The Sparkly $2 Bills, the reigning champs of the adult kickball circuit, lived up to fears and handed Total Depravity their 2nd loss in as many games. Moving Total Depravity to 2-2, The Sparkly $2 Bills improved on their undefeated season and cemented their standing as the juggernaut of Grandview Kickball with a 13-0 beat-down of the short-staffed Total Depravity, the kickball team of Boulevard Presbyterian Church.
Hopes were high as game time inched closer and closer to the 8 PM first pitch. The Sparkly $2 Bills, known by many as the Pink Team due to their t-shirts, appeared to be set to declare a forfeit as they lacked the necessary number of female players to make the game official but like most of the evening, Total Depravity's hopes were dashed as two females clad in pink emerged out of nowhere. With hopes of a forfeit gone, TD took the field and from the 1st pitch forward found themselves playing catch-up as a lead-off home run was surrendered before the defense could even exhale.
To Total Depravity's credit, the Sparkly $2 Bills were held to a 2-0 lead for a number of innings thanks to solid defense and less than stellar kicking but all good things come to pass. Eventually scoring 13 runs over 7 innings, the $2 Bills employed their trademark agressive base-running and solid defense to both blank Total Depravity and run up inning after inning of runs. In the end, no one thing could be pointed to as the cause for Total Depravity's shutout.
With our Labor Day hiatus, Total Depravity looks forward to a pivotal game against fellow church group The Beloved St. Luke's, kickball franchise of neighbor St. Luke's Lutheran. With Total Depravity sitting at 2-2, a playoff bearth hangs in the balance as St. Luke's (0-4) looks for their first win, and Total Depravity looks for a chance to compete for the title.
Plan on attending the Sunday, September 12th contest at 6 PM (C. Ray Buck Sports Park) after attending the Boulevard 2010 Fall Fun & Food Block Party running from 2-7 PM. Free food, music, activities for the kids, and more await all those who come on by. See you there!
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Monday, August 23, 2010
Two Game Win Streak Snaped, Total Depravity Drubbed 11-1
If excellent defense and big-time kicks were responsible for propelling Total Depravity to a 6-5 win over Barley last week it was the lack-thereof that doomed Total Depravity as they fell to a younger, faster Grasskickers team 11-1 on Sunday. Scoring only one run, Total Depravity never was able to find a rhythm and settle down into the play that prevailed the week before.
The Grasskickers, a youthful newcomer to the Grandview Kickball League, jumped out to an early lead on solid kicking and shaky defense going up 4-0 before Total Depravity ever lined up to kick. From the 1st inning on, The Grasskickers superior speed was able to exploit the cracks in the defense, scoring runs in most if not all subsequent turns at the plate, and holding Total Depravity to the one run scored by "rookie" Jim Savage who scored from 2nd.
By looking at the score, one might conclude that nothing went right but that was not the case. Total Depravity's showing last Sunday provided a lot of opportunities to celebrate as we welcomed back 2nd year stand-outs James Sledge, and Travis Williamson. Both Sledge and Williamson pick-up where they left off, with Williamson showing some solid defense from the Right Center position as he saved numerous runs and recorded many spectacular outs. Sunday's outing was also our largest turn-out of the season as first time players Ian, Kyme and Julie Rennick, Kristy Wathen, and Ken Odiorne took the field for the first time.
Next week Total Depravity takes on defending champs Sparkly $2 Bills (aka the Pink Team) at 8:oo PM at C. Ray Buck Sports Park.
The Grasskickers, a youthful newcomer to the Grandview Kickball League, jumped out to an early lead on solid kicking and shaky defense going up 4-0 before Total Depravity ever lined up to kick. From the 1st inning on, The Grasskickers superior speed was able to exploit the cracks in the defense, scoring runs in most if not all subsequent turns at the plate, and holding Total Depravity to the one run scored by "rookie" Jim Savage who scored from 2nd.
By looking at the score, one might conclude that nothing went right but that was not the case. Total Depravity's showing last Sunday provided a lot of opportunities to celebrate as we welcomed back 2nd year stand-outs James Sledge, and Travis Williamson. Both Sledge and Williamson pick-up where they left off, with Williamson showing some solid defense from the Right Center position as he saved numerous runs and recorded many spectacular outs. Sunday's outing was also our largest turn-out of the season as first time players Ian, Kyme and Julie Rennick, Kristy Wathen, and Ken Odiorne took the field for the first time.
Next week Total Depravity takes on defending champs Sparkly $2 Bills (aka the Pink Team) at 8:oo PM at C. Ray Buck Sports Park.
Thursday, August 19, 2010
Special Teams
Note: The following has been taken from the September 2010 Boulevard Good News, our monthly newsletter.
Special Teams in football is dirty work. Thankless except for the kicker and the guy who catches the kicks, players on Special Teams got virtually no credit for when it went right and all the blame when something goes horribly wrong. I remember one game in particular when we had given up one touchdown and one near touchdown to what could best be called a mediocre team. Guys were not tackling, which happens to be the sole job of kickoff special teams, and so when the kickoff team took the field after an interception turned touchdown, the Special Teams Coach raced up and down the sidelines shouting “If not you, who? If not now, when?” Flapping his arms, shouting at his players, the coach continued up until the point the opposing team fumbled the ball, picked it up again, and went 80 something yards for yet another score.
I took the field as the kickoff return squad came off the field, and was not present for what had to have been an intense sideline intervention. Perhaps unluckily, my offensive unit made short work, scored quickly, and upon kicking the extra point, the previously inept kickoff crew took the field. Much to everyone’s shock a tackle was made minus any fanfare or celebrations. The 2nd sting Linebacker who made the stop trotted off the field, took off his helmet, and awaited what happened next. Being a friend of mine, I asked him the day after what transpired on the sidelines, and he said the Special Teams Coach went to every member of the squad and asked “If you don’t tackle this guy, who will?” My friend later remarked, “he made it personal.”
Boulevard has not fumbled the ball nor have we given up any touchdowns. We have not shirked our responsibility nor have we thought following the Call of the Spirit was “someone else’s job.” Boulevard has been faithful and true to the Call that runs throughout this congregation, and it is not because we have not, but precisely because we have listened for God’ Call that we are embarking on a new era of being the church; an era of imagination and possibility.
Starting now, and continuing into the Fall, meetings are happening and plans are in the works to provide opportunities for everyone to get involved on personal level and take ownership of how you engage your faith. We will see more and imaginative missions and community outreach, we will see the formation of small groups around topics, service, and much more, and we will see the dreams many of you shared with our Appreciative Inquiry group, the aptly named Dream Team, work to come alive and viable. But none of this happens automatically just because we want it.
“He made it personal”, replied my friend. Like the responsibilities of a special teamer to tackle the runner, we here at Boulevard must also take the work of the Church personally too. We must
reorient our passions, our energy, and even our time to help make the things we dream about like mission trips for the youth, outreach to the community, and fighting hunger and poverty personal and by doing, make these things possible. I hope you will join us!
Special Teams in football is dirty work. Thankless except for the kicker and the guy who catches the kicks, players on Special Teams got virtually no credit for when it went right and all the blame when something goes horribly wrong. I remember one game in particular when we had given up one touchdown and one near touchdown to what could best be called a mediocre team. Guys were not tackling, which happens to be the sole job of kickoff special teams, and so when the kickoff team took the field after an interception turned touchdown, the Special Teams Coach raced up and down the sidelines shouting “If not you, who? If not now, when?” Flapping his arms, shouting at his players, the coach continued up until the point the opposing team fumbled the ball, picked it up again, and went 80 something yards for yet another score.
I took the field as the kickoff return squad came off the field, and was not present for what had to have been an intense sideline intervention. Perhaps unluckily, my offensive unit made short work, scored quickly, and upon kicking the extra point, the previously inept kickoff crew took the field. Much to everyone’s shock a tackle was made minus any fanfare or celebrations. The 2nd sting Linebacker who made the stop trotted off the field, took off his helmet, and awaited what happened next. Being a friend of mine, I asked him the day after what transpired on the sidelines, and he said the Special Teams Coach went to every member of the squad and asked “If you don’t tackle this guy, who will?” My friend later remarked, “he made it personal.”
Boulevard has not fumbled the ball nor have we given up any touchdowns. We have not shirked our responsibility nor have we thought following the Call of the Spirit was “someone else’s job.” Boulevard has been faithful and true to the Call that runs throughout this congregation, and it is not because we have not, but precisely because we have listened for God’ Call that we are embarking on a new era of being the church; an era of imagination and possibility.
Starting now, and continuing into the Fall, meetings are happening and plans are in the works to provide opportunities for everyone to get involved on personal level and take ownership of how you engage your faith. We will see more and imaginative missions and community outreach, we will see the formation of small groups around topics, service, and much more, and we will see the dreams many of you shared with our Appreciative Inquiry group, the aptly named Dream Team, work to come alive and viable. But none of this happens automatically just because we want it.
“He made it personal”, replied my friend. Like the responsibilities of a special teamer to tackle the runner, we here at Boulevard must also take the work of the Church personally too. We must
reorient our passions, our energy, and even our time to help make the things we dream about like mission trips for the youth, outreach to the community, and fighting hunger and poverty personal and by doing, make these things possible. I hope you will join us!
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Finding Jesus in the Scrambled Eggs
Today was the Men's Prayer Breakfast. It started at 7am. But the food doesn't cook itself. So to say it started at 7am is a little misleading. I really started around 5:15am when I got out of bed.
Folks here at Boulevard have heard me say that there is very little in life that cannot wait until 9am. It is not so much a personal rule but a guideline. I, as you may have already picked up, am a reluctant morning person. I am highly functional, articulate and require no assistance from coffee, but I am those things only when duty and service to humanity calls. For the great guys that make up the Men's Prayer Breakfast here at Boulevard I will gladly wake up early and do what I can to make a tasty breakfast. It is my pleasure. The same holds true for the other times in life when early rising & productivity is helpful to those folks I care about like my wife who will need to be at the airport on a chilly Sunday in November for her 6am flight to Denver. I am glad to do it. But I have to wonder... would I get up at 4am make breakfast, drive to the airport, or wait in line for concert tickets for a total stranger? Would I sacrifice my sleep, my routine for you, unknown blog reader? The honest answer is probably not.
Jesus always seemed to have something to say about loving and respecting your neighbors. Love them as you love yourself was one of his greatest hits & a personal favorite of mine but the rub is this: 4am. I am ready to wrestle bears for the Lord or neighbor at 10:30am, but 4am seems like a deal breaker. It is a bit more than I am willing to commit, which is personally convicting in light of the passage from Romans that we read together at this morning's Men's Prayer Breakfast. Paul writes, "present yourselves as a living sacrifice...", which as James pointed out, meant that like the saricifces of old, what you brought to the Temple you were not bringing back. To put it bluntly: what we give to God isn't ours anymore.
We all have growing edges when it comes to understanding the personal side of faith. The work of God in Christ isn't available for personal compartmentalization in the same way that many of us can distinguish and separate between the pulls of life (ex. work life vs. personal life). We will all need help seeing that the love Christ speaks of when it comes to our neighbors is bigger, more expansive than our limited understanding, and one that will provide constant opportunity to be stretched and moved to a more inclusive faith - one that compels us to serve without limitations and barriers.
So 4am it is.
Folks here at Boulevard have heard me say that there is very little in life that cannot wait until 9am. It is not so much a personal rule but a guideline. I, as you may have already picked up, am a reluctant morning person. I am highly functional, articulate and require no assistance from coffee, but I am those things only when duty and service to humanity calls. For the great guys that make up the Men's Prayer Breakfast here at Boulevard I will gladly wake up early and do what I can to make a tasty breakfast. It is my pleasure. The same holds true for the other times in life when early rising & productivity is helpful to those folks I care about like my wife who will need to be at the airport on a chilly Sunday in November for her 6am flight to Denver. I am glad to do it. But I have to wonder... would I get up at 4am make breakfast, drive to the airport, or wait in line for concert tickets for a total stranger? Would I sacrifice my sleep, my routine for you, unknown blog reader? The honest answer is probably not.
Jesus always seemed to have something to say about loving and respecting your neighbors. Love them as you love yourself was one of his greatest hits & a personal favorite of mine but the rub is this: 4am. I am ready to wrestle bears for the Lord or neighbor at 10:30am, but 4am seems like a deal breaker. It is a bit more than I am willing to commit, which is personally convicting in light of the passage from Romans that we read together at this morning's Men's Prayer Breakfast. Paul writes, "present yourselves as a living sacrifice...", which as James pointed out, meant that like the saricifces of old, what you brought to the Temple you were not bringing back. To put it bluntly: what we give to God isn't ours anymore.
We all have growing edges when it comes to understanding the personal side of faith. The work of God in Christ isn't available for personal compartmentalization in the same way that many of us can distinguish and separate between the pulls of life (ex. work life vs. personal life). We will all need help seeing that the love Christ speaks of when it comes to our neighbors is bigger, more expansive than our limited understanding, and one that will provide constant opportunity to be stretched and moved to a more inclusive faith - one that compels us to serve without limitations and barriers.
So 4am it is.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Walk Off Home Run moves Total Depravity to 2-0
Solid defense and smart base-running set the stage for Jon Stephen (pictured to the right making a catch) & his walk-off home-run in the bottom of the final extra inning to propel Total Depravity, Boulevard Presbyterian's Kickball team to 2-0.The game began with some ambiguity as Barley, our black-clad opponents were unsure if they had the minimum of number of players to field an official team for the August 15th 6:00 PM outing. A last minute female, who came to the game as a spectator, thus explaining her stylish footwear, stepped in gave Barley the minimum and cleared the way for the contest.
In the early innings, solid defense prevailed for Total Depravity as it held Barley scoreless and jumped out to a 2-0 lead on the 1st of Jon Stephens' two home-runs. Barley's scoreless streak would become short lived, as they found their footing and quickly tied the contest that would turn into a sew-saw battle all the way into the bottom of the 7th and only extra inning allowed by Parks and Recreation rules.
With the game tied at 5-5, Barley stranded the go-ahead run when the last out was recorded on an infield fly. Clearing the way for walk-off heroics, and Total Depravity's second win of the season, Barley took the field in their standard alignment. Enter Jon Stephens, who had already recorded Total Depravity's 1st home-run of the year with a shot to right field, lined up and booted the ball deep left field, bouncing past the left fielder as Stephens rounded 1st. Hustling, Stephens approached 3rd when the cut-off fielder got control of the ball, and sensing destiny and his chance at Boulevard recreational sports immortality, Stephens rounded 3rd and beat the throw home amid the cheers and celebrations of his fellow teammates.
For Total Depravity historians this game represented a number of milestones. Our 6-5 victory over Barley represented the first time back-to-back victories were recorded, as well as the first time a player has kicked two home-runs in one game, as well the first walk-off victory. Individually, Stephens' home-runs puts him in the All-Time lead. Also Adam Anderson, a 5-tool newcomer for Total Depravity, executed the first (intentional) slide to reach 3rd base.
Join us next week Sunday, August 23rd at 6:00 PM as Total Depravity defends its win steak against newcomers The Grasskickers at C. Ray Buck Sports Park.
Sermon: The Present Time - Luke 12:49-56
Last Sunday it was hot.
Let’s be honest, its been hot just about all this month, and try as we might, sometimes it is hard to get this sanctuary comfortable for worship. Because the choir was singing this old fan right above me was flipped on to blow some relief to the members of the choir. Depending where I stand up here I can feel the breeze it produces, and last Sunday I really enjoyed having it on. But something funny happened.
Did you ever have one of those memories that just shows up, out of nowhere, and hijacks your thoughts? Maybe it was triggered by a smell, a sound, a song, or in my case, from the breeze from a blowing fan. Standing up, singing the opening songs and hymn, I was transported back to my early high school years and there before all of you I stopped singing and I was terrified to realize I could think of only one thing: Baywatch.
The fact that my mind flashed back to Baywatch when we were worshiping the Holy, Everlasting God may be counted as further evidence of my depravity, but there is was: Baywatch. With it’s red swimsuit beach bunnies, and slow motion running; hair constantly being blown to and fro, and its almost universal appeal to my former demographic of 14 year old, puberty riddled high school freshmen. I say “almost universal appeal” because even at 14 I didn’t like the show. Now, I understood why my friend David did. Shoot, I understood why everybody did (I am not sure if you can see me but I am raising and lowering my eyebrows suggestively), but I needed something a little more than buxom beach babes to require my attention. But then again, I have always been the holder of minority opinions.
I don’t like Bob Dylan’s music, I like Oatmeal Raisin cookies over Chocolate Chip, I unabashedly wear white after Labor Day, I voted for John Kerry, I think Pete Rose should go into the Hall of Fame, and on that summer day in high school I told my friend David I didn’t like Baywatch. Actually I told him I thought it was dumb, and he was being a jerk for running the ol’ bait and switch. I rode over to David’s with a 12 pack of Mountain Dew under my arm, for promises of pizza & a night of video games. When I arrived the pizza was there but the video games were replaced by the blondes of Baywatch bounding across the aptly named boob-tube. What happened next was what I think it was what the fan was trying to get me to remember as I had our scripture floating around in the back of my head. I got up, and made sure that David, and really anyone within ear-shot heard my thoughts on his shenanigans, Baywatch, and a few choice remarks on friendship, and left. Riding home that night, sans my Mountain Dew, I knew that standing up, and speaking out was going to affect my friendship with David, and it did.
Maybe for you it isn’t Baywatch, or TV at all. Maybe for you it is politics, or your work situation. Perhaps you and your brothers and sisters don’t agree on how best to care for aging parents. Then again, maybe it is TV, but it is here that you make your stand. You lend you voice to an issue, you debate, engage, enrage, isolate, alienate; your cautioned that you are making a scene, coming too close to the 3rd rail. So you abdicate, regress, confess, readdress the issue softly, jokingly like it never was a big deal, and hearing the words of Rodney King echoing somewhere in the corner of your mind, you decide “yes, I think that we can all just get along.” Certainly Baywatch, Bob Dylan, or Pete Rose isn’t worth the social equivalent of the Alamo – an ill-fated last stand that everybody seemingly wants you to remember.
“Can’t we all just get along?” seems like a worthy goal, doesn’t it? For many of us it might even be a prayer. Wars rage, genocide is a word our children will grow up knowing all to well, and in the crucial moments of history, when a glimmer of hope shines in the darkness of terrible situations it seems that we always find men and women arguing rather than coming together to effect change. Wouldn’t it be easier, or rather, wouldn’t it be better if we put our partisan bickering aside and got to work? Rolled up our sleeves and helped people without all the hot-air and blue ribbon committees? What if we all just got along? If this is indeed our dream, the passage from Luke today is profoundly upsetting.
"Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!” Father against son, daughter against mother, and while I didn’t need Jesus to tell me that I wouldn’t always see eye to eye with my in-laws, the hard truth of this message is that disagreement will be a constant companion for anyone seeking to live out the Gospel. Families, communities, groups of people all the world around exist in some way due to the harmony that comes with the status quo. The perpetual predictability, the entrenchment in safety, and the elimination of the stress of doing something new, trying something different is built into the fabric of society & we are taught at an early age that individuality is ok but conformity is better. Schools reinforce it, companies exist by it, but the “voice crying out in the wilderness” was not proclaiming the coming age of business as usual.
Like John the Baptist before him, Jesus raises his voice to offer a new way, a different way; a minority-report on how to live, love, show grace and mercy, and to care, and respect the stranger. It is from Jesus that we hear “you have heard it said, but I say unto you”; words that help us understand that Jesus sees his mission not to ordain and validate the status quo but rather to show a new, a better way. Jesus was, and still is the voice of dissent. The Gospel that we believe in and seek to live our lives by should never be put on the back-burner in favor of conformity, in favor of the status quo. The Gospel is by definition something different, something loud and obnoxious to be lived out in the very communities that tend to favor everyone getting along. It requires decision and commitment, and therefore families will disagree about it, communities will splinter along issues, and churches will have its factions but ours is the faith of a “new way” and silence is never golden.
The world today, the Present Time, needs your voice. The divisions that come will one day lead to a true reconciliation, but first we need to divide, to set apart – not by splintering and forming new churches and institutions but by grabbing the 3rd rail, and speaking out when it isn’t popular, or perhaps even welcome, but we grab the 3rd rail confident that its there that we find all the power. Power to be part of the Kingdom of God breaking into the world. A world where evil goes unchecked because as Edmund Burke famously remarked good people “do nothing.” Power to stand on faith though our voices may still shake. Power that by speaking out, we inspire others to lend their voices, just as those who came before have inspired us. The Book of Hebrews speaks of the “great cloud of witnesses”; generations of the faithful who have gone out before us, inspiring us, and giving us a model of how to live faithfully in trying times. From their ranks we find those who spoke up against tyranny, slavery, injustice, and oppression when the culture wanted to hear none of it, but it is there too that we find men and women much like yourselves who have stood up for what they thought was right, and have paid the price. My relationship with David wasn’t ever the same, and many of you have paid far worse but in that moment I hope you can see that you were not alone.
We need men and women to speak out and show that faithful, intelligent, passionate people disagree over the fundamental, the elemental building blocks of life – human rights, law, the poor, the oppressed, and more – and in so doing crave out place where with respect, grace and love we engage the issues that define our life. I remember the first time I had a fundamental disagreement with my Mom. Neither one of us would concede, and I remember thinking “My mom is kind of crazy.” Around and around we went, and it wasn’t until she paused and told me she understood what I was saying, why I said it, and why it was important to me but she just didn’t agree with what I had to say. She went on to suggest that perhaps we could start over, this time with an understanding that we didn’t come to our views casually but they were born out of something deep and impacting.
I am found of a story I heard from a Rabbi, who told of two men who both worked in a mine, and whose job it was to carry heavy loads of rocks from the valley to the top of the hill. One day, one of the workers lingered too long at the top of the hill and overheard the men who took his rocks that what he carried contained diamonds. What an honor he had been trusted with, especially when the other man carried only rocks. The next day he lingered at the top of the hill and overheard that the rocks the other man carried contained emeralds, and so each and every day thereafter the man walked up the hill with deep respect for his fellow worker. If we, brothers and sisters, know of the diamonds we carry, it is easy to see the emeralds in the basket of others.
It will not be easy.We cannot do this alone. We must lean into the witness of those who have come before and into the transforming power of the Holy Spirit.We pray that our voices be strong, our convictions steady, and may we walk in the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ with confidence that the Kingdom of God is indeed near, and with it comes a true reconciliation.
Let’s be honest, its been hot just about all this month, and try as we might, sometimes it is hard to get this sanctuary comfortable for worship. Because the choir was singing this old fan right above me was flipped on to blow some relief to the members of the choir. Depending where I stand up here I can feel the breeze it produces, and last Sunday I really enjoyed having it on. But something funny happened.
Did you ever have one of those memories that just shows up, out of nowhere, and hijacks your thoughts? Maybe it was triggered by a smell, a sound, a song, or in my case, from the breeze from a blowing fan. Standing up, singing the opening songs and hymn, I was transported back to my early high school years and there before all of you I stopped singing and I was terrified to realize I could think of only one thing: Baywatch.
The fact that my mind flashed back to Baywatch when we were worshiping the Holy, Everlasting God may be counted as further evidence of my depravity, but there is was: Baywatch. With it’s red swimsuit beach bunnies, and slow motion running; hair constantly being blown to and fro, and its almost universal appeal to my former demographic of 14 year old, puberty riddled high school freshmen. I say “almost universal appeal” because even at 14 I didn’t like the show. Now, I understood why my friend David did. Shoot, I understood why everybody did (I am not sure if you can see me but I am raising and lowering my eyebrows suggestively), but I needed something a little more than buxom beach babes to require my attention. But then again, I have always been the holder of minority opinions.
I don’t like Bob Dylan’s music, I like Oatmeal Raisin cookies over Chocolate Chip, I unabashedly wear white after Labor Day, I voted for John Kerry, I think Pete Rose should go into the Hall of Fame, and on that summer day in high school I told my friend David I didn’t like Baywatch. Actually I told him I thought it was dumb, and he was being a jerk for running the ol’ bait and switch. I rode over to David’s with a 12 pack of Mountain Dew under my arm, for promises of pizza & a night of video games. When I arrived the pizza was there but the video games were replaced by the blondes of Baywatch bounding across the aptly named boob-tube. What happened next was what I think it was what the fan was trying to get me to remember as I had our scripture floating around in the back of my head. I got up, and made sure that David, and really anyone within ear-shot heard my thoughts on his shenanigans, Baywatch, and a few choice remarks on friendship, and left. Riding home that night, sans my Mountain Dew, I knew that standing up, and speaking out was going to affect my friendship with David, and it did.
Maybe for you it isn’t Baywatch, or TV at all. Maybe for you it is politics, or your work situation. Perhaps you and your brothers and sisters don’t agree on how best to care for aging parents. Then again, maybe it is TV, but it is here that you make your stand. You lend you voice to an issue, you debate, engage, enrage, isolate, alienate; your cautioned that you are making a scene, coming too close to the 3rd rail. So you abdicate, regress, confess, readdress the issue softly, jokingly like it never was a big deal, and hearing the words of Rodney King echoing somewhere in the corner of your mind, you decide “yes, I think that we can all just get along.” Certainly Baywatch, Bob Dylan, or Pete Rose isn’t worth the social equivalent of the Alamo – an ill-fated last stand that everybody seemingly wants you to remember.
“Can’t we all just get along?” seems like a worthy goal, doesn’t it? For many of us it might even be a prayer. Wars rage, genocide is a word our children will grow up knowing all to well, and in the crucial moments of history, when a glimmer of hope shines in the darkness of terrible situations it seems that we always find men and women arguing rather than coming together to effect change. Wouldn’t it be easier, or rather, wouldn’t it be better if we put our partisan bickering aside and got to work? Rolled up our sleeves and helped people without all the hot-air and blue ribbon committees? What if we all just got along? If this is indeed our dream, the passage from Luke today is profoundly upsetting.
"Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!” Father against son, daughter against mother, and while I didn’t need Jesus to tell me that I wouldn’t always see eye to eye with my in-laws, the hard truth of this message is that disagreement will be a constant companion for anyone seeking to live out the Gospel. Families, communities, groups of people all the world around exist in some way due to the harmony that comes with the status quo. The perpetual predictability, the entrenchment in safety, and the elimination of the stress of doing something new, trying something different is built into the fabric of society & we are taught at an early age that individuality is ok but conformity is better. Schools reinforce it, companies exist by it, but the “voice crying out in the wilderness” was not proclaiming the coming age of business as usual.
Like John the Baptist before him, Jesus raises his voice to offer a new way, a different way; a minority-report on how to live, love, show grace and mercy, and to care, and respect the stranger. It is from Jesus that we hear “you have heard it said, but I say unto you”; words that help us understand that Jesus sees his mission not to ordain and validate the status quo but rather to show a new, a better way. Jesus was, and still is the voice of dissent. The Gospel that we believe in and seek to live our lives by should never be put on the back-burner in favor of conformity, in favor of the status quo. The Gospel is by definition something different, something loud and obnoxious to be lived out in the very communities that tend to favor everyone getting along. It requires decision and commitment, and therefore families will disagree about it, communities will splinter along issues, and churches will have its factions but ours is the faith of a “new way” and silence is never golden.
The world today, the Present Time, needs your voice. The divisions that come will one day lead to a true reconciliation, but first we need to divide, to set apart – not by splintering and forming new churches and institutions but by grabbing the 3rd rail, and speaking out when it isn’t popular, or perhaps even welcome, but we grab the 3rd rail confident that its there that we find all the power. Power to be part of the Kingdom of God breaking into the world. A world where evil goes unchecked because as Edmund Burke famously remarked good people “do nothing.” Power to stand on faith though our voices may still shake. Power that by speaking out, we inspire others to lend their voices, just as those who came before have inspired us. The Book of Hebrews speaks of the “great cloud of witnesses”; generations of the faithful who have gone out before us, inspiring us, and giving us a model of how to live faithfully in trying times. From their ranks we find those who spoke up against tyranny, slavery, injustice, and oppression when the culture wanted to hear none of it, but it is there too that we find men and women much like yourselves who have stood up for what they thought was right, and have paid the price. My relationship with David wasn’t ever the same, and many of you have paid far worse but in that moment I hope you can see that you were not alone.
We need men and women to speak out and show that faithful, intelligent, passionate people disagree over the fundamental, the elemental building blocks of life – human rights, law, the poor, the oppressed, and more – and in so doing crave out place where with respect, grace and love we engage the issues that define our life. I remember the first time I had a fundamental disagreement with my Mom. Neither one of us would concede, and I remember thinking “My mom is kind of crazy.” Around and around we went, and it wasn’t until she paused and told me she understood what I was saying, why I said it, and why it was important to me but she just didn’t agree with what I had to say. She went on to suggest that perhaps we could start over, this time with an understanding that we didn’t come to our views casually but they were born out of something deep and impacting.
I am found of a story I heard from a Rabbi, who told of two men who both worked in a mine, and whose job it was to carry heavy loads of rocks from the valley to the top of the hill. One day, one of the workers lingered too long at the top of the hill and overheard the men who took his rocks that what he carried contained diamonds. What an honor he had been trusted with, especially when the other man carried only rocks. The next day he lingered at the top of the hill and overheard that the rocks the other man carried contained emeralds, and so each and every day thereafter the man walked up the hill with deep respect for his fellow worker. If we, brothers and sisters, know of the diamonds we carry, it is easy to see the emeralds in the basket of others.
It will not be easy.We cannot do this alone. We must lean into the witness of those who have come before and into the transforming power of the Holy Spirit.We pray that our voices be strong, our convictions steady, and may we walk in the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ with confidence that the Kingdom of God is indeed near, and with it comes a true reconciliation.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
I don't like Bob Dylan's music
There I said it. It has been brewing up for sometime now and I have decided it is time to stand up and declare that despite the fact that he is a so-called "genius", despite the fact that he is an "icon" in American music, despite his intriguing life and lyrics, I just plain don't care for Bob Dylan's music. I could get into why. I could tell you all about how his voice drives me nutty, or how fans of his music always want to sing along in an impersonated Dylan voice, but my reasons aren't the point. The point is this: I don't like Bob Dylan's music.
I bring this up because in my specific circle of friends, like many of your friends, there are some realities that will distance you from the pack if made public. The music of Bob Dylan is my social leprosy; casting me out to the far reaches of the acceptable circle where only those along the watchtower can keep an eye on my movements. Knowing this, I keep my mouth shut for the umpteenth time and I grin and bear it. But no more! I am standing up before cyberspace, and whoever else may read this and declare I vote NAY on yet another spin of Blonde on Blonde. Popularity be damned.
Real dissension isn't usually centered around Bob Dylan. Real dissension, the kind for which your standing up might produce fractures and upsets along relational, social, and institutional lines, is the 3rd rail of living in community. Touch it and die. Resist the status quo by standing up for what you believe, what you feel your faith, your love, your sense of right and wrong dictates and you quickly become "that person" who "crashes" city council meetings, and can't leave well enough alone. How many voices have been silenced because we prefer the status quo? How many times have we settled on preservation of the institution rather than listen to voices of dissent?
The 3rd rail might kill you but it is only because that is where all the real power is. Stand up and let your voice be heard.
I bring this up because in my specific circle of friends, like many of your friends, there are some realities that will distance you from the pack if made public. The music of Bob Dylan is my social leprosy; casting me out to the far reaches of the acceptable circle where only those along the watchtower can keep an eye on my movements. Knowing this, I keep my mouth shut for the umpteenth time and I grin and bear it. But no more! I am standing up before cyberspace, and whoever else may read this and declare I vote NAY on yet another spin of Blonde on Blonde. Popularity be damned.
Real dissension isn't usually centered around Bob Dylan. Real dissension, the kind for which your standing up might produce fractures and upsets along relational, social, and institutional lines, is the 3rd rail of living in community. Touch it and die. Resist the status quo by standing up for what you believe, what you feel your faith, your love, your sense of right and wrong dictates and you quickly become "that person" who "crashes" city council meetings, and can't leave well enough alone. How many voices have been silenced because we prefer the status quo? How many times have we settled on preservation of the institution rather than listen to voices of dissent?
The 3rd rail might kill you but it is only because that is where all the real power is. Stand up and let your voice be heard.
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Kickball Begins Sunday, August 8th
I just got word this weekend that the Grandview Heights Adult Kickball League begins Sunday, August 8th. For the good folks at Boulevard who are risking (or guaranteeing) pulled muscles, minor injuries of body and pride, and the occasional over-zealous Kickball All-Star, the season truly is a highlight of the year and a great way for people to get together and have some fun.
Come on out next Sunday, August 8th. Games are held at C. Ray Buck Sports Park located on Goodale Ave. Game time is 4pm.
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