would like to add someone to the prayer list, please contact the church office at 637-3734 or e-mail the church at waldronumc@yahoo.com

Angel Food Ministries Distribution Day

2008-05-03T13:47:00.002-05:00

What a blessing this ministry has been! In three months time we have seen many people in our community take advantage of Angel Food and we look forward to continuing this ministry for a long time to come.

On Saturday, May 17th distribution of the May Angel Food orders will take place from 10:30 a.m. until 12:00 noon at the Fellowship Hall. As a host site, we are still learning how to best get the orders out quickly and efficiently. As a help to our volunteers, please try to bring your receipt when you pick up your order and don't forget a big box, tub, or laundry basket to place your food items in.

We hope to have some of our student athletes from WHS assisting us in carrying your orders to your car. On distribution day you may also place your Angel Food order for the following month.

This ministry has proven to be as fun as it is helpful and we are blessed to be able to provide this for our community. For more information about Angel Food you may contact the church office at 479-637-3734.

Daylight Savings Time Begins

2008-02-27T13:29:00.001-06:00

Don't forget to set your clocks forward one hour on March 9th.

Lenten Luncheons

2008-02-10T14:48:00.000-06:00

The community Lenten luncheons will begin this Wed., Feb. 13th. Our church will host the first luncheon, which will begin at 12:00 noon in the Fellowship Hall. Let's share our hospitality and love with our community as we gather to feed both body and spirit.

The schedule for remaining Lenten luncheons are:
Feb. 20...St. Jude's Catholic Church
Feb. 27...First Baptist Church
Mar. 5....Assembly of God Church
Mar. 12...To be announced

The Season of Lent: The Significance of These 40 Days

2008-01-30T08:50:00.000-06:00

As United Methodists we observe Lent as a special time in the church year. But for those new to the faith or for those who have never really understood Lent, the following may add understanding and appreciation for this sacred season.

Lent is a time of repentance, fasting and preparation for the coming of Easter. It is a time of self-examination and reflection. In the early church, Lent was a time to prepare new converts for baptism. Today, Christians focus on their relationship with God, often choosing to give up something or volunteering and giving of themselves for others. The forty days represents the time Jesus spent in the wilderness, enduring the temptation of Satan. Sundays in Lent are not counted in the forty days because each Sunday represents a "mini-Easter" celebration of the Jesus' victory over sin and death.

Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of the season of Lent. It is a day of penitence and remembrance of our sins of the past and our ultimate mortality. Palm branches are usually burned and the sign of the cross is placed on the forehead using the ashes. Sometimes a small card or piece of paper is distributed on which each person writes a sin he wishes to be rid of. The cards are then brought to the altar to be burned along with the palm branches. The ash cross is an outward sign of our sorrow and repentance for sins.

We invite you to join us for the

Ash Wednesday Service

on February 6th at 6:30 p.m.

As we embark on this season of Lent, let us take time to ponder it's meaning in our lives. If you would like more information on Lent, please visit www.gbod.org/easter/

Coming Soon...Angel Food Ministry

2008-01-21T21:41:00.000-06:00

A planning meeting was held to discuss a new opportunity for ministry and outreach in our community. Angel Food Ministries is a non-profit, non-denominational organization dedicated to providing grocery relief and financial support to communities throughout the United States. Angel Food is available in a quantity that can fit into a medium-sized box at $30 per unit. Each month's menu is different than the previous month and consists of both fresh and frozen items with an average retail value of approximately $60. Generally, one unit of food assists in feeding a family of four for about one week or a single senior citizen for almost a month. The food is all the same high quality one could purchase at a grocery store. There are no applications to complete or qualifications to which participants must adhere. Angel Food Ministries also participates in the U.S. Food Stamp program, using the Off-Line Food Stamp Voucher system.
Those attending the planning meeting were excited about this ministry and voted to apply to become a host church for Angel Food. Paige Bethel has completed the necessary paperwork to become a host church, so now it's just a matter of time until we can begin. Tell your friends and if you would like more information regarding Angel Food Ministries or to take a look at a sample menu, go to www.angelfoodministries.com.

Boys and Girls Club Banquet

2008-01-21T21:22:00.000-06:00

The annual Boys and Girls Club Banquet will be held Saturday, February 9 at 6:00 p.m. The church has 5 tickets still available at the "Methodist" table. If you do not have a ticket and would like to attend, contact the church office at 637-3734. Our church is proud to support this organization and the positive influence it offers our community!
Check back for more information.

Potluck/Church Council Meeting Jan. 27th

2008-01-21T21:10:00.000-06:00

Let's get together and share in fellowship and good food. Once we have enjoyed lunch and the company of our church family, we will conduct the first Church Council meeting of 2008. Your Waldron UMC Church Council for 2008 are:
Cliff Daily, Robert Lyons, Diane Miller, Joe Don Rogers, Harvey Bates, Aldon Hughes, Harold Bergmann, Jack Bethea, Roger Simon, Peggy Catron, JoAnn Black, Darla Dozier, Laurie Richardson, and Karan Rogers.

Hurry Less, Worry Less at Christmastime

2007-11-01T20:18:00.000-05:00

The Young & Restless Class is beginning a study using the book,

"Hurry Less, Worry Less at Christmastime" by Judy Pace Christie.

It offers tools for having the 'holiday season you long for' and 'helps busy people learn to celebrate more joyfully, peacefully, and deeply' during this most holy and hectic time of year.

If you yearn for the simple pleasures of this special season and long for a more meaningful and spiritual holiday, then we invite you to join us beginning Sunday, Nov. 4 at 10:00 a.m. in the Fellowship Hall (first door on the left as you enter).

Fall Fun!

2007-10-03T08:29:00.000-05:00

When fall is in the air what do you think of?

Is it football, or maybe the brilliant colors of changing trees?

Perhaps it's the smell of burning leaves and roasting hot dogs

over the open flames.

On October 27, Marvin and Peggy Franklin are hosting a bonfire and wiener roast. The church family is invited to come and enjoy the sights and smells of fall and the festivity of joining with friends for a time of fun,

food, and fellowship. Watch your bulletin for further information and directions to the Franklin home.

Vision for the Future!

2007-10-03T07:47:00.000-05:00

On September 15, 2007, JoAnn Black and Ann Crossett attended a workshop sponsored by First United Methodist Church in Springdale entitled, "Children's Ministry for a New Generation." One segment, hosted by Chris Dodson, Doug Reeves and Ken Whelan, spoke on "Technology on a Budget" and the process of setting up a computer lab for children.
We all know that today's generation of young people are very technologically minded and utilize computers in many aspects of their education, as well as their recreation time. The goal of a computer lab is to provide an additional tool to teach children about God's Word in a way that makes it fun and interesting.
So how do we get started? We are asking the congregation for your help! If you have recently upgraded your computer system, but your old computer is still relatively current (Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows 98 Second Edition, PII 650 or higher, 17" or larger monitor), think about donating it to the church. If you have no idea what system you have or whether it would be suitable, please contact Roger Simon at ras@idcomm.com with any questions or concerns. If you would like to make a monetary donation, please earmark the donated funds for "new PC purchases."
The vision for the church is 4 computers with monitors, printer, and hub. If purchased new the cost would be around $2700.
Please prayerfully consider this request.

9.2.7 NO EXCUSES

2007-09-05T11:30:00.000-05:00

NO EXCUSES
LUKE 14: 18-20
This week I came across the following somewhat humorous re-telling of the story of Noah:
And the Lord said unto Noah: “Where is the ark which I commanded thee to build?” And Noah said unto the Lord: “Verily, I have had three carpenters off ill, Lord. Plus...the gopher wood supplier hath let me down—yea, even though the gopher wood hath been on order for nigh upon twelve months. What can I do, O Lord?” And the Lord said unto Noah: “I want that ark finished even afer seven days and seven nights.” And Noah said: “It will be so.”
But it was not so. And the Lord said unto Noah: “What seemeth to be the trouble this time?” And Noah said unto the Lord: “Mine subcontractor hath gone bankrupt. And—the pitch which Thou commandest me to put on the outside and on the inside of the ark hath not arrived. To maketh matters worse, the plumber hath gone on strike. This is not to mention the fact that Shem, my son who helpeth me on the ark side of the business, hath left to form a hip hop group with his brothers Ham and Japheth. Lord, I am undone.” And the Lord grew very angry and said: “What about the animals, the male and female of every sort that I ordered to come unto thee to keep their seed alive upon the face of the earth?” And Noah said: “They have been delivered unto the wrong address but should arrive on Friday.”
And the Lord said: “What about the unicorns, and the fowls of the air by sevens?” And Noah wrung his hands and wept, saying, “Lord, unicorns are a discontinued line; thou canst not get them for love nor money. And fowls of the air are sold only in half-dozens. Lord Thou knowest how it is.” And the Lord in His wisdom said: “Noah, my son, I do knowest. Why else dost thou think I am causing a flood to descend upon the earth?”
Now—might I venture to sayest that thy grins comest so readily because this story hit-eth home?
Sure it does—I mean, just like the Noah in this story, we human beings have been making excuses for ignoring or even disobeying God’s loving laws from the very beginning when Adam and Eve excused the first sin by blaming each other.
THE VOW
When someone joins a United Methodist church they are asked a series of questions. The last question was, “Will you faithfully participate in the ministries of this church by your prayers, your presence, your gifts, and your service?”
We are called, as Christians and as members of this church, to a life of service to the Kingdom of God through the ministries of this church.
This is only fitting when we consider what Jesus did for us:
“He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried; the third day we rose from the dead.”
The host of the feast, who represents Jesus, was a generous man who went to great expense for his guests. He didn’t have to!
THE EXCUSES
In the face of such generosity we find some pretty lame excuses. To this day people make shallow and ridiculous excuses such as these in verses 18-20. Let’s have a look at them.
1. “I have just bought a field, and I must go and see it. Please excuse me.” (The theme is: I did this; I must do this; excuse me.)
The Promised Land was the gift from God given to each family. Selling it in Jesus’ day was frowned upon.
In biblical days there were certain prescribed procedures for purchasing. One went out and walked over the entire property with the current owner. We did not have a better business bureau at the time and it was important to make sure that you’re getting the best value for the money. One did not buy property, and then go have a look at it. This was unheard of and a very lame excuse.
This does beg another point though. We can let the material things of this world get ahead of God. We want more, more, more and when we get it we look and say, “It’s mine! All of it is mine!” The problem with that is that everything you have is a gift from God.
We must always be seeing about this and that. But what must we do about the things of God. What about that, your greatest possession. In Matthew 6:19 we find Jesus saying:
"Don't hoard treasure down here where it gets eaten by moths and corroded by rust or—worse!—stolen by burglars. Stockpile treasure in heaven, where it's safe from moth and rust and burglars. It's obvious, isn't it? The place where your treasure is, is the place you will most want to be, and end up being.” (The Message)
2. “I just bought five teams of oxen and I really need to check them out. Send my regrets.” (The theme is: I did this; I must do this; excuse me.)
Back in the days of my pastorate in Kentucky, there were several coon hunters in our little church. They bought some expensive dogs that were well trained. When a man wanted a trained dog he would go out with the current owner and they would watch the dog hunt coons. Oftentimes they did this for several nights in a row. You wanted to make sure the dog would hunt before you paid good money for him.
The same is true of this excuse. Five teams of oxen costs about $20,000 in today’s dollars. You took them out and worked them thoroughly before you paid good money for them. This too, was a lame excuse.
Sometimes, as Christians, we let work get in the way of our walk with Christ. We are too busy with work to go to church regularly. We are too busy with work to be involved in the ministry of his church.
For some, our work is too important to take time away from it for the things of God. Let me ask you a question. What is more important than your relationship with God? When you stand before him in judgment, what will he say about your stewardship of your time, talents, gifts, and service?
There will only be two choices. The illustration is in Matthew 25. To the servant who made good use of what the boss gave him he said:
“Good work! You did your job well. From now on be my partner.” (v. 23)
To the one who simply squirreled away his gifts he said:
“So take the money from him, and give it to him who has ten thousand.” (v. 28 paraphrase)
3. The third man said, “I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.” (Change in theme: I did this; so I must do this; I cannot come.)
The first thing we have to note here is that this man did not get married recently. Villages were small and there were few special occasions. Had there been a recent wedding, the host would not have scheduled a banquet so soon thereafter. Hence the man did not have a valid excuse.
This is the rudest shun of the three. Middle Eastern society maintains formal restraint in speaking of women. In Aramaic, the language of Jesus’ day, the words for women, sacred, and forbidden are all from the same root. Even in the nineteenth century a man away from home, if he had only daughters at home, would address a letter to the son he hoped to father. To address a letter to a woman would be improper. Middle Eastern men were, and often are, extremely reluctant to talk about the women in their family.
More than that, this was the main meal of the day. It would have come in the middle of the day. This guest is saying: “Yesterday I said I would come, but this afternoon I am busy with a woman, who is more important to me than your banquet.”
This excuse would be rude in any society. It is intensely rude in the Middle Eastern world and totally unprecedented. The time away from home would have been, at most, a few hours. Soon he would be back in the arms of his bride. Lastly, he does not even ask to be excused! This excuse was carefully tailored to insult and infuriate the host.
Conclusion:
Clearly the man throwing the banquet is God or Jesus. His invitation is for us to come in and dine with him. We are invited to partake in his work and ministry. Sometimes our excuses are just as lame. Do you think you have a good excuse for not serving God?

The “No Excuses” Litany

Noah was drunk…
Abraham was too old…Jacob was a liar…
Leah was ugly
Joseph was abused
Moses was a stutterer…
Gideon was afraid…
Sampson had long hair and was a womanizer…
Rahab was a prostitute…
Jeremiah and Timothy were too young…
David had an affair and was a murderer…
Elijah was suicidal…
Isaiah preached naked…
Jonah ran from God…
John the Baptist ate bugs and was fashion-challenged…
Peter denied Christ…
The Apostles fell asleep while praying…
Martha worried about everything…
The Samaritan woman couldn’t get an annulment…
Zacheus was too small…
Paul was too religious…
Timothy had an ulcer…
And Lazarus was dead!

My favorite sermon illustration is one I heard from D. James Kennedy, the founder of Evangelism Explosion. He tells of a Chinese farmer who purchased a new plow. His neighbor came over to ask permission to borrow the plow. The farmer replied, “No, my wife is combing her hair with it.” “Combing her hair?” the neighbor asked. “Well, no she isn’t,” answered the farmer. “But I don’t want to loan it to you and one excuse is as good as another.”
We all have our excuses why we don’t do more in ministry. We call them reasons but they are merely excuses. D. James Kennedy defines excuses as, “a fruit whose skin is a reason, but whose meat is a lie.”
We are to live our lives without excuses. Romans 1:20 says that in the judgment we will be without excuse.
I would like to share with you the words of an unnamed African pastor whose level of faith and commitment can teach us a lot.

“I’m part of the fellowship of the unashamed. I have Holy Spirit power. The die has been cast. I have stepped over the line. The decision has been made. I’m a disciple of his. I won’t look back, let up, slow down, back away, or be still. My past is redeemed, my present makes sense, my future is secure. I’m finished and done with low living, sight walking, small planning, smooth knees, colorless dreams, tamed visions, mundane talking, cheap living, and dwarfed goals.
I no longer need pre-eminence, prosperity, position, promotions, plaudits, or popularity. I don’t have to be right, first, tops, recognized, praised, regarded, or rewarded. I now live by faith, lean on His presence, walk by patience, lift by prayer, and labor by power.
My face is set, my gait is fast, my goal is heaven, my road is narrow, my way is rough, my companions few, my guide reliable, my mission clear. I cannot be bought, compromised, detoured, lured away, turned back, deluded, or delayed. I will not flinch in the face of sacrifice, hesitate in the presence of adversity, negotiate at the table of my enemy, ponder at the pool of popularity, or meander in the maze of mediocrity.
I won’t give up, shut up, let up, until I have stayed up, stored up, prayed up, paid up, preached up for the cause of Christ. I am a disciple of Jesus. I must go till he comes, give till I drop, preach till all know, and work till he stops me.
And when he comes for his own, he will have no problem recognizing me.”
We issue an invitation to follow Christ in his ministry and his lordship in your life. What’s your excuse?

Sermon 8.26.7: Thermostats Not Thermometers

2007-08-31T14:37:00.000-05:00

Thermostats Not Thermometers

Everything you have is a gift from God! Your life, health, family, salvation, the air you breathe is a gift from God. Now, some of you are sitting there and saying to yourselves, “Hey, I worked hard for the things I have.” But God gave you life and he gave you the energy to work for them. He gave you good sense to save your money to be able to buy them. He gave you the ability to count. These are your blessings!
The question for us is, “what will we do with what we have?” We are called to be good managers of our resources. The biblical word for that is “stewardship”. We are to manage the things God gives us well. That includes our opportunities, intelligence, relationships, and resources.
Christians are to use these to influence our world. The Cambridge Dictionary defines influence as:
“The power to have an effect on people or things, or a person that is able to do this”
Everyone is an influence. What we have to decide is, “What, and how, I will influence my world?” God commands that we be an influence on our world. In Matthew 5:16 we find:
“Let your light shine, so that others will see the good that you do, and will praise your Father in heaven.”
Jesus says, “Let your light shine”. Don’t waste your influence. Be a thermostat. Don’t hide it.
One of the first songs we teach the little children in Sunday School is “This Little Light of Mine”. We teach them and they sing it. They love it so they sing it with gusto. They sing it loudly and proudly. We smile with pride when we hear them sing it. But we do not sing it as adults. We forgot about our light!
He then says, “You are the salt for the whole human race.” He calls us to be salt because of what salt does. Salt seasons, preserves, and improves. God wants you to season the world. He wants you to preserve the world. He wants you to improve the world. God expects you to use your influence for good in the world.
Jeremiah 15:19 says:
“You are to influence them; do not let them influence you.”
Christians often get this reversed. We are too often influenced by the world, rather than influencing the world. We let the world take the salt out of us. We are thermometers, not thermostats. A thermometer measures temperature. A thermostat sets the temperature.
Every contact we have with anyone can set a temperature. When you smile at someone; you set a temperature. When you speak to someone, you set a temperature. When you cut someone off in traffic, and they give you that strange gesture; you set a temperature. Every contact you have; sets a temperature. You are the thermostat.
Everyone email you send; sets a temperature. Every note you write; sets a temperature. Everything you do; sets a temperature. You are the thermostat.
We need to recognize our influence. There is no doubt as to the fact we have influence. The question we must ask is: “How will I influence my world? Will I be for Christ, or against Christ? What is the setting on my thermostat? Will my influence be positive or negative?”
The bible says that God wants you to consider how you use your life and how you use your work for him? We are to make the most of our opportunities to set the thermostat in our world. People watch you and associate your behavior with your church and with your God. The rock group got it right back in 1995 when they sang:
Every breath you takeEvery move you makeEvery bond you breakEvery step you takeIll be watching youEvery single dayEvery word you sayEvery game you playEvery night you stayIll be watching you
Every move you makeEvery vow you breakEvery smile you fakeEvery claim you stakeI’ll be watching you
Our church was founded by a man of great influence. John Wesley was a man with a heart for God. For years he focused on growing in grace in Christ. He gathered a small band around him at Oxford. They called themselves “The Holy Club”. They focused on growing in grace in Christ. In his journals, he called this: “The First Rise of Methodism”. We got the name “Methodist”, not as an honor. It was one of the many derisive terms used about the Holy Club. It was the one that stuck.
After a few years Wesley asked himself what good it did for one to grow in grace if that did not affect his world. After much soul searching he set off on a trip to America. He determined to “save the heathen Indians”. This trip was known as the “Second Rise of Methodism”. It was a failed adventure that ended with Wesley sneaking out of Georgia to avoid arrest.
He returned to England a broken man. That brokenness made possible the experience at Aldersgate. It was there that he felt his heart “strangely warmed”. It was there that he truly found God. Wesley’s truly became a thermostat that day.
He now determined to do everything in his power to make others into thermostats. The Anglican priests of his day would not let this “fanatic” into their pulpits and he had no venue to spread the word. It was then that George Whitefield invited Wesley to come up north and help him in a revival by preaching in the fields. This was an unheard of thing to Wesley. The Word of God was so sacred that it should only be proclaimed in his hallowed house. Still, his thermostat was changed and he took a chance. Through his preaching, God changed hundreds from thermometers into thermostats that day. They met Jesus through the preaching of John Wesley. The Holy Spirit changed thousands from thermometers into thermostats through the influence of John Wesley.
When you die they will probably read a thing called an “obituary” at your funeral. That brief description is a summary of who you are and what you have done. It will tell others what kind of person you were. It will tell them whether you were a thermostat that set values for others and kept those values firm. Or it will tell them you simply reflected the values of everyone else. Will your obituary say you were a thermostat?

Message August 5, 2007

2007-08-06T08:44:00.000-05:00

Almost Persuaded
Numbers 13:16-14:44
1. Introduction—the setting
It was the end of a forty year journey. Now in the Bible anytime you see the number forty that is “Bible speak” for “a long time”. You all remember the story from Sunday School. YHWH (God) forced Pharaoh to change his mind about keeping the people of Israel in slavery. Then when they got started on their journey, Pharaoh changed his mind again and went after them. Then YHWH managed to mire down the Egyptian army and drown them.
Next YHWH fed, watered, and clothed a people while they wandered the Sinai Peninsula for “forty years”. Oh and they were cantankerous! If you left them alone for a few days they would create their own god. He lost his patience with them a time or two and some of them did not live to regret it.
Now here they are on the verge of having everything they had been looking for. Here they were at Kadesh Barnea, just across the river from the Promised Land. They were on the verge of greatness. They were just across the river from the “land that flowed with milk and honey.” Now, again, that’s “Bible speak” for “fine.” It was to be the culmination of all their hopes and dreams.
2. The scouting party
No military expedition can commence until one does proper reconnaissance. Moses picked a man from each of the twelve tribes, one of which was his personal assistant, Joshua, to do the recon. They set off to be gone for a long time (remember 40) to do a thorough reconnaissance.
The instructions from Moses were very specific. Go up through the Negev into the hill country (what today is known as the Golan Heights) and see what the land looks like. Are there a lot of people in it or just a few people? Are they strong or weak? What is the soil like? Is it fertile or poor? Are the cities fortified? Are there trees on it or not? Bring us back some fresh grapes.
3. The report
The contrasting reconnaissance reports were interesting. The spies returned with a cluster of grapes big enough that it required two men to sling a pole between them to carry it. There was some other fruit. They stood before all the people and said “Mo, that land is finer than frog hair split four directions. But there are guys living there that would be first round draft picks in the NBA. Their legs are bigger than most NFL linemen and we personally do not have the gumption to face them. Those guys will rip our heads off.”
4. The argument
Caleb and Joshua silenced the panicky people and said, “You boys need to grow a little hair on your chest. We can do this thing.
“‘We thought surely God promised us the land,” the ten replied. “But we did not expect to have to fight for it. We supposed God would just give it to us without any fighting or trouble on our part.”
“Oh, no, God never promised Canaan without a battle,’ Caleb replied. ‘But He will help us fight, then we shall properly appreciate both God and Canaan and the fighting will make us stronger.”

Then the people lost what little vestiges of faith they had and the situation degenerated into a general panic. These people whom YHWH had brought out of Egypt with a series of miracles. These people for whom YHWH had fought. These people whom YHWH had fed and clothed. These people wanted the land of their Fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob returned to them without their having to do anything for it.
The people had no faith. Faith believes, and doubt does not believe. One is the opposite of the other, just as heaven and hell are opposites. Considering doubters more closely, we find that doubters believe; but they believe the opposite of what they should believe. Doubters believe the wrong thing. A doubter is one who could and ought to believe facts, but for some reason or other cannot bring himself to do it. Instead, he believes another set of things, which appear to be facts but are not.
Faith and doubting is a little like a set of twins. One was born an optimist, the other a pessimist. They were so extreme in their views that the parents consulted a psychiatrist. After much counseling and many thousands of dollars, the psychiatrist was in a quandary. No progress was made. He finally settled on a course of action and informed the parents that for their upcoming birthday they should give the optimist the worst gift they could think of. The pessimist was to receive the most wonderful gift he could imagine.
Not being able to stand his curiosity the good doctor went to their house on the given day. Out front, he found the little pessimist with a wonderful bicycle. It was state of the art and had all the bells and whistles. When asked about his beautiful gift, the little boy replied, “It’s not the right color and I will probably break a leg or crush my skull on it if I ride it.”
Disheartened, the doctor found the little optimist out back. The boy was sitting in the middle of the yard with a shoebox full of horse apples. The doctor asked him about his present and the little optimist replied, “It’s wonderful! I got a pony; I just haven’t found him yet.” That’s the way this scouting party was. Two had faith. Ten did not have faith.
5. On the verge of greatness—rebellion
The people, on the verge of greatness, rebelled against their leaders and their God. A mob mentality ensued and the people spoke of stoning Moses, Aaron, Caleb, and Joshua. To Moses they said, “Why didn’t you and YHWH just leave us alone back in Egypt? We were slaves but at least we were alive!” They continued to rant like petulant children.
God became upset and was content to blast all but these men and their wives and children. He would then raise a whole new nation to have the benefit of his promises. A new nation from these men would be the ones to inherit the Land of Promise; the land of their Fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
“As surely as I live and as surely as the glory of YHWH fills the whole earth, not one of the men who saw my glory and the miraculous signs I performed in Egypt and in the desert but who disobeyed me and tested me ten times, not one of them will ever see the land I promised on oath to their forefathers. No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see it.”
6. Loss and wandering
So they turned and retraced their route. They wandered in the desert for another long time. They had been on the pinnacle of greatness. They were there where they could have received their promise. They were SOOOOOOOOOOO close, and they missed out. Not just for now but forever.
God wants a people who will believe in him. He wants a people who will trust in him. If you think about it, these people were very much like babies. They were little tyrants whose hand was always out. They always expected YHWH to meet their every need. They were content as long as he would meet their every need. It was when he required some effort on their part that the trouble started. We parents will do that for our children until they are able to do for themselves. At that point most of us can let go.
Today, we can go to Fayetteville and watch the Hogs play. It’s entertaining to sit in the stands and watch Darren McFadden run the ball. I never understood the entertainment of NASCAR but some find it entertaining. Sometimes it’s entertaining to go to church.
The difference is that this business of Christianity is not a spectator sport. We have no business “going to church” to be “entertained”. God send his son. They called him Jesus. He came to love, heal, and forgive. He lived and died to buy our pardon. This is a time for us all to search our hearts. The business of having God do all the work is a dangerous one.
We stand on the ground of Kadesh Barnea. God calls us to go over and be about the business of “being” Christians. He calls us to go forth and conquer. He asks for great risks to be taken in faith. He offers great reward. It requires us to get off the couch. You men will have to put down that remote. We must be about the business to which he calls us. Will you cross over the Jordan, or will you go back to the desert? There was so much that could have been. There is so much that could be. It is a choice each of us must make.

Have A Whale of a Good Time!

2007-08-03T22:34:00.000-05:00

Swim Party
August 7. from 6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
Sodie Davidson Park Pool
Free Snacks/Drinks provided at "Jonah's Snack Stand"
Lifeguards will be on duty

This "cool splash" is for children, youth, (and any brave parents who want to join in the fun). Kids, invite a friend!

Adults who prefer to be "landlubbers," we suggest that you bring a lawn chair to relax by the pool.

Thanks go to JoAnn Black and Darla Dozier for organizing this event!

Message July 29, 2007

2007-08-01T05:18:00.000-05:00

Waldron Methodist Church July, 29, 2007
On the Road to Emmaus
Luke 24: 13-33
Humans are fascinated by journeys. From the shenanigans of Bob Hope and Bing Crosby on the roads to Rio and Morocco, something about traveling grips us. Willie Nelson can't wait to be on the road again, Nat King Cole gets his kicks on Route 66.
Have you ever noticed that the saddest words in the English language begin with the letter “d”? There’s: death, disappointment, doubt, despair, defeat, discouragement, despondency, depression. I have no doubt that if you were to ask Cleopas and his companion how they felt that day, their reply would have included all of these words.
1. Everyone will go to Emmaus:
If you live long enough you will make it to Emmaus. It is that place we have all visited or will visit. It is the place we come to when the hurt is enormous, the pain is too great. We get there when all hope is lost and life doesn’t turn out like we planned. It is that place we journey when we have known great loss and only the greatest of disappointments.
A. We go to Emmaus when we are angry, bitter or irritated:
Emmaus is not far away. It’s about the distance between Waldron and Needmore. In our heads Emmaus may be even closer than that. Some who come to Emmaus are irritated, angry, and bitter. The news was not good on that Sunday morning. The previous week leading to the time of the Feast of the Passover, was one in which hope abounded. This is just a scant few days from Palm Sunday and the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. Remember the story? In Luke 19 we read:
“As he went along, people spread their cloaks on the road. When he came near to the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples joyfully began to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen:
‘Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!’
‘Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!’
Jesus himself said, ‘if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out’”
Boy those were the days. It was to be the culmination of all their hopes and dreams. His followers just knew that the glory of God was about to break loose and all these Romans were leaving. Man things were exciting.
Now it was all gone. He was dead. His closest followers were hiding out. Everyone else had scattered. Where there was once great joy, now there was sorrow. Happiness and joy was replaced by pain. One of their own betrayed him. Now he was dead. It was over.
B. We go to Emmaus when it is hopeless:
“Jesus of Nazareth was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people.” “We had hoped he was going to be the one to redeem Israel.” Cleopas said, “We had hoped.” Emmaus is that place you go when your hopes are dashed. Cleopas thought that Jesus was to throw off the yoke of Roman oppression. I personally have no doubt that Judas felt the same way. He hoped to force Jesus’ hand by bringing in the Romans. Surely Jesus would break forth in combat when they showed. The conflict could then begin.
Eugene Land was a self made millionaire. According to a Parade magazine article he was invited to speak to 59 sixth-grade students in East Harlem. What could he say to inspire these children who were the poorest of the poor? He wasn’t sure he could even get the predominantly black and Puerto Rican students to look at him. He scrapped his notes and spoke to the students from the heart. “Stay in school,” he admonished, “and I’ll help pay the college tuition for every one of you.” At that moment their lives changed. One boy said, “I had something to look forward to, something waiting for me. It was a golden feeling.” Nearly 90% of those students graduated from high school and most went on to college. Eugene Land took them out of Emmaus.
Some on the Road to Emmaus are in denial. Jesus tells them they are “slow of heart.” Jesus never intended to be a militaristic messiah. He made that plain in his teachings. His disciples, “just didn’t get it.” They wanted to be free of Rome and here was a man with the power, charisma, and wisdom to make that happen. Our emotional programming is such that we seldom hear what we do not want to hear. Cleopas and his companion had visions of grandeur, and that is what they heard in Jesus’ teaching. Now they were sad.
Still others on the road to Emmaus are worried. “Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said (empty), but him they did not see.” Those were the ones who were worried about the body. What had happened to it? These particular disciples were probably the only ones to even venture outside. The others were in hiding. They were afraid for their lives. What a difference a week makes. This is Emmaus.
Emmaus is that place where:
You wake up face down on the pavement.
You call Suicide Prevention and they put you on hold.
Your birthday cake collapses from the weight of the candles.
You turn on the news and they’re showing emergency routes out of the city.
Your twin forgets your birthday.
Your boss tells you not to take off your coat.
The bird outside your window is a buzzard.
Your income tax check bounces.
Your wife says, “Good morning, Bill”, and your name is George.
2. Even if you don’t see him, Jesus is on the road with you:
Keep in mind that the whole time they were discussing all that had happened with the stranger, they didn’t recognize him. It did not seem to occur to them that if the report of the empty tomb was true, then the report of his resurrection might also be true. He was right there with them and they had no clue.
3. When you get to Emmaus leave! Do not get a room there:
Whatever brings you to Emmaus, there is something important you should know. Do not get a room there. Do not give in to the depression, despair, doubt, disappointment, defeat, despondency, or discouragement. Fight it with every fiber of your being. Do not give in to it one iota. As the poet Dylan Thomas wrote, “Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” Our text says, “But they urged him strongly, ‘Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over.’”
I know a woman who suddenly lost her husband to a heart attack. He was only forty-seven. For the last five years she has stayed in Emmaus. She is still angry at him for being gone. She is still bitter at her world. She still cries herself to sleep at night over him. She is still in Emmaus.
They clung on to the one person who gave them hope. They were insistent that he stay with them. In their heart of hearts, they sensed the hope that could burn again inside. “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”
4. Seven miles from Emmaus is the place to be (but only for a short time):
Jerusalem was the place where life was going to happen. Jerusalem, not Emmaus, is the place to be.
“They got up and returned at once to Jerusalem there they found the Eleven and those with them, assembled together and saying, ‘It is true! The Lord has risen and has appeared to Simon.’ Then the two told what had happened on the way, and how Jesus was recognized by them when he broke the bread. While they were still talking about this, Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace is with you.”
Jesus appears and they are startled and frightened. They think he is a ghost. Unbelief continued to reign in the face of incontrovertible evidence.
He calmed them by allowing them to touch him. Jerusalem, not Emmaus is the place to touch Jesus. Seven miles from Emmaus they not only saw Jesus but could touch him. Yet there is one more thing we need to remember. Even Jerusalem is not a place of permanent abode. It is simply that place we go to prepare to get back out into the world. We get there and sort things out and the healing can begin. More importantly, we can begin to get the power to go on and do our work.
5. Stay seven miles from Emmaus only until you get your marching orders:
Jesus opens their minds in order that they may learn the true meaning of his teaching, life, death, and resurrection. He then tells them to stay in the city only long enough to receive his power and leave.
We would all like to stay close to Jerusalem. That’s a comfortable place. We can sing songs; read the Bible; pray; and generally have a “feel good, touchy, feely” thing going. The trouble with that is we are not doing what we are to do.
Airplanes are made to fly. They last longer when they fly. An airplane that is always on the ground will deteriorate more quickly than one which is in use. I think Christians are a little like that. If we are not about the business of doing what God has called us to do, we are deteriorating. We are not living up to our purpose.
This story of the road to Emmaus is a symbol of the Christian life. It’s about ordinary Monday morning drudgery and ordinary despair. It is a story to tell us that the risen Lord gives hope and joy. Without seeing him all we will know is disappointment, discouragement, and despair. When we see him as a part of our life this world is not just a place of death, decay and defeat but is a place that groans towards God’s final victory. It’s a story about everyday life.
The changes to the disciples were described like this:
“Their lives prior to this moment were like a smoldering fire that gives no light, just smoke to cloud things up. But once they came into the presence of the Risen Lord their hearts were ablaze! A burning fire gives light for all to see, and they saw, understood and believed! All because of the Risen Lord! Jesus’ victory became their restoring hope. It became the anchor of their lives.” (Author unknown)
That stranger that comes up to us when we are hurting or lonely is Jesus. Come away from Emmaus and back to Jerusalem.

"Showdown at the O K Corral"

2007-07-23T09:15:00.000-05:00

Waldron Methodist July 22, 2007
“Showdown at the O K Corral”
1 Kings 16:23-17:6, 18: 22-46
We begin with Ahab:
After the death of Solomon, Rehoboam took over as the king of Israel. A minor court official named Jeroboam led the northern tribes out of the nation and called themselves Israel. The rest of the country, including Jerusalem, is called Judah.
The writers of 1 Kings, have almost nothing good to say about the kings of Israel. They were the leaders of the renegade tribes. Jeroboam was said to have done nothing good during his reign. He led the nation of Israel into sin and degradation. He worshipped the Canaanite fertility god known as Baal, and the fertility goddess known as Asheroh. We’ll talk more about them later.
As king succeeded king in Israel their crimes grew worse. The worst of the worst was Omri. Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse, Ahab becomes king. He was Omri on steroids. First he married a foreign woman, Jezebel, who led into Baal worship. In verse thirty one we find that he “considered it trivial to commit the sins of Jeroboam, son of Nebat.” He became worse by building a temple to Baal in Samaria. He then set up an altar for him in the temple. He also made an Asherah pole and, “did more to provoke YHWH(Yahweh), the God of Israel, to anger than did all of the Kings of Israel before him. In modern language that means he was worse than the rest of the kings all “put together”.
Continue with Baal:
We give you Baal. He was the Canaanite fertility god. They believed that his death and resurrection annually brought prosperity to the fields. They also believed he controlled the rain. He was seen as a direct rival to YHWH (Yahweh) the god of Israel.
It was believed that Baal and Asherah was a fertility couple that was so powerful, YHWH could not keep up with them. Most importantly, it was believed that Baal controlled the rain from heaven. In the time of Ahab, their worship became prevalent. There was a real possibility that the worship of YHWH in Israel would cease to exist.
The reason was Jezebel:
She was the Queen of Israel. She brought her court prophets and sought to convert the nation of Israel. Now that proved to be a relatively easy proposition. You see the worship of Baal and Asherah provided for human intercourse with concubines. They believed that as their gods watched this, he would find favor and the land would be more fertile.
The other way Jezebel sought to win the war over YHWH was to openly persecute his prophets. What that really means is if she could get her hands on you she would kill you. Worship of YHWH in his temple was allowed but few came out of fear of Jezebel.
Now we have Elijah:
In the midst of persecution he was the prophet who dared to profess the word of YHWH or God. Keep in mind that Jezebel was trying to catch and kill him in chapter 17, verse one, he appears before the king to say, “As the Lord, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor ran in the next few years except at my (Elijah’s) word.”
Elijah then does the first sane thing we know about him. He left town. In fact, he left the country by crossing the Jordan and hiding in a ravine.
The heat was on and now we begin the story:
While Elijah is hiding out near one of the few sources of water for miles around, God was feeding him by means of ravens. Those really were a form of crow in modern language. The drought continued and his water source dried up.
He then headed north and stayed out of the nation of Israel. He went to the city of Zarapeth in Sidon, Jezebel’s country, and stayed with a widow and her son. Through the providence of YHWH, he is fed and watered along with the widow and her son. The boy died and Elijah takes the time to raise him from the dead.
Throughout all this time Ahab is scouring the countryside looking for Elijah. He is even threatening the neighbors if they harbor him. He wanted to get a hold on Elijah, torture him, and end the curse.
After three years of this arrangement YHWH speaks to Elijah. “Elijah,” he said, “it’s time to get this show on the road.” He tells him to go see the king, who is pretty fired up after three years without rain due to Elijah’s word, and tell him that we want an audience with the country.
Now in the days before radio, television, newspapers, organized sporting events; the people had nothing to do. They could not work because nothing was growing in the fields. It hadn’t rained in three years! The king sent runners to the ends of the kingdom and tells everyone to show up on Mount Carmel. They did!
Now I need you to remember something. Everyone thought Baal controlled the rain. Everyone thought Baal controlled the fertility of the fields and earth. YHWH through Elijah is about to bash Baal in the mouth and maybe put an end to this heresy once and for all. The place for the showdown was Mount Carmel.
Mount Carmel (in Hebrew it means the garden of God), juts out into the Mediterranean Sea in the northwestern part of Israel. It was usually the first place to get rain in the country. It’s about halfway between Jezebel’s Sidon and Ahab’s Samaria and was the perfect place for a confrontation. It contained an altar to YHWH which had been torn down. On top was a natural amphitheater in which the battle would rage.
Elijah stepped onto the floor and addressed the people, “how long will you waver between two opinions? If YHWH is God follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.”
The rules are set. Baal has four hundred and fifty prophets and they will go first. Each side will have an opportunity to take a bull; cut it into pieces; put it on the wood of the altar. But they cannot set it afire. Their God must do that.
So began the prophets of Baal. They prayed, danced and shouted from morning until noon. “Baal, answer us!” But there was no response; no one answered. At noon things began to heat up. Elijah began to taunt them. “Shout louder!” he said, “Surely, he is a god! Maybe he’s off meditating or sleeping. Yell louder to wake him up.”
They danced, and danced. They shouted and danced. Nothing happened. In keeping with their worship they began to shout louder and slash their skin. The blood flowed. Sunset was coming. “But there was no response, no one answered, and no one paid attention.”
Elijah tells the people, “Come here” The altar of YHWH is repaired. A trench is dug, he cut the bull into pieces and lays it on the wood. Then he drenches the offering and the wood three times. At sunset he stepped forward and called:
“O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. Answer me, YHWH, answer me, so these people will know that you, YHWH, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.”
The mighty fire of YHWH fell from heaven and burned up the sacrifice, wood, the huge rocks of the altar, and the ground. The water in the trench turned into steam and disappeared.
This was, for the nation of Israel, what a redneck would call a “come to Jesus” moment. They fell to the ground and screamed at the top of their lungs, “YHWH is God. YHWH is God. YHWH is God.”
Elijah was a gracious winner. Remember that Jezebel had killed every prophet of YHWH she could get her hands on. Elijah was happy to return the favor. They seized the tired, exhausted, bleeding prophets of Baal and slaughtered them.
Then Elijah turned to Ahab and says, “You better eat, drink, and go home early because the rain that’s coming now will stick your chariot in the mud.”
A small cloud began to form on the horizon. It looked about the size of your hand. Then the sky grew black with clouds, the wind raged and heavy rain pelted Ahab as he rode off to Jezreel. YHWH is God.
This is the tale of a life and death struggle. What lessons can we learn from this? First, Jesus says the greatest commandment is to “love YHWH your God, with all your heart, with your soul, and with your entire mind.” I believe what Jesus was saying to us here is that we should love and serve God with everything we have. He must be at the center of our being, our heart. We walk for God with our entire life force. Walk for God with our entire understanding.
In this passage we learn that you are either serving YHWH; or you are serving another god. There is really no neutral ground. We also see that this is a war. People were being killed as a result of their beliefs. You had an enemy.
Some things do not change. The enemy is one of them. He may look different or disguise himself differently but he is still the enemy. He would like to make us complacent because that keeps us neutral. But we are in a war.

Upcoming Committee Meetings

2007-07-22T14:42:00.000-05:00

Wednesday, July 25...The Finance Committee will meet at 7:00 pm in the Fellowship Hall. Members of that committee are: Chair-Aldon Hughes, Marilyn Hicks, Clifford Daily, John Paul Davidson, Cindy Frankin, Libby Goddard, Joe Don Rogers, Harvey Bates, Jack Bethea, Dewey Frazier, Ann Crossett.

Thursday, July 26...The Committee on Lay Leadership (Nominations) will meet at 6:00 pm in the Fellowship Hall. Members of this committee are: Cindy Franklin, Linda Goodner, Donald Goodner, Harvey Bates, Jack Bethea, Mary McKinley, Karan Rogers, Kevin Floyd.

Saturday, August 11...The Worship Comm., the SPPR Comm., the Finance Comm., and the Board of Trustees will all be meeting with Robert to make plans and set goals for the coming year. The meeting will begin at 10:00 am in the Fellowship Hall and will conclude around noon, followed by a light lunch. Those serving on these committees are respectively expected to attend.

"Goodnight Irene"

2007-07-16T19:18:00.000-05:00

Sermon for July 15, 2007
Robert Lyons, Pastor

Sermon Text: Philippians 4:4-8

The church at Philippi was a beautiful one. There were no stately steeples or anything else to mark its grandeur. Their beauty was from the heart. As a class, the people of the church were the dregs of society. They were the lower class. A Pharisee would have characterized them as “tax collectors and sinners”. They owned no gold jewelry, had no fine clothes, they did not sleep in mansions. They were poor.
While they did not have enough money to pay attention, they did support Paul’s missionary work. In fact, their contributions were among the only ones he would accept. They were a paradoxical mix of poverty and open-handed support of Paul’s mission to people they would never know. They were very attached to Paul and he to them.
And yet they still had some of the same difficulties we have today. In chapter 4, verse 2, Paul asks two of the women in the church to quit bickering and get along. His final words to them are some we can live by. The title of this message is “Goodnight Irene”. The Greek word for peace is Irene (åéñÞíç). In this day and age of many creature comforts, many have no peace in their heart. Irene has left their building. Paul writes to them about things we might be missing in our lives.
The practice of living in peace and without worry requires a focus. In chapter 4 and verse 4 he gives them his focus. A current paraphrase might be to “dance a jig for Jesus.” Oh, and do this ALWAYS! Then, in case they didn’t get the message he takes up precious paper and writes it again! REJOICE!!!
There is a simple principle involved in the human brain. We can only think about one thing at a time. Just one! Another simple principle is that we can choose what we think about. Paul encourages us to make that choice our God. Chapter 2 of this letter contains one of the oldest passages in the New Testament. It was a hymn sung by the earliest Christians. We know this because the Greek style here is very different from the style in the rest of Paul’s writings. Beginning with verse 5 he writes:
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who being in the very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
So he writes to his church to remember what God did for them.
Next he tells them to put on a mindset. In verse 5 of chapter 4 Paul tells his people to let their “gentleness” be evident to all. The word translated as “gentleness” is one of the most difficult in the entire New Testament for us to understand. That is because we do not have an exact English equivalent. If we did it would be something like: your good natured, sweet spirited, easy to get along with-ness. And he tells them to let that aspect of their personality stand out like the hood ornament on a Mack truck.
“Don’t worry about anything.” Worry is a nasty thing. The word itself is a derivative of an old Anglo-Saxon word that means “to grab you by the throat and choke the life out of you.” In the Matthew 6:25 and following, Jesus indicates that worry was prevalent in the human condition. We know this because he addressed it:
Don’t worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet the heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
He then tells his people to give up worry for communication. We have two different words here. The first is prayer. Now, that’s not exactly prayer the way you and I know it. It’s more of the type of thing that I do when I have a lot on my mind and I am driving, or walking, or otherwise engaged. It is that internal conversation one has with God on an ongoing basis.
Then we come to “petition”. That is the sort of thing one does on their knees or in a prayer meeting. Petition is for those times when we stop for a conversation with God. Those conversations must be a dialogue to be effective. Paul tells us to simply turn these things over to God.
He inserts a wrinkle to prayer that we seldom hear from the TV preachers. He says “but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”
He then tells us in verse 7, that by following the above steps: that if we rejoice in the Lord, keep a good natured spirit, do not worry, pray, petition God, that a peace will come over our life. The peace of God will arrive. Oh, and it’s one of those things we cannot understand. That’s how encompassing it is. This peace guards our hearts like armed bodyguards around a Mafioso meeting or the doorkeeper in a club.
Finally he tells us to exercise a little mind control. If it’s good, think on it. If it’s noble, think on it. If it’s right, think on it. If it’s pure, think on it. If it’s lovely, think on it. I think you get the picture.
Do all these things. Then, the åéñÞíç (peace) of God will be with you. It will be with you forever and ever, Amen.

In Memory of "One of the Good Guys"

2007-07-16T19:14:00.000-05:00

Service of Death and Resurrection July 14, 2007
Jack Wengert

Robert Lyons, Pastor
1 Thessalonians 4:13

Emma called me early Wednesday morning. “Jack passed about 3:30 this morning,” she said.” I knew it was coming but something about it didn’t seem right. To tell you the truth, something about this still doesn’t seem right.
Emma said it best, “Jack was one of the good guys. He had his head on straight.” Jack was one of the good guys. People like Jack Wengert are rare. He had a heart bigger than Texas.
Jack retired from the forestry service. In the course of my lifetime, I have been blessed to call more than one forester a friend. One thing I do know about them. They are tough. Early on in their marriage there were no good jobs available. Every day Jack took a bus up into the mountain. He spent the day shoveling snow around the trees so the sawyers could cut trees during the winter. It was tough work but he was a tough man.
In spite of this toughness, he was one of the most wonderful people you would ever meet. Brent told me that he has always looked people in the eye and, with pride, told them he was Jack’s boy. Jack loved his children. He was devoted to his family. He was a loving grandfather who loved his grandchildren so much they, indeed, considered him grand.
Jack was a giver. He was devoted to this church, the Boys and Girls Club, Lion’s Club, the Men’s Prayer breakfast, and generally to helping others. Things would get fixed around this place and no one would know who did it. “It must have been Jack,” people said. Jack loved projects and fixing things. He liked to make trailers of all kinds. He enjoyed making duck blinds and inventing things. His greatest pleasure was finding new uses for objects that no longer had use. Jack liked to work on everything. It was important to him that everything on his place be in “good working order.”
Jack understood the truth of James 2:14-18
“What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith and has no deeds? Can such faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, ‘Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by actions, is dead. But someone will say, ‘You have faith; I have deeds.’ Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.”
You see Jack believed that talk was cheap. Actions, in his book, spoke louder than words. He believed the truth contained in James 1:22, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says!”
Jack treated everyone the same, like people. Larry told me his favorite Jack story yesterday. When they were in Florida, after a Hurricane Andrew, they had a small catering outfit setup for relief workers. Civilians ate well and the military was eating MRE’S. A general came in to inquire if his men were welcome to eat. Jack told him, “yeah.” The general then said he wanted his men to have a reserved set of tables. Jack objected to this and the general went on his way. A few days later the general saw things Jack’s way and the soldiers were able to mingle with their civilian coworkers.
If I think there is the remotest possibility that I might find it necessary to conduct another’s funeral, it is important that I know their spiritual condition. In those affairs, one never assumes. The first Monday I was here, I went up to the hospital for the second time. Emma was kind enough to allow a few moments alone with Jack. I was able to ask him two questions that are of vital importance. “Jack, do you know for sure and certain that if you died tonight, you would go to heaven?”
“Well, yeah,” he replied.
“Jack,” I said, “if you did die tonight, and stood before God, and he said, ‘why should I let you into my heaven?’ What would you say?”
He replied, “cause I’m Jack!” Then he smiled. He waited for a few moments to sweat the new preacher, then he said, “and then I’d tell him, ‘also because I know your boy.’”
You see, Jack did a lot of good things. Only one of them got him into heaven. He accepted Jesus, the Son of God, as his savior to forgive him his sins. After that, everything else was mere icing on the cake.
I want to take this occasion to say that if you cannot, truthfully, answer these questions in the same way Jack did, talk to me. Right now is the only thing we are guaranteed. We never know if we will have time.

All Things

2007-07-08T10:03:00.000-05:00

Robert Lyons, Pastor July 8, 2007
ALL THINGS
ROMANS 8:28
It was April 19, 1995 and a normal workday for me. I lived in Oklahoma City and was an account executive for FedEx. At that time there was no office in the station for me and I worked out of my home. This was a telephone day for me and I sat down to make phone calls from 8:00 A.M. until 9:00 A.M... I then went in and started the shower to let the hot water warm up. I disrobed and stepped into the shower at exactly 9:02 A.M. The house shook violently and rattled the windows so hard that I thought the water heater must have blown up.

Hastily, I ran down the hall, threw open the door to the garage, turned on the lights, raised the garage door and opened the water heater door. There was nothing there but a normal water heater. There was no smoke and no fire. Puzzled, I shut the door and turned to discover all the stay-at-home moms of the neighborhood were gathered in the street in front of the house. You see, in my haste, I hadn’t taken the time to grab a robe.
Soon, thereafter, the world knew what shook my house. A deranged war veteran, Timothy McVeigh, had blown up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building located in downtown Oklahoma City. It was the offices of many of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms agents who stormed the Waco compound two years before. It was intended as a retaliatory strike against those agents.
The devastation was horrible. Over one thousand people were wounded. One hundred and sixty eight people were killed and many of those were in the daycare that was in front of the truck that contained the bomb. Still more sustained injuries that would have sent them to emergency rooms in normal times.
There was a man in our church who did not show up for work that morning. After twenty four hours he went on the missing persons list. It was only after this that his wife found his datebook in the study. He had an appointment to sign up for Social Security benefits at 9:00 A.M. at the Murrah building.

I could tell you dozens of stories about that day. When all is said and done one simply has to admit, sadly, that this was a terrible tragedy. Most of us in Oklahoma City were affected either directly or indirectly. All knew someone that did not come home that day.

I can still remember a trip to the site the following Sunday night. It was dark, except for the work lights from the rescue crews at the sight. Crowds stood outside the fence that was erected around the block. They stared in numbness and in awe. A choir, holding candles, walked down the street singing “Amazing Grace”. You could definitely feel a spiritual presence at this place.

READ TEXT. Many pastors, well intentioned, quoted this passage from the pulpit on the following Sunday. Most of them made a careful delineation. Not everything that happens in this world is good. There is evil. There is an enemy. He wants us dead and in this case, he won. This was a tragedy pure and simple. I can honestly say that in the coming days we found more blessings than we did bodies.

You see, many were spared that should have been dead. The other FedEx Account Executive in Oklahoma City had a 9:00 A.M. sales call at the building across the street. She was late because the pricing department in Memphis held her proposal too long. The conference room she was scheduled to be was thus empty and no one was injured by the glass shards which destroyed the table, chairs and wall.

Another friend of mine lived in the apartment building that was in the direct path of the blast. At 9:00 A.M. he got out of bed to take a shower. He ran back into the bedroom after the explosion to look out the window only to discover that the window had ripped the mattress to shreds he had been laying on. You see, my friends were not Christians at the time. Had they died that morning they would have spent an eternity without God in a place of unimaginable agony.

Our text does not say that everything that happens in God’s world is good. It does not say that everything that happens to us is good. The entire Book of Job is wisdom literature from the Old Testament of the Bible. Its purpose is to determine why bad things happen to good people. The entire forty two chapters deal with the topic. You see, Job was a good man. According to God’s words he was, “blameless and upright”. God says of Job, “there is no one else like him.” Job feared God and shunned evil.

Job lost it all. First it was his stock. Then it was his precious sons and daughters. His body was then wracked by painful sores. His wife and best friends admonished him to “curse God and die!” In chapter fourteen and verse one he replies that a man who is born of woman has a life that is short and full of trouble. Job never cursed God, but he did question him.

Finally in chapter thirty eight, God deigns to speak. He tells Job that he really does not have a clue how things are run. His words from the next four chapters are best summed up from the book of Isaiah 55:8 where God says that you don’t think like I do and you don’t act like I act. You see we do not have a clue when it comes to the ways of God. They are so far above us that we cannot hope to know more than a small portion of them.

Back in my seminary days I had the privilege of working as a chaplain in an alcohol treatment center. There is a particular passage from the “Big Book” that still sticks with me today. It is simply called “Page 442” and it says:
“And acceptance is the answer to all my problems today. When I am disturbed, it is because I find some person, place, thing, or situation—some fact of my life—unacceptable to me, and I can find no serenity until I accept that person, place, thing, or situation as being exactly the way it is supposed to be at this moment. Nothing, absolutely nothing, happens in God’s world by mistake.”

This passage means a lot to me because it is a pattern by which I live my life. A lot of bad things have happened to me in fifty-one trips around the sun. Most of them were due to bad choices I made. I became a lot less mad and a lot more glad when I incorporated these words into my personal philosophy.

What happened to our beloved friend Jack Wengert was a terrible and unnecessary tragedy. I do not know why bad things happen to good people. I do not believe it was caused by my God any more than I believe he will run over a child to get his drunken father’s attention. This much I do know, “and we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him…”

I long ago gave up on the asking of “why?” That is a luxury I can no longer afford because I find that using it leads only to misery. Now I have learned to accept that bad things happen. Things happen regularly that I cannot control. Until I accept the situations, such as this one with Jack, as being exactly the way they are supposed to be at this point in time, I am usually angry and upset. When I get like that I just want to punch someone in the mouth. That doesn’t really relieve the frustration and it doesn’t help the hand.

As I close this morning I want to share a little ditty that I learned while working with alcoholics:
The past is history.
The future is a mystery.
All we have is today, it’s a gift.
That’s why it’s called the present.

When we live in the past and want to change it we hang on to a lot of questions we have no business asking. It’s the past and you cannot change it. When we worry about tomorrow we simply are giving in to fear and worry. If you are giving in to either of these two temptations, you are not at home in today. Today is all we are really guaranteed.

Getting To Know You

2007-07-01T14:29:00.000-05:00

In an effort to become better acquainted with the congregation, Robert would like to invite you to an informal group meeting. The congregation has been divided into groups of about 10. These small groups will meet on Tuesday and Thursday evenings throughout the month of July. You will be receiving a card with your date, but if you have a preference or if the date chosen is inconvenient for you, please contact the church office at 637-3734.

July 1, 2007 Sermon "I Don't Know, But..."

2007-07-01T13:43:00.000-05:00

Sermon Text: 1 Corinthians 2: 1-5
(First sermon to the church)

Ladies, one of the hardest things for a man to admit is that I don’t know. Maybe it's so hard for me because I say it so often. I honestly believe that I have made the statement, "I don’t know", more often this week than I have in the past five years:
"What's the phone number here?"
"I don’t know."
"What's your new address?"
"I don’t know."
"Preacher, what can I do to help?"
"I don’t know."
"What will happen in the Jack Wengert situation?"
"I don’t know."
What pains me so much about most of my replies is that I need to know and I need to know now! Maybe that’s the reason I appreciate Paul so much, because he was honest and humble enough to willingly say, "I don’t know" even when he was faced with important questions that needed answers. READ TEXT.
When we look at this text, we must remember that the church at Corinth was going through some hard times, faced with internal struggles and external vices. In their desperation they remembered Paul, the founder of their church, who had personally led many of them to Christ. He was their spiritual leader, and it was natural that they should turn to him for guidance.
In these challenging, uncertain moments, it's natural to look to the past for comfort and strength. You’ve had some good pastors here. You had Deedee who knew how to work with the Conference offices and get such programs as Igniting Ministries started. You had the bright, young and exciting Nathan. You had the gentle and laid back Lynn McClure. Each of your previous pastors brought their own strengths and each touched you differently. Some of you would be so comforted to reach out to those familiar leaders who know this church and would surely have the answers.
Instead, here I am. Most of you are looking at me and wondering "What is he going to be like? Does he have any answers? Is he going to be a flake?" It may or may not help you to know that I am wondering the same thing! You see, WE WANT CERTAINTY!
Please imagine how surprising these words from Paul were to the Corinthians. Instead of saying, "Yeah buddy, those were the days!" Paul reminds them how it had really been. "Don’t you remember?" he asked. "When I first came to you I was very weak and afraid; why I trembled at the mere thought of speaking to you. And even when I did talk, it wasn't anything profound…why, it was just my own words." "No," Paul said, "don’t build me up. I didn’t know what to say then and I’m not sure I do now. Your problems were so big, your needs were so great that I didn’t know how to answer your questions. That’s why I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified!"
Maybe you don’t identify with those words, but I do. It has been my pleasure to meet so many of you this week. Many of you flatter me with your kind comments and high expectations. Inside, I still feel like Paul did. I have not come to you with eloquence, superior wisdom, or a thorough knowledge of the programs, polities, or procedures of the Arkansas Conference. I do stand before you today with fear and trembling. I know there are great challenges ahead and my efforts alone will never be enough to move us where we need to go. I say to you today, along with Paul, "I resolve to know nothing while I am with you but Jesus Christ, and him crucified!"
At times I feel like the blind man in John’s gospel, chapter 9. Perhaps you remember the story. There was a man sitting outside the Temple, a man who had been blind from birth. Imagine how limited his world was. They had no Braille, Seeing Eye dogs, or white canes then. There was no disability insurance or Medicaid. One must earn their living or they did not live. He couldn’t enjoy the beauty of this world for there was no beauty in his utter darkness. He didn’t have the freedom of going where he wanted. He had to, necessarily; take a well ordered path through life. It may have been something like: 50 steps forward from the house, turn right 100 steps along the stone wall, dodge the chariots…..well you get the picture. He could do nothing except beg. There was no "up side" to his life.
Then Jesus came. He mixed a little clay with a little spit and pushed it into the man’s eyes. He washed it off and his eyes were opened! He could see! His whole life was changed. I hazard to say that life, as he knew it, ended that day. HE COULD SEE! HE WAS FREE!
For those who desired a well ordered world, this was a problem. No one could figure it out and the neighbors couldn’t believe the change: "I don’t know how this can be the same man!" The whole event caused an uproar. Some of the neighbors refused to believe it was the same man. Others said it was. The Pharisees got involved. Anyone who would admit that Jesus was the Christ was to be excommunicated. In a society that believed God controlled everything, it was akin to a death sentence. They called the man’s parents. The parents rolled over on their son. They said, "He’s a big boy, you ask him."
The Pharisees asked of the man whether Jesus was the Messiah. The formerly blind man said, "You’re asking me questions I don’t know the answer to. Let me tell you what I do know. I know neither how he did it nor do I care. Then I was blind. Now I see."
He didn’t have to know how it happened. He simply accepted the fact that it did. His eyes were opened but so was his heart. He gained the courage to stand up to the Pharisees (v. 30). He now recognized Jesus as THE MAN!
This is where ministry begins, when we say along with the recovered blind man and with Paul, "There are a lot of things I don’t know….but I do know Jesus the Christ, who overcame Satan, and stormed the gates of Hell." The Romans took their best shot and killed him. Still he beat them, for one day the Empire would become Christian. His Kingdom survived the empire. I say along with the blind man, Jesus changed me!" That affirmation propels me back into full time ministry and will send us all out to do ministry. When we decide to be a church that points the way to Jesus Christ; when we determine to know Christ and to love Christ and to rely on Christ and to be led by Christ; life will change and ministry will flourish!
In the book of 1 Peter 2:9-10 we find, "You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, that you might declare the wondrous deeds of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous life. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have." You and I who have been so touched by Jesus Christ now have a chance to touch others with that same message of grace. People NEED grace.
Sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with the world around us is our opportunity for the future. "Declare the wondrous deeds of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous life." Think of the people who will walk through these doors in the coming years. There will be beautiful babies and children. Others will be couples starting out in life. There will be youth who want a place to be taken seriously; men who are disillusioned, women who’ve given up.
Our great purpose is: to share with them the good news that Jesus the Christ is calling and leading us out of darkness and into his beautiful light. His message is one of comfort to the young mother of the colicky baby who is working on three days with little sleep. It offers hope to the man who has established himself in life only to find he still has that hole in his gut. And the great thing about this message is that it's the gift that keeps on giving. It not only offers a better life here but another after the undertaker has you.
The song writer, Brad Paisley, got it right you know:
When I get where I'm going
on the far side of the sky.
The first thing that I'm gonna do
is spread my wings and fly.
So much pain and so much darkness
in this world we stumble through.
All these questions I can't answer
So much work to do.
But when I get where I'm going
There'll be only happy tears.
I will shed the sins and struggles
I have carried all these years.
And I'll leave my heart wide open
I will love and have no fear.
Yeah when I get where I'm going
Don't cry for me down here.
Some might call this a fallback position but it IS the hope that Jack and Emma have right now. You will never hear me knock organizations such as the Civitans or Rotary, for they do many good things. But they just don’t cut it when in the end it is the gospel that matters, and that is what WE have to offer.
I know this is a wonderful church. I am privileged to be your pastor. Over the years, you have touched the lives of hundreds or thousands of people by sharing the good news in a darkened world. For these many years God has used this church to touch lives and help people. You have a proud heritage. I must tell you something today: "You can have an even greater future! Your best days are ahead. Your greatest victories are yet to be won. Your greatest deeds are yet to be done. I will do all that I can to help you move into what can be your greatest times ever. There can and will be a time in which Waldron United Methodist Church proclaims the gospel of Jesus the Christ boldly and proudly. Lives will be changed by God’s Spirit through Jesus Christ.
No planning committee can do this until; no program can do this until; no project can do this until; no pastor or preacher can do this until we are willing to put our selfish ways behind. We are called to lay our lives at the cross and commit ourselves fully to the challenges God puts before us.
This is, indeed, a day of new beginnings! Will you accept this challenge to commit yourself fully? Jesus throws down the gauntlet to you today. It involves change; it takes the same courage as that required of one involved in combat. We are in a battle. We are in a war. We are in a dogfight. We do have an enemy. He does want us dead. We are the people of God, chosen by God. You are a holy nation. Let’s go out and take it to the enemy that his blackness will never cover us. That he will not overcome us. That our light will never go out. We are not a people of darkness, we are THE people of light. Let us go out and be the church!

Welcome to Robert Lyons

2007-06-28T21:45:00.000-05:00

We welcome our new pastor, Robert Lyons to Waldron UMC. Robert is a native Arkansan who moved here from El Dorado where he served as pastor of Jack Mayfield Memorial UMC at Huttig, Arkansas.

Robert received a B.S.E. from Ouachita University and a M. Divinity from Southern Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.

After serving as a pastor for 10 years in other churches, Robert was appointed to the Arkansas Conference of the United Methodist Church. In addition to his pastoral duties, he is also finishing a twenty-year career in marketing and sales.

Robert is the proud father of two children, Jennifer Hart of Sallisaw, Oklahoma and Robert Lyons, Jr. of North Little Rock. He is also the very proud grandfather of three beautiful granddaughters, Katie, Karlee Jo and Karaline Hart. We are also pleased to welcome Robert's mother, Etta "Mama" Lyons.

Robert's first Sunday with us will be July 1. He looks forward to his appointment to Waldron UMC and to ministering to the community. Please join us in welcoming Robert and "Mama" to Waldron by worshiping with us this Sunday and we invite you to remain following the worship service for a potluck dinner in the Fellowship Hall.

LENTEN EVENTS AND HOLY WEEK SERVICES

2007-03-07T08:20:00.000-06:00

Sunday Evening Bible Study: Spiritual Disciplines will be offered during Lent @ 6:30 p.m.

Lenten Study: On The Road Again-A Lenten Journey offered each Tuesday morning of Lent at 10:00 a.m. and each Wednesday evening of Lent at 7:00 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall.

Lenten Lunches: sponsored by the Waldron Ministerial Alliance
Wed., Feb. 28 12 noon @ Waldron Assembly of God
Wed., Mar. 7 12 noon @ Waldron First Baptist
Wed., Mar. 14 12 noon @ Waldorn United Methodist
Wed., Mar. 21 12 noon @ Waldron Church of the Nazarene
Wed., Mar. 28 12 noon @ St. Jude Catholic Church

**Easter Sunrise Service will be held at Waldron First Baptist Church with Pastor Lynn Bean, of Waldron Church of the Nazarene, leading the service.

This service begins at 7:00 a.m.

Holy Week Services:

April 1 Palm Sunday @ 11:00 a.m. Worship .....a special service commemorating Jesus' triumphal entry into Jerusalem that will begin in the sanctuary and end in the Fellowship Hall with the serving of traditional Hot Cross Buns.

April 5 Holy Thursday @ 6:30 p.m......a service of Communion with a special drama presentation, "Lord Is It I?" Hear the disciples question Jesus if they are the one who will betray Him.

April 6 Good Friday @ 6:30 p.m......a Tenebrae Service: A Service of Darkness. This service retells of the passion of the Christ. In this service we use increasing darkness to dramatize the increasing sadness of Holy Week.

April 8 Easter @ 11:00 a.m. Worship.....we invite you to join us for the most sacred day of the year as we celebrate the risen Lord!

Online Labyrinth

2007-03-06T21:47:00.000-06:00

Use this tool as a means of reflection and spiritual discipline during this season of Lent. http:/www.labyrinth.org.uk

Valentine's Banquet

2007-01-20T15:59:00.000-06:00

On Sunday, Feb. 11, the youth are hosting a Valentine’s Banquet to raise funds to attend two upcoming youth events.

VERITAS 2007 which will be held at the Fort Smith Convention Center the first weekend in March. This event is a mid-semester get away that offers youth from all over the state of Arkansas an opportunity for worship, fellowship, experiences, and relationships.
The other event is the West District Spring Rally, April 28-29 at Shoal Creek Camp.
Both events are sponsored by the Arkansas Council on Youth Ministries.

The youth have set a goal to raise approximately $1000.00 to help cover expenses for these events. So in order to help reach our goal, we invite you to attend our Valentine’s Banquet on Feb. 11 at 5:30 p.m. The cost is $10.00 per person.
The “Italian themed” evening will feature a dinner by candle light, complete with fine food, superior service (provided by the youth!), heart-warming entertainment, and all for a worthy cause. The evening will include a romantic slide show, so we ask you to share photos of you and your special someone. Please bring your photos to the church office by Jan. 28.

For the next two weeks the youth will be selling tickets following the worship service or you may contact the church office to reserve tickets. Tickets will be on sale until Feb. 8. Since seating is limited, please purchase your tickets in advance. There will be no tickets available at the door.

So, bring your Valentine or simply treat yourself to an evening out. We thank you for supporting the Waldron United Methodist youth.

2007-01-20T14:56:00.000-06:00

Advent/Christmas Services and Events

2006-12-09T10:36:00.000-06:00

Following are a list of special services and events throughout December at Waldron UMC.

Dec. 9 at 7:00 p.m. Waldron Christmas Parade. Our church will sponsor a float.
Dec. 10 at 6:00 p.m. Christmas Pageant/Potluck
Dec. 12 at 10:00 a.m. Chrismon Workshop/Fellowship Hall
Dec. 17 at 5:00 p.m. Christmas Caroling. Will leave from church.
Dec. 24 at 9:45 a.m. Birthday Party for Jesus during Sunday School
Dec. 24 at 6:00 & 11:00 p.m. Candlelight Communion Service
Dec. 31 at 11:30 p.m. Watch Night Communion Service

Sunday Morning Worship is at 11:00 a.m.

December Mission Projects:

Bring gifts appropriate for a newborn. These gifts will be distributed locally to mothers in need.
Food Pantry. This is an on-going mission that is frequently utilized by families in need.
Hair Washing at the Nursing Center. Tuesday, Dec. 5 at 1:00 p.m. A service provided by the ladies of our church for 20 years.

For more information regarding services or events, please contact the church office at 479-637-3734 or e-mail questions to waldronumc@yahoo.com

An Old Fashioned Christmas Pageant

2006-12-09T09:17:00.000-06:00

On Sunday, Dec. 10 at 6:00 p.m. we invite you to attend our special worship service. Different classes and organizations of the church have prepared a Christmas "Pageant" based on the theme, Christmas Around the World. Join us as we learn of Christian holiday traditions from other countries, sing familiar carols that you may be surprised to learn their cultural origin, and then we will end the evening with a pot-luck dinner in the Fellowship Hall. Please join us!

"Life on a Train"

2006-11-15T08:23:00.001-06:00

Here is a flash movie that gives an interesting perspective on this journey we call, "life." Enjoy.

Advent Bible Study..."The Miracle of Christmas"

2006-10-28T16:04:00.000-05:00

The season of Advent is nearly upon us. It's easy to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of decorating and shopping, but why not take a break from all the chaos and spend some time reflecting on the real reason for our joy at this time of year. A four week Advent study, "The Miracle of Christmas " will be offered beginning November 27. A morning session will begin at 10:00 a.m. on that day, and an evening group will meet on Wednesdays at 7:00 p.m. beginning December 6. This study will be an opportunity to join with other Methodists in our community, as well.
Please contact the church office @ 637-3734 by November 15 if you plan to take part so that study books may be ordered.

Community Thanksgiving Service

2006-10-28T15:51:00.000-05:00

The Scott County Ministerial Alliance invites you to attend the annual Community Thanksgiving celebration on Tuesday, Nov. 21 at the Assembly of God Church on south Main Street. The service will begin at 7:00 p.m. and our own, Rev. Lynn McClure will present the message. Let's join with other Christians from all over our area to worship and give thanks to God, who blesses us abundantly. For more information or for a ride to the service, please contact the church office
at 637-3734.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

2006-10-28T15:19:00.000-05:00

Or it will soon! A beautiful Chrismon tree, vibrant poinsettias, flickering candlelight...some of the sights of this inspiring season. Help us decorate our church home for the holidays! On Sunday, Nov. 12, following morning worship, we will have a pot-luck lunch to help fuel us for an afternoon of Chrismon making. Everyone can take part in this wonderful tradition. Then on Wednesday, Nov. 29 at 7:00 p.m. we will begin decorating the sanctuary in preparation for Advent. The Hanging of the Green service will be December 3 during morning worship. At this service is when we will climb the extremely tall ladder and place the Chrismons on the tree. We also invite you to place poinsettias in memory or honor of someone special. These beautiful plants add such a festive look to the sanctuary.
Let's get caught up in the wonder and hope that is Christmas and enjoy opportunities for fellowship and service.

Trick or Treat

2006-10-28T15:03:00.000-05:00

Don't be a "scaredy-cat"...join us for an evening of hauntingly good fun!

The fun begins around 5:30 p.m. in the Fellowship Hall.

There are sure to be lots of treats

and maybe even a few tricks.

July: From the Pastor's Pen (by Rev. Lynn McClure)

2006-06-26T22:46:00.000-05:00

From the July Newsletter, Pastor Lynn's first article "From the Pastor's Pen"

My first days in Waldron have been a wonderful whirlwind of activity even before I preached my first sermon. But, hopefully, I have been able to convey without words my love of the Lord and my joy in being here in Waldron with all of you. St. Francis of Assisi is attributed with the thought, "Preach the Gospel at all times, and if necessary, use words."

So far I have been privileged to witness and benefit from a jubilant gospel parade of people called Waldron United Methodist Church. A group of many willing people helped us move our "stuff" into the parsonage and to my church study. Thank you ever so much!! We have met so many smiling people, already we feel extremely welcomed and blessed. Watching you all work together for the Arkansas Conference Youth Choir visit, the Relay for Life and Vacation Bible School. I see a church alive! Keep up the good work in Christ's name and thank you once again.

In the June newsletter, Nathan laid out before the church some things to keep in mind as we live as Christ's Church. I believe this provides us witha good solid basis in which we begin our ministry together as pastor and congregation. I am thankful for Nathan's ministry with you this year and feel privileged to be his successor. I look forward to serving with you.

As we move into this new phase together, I pray we will do what God is blessing and that we have a long and fruitful ministry together.

Grace & Peace
Pastor Lynn

P.S. We wish Nathan and Lara a very Happy Anniversary. From your friends at Waldron United Methodist Church.

Introducing Our New Pastor and Family

2006-06-26T22:21:00.000-05:00

Written by the Rev. Lynn McClure for the May 2006 Newsletter at the request of the church.

To the people of Waldron United Methodist Church:

I was excited to hear of my appointment to Waldron United Methodist Church. Thank you to everyone for the early welcome through email and phone calls. I am greatly anticipating the opportunity to serve among you and with you in the Waldron community. My husband, Gene and I feel this will not only be an excellant appointment for me but a wonderful experience and community for our children.

I call myself a transplanted Arkansan. Though born in Elkhart, Indiana, I have claimed Arkansas as my home since age 10. I have a strong belief in prayer and love to sing and play music though I may not be very good. I enjoy the outdoors, small hikes and being in or near water. There is something so very special about the symphony of sounds I hear when in the woodsw or at water's edge that brings to me a taste of God's green grace that renews me.

My husband, Gene is a paramedic currently with LifeNet out of Texarkana, working at the DeQueen post. He loves to travel, attend sporting events, and listen to music. Gene feels his work is also a calling like my ministry. I whole-heartedly agree. Gene has his sisters & their families in Conway and my only brother lives and workds in the San Diego area. All of our parents have entered the Church Triumphant. My father passed in late August of cancer but his wife still lives in the Mtn. Home area and we love her dearly.

Gene & I have three children. Callie-Anne, age 19, is a fine arts student at the University of Central Arkansas. She is preparing to be a studio photographer. Trey, age 15, is currently a ninth grader with a zest for life, especially as he was the school mascot (the blue darter AKA The Bird) for the past two years at Lockesburg High School. Trey loves to skateboard, listens to music and recently recieved Life Rank in Scouting. He will be working on his Eagle rank. Kenna is 8 years old and currently in 2nd grade. She's been involved in Scouting over the past three years as a Daisy and a Brownie. Kenna loves books, writes her own books and also loves life. Both Trey and Kenna have been on the area swim team, the DeQueen Dolphins.

Again, we are looking forward to our move to and ministry in Waldron. May grace and peace go with Nathan, Lara and Wesley as they prepare for thie move to Oklahoma. Godspeed to you all.

Grace & Peace to all of you at Waldron UMC
Pastor Lynn A. Lewis McClure

June: From the Pastor's Desk (by Rev.Nathan Mattox)

2006-06-26T18:50:00.000-05:00

The following article written by the Rev. Nathan Mattox was posted at Pastor Lynn McClure's request since she refers to it in part in the July newslettter article "From the Pastor's Desk" and gives it a firm but enthusiastic AMEN.

This is the last newsletter article I'll write for the church, and I want to begin bysaying how thankful I am that I was brought here to Waldron to begin my ordained ministry. I'll always remember you all as my first parish -- I was honored to join the ministry of this congregation. I believe the Spirit is moving in this congregation. You have a demeanor of openness, enthusiasm, and dedication. New people are taking leadership roles, and the church continues to grow. I have often thought to myself how lucky I was to serve a congregation that is so willing to allow for new things and fresh ideas. It is sometimes difficult to get beyond "the way we've always done it" and it seems to me that this congregation knows which traditions to foster and of which to let go. I'll leave you with some things to consider that I believe would enhance the spiritual life of this congregation. These are instead ideas for YOU to take more ownership over your participation in this body of Christ.

1. Don't make us ask you--If you have any willingness to participate in the worship life of the congregation, either as a liturgist or as an usher or acolyte or a greeter--don't just sit there and wait to be called on. Sign your name on the sign-up sheet at the back of the congregation. We have many more women that are willing to read the liturgies and sing in the choir tha we have men it seems, so you men need to take the bull by the horns and sign up for liturgist or join the choir. Our congregation is fairly open to the ordaining of women -- and that's good because it's enlightened, it's Biblical, and it's a great witness to the community. But many people in the church are concerned with the shortfall of men going into the ministry. Most seminaries at this point have more women than men enrolled in MDIV programs. It is truly a blessing to have women ordained to serve in priestly roles in the church -- but you can bet that the shortage of men is probably due to the widespread failure of men to take an active role in the worship life of local congregation. Do something about it! It starts with the men in our pews.

2. Regarding the role of the greeter -- We have a system in place that would ensure that we have someone at the front door making people feel welcome -- the system just needs people to actually make it work. Too many Sundays we simply have someone to decide on the spot to be the greeter that morning. What if no-one decides to be the greeter, then the role is overlooked for that Sunday? The role of the greeter is important -- it is an integral to helping new-comers feel welcome and in tune with the congregation that they visit. This church MUST make new disciples in order for this church to remain a vibrant ministry to this community. In order to do that, the greeter helps a person take the "first step" into the life of this congregation. This goes for everyone -- when you see a new person, engage them in conversation. Without this "human touch", the church seems cold and unwelcoming. Fortunately, this church is learning this way of discipleship -- it hasn't always been the case. I've spoken with people in our community and even people in our church who've said that when they first came to visit, no-one said anything to them, and they sensed it was a cold, lifeless place. Don't let this ghost haunt you -- it takes a continual presence and effort to be a welcoming place. I've been proud of the evangelism through hospitality that I've seen in this congregation -- keep it up!

3. Participate in a Bible Study. We only have church once a week at this church. That is an anomaly in this community. To supplement our worship together, I've tried to maintain some other Bible study or class to provide opportunities for fellowship and faith building. It is up to you to take advantage of these opportunities. Faith is not a destination -- it is a journey. Communion is the gas station, worship is the beautiful views out the window, and Bible study is the roadmap. If you don't study the Bible, or participate in some small group activity within the life of the church, you are just driving around for a joy-ride. That's okay -- but we're called to go somewhere! Christ says "I am the way, the truth, and the life." Bible study and small group activities help us find that way.

4. Plan a mission experience. Without an outward focus, the church can become stale and lifeless. Mission not only helps other people -- it helps this local congregation grow and become more vital. There are many opportunities close by for mission projects -- Camp Aldersgate in Little Rock, Arkansas Children's Home, Oklahoma Indian Mission Conference, Sager-Brown Depot for UMCOR in Louisana, Habitat for Humanity. We have people in our congregation who have the skills to lead a work group. We seem to have the way -- do we have the will? This church needs to get on the road. The road is where one oftentimes meets the Risen Christ, you know. Mission isn't about having all the answers and then going out to tell people what to think and what to believe. Some people approach mission this way, but I believe it ends up being unhealthy and counter to the Gospel. Mission is about helping those who need help. You don't have to say a thing about Jesus on a mission trip -- do you believe that? Through your work, friendship, effort, and willingness you preach the Gospel without even saying a word about it. Of course, sharing with others about your belief is a wonderful thing that if that is what suits you -- but my point is that you don't have to have it "all figured out" to be a missionary.

Nathan Mattox's Last Sermon in Waldron, June 11

2006-06-10T22:10:00.000-05:00

John 3:1-17
Philippians 1:1-11

I’ve come to love this bit of scripture. It has been a journey for me though. To tell you the truth, John 3:16 used to annoy me to no ends. You see people wave big posterboards with it on it at football games. It always struck me as being a scripture some Christians with definite ideas about God were trying to shove down people’s throats. For God so loved the world that he gave his ONLY son, is how I always heard it. The “only” rang in my ears—I sensed people used the verse to further their ideas of exclusivity and narrowness. Jesus is God’s ONLY son—everyone else is wrong. Whether this is indeed the intention of those who wave the verse at NASCAR races, or whether I was being paranoid and hypersensitive, I had to come to terms with this verse of Scripture. “What about John 3:17? I used to say to myself.” For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world but to save it? Didn’t that fly in the face of what I imagined those people saying?

Perhaps I just needed to grow up a little. I still don’t agree with the exclusivists—those who try to shrink God down to fit into our shabby boxes. I can tell you—especially at this moment—God and boxes have nothing in common. But as I became a father, I began to see into John’s statement about Christ in a new light. God’s only son? God felt about Jesus as strongly as I feel about Wesley? And Jesus is telling me that God feels the same way about me as well? It wasn’t until I had a son that I was able to see the depth and the mystery and the true emphasis of this scripture. “Only” is not a statement of exclusivity, it is a statement of theological significance. God loves Christ as a father with an only son loves that son. God loves me as much as I love Wesley! This is incredible! The emphasis shifts to “For God so LOVED the world!”
Isn’t it great when emphasis shifts? I think the emphasis shifted for Nicodemus, who came to see Jesus after the veil of night had fallen. He seemed to be more interested in flattering Jesus into telling him what one had to DO to know God like Jesus knew God. But Jesus unsettled him with a riddle of sorts—an idea that we don’t do much more than what we do when we are born. It is not what we do, but what we are that counts. Jesus wants Nicodemus to know that we cannot see the Kingdom unless we are “born from above.” Jesus wants us to know we are God’s children, born of the spirit.

I don’t think anyone would disagree that Paul was one who was born from above—and how did that new life express itself in his life? With an enormous amount of gratitude. Paul was thankful for life and thankful for each breath that brought a new opportunity to sing the Praises of Christ. In his introduction to his letter to the Philippeans, Paul is bubbling over with gratitude for the spiritual awakening of his friends in Philippi. I can attest to you that this great experience of being re-born by the wind fills one with gratitude because I am extremely thankful for who you are and what you are becoming as a church—a family of faith.

I told you last week about how celebrating the sacraments have been the most important thing I feel I have done here. It has indeed confirmed the calling that I have to the order of Elder (which is the only order in our system of ordination that is able to celebrate the sacraments) The Baptisms that I have been privaledged to celebrate—Garret’s, Cameron’s, Jaylon’s, Allen’s, Logan’s, Ethan, Evan, and Nathan, Hudson’s—Have been a blessing to me, as I hope they have been to you. Through the sacraments, This church family has shown me something of the familial nature of discipleship. As I introduced those I baptized to you as your new brothers in faith, and as I told each of you “Brother, or Sister, this is the Bread of Life,” the Spirit that works through me taught me something about being “born from above.”
You see, when we are born from above, we are all brothers and sisters, and so we should refer to, or at least think of each other as such.

But it’s verse 8 of John’s chapter that I wanted to especially lift up to you today. It has always been one of my favorites—the part about “no-one being able to see which way the wind has come from or where it is going. The same thing applies to people born of the Spirit.” We, as Spirit born people, must let go of our “destination oriented” mindset—we cannot tell which way we are going as a people because we are born of the Spirit—the Spirit leads us into mystery, and we must trust the Spirit’s guidance.
This is at no time more keenly felt than at a transition in the church. As I leave and a new pastor takes the leadership role in this congregation of believers, we must trust the Spirit’s guidance. We do not know the destination of our faith walk, but we know the path! Christ goes ahead of us in the journey. I see him putting luminaries along the way, lighting the path, being a lamp unto our feet. The Spirit is the wind at our back, propelling us along the way. It may seem like a difficult trail to traverse at times, but we know we are never alone along the way.
We know we are never alone because of this fellowship that we share—a fellowship of the Spirit. This fellowship is led by Christ. He is our captain, he also brings up the rear, comforting and standing with those who struggle.
Much like Nicodemus, I’ve only been here with you for a brief time—a visit in the night, in the scheme of things. But even though we’ve only been together for a brief time, you’ve given me some riddles that have moved me toward a more meaningful and mysterious understanding of discipleship.

Spaghetti Supper News

2006-06-07T08:40:00.000-05:00

The spaghetti supper was a big success! We raised around $700 for cancer research through our relay for life team! Thanks to everyone who participated!

Pentecost Sermon--June 4

2006-06-03T21:45:00.000-05:00

Acts 2: 1-21
Ezekial 37: 1-14

The beginnings of something new are also the revival of something old and gone.

We celebrate the arrival and participation of the Spirit in the sacrament of baptism—recognizing that as the prophet Joel says, I will pour out my Spirit upon you.

We celebrate the outpouring of the Spirit of Wisdom/ the Wisdom that is present at Creation according to the book of Proverbs—this Wisdom that is heard and inspires the writing—and study—of our Holy Scriptures.

What we call Pentecost is also a revival of something lost—Lost life, lost inspiration. The valley of dry bones was a metaphor by God through the prophet Ezekial. It was a word-painting of a people who had been captured, scattered, and destroyed by the Babylonians. But God tells Israel that it will be lifted up. It would rise from the ashes like a Phoenix from the fire.

Jesus is himself a personification of this Israel. He rises from the grave and in so doing give us hope again that God will not forsake God’s people. Ezekial and Luke give us hope that what was lost is regained.

In the chapters following the dry bones, God gives Ezekial a blueprint for the Temple—in so doing God gives concrete evidence of God’s continuing presence even in the midst of slavery. You know someone is serious about something when they make a blueprint. I’ve been told that this church was reminded of it’s hope and vision by the use of a blueprint. The fellowship hall blueprint had hung in the pastor’s office for some years when some hopeful members of this congregation held it up for all to see—Let’s do this! We have the blueprint!
The Gospels preceding Acts tell of the blueprint of Christ—that blueprint of the body as God’s temple. Everything we know as Holy and Sacred we see in Christ—a human life as a blueprint for not just the Temple—but the whole Kingdom of God.

But Christ isn’t only the blueprint, he’s the building blocks—he refers to himself as that Cornerstone in Psalms—the one that the builders rejected! He becomes the building blocks not in physical mortar and stone, but in Spirit. We enter a new dimension of seeing when the Spirit of God enters us! We see a world of people enlightened like the flame of a lamp. We hear a world that understands each other despite cultural differences. The tongues of fire and the tongues of speech are united in the birth of the church—the Pentecost. The power (dynamis) of the Spirit is its real presence without even being visible to the human eye. It is visible to the eye of the Spirit. The eye of the heart that can be opened—according to Paul’s letter to the Ephesians that we read last week. They can be opened and see the reality of Christ as the cornerstone and the building blocks in the Spiritual reality of our lives.

………………This is why church isn’t just another social club—this is why our opportunity here is not to just eat spaghetti and collect money for cancer research. In those actions, The building blocks of the Spirit make the church even higher and more beautiful. The blueprint is in the life of Christ, and construction begins in the Acts of the apostles. Acts doesn’t end with a completed building. In fact, our Bible doesn’t even end with an ending—it ends with a beginning. The beginning of a New Jerusalem—one that Christ takes the scissors and cuts the ribbon on. If the New Jerusalem is a ship, then Christ breaks the bottle of champagne on the bow. Actually, this metaphor is perfect, since the practice of christening and launching a ship with a bottle of champagne traces its roots to the offering of a precious substance to the gods at a ship’s launch. It’s a tradition as old as the Babylonians. Christ is the bottle of champagne broken on the ship’s bow. And Christ offers his life as a sacrifice to our relationship with God. Showing us a life of purpose—a blueprint.
That blueprint is put into construction in the lives that are touched by Christ today in this body of believers. The Spiritual bricks of the kingdom are placed carefully by this church in our worship and our action. The Kingdom grows in the lives of discipleship and study with the presentation of God’s words to our growing family. It expands with the adoption of a new brother in Christ with the ritual of Baptism. It is restored and renovated in our own hearts as we come to the table of communion with forgiveness in our hearts. As that poem says on the front of your bulletin—Christ carves a hollow in our wooden hearts—one that is filled with the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Pentecost is not only about something new. It’s not just a new army marching over the horizon and stomping bones underfoot. It is a resuscitation of that which has perished. It is not just a good bye party for a departed savior. It is a welcome wagon for the Spirit’s entry. Praise God! Praise God! In so doing we put our weight on the cornerstone that will never break! Praise the Master Builder, the Blueprint, and the Spiritual Stones and mortar. Let the Kingdom be built with our lives and our worship! Amen!

Ascension Sunday sermon--Jesus Walks

2006-05-25T15:15:00.000-05:00

Acts 1: 1-11
Ephesians 1: 11-23

What do we make of this strange testimony? In our day and age, the idea of our savior flying away in the sky strikes us as somewhat fanciful. How do we envision the scene—does Jesus peek over the edge of the cloud as he is wisked away like Alladin on a magic carpet? Does he raise up one fist and take off like Superman? The ascension is part of the creeds of the early church. What is important about this anyway?
A closer look at our scriptural tradition shows us that it is customary for God’s most important prophets to be lifted up from the Earth rather than perish and placed in the ground. Elijah and Enoch are said to have ascended into heaven. Elijah was wisked away on a fiery chariot. The famous Rabbi of Alexandria, Philo, who was a contemporary of the Gospel writers and a favorite theologian among early Christians, wrote that Moses also ascended. John’s gospel speaks of Jesus being “lifted up,” as an implication of Christ’s death on the cross, lifted up in agony, an implication of Christ’s resurrection, lifted up in mystery, and Christ’s ascension—lifted up in glory. There is clearly more to this story than what is literally written.
The cloud that takes Jesus away is an allusion to the Shekinah—the presence of God formed in a cloud that can be found in the story of Moses receiving the law, and the presence of God in the tabernacle on route to the promised land, among others. In fact, Luke’s own gospel reports the descent of a cloud that covered the mountain at the Transfiguration of Jesus. And at this event, Moses and Elijah—both of whom ascended according to Jewish legend, are speaking with Jesus at that moment about what? Luke 9:30 tells us that they were speaking of “his departure, that would soon occur in Jerusalem.” All of these elements are linked together by the symbols chosen by Luke to report this story.
Ascension of Jesus/ Neo at the end of the Matrix. The Matrix is about Neo’s Mastery of the world that he used to know as reality. Through the help of others, Neo sees the world for what it is—the a complex computer program that occupies the minds of every human on earth while machines use the energy from their body to power their society. Over the course of the movie, Neo voluntarily enters the Matrix and learns to manipulate it. At the end of the film, there is nothing—not even death in the Matrix, which confines Neo to the laws of the world. The last scene of the film shows Neo taunting the rulers of the Matrix and then flying off—an illustration of his newly found power.
Ephesians tells us that our Christ was able to achieve a similar mastery of the world. “The world is under his feet, and he is above all power of the world.”
Are we to gaze up at the sky and imagine similar glory for ourselves? The two men in the sky tell us no—we are to wait for the power to come from on high down to us. How did Jesus master the world? The Holy Spirit came on him in the form of a dove at his baptism—he expressed this mastery in a no-holds barred Love for the entire Creation. He then said that he had come to baptize the world by fire. Next week at Pentecost we will talk more about this fire. It is a fire of Love. He Mastered the World by loving it. He conquered his enemies by loving them. This is not mere “fluffy teddy bear love” this love is called dynamis. Greek for tangible, visible power. Fire in souls. Fire of love so tangible and real it can be seen and heard by witnesses.

And so—instead of standing there gaping at the sky—the utter mysteriousness of our Lord should not inspire us to be navel-gazers on an individual hunt for enlightenment—We are to manifest this power in community. Paul commends his followers in Ephesus for their enlightened hearts—that they have seen Christ in his glory. And what is the most glorious aspect of Christ? Look on the front of your bulletin at the painting of the Ascension by Salvador Dali. What is it you see? His feet! Isaiah 52: 7 says, How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of the messenger who announces peace, who brings good news, who announces salvation, who says to Zion, "Your God reigns."
Feet are important to God. There are many references to feet in the Bible. In fact, a search of the word feet in the Bible turns up 229 results. Foot turns up 100 more results. When Moses met God at the burning bush—God instructed Moses to take off his shoes—that he was standing on Holy Ground—God wanted God’s creation touching God’s creation. His bare feet and the solid ground. There’s the story of the priests crossing the Jordan on the way to the promised lands. The text says that everywhere the priests lay their feet, the water dried up and the people crossed on dry land. God told the people to take 12 stones that the priests feet had touched and make them into altars. One for each tribe. The gospels tell us that on the night of Jesus’ betrayal. The last and most important thing he did for his disciples was to wash their feet. A woman anointed Jesus’ feet and then washed them with her hair—when the disciples objected, Jesus praised her.
Yes, feet are most important in the Bible—the spot where the ascension is said to have taken place is marked by a rock with what is reputed to be Jesus’ footprint in a rock. I bet almost every person has the anonymous poem “Footprints in the Sand” committed to heart. We long for a footprint of Jesus—one to show us where he’s been. One to show us where we’re going. The disciples ask for an answer—is it time for the Kingdom to Come—are we going to be raised up as well? Jesus doesn’t give them that information—and he forbids speculation by saying It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority. 8But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.
It seems that Jesus wants us to pay more attention to the footprints he left all over the Gospels. Yes, Christ’s feet take him to some surprising places—and he asks us to follow.
* Can you see Jesus' footprints in the wilderness? Each time he was tempted to claim earthly power and glory, he reached up and touched the words of Torah. One does not live by bread alone. Worship the Lord your God and serve only God. * Can you see Jesus walking on the wrong side of the street with the wrong people? * Can you see Jesus walking up to a sycamore tree, then looking up at Zachaeus, the tax collector, perched in the branches? "Come down, Zachaeus," Jesus said, "let's walk over to your house for dinner." * Can you see Jesus walking, then riding, into Jerusalem? * Can you see him stumbling toward Golgotha, loving us to the very end?
We have not yet referred to what is perhaps the most striking single phrase in the lessons for today, however. We read it in the very first verse of the book of Acts! That opening verse is startling. It must be read with the “enlightened eyes” to which Paul refers in the Second Lesson. “In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach . . .” Now there is a verse to bring a discerning reader up short!
Did Jesus not complete everything he was sent to do? Is this not the very meaning we have just suggested that is contained in his ascension? He has finished his work! He, himself, cried out, “It is finished” when he died on the cross. What more is there to do?
Yet Luke speaks of that which “Jesus began to do and teach . . . “ Has he made a mistake in his reporting . . . or has he seen more deeply into that of which he is writing than we are prone to see at first reading? Is he not speaking of that which Paul wrote to the Ephesians: “[He is] head over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all”? There is every indication that Luke, beginning his account of the “Acts of the Apostles” (also properly called the “Acts of the Holy Spirit”) is telling his readers from the start of this second volume that “the body of Christ” is now hidden within and among and through those who will go forth in his name, bearing that Good News of Salvation as his “witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
Meanwhile, we are reminded by the two men in white that “this Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” Between now and then we are to keep in mind that which Jesus, himself, had emphasized in his last words recorded in the Gospel according to St. Matthew: “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” (Matt. 28:20b) In short, although he is gone from any one place in this world he now becomes available to his people everywhere and anywhere. His presence is not to be sought here or there, in the sacred places or in the secular places, in the expected places or the unexpected places. He is not to be identified by location any more, but he is present everywhere at once, to every person as though he / she were the only person in all of creation and yet to all of creation as though no place were without him.
Where can we look to guide us? Sometimes the footprints of a ubiquitous Spirit are hard to determine. It is easy to hear about and read about the doings of Jesus, but not as easy to apply in our own lives. Perhaps one place to look is at more recent footprints. At those of our loved ones who have passed beyond the veil of death. It is a fitting weekend to do so—We might remember the saints of our faith family who clearly followed the footsteps of our Master. We all remember Joe Huie—who used to stand in the back of the congregation and welcome anyone and everyone who came through the doors—yes his footsteps are there! They are following the Master’s we can all tell! We could look at the footprints of Dale Miller—footprints that from what I understand were made without shoes as he faithfully attended church even when the radiation therapy burned him so bad that he could not wear shoes—but he still managed to come to worship—without shoes! How fitting it is that I memorialize him today as I stand here and preach without shoes on. I actually found out that tidbit of information after I had planned to take off my shoes for the children’s sermon. How beautiful were his feet, indeed—and his footprints follow the Master, who exalted God in the midst of execution!
And in fact—it is not only from those whom we memorialize that we should look for footprints. We should watch the feet of those in this congregation now as well. We can see the footsteps of Christ guiding them as well. We don’t just come to worship to gaze up at the sky—we come to applaud each other’s efforts to follow the footsteps of Jesus. This is much more efficiently done if we use our mouth to actually reach out and encourage one another when we see our brothers and sisters following Christ. You might have to get out of your comfort zone to make a sincere statement to someone you don’t really feel like you know that well—but our “comfort zone” might actually be another term for “barrier” if you ask me.

So bring the Good News—bring it with the enthusiasm and the passion of our Captain! That is what Christ proclaims right before he ascends to heaven. It is in this moment that his disciples become apostles. Disciples are those who follow Jesus—apostle means “sent.” Those who are sent to spread the good news throughout the land. Paul echoes Isaiah in Romans 10:15—How beautiful are the feet of those who bring Good news!” In short—our feet can look like Jesus’ feet. Our feet can become his feet. We need to keep the tracks fresh so that others may follow! Jesus’ footprints lead us toward Pentecost—the outpouring of the Holy Spirit—and we must set our faces toward that destination!
Amen

2006-05-22T23:47:00.000-05:00

Confirmands learn about our Anglican heritage and the symbolism of architecture at St. John's Episcopal church

Making a Home in Christ

2006-05-12T13:16:00.000-05:00

Sermon Texts
1 John 4 7-21
John 15:1-8

As we celebrate the confirmation and baptism of these five members of our faith family today, I can think of no better scriptures than what was assigned by the lectionary today. John’s gospel and epistle passages boil down our 8 weeks of confirmation lessons into two themes that illustrate the whole Christian walk. We must abide in Christ and we will bear much fruit. And, We are commissioned to love one another because God is Love.
First, I’m glad that we are presenting you with Message Bibles today, because I think Eugene Peterson’s translation of the word “abide” really nails what that word means for us. Christ says, make your home in me and I will make my home in you. Christ illustrates this by talking about the relationship of a vine to its branches.
What do you envision when Christ says, “Make your home in me?” or “Live in me?” I have had the privilege of making that parsonage right across the street my home. Over this past year, I’ve gotten to the point where I can walk down the hall at the dead of night without turning the lights on. I know how many paces it is down the hall to get to the refrigerator. Just last week, I stumbled into the kitchen at 6:30 in the morning, got out the coffeemaker and some coffee, and prepared a cup of coffee before I think I even really woke up. When we make our home, we become familiar with it inside out.
Christ invites us to make a home in him. If you have ever received a letter from me, you may have noticed that I try to take this to heart when I sign the letter “In Christ.” By signing my letter “In Christ,” I’m letting the person who I’m writing to know that I have found Christ to be a wonderful home—a spacious and warm home.
You confirmands may remember not too long ago making forts out of blankets and chairs and whatever else you could find to make a little dwelling place all your own. Did you do this? Perhaps if not, you had a tree house that your own little refuge. Do you remember that feeling you got when you hunkered down in that fort? That feeling of contentment and security? I remember it as a kind of fullness in the belly. A sense of wonder and peace—for whatever reason, when I think of the word “abiding” I think of those little forts I used to make in my room or of the treehouse that a friend and I made out in the field by my house.
Jesus asks us to “Live in him,” to “make a home in him as he makes in us.” However, the result of this close relationship with Jesus—what Peterson describes as “intimate and organic”—the result of this intimate and organic relationship is not just a feeling of security and contentment, it is fruit! Jesus tells us that there is something produced by this relationship—and the more grapes that are produced, the more the Master Gardener will prune us in order to produce even more fruit.
So what is it that the grapes represent? Truth be told, there is probably a lot of applications for this passage—and you may find that a close connection with the vine gives you more power and enthusiasm to express your spiritual gifts, which could be one way to think about fruit. But today I want to focus on something a little more basic that is a fruit of the vine. It is something that the letter of John calls to our attention today. It is simply: Love.
John asks us in the first epistle to Love our brothers and sisters because that love is itself an expression of God. That love is itself an embodiment of our Lord. That love is itself a fruit of the vine.
This part of the letter is a perfect companion to the gospel text—the theme is the same. In verse 15, John says Everyone who confesses that Jesus is God's Son participates continuously in an intimate relationship with God. 16We know it so well, we've embraced it heart and soul, this love that comes from God.
God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us.
So, making a home in Christ—abiding in Christ—means letting God live in us. It means taking up permanent residence in a life of love.
And so, those of you who are taking the vows of baptism and of confirmation today, I ask you—are your bags packed? Are you ready to make a new residence in a life of love? The letter tells us that “everyone who confesses that Jesus is God’s son participates continuously in an intimate relationship with God. Are you ready for the deepest relationship you will ever have? Today is not the first day you have been involved in that residence—in your lives as preparatory members of the church, you have been learning about what is involved in that relationship—you have been gathered into Jesus’ arms as he gathers the children into his lap, as he gathers his sheep into a fold.
Now though, you have the opportunity to live in this “home” with a fuller appreciation for your surroundings. You know more about “the rules of the house,” you know more about the “foundation” of the house, you have heard some of the stories of this old, wonderful dwelling place that we call Jesus. Now you have the opportunity to confirm that decision that your parents guided you toward. It is as if your parents are handing you the keys to the home, letting you know that it is now your decision to make this faith your home as we have all hoped you would. That is confirmation!
One other thing that John tells us about this dwelling place though. If we make our home in Christ by bearing the love of Christ, we must understand that there is literally no room in the home for fear. The last part of the letter says it best, “This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we're free of worry on Judgment Day--our standing in the world is identical with Christ's. 18There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life--fear of death, fear of judgment--is one not yet fully formed in love.”
If we put our trust and our lives in Christ, if we make our home in Christ—then fear has to move out! We don’t have the room for that ugly old furniture! Fear of death? We can toss it out! Christ lives here! Fear of judgement? Put it on the bonfire! A fearful life is one not yet fully formed in love—so if we want to live in the continually close, organic, fruit bearing connection with our Maker, Redeemer, and Transformer, we’ve got to get rid of those things!
And a failure to love our brothers and sisters? That is usually a product of fear as well. That is a withering vine not connected to the source! The letter tells us that if we can’t love our brothers and sisters, whom we can see—how can we expect to love God, whom we cannot see? This is the tough part, because Christ opens our eyes to see that our brothers and sisters aren’t just the people we feel comfortable with—they’re the poor and the outcasts. Jesus shows us in his ministry that they are sometimes those people we can’t ever imagine God loving in the first place. So if you find yourself “hating” these people, chances are that you might have sleepwalked right out the front door of your home in Christ and are laying face down in the ditch! Run back into your home as fast as you can—take a shower in the outpouring Holy Spirit and get the mud out of your eyes, because God says we don’t love God unless we can love those around us! Do you hear what I’m saying?
If you hear me, then walk up here right now, because I’ve got some questions for you! This isn’t just a ribbon to pin on your shirt, confirmation is a means of grace, and the Church is wanting you to receive it!........................

A Thoughtful Interview with a famous pastor and theologian about the Da Vinci Code

2006-05-09T16:17:00.000-05:00

Brian McLaren on The Da Vinci CodeAn interview by Lisa Ann Cockrel
With The Da Vinci Code poised to go from bestseller list to the big screen on May 19, pastor and writer (and Sojourners board member) Brian McLaren talks about why he thinks there's truth in the controversial book's fiction.
What do you think the popularity of The Da Vinci Code reveals about pop culture attitudes toward Christianity and the church?
Brian McLaren: I think a lot of people have read the book, not just as a popular page-turner but also as an experience in shared frustration with status-quo, male-dominated, power-oriented, cover-up-prone organized Christian religion. We need to ask ourselves why the vision of Jesus hinted at in Dan Brown's book is more interesting, attractive, and intriguing to these people than the standard vision of Jesus they hear about in church. Why would so many people be disappointed to find that Brown's version of Jesus has been largely discredited as fanciful and inaccurate, leaving only the church's conventional version? Is it possible that, even though Brown's fictional version misleads in many ways, it at least serves to open up the possibility that the church's conventional version of Jesus may not do him justice?
So you think The Da Vinci Code taps into dissatisfaction with Jesus as we know him?
McLaren: For all the flaws of Brown's book, I think what he's doing is suggesting that the dominant religious institutions have created their own caricature of Jesus. And I think people have a sense that that's true. It's my honest feeling that anyone trying to share their faith in America today has to realize that the Religious Right has polluted the air. The name "Jesus" and the word "Christianity" are associated with something judgmental, hostile, hypocritical, angry, negative, defensive, anti-homosexual, etc. Many of our churches, even though they feel they represent the truth, actually are upholding something that's distorted and false.
I also think that the whole issue of male domination is huge and that Brown's suggestion that the real Jesus was not as misogynist or anti-woman as the Christian religion often has been is very attractive. Brown's book is about exposing hypocrisy and cover-up in organized religion, and it is exposing organized religion's grasping for power. Again, there's something in that that people resonate with in the age of pedophilia scandals, televangelists, and religious political alliances. As a follower of Jesus I resonate with their concerns as well.
Do you think the book contains any significantly detrimental distortions of the Christian faith?
McLaren: The book is fiction and it's filled with a lot of fiction about a lot of things that a lot of people have already debunked. But frankly, I don't think it has more harmful ideas in it than the Left Behind novels. And in a certain way, what the Left Behind novels do, the way they twist scripture toward a certain theological and political end, I think Brown is twisting scripture, just to other political ends. But at the end of the day, the difference is I don't think Brown really cares that much about theology. He just wanted to write a page-turner and he was very successful at that.
Many Christians are also reading this book and it's rocking their preconceived notions - or lack of preconceived notions - about Christ's life and the early years of the church. So many people don't know how we got the canon, for example. Should this book be a clarion call to the church to say, "Hey, we need to have a body of believers who are much more literate in church history." Is that something the church needs to be thinking about more strategically?
McLaren: Yes! You're exactly right. One of the problems is that the average Christian in the average church who listens to the average Christian broadcasting has such an oversimplified understanding of both the Bible and of church history - it would be deeply disturbing for them to really learn about church history. I think the disturbing would do them good. But a lot of times education is disturbing for people. And so if The Da Vinci Code causes people to ask questions and Christians have to dig deeper, that's a great thing, a great opportunity for growth. And it does show a weakness in the church giving either no understanding of church history or a very stilted, one-sided, sugarcoated version.
On the other hand, it's important for me to say I don't think anyone can learn good church history from Brown. There's been a lot of debunking of what he calls facts. But again, the guy's writing fiction so nobody should be surprised about that. The sad thing is there's an awful lot of us who claim to be telling objective truth and we actually have our own propaganda and our own versions of history as well.
Let me mention one other thing about Brown's book that I think is appealing to people. The church goes through a pendulum swing at times from overemphasizing the deity of Christ to overemphasizing the humanity of Christ. So a book like Brown's that overemphasizes the humanity of Christ can be a mirror to us saying that we might be underemphasizing the humanity of Christ.
In light of The Da Vinci Code movie that is soon to be released, how do you hope churches will engage this story?
McLaren: I would like to see churches teach their people how to have intelligent dialogue that doesn't degenerate into argument. We have to teach people that the Holy Spirit works in the middle of conversation. We see it time and time again - Jesus enters into dialogue with people; Paul and Peter and the apostles enter into dialogue with people. We tend to think that the Holy Spirit can only work in the middle of a monologue where we are doing the speaking.
So if our churches can encourage people to, if you see someone reading the book or you know someone who's gone to the movie, say, "What do you think about Jesus and what do you think about this or that," and to ask questions instead of getting into arguments, that would be wonderful. The more we can keep conversations open and going the more chances we give the Holy Spirit to work. But too often people want to get into an argument right away. And, you know, Jesus has handled 2,000 years of questions, skepticism, and attacks, and he's gonna come through just fine. So we don't have to be worried.
Ultimately, The Da Vinci Code is telling us important things about the image of Jesus that is being portrayed by the dominant Christian voices. [Readers] don't find that satisfactory, genuine, or authentic, so they're looking for something that seems more real and authentic.
Lisa Ann Cockrel is associate editor at Today's Christian Woman.

Easter 4 Sermon, "the Good Shepherd"

2006-05-06T16:07:00.000-05:00

Scriptures related to this sermon
John 10
1 John 3:16-24
Psalm 23
Ezekiel 34

(For the first half of this sermon, I have elected to share the reflections from the New Interpreter's Bible, after the "gathering at the table" bit, the work is original.)

The image of Jesus as the good shepherd has a perennial hold on Christian imagination and piety. Some of the most popular pictures of Jesus are those that depict him as a shepherd, leading a flock of sheep. This picture of Jesus has influenced the church’s images of its leaders, so that in many traditions the ordained minister is referred to as the “pastor,” and ministerial care of the congregation is referred to as “pastoral care.” Behind both of these understandings of ministerial vocation is the sense that the minister is called to lead in the image of Jesus’ leadership, to be the shepherd as Jesus is shepherd. Because these images play such an important role in the life of the church, it is critical for us to distinguish among the various uses of shepherd imagery in the NT.
The move to pastoral images of ministry, for example, belongs more to other NT texts (e.g., John 21:15-19; Acts 20:28-29; 1 Pet 5:2-3) than to the interpretation of John 10. The pastoral images of John 10 are primarily focusing on Jesus’ identity and his relationship to the sheep.
The heavy concentration of OT pastoral images in this discourse, particularly images associated with God in the OT texts, points the reader to the discourse’s christological heart: Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s promises to God’s people. Yet Jesus is more than the good shepherd for whom Israel waits (Ezekiel 34), because he is also the gate for the sheep. Jesus is the way to life (the gate), and he leads the way to life (the good shepherd). While these are closely related, they are not the same thing. Jesus is the way to life because he is himself life (v. 10; cf. 14:6). Jesus leads the way to the life because he lays down his own life (vv. 11, 14-15). These are non-transferrable attributes; they derive from the heart of Jesus’ identity as the one sent by God. Later in 14:6, Jesus says perhaps more boldly, but also more explicitly, “I am the way, the truth, and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me, then you know my Father who sent me.
The “I am” statements of John 10, then, deepen the array of images of Jesus available to the church. The images of Jesus as the gate and the good shepherd are intensely relational; they have no meaning without the presence of the sheep. These “I am” statements do not simply reveal who Jesus is, but more specifically reveal who Jesus is in relationship to those who follow him. The identity of Jesus and the identity of the community that gathers around him are in-extricably linked.
The relational dimension of the Christ images provides the bridge to what these images have to say about being the church. The identity of the community is determined by the shepherd’s (Jesus’) relationship to it and its relationship to the shepherd (Jesus). For the community of faith, human identity is determined by Jesus’ identity. Who Jesus is with and for the community determines who the community is.
What image of community life does this discourse present? Nowhere in this discourse are any who follow Jesus depicted as shepherds or even assistant shepherds. Rather, all who gather around Jesus receive their identity as members of the flock. The community that gathers around Jesus are the ones who share in the mutual knowledge of God and Jesus, whose relationship to Jesus is modeled on Jesus’ relationship to God (v. 15). Listening to Jesus’ voice is the source of its unity (v. 16). By taking Jesus as its point of access to God, the community receives abundant life (v. 10).
Most important, however, the community that gathers around Jesus receives its identity through Jesus’ gift of his life for them. In the end, to be a member of Jesus’ flock is to know that Jesus died for you. In the freely chosen act of his death, Jesus shows the way to life (gate) and offers abundant life by the example of his love (shepherd). It is important that Jesus says he lays down his life for the sheep, not for his sheep (v. 15), just as in 6:51 he speaks of giving his flesh for the life of the world. It is an inclusive, rather than an exclusive, gift, just like God’s love for the world (3:16). Jesus makes the love of God fully available by expressing that love in his death (vv. 17-18).
That love and that sacrifice is what we celebrate at the table today as a community of faith. We remember Christ’s offering for us, and in so doing pledge to sacrifice our lives for his sake in this present day. As we feast and fellowship together as forgiven and forgiving people, we see that the table is the gate—and because our Christ is a loving, good shepherd, that gate is open to us.
As the 23rd Psalm goes, Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
6Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.
This Good shepherd is a restorer of relationships. Though we may find our vision clouded with notions of enemies and friends, this shepherd calls us all his flock. When we come to the table, even a table in the presence of people we may consider enemies, we are forgiven and healed—our head is anointed with oil. Anointing symbolizes both healing and the commissioning of kings. When we realize that we are forgiven and our enemies are as well, we are both healed and commissioned. The experience of this healing is like a cup running over.
Friends, here at this table, the cup is running over. Jesus says in John 7, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me,
and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, "Out of the believer's heart shall flow rivers of living water.' "

As we come to this table, and our cups runneth over, we have the potential to be living water for those around us. As a community, as a flock, we are asked to also be the body of Christ. At the end of John, Jesus comes to the disciples in his resurrected form. After asking for some breakfast, the disciples realize it’s him, and he asks Peter 3 times, “Do you love me?” to which Peter answers, “yes, of course!” What is Jesus’ response? “Feed my lambs,” “Tend my sheep,” “Feed my sheep.”
In relationship with our savior and maker, we are asked to share the duties of our shepherd. We are asked to lay down our lives for one another, as in the first Epistle of John 3:16. We are asked to not love only in word or speech, but in truth and action. In the sustaining meal that we take together, we are asked to fellowship with our enemies, and in doing so becoming healed and blessed with abundance.
Being a flock means following the shepherd. The shepherd did these things for us, and by following the actions of the shepherd, we enact the sacrifice of Christ for this world.
Let us feast then! Let us be led into green pastures and beside still waters. Let our cups run over, and let the life giving rivers flow from our hearts, because we believe and we hear the shepherd’s voice calling us—and not only us. We hear the shepherd’s voice calling the world! Amen.

April 3 sermon---Food for Faith

2006-04-29T18:17:00.000-05:00

Sermon Text:
Luke 24:36-48

This past week, I went to South Carolina with some college friends. We had intended on driving straight through—but instead we decided to “crash” with some of our friends who lived in Nashville, and effectively cut the trip in half. Before we left, we had Salmon croquettes and macaroni and fruit provided by my family in Little Rock. We arrived at my friend Will and Carrie Churchill’s (Bill Churchill’s great nephew) house around 12:30 to find him picking his banjo on the front porch. After enjoying a beer on the porch, we hit the sack, then woke up a few short hours later to the smell of omelets and coffee. After enjoying a breakfast and a first sight of Will’s 6 month pregnant wife, we got on the road again for the remainder of our trip to Columbia.
Isn’t it amazing how a meal can energize us and open our eyes to the beauty of the friendships in our midst? What do we most often do when reuniting with friends we haven’t seen in a while? We eat a meal together! Should we be surprised to find the same kind of thing in the Gospel accounts of the resurrection?
Gospel accounts of eating
Craig Satterlee, a homeletics prof. at the Lutheran school of theology at Chicago, guided my attention to the fact that Easter, as Luke presents it, is not so much about an empty tomb as it is about food. Jesus spends Easter day eating. His followers celebrate Easter not at an empty tomb but a table. Here we experience resurrection by eating.
Have you ever been in the midst of a family meal and noticed the presence of Christ with you? It is probably a little harder to catch this vision if we are eating our meals in front of the television. Munching our meals in collective silence while the TV pumps us with entertainment like a gas pump fills our cars with gas. However, if we perhaps face each other and have conversation with our meal, it has the potential to turn into something very life-giving and life-changing. One of Lara and my attempts to give our life together some support and enhancement has been to take our meals at the table with Wesley’s high chair pulled up with us. We’re not perfect at it. Sometimes we just instinctively sit in the den when our show comes on—but slowly and surely, our life is enriched when we remember that we have a commitment to raising our son with a good tradition.
We enter Jesus’ dinner party between two of the courses. The 11 are discussing the first of these courses, bread served to Cleopas and a companion. In Emmaus, Jesus took the bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them. Cleopas reports that thy talked a lot about scripture, and experienced Jesus as the risen Christ.
What is the point of all this post-resurrection eating? Some New Testament scholars believe it has a very tactful purpose. In the early church, there was a debate among two different groups about who Jesus was and how he was resurrected. Some believed that Jesus didn’t have a bodily resurrection, and some even believed that Jesus never had a physical body at all. The reason that this group, called Gnostics, didn’t believe that Jesus had a body was because they thought of the physical world as being corrupt and bodies as unclean. They didn’t believe that a divine being such as Jesus would or even could dwell in something so unholy as flesh.
Certainly John and probably Luke and Matthew as well were aware of this group of people. John’s gospel was written for a community that seemed to either have these believers present or as competitors in the same community.
So, in order to prove to the “misinterpreters” of the Gospel message, Luke and John made many references to Jesus eating after the resurrection. A purely spiritual being would most likely not need to eat, you see, and Luke tells us that “even in their joy, some of the disciples still did not believe.” John singles out Thomas as the one who does not believe, and actually has to put his fingers in the wounds of Christ because many of these Gnostic Christians traced their tradition to the Gospel that bore his name: The Gospel of Thomas. So, one reason we have so much “lunchroom discussion” in the Gospels that we read is because they were written to convince the world that this man we call Jesus had a physical, a bodily resurrection. If Jesus didn’t have a bodily resurrection, the early Christians did not see any hope for the world being redeemed. Christ’s body being made new was a symbol and a foretaste of the whole world becoming new, as is told in the Book of Revelation.
But back to the story that Luke tells us—Right before the passage we read today is the Emmaus passage, when Jesus joins two disciples on the road to Emmaus and they don’t know it is him until they invite him to have dinner with them and he breaks the bread. They see him as they knew him, and he vanishes. “They said to each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he was talking to us on the road, while he was opening the scriptures to us?” The story we read today connects the dots in our minds between the meal in the upper room and the Emmaus meal and the meal that we share with one another that we call communion. The story told is not just about “ghost-busting” and refuting the Christians who believe Jesus wasn’t physically raised from the dead.
Chris Satterlee writes in a recent issue of “the Christian Century,” that Bread and fish are not much of an Easter dinner. Why bread and fish, loves and fishes? Our minds race to other meals that appear to be courses in Jesus’ resurrection feast. Jesus served the first of this pairing in a deserted place when he blessed bread and fish and gave them to a multitude. All ate their fill, and there were leftovers to boot. This meal served as a foretaste of the feast that Jesus will serve when the reign of God comes in all its fullness. Surrounded by people of every time and every place, surrounded by all of creation, Jesus will serve up the great and promised feast, the final course of Jesus’ resurrection banquet. No one will be hungry: all will be satisfied. The last will be first and the first will be last, and the feasting will continue forever!
What about all those other meals Jesus attended and served? Could Jesus’ eating and drinking with the poor, the outcast and the despised also be courses in this resurrection feast? Jesus certainly raised people to new life at those dinner parties! People were given a new chance as a follower of the new covenant—to love and live in a new way with a new purpose. And if resurrection happened at those tables, does that mean that Jesus, risen from the dead, is present and bringing new life to every table at which the hungry are filled, the despised are loved, the outcast are welcome and the poor receive the reign of God?
Dare we allow our minds to wander to still other meals? What about Abraham’s feast with angels, manna in the wilderness and the cake that the angel of the Lord provided Elijah—were they also courses in Jesus resurrection feast? What about the family dinner, the business lunch, the snack shared between classes? Are they part of Jesus’ Easter feast?
We are called back from our wondering by Jesus, who confirms our musings. Jesus has finished eating and is talking about scripture. We are not surprised, since scripture seems to be the topic of conversation at this Easter feast. Jesus gives those gathered a panoramic view—the law of Moses, the prophets and the psalms—all in one sitting. Jesus points out that he—and with him death and resurrection, repentance and forgiveness—can be found throughout scripture.
It may be easier to testify to the risen Christ by making a trip to the empty tomb than by eating around a table. A trip to an empty tomb confines Easter to very early morning on that first day of the week when the women went to anoint Jesus’ body. We know when, where and how resurrection happened. We know Easter is over.
Celebrating Easter by eating means that Jesus could show up, that resurrection could happen, at any table, at every table. We have no way of knowing when, where and how the risen Christ will bring new life. Rather than being confined to one day, or to the 50 that we observe in the church, Jesus’ Easter feast continues as one meal leads to another, and tables get larger and larger, and closer together.
Only time and space separate all the courses in Jesus’ resurrection feast. Overcoming time and space does not appear to be a problem for our risen Jesus, who can be in Emmaus for the bread course, Jerusalem for fish, and at every table around which people testify to Christ from the scriptures, preach repentance and forgiveness in Christ’s name, and share bread and wine in remembrance of him.
Rather than making an annual trip to the empty tomb, we celebrate Easter by eating together and sharing scripture until that day when Jesus, risen from the dead and standing in our midst, overcomes time and space and everything else that separates the tables around which we gather.
So take the Easter message to your tables. Take the Good news with you to your Sunday lunch. Take it in a sack lunch to work. I know that our sister Nadine takes it every day to McDonalds where she has a breakfast sausage biscit and shares the word of her church with anyone there who she decides to converse with. Like Nadine, we all have the ability to bring Easter into our daily lives and conversations. We all have a mouth, and we all have to eat. In doing so, the Christ is resurrected all over the world. People find new hope, people let go of old grudges, people believe in a love that is so broad and powerful that even they can be within the Love of God. This is how Christ comes into the world! Think of it as practice for that heavenly banquet.
Our communion liturgy asks God to “Pour out your Holy Spirit on us gathered here, and on these gifts of bread and wine. Make them be for us the body and blood of Christ, that WE MAY BE FOR THE WORLD THE BODY OF CHRIST, REDEEMED BY HIS BLOOD. Have you ever really heard that? It means we are the physical resurrection of Jesus in this day and age. We can be bread for the world. To do so, we must open our mouths and share the Good News.

2006-04-17T21:37:00.001-05:00

communion banner detail

2006-04-17T21:37:00.000-05:00

communion banner detail

2006-04-17T21:36:00.001-05:00

processional cross detail

2006-04-17T21:36:00.000-05:00

Easter saw three new additions to the chancel area: a processional cross and two banners

2006-04-17T21:24:00.000-05:00

The Avilas took vows of membership on Easter

2006-04-17T21:22:00.000-05:00

Have you found anything yet?

2006-04-17T21:20:00.000-05:00

Nathan, Lara, and Wesley stand next to the Easter cross covered in flowers

2006-04-17T21:19:00.000-05:00

Young adults watch the Easter egg hunt

Easter Sermon

2006-04-16T09:26:00.000-05:00

Mark 16:1-8
Psalm 118: 1-2, 14-24

After finishing MARK 16:8—The end! That’s all we get from the first Gospel written. If you were a Christian in the first century before Matthew or Luke or John wrote their versions of the story, that was the ending you had to build your faith on. “The women ran out of the tomb and they told no one, for they were afraid.” The Greeks would have actually read the last verse as grammatically unsatisfying as well. “To no one anything they said; afraid they were for…”
In his commentary on the Gospel of Mark, the late Donald Juel tells the story of one of his students who had memorized the whole of Mark in order to do a dramatic, broadway style reading before a live audience. After careful study, the student had decided to go with the scholarly consensus regarding the ending. At his first performance, however, after he spoke that ambiguous last verse, he stood there awkwardly, shifting from one foot to the other, the audience waiting for more, waiting for closure, waiting for the proper ending. Finally, after several anxious seconds, he said, “Amen!” and made his exit. The relieved audience applauded loudly and appreciatively. Upon reflection though, the student realized that by providing the audience a satisfying conclusion, his “Amen” had actually betrayed the dramatic intention of the text. So at the next performance, when he reached the final verse he simply paused for a half beat and left the stage in silence. “the discomfort and uncertainty within the audience were obvious,” said Juel, “and as the people exited…the buzz of conversation was dominated by the experience of the non-ending.”
Ever read a story or watch a movie that you just didn’t want to end? It might have been so beautiful, so thrilling, so involving that you felt a part of you died when you came to the conclusion. You found yourself paging back a few chapters to try and re-create that last hour or so that you were so enthralled by the story.
Or perhaps you’ve sat in a movie theater as the crowd files out hoping that the filmmakers will have rewarded you for sitting to the very end of the credits with one of those clever little “secret endings” that only the die-hards know about.
I am reminded of going to see the last installment of the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy with Lara at this huge theater in Hollywood called the Orpheum. As the movie neared its ending, I started feeling like I was watching a roommate pack up his things to move to the other side of the planet. I knew I would never again see a Lord of the Rings movie for the “first time” ever again. I sat in desperation through the entire credits, hoping for something more, some last “farewell.”

Our gospel writer, Mark, understands this feeling I believe, because he simply ends the Gospel without really ending it. Some mysterious guy in a tomb saying Jesus isn’t there? Women running out and telling no one, despite the promise of this mysterious man that Jesus would meet them in Galilee?

That is so unsatisfying! We want some face time with the newly risen Jesus, like in John…….when Mary goes to the tomb and Jesus appears to her when who she had mistaken to be the caretaker whispers her name—she recognizes his voice, sees him face to face, then goes to tell the others, dutifully—not running away scared.
Mark just gives us an empty tomb and an enigmatic promise met with….fear and fleeing. Why? The fact that we may find this unsatisfying was not lost on later leaders of the church, who added to Mark’s ending some semblance of a resolution. We have two such endings, in fact—one brief and poignant, one full of reprimands and high expectations. Even though I want more, like I want to keep reading those beautiful stories or like I stay in the theater till the little symbols of the studios come up—hoping for something more to the movie—even though I want more from Mark, I’m also very attracted to his original ending to the story. I think I like it because it compels me. It is like one of those “Choose Your Own Adventure” books that I recently pulled out of storage at my parents house and had a ball looking through. “If you run to Galilee to meet Jesus, turn to page 113,” or “If you run out with the women and “tell no one” turn to page 44.
My father pointed out to me as we compared notes for this “most important sermon of the year” that this is the only occasion in Mark when the disciples (yes, the women are disciples too, of course) have been commanded to let the cat out of the bag, and they instead “tell no one.” In every other instance, Jesus has commanded the disciples to “tell no one of this” and they have promptly spilled the beans. Here’s the biggest event yet, and they’re given the green light to spread the word and instead they “say nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.” Clearly the later editors of the book were bugged by this incoherent ending because they add that “well, actually they did tell someone.”
Clearly they had told, because if they hadn’t, Mark wouldn’t be telling this story to anyone in the first place. The empty tomb would have eventually been filled by someone else’s body, the stone closed, and the movement begun by Jesus would have fizzled out and the only person to know the name of Jesus would be some ancient Judaism scholar working on his PH.D and writing a thesis on some obscure references to a man by the name of Yeshua who was crucified by the Romans for probably starting an insurrection.
Mark ends his gospel with a failed commandment because it is compelling. We want to tell the story to make up for the characters in the story who fail to do so. That’s exactly the kind of response that Mark is hoping for—the resurrection is in our hands. If we don’t share it, the Message will die out and be forgotten.
We live by faith, then, precariously balancing between the young man's promise and the women's fear and astonishment. We seek ending after ending, only to discover that every ending that we fashion inevitably disappoints us. Every finale forecloses the drama prematurely. An ending says too much too surely, and therefore it never says enough. Although it may satisfy us for the moment, we sense its failure and falsity.
The young man who performed the Gospel learned that the last verse of Mark is better left as is because Mark didn’t need an ending. The story he was telling was continuing on in the lives of the people who heard about Jesus and believed. The life of the hero of our story is still going on in you and in me. The young man in the tomb understands that there is more to come. "He is not here," not in the tomb, not at the end of the story; "he is going ahead of you," always ahead of us; and "you will see him," in Galilee and in places we would never have expected. He is going ahead of us, and of his story; there is no end.

2006-04-09T21:12:00.000-05:00

Waldron UMC celebrates Palm Sunday with Donk-Donk. The Avilas and Oaks live out the disciple task of "going to fetch a donkey."

Palm Sunday Sermon

2006-04-09T14:06:00.000-05:00

Sermon Texts
Mark 11: 1-11
Mark 15: 1-39
The week that we call holy week—the week that begins today and contains the remembrances of the most important aspects of our faith—begins with a parade. And the parade begins with a detailed description of going to get a donkey.
Jesus clues his disciples into the perfect love that is about to be expressed in the coming week by giving them what seems to be a menial task. Why does Mark give us such a detailed description on the directions to get a donkey on the way to Jerusalem? Perhaps it is a counterweight to the delusions of grandeur that are being promoted by the disciples on the way to the city. In their mind, they are on the march to conquer Babylon, and they want to know who would sit on the right and left hand of their new Messiah. But Jesus gives these disciples a humbling task that reflects the humbling task he must undergo in the week that follows.
We oftentimes think that God’s love is expressed in power. What we consider power is usually coercive power. But what we find hard to stomach and even harder to imitate is the divine ideal of Love as totally and perfectly vulnerable.
Several years ago a beautiful movie came out called “The Green Mile.” Tom Hanks starred as the prison warden on death row in the 1930’s south, and came to know one of the inmates who had strange powers. This man was literally huge as an ox—a symbol of this character’s power—yet his real power was in his vulnerability. Through his love, he healed a mouse, a woman, and even the warden himself. Through his healing love, he became more and more vulnerable. The movie is called “The Green mile” because the hallway to the death chamber is painted green, and the inmates call it the mile because it feels like a mile when one walks it to their death. John Coffee, the character in the Green Mile, walks his path willingly even though he is innocent of the crime for which he is accused. Much like John Coffee, Jesus Christ knew that thegreen palms thrown at the feet of his humble donkeywere paving the way to the cross.
. He goes willingly even though he is innocent of the crime for which he is accused.
Christ’s power come through his perfect love. Perfect love involves a submission to vulnerability. Every welt on his back, every thorn in his brow happens because Christ’s love makes him vulnerable. He’d been telling his disciples it had to be this way for some time, and they didn’t understand. More accurately, they didn’t WANT to understand. Mark tells us in ch. 9 that they were afraid to ask him what he meant when he told them that the son of man must suffer and be killed. They were afraid to ask him because while they were arguing about who was the greatest, Jesus was sitting a little child on his lap and saying “welcome this child and you welcome God.”
This terrible, beautiful passion of our savior says to us once and for all, “this is how to love—this is how I love you.” Christ was killed because he dared to love us as we are, he dared to love those who weren’t supposed to be loved. He died to show us that true power lies in vulnerability, it lies in submission, it lies in Love.
Can we learn this perfect love? Our Methodist heritage and the theology of the Wesleys say that we can. To learn it, we must pay special attention to the events of the passion story. It may involve fetching a donkey when we really want to sit by our King in glory. It may involve walking the path though we may be taunted and derided the whole way. Jesus looked with love on the world even as the very people he was being crucified with joined in the taunts and accusations. Can you imagine? Don’t those other guys being crucified have enough to worry about? This radical, perfect, vulnerable love might involve reaching out in embrace when we really want to slap or punch. It might involve placing a great deal of importance on the creative efforts of a little child when what we really want to do is get back to fixing dinner or writing a report or watching a tv show. That action alone could be placing the welcome mat out in front of our heart for God. Don’t you imagine that the disciples would have rather been suiting Jesus up with armor and perhaps killing a mounted Roman so that Jesus could ride in on his horse? Don’t you imagine Peter would rather have been basking in the glory of his master’s fame and respect rather than denying him as his master was being tried? Don’t you imagine Jesus’ disciple Judas would rather be drawing swords with his master to put down the evil Romans rather than handing him over to the Romans?
Showing that perfect love could mean letting go of anger or feelings of betrayal or mistrust and instead opening our lives to the future, opening our hearts to new possibilities.
Perfect love embodies vulnerability. What position is more vulnerable than open arms? It is in this action, when we go to embrace, that we mirror our creator and savior’s sacrifice. What we must sacrifice is our Ego, our desires, to the one desire of God---to building the Kingdom, to the authentic life that Jesus placed in the offering plate for us.
You would probably rather not focus in on the story of our Lord’s betrayal and beating and crucifixion this week and instead zoom right ahead to the Easter celebration. I challenge you to observe Holy week—to be here as we plunge into the stories of the Last week of our savior. If it is not your custom to be here in worship in the middle of the week, just imagine how out of custom it must’ve felt to the original disciples to hear about the path that their Messiah was going to take—not a path of glory and military revolution, but a path of vulnerability and spiritual revolution. Together we will observe the pain and the heartache—so that together we may experience the joy and the hope in a new light--The light that accompanies the resurrection.

Which version of the Bible is best for you?

2006-04-05T22:45:00.000-05:00

Most of my members know that I enjoy reading the "Message" but use the NRSV for study as well. Here's what another guy thinks

March 26 sermon. Light and the Darkness and the Dusk

2006-03-25T15:02:00.000-06:00

Sermon Texts:
Ephesians 2: 1-10
John 3: 14-21

You’ve heard stories from people for whom the experience of salvation was so impacting that it turned their life around completely. It is usually the case that they sink to a certain depth and then ask God for redirection, and they mark that experience as the distant reminder of what they had been and now are. It is like they are one of those wind up toys which hits the wall, spins around and zooms off in the opposite direction. The wheels don’t turn, they just stay on course.
Tom Long, professor at Emory, wrote in a recent issue of Christian Century about the conversion stories that Chrisitians often tell. He described a musician who was on Larry King talking about his faith who from an early age was blessed with a vibrant faith and a musical gift. Eventually, shaking the dust off his little town, he took his faith and his keyboard and headed toward the bright lights of Nashville. He found some success, but he also found drugs—lots of them. A life once young and hopeful soon spiraled out of control: a faith once alive soured into despair. One desperate night, he came apart emotionally and found himself lying face down on the linoleum floor of his kitchen, sobbing uncontrollably, crying out to God for salvation. He told Larry King “I woke up the next day,and I haven’t been the same since. That was 28 years ago. I give credit to the Lord.” Reflecting on three decades of sobriety and productivity, he said “I think God just rescued me.”
I have to agree with Tom Long when he admits that he doesn’t have much patience for hearing pastors give this kind of testimony about themselves in the pulpit. Seems simplistic and naïve. It somehow turns the faith walk into a long jump. Growing up in a Baptist town without a story of redemption like this musician’s was trying at times. My mother and father gently suggested that perhaps salvation isn’t an event, but that perhaps it began when I was born into a community of faith and baptized among them as an infant. They would tell me that salvation is a continuing process. Perhaps it is a lifelong experience instead of a moment of clarity.
Tom Long suggests that frankly though, the real reason why such stories of sin and salvation cause us discomfort may well be that they bring us too close to the molten core of the Christian faith. We prefer to leave the control rods in the reactor, but as much as we might like to domesticate the gospel, to make the faith about spiritual enlightenment or ethical ideals or the broad love of God that inspires tolerance, the fact of the matter is that the gospel is at root a rescue story. Even Jesus’ name, as theologian William Placher reminds us, means “the Lord Saves.”
I feel somewhat convicted. The majority of what I have said to you from this pulpit is about spiritual enlightenment and ethical ideals and the broad love of God which inspires tolerance. Perhaps part of the problem is that I don’t usually see myself as ever having been “bogged down in the depths of sin.” God hasn’t helped me kick any habits. I haven’t had any radical changes of heart. Christ hasn’t miraculously caused me to love some group of people I once hated, because I’ve never really hated a particular group of people. The point of me saying all this is not for you to admire how great an example I am, it is to ask the question, perhaps for more than just myself, what do you do when your religion is about rescue, but you don’t really feel adrift at sea. Is it akin to throwing a life preserver to someone who already sits in the lifeboat? “Oh, thanks—I appreciate that. Hope I don’t need to use it!?”
John uses drastic dualisms to communicate to us the mystery and the power of salvation. Specifically, a favorite motif of John’s is the Light and the Dark. Well, if I just take John’s imagery to heart I might assume that there is a reason I don’t feel in need of rescue—there at the end of today’s passage, it says very clearly, “For all who do evil hate the light and do not come to the light, so that their deeds may not be exposed. 21But those who do what is true come to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that their deeds have been done in God.” I knew I was on the right track—it feels good to be in the light. Sorry to all of you who “hate the light” and would rather creep around with your addictions and your predjudices and your shame. Come on into the light, the water’s fine!
There is a beautiful short story by Ernest Hemingway called “A clean, well lighted place.” The anecdote revolves around the difference between a clean, bright cafe and a dark, not-so-clean, bar as a place for lonely men to spend the long, sleepless nights. Two waiters discuss a lingering patron in a cafe who overstays his welcome as the night wears on. The old man gets quietly drunk each night; just last week he tried to kill himself, but was rescued.
Tonight he tries to pass the night in a clean, well-lighted place. The young waiter, impatient, to get home to his wife, does not comprehend the importance of this place to this old man's survival. The older waiter, who does understand, walks into the night himself, unable to find his own clean, well-lighted place in which to pass a lonely and sleepless night.
Perhaps the duality that Jesus uses for Nicodemus and that Hemingway uses in his own story is more an illustration of an experience of salvation rather than a sustained mode of being though. I don’t feel like I live in the gleaming light of righteousness, even though I don’t have any rescue stories. Perhaps the reality is that we live in the dusk. There is always the looming darkness, there is always a long shadow. If we are sustained in the bright noonday light, we may not be able to see our shadows lurking directly underneath us. As the day moves on, we become more aware of our shadows, the darkness that each and every one of us projects onto the world around us. Paul tells the Romans, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” We may dwell in the light as church-going, open hearted, people trying to do well, but the fact is that we all cast a shadow, and the closer we get to the darkness, the more apparent that shadow becomes.
Paul tells the Ephesians, “You were dead through trespasses and sins in which you once lived, following the course of this world, but now by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing.” Prof. Long continues, “To see this statement as applicable to us, to swallow even one ounce of this claim, we must admit a cluster of truths about ourselves we would rather not face—that we are captive to cultural and spiritual forces over which we have no control, that they have drained the life out of us, that we are unable to think or feel or crawl our way free, and that we are in urgent need of a God who comes to rescue. IN short, we need saving. We can accommodate this perhaps, in a 12 step program, but to encounter it as a description of our true and basic selves sends us scrambling for safer ground.
This is why our spiritual father, John Wesley, prayed fervently for conviction. He could buy the idea that the world needed a savior, but wasn’t convinced that Christ saved him. It isn’t about being egotistical or humble. I don’t think it is egotistical to be honest about our perception that we stand in the light of God, we may very well have had experiences of sanctification in which we did feel bathed in God’s magnificent light. It is more about attention—some of you may be at a point of noonday light right now in your lives, some of you may be helpless in the darkness—most of us I would venture to say are living in between, in the early morning fog, waiting for the sun’s rays to burn away our confusion and doubt—hoping it is right around the corner. Some of us are probably in the waning hours of the afternoon, the late day light giving us the ability to see our long shadows stretching across our world and determined to do something to “turn back the clock” to those brighter hours when that shadow wasn’t there.
Jesus is clear to Nicodemus about one thing—the light isn’t in the world to judge it—the light falls out into the open, it illuminates everything, it is available to all who step out of the shadows. It doesn’t condemn what it reveals, it saves what it warms. In bringing to light our mistakes and transgressions, we can see them ourselves—and through this recognition, we can let go of them, we can drop them on the ground and stretch our hands and face toward the light. The judgment is that we love the darkness more than the light—we don’t want to see, we don’t want the world to see our mistakes—we want to pretend like they aren’t there.
Perhaps my own mistake about believing I don’t have any need for “rescue” is the idea that some “thing that I do” would keep me from salvation in the first place. Perhaps orienting myself in the light just because I haven’t had some crisis or secret shame that I have to relinquish IS the reason I need saving. Such works righteousness is a clear problem of the Pharisees like Nicodemus, who comes to Jesus in the darkness, seeking enlightenment.
Instead of righteousness, the light that falls all over the ground is grace—you all know people who live in the midst of that grace, soaking it up, squeezing it out into the shadows where people live in fear and shame. That is what it is to live in the light, not some degree of “morality.”
Light-lovers soak up God’s grace through every pore of their being. They have sometimes come out of the darkness of despair and trespasses, and they have sometimes come out of the dusk of self-evaluation and confession.
The promise of God is that the Grace of Light is ever-present—it is always daytime without a cloud in the sky—we may be fearful about leaving behind our comfortable darkness, our false sense of security that gives us a sense of belonging or power. We step out naked into the light—the promise of God is that we are accepted by God just like a mother accepts and nurtures and loves the child that comes out of the darkness of the womb and into the light of the world. We should have no fear, because in the light we see our true purpose and our true nature—we are children of God and we are Kingdom builders! Amen

A word about this week's sermon

2006-03-20T23:52:00.000-06:00

In this sermon, I refer to the "news" that Lara and Wesley and I are going to be moving to Tulsa this summer. I am tremendously thankful for the friendships and growth that the Waldron UMC has given me and my family. It was difficult to make the decision to request a move to the Oklahoma conference, but after much prayer and tears, Lara and I decided that this was the best opportunity for both of us to utilize our gifts and talents.

We have both always approached our professions as "callings," and Lara's calling is fairly specific--she specializes in evaluations for autism and learning disorders. She was recruited to the staff of Tulsa Developmental Pediatrics by her mentor from graduate school, and she will be replacing her position within the practice. This is an ideal professional arrangement for Lara, as she will be working part time and will still have plenty of time to be at home with Wesley G. I will be seeking an appointment in the Tulsa district, and will let you know what comes of that as soon as I hear.

Our prayers are focused on the continued strength of Waldron UMC. We know that this might be a tough transition for a church that has had 3 pastors in as many years. For this reason, our decision to move to Tulsa was not an easy one, but it is indeed where we feel God calling us.
Signs of hope and strength for the church in Waldron are evident--this week, on the same day we announced our coming departure, we also welcomed into membership Paige Bethel, who comes to us from Goddard UMC in Ft. Smith. She has found the community of faith at Waldron UMC to be welcoming and affirming of her discipleship. She has already volunteered to be part of our Relay for Life fundraising team, so we are truly blessed to have her as part of our family of faith. God's Spirit moves even in the difficult and painful moments of our shared walk of faith. I am confident that the next appointed pastor will build on the strengths of the church and continue to open new doors of possibilities for discipleship.

Sermon for Lent 3

2006-03-20T23:08:00.000-06:00

Sermon Text
John 2: 13-22
1 Cor 1: 18-25

Upending the tables
Our text today is challenging. It doesn’t feature the comfy, “favorite uncle” type of Jesus that we are used to, but instead it tells of a wild man with a whip and fire in his eyes. This Jesus comes barging into a group of people trying to make a living and runs them out, scattering their livestock and throwing their money on the ground. In the process, Jesus “turns the tables” on a system of worship that had lost its sacredness.
I imagine the news today makes you feel like you have had the tables turned on you. This coming summer, you will have the fourth pastor in as many years.
I don’t want to encourage you to feel this way, but I want you to know that if you feel abandoned, let down by the system, or like the wind has been taken out of your sails, I can understand. Instead of “dropping out” and seeing attendance dwindle, I hope this church family continues to strengthen its mission, as it has been doing. I hope that this church continues to broadcast its purpose and message in the community, as it has been.
We welcome a new member of this congregation today—it is especially hopeful to recognize that the church continues in its mission to welcome people into our family of worship regardless of who stands in this pulpit on Sundays. The reason is that our real leader is among us even when we are but two or three in number. Christ, our cornerstone—is our captain and our pathway. Even though the story may seem like foolishness—Christ crucified is our hope and our redemption.
Today our scripture texts further the difficulty of following Christ. Our first scripture of Lent showed us Jesus going out into the wilderness for 40 days to be tempted by Satan. Our reading last week told us that Christ knew that he must be rejected and killed to fulfill his mission. We should be ready and willing to deny ourselves and take up our cross and follow. Some of you may have heard that the body of Tom Fox was found in Iraq—Fox was a peace activist who went to Iraq ready to die as a result of the witness of the King of Peace.
I read something in an introduction to Job that we used last Sunday in our bible study. Eugene Peterson wrote, “More often than not, people do not suffer less when they are committed to following God, but more! When these people go through suffering, their lives are often transformed, deepened, marked with beauty and holiness, in remarkable ways that could never have been anticipated before the suffering.
Christ comforts us in our weakness. Our savior not only comforts the afflicted, he afflicts the comfortable. He turns over the tables of a place of worship and instills a new hope—one harder to grasp than the blood of animal sacrifice. Jesus knows he will put an end to the age of appeasing God with a sacrifice of “things.” He ushers in an age of appeasing God only with a sacrificed heart. “Tear down this temple, and in three days I will build a new temple,” he says…and he does!
In Christ’s temple—which is our very body and life—Christ cleans and purifies as well. We ask God for the privilege and challenge of being a living sanctuary, and we do this because Christ did first. When the temple authorities ask for an explanation and Jesus refers to his forthcoming resurrection, he is prophecying about God’s Spirit becoming unleashed on the world, not bound by the brick and mortar of a physical temple. Jesus cleanses the temple of our hearts of corruption just like he drives the corrupt system out of the Temple—he replaces the corruption with Hope.
St. Augustine of Hippo said, "Hope has two beautiful daughters. Their names are Anger and Courage: Anger at the way things are, and courage to see that they do not remain the way they are."
Here is another lesson to be learned from this reading: the need for righteous anger in the face of injustice, extortion, and especially, the exploitation of vulnerable people.
We have to do some historical digging to see what stirred up Jesus’ wrath so much about this particular circumstance. The whole system of commerce in the Temple was well established, and indeed, quite a racket for the temple authorities. Historians tell us that once a year, Jewish males had to pay a temple tax, and that tax could be paid only in temple coin, not with Roman or Greek coins. Hence the moneychangers. But the moneychangers charged a huge fee for the exchange; often up to half the amount being changed went into their pockets, out of which the temple took its substantial cut.
Additionally any sacrifice offered at Passover had to be that of an animal without blemish. The temple authorities offered perfect animals for sale. Anyone bringing his own animal had to have it inspected by the priests. Not surprisingly, the animal was nearly always rejected, and the person had to buy another from the priests. Scholars tell us that a bird bought outside the Temple cost about 15 of our cents, but one from inside the Temple could cost many times as much.
So it was not simply the presence of the moneychangers and the animals offered for sale that so angered Jesus -- after all, they were services meant for the convenience of people who had to travel long distances to get to Jerusalem. No, it was the misuse of authority in the blatant and gross overcharging of even the poorest people that set him off.

Anger at such things is not a bad thing. It is a good, cleansing thing. Such anger is not the opposite of love. Anger at injustice is an appropriate expression of love -- it is a cry for righteousness.
Righteous anger is not a loss of control. Jesus is not out of control in this reading -- he's very clear about the targets of his wrath. Righteous anger is a taking of control, a move out of passive acceptance and toward change.
How have we turned the Sacred into a marketplace? There is a good bit of wisdom in a movie that some of you I’m sure would not find very tasteful—it’s called Dogma, and is a comedy about faith. In the movie, the church decides to exchange the crucifix image because it is too sullen and depressing. To replace the crucifix, the church unveils “The Buddy Jesus,” a cartoonish savior with a toothy grin, a wink, and a “thumbs up” gesture, saying “it’s all you, man.”
The message Kevin Smith, the filmmaker, is trying to make is that we American Christians tend to market Jesus, who is our Temple—whom we go to to encounter God. We market Jesus when we glamorize Jesus into the one who gives us a wink and a nod, giving us nothing but acceptance without placing on us any demands for repentance. This Jesus strokes our egos, gives us license to denigrate others who don’t see the world the way we do, and requires nothing from us but belief. When we sell this Jesus to the community, we mis-represent a Christ who may make life more difficult rather than easier. Lent is a time when we re-focus our lenses on the crucifix and begin to see the truth and beauty of what the world may know as foolishness.
This cross is good news because it saves us from the illusion that we should be happy go lucky in a world that is so painful and difficult for the majority of God’s creation. Buddy Jesus tells us it’s okay and we should turn a blind eye to the corrupt systems of destruction and idolatry. Perhaps we should pity those who suffer. The crucified Christ, the fool, tells us we should join the sufferers, we should enter the suffering and through it be changed, we should take up our cross and follow.
Easy answers and quick fixes are the merchant’s tables of our day, and the Jesus we encounter in this passage sends the coins flying.

Ash Wednesday Sermon

2006-03-01T12:50:00.000-06:00

Text: Job 42: 1-6

Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust.

They’re haunting words aren’t they? The words ring in our ears like funeral bells. Ashes to Ashes—I hear it and I taste the words. Ashes stick to your tongue, ashes cling to your clothes. When I preside at a funeral, I always feel a tremendous sense of humility when I turn toward the coffin before it is lowered into the ground, put my hand on it, and say, “We commit this body to the ground, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.”
I always think of the ashes that are the last part of a campfire. Faces are illuminated faintly by the slowly dying embers inside a haphazard bundle of logs. A night of stories, laughter, and fellowship naturally retires to a lulled hush as a campfire turns to ashes. Like campfires, our lives come to an end and we retire to ashes.
On this day we are called to remember that we are made from dust, and we will return to dust. Our life on this earth is finite—and as sure as our bodies, our societies, and even our sense of self arose from the primordial dust of time and space, all of it will return to this simple, yet inescapable origin. These words recall the creation story, in which God crafts our very existence from the dust and ash that is leftover from the tumultuous process of creating everything else. Many scientists posit a theory that the big bang will eventually collapse on itself in a dramatic reversal of infinite expansion. Ashes to Ashes, dust to dust. All will become nothing—and then what?

Though it may not be on the front of our minds, we will eventually die. Our bodies will decay or be burned, our mind and heart will cease being the place where our spirit resides, the memory of us will eventually fade among generations who had no immediate contact with our presence on this earth. Everything having to do with the vibrancy of my life will fade like that dimming campfire until there is nothing, not even a memory of me. Our tombstones will grow more and more worn, our names and lives will vanish with the winds of change.
Perhaps it’s just a folly of my youth, but I find it hard to imagine that there will come a time in the not so distant future when I will cease to exist, when my presence on this earth will not have amounted for anything. Perhaps I could tell myself that the world wouldn’t be the same without my presence having been in it, but how do I know that? One of my family Christmas traditions that makes my mom really happy is watching “It’s a wonderful life.” I’ve learned from repetitive viewing of George Bailey’s moral dilemma that I really do matter to the well being of the world, but there’s a more important source of my confidence that the world will be better off with me than without me even after I have died and been forgotten.
Though its “ashes to ashes and dust to dust” for me, I’ve given myself to something that lasts—God’s Vision! The mark you’ll receive on your forehead in a few minutes is a visible sign to ourselves and our community that we have made a decision about the placement of things in our lives. I see that mark on our forehead saying, “I commit myself to hoping for God’s Kingdom—and those efforts are going to make a lasting impression on the world.” Ash Wednesday is a gentle reminder that we are only temporary…..but God’s Vision is Eternal!
What is in God’s Vision? As Christians we believe it involves good news for the poor, release for the captives, recovery of sight for the blind, liberty for those who are oppressed, voice for the voiceless, strength for the weak.
The symbolic role that John the Baptist saw Jesus fulfilling when Jesus came for baptism was to “Baptize with fire.” Christ brings a purifying fire to the world that we’ve constructed with our egos, with our ignorance, with our hatred, with our sin. We celebrate a God who raises a new and better vision of the world and of ourselves like a Phoenix from these very ashes. Though I may pass to dust before this Vision is realized, Christ calls us to Hope for “the day of God’s favor.”
We must not allow our own finality to cloud our vision of what God has in store for Creation. We are part of that story, and God needs us to help fulfill that vision. By participating in this ongoing creation, we turn dust into beauty—we turn ashes into a Kingdom! By recognizing our own finality, and in so doing giving up the idea that our own fulfillment should be the center of our attention, we have the opportunity to give ourselves fully to the task Christ has put before us—opening eyes to the Kingdom, the Vision of God.
The cross of ashes that you wear on your foreheads today is a testament to this Gospel. You might be stared at today by people who aren’t quite accustomed to this ritual, but when and if that happens I would encourage you to share the Good News that we are dust, and to dust we shall return. Yes! The recognition that we are very temporary is Good News indeed! Why? Because when we recognize that we are temporary, we recognize that God’s Love is eternal. When the false idols of our very understanding of “Self” crumbles to the ground, we fall down on our knees in awe and wonder at the great “I AM.” When we contemplate our endpoint, we no doubt remember our starting point. At each end, we see a Loving creative God--The one who made us, who fashioned us lovingly with mud and dust and Breathed the Breath of Life into our nostrils. This Alpha is also the Omega—waiting to change us into new creations as our bodies wither and die, and the Breath that was breathed into us at birth is taken back into the One who Breathed.
This is our hope, this is our testimony. This is why we do funny things like wearing a cross of ashes on our foreheads. What is old has died, and in us—in new wineskins, new wine is poured. ThanksbetoGod!

Transfiguration Sunday Sermon

2006-02-28T09:13:00.000-06:00

Texts:
II Corinthians 3:12-18, Matthew 17:1-13

When I first imagined the tents in this passage, I was brought back to my days when we pitched canvas tents that I used to spend a couple weeks under as a Boy Scout at Camp Orr, along the Buffalo River in NW Arkansas. These tents weren’t like the well ventilated, lightweight tents that we have today. I think they were left over from Vietnam. The dark canvas soaked up the Arkansas 95 degree sun. They were musty from the humidity and rain that accompanied the heat in the summer. Despite these defects, I have a fondness in my heart for those tents.
To the modern reader, Peter’s suggestion to build three tents on such an occasion seems like an interruption in the flow of the story, and to Mark and Luke, both gentiles, the idea of erecting tents on such an occasion must’ve seemed equally silly, because they both make excuses for Peter. Mark comments on Peter’s idea by saying, “he did not know what to say, because he was terrified.” Luke shortens Mark’s comment simply to “not knowing what he had said.” Matthew seems to be the only gospel writer to think Peter is up to something worthwhile, because he leaves out commentary entirely.
When the disciples react like we would react to the sight of the transfiguration unfolding before their eyes, God appears in a cloud. Perhaps this cloud is a visual ignorance--A veil of missed comprehension. Christ stands before us transfigured, and all we can do (through Peter) is to suggest our tent-building. God doesn’t seem to be too interested in our tents. God seemingly interrupts Peter without justifying his idea with a response. Instead, God is bubbling over with adoration. “This is my son, IN whom I am well pleased.” Should we make a tent for him then God? No---“Listen to Him.” Listening to him involves us confronting our fears. Are we afraid to live our lives the way that he perceives is possible in us? Matthew tells us that 6 days before Before the Transfiguaration event, Jesus confronts his disciples with the question, Who do you say that I am? I imagine that the emphasis is not on the “I” but on the “you.” Christ’s love for us can make us quite uncomfortable. Jesus loves us outside the tent. Jesus walks through the cloud of our ignorance and touches us.
I believe that these tents in some ways symbolize our impulsive response to the divine. When the divine becomes apparent, we try to build it shelter. Instead of basking in the light of the transfiguration, we want to put it under canvas. Sure, we think this is best for the divine. God is in need of our protection!
We want to protect God under the tents of our dogmas, our customs, and our explanations. Humans are naturals at tentmaking. Douglas John Hall writes in a book I’ve been reading, The Cross in Our Context….“One suspects that our Western concepts of God are the answers that we give to depth experiences that are too basically unsettling to remain undefined, unnamed. Better name it straightaway—otherwise what control can we claim?”
The tents that we build as a response to the divine experience are our attempts to define and name the divine. Our human tendency is to feel uncomfortable with the divine. We can’t just stand with our mouths agape. Though ignorance breeds fear, the inverse is true as well: We are afraid of our ignorance—or at least I am anyway. I don’t like to think that “I don’t know.”
Far superior to “I don’t know” is to pretend I know. Many of us latch on to a few ideas that are comfortable to us, then we construct our self-centered realities around these comfortable ideas. God hates this or that is a lot more comfortable because it takes the spotlight off me.
The world is just so much more manageable if I can stake my claim on the idea that God hates something rather than the idea that God loves everyone. If I can build my identity around something I might find in scripture that God “hates,” some abomination that doesn’t apply to me, then I can point my finger instead of claiming my own sinfulness. Building walls to keep the “other” out is a lot easier than letting Christ in. Why? Perhaps this is why in Romans, chapter 2, after describing the apparently sinful culture the Christians find themselves in, he asks those disciples, who are we to judge—perhaps we should just leave that up to God and concentrate on loving our neighbor.
Christ isn’t waiting for us to put a box around Him so that we can define and control Him: the Christ of the Transfiguration grabs our hearts and wrings them out. Sometimes Christ approaches us with arms open—other times Christ overturns our tables.
Christ’s love is a transformative love, it is healing love. I can’t open myself to Christ’s love without being transfigured myself, and frankly the sight of that scares me to death. The transfiguration burns our worldly eyes. IN a later experience of the transfigured Christ, Paul experienced this transformation as so reformative that it blinded him. After seeing a bright light and being questioned by the Risen Christ, Saul “could see nothing, and had to be led by the hand to Damascus,” where he was healed by Ananias and scales fell from his eyes. Our eyes are burned by this vision as well. The love of Christ transcends our worldly vision. Of course we hear and nod our heads that the Christ is present in the whole world—in the “least of these,” but the actual vision of that reality has the power to dumbfound us.
When we open our hearts to the transforming, transfiguring love of Christ, we’re blinded by the light—when we recover from this life changing event, it oftentimes means that we may find love in our heart for the very people we THOUGHT God hates. Saul knew with all his heart that God hated the Christians. The scriptures tell us that he held the coats of those who stoned the early Christian martyrs. He was right there cheering them on, and probably even participated. Then Christ shows up, blinds him with a vision of love he can’t quite wrap his mind around, then when the scales fall from his eyes, he loves the Christ so much that he ends up finding him in groups of people that the early Christians didn’t even imagine could be possible! Do you recognize this?! Are we ready and willing to be changed by and then bear the transforming power of Christ in the world? I’m not talking about Christ’s blinding power changing other people—I’m talking about that blinding power changing you!!!! And me!!!!
We don’t have any business saying someone else should be changed and healed and transformed by God until we step up to the plate and take a swing at what that means for us---for our rigid notions and our usual habits and our sacred cows. God smashes those things up and makes them into ashes and smears them on our face. That’s what we’ll do this Wednesday—swallow our own finitude and accept God’s gracious everlastingness. Grace lasts forever—walls crumble!!!!!
For Matthew, the tent probably symbolizes the Tabernacle, where the Shekinah, the fiery cloud of the continuing presence of God with the people that dwelt over the Ark of the Covenant, is kept. The Ark is the container of the Tablets containing God’s Law. The tabernacle is a symbol of God’s presence with the Jewish people while they are on the Exodus from Egypt to the promised land. Even when the people of God are settled, God prefers the mobility of the tent, perhaps as a suggestion to Israel that their people are going to be on the move throughout their collective history.
Paul realizes that Christ is the tabernacle—the reality of God’s abiding presence with us. Putting Christ in our heart is the same thing as building a tabernacle in our heart—but one difference. We had to build the tabernacle. God gives explicit instructions for a few chapters of Exodus; meticulous details of the tabernacle are given. An artist is selected because of his ability to detail the tabernacle.
Instead of building a tent and carefully putting Christ in our hearts, we open our hearts to Christ’s presence. Christ coming into our hearts is God’s doing, God’s grace. Christ explodes into our hearts. Are you afraid to live your life the way that I perceive?, Christ asks us. That’s how Jesus enters our hearts: that introspection that causes us to see what Christ perceives is possible in our lives. Christ challenges us to do all that he has done. He perceives greatness in us when we perceive weakness. Christ is the fulfillment and potential for all humanity.
Paul writes about the transfiguration in 2nd Corinthians “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.” Christ perceives Christ in our hearts, and that’s how Christ enters. The law is written on our hearts. Christ’s coming into our hearts isn’t a move into empty space, it is an unveiling.
Jesus shows the disciples the glorious nature of the Christ. Even though we are Disciples of Christ, we can never quite wrap our minds around the simple light and beauty of the transfiguration. It is out of the ordinary. Right when we think we have the right answers to the question “Who do you say that I am?” the reality of the Christ melts our minds and envelops us like a cloud. We try to build appropriate shrines, and we don’t even begin to get it. The cloud forces our knees to buckle. What is this grand vision? This awe inspiring light? Is it a taste of some transcendent deity? No—it is pure humanity. It is fearless, unbounded love. Christ never lets us disciples off the hook—He asks us if we would like to join him on Golgotha. He tells us that we will do all he has done and more. Christ’s radiant face is the potential for all creation.
Are you willing to believe the miracle? Are you willing to look for the shining face of Christ when you look in the mirror? With the awesome beauty of our true nature comes an awesome responsibility, an awesome task on this earth. We walk down the mountain with Christ—back into the valleys of the shadow of death. But with this vision stamped fresh in our minds, we will fear no evil, for Thou art with us! Christ’s presence is just as divine when he is tenderly touching a prostitute or a leper as when he is in the company of Elijah and Moses. Christ shines brightest in the world in the company of those we think are unworthy to be brought to light. Christ may blind us and if we go and seek out the aid and counsel of those who are compassionate enough to receive us, we may just find ourselves loving those we don’t think God loves. In so doing, we may even uncover the beauty of God’s love for us! Amen.

Transfiguration Midrash

2006-02-28T09:09:00.000-06:00

I wrote this a couple years ago as an exercise to "get inside the scripture." Later I found out that this practice of "fleshing out the details" of a Biblical story was practiced by Jewish Rabbis in an art called "midrash." When we give ourselves the opportunity to put into words or on a canvas what our mind sees when we read a scripture, it sometimes illuninates more of the truth of that particular passage in our devotional life. I recommend doing this yourself as a discipline of Lent. Here's an example:

Transfiguration Mountain
One evening, a week after our master had asked us who we believed he was, we were all slumbering in a grove of trees outside Cesarea Phillippi. The night had the chill of crisp air and I had not yet drifted into sleep. I was still imagining if I would be one that Jesus spoke of when he had said earlier, “there are some standing here who will not taste death before they see the Son of Man coming in his kingdom.” Lately, I could see that Jesus was beginning to get frustrated about something. He kept telling us that we weren’t getting the point of his stories. Then, as my eyelids were growing heavier, I heard the Master say out loud, “Who will accompany me up the mountain to pray?” Most of the disciples were asleep, but next to me James snapped out of a dream. He said to me, “Brother John, Am I dreaming? I thought I heard the teacher ask if someone would walk with him up the mountain, and I saw he was wearing a crown made of thorns!?” “You’re dreaming,” I answered, “but he did call for us to accompany him up the mountain, let’s go!” All of us usually argued over who of us would get to accompany the Master on walks alone. I relished the chance to walk at his side. Peter had been standing against a tree, away from the fire, so he could watch the woods and warn us if we were being approached by intruders. Jesus, James and I walked down to Peter and Jesus asked him if he wanted to come with us on a hike.

We were camped halfway up the mountain already, so the climb became tedious quickly. We were climbing around large rocks and the ground was not stable. Our feet kept stepping on loose areas and little landslides of rocks and dirt would slide down the mountain in clouds of dust. Soon we reached the snow. Jesus was walking a few paces ahead of us, and in the moonlight I saw that there were sets of footprints on either side of his! When I looked up, it seemed as though the moonlight had left the rest of the world and all concentrated on him. Then, I could see that in the light reflected from the Master, the owners of the other footprints had appeared! I could sense, much like you can hear your father’s sneeze in a busy marketplace, but in this same way I could see—I knew that the other footprints belonged to Moses and Elijah! They were speaking with one another, and I could tell by the looks on their faces that Moses and Elijah felt about as proud to be walking with Jesus as we did. I wondered if all the prophets and angels argued, like we did, over who got to accompany our Master different places.

We were all stupefied. Peter seemed to be the most effective at fishing his voice out of his stomach and stammered: “Master, it is most fortunate that we have come with you….I, I, I can pitch three tents for you and for Elijah, and for Moses.” Moses looked at Peter fondly. He understood that we were homeless and on the run with Jesus like he and his followers were homeless and on the run from the Egyptians—with Yahweh on the run with them in a tent of His own. It seemed that the tents were no longer the right idea---but the cloud of our unknowing grew thicker, and actually seemed to materialize around us. From it, I could feel the words surging through my body like I was standing inside a thundercloud and the lightening was entering my ears and grasping my heart. The words confirmed what Peter had exclaimed to the Master’s question a week earlier—“Who do you say that I am?” “My Son…My Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” the voice uttered. “Listen to him!” I could not even turn my head to look at James, but I felt him grab my hand, and through it, I could feel that he was seeing and hearing the same thing. The voice sounded like the sweetest notes from the lyre—and like a person’s dying breath. We were all stuck, hearts pounding, breathing heavily. We began to pray the prayer that our Lord had taught us to pray. My knees hit the snow, then ----------I could feel his hand burning me like the electric words that had burned my heart. Jesus said, “Get up and do not be afraid.” It seemed that the cloud evaporated as I took in what I thought was going to be my last breath. I saw Jesus standing in front of us with his hands on our joined hands. The night was dark again, and in the moonlight I saw that a host of footprints were all around us in the snow. Jesus started back down the mountain, and we quickly followed. He turned his head and said, “Tell no one about this vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead.” The questions were popping in my mind like a rabbit darts into her hole. As the rabbit feels safety and contentment in her hole though, the questions seemed to be put to rest as soon as they entered my mind. Peter, though, asked him question after question. He needed to hear from the mouth of our teacher what I felt in my heart. We were walking with the Savior!

Sermon for Feb. 19, 2006--The World is my Parish

2006-02-19T23:29:00.000-06:00

Scripture
Matthew 28: 16-20
Isaiah 49: 1-6

This past Wednesday, after an early morning prayer breakfast, talking all day to two discussion groups, choir practice, a weather change and allergies, my voice started sputtering out until it was lost completely. Perhaps God is telling you something when you lose your voice! Silence is something that may come easy for some of you, especially those with Joseph like spirits, but for most ministers, it is something pretty tough.
If nothing else, it did spark an idea for this sermon, which is perhaps my favorite quote in all of Christian tradition, and one that applies quite well to our United Methodist heritage of mission work—St. Francis of Assisi said, “Preach the Gospel wherever you go….IF you have to, use words!” Amen brother Francis! I suppose it is a lesson that is sometimes learned the hard way!
During the past century, this saying of Francis’ could have been a motto for our mission outreach throughout the world.
Many in the Anglican church, the church to which Charles and John Wesley always remained devoted, felt threatened by John’s ministry among the common people. Shut out of preaching venues, Wesley resorted to preaching in the fields, in some cases drawing as many as 20,000 people. It is during this chapter in Wesley’s ministry when he uttered those words that are now celebrated by the church, “The world is my parish!” When Wesley was shut out of even his home church in Epworth, he preached from the top of his father’s grave, right outside the front doors of his birthplace and where his father served as a priest for 40 years.
Our theological father was relentless and creative in his passion to “make disciples.” He saw opportunities and organized a mission to meet the needs of a community which wasn’t being met by the church. It is in his legacy that we continue to grow and meet the needs as “mission outposts” of the one true church.
Our gospel lesson is the mission statement of the United Methodist Church. Christ wants us to share the good news with the world. During the sermon on the mount, earlier in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus says, “Let me tell you why you are here. You’re here to be salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors of this earth. If you lose your saltiness, how will people taste godliness? You’ve lost your usefulness and will end up in the garbage. Here’s another way to look at it: You’re here to be light, bringing out the God-colors in the world. God is not a secret to be kept. We’re going public with this, as public as a city on a hill. If I make you light-bearers, you don’t think I’m going to hide you under a bucket do you? I’m putting you on a light stand. Now that I’ve put you there on a hilltop, on a light stand—shine! Keep open house; be generous with your lives. By opening up to others, you’ll prompt people to open up with God, this generous Father in heaven.” This passage, translated by Eugene Peterson in the Message, illuminates well that the gospel we bring is salt, it is light.
So often we think mission is about going and teaching inferior natives why they are wrong and we are right about cultural customs. This is not mission—that approach leaves the taste of bitterness, not saltiness. That doesn’t pick up the “God-flavors” of the earth, it tastes like imperialism.
So many times, people quote today’s scripture and leave off the last half of verse 20—they envision “making” disciples as something similar to making my cats refrain from using the bathroom in the house. First you hold their noses down to the mess they’ve made, then you give them a good swatting. So often we forget the “God-colors” that the light of the Gospel helps us see. The “Great commission” holds hands with the “Great Promise.” “For I shall be with you until the end of the age.”
This is the Light—this is the saltiness. Without the Great promise, the Great Commission is a futile endeavor. Unless we breathe the breath of God when we spread the Good news, we are sowing seeds on the rocks.
The United Methodist Africa University is a light on a light-post. At the main campus in Zimbabwe, Africans from many countries come to attain degrees in resource management, public health, peace and governance, and much else.
The $62 million dollars contributed by United Methodists to UMCOR for hurricane relief by the end of 2005 is a salty figure if you ask me. Roland Fernandes, treasurer of General Board of Global Ministries, said “Year-end receipts from the annual conferences pushed the figure far, far beyond what we anticipated in the late fall.” When we respond to those in need, we live the statement that “The world is our parish.”
The United Methodist Community-Based Malaria Control Program, a denominational campaign to eradicate a controllable disease that kills a child every thirty seconds, formally launched at United Methodist Church maternity and Health Center, in Freetown, Sierra Leone, on December 5, 2005. I hear the Gospel being preached in wordless wonder!
The HIV/AIDS Ministries Network and Covenant to Care programs were launched in 1989 by Health and Welfare Ministries, General Board of Global Ministries, The United Methodist Church.
HIV/AIDS poses one of the most significant health risks of our time. Many United Methodists have been in the forefront of ministry with persons living with HIV and AIDS in the United States and around the world.
A Covenant to Care congregation publicly declares that people with HIV/AIDS and their loved ones are welcome in all facets of the church's life, leadership and ministry. Hospitality to all of God's children is the message of the Good News which Jesus brought and challenged the church to live. For a group of people who often feel stigmatized by society, this program truly communicates the love of a Christ who held lepers in his arms, touched them and healed them.
We have an opportunity to support many missions and ministries through our participation with various arms of the church. Inside your bulletin, you’ll find an invitation to contribute to the “Catch the Vision” offering, which funds new church starts in the Arkansas conference. Through this fund, we are reaching new people with the fresh possibilities of a life in Christ. In the beginning of the Methodist movement, John Wesley’s preaching attracted the emerging culture of manufacturing and industrial laborers, who would become the middle class which would come to dominate the Methodist church. Through the “Catch the Vision” fund, our church continues the tradition of tapping into emerging cultures in our state. Churches grow where populations grow, and our conference set the goal in 2003 to start at least 3 new churches every year for the next 10+ years. We have the goal that by 2013, there will be 3 Hispanic churches with an average attendance of 350 plus and 1 with 500 plus. This past year, the Methodist church reclaimed a property that had been sold to another denomination in Ft. Smith. Though this new church isn’t in the “growing” or “affluent” side of town, the church is growing and making disciples. These new churches are finding ways to shine the light of Christ in new communities and opportunities.

On this same line of thinking. I find it hard to say “The world is my parish” without thinking about the responsibility we have as stewards of the Earth. God blessed us with reason and skill, and made us uniquely powerful with these gifts. We can use them to bring devestation to the ecosystem that God has so lovingly created, or we can use our reason and skill to facilitate a responsible use of the Earth’s resources, one that leaves a better world for our future generations. Wesley learned to appreciate the power of preaching out doors. He realized that nature is God’s sanctuary open to all. As we are currently exisiting in the world though, we are making it difficult for human and non-human species to inhabit this world of ours. Why? Because we want to consume more, we want to have everything at our fingertips, we believe we are entitled to it. We believe we are entitled to $1.50 gallons of gasoline, and even when the companies that make record profits off of us by charging twice that, we still buy in and say “fill ‘er up,” because we don’t know any other alternative. We’ve painted ourselves into a corner in that department. In the past two weeks, Evangelical organizations have made headlines by publicizing a statement signed by some 80 leaders that Global Warming is a reality, and that humans have a responsibility to stem the tide of Climate change. The United Methodist church has been pointing to this reality for more than a decade now, but when the powerful political block of evangelicals says something, it usually gets noticed in this day and age. And thank God they’re saying it!
Wesley said “the world is my parish” in part because he was being forced outdoors to preach and do ministry. We should be saying the same thing because it is our legacy to look out these doors for opportunities for ministry. Ministry extends not only to human creation but also non-human creation. Those that say “the conversion of souls is more important than the environmental crisis” miss the point that the environmental crisis is as endangering to human souls as the “powers and principalities” that embody evil in this world. ……Back of the sanctuary……. The world is our parish. It’s through these doors. That’s where we spread the word about the great news that we’ve heard. God is with us. To the end of the age. As Isaiah lamented, sometimes it seems that we labor in vain, like the problems of this world are too huge for us to change. But God doesn’t just want us to be a servant. He tells Isaiah, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth." God doesn’t just want us to subscribe to some ideals, God wants to shine THROUGH us! If we sit around and are lazy with our faith and our witness, if we aren’t responding to Christ’s promise to be with us, we are hiding that light under a bushel! Thank God we can be inspired by our church to do as Christ calls us and to “let it shine!”

Goddard UMC Ft. Smith to host Seniors retreat

2006-02-15T08:06:00.000-06:00

Goddard UMC in Ft. Smith will be hosting Rev. Buzz Stevens from Phoenix, AZ to lead an all day workshop for Seniors. The cost for the day is $8.50, which includes lunch. Sessions begin at 9:15 and include "Honoring our single encounters," "Born to Love outsiders instantly," and "Love thy Neighbor...Once!" The day will end at 2:15 with communion in the sanctuary. Let us know by Friday, Feb. 17th if you want to attend. waldronumc@yahoo.com

Hendrix College to host Ministry Inquiry institute

2006-02-15T07:55:00.000-06:00

Do you know any high school juniors or seniors who are interested in ministry? Hendrix College , the alma mater of this minister and many others, is hosting a Summer Institute with Bible study, shadowing clergy, spiritual gift inventories, mission work, and reflection. The Lilly program at Hendrix funds many ministry related trips, workshops, and speakers, and would be a good choice for any high schooler considering college and ministry. The institute is June 5-9. Admission is free. Space is limited to 20 students, so give us an email at waldronumc@yahoo.com if you have someone in mind.

Young Christians weekend at Silver Dollar City

2006-02-15T07:46:00.000-06:00

Silver Dollar City will be hosting a special day of fun in the park march 31-April 2 in Branson. Registration before March 24 can be secured for a price of $33 for ages 12+ and $28 for ages 4-11. The park unleashes 10 new rides this season, and there will be fun in the amusement park, faith filled workshops and worship, Christian comedy, and even Grammy nominated Audio Adrenaline will be there! Find out more here. If we'd like to go, we need to begin organizing a group now!

Bishop's Day with Confirmands

2006-02-15T07:37:00.000-06:00

We have a great opportunity to let our confirmation aged youth (6th-8th grade, and any other youth who haven't been confirmed) to meet the bishop. Saturday, March 11 from 9:30 to 3pm, Bishop Charles Crutchfield will be joined by recording artist Matt Neely at St. James UMC in Little Rock to have a retreat with confirmands from all over the conference. If you are interested in attending, give us an email at waldronumc@yahoo.com There will be time with the bishop, interactive stories and song, and a gameshow based on our Wesleyan heritage.

What is confirmation? It is a process of discovery and claiming the name "Christian" for young people who are approaching the period of life when they begin to make decisions for themselves. Confirmation will begin in our church on March 5 at the Sunday small group hour of 9:45. Youth who are interested will covenant to be there for a time of discussion about the nature of our faith with the pastor and other leaders of the church.

Veritas

2006-02-14T22:28:00.000-06:00

We will be sending three youth to Veritas March 3-5 at the convention center in Ft. Smith. If you are interested to see how their experience was, ask Katy, Jarica, or Matt!

Three-Fold Grace, Feb. 12

2006-02-14T08:23:00.000-06:00

2 Peter 1: 1-9
Luke 15: 11-32

Grace—It’s probably the most important word in the language of Christianity. It is just one syllable, but it is so hard to wrap our minds around. Swirling around the idea of grace are the ideas of salvation, sin, forgiveness, atonement. Many of these words we’ve heard and think we understand, but which do not occupy the modern mind like they did the mind of Luther, Calvin, or Wesley or any of their contemporaries.
One difference in the thought of Wesley and other reformers is that the basis of many reformers’ ideas about sin and salvation is based on “objective truth.” Concern was more for the overarching idea about God’s relationship with humanity. Wesley was concerned with sin and salvation from the vantage point of subjective experience. Unless the idea of sin and salvation became effective in human life it remained abstract and useless. He constantly examined his own experience and that of others to see whether and how the Biblical teaching was realized.
Wesley was interested in loosening the idea of grace from a single experience of justification or salvation, to instead be conceptualized as a stream of experience, a whole lifetime of salvation. A path of human and divine relationship that led toward humans realizing and manifesting the image of God—what Wesley called utter sanctification, or perfection.
Our scriptures today illustrate three very important aspects of Grace. We believe that humans have fallen into a state of Sin. But we are never so far from God that he can’t reach us. This is prevenient Grace. We believe that this God grabs hold of us, either in a dramatic change of life, or in a gradual process. This is justifying grace

We believe that God molds us after the moment of justification. This is sanctifying Grace.
This parable of the prodigal son is what Charles Dickens called, “The Greatest Story Ever Told.” It is Christianity in a nutshell. IF you understand the meaning of this story, you understand the heart of Christianity.
In our story, Jesus tells of a son who misunderstands what his father has to offer. He thinks of his father as an ATM machine, and he doesn’t want to wait around for the old man to die to get what’s coming to him.
Too often we think the problem is that our desires are just too strong. The church seems to take on this dreadful task of stamping out desire. But as C. S. Lewis pointed out on the radio back in 1948, the problem isn't that our desires are too strong, rather, our desires are too weak. We are far too easily pleased. We settle for mere trifles like money, sex, glory, when God wants to give us true wealth, genuine intimacy. We were not made for the far country, however enticing it may be. We aren't pigs. We are sons and daughters, and we dare not settle for less.
First thought of returning to father while he’s wallowing around in the mud with the pigs. Prevenient grace. Wesley said that prevenient, or preventing grace is responsible for “all the drawings of the Father, the desires after God, which if we yield to them, increase more and more; all that ‘light’ wherewith the Son of God ‘enlighteneth everyone that cometh into the world’ showing every man ‘to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with his God,’ all the convictions which his Spirit from time to time works in every child of man.” Grace accomplishes much before justification and sanctification occur.
The earlier Reformers had attributed collective guilt to all human kind. In Adam’s sin the whole body of humanity sinned. Hence they emphasized universal human guilt accompanying universal depravity. The fate of an individual was not determined by personal sins, and all people deserved nothing but punishment. So in principle there was no reason to deny that infants too are guilty and deserving of eternal punishment.
Wesley drew back from this conclusion. He agreed that physical death is a punishment for the sin of Adam who was in some way the representative of all human beings. Therefore, death afflicts all people, including infants, independently of their personal sin. But spiritual or eternal death is inflicted only for actual sins. Wesley wrote, “I believe none ever did, or ever will, die eternally, merely for the sin of our first father.”
Wisdom is when we recognize the empty place inside for what it is. God calling us home. T. S. Eliot put it like this: "The end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time." It was not unheard of for sons, younger sons especially, to try to make it big in the burgeoning mercantile economy of Greco?-Roman world. But you were supposed to invest, to save. The money this boy squandered was his father's, his family's social security. By wasting his inheritance, the son in effect says to his father, "You don't matter." Common wisdom said you don't tempt your son this way, they'll only take advantage of you. This father let himself be taken advantage of. George Balanchine got it wrong in his ballet, which debuted in 1929 in Paris; the son, groveling, the father, austere. No, Jesus says the father ran. Now running is regarded as cool in our culture, but in Jesus' day men just didn't run; to run was a sure sign you had lost all dignity. But this father, who let himself be taken advantage of, cares more for the boy than for his own dignity. He could have given the boy a thrashing, required heavy penance, sackcloth, fasting, ashes. But he ran.
Return to father’s arms and coming to terms with his sin. Admitting his sin. Justifying Grace. Grace of father.
Justifying: For Wesley, it is like going before a judge, and declaring your guilt. You are in that very moment justified because of the atonement of Christ, and in that instant, you begin on the road of sanctification—a real as well as a relative change. in justification, sin remains, but does not reign
Experience of admitting my guilt. Freeing experience. Admitting means “letting in.” When we admit our sin. When we “let it in” and accept that it is our condition, we also admit God’s grace that had equalized this sin. It is being embraced by the arms of a tearful, happy father.
Sanctifying grace is participating in the feast. It is where the older brother, who resents his father’s welcoming spirit, falls flat on his face. The author of 2nd Peter tells us more of this “growing into grace” through the association of grace with the process of sanctification, or “participating in the “Divine nature.” We are told to support our faith with goodness, goodness with knowledge, knowledge with self-control, self control with endurance, endurance with godliness, godliness with mutual affection, and mutual affection with love. Peter reminds us that we keep these things by the grace of God to keep us from being ineffective and unfruitful in the knowledge of Jesus. So that we don’t forget the cleansing of past sins.
Wesley believed that sanctifying Grace began at the same moment of justifying Grace. The actual result of the new birth then seems to be that the perception of spiritual reality which had only flickered before becomes established and what is seen is truly recognized and affirmed. This establishes the love of God and neighbor as the real basis of the new life. But the unregenerate nature, with all of its perceptions and habits, is far from obliterated. It resists the newly dominant love.
The closest term in the contemporary vocabulary to what Wesley meant by sanctification is spirituality. Many Christians feel a hunger for something more than their present participation in Christian life provides them. They understand themselves to be believers, and this status is important to them. They do not feel God’s condemnation or condemn themselves. But their lives still seem fragmented, aimless, empty, without sufficient purpose, shallow. They seek some structure or discipline that can respond to their needs.
Wesley agreed that being a Christian was crucially important, but it was not enough. Justification and the new birth initiated Christian life. But the living of that life was much more than simply claiming the status of having been saved at some point in the past. The focus should be on what is happening now. And unless what is happening now is sanctification, it does not suffice. This is why I suggested that we explore together the Christian disciplines and daily practices.
Some forms of spirituality today focus on moral behavior. More are quests for inner serenity. For Wesley the separation of these two would prevent either from being Christian. His account of sanctification was shaped by both concerns. IF time, talk about the midpoint between Moravians and Lutherans.
We, too, need to find a way between claiming too much and too little of the life transforming power of grace. We need to have enticing but realistic expectation of what our lives can become. We need to understand our role in the realization of those expectations without supposing that we can bring them about by our own strength.
So, in what way can you give voice to your experience of salvation? In what way do we build upon the grace given us? If you don’t know how to speak about it, how do you think you can share the good news of it? How, in your own language, do you convey those words that John Newton, a scoundrel and slave dealer, shared with the world upon his conversion. “I once was lost, but now am found—was blind but now I see.”
One thing that used to be a distinctive element of Methodism was the testimony. This was a time when people stood up in front of their brothers and sisters in Christ and shared with them their experience along the road of salvation. Wesley didn’t believe that salvation was one lone event, but instead a whole lifetime of journeying with God. I challenge you to think about your experience of salvation.
Somewhere along the line of Christian history, common thinking of salvation evolved into a focus on the next life. We have seen that the belief that what happens beyond death is supremely important has led at times to people doing for the sake of otherworldly salvation, things that were harmful to people here and now. Wesley did not understand salvation to be something otherworldly. Wesley wrote that salvation “was not a blessing which lies on the other side of death, or (as we usually speak) in the other world. It is a present thing, a blessing which, through the free mercy of God, ye are now in possession of.
Grace is unfolding and it is enfolding. It is a journey and it is a sudden experience. Grace is God’s gift and our responsibility. I say responsibility because Grace demands a response from us. The response is repentance, it is turning around, it is journeying on and accepting our gifts.

Sacrament Sermon Feb. 5

2006-02-04T21:23:00.000-06:00

Romans 12: 1-2
Luke 24: 13-35

Over the past half century, there has been a movement within the United Methodist church to re-invest our attention to the sacraments of the church. If you look at the hymnal published in 1964, you can see physical evidence of this ongoing movement. As you can see, the services of Baptism and Communion in this book are located here, in the back of the hymnal. In the most recently published hymnal, the services of Baptism and Communion are found here, in the front of the hymnal.
Over the past 10 years, church wide studies first on our understanding of baptism, and then 8 years later on Communion were presented and enthusiastically accepted at our General Conference. In fact, at the 2004 General Conference, after the comprehensive statement on the theology and practice of Communion was presented and adopted, the conference stood and applauded the action. The delegates recognized and celebrated that God’s Spirit had used their action to address a deep hunger among UM”s for more meaningful understanding and experience of the Eucharist.
Baptism and communion have been celebrated since the birth of Christianity. In fact, we count these as our two sacraments because they were instituted by Christ himself. Within these practices, Christians throughout the century have received the presence of the Holy Spirit in unique ways that cannot be quite understood with the mind alone. You might picture the sacraments as prisms that refract the light of God’s grace and love into colors that we can plainly and visibly see.
What we call the “sacraments” were first called “mysterion” in the Greek language of the early church. “Mysterion” communicates in Greek a Holy Mystery, aspects of creation that communicate to us very deeply God’s love and acceptance of us. In Latin, the word was translated to “sacramentus,” originally meaning “a signed and sealed pledge.” This Latin word was probably chosen because of the understanding that the sacraments were God’s “important message” to humanity. Eventually, the word came to mean “a consecrated thing or act,” or “something holy.”
John Wesley was profoundly inspired by his understanding of the sacraments. Wesley adopted the traditional Catholic and Anglican understanding of the sacraments as “An outward, visible sign that conveys an inward, spiritual grace.” The sacraments were so important to Wesley because he knew them as “channels,” or streams of Grace. Today, this is still a beneficial way of approaching the sacraments. Combining words, actions, and physical elements, sacraments are sign-acts which both express and convey God’s grace and love.
United Methodists believe that these sign-acts are special means of grace. The ritual action of a sacrament does not merely point to God’s presence in the world, but also participates in it and becomes a vehicle for conveying that reality. God’s presence in the sacraments is real, but it must be accepted by human faith if it is to transform human lives. The sacraments do not convey grace either magically or irrevocably, but they are powerful channels through which god has chosen to make grace available to us.
Wesley identified baptism as the initiatory sacrament by which we enter into covenant with God and are admitted as members of Christ’s church. This sacrament is to be administered only once in a lifetime, and we do not discriminate between baptism in the Methodist church and any other Christian church. He understood the Lord’s supper as nourishing and empowering the lives of Christians and strongly advocated frequent participation in it.
Neither Baptism nor communion is necessary, or sufficient for salvation. The sacraments are expressions of God’s grace, but God is not limited to the sacraments alone to persuade us into His love. United Methodism shares with most Protestant denominations that the proclaimed word is also sacramental in nature. A convicting word may lead us to an experience and acceptance of grace as much as the sacraments of baptism and communion.
You could say the Methodist church was born because of the sacraments, and the unavailability of ordained priests in the American colonies who could provide the sacraments to a spiritually hungry people. Throughout the mid 1700’s, Wesley was insistent that the Methodists remain a revival movement within the church of England. However, by the 1780’s, it was obvious that the American Methodists were hesitant to partake of the sacrament in the American Anglican churches, and there weren’t enough Methodist clergy to provide the sacrament (in fact, all of the Methodist missionaries to America were layman.) So, out of desperation, Wesley ordained new clergy who would in turn ordain other American clergy so that the sacraments could be celebrated among the quickly growing Methodist movement. The newly ordained clergy in America formed the Methodist church as a separate entity from the Church of England, and such was the birth of the church you sit in today.
The Evangelical revival of early Methodism was fueled by the Wesleyan heritage that the sacraments are open to all who seek them, regardless of where they are on the path of salvation. All who respond in faith to the invitation are to be welcomed. Holy Baptism normally precedes partaking of Holy Communion. Holy communion is a meal of the community who are in covenant relationship with God through Christ.
Beginning early in its history, the Xian church divided its worship services into the Liturgy of the Word, in which all participated, and the Liturgy of the Faithful, which was the celebration of the Holy Communion. Those who were not yet baptized were dismissed before the celebration of the sacrament.
John Wesley stressed that baptism is only a step in the salvation process and must be followed by justifying faith and personal commitment to Christ when one reaches an age of accountability. He referred to Holy communion as a “converting ordinance.” For this reason, we celebrate an “open table” because we believe it is Christ’s table. As we read in the Gospels, Christ invited all to have fellowship with him—so who are we to draw a line around His table and say only some can participate? For me, the open table is one of the chief reasons I have chosen to celebrate Christianity through the expression of United Methodism.
It is deeply moving to offer the sacrament. It is why I am called to the order of Elder. I believe the sacraments empower us to be alive. I believe they help us see the holy in the everyday things.
In our Gospel story, Jesus was “unveiled” in the breaking of the bread. The sacraments reveal Christ’s real presence in our midst. By discerning the sacred in the mundane—in things as simple as bread and the juice of the grape and water, we “conform not to the standards of this world,” where things are given quality by their material composition.
The sacraments give us a glimpse of what is good and acceptable and perfect. They are channels of God’s grace because they transform us by the renewing of our minds. Every time we share in a sacrament together, we’re renewing our minds to look at God’s creation with awe and reverence, with a sense of tremendous mystery. This is why the early church called our shared meal and pouring water over our heads “mysterion.”
Every time the McGaughs bring the loaf and the cup down the aisle and put it on this table, it becomes an offering. In the shared experience of this simple loaf and juice, it becomes for us the real presence of Christ. Likewise, when I come to fill up the baptismal font with warm water, I pray that the water that I put over the person’s head might be an opening in that person’s life of a new life in the Body of Christ. One reason I so love bringing the newly baptized member of our family and showing him off to you is because I believe we are witnessing the true nature of our relationship with one another as Christians.
I am so happy that last week we welcomed Cameron into the life of faith through the sacrament of Baptism. As a brother in Christ, he is on the road with us toward the fruition of the Kingdom in our midst. We are together on the road home. Along the way, God offers us nourishment and strength through the sacrament of Communion, which we celebrate today. The table is open to all who desire it. It is offered freely and enthusiastically by a God who wants you to “taste and see that the Lord is good.” Thanks be to God that we are refreshed and emboldened in this journey of faith. Thank be to God that it is a meal we share together. Amen.

Holiness Sermon in Series "What it Means to Be a Methodist" Jan 29 sermon

2006-01-28T17:55:00.000-06:00

Scripture
Micah 6: 6-8
Matthew 6: 1-15

It is very clear that the idea of holiness was the main concern of two young men at Oxford two and a half centuries ago named John and Charles Wesley. The two named their student religious club “The Holy Club,” and their meticulous attention to applying a holy regiment to their lives earned this club the nickname “the Methodists” among those who derided their efforts.
In John Wesley’s “Notes,” Wesley writes in a question/answer format: “What was the rise of Methodism, so called? In 1729, two young men, reading the Bible, saw they could not be saved without holiness, followed after it, and incited others so to do. In 1737 they saw holiness comes by faith. They saw likewise, that men are justified before they are sanctified; but still holiness was their point. God then thrust them out, utterly against their will, to raise a holy people.” The mission statement of the early movement of Methodists was clearly dedicated to holiness as the guiding principle. Wesley asked himself the question, “What may we reasonably believe to be God’s design in raising up the Preachers called Methodists? Not to form any new sect: but to reform the nation, particularly the church; and to spread scriptural holiness over the land.
What exactly is this idea of holiness? Christian perfection, according to Wesley, is “purity of intention, dedicating all the life to God” and “the mind which was in Christ, enabling us to walk as Christ walked.” It is “loving God with all our heart, and our neighbor as ourselves” (A Plain Account of Christian Perfection, 109). It is “a restoration not only to the favour, but likewise to the image of God,” our “being filled with the fullness of God” (The End of Christ’s Coming, 482).
Wesley was clear that Christian perfection did not imply perfection of bodily health or an infallibility of judgment. It also does not mean we no longer violate the will of God, for involuntary transgressions remain. Perfected Christians remain subject to temptation, and have continued need to pray for forgiveness and holiness. It is not an absolute perfection but a perfection in love. Furthermore, Wesley did not teach a salvation by perfection, but rather says that, “Even perfect holiness is acceptable to God only through Jesus Christ.” (A Plain Account of Christian Perfection)
Holiness, or Perfectionism, was a guiding principle of the Methodist movement for Wesley. It was also one of the most contentious of issues throughout the history of our denomination.
Some in the movement stressed holiness as a personal moral code, while others translated holiness into social activism. Many remained true to Welsey’s notion that personal holiness fed social holiness.
The Book of Discipline states, “we proclaim no personal gospel that fails to express itself in relevant social concerns; we proclaim no social gospel that does not include the personal transformation of sinners” (49). The social witness that is the goal of the church begins in the hearts and lives of its believers.
Amidst the tumultuous times of the American 19th centuy, certain elements of the Methodist movement felt that the church wasn’t lifting up the great heritage of personal holiness. During the last half of the 19th century, groups within the church began challenging the church as a whole to become reinvested in “personal holiness” by reclaiming the class meetings and love feasts that had been a hallmark of our denominational expression. In the 1870’s a group called the National Camp Meeting Association for the Promotion of Holiness sought to bring the church back to the glory days of the early 1800’s, when the Methodist movement spread like wildfire throughout the wilderness of the Appalacias in a series of Camp meetings. IN the 1890’s The Nazarene church split off from the main line of Methodism as well because some felt that personal holiness was no longer being accentuated.
There is no contesting the fact that by the late 19th century, the Methodist Episcopal church had indeed lost many of the traditions that had characterized the movement in its earlier days, such as testimony, shared feeling, and spontaneous evangelism, and practices such as the class meeting and love feasts and camp meetings. However to identify these practices as the only vehicles of “Holiness” is to misinterpret Wesley’s full understanding of holiness. The church did indeed evolve. The class meeting became Sunday School, church policy and mission built on testimony and shared feeling was transformed into church policy and mission coming out of specialized, rationally deliberated and centrally coordinated committee meetings.
To say that these structures eliminated the persuasion of the Holy Spirit though is to believe the Holy Spirit is fairly weak and incapable. The emphasis in the Main line church at the time of the Holiness “exodus” and Pentecostal movement was indeed on transforming society, but it was still holiness. It was Social holiness—attention to women’s suffrage, dietary reform, medical attention in the ghettos and in poor countries, mission work, abolition of slavery.
What does it mean for us today?
As someone who is consecrated by the Bishop to serve as a leader and an example to this community, I understand holiness to be to make myself a “clean window” for God’s light to shine through my life. Wesley believed, and I believe, that personal holiness is the foundation of social holiness.
As we “grow in grace” and come closer to the redemptive heart of Christ, the Spirit will flow out of our hearts, as Christ proclaims in John 7: 37-38: “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me, and let the one who believes in me drink. As the scripture has said, ‘Out of the believer’s heart shall flow rivers of living water.’” Personal holiness is living with the thirst for Christ. When we drink from the spring of life, when we live holiness, our hearts become channels of that great peace and joy. That personal decision to accept the grace that aligns our lives with life of Christ makes us one more step toward a “complete holiness” of individuals and society.
The scriptures that we read today also give us a key to holiness. Oftentimes our temptation is to “show off” our holiness.
It’s this attitude that has caused modern minds to think negatively when they hear the word “pious.”
The prophet Micah reminds us that what the Lord truly requires of us is not the fanfare and the show, but instead God wants us to be excellent in the quiet things that truly show our love for the God of love: to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with God. This is what it means to be an open window for God’s light.
Matthew also tells of Jesus warning his followers about the “dangers of holiness. It is our temptation to seek recognition for the lives we lead. Jesus tells us plainly, “Beware of practicing your piety in front of others in order to be seen by them, for then you will receive no reward from your father in heaven.” The pitfall of holiness is that we believe it is OUR determination to lead a life of piety and purity that DESERVES to be noticed.
This is why I prefer the window illustration. A window works best when it is completely clean and free of blemish or obstruction. Seeking a life of holiness is akin to keeping our “window clean.” What do we notice about a clean window? Well, if the window is truly clean, it might not even be noticed at all! A clean window is transparent—it draws no attention to itself, but instead to what is outside it! A clean and holy life truly draws attention not to ourselves, but to what shines through us!
At the end of the passage we read in Matthew, Jesus helps us reign in our egos and desire for attention by laying out a simple prayer. At the end of the prayer, he shares the secret of salvation. Most of us, when asked what it takes to be saved would probably lay out a set of beliefs. If you subscribe to this idea, then you’re saved—that’s the way many of us approach a life of faith.
However, according to Matthew, Jesus has another idea of what is the key to salvation. Once again, he lays it out very plainly—“For if you forgive others their trespasses, your Father will forgive you. But if you don’t forgive others, your father will not forgive you.” There it is—the most holy thing we can possibly do. Somewhere along the line, it was contorted simply into living a life of abstincence. Don’t drink, don’t smoke, and don’t dance: that’s holiness. How can we forget when it is right there in the print as plain as day—If you want to live a life of holiness, you must forgive! Forgiveness is that light that shines down from heaven. That is the main point that Jesus was trying to communicate to us—we are a forgiven people. If we block up the window and pull the drapes on God’s forgiveness by not allowing that beautiful light to shine through our lives, then we are in the darkness too!
If you’re seeking to live a holier life—start by asking yourself, “From whom am I withholding forgiveness?” If you have forgiven another person, but are not receiving reconciliation in return, know that God’s light of forgiveness is bursting at the seams to come back to you. Forgiveness is not ours, this is why it is a key to salvation. Forgiveness belongs only to God, and God wishes to share it through us with the world.
This is true holiness. Life is not a stage, and holiness is not a show. We don’t do things to be noticed. Holiness isn’t amping up our worship services so they look and sound more “spiritual.” Holiness is simply living forgiveness in every aspect of life. It’s keeping the window clean so that God’s light can shine through. What a gift it is to have the potential to represent God’s goodness in the world! May we all pray to “let love and integrity envelop me until my love is perfected and the last vestige of my desiring is no longer in conflict with thy Spirit. Lord, We want to be more holy in our hearts!” Amen

Jan 22 Sermon, "What it Means to be a Methodist" Series: What Draws us Together--Connectionalism

2006-01-25T09:09:00.000-06:00

Scripture:
Ephesians 4: 1-16
John 17: 20-26

“Hey, that’s not Waldron United Methodist Church!?”
Looks like a very big church—perhaps a city church. Definitely not us!
I can tell you many things about this church—youth have gone out to sleep on the street and were interviewed by the local news to raise awareness about the homelessness in their part of town. The choir is great—they have a pianist who really gets into the music and kind of bobs her head up and down.
The pastor is a dynamic woman who speaks with great joy and passion about the love of God, and yet has the heartache of living with a husband who has Alzheimer’s at a fairly young age. They have a vibrant Steven’s ministry, where members are trained to be grief counselors with other members in confidential, life giving settings. This, friends is your presence as a United Methodist on Wilshire Boulevard in Westwood—the neighborhood around UCLA where Lara and I used to attend before we came to know the Methodists here in this neck of the woods.
You have a real and living connection with Westwood UMC—and it is not just through Lara, who transferred her membership from this church to Waldron. It is through a system that connects our local churches together to minister to the world in ways which might be impossible by ourselves. It was the faith and genius of John Wesley, thefounder of Methodism, to adopt such a structure forhis renewal movement in eighteenth century England - aconnectional system. For Wesley, that meantindividual Christians involved in a small fellowshipgroup, designed for faith-sharing and holding oneanother accountable to a life of discipleship. Those small groups were joined into congregations,which were joined into the larger connection of thewhole of the Methodist movement.

Even closer to our church in connection is the body of United Methodists within the “connection” of the Arkansas Conference. This church is literally a “charge” of the Methodist connection in this community. You may have noticed that I never took vows of membership within this particular church, because my membership is with the whole “connection” of United Methodism within the Arkansas Conference. Of course, we do great ministry right here, throughWaldron United Methodist Church. But we do even greater things through our worldwideconnection. This is who we are and what we supportthrough our generous apportionment and mission giving.
Through our apportionment, that sum of money that our church sends to the conference and district and combined with the money collected by every other charge, we are able to provide for ministries in needed areas which are decided on by representatives of each charge at the “Annual Conference.” The apportionment is the “lifeblood” of the connectional system. It grounds the churches in the reality of their connection to the rest of the churches in the conference.
Our Book of Discipline, which is basically the constitution of the church, states that “Connectionalism in the UM tradition is multi-leveled, global in scope, and local in thrust. Our connectionalism is not merely a linking of one charge conference to another. It is rather a vital web of interactive relationships.
All this is not for its own sake. As the retired Bishop Kenneth Carder of Mississippi once said, “Polity is Ecclesiology”, or in simpler terms, the way we structure the church gives us insight on what we believe the church represents in the world. The connectional ideal is grounded in the very scriptures that we read today. We hear that Jesus wishes us to be “One, as the Father and I are one.” We also are familiar with Paul’s referral to the church as a body, and that as he says in Ephesians, “We are members, one of another.”
Paul speaks about the unified ideal of the church, and it is obvious that through a healthy and vibrant connection, we are more capable of reaching the goals of this earthly representation of the Body of Christ, in which we aspire to “grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love.”
In my own experience, the connectional church has indeed promoted the body’s growth in building itself up in love.” Several of you are involved in a “Committee on Care” with 2 pastors from this district. This group’s sole purpose is to foster my spiritual growth as the pastor of this church. This is part of the three year ordination process that I am currently involved in that is administered by the Arkansas conference to assure the people of its churches that it is served by a competent clergy. It has been very helpful for me to have these mentors to talk with about my struggles, joys, and new insights as I am called to be the best pastor I can be. This kind of process would not be in place if we didn’t belong to a connectional church, where the pastors of UM churches in Alma and Greenwood care very deeply and pray for my blooming ministry right here in Waldron.
Perhaps one of the most visible and impacting aspects of the “connectional church” is the iteneracy. Though it may sometimes be a reason you lament being a United Methodist, you are served by an “itinerant” clergy. One who comes anD lives and serves this community along side you, but who remains a person “assigned” to this charge, and at the discretion of the Bishop and his cabinet may be reassigned to another “charge” within the Conference.
This method of organizing church leads to a very real sense of connection between the Methodist churches in one area because they are all served by the same clergy, and because they all contribute to one purpose—making disciples for Jesus Christ.
In 1 Corinthians 3, Paul speaks of this same structure within the church. He writes
Using the gift God gave me as a good architect, I designed blueprints; Apollos is putting up the walls. Let each carpenter who comes on the job take care to build on the foundation!
11 Remember, there is only one foundation, the one already laid: Jesus Christ. 12 Take particular care in picking out your building materials. 13 Eventually there is going to be an inspection. If you use cheap or inferior materials, you'll be found out. The inspection will be thorough and rigorous. You won't get by with a thing. 14 If your work passes inspection, fine; 15 if it doesn't, your part of the building will be torn out and started over. But you won't be torn out; you'll survive - but just barely.
16 You realize, don't you, that you are the temple of God, and God himself is present in you? 17 No one will get by with vandalizing God's temple, you can be sure of that. God's temple is sacred - and you, remember, are the
When I was first appointed to this church, I had a dream of being a kind of “traveling architect” who came upon a group of people building a house. In my dream, you—the church were the people working on the house, and the house was something very special, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on what it was meant to be. The house was a unique kind of place, windows sticking out here and there, winding staircases and turrets, a large, welcoming front door, and a couple back doors. As I came up to the house and made my suggestions for other additions to the house, you scratched your head and surveyed the plans, you shared your tools with me and we began building. It became clear to me that you, the church, had been welcoming other “traveling architects” like me for quite some time, which was why this place was so unique. After reading this passage from Corinthians the other day, it struck me that the building that we are working on is literally God’s Temple—Not a physical structure, but the wonderful temple which is YOU according to Paul’s letter to the Corinthians.
With an itinerant clergy, you may sometimes feel like a watering hole for clergy to pass through and offer their “two cents.” But if we pay attention to Paul’s metaphor, we see that we are indeed building a very unique and beautiful house—one that God can live in. One that has welcoming doors and lots of windows and even a couple back doors. We should pay attention to the building materials that we use, because we want this house to stand the test of time—and it will endure some trials. However, with our connection, with the input of all those traveling architects, the Spirit will lead us to build on solid foundations. One thing I really love are the great cathedrals of Europe . Some of us have been privalidged to havestood under their great lofty domes and felt ourspirits soar to the heights. Imagine if you will, thework of the first builders, learning how to keep thosedomes aloft. It was trial and error.

Did you knowthat the great dome of the Hagia Sofia in Constantinople collapsed twice before the builderslearned how to do it right? But the cathedralbuilders gradually learned about arches and flyingbuttresses. They learned that the more structuralconnections you make, the stronger the building, themore structural connections, the larger and moreexpansive the dome. Just as for our greatest cathedrals, the same is truefor the living body of the church as well. The morestructural connections there are, the stronger themission. The more connections there are, the largerand more expansive the witness.

What Does it Mean to Be a United Methodist--Sermon 1: What sets us apart. Sermon in Preperation for Covenant renewal service

2006-01-16T15:51:00.000-06:00

Scripture:
Jeremiah 31:31-34
John 15: 1-8

What does it mean to be a United Methodist? I assume many of you would answer a friend who asked you that question with a set of beliefs that you feel are unique to United Methodism, perhaps some of you would answer that question with a description of how we Methodists practice our religion. Still others may answer according to what our church stands for in society. Well—perhaps. More likely, I would venture, might be an answer having to do with your family’s history in this particular church, or in Methodism in general. To you, being a Methodist might just be what it means to be a Millard, or a Goodner, or a Huie. Others of you may have found this church as a good “meeting ground:” A halfway point between Roman Catholicism and the Baptist church for example. Or, a denomination not too terribly far from Lutheranism. Over the next six weeks in this service, we will be looking at some answers to the question, “What does it mean to be a United Methodist?”, but I want to start by affirming some of these definitions first. If your family has been United Methodist since Francis Asbury rode into town, that is very much a part of what it means to be a United Methodist for you. If you’ve found common ground with your spouse in the United Methodist Church, that has a lot to do with “what it means to be a Methodist.” If you’re simply here because you’re drawn to the fellowship of this place or have been in the past—that is indeed what it means to be a Methodist.
What I’m going to share with you are certain themes or ideas that have been birthed in the Methodist movement that have uniquely shaped this denomination of almost 12 million people. We are a large denomination, and a highly democratic denomination—and because of this unique heritage and polity, there are United Methodists who think differently about different issues. The aspects of the church I am going to share with you through this six week series though are foundational aspects of our denominational heritage, and they make us distinct, and we should know them and celebrate them. They are fairly clearly captured in our hymnal’s table of contents, and Reba Nell and I had a great time picking out the hymns for this series.
Next week: What Draws us Together: Connectionalism—Nature of Church, United in Christ
3 or 4 Fold Grace: Power of the Holy Spirit: Prevenient, Justifying, Sanctifying and Perfecting Grace
Sacraments: Whole Section on Sacraments and Rites of Church
Holiness: Sanctifying Grace—Personal and Social Holiness
The World is My Parish: Nature of Church, Called to God’s Mission
.But, even though they make up our church’s DNA, it is possible that you might not know how to articulate them. If that is the case, you’re not alone.
What prompted me to give this sermon series was an article in the Christian Century.
Most Teens learn beliefs from parents! But most parents don’t feel competent in transferring beliefs
Religious traditions understand themselves as presenting a truth reavealed by a holy and almighty God who calls human beings from a self-centered focus to a life of serving God and neighbor….but most teens and probably most parents too think religion is to help them make good life choices and be happy.
Moralistic Theraputic Deism
Why we don’t affirm Moralistic Theraputic Deism
We have a much richer, more theologically deep religion, and the distintinctive elements of it are the unique parts of the revelation—we could come up with “be happy and feel good about oneself” without a revelation from God.
The Jeremiah scripture that we read this morning leads us into the covenant experience, and it also grounds one particular aspect of Wesleyan theology that is fairly unique to the Methodist movment. This idea is called “Imparted Righteousness.” Whereas Imputed Righteousness is the righteousness of Jesus credited to the Christian, enabling the Christian to be justified; imparted righteousness is what God does in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit after justification, working in the Christian to enable and empower the process of sanctification. Don’t worry, if you’re not quite sure about all those words, we’re going to talk about them in coming weeks. It is probably easier for now for you to think about it this way. In our expression of Christianity, we believe there is a moment of being “saved,” but we believe the process of salvation involves a continual outpouring of grace propelling us toward a higher plane of living and loving.
A covenant is an expression of living into a higher expression of trust and commitment. This is an expression of imparted righteousness. As I mentioned with the children, at first glance a covenant looks a lot like a contract because it is an agreement. One way of looking at it would be turning over our own will freely to the will of God. Certainly, later in the covenant service, you will all say the words, “I renounce my own will, and take your will as my law.” However, I believe a better way of thinking about it would be making a formal commitment in the presence of God and our community to consistently strive for the Vision and Goals we find expressed by God in the Scriptures.
At the end of the covenant service, we will also all say together, “O mighty God, you have now become my Covenant Friend, and I, through your infinite grace, have become your covenant servant.”
As Jesus proclaims in the Gospel reading we read today, by acknowledging our connection to the life giving vine—which is Christ himself, we will bear much fruit. A covenant is this kind of connection, and fruit bearing is the activity of a Christian who is “plugged in” to the radically life changing grace and love that we find in the person of Jesus Christ. Christ causes us to live outside ourselves. Christ calls us to sacrifice for others, to confess our sins and to turn around on a new course. Christ calls us to live according to a new law—the law of Love. Seperated from this Vine, we shrivel up in the dry depravity of self-centeredness. We whither in the wasteland of want. Covenant making is public declaration—it calls our attention to our own connectedness. We serve God both individually and together as one body. We are fed spiritual food individually and as one body. We bear fruit individually and as one body. We make a covenant both individually and as one body. Making a covenant is an audible, visual, experiential reminder that we are indeed connected to the vine, and therefore SHOULD bear fruit. As Wesley wrote, “I do here willingly put my neck under your yoke, to carry your burden. All your laws are holy, just, and good. I therefore take them as the rule for my words, thoughts, and actions, prominsing that I will strive to order my whole life according to your direction, and not allow myself to neglect anything I know to be my duty.” Keep in mind that Jesus says that his yoke is easy, and his burden is light. This is because God propels us forward with the Holy Spirit to advance the Kingdom of God. We aren’t on our own—through covenant, God vows to be on our side. And unlike us, God never abandons this Holy covenant. Thanks be to God!

Baptism of the Lord Sunday (Jan 8) Sermon

2006-01-14T18:43:00.000-06:00

My tool box……….—haven’t done much creating---don’t have a tool shed or a workshop like some of yall. I’ve looked with great admiration on some of our member’s workshops. I’ve seen workshops that Santa Claus himself would feel very at home in. Growing up in the church, I gained a lot of “surrogate grandparents.” One of my surrogate grandfathers—Walter Losey, used to show me around his workshop. This family had a 3 car garage, and the 3rd part he’d walled off and turned into a little shop. He was a woodworker, and I’d watch with wonder as he’d make beautiful details in what before was simply a board of wood.
I’ve been impressed with Jack Wengert’s workshop where he graciously hosted church members who put together the Christmas parade float. Jack’s tool shop is deluxe!!! Plenty of space, a woodstove, and scores of Pringles cans holding every kind of screw or bolt or whatever it takes to hold something together.
Creative Power of Tools----
God’s Word—Christ—the creative word of God, holds us together too. Tighter than any screw or glue. God claims us through grace. The ritual of Baptism celebrates this fact—God’s claim on our life.
In the beginning, God’s workshop was the inky blackness and primordial storm of Chaos. In the beginning, God’s only tools were Wind and Word. Have you ever had trouble understanding the importance of the Trinity? I have heard several people in this congregation ask, “What is the Trinity, anyway?” Well—this is one way to envision the Trinity. It is all there in the first few sentences of the Bible. God is the “One who speaks.” Present in the act of speaking are Breath and Word. This falls into line with the classical doctrines of the Trinity, which say that the Son, or Word and Spirit, or Breath “emenate from the Father, or the One who Speaks.” For me, this way of thinking about the Trinity is a very powerful image, and it is helpful to see how each aspect of the Trinity is involved in the Creation. The Trinity is pre-existent of Creation, and as the Book of John says, “All things come into being through the Word.”
Into the Light, into the Waters, into the mud, into the sky God breathes the Breath of Life and articulates the Creative Word to give each thing form and function. Psalm 104 proclaims that God gives Life Breath to all Creation. In Genesis 1, The Breath of God is pictured in this passage as “hovering over the waters.” The word used for “hovering” is the same word used later in Deuteronomy 32: 10-11 when an eagle is pictured “hovering” over its young. The word “hovering” is meant to evoke feelings of nurture. God looked with satisfaction on each detail of creation and exclaimed—It is good!
We believe in a God who has created the heavens and the earth—all the universe—with something as subtle and intimate as God’s own voice. God divides light and darkness by breathing the word “Light” into the chaos. As the Psalm we read today proclaims, “The voice of the Lord is powerful, the voice of the Lord is full of majesty.”
God speaks us into being as well—into what scripture tells us is God’s last thoughts of Creation, God makes humans in his own reflection, so that we may express in Creation God’s unparalleled beauty and compassion.
We know that this is our purpose because God’s Creative Word—the Logos—lived among us in the flesh and now lives among us in the Spirit, and this is how Christ lived—with beauty and compassion. Because we had lost our meaning, because we had in a sense forgotten how to pronounce the Logos through which we have all come into being, God spoke the pure, unblemished Word into our human story once again—so we could see who we really are: children of God.
At Jesus’ baptism, Mark tells us that the sky is torn open, and the Holy Spirit descends like a dove on Jesus. Then God once again speaks Life giving, creative words—“You are my Son, the Beloved, with you I am well pleased.” The words were Creative because Mark tells us Jesus is “immediately driven by the Spirit into the wilderness.” The words are creative because the word “Beloved” in God’s proclamation refers to an act of will instead of a “feeling.” It is also translated as “the chosen.” God creates a new possibility in the life of Jesus through this experience, and Jesus is open to it because he is infused with the Holy Spirit.
These words of Creation open the eyes of Jesus the man, the dusty carpenter from Nazareth. “What good could come out of Nazareth?” was the question on many people’s minds when they would meet this man and contemplate his identity. For Jesus of Nazareth, the Words that poured out of the sky like the water poured over his head were the sparks that started the fire of his ministry.
The ritual Words of acceptance and induction at our Baptisms communicate this creative power in a special way. The Beautiful Words, Wonderful Words, wonderful words of Life mold us as a new creation. They strip us of the veil of abandonment and fill us with the assurance of adoption. This is why at a baptism, I ask the parents to tell me “what name is given this child?, though I may full well know what the child’s name actually is. It is not a chance for me to make sure I have everything straight so that I don’t embarrass anyone—this question is asked so that the child or person who is baptized is “named” ritually. AS they are “named,” they are also claimed—by the family of faith that is this very congregation. You might notice at our next baptism later this month that I don’t use the child’s last name or family name in the ritual of Baptism—that is because in a ritualistic sense, through baptism, we claim the child as our brother or sister, and in a sense their family name is “Christian,” or “child of God.”
Henri Nouwen said, “The one who created us is waiting for our response to the love that gave us our being.”
What is our response? We reflect that creative word that gave us being by telling the story that saves lives. “We’ve a Story to tell the Nations, that shall turn their hearts to the right, a story of truth and mercy, a story of peace and light.” Our response to being graciously Spoken into being and claimed by the family of Christ is to be “Co-Creators with God.” God creates new possibilities in each moment for redemption, peace, understanding, reconciliation. As co-creators, our task as followers of the Risen Christ is to help those possibilities become realities.
Telling the story of Christ is sharing those gifts with a hurting world. Though the consumer making, conflict breathing, caste perpetuating, illness spewing world utters Words of destruction, domination, and division, the Life Giving, Ego shattering, Bondage Breaking Word of God speaks unity, empathy, and liberty. We worship and celebrate the God of Creation—but the world around us would have us instead worship the opposite: Destruction! There are times when it seems that the powers of destruction have the upper hand. Doesn’t it sometimes seem like the world around us is filled with nothing more than heartache and war and hatred and ignorance?
But we know that God will quite literally have the “Last Word.” Yes! The Creative Word that was with God at the Beginning and through which all things came into being will also be there at the End. In Revelation 21, Christ says “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the Spring of the Water of Life.” We believe that the Logos through whom we are made is at judgment at the End of all time—and we are once again made into new Creations through this Judgment. We may get caught up in the idea that the aspects of our lives are being judged at the end of time—but what this scripture says is that “to the thirsty I will give water as a gift from the spring of the water of life.” Let me ask you today church—are you Thirsty? Are you thirsty for the life giving spring? Are you thirsty for the Holy Breath of God to be breathed into your being and Create you anew? Let me warn you—quenching the Thirst for the Holy Spirit may lead to a thirst for justice and peace and compassion. The Life Giving Breath and Word of God may send us running into the wilderness to face the demons and Wild animals of our lives! Quenching the thrist for the Holy Spirit may mean taking up our cross and following Christ! The Powers and Principalities that love destruction and division and death have a firm grip on our perception of reality. Remember, Jesus really did die on a cross. There really is a “dark night of the soul.” Faith in the Living, Loving, Life Giving Word of God means that we are ready to stand up to the cold, dark, chaotic realities of destruction, division, and death with nothing more than a candle of hope. Victory may not be apparent if we give up the foolish hope in the resurrection.
We must carefully listen to the Life giving, Creative, word of God that has been ringing in humanity’s ears since the beginning of time. God molded the Good Creation out of the formless, lifeless Earth and the chaotic, dark waters, and sometimes it seems like the world is spiraling back towards its primordial origins. But if we listen closely, if we search deeply, who we are is apparent. God makes Creation and declares “It is good.” Because we forget and we corrupt and we ignore, God sends the Word directly to us—You are good! He says. You are beautiful and God loves you no matter what the world thinks of you, he says. Turn around and face the light of your Creator, Christ says.
Do you hear your Creator Speaking? God is still speaking and creating and Loving and Proclaiming “It is Good!” All we have to do is take our fingers out of our ears and accept it! God’s Creative Word is challenging us to live the lives we were created to enjoy. Listen closely, the Word is here among us! What is it saying to you?

Divorce Adjustment Workshop in Ft. Smith

2006-01-09T17:11:00.000-06:00

Do you know someone who would benefit from this workshop? Invite them or let the pastor know so he can recommend it to them.

First United Methodist Church, Fort Smith, is offering a Divorce Adjustment Workshop the weekend of January 20-22, 2006 at the church. The workshop is free of charge to anyone in the area who is suffering from the pain of divorce. The curriculum is based upon the book, Rebuilding, When Your Relationship Ends, by Drs. Bruce Fisher and Robert Alberti. Opportunities for small group interaction and informative speakers are also included in the weekend activities. In addition, participants receive a free copy of the text, a manual filled with helpful information, a special concluding ceremony and three meals highlighted by a special candlelight dinner on Sunday evening.

Pre-registration is requested to adequately plan for the event. Those interested may register online at the church website, http://www.fsfumc.org/, or by calling the church office at (479) 782-5068. Please contact Rev. J. J. Galloway for additional information or questions.

Journey to United Methodism

2006-01-05T16:13:00.000-06:00

During the months of January and February, members and guests at Waldron United Methodist Church will delve into the distinctive aspects of United Methodism in a thematic sermon series and two weekly discussion groups.
The series will begin on January 15 with the traditional New Year's Wesleyan Covenant Renewal Service found on pages 288-294 of the Book of Worship. The sermon for this date will be "What Sets Us Apart."
To celebrate the Ecumenical "Week of Prayer for Christian Unity," the next sermon in the series on Jan 22 will be "What Draws us Together--Connectionalism." Other sermon themes will be "Holiness," "Sacrament," "Three or Four-fold Grace," and "The World is My Parish."
To conclude the six week sermon series, the church will invite the local Nazarene church to an evening "Wesleyan Hymn Sing" where we will sing and learn the stories of many of the Wesleyan hymns.
To round out the six week "Journey to United Methodism," Rev. Nathan Mattox will lead small group discussions of the book "The United Methodist Member's Handbook," by George Koehler.
Rev. Mattox was prompted to plan the comprehensive series a few months ago when he read an article in the September 6, 2005 Christian Century article "What Teens Believe." The article cited a survey that found most teens learn their beliefs from their parents and that most teens were unaware of the distinctive aspects of their religious identification and instead "boiled down" their belief system to what the researchers called "Moralistic Theraputic Deism." Rev. Mattox was also involved in a preaching workshop with Eugene Lowry at Hendrix College in November, where Lowry suggested, "If you typically work with the lectionary, try going off it for a while. If you don't usually follow the lectionary, get on it!" Rev. Mattox and members of the church used the upcoming series to make "New Year's invitations" to past constituents of the church. Check the church's website to keep up with the weekly sermon series and class notes at www.waldronumc.blogspot.com.

2006-01-01T18:20:00.000-06:00

An SUV full of gifts. Thanks WUMC for making Christmas more merry for two area families!

2005-12-28T21:07:00.000-06:00

Church staff and families enjoy a Christmas meal at the parsonage. (Matt is especially enjoying the meal)

2005-12-28T21:03:00.000-06:00

Trees ablaze with the sunset over WUMC fellowship hall

Christmas Day Sermon

2005-12-25T22:55:00.000-06:00

Sermon Texts
Isaiah 9: 2-7
John 1: 1-14

Over the past weeks of the Advent season, we have looked into the faces of the cherished figures of the Nativity. During the first week, amidst the celebration of the Hanging of the Greens, the Angels were our focus. We asked ourselves what kind of signs we might be given by the angels we might knowingly or more likely unknowingly encounter in our own lives. The next week, we focused on the role that the shepherds and livestock played in our great story, and how they were open to God’s announcement of incarnation because of their willingness to “keep watch” and “listen.” Then we focused on Joseph, the silent guardian of God as a baby. We looked at his great witness to follow God’s promptings and the miracle of his belief and faith in the message brought to him by the angel. Last week we reflected on Mary’s Song of Magnification of the works of God. And today we turn our attention to the manger. That centerpiece to the nativity story—and what it holds: The center of the whole world. John’s prologue is revered by many as the most beautiful words of the entire Bible. It tells the story of our Christ in a unique way in the Bible. Whereas Matthew and Luke tell the story of Jesus’ humble beginnings in the manger, and Mark’s hurried gospel doesn’t even reflect on the Christ’s origins, John’s Gospel tells that Christ as the Eternal Logos or Word was with God and Part of God before the Creation of the world. It is from John that we learn that this man traveled around the lakes and mountains and cities of Palestine 2000 years ago was no ordinary man, but instead the “Word in Flesh.” It tells that how everything was created through the Word, and that therefore all creation was known by him and all creation has a connection to him. God creates by speaking, and the Word is the manifestation of that aspect of God. We also learn that this creative Word is Light—as Isaiah says, the “people who have walked in the darkness have seen a great light” Isaiah goes on to talk about a child who will one day be born who will bear this light, and John identifies this light as the person whose birth we celebrate this day. Last night as I read this scripture as our last lesson to the lessons and carols service, we enacted the scripture as it was read. We began in darkness, as we heard about the Word being in the beginning with God and nothing else. This was before the creation of anything, including light and darkness. And then I lit the Christ candle as we heard about the Word’s life being the light of all people. As the light went around the room and illuminated the faces of everyone present, I read the words that contain the whole Gospel in two sentences, “But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, 13who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God. 14And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.”I enacted this part of the service last night because I wanted us to hear it and understand it as being true and present in this moment with us. John doesn’t tell the story of something that happened a long time ago and is merely an occurence of the past—John writes about a light that shines in darkness. The darkness of time or place does not overcome the light that continues to shine. This is the amazing thing about the Gospel. WE have walked in the darkness. We come from all walks of life. Some of us are old, some of us are young, some of us are hometown people, some of us are transplants from another place, some of us are rich, some of us are poor, some of us have loved, some of us have loved and lost. Here’s what we all have in common—we have all walked in the darkness. Though it would seem that some of us have sinned in greater frequency or greater magnitude than others, we have all been born with something missing in our lives, a “God shaped hole in our hearts” as some people call it. Isaiah and John calls it darkness. But the good news is this, we have seen a great light, and furthermore, that Light comes to us to receive. Graciously, the Light has come toward us and continues to come toward us. As long as we reject the great filling light in our presence, we will continue to walk in darkness. As long as we refuse to forgive and love and share and make peace, that “God shaped hole” will continue to be a God shaped hole. Why? Because God loves us so much that God gave us freedom. The light is not invasive. It is persuasive, like a friend holding a candle toward you for you to light your candle on. And if we do light our candle with the Light of God, IF we do allow our soul to be ignited with the awesome power of love and forgiveness and peace and sharing, our faces will become illuminated in the presence of the Living Christ. We will finally see ourselves and our neighbors as Children of God. This is the message that the Living Word would have us understand. After all of creation was spoken into being through the creative power of the Word and Breath in Genesis 1, there is a pronouncement that is as creative and life giving as our identity: God is happy with God’s creation and exclaims, “It is good!” Yes, we are children of God from the very beginning, but we enslave ourselves to lesser parents. We walk in darkness and we look to other sources for parental comfort, don’t we? We make ourselves “Children of Exclusiveness” or “Children of Posessions” or “Children of Beauty” or “Children of Hollow Happiness.” Jesus says later in John’s gospel that “this is the judgment of the world, that the light has come into the world, and people loved darkness rather than light.” Why do we love the darkness rather than the light? Because the light comes to earth in a feeding trough…The Light takes a cross on his back and asks us to as well. The Light asks us to change our direction in life. We fill the God shaped hole with other things, and we think we are full until the little cracks appear in our carefully tailored lives. God’s light continues to shine in our direction though, and it continues to come to us. All we have to do is dip our candle toward the one being offered to us. All we must do is dip our heads down and ask for forgiveness. All we must do is forgive others as God forgives us. When we take on the light, our burdens are taken on by that little child laying in a manger. He is willing and able to carry our load. As things become lighter in our lives, we may even find ourselves sharing the light with others. We may turn to the person next to us and offer the Light of Christ to them. In so doing, the brightness grows! God’s Kingdom is made manifest on earth, and more faces glow with the good news of the Word and Light. Just as we saw last night, the Light comes in the flesh because the Living Christ is alive in our flesh. The very enactment of the Christmas story in our midst is shown in Our faces glowing in the candlelight as we sing hymns declaring the wonder and mystery of God’s humble birth. The Light becomes brighter through our sharing, and more people in the shadows are able to see it. But for us to share the Light and be the Living Christ, we must walk toward the shadows. This is what Christ exhibited in a life in which he was reprimanded by the “holy men” for going into the houses of tax collectors and prostitutes. This birth that we celebrate today is not just a birth in a stable 2000 years ago, it is a birth waiting to happen. Every moment holds the potential for this birth because this birth is the birth of the Light in the world of darkness. The darkness cannot overcome it, and as long as we hold the candle of our faith in front of us, guiding us, we cannot be overcome. Even in dying, the martyrs of our faith were able to shed light on the darkness. As we gather to share this sacred meal together, let us imagine ourselves receiving the light just as we did last night with candles. We take this meal for the same purpose—to bring more fuel for the fire, to help the light shine brighter through our participation in the Living Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. The Light of God wants to enlighten your life because God wants you to know who you really are—a shining faced Child of God! Amen.

Church members go Caroling

2005-12-18T23:56:00.000-06:00

On the evening of Dec. 18, several families from the UMC visited many of our shut ins with some Christmas Carols and cookies made by our Junior youth group. It was a touching experience for all involved as we shared Christmas cheer with our beloved senior members of the congregation. Thanks for participating everyone!

Advent 4 Sermon, Mary's Foolish Song

2005-12-18T23:52:00.000-06:00

Scriptures:
2 Sam. 7: 1-16
Luke 1: 39-56

Today’s Old Testament scripture is a good prelude to our focus on Mary because it is a prophetic account of God’s desire for a dwelling place in the world. David looks with guilt upon his palace when he remembers that the Ark of the Covenant, which was thought to be the unique dwelling place of God, still resides in a tent. The prophet Nathan assures David that he should not presume to build God a permanent dwelling place because this God prefers the mobility of a tent. He tells David that it is not we who build God a house, but God who chooses a house within us. It is in people, not things, that God wishes to live. In the Christmas story, we learn that God chooses a young peasent woman to live in in a very unique way. The Gospels tell us that like the tabernacle, the Holy Family is constantly on the move while Mary is pregnant and after Jesus is born.
If we were totally unfamiliar with Christianity or the story of the nativity, we would still be aware of Mary’s presence and perhaps her role in bringing about the great incarnation of God. All we have to do is go to the US Post office and ask for a Christmas stamp to know that this woman is the “lead role” in the Christmas story. If there were a Nativity movie that earned an Oscar nomination, Mary would definitely qualify for the “Best Actress” whereas most of the other characters would probably only qualify for the “Best Actor in a Supporting Role.” Today’s Gospel lesson would undoubtedly be the soliloquy that would earn her the coveted “little gold man.”
The song she sings is one of the most beloved pieces of scripture in the Bible. Mary, glowing with the news of her pregnancy, rushes to visit her cousin Elizabeth. Elizabeth doesn’t squash her excitement with a raised eyebrow or suspicious questions about the origins of the baby, instead she exclaims with joy and prophetic zeal. “Blessed are you among women, and the fruit of your womb! What makes me so special that the mother of my Lord would come to visit me?” She tells Mary that she is also with child, and the two babies they are carrying are connected in a very special way, because the two are going to change the world together.
Then Mary erupts into a song the church calls by its first Latin word—Magnificat anima mea Dominum. My soul “magnifies” the Lord. The Magnificat is a song of great awe and wonder and intimacy with God. If anyone is qualified to sing it, it is definitely the woman who is carrying the very incarnation of God in her womb. The song is radical, it is bold, and some would say it is foolish.
The foolish song of Mary celebrated a God who doesn’t really seem to stand up to the test of “reality.” Perhaps Mary just has her head “buried in the sand,” but it does not seem that God ever “brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly.” Israel had a long history of being dominated and subjecated by whatever Empire happened to be controlling the trade routes of the time. At the time Mary was singing her song of praise, Israel had been dominated by the Romans for 63 years. For a very short period proceeding that, Israel was ruled by a family of Jewish warlords who sold the priesthood to the highest bidder and weren’t exactly “lowly.” The Greeks, Babylonians, Assyrians, Persians, Egyptians all had a chance to rule over Israel. Did Mary simply make bad grades in her History and Social Studies classes at school?
What about the idea that God “fills the hungry with good things and sends the rich empty away?” When has this ever happened? There may have been times when the hungry have been filled with good things, but I don’t know when the rich have ever been sent empty away, except perhaps in the Marxist revolutions! Is Mary a Marxist? We all know that system of government just doesn’t work!
Perhaps it is because I was a child who desperately wanted to be an archaeologist and would dig in my back yard and out in the field by my house with all my tools, but upon reading this passage of scripture this past week, I literally pictured Mary’s soul as a magnifying glass. I mean, she does say that her soul “magnifies” the Lord! But perhaps Mary’s song, Mary’s faith and joy and glowing pregnancy is indeed a magnification of how things really are. You see, with a magnifying glass, you can see quite a bit of detail that is imperceptible to the unaided eye. If I look at the bulletin with the magnifying glass, I can see the places the printer put more or less ink on each letter.
To return to the foolishness of Mary’s song, her proclamation that the “Lord has looked with favor on the lowliness of His servant, and that the Lord has blessed her” on the surface would seem to ring hollow in her ears as she watched her son 30 years later go off on a rambunctious mission that she herself would try to talk him out of, and that in return Jesus would seemingly disown her in favor of his ragtag band of fishermen, tax-collectors, and prostitutes. But through her magnifying glass, Mary perhaps can see that no matter how much a mother would cling to her son, and that no matter how horrific the sight of him hanging on a cross for the very things she tried to talk him out of, his life was lived for her and for the world in a way that no else could have.
So how does all this reconcile? We wouldn’t be here today if we just shrugged our shoulders at these inconsistencies between the proclamations of her song and the facts. What is the key to Mary’s foolish faith? IF we hold up the magnifying glass of our faith, how does her song ring true? Perhaps our magnifying glass could see a small detail that might uncover the meaning of her foolishness. Her song sounds a little less ignorant when we consider something called Kairos.
You see, Kairos is a Greek word for a type of time. Kronos is an aspect of time that we can measure. Kronos is the clock that this world operates on. Kairos on the other hand, is an aspect of time that moves at a different pace. It is not measureable. It is a quality of time that some theologians say is apprehended in the mind of God. It is the quality of time that is spent rocking a baby, or holding a dying person’s hand while they exhale their last breath.
Whether you know it or not, Time is a central aspect of this season. Advent itself means “coming.” We wait for something that has already happened, and at the same time has not yet happened. The magnifying glass of our faith gives us the sight that God’s time is fundamentally different from our own. In the mind of God, something that we are waiting for is already realized. God plants the vision of what has been realized in our minds and draws us nearer to it, but we must take the initiative to grasp that vision. This is what Jesus means when he grows up and says to the Pharisees in Luke 17: 20, “The Kingdom is not coming with signs that can be observed…the kingdom is already here in your midst and you do not see it.”
Though Mary’s song sounds ignorant or foolish or even idiotic at first glance, if we realize that Elizabeth and Mary are “filled with the Holy Spirit” when they are making such proclamations, we might be able to understand that they are seeing more deeply than what is on the surface. They are viewing the world in Kairos time. Kairos encourages us to wait and have joyful anticipation for an event that happened 2 millenia ago.
When we hold up the magnifying glass of our faith, when we see the great detail and complexity of a life lived in hope and anticipation, we begin to understand that what we know as wisdom in this life is great foolishness compared with the great transcendent wisdom of our Father.
When we look at the idea that the hungry are given food and the rich are sent empty away through the magnifying glass of faith, we can see the details of truth that show us our riches and belongings are distractions from the path of Christ and that a heart hungry for truth and justice can be much more filling than one hungry for more possessions. Through the magnifying glass of faith, we can see that the proud and powerful are indeed brought low by their insatiable egos, while the lowly are lifted up by their example of humility.
Ultimately it may not be Mary’s song that is foolishness, but what we generally perceive to be “the hard facts” that are “foolish.” When our hearts beat in Kairos time, it is more apparent that the things we generally put a premium on are worthless and the things we spend our life ignoring are precious jewels. Christmas is a time when this truth attempts to break through the veneer of our common distractions. God born in a barn….A poor virgin being impregnated by the Holy Spirit…Wise men from the East tracking down a star only to find a poor peasant boy, and then giving him gifts of gold, frankincense and muihr. The circumstances all bend our expectations—they prepare us to receive a great gift, which is beyond us and at the same time in our midst, behind us and at the same time before us, within us and at the same time around us.
The story of Christmas turns our usual ideas of power and importance and glory and all on its head, and Mary’s song celebrates this great, insane vision of a world in a way molded by the prophets, and brought to a new kind of reality in the life of the little baby she carries. Though the church may have lost touch with the revolution this song calls for, it is still captured in the fervent anticipation of advent, when we wait for the coming of a man who would boldly proclaim The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, 19 to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." and would understand that reality within his own heart. This we believe is the nature and presence of Christ. When we strive toward this mission, we strive toward Christ’s mission, and Christ becomes born anew in our midst! Thanks be to God, amen!

Church on Christmas Day

2005-12-12T23:40:00.000-06:00

Written by a Methodist minister in Arkansas>>Yes, Virginia, We Are Having Church on Christmas>>Dear Virginia,>Thank you for your letter. I understand why you are shocked and>puzzled that the church where you attend has canceled services because>Christmas Day falls on a Sunday this year. You are absolutely correct>in saying Jesus should be the "reason for the season" above all. In>fact, the word "Christmas" itself is a combination of two words,>"Christ + Mass" which describes a worship service dedicated to the>remembrance of the birth of Jesus. From looking at its origins,>therefore, a Christmas without a worship service is not really>Christmas at all. For hundreds of years the majority of the world's>Christian communions have found the time to hold worship services for>Christ on His birthday, on whatever day of the week it happens to>occur. After all, it is not OUR birthday is it?>>Most of the churches that I know of who are canceling their services>are the large, urban churches which we have come to know as>"megachurches." These churches have become large by catering to the>consumer mentality of our culture. Their decision is a reflection of>this. On the national news the other night I saw where Willow Creek>Community Church near Chicago and a number of other well known huge>churches, as well as Fellowship Bible Church in Little Rock have>canceled services for what used to be a high holy day, saying they>wanted people to spend time with their families. But one employee from>Willow Creek let slip the real reason for the>cancellation: She said "it would not be an effective use of staff and>resources." Since they anticipate low attendance, they feel it would>not be worthwhile to pay the orchestra, sound and lighting crew,>custodians, and other costs which add up to the cost of holding a>worship service in a huge church. In other words, the decision was an>economic and financial decision rather than a spiritual one. I cannot>tell you why these churches could not just be honest with us about why>they are not holding services on Christmas Day.>>The last time I remember Christmas falling on a Sunday was 1994. As a>pastor I privately wondered if very many people would come to church>that day. To my delight and surprise, we had almost the level of>attendance as usual, with a number of guests. Many of these guests>were family members from out of town. Knowing this is a family time,>they said what better thing to do with your family on Christmas than to>worship the living Lord together, as a family? The one hour worship>service did not seem to detract too much from the exchange of gifts,>consumption of food, watching of television, or any other traditional>experiences of family. If Christmas is more about family for some>people than about Christ, they might view Christian worship as an>intrusion on their family time. But there are some people who say>"Let's keep Christ in Christmas," and really mean it. They honor Jesus>by keeping Him first in their families, and in turn they find that>their families are blessed. They do not feel or act as though they are>having to squeeze the baby Jesus into their busy Christmas schedule.>>Those who attended church on that Christmas Day in 1994 enjoyed a very>simple, quiet, holy time with their Lord, a most meaningful time of>worship and adoration. It was kind of like the Holy Birth>itself: Nothing elaborate, just a time of intimacy with the God who so>loved the world.>>No, Virginia, I don't really think our commercial and consumer culture>has completely taken over the minds and hearts of those who still>cherish the holy days of the Church. For my part, I will be in church>that day and I will be delighted to worship with whoever wants to come.>I hope for everyone, whether they come or not, that the day will be>most holy and blessed for them. Remember the Gospel. "The light shines>in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome the light." And it>never will.>> Yours in> Christ, Bro. Bill

2005-12-12T00:06:00.000-06:00

UMC kids and moms let invite parade goers to "not leave the gift unopen." Inside the big box was baby Jesus in a manger. Our float was judged "most inventive, best concept, and most enthusiastic" by self proclaimed judge Nathan Mattox

Advent 3 sermon---joseph

2005-12-11T21:19:00.000-06:00

scriptures
Lamentations 3: 19-26
Matthew 1: 18-25

We worship a man who knew himself as Yeshua bin Yosef—most of us know him as Jesus. bin Yosef means “son of Joseph.” But who is this man who gave his name to our savior? Who is this man who was the quiet guardian of God incarnate? Who is this man who no doubt instructed little Jesus in the Law and carpentry? One description that sticks out in my mind about the character of Joseph is from the “Best Christmas Pageant Ever,” (which I have been in enough times to fill the role of every male Herdman). In this play, Imogene tells whichever brother it is that is playing Joseph in a dramatization of the nativity that “He got an easy part, all he has to do is stand there and keep his mouth shut!”
Many of us have the image of Joseph as an older carpenter. Some of us may have heard that Joseph was a widower, and that Mary was his second wife. This is never mentioned by the 4 gospels of the New Testament, but it was a tradition of the early church based in large part by the Protoevangelon (or Pre-Gospel) of James—a non-Canonized document purported to have been written by James, the brother of Jesus and later disciple and head of the church in Jerusalem. Although scholars refute the book’s actual authorship by this James, the book is the earliest record of a belief in the adoration of the perpetual virginity of Mary and the idea that Joseph was an older widower.
The book reports that James and the rest of Jesus’ brothers and sisters who are mentioned in the Gospels are actually children of Joseph by a previous marriage, and that Jospeh was a celebate man during his marriage to Mary. Much of this lore was constructed to ease the theological discomfort that the “Theotokos” or “mother of God” had ever been spoiled by something as revolting as sex with her husband. Despite the fact that Matthew’s gospel tells us Joseph refrained from sex with Mary “until” the baby Jesus had been born, there is a philosophical underpinning to this idea based in the fear of the body and sexuality called dualism, which says the spirit is pure and the body corrupt. This idea is not rooted in the faith of God in the scriptures, but instead in Greek “dualistic” philosophy. It is also not the point of the sermon, but just an interesting sidenote.
We do know that Joseph is not mentioned in the Gospels after the journey to Jerusalem when Jesus was 12 years old (presumably for Jesus’ Bar Mitzvah). So he possibly did die when Jesus was relatively young. Of course the Gospels never tell us this either. The fact that the greek word used to describe Joseph’s occupation is more appropriately translated as a “skilled artisan” means that the popular conceptualization of Joseph as a simple carpenter may be an artistic invention. Basically, Joseph is a phantom figure in our faith history. We know that he must have taught Jesus his profession, because we know that according to Mark 6:3. Jesus was a carpenter (or perhaps a skilled artisan) as well. IN the inventive mind of Nikos Kazsantzakis, the author of LTOC, Jesus is not only a carpenter, but is contracted by the Romans to make crosses on which they crucify radicals and dissidents. Jesus’ profession in that novel makes him a social outsider and dramatically casts ironic foreshadowing on what we know as Christ’s fate……..Whoever Joseph was, and whatever role he had in teaching Jesus, we can learn from him quite a bit simply from the small amount of information we have about him.
Many pastors, theologians, and NT scholars refer to Mary as the “first disciple.” She is the first who receives news of God’s incarnation in the world and the wonderful gift that is in store for us. She is the first disciple and she is a vocal disciple. When she hears the news, she runs to her cousin and tells her about it, then they break out into song together. Her fiancé Joseph is not known by much of anything, but today I believe we should start thinking of him as the “second disciple.”
The second disciple is a quiet one. Not a word from him in all the Gospels. While the other Gospels deal with Mary’s encounter with the angel and the news she received, Matthew focuses on Joseph’s visits from the angel. While Mary bursts into song at the news of her bodily and spiritual participation in the incarnation, Joseph awakens from a dream, hears the call, and sets his eyes toward Bethleham, then toward Egypt, then toward Nazareth. He merely hears and acts—no commentary, no argument, no discussion. Joseph’s quiet faith and determination to not abandon his commitments is a good example for us today.
I’d like to explain what I mean by the title “The Art of Getting out of the Way.” As we are hopefully aware, responding with silence and action is not “getting out of the way.” Yes, Joseph does seem to be “supporting cast” in the great story of the nativity in our popular conception. However, Joseph’s response to the news received is far from getting “out of the way.” Joseph had tremendous responsibilities, and was used by God in the fulfillment of these responsibilities.
My original idea in titling this sermon the “Art of Getting out of the way” was that Joseph had enough courage and enough faith to “let go and let God” as the popular saying goes. Many times, it seems like we celebrate only those who are called to voice the faith: to put it into song, or speak about it in front of others. The words “Witnessing” or “Evangelism” probably conjure up images in our minds of talking with people about faith, hope, and salvation. Joseph is an inspiration to those of us who may not feel so compelled to express our faith with words and song, but with quiet action. He quietly and boldly stands behind Mary when the news gets around town that Mary is pregnant. He could have easily and honorably broken his ties with her and gone on with his own life. But he didn’t. He accepted his responsibility without a word of argument or question.
In a sermon in Harvard University's Memorial Church, Peter Gomes talked about the particular role that Joseph had to play in the Incarnation: He writes,
the miracle of Christmas, (dare I say it?) is not the virgin birth of the creeds. The miracle to which our attention should be drawn at this holy season is the fact Joseph believes what he hears and acts upon it. Miracles some say, are things that happen in the absence of evidence to explain them. Well, that's not a miracle at all. That is merely a mystery, or an as yet unexplained phenomena, or unbelievable fantasy. The Bible is not concerned with unbelievable fantasies. The miracle here is that a sensible, reasonable, pragmatic, and good man, a man named Joseph, acts contrary to the evidence that surrounds him on every hand. He sees the evidence. He understands it. He knows its implications and he acts contrary to it.
Faith is not life lived in the absence of evidence. Faith is life lived contrary to the evidence on hand. The evidence on hand is that people are nasty, brutish, and short: most of them are anyway. The evidence on hand is that they will do you in. The evidence on hand is that good guys and good gals come in second, third, or fifth. And yet the gospel tells us that we love our neighbors, that we hope for peace in the middle of war, that we believe that peoples' better natures will overcome their lesser natures. That is faith contrary to all the evidences surrounding you. That then is why this is an example of faith: life lived contrary to the evidence. And, when he could have cut and run he stayed and he played. And, it was as an active participant in the great drama of the incarnation that he played, not as a potted plant. Clear in his conscience as to what his duty now was, with a little help from the angels, he did it. And, for that we must give him credit, praise and pride of place.
Therefore, we remember Joseph this Sunday, this Sunday before we remember Mary. William Willimon points out that most of us can probably identify more with Joseph, the second disciple, than with Mary, the first. Most of us are ordinary. We live and work in some rather drab places. We are rarely the first to get the news, when God makes some large move. We mind our own business. But then, in to many an ordinary life, God intrudes, comes upon us. And even if you are not good with words, couldn't burst into a hymn if you had to, if you will at least whisper, yes, then that makes you like Joseph: A disciple, somebody who is willing to follow the strange and unexpected movements of God in Jesus Christ wherever that takes you. And that, friends, is enough.

Work on the Christmas Parade Float this Friday and Sat @ bus barn

2005-12-08T12:51:00.000-06:00

IF you decide to come, bring some boxes and Christmas wrapping paper so we can make a bunch of gifts that the kids will be pretending to open on our float. Also, if you have spare Xmas lights--bring those too!
Contact Kim at 637-5494 if you have questions

2005-12-05T23:18:00.000-06:00

UMC members on a Heifer Project Hayride. The Living Nativity was also beautiful (but I left my camera in the car.)

2005-12-05T23:16:00.001-06:00

One of the newest "members" of the church--Little Hudson Davis with proud papa Kevin.

2005-12-05T23:16:00.000-06:00

Rev. Mattox delivers the Ministerial Alliance's gift to the community of Waldron to the Public Library for display. The gift was given in gratitude for all the hospitality shown to the Hurricane Evacuees. The passage from Hebrews reads: "Be careful to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing so some have entertained angels unawares."

Dec. 4 Sermon--Shepherds and Livestock: God's Royal Guests

2005-12-05T23:05:00.000-06:00

Scriptures
Psalm 46
Luke 2: 8-20

The shepherd lifestyle is one of foul odors and ill repute. Long days and nights of waiting and watching are punctuated by the occasional thrill of chasing off a coyote or some other animal hungry for some easy prey. Shepherds aren’t the strongest, aren’t the smartest, aren’t wealthy or noble. Yet our God seems to have a high regard for them. The heroes of our faith are shepherds: Jacob, Moses, David. The prophets even see God as a shepherd, tending the flock of Israel. Jesus verifies that the prophets are right, because he says that he is a shepherd, even though we know his profession is carpentry.
We also see in the nativity story that Jesus is born amongst the animals in a stable. He’s put in a feeding trough instead of a cradle. The fact that God incarnate is more appropriately born in a stable among cows and donkeys and sheep and that his first human visitors are poor, crude shepherds tells us something very important about our ideas about power and glory and importance. What we generally regard as royal doesn’t fit the mold that God defines for us in the very birth and life of Jesus Christ.
Even though we know that God came into the world in such a way, we tend to whitewash the story in our imagery. The shepherds in the field visited by the angel have clean headdresses on, we probably don’t think of the smell they carry. The livestock in the stable kneel gracefully in the clean hay. We probably don’t think of the smell of donkey sweat or animal droppings corrupting our picture. This is one reason I decided to use a modern picture of some Afghan shepherds on our bulletin cover today. I like the fact that they’re sitting on the rocky dirt, smoking a cigarette with the little lamb playing in their company. To me, it pulls my mind’s images out of the same old characters that are usually found out in the pastures “tending their flocks by night.” in our nativity ideal. What is it about shepherds and livestock that appeal so strongly to God?
In our Wednesday night Advent study this past week, we are reading a book called “Where Heaven Touches Earth” by a UM pastor in Shreveport named Rob Weber. Our first week of study focused on the shepherds activity of “keeping watch.” Despite the common image of shepherds on a grassy hillsides with a full moon illuminating the scene, Weber points out that many nights clouds must’ve obscured the light of the moon, or there was a new moon and not much light. Shepherds must’ve had to develop another way to “watch” their flocks in case of these kinds of occasions. Many of you who have farms or ranches know how the shepherds “Keep Watch” don’t you….they listen!
Advent is a time for careful listening, active anticipation. Waiting in this case is not a passive activity. Advent Waiting is making room, clearing the path. The hymn that we sang this morning is an ancient hymn telling the story of each beast’s contribution to the event where “Heaven Touches Earth.” The simple beauty of the hymn tells of each animal speaking with pride about what they could give as a gift to the holy family. Though we may sometimes think animals aren’t really worth God’s attention because they are somehow “lower life forms” perhaps it will give us a good dose of humility to know that God does use animals. The story of Balaam’s ass I told the children is not the only part of the Bible where animals play a key role in getting across to humans what God wants them to know. God’s response to Job tells us that animals occupy the mind of God just as humans do, and we might do well to be as attentive as they are. If we are to take a note from the shepherds and the livestock, we may understand that a key to our Advent preparations is to tune our ears to the silence, listening for the angel choir.
Weber points out that in this day and age we have much to distract us from the silence. Those of us in the Advent study commiserated with one another when we talked about how we tend to cover up the silence with “background noise.” Why? Because it makes us more comfortable I suppose. The silence often sounds hollow and it makes us feel empty. So we fill it up, we turn on, tune in, and drop out as they said in the 60’s, (So I’ve heard.)
Recently I played a little game with the youth where I gave them an advertising slogan or a familiar image from a commercial, and they rang a bell to see who the first person would be to get the advertising company. I remember when I wrote the slogans, I sat down at the computer and mentally spewed forth the questions and answers in a purge of “mental space.” Isn’t it amazing that most of us can probably rattle off a whole litany of commercial taglines and slogans, but very few of us have committed the scriptures to memory?
It is amazing to me that John Wesley and other people of his time had the entire Bible committed to memory. You often see on television Victorian era people reciting long poems from memory. I don’t have any poems committed to memory. I don’t have any scriptures longer than a couple verses committed to memory. But I can tell you that Burger King lets you have it “your way.” I can tell you who the “Great American Road belongs to” (And that one has been off the air for 15 years or more—that little bit of information has occupied a little chunk of my memory for 15 years or more!”
I can tell you what kind of insurance a duck is trying to sell me and what kind a little green lizard is trying to sell me or what kind is “like a good neighbor.” I can tell you who is the King of Beers, who “tastes great but is less filling,” or what is Australian for Beer. I can go on, but the point is that perhaps you can identify with me. My mind has been bought with entertainment. Some sociologists say this American culture is “entertaining itself to death.” In many ways we are. We’re trading our own authentic creativity for pre-packaged sound bites of corporate creativity designed to help us spend our money.
Advent asks us to “keep watch.” It invites us to prepare. How do we prepare in such a crazy, image laden world? We turn off, tune in, and drop everything. Actively anticipating takes our undivided attention. The shepherds were accustomed to active anticipation because they had to defend their flocks from predators. To do that, they had to know what to expect. We too know what to expect. We have been given the Good news. We know to look for God where we might least expect to find God. Jesus was born in a feeding trough. God chose to become incarnate in a little baby, born in precarious circumstances to parents of little means. God’s sign to the outcasts was as direct as a visit from a heavenly being. To the powerful kings and sages, God merely put a star in the sky—A subtle sign that something important was happening.
There is a saying that “The universe is filled with miracles and surprises simply waiting for our wits to become sharp enough to notice them.” IN Elizabeth Barrett Browning’ s words, “Earth’s crammed with heaven,/ and every common bush afire with God; / And only he who sees takes off his shoes; / The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries.”
This poem for me illuminates the meaning and practice of Holy Communion, which we celebrate this morning. If we gaze with awe and wonder, if we look with Advent eyes at something as common as the bread and juice, we might see that it too is afire with God. This ritual was instituted by Jesus to assure us that he would always be with us. The miracle of Christmas is that God comes to the world “In the flesh,” The miracle of the Eucharist is that this person of God who came to us “in the flesh” is still with us by the power of the Holy Spirit in this very act of eating bread and drinking juice. Jesus tells us that by participating in this ritual we are eating his flesh and drinking his blood. Though this may sound odd to our ears, I think of Jesus speaking here from his Divine nature. If we are to think of the bread, we might picture the soil growing the grain, the fields of wheat bending in the wind, the hands of laborers harvesting the fields and turning the wheat into flour. We might picture the contributions of all of these things coming together to produce this loaf. This wide range of images associated with bread keys us into the diverse nature of God’s presence in the world. Christ’s body is visible to the Advent eyes even when we think we are observing something mundane. If we think of the juice, we might think of the hillside vineyards fed by the rain. We might think of that vine taking the moisture from the air and the ground and gathering it in the sweet juice of its fruit. Why is it sweet? So that it will be eaten and the seeds within will find new life in new soil. What a miracle! The blood of Christ does indeed course through the entire process that brings this cup to our lips.
If we embrace silence and attune ourselves to the quiet miracles going on right under our noses, we might just be able to perceive the divine reality in the simple things we usually overlook. Bread and Wine, Babies and Mangers, flesh and blood. These are gifts to us shepherds. If we see the light, will we travel to the stable? Will we go from there and spread the news far and wide like the shepherds in the scripture? That is up to us! Like the shepherds, God has invited us to be special guests at the birth of his Son. And it happens right here………

Advent 1: Angel Sermon, Nov. 27

2005-12-01T15:20:00.000-06:00

Angels are perhaps the most visible part of our religion in American culture. Everywhere you turn you see angels: Books on angels, tv shows about angels. When I think of angels, I always think about War Eagle and craft fairs, because my mom always brought home an angel for her collection from craft fairs. My mother actually has a Christmas tree solely devoted to her angel ornament collection. You no doubt might think of Cary Grant as Dudley the angel in the “Bishop’s Wife” or Henry Travers as Clarence, the angel earning his wings in “It’s a Wonderful Life.” At a religion bookstore I worked at in West Hollywood, we had a whole section on angels. So, what is it about these emissaries of God that appeals so strongly to our culture? What does the Bible really say about angels?
One thing that is not usually shown by our culture’s representation of Angels is the fact that they are by most accounts fairly terrifying. The first words out of an angels mouth in the Bible is usually, “Do not be afraid.” There are many accounts of angels in the Bible, but one that perhaps expresses best the otherworldly nature of these beings is Ezekial 1. Here is a detailed account of Ezekial’s vision of what is called a “cherub” and it is not quite as benign looking as a little fat baby with wings and a harp.
What angels are is always played down by the Biblical texts. The most important thing about them is the message they bring. Angels are shown by scripture to be the emissaries of God. Bruggemann describes the distinction as being like political representatives of the Almighty power in heaven who come to earth bearing the Divine’s message. IN fact, the word angel simply means messenger in Greek.
Angels offer encouragement, hope, assistance. Sometimes, what they bring is met by humans in struggle—As is the case with Jacob wrestling with an Angel on a riverbank. Our scripture this morning tells us that Mary is at first troubled by what the angel Gabrielle has to say to her.
Take the angel on the front cover of your bulletin. This is a picture of Gabrielle, and look what the angel is carrying. Is Gabrielle coming to the hanging of the greens service here at the Methodist Church? The branch in Gabrielle’s hand is a reference to Isaiah 11, where the great prophet tells of the coming of a man who will not judge by what his eyes see, or decide by what his ears hear; 4 but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.”
The branch the angel is carrying is the “branch that will grow out of the root of Jesse,” which is another way of saying “Messiah.” The message that Gabrielle brought to Mary was that she would bear the Messiah. Though Mary does not wrestle with the angel who brought her word of the son she would bear, the news does create some strife and hardship for her life and for Joseph’s life.
The message is clear to us today as well. Christ is born among us! Are we waiting on a dramatic divine encounter in the middle of the night to hear the news of Christ’s presence, or can we be content with the subtle miracles that tell of Christ’s birth in our lives? Hebrews 13:1-2 tells us that simply by showing hospitality to strangers, some have entertained angels unawares. If we live the life of hospitality in our hearts, if we let the hope of this Christ child born to Mary surround us and infuse us, we too will live among angels and be graced by their presence. There is a song by an artist named Ben Harper called “Waiting on an angel.” In it, he references this saying from Hebrews, and declares that he’s waiting on an angel—one to carry him home. Are we preparing our heart for the season of waiting with joyful anticipation? Waiting plus joyfulness = hope. The message carried by the angels is quite often not an answer to a question, but rather the instilling of hope. Mary was asked to bear a son for nine months for the sake of world. We are asked to bear our patience and remain hopeful.