Friday, October 31, 2014

Letter to a Street Preacher

Dear Rochester Street Preacher,

I noticed you last week.  As I drove through downtown Rochester there you were on the corner of Broadway and 2nd, just you and your little sound system.  It didn’t look like you were having much success.  Nobody came within a block of you, yet you stubbornly kept at it.  Thankfully I couldn’t hear a word you were saying (I had my music playing at a ‘proper’ volume which drowned out even your loud rants), but I know exactly what you were saying.  You were quoting all sorts of verses from the King James version of the Bible (as if that’s the only translation that God allows).  You were telling people that they needed to repent or they would go to hell. 

I know your type and frankly you drive me crazy.  It’s because of people like you that we Christians get a bad name.  You don’t have a word to say about God’s grace.  You spew your words of hate and damnation, turning a loving God into some sort of monster to be feared.  You have no use for building relationships. The people who walk by you are just objects to be preached at.  You won’t listen to them or their backgrounds.  You put people in a box labeled ‘sinner’ and condemn them for it.    Do you forget that the people you’re yelling at are God’s children too?

Jerks like you are unloving, intolerant of those who disagree with you, and 100% convinced that your interpretation of Scripture is the correct one. 

Oh wait.   Pot…meet kettle! 

See what I did there?  I ream you for your lack of relationships, but I didn’t even turn down my music to hear what you had to say.  I put you in a box called ‘street preacher’ and condemned you for it.  I call you unloving, but I looked down on you from the moment I saw you.   I call you intolerant, but I dismiss your faith perspective out of hand.  Perhaps I’m the one 100% convinced that my interpretation of Scripture is the correct one.

Mr. Street Preacher, it sounds like I forgot that you too are a child of God.  You too have a story of faith.  You too follow Jesus.   I made you into a caricature of yourself just so I could self-righteously condemn you.   

Last Sunday evening I was on that same corner in Rochester, this time walking to hear Jay Bakker speak (a shout out to the Sandbox Cooperative for bringing him in).  Jay is the son of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker.  Yes, that Jim Bakker, the one who went to prison in the 1980’s for bilking his congregation for millions.  I’ve railed against ‘people like that’ who fail so completely.  They make the church look bad!

Jay now serves as a pastor at Revolution Church in the Twin Cities and he travels extensively to talk about grace.  It’s a message I love to hear, but it sounds like I need to hear it more.  When Jay talked about Jim Bakker, it wasn’t as some evil church dude.  He talked about his dad, a man of faith who worked to instill faith in his son. 

Mr. Street Preacher, I did the same thing to Jim Bakker that I did to you.  I turned him into a caricature of himself so I could feel justified in attacking him with impunity.  I forgot that he too is a beloved child of God.

Ironic, isn’t it?  In my zeal to proclaim the love and acceptance that God has for God’s world  I self-righteously condemn those who I feel ‘get in the way’ of that message.  It’s funny how we who insist on ‘tolerance and acceptance’ are quick to shun and condemn those that they feel are intolerant. 


Mr. Street Preacher, I’ll likely never have a chance to have a conversation with you.  Forgive me for so quickly condemning you.  God loves you unconditionally.  It appears that I have some work to do before I can do the same.

Your brother in Christ,

Pete

Friday, October 24, 2014

Facing Reality

On one morning back in February of 2004 my family’s life changed forever.  My wife Shannon felt a couple lumps by her hip and decided to go have it looked at.  I took her to our local clinic (which just so happens to be Mayo Clinic) and at first they assumed that she had a hernia , ordering a scan to verify it.  The next day, after the scan, we were quickly called back to the clinic with a diagnosis that we didn't want to hear: ovarian cancer!

We had moved to Minnesota only a couple months before.  We had a son in kindergarten and a growing business to tend to.  I was just getting started at a congregation that still worshiped in a gym.  We didn't have time for cancer…but we had no choice!  Our reality changed that day and we quickly acted to do something about it.  Surgery and some nasty chemo followed and we thought we were on the road to ‘normal’ life again.  Things looked good…until the cancer returned in six months.  More surgery…more chemo…more hope that it would all just go away.   It didn't.  We finally had to admit to a new reality: a reality that included ovarian cancer and chemotherapy for the foreseeable future.  We could have pretended that the cancer didn't exist.  We could have just gone on with life as if nothing had changed, but that would have allowed the cancer to spread unchecked.
 
For these 10 years we've been blessed to have Dr. Prema Petthambaram in charge.  Cancer is a slippery thing.  Shannon would go on a new chemo and it would work fabulously…for a while.  Eventually the cancer would mutate  just enough to avoid the drug.  Her cancer counts would go up.  The tumors would grow.  Dr. Peethambaram knew this cycle well and always had another type of chemo up her sleeve.    Sometimes we were thrilled to get off a drug because the side effects were nasty and hard to live with.  At other times it was really hard to abandon a treatment that had gone well.  It was easy to think, “It worked great for the past six months…it should still work.  Don’t stop!”  Dr. Peethambaram would explain the changes in the tumors and we knew full well that we had to move on to something new.  After each round of chemo the game changed, forcing us to something new.  Going back to an old chemo was not an option.  We had to move forward to something new.

Have I felt anger and frustration in the midst of all this?  Definitely!  Do I have anyone to blame?  Nope!  It’s not Shannon’s fault that she has cancer.  It’s not her surgeon’s fault that they couldn’t get all of it.  It’s not her oncologist’s fault that they don’t have a miracle drug to make it all better.  Sometimes things in life just stink.  It’s just reality.

Time and time again we've had to admit that we could not live in the past.  We could not go back to a time that we liked better.  We've had to face the reality of each day with a cancer that drives us forward.  It’s a reality we would never have chosen, but sometimes in life we don’t get to choose.  Our role has been to take stock of the situation and find the best way forward.    We are in God’s hands.

The same can be said of Gods church.

We look back to days when our Sunday Schools burst at the seams…when the building barely held all the people coming for worship…when new people to town sought out a local congregation and enthusiastically signed up for membership.  Some remember the days when the church held great power in society.  Sunday morning was a time for worship…and worship only.  Nobody would dare schedule another event to ‘compete’ with worship! 

Life had changed, hasn’t it?  Church membership is in decline in EVERY denomination in this country.  The Sunday School movement has lost steam with numbers plummeting in nearly every congregation.  Church’s no longer have a monopoly on Sunday mornings.  Youth sports and a myriad of other events have moved into those time slots.  Worship attendance is down across the board. 

How do we respond to these changes?  Too often congregations get into the ‘blame game.’   Perhaps it’s the pastor…or a Sunday School Superintendent…or a youth leader.  People say, “If they were just doing their job then things would be like they used to be” and “if we just did things the way we did 50 (or 5) years ago then we’d be in good shape.”   That fails to take the massive societal shifts into account.  It’s like telling a cancer cell, “You really SHOULD respond well to this chemo drug” and blaming the doctor for not having control over cancer.    Wishing doesn't make it happen.  Society has changed (like it or not).  Some of the things that the church did effectively in the past no longer have the same impact.   

God calls us to live in the reality of this day.  The ‘church game’ has changed.  God provides many good leaders who look to the future with great hope and wonderful creativity.  When the ‘old chemo’ quits working, Shannon moves on to something different.  When the ‘old ways’ become less effective, it’s time to find new models of ways to reach out with the Good News of Jesus.  I’m seeing this happen in congregations all over the place: from House Churches in Rochester to a nine week confirmation program in Eyota, from Wednesday night worship and activities to faith formation happening with whole families, from on-line financial giving to congregations with lay leaders and not pastors.  It’s an exciting time of experimentation…and the Holy Spirit leads those experiments! 

Time and time again we have to admit that we cannot live in the past.  We can’t go back to a time that we liked better.  We have to face the reality of each day with a God that drives us forward.  It’s a reality we probably would never have chosen, but sometimes in life we don’t get to choose.  Our role is to take stock of the situation and find the best way forward.    We are in God’s hands.

God has not abandoned Shannon or me in our journey with cancer.  God will not abandon God’s church in our journey in a changing world. 


Welcome to the new reality.  May God raise up leaders in God’s church to carry us into this new and constantly changing world.

Friday, October 17, 2014

Victory!

I play to win.

In some families a game of Monopoly can go on for days.  People play cautiously, holding back money lest they land on someone else’s hotel and have to pay a huge amount.  They only build houses or hotels once they are sure that they have a large enough sum to cover all contingencies.

My family can usually crank through a game in about an hour.  As soon as any of us receive enough money, we’re purchasing houses and hotels.  We are the ultimate risk takers.  If someone lands on our property we’re all set to win.   In Monopoly, playing with caution makes you miss out on opportunities.  What’s the point of owning Boardwalk if you don’t have anything built on it?    We play to win, and if that means that there is some risk involved we’re more than ready to face that fact.  Better to risk and have a chance to win than to play with caution and die a slow death.
I like to win, not only in Monopoly, but in all of life.

One of my earliest memories of faith is bathed in victory: God’s victory.  My mother passed away when I was eight years old.  Edee suffered from lupus, which meant that her body rejected her kidneys as if they were transplants.   I don’t have many memories of her.   I vaguely remember visiting her in the hospital and seeing her sick at home, but I clearly remember the scene at the cemetery on a cold March morning with daisies (her favorite flower) draping her coffin.  In that moment, I heard words of victory: a God who defeated death.  I latched onto those words with my whole being.  Edee won…because Jesus won. 

This hope has sustained my faith throughout my life.  We have a powerful God who has defeated death.  The book of Revelation isn’t one that many people read time and again.  Most get lost in the bizarre imagery and strange battles with evil.  Not me!  I gravitate again and again to the images of the heavenly throne room…and the God who conquers.  In Revelation, no matter how much pain and suffering is unleashed on the world, God remains God, gathering God’s people in praise and victory.  I’m reminded that I am on the winning team.  This isn’t because of anything that I have done (or can ever do).  God’s power tells the whole story.  God has won.  Nothing can stand in God’s way.  This God has claimed me to be on that winning team.  V-I-C-T-O-R-Y!

Into this story I keep hearing words of doom and gloom for God’s church.  People decry the ‘death of Christianity’ and some numbers seem to bear that out.  In America the number of people in worship on a given Sunday has dropped precipitously.  Sunday Schools no longer burst with children’s voices.  Financial support to congregations is way down, with many wondering what the future will hold.  People talk of days when churches will no longer exist.  The numbers can lead people to despair. 

Unfortunately, we’ve ‘played church’ much like many people play Monopoly: cautiously!  We’ve been afraid to take risks, leaving us willing to die a slow death rather than take a chance on something new and different.  We have been tied to models of church that worked in one era, but no longer prove effective.  We circle the wagons and try the same things, thinking that greater effort will make everything turn around.  When it doesn’t happen we feel like there is no future for God’s church. 

Nothing could be further from the truth!  The God who conquered death will not sit on the sidelines.  As long as God is at work in the world, ‘the church’ will be just fine.  God has not sustained people of faith for the past 2000 years only to quit now.  Remember, we’re on the winning team!  If God can conquer sin and death, surely God can handle some changes in American society.  As members of the winning team, the church can take risks.  We can go ‘all in’ on listening to the Holy Spirit to find new and creative ways to be God’s people in the world.  We can risk, knowing that in the end we can’t lose.  There is nothing that we can do to ‘kill’ God’s church.   True, we may find some of our risks end in spectacular failure, but at the end of the day God remains the head of the church and will sustain people of faith.  God gives is the freedom to take risks…to try new things…to envision what communities of faith can look like in the future. 

I’m not willing to be a part of a losing team.  If ‘the numbers’ are against the church, that simply means that it’s time for some risk taking, trusting that God will not abandon us.  ‘The church’ of the future may look vastly different, but if that’s what God is calling us to, I say, ‘Bring it on.’ 

We’re already on the winning team.   The end of the story has been written.  God walks with us in the midst of the pain of this world (which I know all too well).  It’s time to step out in faith.
Better to risk and win than play cautiously and slowly dwindle away to nothing. 


And the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’ Also he said, ‘Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.’ Then he said to me, ‘It is done! 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. Those who conquer will inherit these things, and I will be their God and they will be my children. Revelation 21:5-7

The Blog is Back!

It's been nearly a year since my last blog post.   It's time to start up again! I have received great encouragement to get underway once again (yes, I'm talking to you Emily Carson).  

I'm excited to share ways that I've seen God at work in the world.  Once again, it's time for me to be 'Walking in the Sunshine.'