by Steve | Sep 3, 2020 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
By Thomas Lambrecht –
Art by Terre du Milieu
As a young adult, I became fascinated by the story told by J.R.R. Tolkien in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy. I was inspired by the extraordinary adventures on behalf of human goodness undertaken by ordinary folk.
Through my wife’s recommendation, I recently became acquainted with a devotional book called Walking with Bilbo (Tyndale, 2005), by Sarah Arthur. It draws spiritual lessons from the various happenings in the Tolkien story (which is in keeping with Tolkien’s deep Christian faith). Fortunately for my wife and others, you do not need to have read The Hobbit to benefit from the devotions. They are biblically-centered and practical in their daily application.
One chapter recalls an episode in The Hobbit when the hobbit Bilbo Baggins and his dwarf comrades need to pass through a broad, dark forest called Mirkwood. Their mentor, the wizard Gandalf, warns them that the only safe way through the forest is to stick to the main path through the center. In Gandalf’s absence, however, the group becomes bored. Day after day, mile after mile, there is nothing but trees! To compound the problem, the dwarves and their hobbit comrade are running out of food. Who knows how much longer this forest will last? Is it not time to disregard Gandalf’s advice and leave the path, just for a short while, to break the monotony and find something to satisfy their need for food? In the story, of course, the decision to do so leads to bad things happening — what Arthur calls “misadventures.”
I can really relate! This coronavirus pandemic has been going on for six months. No in-person church or small group. No concerts or movie theaters. No fun trips. For many, no eating in restaurants. No getting together with friends or even family. For some, not even the ability to work, since they have been furloughed or let go from their jobs. When you have watched everything good on Netflix, you know you are in trouble! Worst of all, we have no concrete idea when it will all be over.
The stay at home routine can become mind numbing. In some places, when things began to open up again, people went wild. Beach parties. Packed bars and nightclubs. Family get-togethers. Forgetting to wear masks or practice physical distancing. The predictable consequences of going “off the path” were a dramatic spike in Covid19 cases and a surge in deaths and hospitalizations.
As Arthur points out in her devotional, these situations illustrate the fact that sometimes, the Christian life can become routine and even tedious. The daily Bible reading and prayer times can become stale. Staying faithful in our marriage or celibate in singleness can seem unexciting. Weekly or monthly tithing can crimp our ability to have fun or buy something we really want. The daily effort to be kind to others in the face of insult and selfishness can become wearying.
As Arthur puts it:
Sometimes you wake up in the morning and — unless there’s a cataclysmic disaster or even just the slightest deviation from the norm — the day’s events will go exactly as predicted with no change from the everyday tasks God has called you to do. Homework is still homework, laundry is still laundry, and dinner must be prepared before the end of the day. … The truth is, if we stick to the path God has chosen for us, we’re not guaranteed eye-popping, jaw-dropping, heart-racing adventures all the time. In fact, we may be asked to do the mundane, the banal, the mind-numbingly boring.
And that’s exactly when we’re tempted to stray. We begin to starve for change, for something to break the tedium of our days, to get the heart rate up again. So we contemplate taking the slightest jog off the track, just to see what’s out there. Those are the times when the misadventures of our lost and wandering peers look almost tempting. … We begin to wonder if there’s perhaps some other path. …
Other times, we’re tempted to stray because we have genuine needs that must be met, like the starving dwarves in Bilbo’s tale. Perhaps we’re simply exhausted at the end of the day and need to relax. Why not with a six-pack? Or maybe we feel the pain of poor self-esteem. Why not pick on someone else in an attempt to feel good at another’s expense? If we’re not careful, our genuine needs can lead us to justify all sorts of unhealthy behavior. (pages 110-111)
It is in those times that we need to remember that God’s way for us is always best. Going off the path can lead to spiritual and even physical danger.
The Bible has a lot to say about staying on God’s path.
- “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it” (Matthew 7:13-14).
- “You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you. Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord himself, is the rock eternal. … The path of the righteous is level; you, the Upright One, make the way of the righteous smooth. Yes, Lord, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you” (Isaiah 26: 3-4, 7-8, emphasis added).
- “Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, ‘This is the way, walk in it'” (Isaiah 30:21).
- “I instruct you in the way of wisdom and lead you along straight paths. When you walk, your steps will not be hampered; when you run, you will not stumble. … Do not set foot on the path of the wicked or walk in the way of evildoers. Avoid it, do not travel on it; turn from it and go your way. … The path of the righteous is like the morning sun, shining ever brighter until the full light of day. But the way of the wicked is like deep darkness; they do not know what makes them stumble” (Proverbs 4:11-12, 14-15, 18-19).
- “There is a way that appears to be right, but in the end it leads to death” (Proverbs 16:25).
- “This is what the Lord says, ‘Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls'” (Jeremiah 6:16).
- “Many peoples will come and say, ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the temple of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths.’ … Come, descendants of Jacob, let us walk in the light of the Lord” (Isaiah 2:3, 5).
The good news is that we have the resources to keep us on God’s path for our lives. We have the Holy Spirit to guide us, if we will listen, and to give us strength for the journey. We have the Lord Jesus as our companion on the journey, who as a man went through times such as we are experiencing, who can sympathize with our weakness and encourage us by his presence. We have the Word of God, which is the “light for our path,” showing us the way to go. We have brothers and sisters in Christ who can help and encourage us along the way. When we are feeling hemmed in by the routine, it helps to be transparent with the Lord and with our human companions on the journey. Sharing our struggles takes the power out of them and enables us to receive encouragement and strength.
We are called to persevere in faithfulness to God’s path, whether that path be exciting or mundane. We find life, peace, and rest for our souls on that path. “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9). Or in the words of Gandalf, “Stick to the path!”
Thomas Lambrecht is a United Methodist clergyperson and the vice president of Good News.
by Steve | Aug 31, 2020 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
From the upcoming issue of Good News.
By Tom Lambrecht –
Dr. Scott Kisker, professor of the History of Christianity at United Theological Seminary, published an article recently in Firebrand Magazine that will also appear in the forthcoming edition of Good News magazine. In it, he explains two foundational disconnects that have contributed to the malaise of our church that is bringing us to the point of separation.
These disconnects have been much on the mind of those working to form a new traditionalist Methodist denomination.
Doctrinal Disconnect
One disconnect concerns the doctrine of the church. Through most of its history, the Methodist Church followed the Articles of Religion developed by John Wesley from the Anglican Thirty-Nine Articles and adopted by the 1784 Christmas Conference that began the Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States. Its final form was established in 1808. The Evangelical United Brethren Church adopted its own Confession of Faith in 1963. It was similar to the Articles of Religion, but also had some differences.
In addition to the Articles of Religion, the Methodist Church also embraced Wesley’s Standard Sermons and his Notes Upon the New Testament as doctrinal standards for the church. These were all protected by the First Restrictive Rule in our Constitution that provided, “General Conference shall not revoke, alter, or change our Articles of Religion or establish any new standards or rules of doctrine contrary to our present existing and established standards of doctrine” (Discipline, ¶ 17).
When The United Methodist Church formed in 1968 out of a merger of those two denominations, it ended up with two doctrinal statements. A commission was established to combine them into a new statement of faith for the new denomination.
Instead, the commission proposed (and the 1972 General Conference adopted) a new theological statement that “interpreted” our doctrinal standards in a new way. Kisker describes it this way, quoting from the theological statement:
Doctrinal standards are “not to be construed literally and juridically.” The words need not mean what they say, nor can anyone be held accountable to them. Although the doctrinal standards were still technically protected by the first Restrictive Rule, they were rendered impotent. Thus, the new UMC subverted the purpose of the first Restrictive Rule, while technically leaving it intact.
Methodists were to engage in “free inquiry within the boundaries defined by … scripture, tradition, reason, and experience.” Yet these “boundaries” cannot be “defined unambiguously” and should be interpreted with appropriate “flexibility.” As David F. Watson has written, with those caveats, why use the word “boundaries” at all?
Four years from birth of our denomination, along with the invention of the “Quadrilateral,” United Methodism adopted a vague unstable doctrinal position that drained the Articles of Religion and the Confession of Faith of any real meaning or authority.
As Dr. Billy Abraham has stated, United Methodism exchanged doctrinal standards for a theological method. Our method became an exploration of Scripture, Tradition, reason, and experience (the “Quadrilateral”), with no practical boundaries. Built into the DNA of United Methodism was a disconnect from our historic doctrines and beliefs. United Methodists could believe nearly anything and still be in good standing in the church.
Accountability Disconnect
Kisker does a masterful job of explaining our “connectional” church polity or governance. It consists of a series of interlocking “conferences” that were connected to one another in discernment and accountability.
Originally, the smallest and most basic “conference” was the class meeting, a group of eight to twelve members overseen by a class leader. The purpose of class meetings was to “watch over one another in love,” to support and encourage each other and hold each other accountable in one’s growth toward Christian spiritual maturity.
All of the classes met together in the Society (which later became the local congregation, known as the charge or church conference). The congregation appointed and oversaw the class leaders. The congregation itself was overseen by an Elder, who was ordained by the next level of conferences — the annual conference.
Representatives of each congregation met together yearly in the annual conference, which approved and sent Elders to oversee the congregations. The annual conference, in turn, was overseen by a bishop, who was elected, consecrated, and sent by the next level of conferences — the General Conference.
Representatives of each annual conference were elected to serve as delegates to General Conference, which represented the global Methodist Church. As Kisker puts it, “At General Conference, Methodists believed, God’s Spirit oversaw the general church as we conferred with one another, to ensure that catholic doctrine (universal across time and geography) and catholic discipline (universal across geography) were maintained for the sake of unity and witness in the world.”
“No conference could act in a way that violated the policies of the more inclusive conference of which it was a part, and to whom it was accountable. This was ensured by each gathering being watched over in love by someone chosen and sent from the more inclusive conference to which it belonged.”
This system broke down in the 1939 merger that brought back together the northern and southern Methodist Churches that had divided prior to the Civil War, as well as the Methodist Protestant Church. The 1939 merger invented a new layer of conference — the jurisdictional conference. The jurisdiction replaced the General Conference as the body that elected, consecrated, and sent bishops to oversee the annual conferences.
The motives for creating jurisdictions were to maintain racial segregation and regional distinctives. A “central jurisdiction” was created for all the black congregations and pastors in the U.S. That way, whites and African Americans would not need to be part of the same conference, and black pastors would not be appointed to serve white churches. United Methodism is still trying to overcome this nearly fatal accommodation to secular standards. At the same time, five regional jurisdictions were created (northeastern, north central, southeastern, south central, and western) to preserve the regional character of each part of the U.S. Thus the seeds for division were sown 80 years ago.
The addition of jurisdictions disconnected the chain of accountability from the General Conference. The General Conference could enact policies and church laws, but eventually could no longer enforce them because it did not elect or assign the primary executive officers of the annual conferences (the bishops).
At the other end of the spectrum, there was also a disconnect because by the end of the 1800’s, the class meeting had been replaced by the Sunday school. The emphasis shifted from “watching over one another in love” as members moved toward spiritual maturity, to gaining knowledge through learning from teachers. Unfortunately, this knowledge did not always lead to spiritual growth, and individual accountability was lost.
The local church was judged by the number of members it had, not the number of true disciples of Jesus Christ who lived out their faith. This new metric seemed to work during the 20th century when people valued membership in the church as a form of belonging. Beginning in the 1970s, however, membership was no longer as great a value, and church membership began its long and unbroken decline. Absent personal accountability and mutual encouragement, many United Methodists remained spiritually immature, their lives not necessarily reflecting the power of a Spirit-led, Christ-imitating character. The power of God to use Methodism to transform society was lost.
Reconnecting the Connection
Those working to form a new Methodist denomination are eager to rectify these major disconnections in order to help restore the vitality of the original Methodist connectionalism.
As proposed, the doctrinal and moral standards of the new church would have binding force within the denomination. There would be safeguards to ensure that ordained clergy in the new church are committed to and supportive of the doctrinal and moral standards of the church, and that there would be accountability to preach and teach these beliefs.
Leaders propose a renewed emphasis on accountable discipleship, as opposed to membership. Church members will be strongly encouraged to participate in small groups that would help them grow in their faith, not just in understanding, but in actually living out what we believe in loving God with our whole being and loving our neighbor as ourselves in very practical ways.
Bishops are proposed to be held accountable globally, not regionally. The same standards would pertain, whether one was a Methodist in Kansas, New York, Alabama, Bulgaria, the Philippines, or Liberia. Our global Methodist identity would be recognizable and consistent from place to place, while still celebrating the various ethnic, racial, language, and cultural diversities within a global church. There is even some thought about returning the election of bishops to the General Conference, rather than a regional conference.
Of course, all of these visions and aspirations are subject to the decisions made at a convening General Conference of a new denomination. But they represent the hopes and dreams of those who are leading toward a new, faithful expression of Methodism.
For the new Methodism to be vital and fruitful, it is imperative to restore the connection between doctrine and life, between authority and accountability. Connectionalism is not just a system for collecting apportionments or supporting mission work. It is at the very core of who we are as Methodists. Restoring the connection will mean a change in the culture of our church that can lead us back to the future — a future informed by “the doctrine, spirit, and discipline with which [we] first set out” (Wesley’s Thoughts Upon Methodism). The Methodist connection was the channel the Holy Spirit used to make Methodism the largest and most vital church in America at one time. It can be so again, by the grace of God.
Thomas Lambrecht is a United Methodist clergyperson and the vice president of Good News.
by Steve | Aug 17, 2020 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
Bishop John K. Yambasu, the Resident Bishop of the Sierra Leone, preaching at the 2016 General Conference of The United Methodist Church. Paul Jeffrey, UMNS — File photo
Along with the rest of the United Methodist family around the globe, we join in mourning the death of Bishop John K. Yambasu, the Resident Bishop of the Sierra Leone Area, who died in a car accident over the weekend outside Freetown in Sierra Leone. According to the press statement issued from the Council of Bishops, he was on his way to attend a funeral service.
“Bishop Yambasu’s untimely death is stunning news to The United Methodist Church. Bishop Yambasu’s undeniable love and passion for the church has been evident in his area and throughout The United Methodist Church,” said Council of Bishops President Bishop Cynthia Fierro Harvey, who also noted that her heart aches for Bishop Yambasu’s family.
“Our hearts are broken, and we’re devastated by this sudden departure of Bishop Yambasu. This is a great blow to the people called United Methodists! It is our hope and prayers that God will comfort the family in particular and The United Methodist family at large. May his soul rest in perfect peace,” said Bishop Samuel Quire of the Liberia Episcopal Area.
Through his ministry, Bishop Yambasu helped assemble the various United Methodist advocacy groups that proposed an agreement for the separation of the United Methodist Church. “Bishop Yambasu blessed The United Methodist Church with his faith and leadership,” said the Rev. Keith Boyette, president of the Wesleyan Covenant Association and one of the principal participants in the separation agreement. “He was the catalyst for gathering leaders of the various factions in the UM Church for the talks which produced the Protocol of Reconciliation and Grace through Separation. He was an important voice throughout those discussions.”
Bishop Yambasu was president of the Africa College of Bishops of The United Methodist Church and the newly elected Chancellor of Africa University.
He was elected a bishop of The United Methodist Church in 2008 and installed in 2009. He would have turned 64 on August 24.
Bishop Yambasu is survived by his wife, Millicent, and their five children – Rebecca, Adima, John, Emmanuel and Elizabeth.
by Steve | Aug 17, 2020 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
By Tom Lambrecht –
Photo by Jasmine Carter: Pexels.
The cover story of the current issue of Christianity Today is entitled, “Can the Church Save Marriage?” I heartily recommend that and other articles in this month’s issue that talk about the challenges to marriage in our contemporary global culture.
The article is written by Dr. Mark Regnerus, professor of sociology at the University of Texas at Austin and co-founder of the Austin Institute for the Study of Family and Culture. The article summarizes points from his forthcoming book, The Future of Christian Marriage. Uniquely, it looks not only at the state of marriage in the U.S., but also in Europe, Latin America, and Africa.
Regnerus examines the decline in marriage among both Christians and the broader society in recent years. To illustrate that decline, Regnerus found that in 2014, 56 percent of evangelical adults ages 20 to 39 were married. Just four years later in 2018, that percentage had declined to 51 percent. Correspondingly for the same age group, only 40 percent of the total population were married by age 39 in 2018.
(Pastorally, I am cognizant here of those who are, or have been, in difficult or painful marriages, those who have been divorced, and those who want to be married, but are not. God is with the brokenhearted, the widow, the orphan. He also calls the Church to come alongside and encourage those in difficult circumstances. God offers healing and comfort in the midst of our pain and frustration. He desires to redeem the painful times and bring about good from the evil that befalls us. As we trust in him and find our refuge in him, the Lord will not leave us comfortless. See John 14:18-19.)
Regnerus examines several factors that could account for this decline. One in particular intrigued me.
“Marriage, even in the minds of most Christians, is now perceived as a capstone that marks a successful young adult life, not the foundational hallmark of entry into adulthood,” he found. “In the foundational vision, being newly married and poor was common, expected, and difficult, but often temporary. In the capstone standard, being poor is a sign that you’re just not marriage material yet.”
In other words, in order to get married, young adults often think they have to have their lives all together and be financially “set.” Marriage then becomes an “achievement,” rather than a foundational part of growing in maturity. It is something one checks off their list when other needs/wants have been satisfied. Couples formerly viewed marriage as a venue that would provide companionship through the growing pains of young adulthood. At present, they seem to desire to grow first individually and then marry after they feel that stage has been conquered.
When my wife and I were married (at age 22), I had an entry level teaching job and she was unemployed (having just graduated from college). Just a year after we were married, I was laid off from my position and she gave birth to our first child. For several weeks, we had no income, and I was only able to secure part-time employment after that. Then we headed to seminary, where we both had very part-time jobs and almost no income. Yet, these were some of the most formative years of our lives. With worldly eyes, we were not being “successful.” Instead, we were making an investment — an investment in each other and an investment in our future. That investment has paid off with a solid and fulfilling marriage of 42 years.
There is no guarantee that investing in marriage will yield worldly success, but marriage can lead to spiritual and relational maturity and growth. This early phase of our marriage became part of our story/narrative as a couple. These early difficult experiences/narratives have directly and indirectly impacted other challenging times as our marriage grew in depth and in years spent together. A sense of “we can get through this” (present trial) is, in part, based on those experiences of persevering through those trials early in our marriage.
Perhaps the shifting view of marriage from foundational to capstone is related to the misunderstanding of our purpose here on earth. Many times, one hears that God wants us to be “happy.” One gets the impression that the guide to our decision-making is what will make us happy. If marriage will not make us happy, then we do not get married. And if marriage to a particular person does not make us happy, then we are free to trade them out for a different marriage partner.
Nowhere in Scripture does it say that God’s will for us is to be happy, notwithstanding the unfortunate mistranslation of the word “blessed” as “happy” in the beatitudes in some versions of the Bible.
Instead, it is God’s will that we be holy. “It is God’s will that you be sanctified [made holy]” (I Thessalonians 4:3). “But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy'” (I Peter 1:15-16).
Being holy simply means loving God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and loving our neighbor as ourselves. Easy to say, but difficult to do. The kind of love we are called upon to give is agape love — the love that sacrifices oneself for the sake of the other — the kind of love Jesus demonstrated.
We learn to love through a lifetime of practice — trying, failing, and trying again with the power of the Holy Spirit helping and transforming us. We grow in holiness as we gain spiritual and emotional maturity. Sometimes we make dramatic improvement in a short time (a spiritual growth spurt!). Other times, we can go long stretches without seeing any apparent progress. This is the normal Christian life.
The joyful blessing and surprise is that in cultivating holiness, we find true happiness. This is not selfish happiness that depends upon us getting what we want. No, it is the deep joy that comes from growing into the person we were meant to be, taking on the character of God and being remade in his image.
Understanding that our goal is holiness, marriage is an ideal relationship in which to learn holiness — sacrificial love. Forging two individuals into a bonded pair is a sometimes painful, sometimes exhilarating process. We learn to give up our own desires in order to serve the other, and they reciprocate. In the nexus of mutual sacrifice and mutual submission (Ephesians 5:21), we are transformed into mature, loving, Christian disciples. This does not happen in a day or in a year, but in a lifetime of living together, practicing love.
In marriage and, when the Lord blesses us with children, in our larger family, we learn to give and receive love. Learning this on the human plane enables us to learn to love God and receive his love. Marriage and family life do not always work the way God intended them to, but that is the ideal picture of marriage toward which we strive.
We learn these lessons of love through other relationships, as well. But marriage is supremely suited to be a school where we learn the discipleship of love. It is a relationship that is intended to be as permanent as any human relationship can be. It is sustained by commitment through all the ups and downs of life’s circumstances (“for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health … until we are parted by death”). No other relationship (except perhaps the parent-child relationship) has that level of commitment.
We can recover a foundational view of marriage when we realize that marriage is not for those who “have it all together.” Rather, marriage is what helps us learn to have it together. We practice with each other the things that will make us holy and mature in the faith. And we have committed in advance to forgive each other when we fail. That commitment level gives us the freedom to try, even if we might fail. Whereas, if we think marriage ought to be a sign of “worldly success,” we are tempted to put on a show in marriage, play it safe, and never step out into the deep water, lest we fail and prove “we were not suited for marriage” in the first place. That is a recipe for failing to grow into maturity.
No one is suited for marriage in that sense. None of us realize what marriage really entails until we get into it a few decades. Marriage is not for those who have arrived, but it is the strength and companionship for the journey.
One of my favorite wedding Scriptures is Ecclesiastes 4:9-12. “Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor. If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up! Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.”
That is a picture of marriage (among other things). It is not a destination, but a way of traveling. Our spouse is to be our helper, our support person, our companion, our defender, our encourager, our loving critic, one who forgives us and “spurs [us] on toward love and good deeds” (Hebrews 10:24). We help each other to grow in holiness, and by doing so, we find happiness in each other, in the Lord, and in all the blessings he showers upon us. That is truly a life of meaning and purpose!
Thomas Lambrecht is a United Methodist clergyperson and the vice president of Good News.
by Steve | Aug 10, 2020 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
By Steve Beard –
Michael pointed out the front windshield at the blue sky and said: “Pastor, there’s a lot of pain in this world, a lot of people suffering right now, but no one suffers from bearing the weight of it all like God.” Photo: Pexels.
There are good reasons to avoid watching the evening news these days. It is a rough slog, even for those with sunny dispositions.
The pandemic has severally thrown us off the normal rhythm of life. Piped-in crowd cheers at baseball games, shuttered businesses on Main Street, empty classrooms, drive-up eucharist at church, Zoom meetings for work.
Once only thought to be the essential accessory of surgeons, fumigators, and bank robbers, face masks are now used to stoke our political divide. No more hugs, nor kisses on the cheeks. Forget the handshake. The entire elbow bump looks ridiculous and feels even more absurd.
Sadly, we cannot even have proper funerals for our dearly departed — and there are so many of them. We have much to mourn and now we must do it in isolation.
It seems as though one traumatic event leapfrogs another. There is a good chance that you have someone in your circle of friends who has either radically withdrawn because of depression or grown numb emotionally because of crisis fatigue.
“The sense of groundlessness has set off a spike in anxiety,” writes Joe Robinson in an article about stress management in the Los Angeles Times. “What’s going to happen to my health, my job, my family? Is takeout food safe? Will there be a depression? How long will it be before we can return to normal? Coping with existential threats in the fog of so many unknowns is a major challenge for folks programmed to make life predictable and, therefore, more safe.”
For entertainment, we thrive on cliffhangers in movies and sports because we know there will be a finale. “It’s a different story when it comes to personal uncertainty, and it’s worse when the unknown is open-ended, as with the coronavirus,” writes Robinson.
In other words, there is nothing normal about the new normal.
The Rev. Kenneth Tanner is a treasured friend of mine and pastor of the Church of the Holy Redeemer, a congregation in Michigan. He recently told me about one of his parishioners, Michael, who had been missing for almost four weeks. “Like millions, he exists at the margins” and all of this pandemic craziness proved to be “too much.” Michael “just couldn’t handle his unbearable existence anymore. He walked out the door of his apartment one night without telling a soul and just drifted away.”
When he first arrived at his parish many years ago, Ken pledged that he would help all those in need that God sent across his path. After Michael missed a couple of services, my friend Ken went looking for him. Discovering that no one in Michael’s apartment complex had seen him in three weeks, Ken’s heart sank.
“With help from the homeless community in Pontiac, some good shop owners, the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office, and a member of the congregation,” Michael was found and Ken was overjoyed. “He matters to me and to our church.”
Ken took Michael to talk to his landlord and try to work out any issues related to the lengthy absence. “A lot remains to be done to restore some semblance of togetherness for his life — logistics and resourcing — but he is resting well” at the church facility in the meantime as they tend to his needs. After all, Michael had spent nearly the last four weeks under a concrete staircase without showering or eating a proper meal.
My friend Ken was there for Michael — looking for him high and low. These are tough days and God bless those who are on the lookout for the souls who are struggling to cope — Heaven’s bloodhounds of compassion.
As the two of them were driving back from the meeting with the landlord, Michael pointed out the front windshield at the blue sky and said: “Pastor, there’s a lot of pain in this world, a lot of people suffering right now, but no one suffers from bearing the weight of it all like God.”
Michael spoke the truth about a God who refuses to cast a blind eye toward suffering and injustice. “But you, God, see the trouble of the afflicted. You consider their grief and take it in hand. The victims commit themselves to you; you are the helper of the fatherless” (Psalm 10:14). He spoke truth about the God who knows the number of hairs on our head and the fluttering migration of the sparrow.
While there will be a time when there will be no more sickness or death, that time has not yet arrived. In the midst of our storms and delayed mourning, God bears the gravity of it all.
Before Jesus bore the weight of the cross, he first served with basin and towel to show his undying love. “Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; so he got up from the meal … and wrapped a towel around his waist. After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet” (John 13:3).
This moment of selfless love was brought to memory when I learned about a couple — Steve and Mary in Jacksonville, Florida — who were separated by a pane of glass for 114 days because of COVID-19.
Facebook photos of Mary Daniel and her husband, Steve Daniel.
Steve is in a retirement facility for those with early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. Mary is the top executive for a successful company. Since last March, she has faithfully visited her husband in the evenings and tucked him into bed until he fell asleep. When the pandemic struck, a state order barred visitors from assisted-living facilities. Steve was confused; Mary was heartbroken. She loved him so much but could not touch him.
“It didn’t matter what I had to do to get there,” Mary told the Washington Post. “I was willing to do whatever it took to fulfill my promise that I was going to be there for him every step of the way.”
March 10 was the last night she was able to spend with her husband. “I got a call on the 11th, and they told me I couldn’t come back,” she recalled. “I didn’t even get to say goodbye.”
Her mind raced for ways to get around the restrictions. “I reached out to the governor, talked to local reporters and called the parent company of the facility asking if there was anything I could do to get inside,” she said. “I even offered to bring my puppy as a therapy dog.”
In desperation, she went to his window at the facility. That turned out to be an especially cruel barrier. “I did that twice, and he just cried,” she recalled. “I decided not to do that anymore, since he’s better when he’s not crying at the window. That wasn’t doing him any good.”
But love often finds a way. Or, as a popular U2 song reminds us, “Love is bigger than anything in its way.”
Mary discovered a job opening for a dishwasher at the facility. In order to get her foot in the door as a cleared employee, she had to do a drug test, a background screening, a Covid-19 test, and video training — all so she could have a part-time job that she does not need.
Nevertheless, with joy, she works hard scrubbing plates and pots twice a week as a dishwasher so that she can walk down the hall and knock on Steve’s door.
“Mary” he exclaimed when he opened the door for the first time. They hugged for a very long time. And they both cried — this time with gratitude.
“I wanted him to know that he is deeply loved and he will never be alone,” she said on the Today show. “That’s the best gift I can give for the rest of his life.”
During these Alice in Wonderland days of strangeness and chaotic rhythms, we are asked to socially distance, wear a mask, and wash our hands.
And, if you walk the path of love, look for those who are having difficulty coping and be prepared to wash a few dishes.
Steve Beard is the editor of Good News.
by Steve | Aug 3, 2020 | In the News, Perspective E-Newsletter
By Thomas Lambrecht –
Robert P. George and Cornel West speaking at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona. Photo by Gage Skidmore.
Religion writer Terry Mattingly recently reported that 50 percent of “strong liberals” say they would fire business executives who donate money to reelect President Donald Trump. At the same time, 36 percent of “strong conservatives” would fire executives who donate to Democrat Joe Biden’s campaign.
The result of such extreme polarization, Mattingly points out, is that “62 percent of Americans say they fear discussing their political beliefs with others, according to a national poll by the Cato Institute and the global research firm YouGov. A third of those polled thought their convictions could cost them [their] jobs.”
Brothers and sisters, this should not be! Even if (worst case) we consider members of the other political party our “enemies,” Jesus commands us to love our enemies and do good to those who hate us. Paul’s warning aptly describes what our society threatens to become. “If you bite and devour each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other” (Galatians 5:15).
This spirit of animosity and even hatred between people of various political persuasions prompted two prominent Christian thinkers to issue a statement calling for humility, honesty, and courage — the subject of Mattingly’s column.
Robert P. George is a professor of jurisprudence at Princeton University and a committed Christian who is politically conservative. Cornel West is a professor of the practice of public philosophy at Harvard University and a committed Christian who is politically progressive. As friends and brothers in Christ, they issued a joint statement calling upon all of us to adopt a different mindset in engaging with one another on the political front.
“We need the honesty and courage to honor the contributions of the great men and women who have come before us — those who articulated and defended true principles of justice and the common good, built or helped to preserve worthy institutions, and modeled important virtues,” they write. At the same time, “We need the honesty and courage to recognize the faults, flaws, and failings of even the greatest of our heroes — and to acknowledge our own faults, flaws, and failings.”
None of us is perfect. We all have sinned and fallen short of God’s glorious standard — some of us spectacularly so. We need the honesty to honor with gratitude those things our “heroes” have done well and the ways they helped to build this country, while recognizing and decrying the ways those “heroes” fell short of the ideals that perhaps even they espoused.
“We need the honesty and courage to recognize the blights on our history, the grave wrongs that have been done, reflecting the failure of our leaders and institutions — and our own failures — to honor our principles of liberty and justice for all.” Yes, we have made tremendous progress in many ways toward achieving greater liberty and justice. At the same time, it is with the spirit of American idealism that we recognize we still have a long way to go. Acknowledging we have more work to do is not unpatriotic. It is humble and sober realism. We cannot make progress unless we identify our shortcomings in making a more perfect union. But we do so with gratitude and acknowledgement of the miracle that is our country.
“We need the honesty and courage to think first of the weak, the poor, the vulnerable, and the impact on them, for good or for ill, of our own actions; the actions of institutions — be they economic, social, educational, or philanthropic — in which we play a role; and the actions of government at all levels,” West and George rightfully remind Christian citizens. “This will not generate unanimity as to what policies are best. Reasonable people of goodwill will often disagree. But this can — and we believe must — be a starting point on which there is common ground.”
Too much of the infighting in our country is due to pursuing selfish interests at the expense of others, particularly those who are less powerful or less advantaged. Paul urges us, “In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus … Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of others” (Philippians 2:3-5).
As articulate public intellectuals, West and George have attempted to contend for their opposing viewpoints without holding one another in contempt. “We need the honesty and courage not to compromise our beliefs or go silent on them out of a desire to be accepted, or out of fear of being ostracized, excluded, or canceled. We [also] need the honesty and courage to consider with an open mind and heart points of view that challenge our beliefs — even our deepest, most cherished identity-forming beliefs. We need the intellectual humility to recognize our own fallibility — and that, too, requires honesty and courage.”
While not compromising our own beliefs, we have sought to respectfully engage with persons holding other perspectives. Rather than resorting to personal attacks or demonizing others, we must seek to understand each other’s point of view and where possible work toward an agreed way forward. Within United Methodism, it is just such honest dialog and willingness to compromise for the sake of a positive solution that led the mediation group to propose the “Protocol for Reconciliation and Grace through Separation” that can help move our church past its impasse.
In our own nation, “We need the honesty and courage to treat decent and honest people with whom we disagree — even on the most consequential questions — as partners in truth-seeking and fellow citizens of our republican order, not as enemies to be destroyed. And we must always respect and protect their human rights and civil liberties.” Regardless of perspective or the perceived importance of the issues at stake, there is no room for violent words or actions in attempting to forcefully get our way.
Ultimately, what West and George are calling us to is love. “We need the honesty and courage to love, in the highest and best sense: to will the good of the other for the sake of the other, to treat even our adversaries as precious members of the human family. We need the honesty and courage to resist the hatred — the spirit of hatred — that the zeal even for good causes can induce in [us] frail, fallen, fallible human beings, and that corrupts the human soul and leads inexorably to spiritual emptiness and to tyranny, even among those who began as sincere advocates of freedom and justice.”
“Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth” (I John 3:18). As Christians, we profess to love our neighbor as ourselves. Do we put that love into practice, or are they just words?
We are amazingly less than 100 days from an election here in the U.S. while in the midst of a pandemic. This is a test. A test of our ability to function as a coherent, democratic society or to splinter into discord. A test of our ability as Christians to engage one another in love, even when we disagree. A test of our capacity to put the needs of others — the common good — ahead of our own needs.
A majority of our country’s citizens are looking to Christians and the Church to lead us onto a better path. What will history and eternity say about how we have risen to that challenge?
Thomas Lambrecht is a United Methodist clergyperson and the vice president of Good News.
