Is LeBron James humble?

This week LeBron James was applauded as a great basketball player but not a humble one. He said he was the greatest basketball player on the planet. I would not bet against that statement. Michael Jordan said he could beat any one of his current players one on one. I think he was right. He still is great although he didn't claim to be able to beat LeBron one on one. Greatness is a passing fashion. Tomorrow LeBron may not be the greatest any more. I watched the film about Stephen Hawking, The Theory of Everything, this week. He claimed to be the greatest, too, as great as god who he did not believe in. His wife said one of the reasons she stayed with him as long as she did was because someone needed to tell him he was not god. He was not. He was the smartest person on the planet at one time, that might be true. Some one will come along who is smarter.

Is it humility if you are great and deny it. God is great he says and He is good and created everything and claimed it was all very good. He wants us to praise him for his greatness. Yet, he wants us to be humble too. So, what is humility?

The prophet Micah tells us what God wants from us: to do justice, love kindness and to walk humbly with him. How can some one walk with God and not be humbled?

The NY Yankees held one of their Old Timers games this week when they honor past Yankee greats. Jim Leyritz, who starred for the Yankees in the 1996 world series, and then became a Yankee outcast for a while after a 2007 DUI and vehicular homicide charges was back in Yankee pin stripes. He said he had been humbled and then some amazing things happened. He is now doing some work for the Yankee front office and charity work. He pointed to A-Rod's own amazing turn around and hinted that A-Rod's humbling in his year out of baseball punishment for using PEDS has been a blessing for him. He said baseball players can start to think they are bigger than they are and need to be humbled some times.

Life can be humbling. Bodies break down. Marriages fail. Skills are lost. Good jobs are hard to come by. You don't have to look too far to see people living in humbling circumstances. There are wars and rumors of wars and refugee camps and all kinds of places where people are eking out an existence. The Old Testament word for humble started out as a word to describe the poor who had no land of their own and therefore no means of support.  They were often abused and oppressed by the more fortunate. Sort of the way it has always been.

In the New Testament several writers urge Christians to be humble which in the Greek world was equated with lowliness and shamefulness and was to avoided at all costs.

The rabbis taught their people to be humble which was seen as a necessary virtue for the help of God now and in the future. The New Testament writers saw humility as a sign of the kingdom of God. God regarded the low estate of Mary, the mother of Jesus. John the Baptist lived humbly and simply and his preaching "brought every mountain and hill low." Jesus was "gentle and humble in heart" and blessed those followers who were meek.

Several times in the Bible, we are told to humble ourselves before God and He will lift us up. At the end, the humble will be exalted and the proud put down.

Humbling yourself or being humbled by life or by God is not a matter of self abasement or false humility, its more like seeing yourself as you see others. Frederick Buechner wrote that humility is not thinking ill of yourself but thinking of yourself the way you think of anybody else.

Do We Need the New Testament?

John Goldingay (JG) is one of my favorite Old Testament teachers. He has a number of short commentaries on Old Testament books that are accessible for daily reading of the Scripture with comment by JG. He has written many other larger works, as well. He is sort of the NT Wright of Old Testament studies. Or the First Testament as JG prefers to call the Old Testament. He believes the OT has been neglected by the Christians. Ever since Marcion (influential leader of the early Church who didn't think we needed the OT) gave it a bad review the OT has had a hard time gaining traction among Christians. It remains like a very poor cousin of the New Testament. In JG's latest book, Do We Need the New Testament?, (how's that for a provocative title?) he wants the OT to get the respect it deserves. It should have been entitled, Why We Really, Really Need the Old Testament because right on page one of the text he admits we do, of course, need the New Testament! Of course, we do. But in the process of coming to that conclusion, he argues that we need the Old Testament just as much as we need the New. In fact, he says, we neglect the OT to our peril.

He makes the case that most Christians are closet Marcionites. We have the NT and we don't really know why we still need to read the OT except to mine it for Sunday School stories about the heroes of the faith. We may not admit it but we probably believe that the God of the OT is a god of wrath and we need the NT Jesus to balance that account as the God of Love. We probably believe the OT has examples of God's people hating their enemies (and killing them) while the NT teaches us to love our enemies. Most likely we believe the NT teaches us grace whereas the OT is all about the law. The OT used animal sacrifice to pay for our sins and set us right with God over against the NT which shows us Jesus paying for our sins. There is no more need for sacrifice, or the law or a priesthood. Isn't the what the book of Hebrews teaches? We may think the OT is mostly for ethnic Jews while the mission of the NT is take the gospel to all people. Most importantly, now we know we have direct access to God through Jesus instead of going through that whole OT religious system.

If we believe any of those things, we need to read this book because JG will prove us wrong.

And additionally, he will show us how our worship, prayers, social justice ministries, mission enterprises, and politics need to be informed by the OT. In a word, JG believes Christians have misread the OT (if indeed they have read it) and it shows.

There are some points I would argue with JG about but I think it is mostly a matter of semantics and where he puts the emphasis. JG's passion for the OT comes across in this book and I hope it rubs off on many of us in the Church.

Beginnings, again

Interesting to come across a new book on Genesis and the questions of origins from an Evangelical who has taught at two well known Christian colleges. I went to one of them and I did not get my Old Testament foundation from anyone like this! Evangelicals have changed. At first when I heard of this book I wondered why we need another book on Genesis to go over the same territory Evangelicals have fought over for years. Then, upon reading a couple reviews, I decided to take a look. This book is different. John Walton who wrote,  The Lost World of Adam and Eve, is a careful Old Testament scholar who goes where the text leads him. He does not read his Evangelical theology and traditions back into the text. He does not believe Genesis needs to be read as six literal creation days. Adam and Eve do not have to be the first human beings. The serpent does have to be the personification of satan. And Eve may have tasted fruit outside the garden and the temptation may have taken place there, as well. Walton is not afraid of asking the questions that are in the text and coming up with non - traditional answers - for an Evangelical. That is refreshing. Walton knows the world in which the Old Testament stories circulated and he frequently refers to those non - Israelite stories and the influence they may have had. I was pleasantly surprised by Walton's book. I am sure he will take some flack for it. I was also somehow dissatisfied by it. It is technical, academic, learned and a bit dry. It's the facts and the explanations and the cross cultural references but I found myself wondering where the mystery had gone. After a close analysis of Eden the big picture got lost. What does it all mean for me, for us?

Evangelicals have read Genesis (and the Bible) not closely enough usually depending on what the experts tell them is ok to believe. They have not read it imaginatively which is too bad because it is such a wonderful story. It is said the text cannot mean what it did not mean to the first readers (Walton makes much of this). So, when we are reasonably certain what it meant then we can know what it means so we can apply it to our situations. The problem is the Bible as a whole story of God's dealings with humanity for our good can mean things that the first readers would not have heard and that does not make the interpretation a bad one. Our applications can be different from what "theirs" were and how do we know what theirs were anyway?

The tendency of Evangelical scholars like Walton is to read the text so closely so they can say, definitively, what the text meant and means and how it is to be applied. That can inhibit creatively engaging with the text, too. We Evangelicals who are people of the Book, may be slightly intimidated by the Book and afraid to come up with a "wrong" interpretation. We have been warned about the likes of Bruggemann and Crossan and Borg. Except when we do read them we find our imaginations opening up. The text is saying something surprising to us and that is a good thing. The ten commandments may have been written in stone but the interpretation of the Bible was not. We can hear God speak to us today.

I am going to take a Bible (probably The Message) and start reading in Genesis. I am going to keep a journal and take notes on what I'm reading. I want to hear God's word anew, afresh, and not read it as if I know already what it means. I am going to take a guy like Bruggemann or some one else who is outside the Evangelical mainstream or who is not quite so Eurocentric and see what he has to say about the text. The stories in the Bible, as Bruggemann says, are not there to aid us in our theologizing but to "catch us in our living." I want to be caught.

Prayer helps

I led our congregation in the prayers of the people. I gave a short talk on prayer to introduce it. I talked about my struggles in prayer. I said I was not very good at it even after so many years as a pastor. Being a pastor does not make it any easier to pray; there is no "direct line" from the Rev. to God like some people believe. Pastors have more practice in public praying and they can sound more eloquent some times but eloquence does not automatically make a prayer good. Many pastors like many people find themselves dissatisfied with their prayers. They should go longer, deeper, be more spirit filled, and effortless. Instead, praying can be like pulling teeth except when you're done you don't even have the teeth to show for it. So, I went on to share a little of how I deal with my feelings of unfulfilled praying. Afterwards, one of our members thanked me for my words and told me he felt like he he had been in a prayer drought for like ten years! I am certain other church leaders could say the same.

I shared some stuff from a book I had been reading, Long Wandering Prayer, by David Hansen. It was written in 2001 and is out of print. That's too bad because it is a good book on prayer by another pastor who struggles with it. The book, while short, is wandering like the praying he proposes in it. He is all over the place but it is the kind of book I like. It's like a hike in the woods when if you are paying attention you can uncover all sorts of cool things. Hansen suggests that maybe we try too hard; we have ideas of prayer that are more about how we are doing than what God is doing. We evaluate them by how we feel about them when we don't have a clue what God was thinking. Hansen confesses he has a hard time sitting in one place and praying. He can manage about ten minutes of that. So, he often wanders: hiking, fishing, walking around town or the church facility. As he wanders, he prays. As Hansen gets visual clues from his surroundings he prays for them. Some people might say he is goofing off but he says he is praying. I have found that praying when you are not "praying" can make for some of the best prayer times. Maybe that is what Paul meant when he talked about praying without ceasing. When I force myself to sit, or attend a long prayer meeting with what seems like interminable prayer lists, I become bored and agitated. But, when I walk and pray the time almost flies by. When I wake in the middle of the night and pray instead of tossing, I have found a better use of time. When I take out the Psalms and pray through a few I can find words for my prayers that I usually don't come up with on my own.

I know I need to pray and I want to pray. Left to my own devices I don't do too well. With the help of books like Hansen's I am encouraged to try less hard and actually pray more. With Scriptures like the Lord's Prayer and the Psalms as mentors, I can pray better.

In the wilderness

Christians have often looked at the wilderness as a place of adversity that tests one's faith. It is place to learn some hard lessons about what it means to follow Christ. Some lessons can only be learned through the adversity of the wilderness. God allowed his people in the Old Testament to live in the wilderness for years. Jesus went out into the wilderness at the start of his ministry where he was tempted by the devil. Many early Christians sought to live in the wilderness as a means to fortify their faith. The wilderness meant stripping life down to essentials. It meant the end of self - sufficiencies and depending on God.

The wilderness is the place where God can become real. His power is seen in forces of nature. His glory in the mountains and the sunrise. His abundant grace in the variety of flora and fauna.

The wilderness is the setting for the movie, Wild, which stars Reese Witherspoon and was based on the book by Cheryl Strayed. Ms Strayed is an unlikely hiker to show up one day to begin the Pacific Coast Trail. She embarks on a 1200 mile journey through unforgiving wilderness with no preparation and so much new REI stuff in her backpack she struggles to stand up with it on her back. She is there not to experience the hike but to find some order and discipline in her chaotic life. She has to do this for survival. Her mother died young of cancer and her life has spiraled out of control through a series of very casual sexual relationships and drug abuse.

She is seeking her salvation in the wilderness. She is looking for God who she does not believe cares about her or even exists yet she is angry at him nonetheless. Surprising herself, she finishes the trek and in the process becomes an able hiker. She has found some peace in her life and she is confident she has a future. Looking back on her life, without regrets, she wonders if she needed to be redeemed or if she had been already.  It's an interesting choice of words from someone whose life was lived on the brink often and there is no hint of a redeemer or redemption before this. Her father abused her mother until she fled with her daughter and son. Her son was estranged from the family and her daughter confused and bitter at the way her mother tried to remain positive when there was so much negative going on in their lives. Cheryl was angry at her mother, life and God if he was there. She starts her wilderness trek angry. Her anger is channeled into energy for hiking miles through tough terrain, and fears about what is out there in this wilderness world. She sits on a mountain top and watches the sun come up and remembers her mother taught her to delight in the best times of the day. She is on a journey to become the best person she can be - another lesson her mother tried to teach her. On this journey, Cheryl is becoming teachable. She is vulnerable to the unexpected, the weather, the wildlife, the men she meets whose interest in her is suspicious.

She is in a much better place when her trek is over. She has found healing or healing has found her. In the wilderness, she has learned lessons about her life. Grace is evident but she has no vocabulary for it. There is the beauty of nature, and the companionship of a fox, and a number of provisions that show up at the right time. It reminded me of manna in the wilderness. Her healing has a source but Ms Strayed has not recognized it, yet. In the wilderness, God is nearer than some of us ever know.

River Church

We just got back from a trip to Wisconsin. Our niece got married. We drove up through Atlanta and Nashville and then a long slog through Illinois. We bypassed Chicago by driving through Rockford. On the way home we stopped in Chattanooga, TN and walked around the downtown. I am usually looking for coffee shops and/or bookstores. On E. 7th we stumbled upon Cadence Coffee Shop. It was a comfortable place to sit and and read the books and newspapers on coffee tables. The coffee was superb and the barista professional. I noticed a sign on the counter that invited you to pay $2 extra and buy some one else a cup of coffee. Interesting, I thought, and it made more sense in a moment. Looking around the room I saw an opening leading to a room next door. I walked over and found a large room with portraits of the words Grace, Hope, Love, and Gospel on the walls. It looked to be something like a worship space. Returning to the coffee shop I had some questions for the barista who turned out to be the pastor of the church that met next door. When he greeted the homeless man who came into the coffee shop and handed him a cup of coffee, I thought of the $2.

The pastor had been on a staff of a larger church in another city before he came to Chattanooga. He felt like he was always talking about what the Church should be doing but not doing it. Now, he said, he was. There was a midweek Bible study and a Church service on Sundays, and, of course, it was a coffee shop so there was lots of conversation. The Church was located in a busy downtown area and had a ministry with the homeless.

While we were there a number of business people stopped by for their morning cup of joe and a few homeless guys sat around talking. I asked for more information and he handed me a small card that was available on the counter. It told the name of the Church: River Church and gave a description of what some one could expect to find there. A list that began with the words We ... said things like, We are a melting pot of all types of denominations, and We are big on community; building it and being part of it, and We honor all people, and We believe and share the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and We are moved with compassion for the least and the last, and We are generous in our giving, and We worship passionately because God loves us, and We are disciples who make disciples, and We are risk takers. Finally, We invite you to join us this week.

While we looked around and read the info card, Pastor/Barista Shannon continued to serve others and talk to them. We wished we were going to be around on Sunday for Church but we felt like we had experienced their ministry on Monday.

The end or is it

On the first Sunday after Easter, our pastor took for her Scripture reading the disputed ending of Mark's gospel. Mark's Resurrection account ends with verse 8 on an abrupt note of amazement and a kind of fear that seems to mute the testimony of the gospel. For many interpreters and readers it is an incomplete and unsatisfactory way to end Easter Sunday! So, many of Mark's scholarly interpreters conjecture that a later editor came along and taking some facts from Matthew and Luke along with his own thoughts "finished" the gospel of Mark. Most scholars observe that the last twelve verses or so do not fit Mark's style or language. Many popular commentaries ( see Michael Card and Tim Keller) assume the ending is not original and barely mention it.

However, our pastor did last night and I wondered what she was getting herself into. I have preached on the Resurrection from Mark many times and I had usually commented on the controversial ending and let it go at that. I mean there is uncomfortable stuff like snake handling, and a harsh rebuke to the disciples for their lack of faith and a graceless note of condemnation for those who do not believe. I preferred not to deal with it. But, our pastor did and I wondered what she would say about it.

She, too, acknowledged the scholarly opinion on the ending of the Easter story. But, she suggested that since it got there somehow we needed to deal with it. She said it was clearly born of a desire to tidy up Mark's story, to complete it with questions answered. And she talked about how that is with us - we don't want any loose ends especially when it comes to our faith.

I was thinking it is like a lot of churches today. It's important to know and do all the right things (what should a Christian believe?), and get everyone on the same page. A nice, tidy faith without any doubts or questions or even any room for questions or for people who do not "fit" in. As, I look around our church every week it seems full of people who would not "fit" in many churches. There is no permanent building and even though we have an order of service it often becomes a "disorderly" service with technological glitches, musicians who are a no-show, and little ones wandering about. We do manage prayer, Scripture readings, a sermon, and some singing and end with communion but it is never a fine tuned program. There is an openness to what each of us brings that night. I would call it the "unchurch". Not surprisingly, it has attracted people who have been hurt, burned out, or just plain felt unwelcome in other churches.

On Sunday night, I heard God speaking out of this questionable ending of Mark. Kimberly Richter has suggested (in her comments on Mark in the Renovare Study Bible) that we need to get over our fears and find our voices as the women at Jesus tomb did. We are the ones "who continue this story" as we share the good news of Jesus. We embody this story as we work for healing, and wholeness and overturn legalisms that limit God's forgiveness and mercy. We "complete" this story as we practice Jesus inclusive love so that no one is treated as unclean, an outcast or a sinner but all are welcomed into discipleship and the coming reign of God.

Mark's "incomplete' ending is no mistake. It calls each of us to a continuing journey of believing Jesus and taking up our cross and following him daily. Our pastor was right. The ending of Mark is there for a reason.