The Theology of Baseball

Romans 3:20-26

Baseball is a great game, one of the greatest!  From neighborhood pick-up games to playing catch with my dad in the backyard; from gym class in school to several years of Little League to watching the Rangers finally make it to the World Series, baseball is a part of the fabric of our lives. 

I have always loved baseball.  There’s a spirit that draws me in.  When I go to a baseball game, I love to get there early during batting practice.  I love walking through the tunnel that opens up into these massive stadiums built like cathedrals.  There’s the smell of the grass, the anticipation hanging on every pitch, the sound of the ball in the catcher’s mitt, the crack of the bat echoing through the stands, and the cheers of the hometown fans. 

Sounds perfect, doesn’t it? 

In short, our culture views baseball right up there with apple pie and Norman Rockwell paintings as a part of Americana, the ideal America, a place of perfection and standing for all that is good in our country.  In baseball, players strive to be perfect and are measured against the legendary figures who have gone before.  Perfection is not easily ascertained.

In our scripture passage this morning, Paul is writing in an attempt to answer the question, “How are we made right with God?”  Before Jesus came along, the relationship between God and God’s people was through the Law of Moses.  The purpose of the law was to show us that we are not perfect.  Under the law, we become aware of our shortcomings, our inadequacies and our imperfections.  Under the law, we are made aware of our failure to achieve what is required in the law.  Under the law, we miss the mark.  Unless I’ve missed my guess, there is someone here today who is trying to be perfect and continually misses the mark.  Is there someone here today who has lived with or grown up with the expectation of perfection and felt like a failure and a disappointment because of it?

The game of baseball has two theological lessons for us: humans are not perfect and we are saved by the grace of God.  First lesson: we fall short of the glory of perfection.  In other sports, you can at least get close to, if not achieve perfection.  Bowling, for example, is one sport where it is fairly common for an avid bowler to earn a perfect score of 300.  In golf, the standard is clear: shooting par.  But there are many who are able to do better than par; many shoot under par with birdies and eagles on a regular basis.  In football, successful quarterbacks like Eli Manning or Drew Brees will complete in a typical season 60% - 70% of their passes and throw twice as many touchdowns as interceptions.  In basketball, you can shoot 55% from the field and 80% from the line and be successful superstar.

Baseball is different in that a player who fails to get a hit 70% of the time is considered one of the game’s greatest heroes, a Hall of Famer.  To put it another way, a batter who gets a hit 30% of the time is in the running to be the batting champion that year.  Three out of ten…Far from perfect; far from getting a passing grade on an exam in school; far from earning the big raise or the big promotion at work.  Three out of ten and you are a hero, an icon, a superstar, a Hall of famer in the sport of baseball.

One of my sports heroes growing up was Reggie Jackson.  Nicknamed “Mr. October”, Reggie had a knack for the dramatic.  Nobody was more consistent in World Series hitting than Reggie Jackson.  He hit 563 career home runs (HR) with 1702 runs batted in (RBI).  He was the World Series Most Valuable Player in 1973 and 1977, the American League Most Valuable Player in 1973, the American League Home Run Champion in 1973, 1975, 1980, and 1982.  Reggie was enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1993 in his first year of eligibility.  But did you know he also set the American League record for the most errors in one game (5).  In his career, Reggie struck out 2,597 times, more than any other player in baseball history.  His twenty-one year career batting average was .262.  Reggie was far from perfect.

There is no way we can make the mark on our own.  So following the law, striving under our own strength and smarts to meet all its requirements and perfect standards, does not bring us into a close relationship with God.  We are left separated from God. 

In baseball, all fall short of the glory of perfection.  That’s the bad news.  The good news is lesson #2: we’re saved by the amazing grace of God.  Paul writes, “they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”  To be justified is to be made whole, to be made perfect in the eyes of God, to be reconciled to God by His grace.  Jesus came to tell us how much God loves us no matter how bad or sinful we may be.  And even though we are sinners, we are still dear to God.  Our sins are wiped clean.  We are acquitted of all wrongdoing, our sins have been atoned for, and we are freed and liberated from sin through the incredible and miraculous grace that Jesus came to bring.  And when we begin to really discover what this means for us, it changes everything.  It transforms our whole relationship with God and one another.  We are brought into a right relationship with God when we believe this and accept it as truth. 

In baseball as in life, the grand, heroic efforts we make often don’t add up to much, while our everyday, average, ordinary efforts are the ones that sometimes save and redeem us.

When I think back to my teenage years, I remember how important it was to be perfect and accepted.  Part of that acceptance, I thought, came from wearing the right clothes and the right shoes.  I had a pair of Nike leather sneakers that were completely white, even the swoosh trademark.  I begged and begged my mom for these thick maroon and grey shoe laces that were very popular for guys to wear.  I finally got ‘em and I knew that I was going to fit in perfectly with my friends and not look like a dork.  I laced up my shoes with my new laces, but since these weren’t the ones you could tie, I had the worst time keeping my shoes on my feet when I walked.  No matter what I did with the laces, I couldn’t quite get them right.  In gym class, every time I kicked the ball my shoe would go flying across the gym.  I almost lost a shoe when I was running to catch the bus.  I barely made it!  All this trouble and drama just to fit in and not look like a dork was becoming more and more stressful and annoying: I just wanted to be perfect.  I wanted to be perfect in the eyes of my peers and still be able to wear sneakers that stay on my feet!  I went through a whole lot of trouble trying to get the perfect look.  I later realized that I just had to be my ordinary self, the one God created at the beginning of time, relying on the grace of God.

In his book, “Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith”, Pastor Rob Bell writes about grappling with issues, such as perfection and acceptance, that had negative affects on his ministry.  One of them was the need to be perfect and gain the acceptance of others, mainly his congregation.  Despite the success of his ministry and the growth of the church he served, he felt empty and dried up inside.  His soul was parched.  He came to realize that no amount of success can heal a person’s soul and that success doesn’t fix anything.  He began to ask himself, “Why is that person’s approval so important to me?  Why do I find it so hard to say no?”  Yes, he believed in Jesus as his Lord and Savior and, yes, he considered himself “redeemed” and “reborn”, but there were areas of his life that were unaffected by his faith in Jesus.  These areas needed to be healed by the hand of Jesus, for he discovered in his efforts to seek approval from others that he tried to measure up to the image in his head of the perfect person, the perfect pastor.  He thought he had to be a “Super Pastor”: always available, accomplishes great things, always has time to stop and talk, visits everyone in the hospital, loves attending meetings and spends hours studying and praying and yet can be interrupted if you need something…and always puts their family first before everything! 

Through a lot of searching, Rob gained this profound insight: we are not defined by what we are not.  We are not defined by what we are not.  We are not defined by the seven hitless at-bats, but rather the three at-bats that were base hits.  We are accepted and loved by God for who we are, for who he created us to be, despite our sins, faults, shortcomings.  There is nothing we can do to earn God’s acceptance or His love to be perfect and blameless in his eyes.  It is by the amazing grace of God in Jesus Christ that we are made perfect, made complete in the eyes of God, reconciled to God by His grace, and able to be in a right relationship with Him. 

I believe when we accept Jesus Christ into our whole life, we stop living in reaction to everything around us and begin to let a vision for what lies ahead pull us forward.  When we accept Jesus Christ into our whole life, we stop worrying about winning and losing and instead focus on how we play the game.  We stop depending on other people to make us happy and give us self-worth and instead draw strength and confidence for living from God’s Word and prayer.  We stop trying to please everybody all the time and instead strive to honor God in Christ Jesus through study, worship, service and fellowship.  We stop trying to do things on our own and fully rely on God for everything we are and will become.  We stop worrying about how many members we have in our church and instead focus our attention on growing in the spirit, on our relationship with God, both as individuals and as members of this community of faith.  We enter into a perfect, complete relationship with God not through the law and not through works.  Rather it is through two precious gifts from God: faith and grace.

In baseball, getting a hit 30% of the time is not perfect, but it will make you a superstar!  A baseball player can get three hits for every ten at-bats and be inducted into the Hall of Fame.  We, too, are not perfect, but by the grace of God alone we are made complete and inducted into God’s Hall of Fame.

Lost in the Flood

2 Samuel 11: 1-15

I remember one time I dreamed that I was in heaven, where I was promptly met by St. Peter at the famous “Pearly Gates.”  Peter began to show me around.  I noticed right away that on the walls of an enormous warehouse I saw thousands and thousands of clocks. All of these clocks were ticking away, but at different rates. 

I then noticed that under each clock was a name plate with a name engraved on it. Naturally, I asked the significance of all this. Peter informed me that each clock was designed to keep track of an individual still on earth. Each time the person committed a sin, the hands on their clock make a complete revolution.

Upon closer examination, I began to recognize a few names.  After searching for my own clock and not finding it, I inquired as to the location of my clock. 

St. Peter replied, “Oh, your clock? Well, we moved it into the office and are using it for a fan.”

We are no strangers to sin.  It comes to us so naturally.  Most of the time we don’t even see our sin or know we did anything wrong until later.  At that point, we find ourselves on a road to nowhere, deep in the woods, lost in the flood.

I’m a big fan of the Veggie Tales video series.  The characters are all vegetables and some fruit.  The main characters are Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumber.  They introduce the theme for the show and tell a story to reinforce the specific theme.  In the episode, “Larry Boy and the Fib from Outer Space”, we meet Junior Asparagus, a young boy who finds himself in some trouble.  He broke his dad’s bowling plate in pieces and knows when he finds out he’s in big trouble.  At the same time a strange visitor tells Junior to cover his tracks and tell a little white lie. 

“My name is Fibrilious Minimus!  But you can call me Fib for short!”  Fib tells Junior that white lies are the ones that don’t hurt anybody.  Junior makes up a little white lie; a story about what happened to the plate and his Dad believes him.  No punishment for Junior. 

Junior begins to notice something strange.  His new friend is getting bigger and less and less cute every time Junior tells a little white lie.  Junior’s “little fib” grew and grew and grew finally into a 30 foot monster that threatens to destroy their town and Junior, too.  Larry Boy comes to save the day and free Junior from the clutches of Fib.  But Larry Boy can’t save him.  Junior learns that he is the only one who can stop the monster.  To stop him, Junior must tell the truth and confess what he had done.  He begins to confess his “sins” and the monster fib gets smaller and smaller, until there is only little fib left.  The little lie led to bigger lies; one little lie can lead to a chain of lies and lead us to sin.

We are no strangers to sin.  And neither was King David.

This narrative is more than we want to know about David and more than we can bear to understand about ourselves.  It started when, instead of leading his army into war, David sends his commander Joab and his officers to do the dirty work. While they are ravaging the Ammonites and besieging Rabbah, King David remains behind in Jerusalem (2 Samuel 11:1).

This is not a good sign. By not going to war, David has ceased to be the commander-in-chief and now relies on agents to do his work.  The slide into sin begins when David neglects his normal duties. He got bored.  He had too much time on his hands.    

While lounging in his house, his eyes get him in trouble.  He spots a woman taking a bath some distance away.  The king is enticed and curious about this woman.  He issues an all-points-bulletin to his servants.  First, he sends someone to discover her identity: Bathsheba, wife of Uriah the Hittite.  Then he orders messengers to fetch her.  Then he laid with her, that is, they had intimate relations. 

With the organization and energy that should have gone into doing his kingly duties, David methodically commits at least five of the Seven Deadly Sins. He begins with the sin of sloth on his couch, moves into lust when he sees Bathsheba bathing, follows up with envy of her husband Uriah, acts on his greed when he sends messengers to fetch the fetching woman. He tries to get out of it by setting up Uriah to deflect any suspicion of linking David to what had happened.  When he doesn’t do what he wants, David sets Uriah up again to be killed in battle making it look like a casualty of the war.  I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that pride and anger must have been a part of the mix as well.

Did David know what he was getting into or was he just lost in the flood?

David is blinded by power.  In the text, he acts swiftly; his actions are quick.  They rush by us as the passion of David rushed:  he sent, he took, he lay.  There is no conversation with anyone about what he wants to do.  There is no hint or sign of caring, affection or love – only lust.  He has become so powerful that he imagined himself as exempt from God’s law and could act for his own desire.

David as king is in control.  As king, he can have whatever he wants, whenever he wants.  He exercises no restraint, no second thoughts, no reservations and no justifications.  He takes simply because he can. 

David’s self-indulgent misperception of his life as autonomous from everything and everyone will lead him to lose his true self.  He was lost.  Lost in himself; lost in his culmination of power as king; lost in a sea of sinfulness whose under toe had pulled him so far from the shore he couldn’t see it anymore.  No bearings to know where he was.  No coordinates to tell someone about where he can be found.  And he is sinking fast.  His absolute power as king had corrupted him absolutely.

Are we in danger of going down with David?

The problem with sins is that we think they’re manageable — a little bit of lust, a smidgen of sloth, a pinch of pride — but before we know it they get out of control and lead to damage, destruction and even death.  Standard sins can be the gateway to more serious, unconventional ones. David’s lust turned into adultery, which turned into deceit, which turned into murder. He spiraled steadily downward until he finally hit rock-bottom, confessed his sins and returned to an authentic relationship with God.

Take gambling, for instance. Even though gambling is now legal all across our country, transforming greed into a rather common sin, the damage done by this industry is impossible to ignore. Americans now spend more money on legal gambling than they spend on groceries, roughly $500 billion a year, and the destruction to individuals and families is heartbreaking.

Soft drugs like marijuana are believed to be the gateway to harder drugs such as cocaine and heroin. For some of us, all it takes is one joint and we’re hooked, one peek at pornography on the internet, one piece of gossip, one lie, one kiss, one bet, one drink and we’re headed fast down a dangerous road, one that is extremely hard to turn off on our own.

When I lived in Chicago, I became friends with a guy from church named Roy.  He was a member of the small group I joined earlier in the year.  Roy was a good guy, energetic and enthusiastic.  He was a solid member of our small group.  It was mid-December when I received a phone call from Roy.  He asked if he could stay at my place for a few days.  He had been kicked out of where he was living and had no place to go.  Surprised by his request I asked my roommate Jeremy if he thought it was okay.  Jeremy was in the same group and knew Roy as well as I did.  We gave Roy the okay and he schlepped himself over to our place that very night.  We all agreed that Roy could stay with us for three nights and three nights only.  Everything went fine with no problems.  I kept asking Roy if he found a place to go and he had a different excuse why he couldn’t find a place.  Something wasn’t right and I couldn’t put my finger on it.  I was getting suspicious.  My Presby-senses were tingling!

When I came home from work on what would have been Roy’s fourth night with us, I found that all his stuff was still in our place.  My roommate had left town for the Christmas holiday, so I was going to have to handle this myself.  After a while, the phone rings and its Roy begging me to stay another night in this very winey, pathetic sounding voice.  I said no.  I was very suspicious of him and the trust level had plummeted.  He kept begging and I kept saying no.  He finally gives up and says he’ll be right over.  Thirty minutes later Roy arrives and as he picks up his stuff begins to beg me to let him stay.  I still said no.  His begging turned to anger.  He called me all the names in the book, told me where to go, what to do with myself and he said I was a bad Christian because I wouldn’t help him.  Oy vey!  If I received a dollar every time I was called that, I would be a very rich man.  Roy finally left and secured the door behind him.  Whew!  That was exhausting. 

I found out later that Roy was an alcoholic who stopped going to AA meetings, couldn’t hold a job, had no income, and no place to live.  He lied to other friends of ours borrowing money and never paying them back. 

I don’t know what happened to Roy.  I never saw him again not at church or anywhere.  His drinking, his lies and his denial not only hurt him but also those of us who called him our friend.  Roy was on a downward spiral and refused to admit it.  Did Roy know what trouble he was into, did he know he was on a road to nowhere, a lost highway or was he just lost in the flood?

What are we to do? In David’s statement of repentance concerning this affair in our responsive reading today of Psalm 51, he suggests that a good place to start is with confession, cleansing and community. 

We must start with confession because we’re never whole or complete unless we take responsibility for our actions.  We must stop blaming others and the circumstances we find ourselves for our problems and difficulties, for all that is wrong, hurtful, and debilitating.  God is waiting for us to acknowledge our need for the grace of God in our lives.

We must be cleansed because only in the act of confession and forgiveness can we feel that the stain of sin has been removed. It is only here that we get a second chance with God, that we get to start fresh and with a clean slate. Our sins go from scarlet red to a white that is as white as fresh snow.

We must do all this in community because it is in fellowship with others that we receive the support and encouragement we need.  Consider church and worship to be a weekly convocation of the courageous, a place where the rewards of righteousness are identified and defined; a convention where we’re encouraged, supported, affirmed, admonished and given help along the way so that we can keep our morality sharp and our spirituality lively. 

Sprinting toward God, instead of Gomorrah, is the way we need to go. Any other direction is bound to be extremely wet. 

The Recipe for Life

John 6:51-58

If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.  It appears many of us are doing just that. 

Journalist and blogger Megan McArdle admits that she and her husband "now have enough high-end cultery to stock a small restaurant -- and have a sense of shame at how rarely they use any of it."

They are not alone, she wrote in The Atlantic (May 2011): "Almost everyone I know seems to have the Kitchen Aid mixers and Cuisinarts they got for their wedding still sitting in their boxes in storage, only to emerge at Thanksgiving, if ever."  America has left the kitchen.

Oddly enough, gourmet kitchens are on the rise at the very same time that people are fleeing the heat. Men and women are spending a ton of money on kitchen equipment that they rarely use. 

For example, it’s not unusual to spend $10,000 for a Viking stove. A Breville toaster oven runs $250. A Margaritaville Frozen Concoction Maker retails for $349. And a Shun chef's knife, with its own wooden display stand? $199. This is expensive kitchen equipment, being purchased at a time when more than a quarter of all meals and snacks are being consumed outside the home. 

McArdle believes that each expensive kitchen gadget "comes with a vision of yourself doing something warm and inviting: baking bread, rolling your own pasta, slow-cooking a pot roast." Gourmet kitchen equipment promises a warm and wonderful feeling, even if you rarely touch it.  Cooking is not as demanding and tedious as it once was with the availability of a wide range of kitchen gadgets to make the work easier.  Cooking has become a leisure activity for many Americans, instead of a daily job.  We take for granted how easy it is to get and prepare the food we need whenever we want it. 

Contrast that with this: in the agrarian culture of first-century Israel, having bread was essential for survival. There was no endless supply of bread (in dozens of varieties) available at the local supermarket. You made your own bread by growing and harvesting wheat and mixing it with other needed ingredients by hand and baking over an open fire.  Some years were better than others.  Some years produced a poor crop while others produced a good crop.  Some years there was a enough food for everyone and other years there was not.  Simply put: no bread, no life. Having enough food was a matter of life or death. 

Almost everything we eat comes from something else that has died. Dead animals provide us with meat. Dead wheat gives us bread. Vegetables come from dead plants. When we truly come to see how other forms of life die so we may live, Jesus' words in our text today take on a new meaning.[1]

Upon hearing Jesus’ words about eating his flesh and drinking his blood, "The opponents of Jesus" begin to dispute among themselves, saying, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" (v. 52).  They think, that’s crazy!  Obviously this group takes what Jesus says literally. 

When Jesus spoke to them about "living bread," they had a sense of what he was talking about because they remembered the bread from God -- the manna -- that their ancestors had eaten in the wilderness. But his flesh? That didn't make any sense.

"Very truly, I tell you," says Jesus, "unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you" (v. 53).

There was this Italian restaurant back in New Jersey that made the most amazing Pasta Fagioli in the world.   

I asked the cook one time, "How on Earth do you make it? Where can I find the recipe."

The cook's face glowed with pride. He said, "Well, I'll tell yas: the pasta is nothing; the broth is nothing; the beans is nothing; but when I throw MYSELF into it, into the soup, my Pasta Fagioli -- that's what makes it what it is."[2]

God has thrown himself into the cauldron, into the earthly mix as the person of Jesus portrayed in the Bible.  In fact, John has already told us that Jesus is the Word of God in human form, having said that "the Word became flesh and lived among us" (1:14). And we know that this Word made flesh was not destined to live a long and happy earthly life, because "just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life" (3:14-15).

God has a purpose for Jesus.  And that purpose involves Jesus being lifted up on the cross, sacrificing his own flesh to bring us forgiveness and everlasting life, to which he alluded in John 3:16, "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life."

Living bread; Word made flesh; Lifted on the bloody cross; given for the life of the world.  In Jesus' kitchen we find God's recipe for everlasting life. But this kitchen gets hot.

Cooking with Jesus is not easy.  It’s not a leisure pursuit.  It’s not microwaveable or one that can be done just a few minutes a day.  Taking Jesus into ourselves, making room for Jesus in our lives, is a full-time challenge, one that transforms us from the inside out. After all, "you are what you eat." Jesus promises, "Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood have eternal life and I will raise them up on the last day; for my flesh is true food and my blood is true drink. Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them; just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me" (vv. 54-57). 

If we take Jesus into ourselves, we are given eternal life. Don't expect to understand it fully right now. Only believe it, trust it and be grateful. 

The challenge for us is to stay close to Jesus, receive his nourishment and do his work in the world. This is not a leisure pursuit, one that can be done off and on again. Jesus wants us to remain in the kitchen with him, even when it gets unbearably hot.  Here is our challenge from Jesus:

We can begin by feasting on the words of Jesus.  The disciples knew the power of the words of Jesus.  They longed to hear them, to understand them, digest them and live them.  But many in the crowds who followed Jesus were turned off by Jesus’ difficult words and walked away.  The words of Jesus remain a source of solid spiritual food for us.  It is spiritual food that builds us up, nourishing us with the truth of who He is.  It’s the spiritual food that sustains us on our journey of faith and gives us eternal life.

We can be nourished by our participation in communion.  Jesus instructs us to eat and drink of the bread and the wine to remember him, to honor him. Receiving communion is an important way of living in Christ, and allowing Christ to live in us. 

We can go out to be the body of Christ in the world.  Christians who feast on the words of Jesus and nourish themselves with communion become nothing less than the flesh-and-blood presence of Jesus in the world today. The Apostle Paul writes in the second chapter of Galatians, “I have been crucified with Christ, therefore it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me.  And the life I now live I live by faith in the Song of God who loves me and gave himself for me” (Gal.2:20).  When we confess Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, we become the hands and feet of Jesus, whether we are young or old, male or female, white or black, liberal or conservative.

None of this requires a gourmet kitchen, filled with expensive equipment or fancy gadgets. All that we need to do is feast on His Word, be nourished through communion and be the bodily presence of Jesus in the world.  We need to keep cooking with Jesus, even when things get hot.

---

[1] --Trevin Wax, "How is Jesus the 'Living Bread'?"Kingdom People, January 22, 2007. http://thegospelcoalition.org.

[2] Anthony de Mello, cited in Spiritual Literacy: Reading the Sacred in Everyday Life, ed. Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat (Simon & Schuster, 1998), 220.

Horror in Aurora

James 5:13-16

We all know about the horrific events early Friday morning in a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado.  I first heard the report on the radio after I dropped the kids off at school.  CNN was in full swing with moment by moment coverage of the mass shooting in theater number nine that left twelve dead and fifty-nine wounded.  They ranged in age from four months to forty-five years old. 

While watching and listening to all the details as they developed, I felt sick to my stomach.  I was in disbelief as I watched a cell phone video of a man wearing a striped shirt covered in blood escorted out of the theater by a police officer.  He was in complete shock.  I listened in horror as eyewitnesses described the scene in the theater as “absolutely horrifying; a scene of claustrophobia, panic and blood; pure chaos.”

I remember back in 2006 when a similar tragedy struck the Amish community of Nickel Mines in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.  The gunman, Charles Carl Roberts IV, entered the West Nickel Mines School, took hostages and shot ten girls, killing five before killing himself.  This brutally disturbing incident was a direct attack on the Amish traditions of pacifism and forgiveness. And the most amazing thing that came from this horrific event was the grace-filled, forgiving spirit of the Amish people.  They visited the wife of the shooter to demonstrate the amazing grace of God.  Many in the Amish community attended the funeral service for Mr. Roberts.  The Amish showed the whole world what the love, grace and mercy of God truly looks like.

The crazed gunman, Mr. Roberts, turns out was angry with God, angry with himself, haunted by guilt, fed up with life and driven by a hellish grudge.  These things haunted him leading to his destruction and shattering the lives of so many others.  As we learn more about the shooter, Mr. James Holmes, and what possessed him to commit such a horrible crime, there are things we will feel and experience that God wants us to forget and other things we must remember as we walk the long, winding road that is the Christian journey of faith. 

Three Things to Forget:
1. That Holding on to a Grudge has any Redeeming Social Value. No it doesn’t. There’s nothing good we can say about a grudge. Grudges are destructive. Grudges tear families apart.  They tear friendships apart.  They poison our souls and slowly harden our hearts.  Revenge is not sweet; it’s really sour, and in this case in Aurora its effects have caused a nation to retch and puke. God said, 'Vengeance is mine, I will repay.' As Christians we believe that Mr. Holmes will not go without punishment.  We also believe that his punishment is in God's hands.

2. Guilt is something we can’t get rid of. Yes we can. We think of guilt as if it has Velcro hooks that grab hold of our fuzzy souls and we just can’t tear it off. Yes we can. How many of us do this, holding on to the guilt of something in your past, an experience that you have not forgotten and it continues to haunt you.  I remember an incident in high school when I did something wrong and lied to my teacher about it, so I wouldn’t get into trouble.  I thought it would go away and be forgotten.  But this incident kept gnawing at me.  I couldn’t shake it.  I couldn’t forget it.  I was so afraid of what would happen if I told the truth.  I felt so guilty and ashamed and I didn’t know what to do.  When I finally did confess and came clean, I felt the weight of the world leave my mind and shoulders.  I still had to face the consequences of what I had done, but the hardship of that punishment was nothing compared to the guilt I experienced before my confession.

Christian faith feels like a radical commentary against trying to hide from our guilt: “Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, so that you may be healed” (James 5:16).  Christian confession as forgiveness of sin and guilt is much different from carrying the sin and guilt of my actions around on my meager shoulders. 

Guilt for sins not only can be removed – let us never, ever forget, it WAS removed at the cross. But to grab hold of the forgiveness of God is the only means of removing guilt. And if we are honest, forgiveness can be quite scandalous...after all, it is offered to thieves on crosses, death row killers, school shooters, and even blue-white-or no collar sinners like us.

So guilt IS something we can get rid of, but we also need to remember that both horrific AND mundane sins are guilt-worthy and require forgiveness.

3. Life is Absurd and Meaningless. No it isn’t. Post-modernism and the growing belief that life has no real meaning or purpose have not been kind to us as Christians.  And if life has no meaning or purpose it may be because we’ve forgotten a few other things…here are some things we need to remember.

Things to Remember:
1. Forgiveness works. Back in 2006, it was reported that the wife of the killer was welcomed to attend the funeral of the girls and did.  The Amish community had forgiven Mr. Roberts for what had happened.  They extended that grace and forgiveness to those who most of us would find hard to forgive.  Forgiveness brings peace and wholeness to our lives.  I hope and pray that the Amish example of forgiveness will be what prevails in the aftermath of the horror in the Aurora shooting.

2. The Second Commandment. The Bible describes how one of the scribes came to see Jesus and heard them disputing and saw how well he had answered them.  He asked Jesus, “Which is the first of all the commandments?" Jesus replied, "The first is this: 'Hear O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."

Stan Purdum, editor and writer of The Wired Word, and contributor to Homiletics writes: “In thinking about the importance of moral education I thought about the difference between Deuteronomy 6:1- 9 (which clearly calls for moral education) and Matthew 19:16-22 (where the rich young ruler says about the commandments, ‘I have kept all these’). The rich young ruler was the product of a moral education, but he lacked one thing, Jesus said. And that lack was the absence of a personal commitment to live according to what his education had provided him. The Matthew version of this story (it’s also in Mark and Luke) includes the “Love your neighbor as yourself” command. By keeping so many of his possessions in the face of the needs of others, he was NOT loving his neighbor as himself. So moral education, by all means, but also something more, is the one thing we often lack—a personal commitment to live what we have learned.

3. Moral Education is important. Does anybody think that Sunday school, Bible study, worship and religious instruction aren’t important for our kids? Wrong!  Rev. Bob Kaylor, Senior Pastor of a UMC church in Park City, Utah, recalled once: “I’m in the middle of a sermon series on Wesley, who was always talking about sanctification as the process whereby we grow more and more into that perfect image of God. Can’t do that sitting our butts in a pew once a week (or, more likely, less). It takes discipline, practice, and modeling. I got very convicted this summer traveling around England in Wesley’s footsteps that my own preaching did not push hard enough at the demands of discipleship and that faith is not another entertainment option. When a mom says to me in the grocery store that, ‘Well, we haven’t been in worship or Sunday School because Jimmy has had soccer practice and it’s the only day he gets to sleep in and, well, he’s 11 now and can make his own decisions and yada, yada, yada’ I am more inclined to respond now by asking whether she cuts Jimmy the same slack on a weekday morning for school.  Which education is more important: academic or moral?  When this kid grows up and is faced with moral issues, a failing marriage, an addiction, depression or a whole host of other issues, won’t you and he both be glad that he spent all that time at soccer practice? Until we get serious with our people about the fact that faith isn’t a hobby, we’re not doing our jobs very well.”  A moral education is what’s lacking in today’s world, one that molds and shapes our worldview of what is right and what is wrong.  We have lost it.  We must reclaim it

4. Goodness abounds. We’re horrified because, in part, there is so much good in the world. Evil is the aberration, not goodness. Desmond Tutu was quoted in The Christian Century several years ago as saying: "The media tend to inundate us with rather unpleasant news. We have the impression that evil is on the rampage, is about to take over the world. We need to keep being reminded that there is a great deal of good happening in the world. Ultimately, good prevails."

The Reverend Bob Kaylor says: “We need to start living that reality. Somewhere along the line we got the idea that the afterlife was the penultimate destination for humanity, rather than having ‘ears to hear’ what Jesus was talking about—God’s Kingdom breaking into to transform THIS world and doing so THROUGH us. I think it’s time we started focusing people in that direction. The issue isn’t us escaping this sinful world, but transforming it through God’s grace.”

Yes, goodness does indeed abound in spite of the evil acts of terror we witness around the world.  I believe that as Christians, in the face of such acts of evil, we have an enduring hope in Jesus the Christ.  It’s a stone of hope cut and shaped from the rock of despair.  It’s a sure hope that the storm is passing over, that truth crushed to earth will rise again, that our sorrow may last for the night but joy comes with the morning.  It is a sure hope that even though we are afflicted in every way, we are not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed.  It is sure hope that the despair and hopelessness and sadness on Friday would be transformed into joy and promise and happiness for all who suffer and struggle life’s battles.  For we know we may lose a battle along the way, but we are confident that God will win the war.

Songwriter and recording artist, Michael W. Smith, sang for the people grieving and suffering in the aftermath of the shootings in Columbine High School. His song, “Healing Rain” is very fitting:
Healing rain is coming down
It's coming nearer to this old town
Rich and poor, weak and strong
It's bringing mercy, it won't be long …
Lift your heads, let us return
To the mercy seat where time began
And in your eyes, I see the pain
Come soak this dry heart with healing rain.

May we all experience this healing rain.  Amen.

So You Think You Can Dance?

2 Samuel 6:1-5; 12b-19

Mark 6:14-29

There is a dance sensation sweeping the nation!  Movies such as Step Up and Dance with Me have contributed to this craze.  You can find it on TV.  Dancing with the Stars has been a popular hit show for many years; it’s number one in its time slot.  Right now we’re in the middle of another season of the hit show So You Think You Can Dance fueling the dance craze even more.

You don’t have to look far to find that a dance fever has swept through our town.  The Kilgore College Rangerettes, founded by a former member of our church, are world-famous having danced in parades and events throughout the world.  My former senior pastor and one of my uncles remember watching them in the Cotton Bowl parades over the years.  The Hi-Steppers at Kilgore High School, led by our friend Coleen Clower, are the talk of the town on Friday nights along with football, of course.  There are dance studios that are packed full of students who want to learn all forms of dance.  Dance is a sweeping sensation.

Dance plays a vital role in most cultures and societies across the globe.  In the Bible, dance was an important part of the life of God’s people as a form of celebration.  When the Israelites crossed the Red Sea, they celebrated with song and dance.  Miriam, Moses’ sister, led the women with tambourines and with dancing.  The psalmist writes that we are to “praise his name with dancing” (Ps. 149:3) and that God has turned our mourning into dancing (Ps. 30:11).  Ecclesiastes instructs us that there is “a time to mourn, and a time to dance” (Eccl. 3:4). 

There certainly is a time for dance.  King David dances in the streets leading the Ark of the Covenant out of storage and into the limelight, to Jerusalem, the new political and religious capital of the United Kingdom, to serve as the centerpiece of their faith.  When King David and all the Israelites danced before the Lord, they did it with all that they had, with all of their being and with an array of instruments that were commonly used in their time and place in history.

It’s an incredibly joyful worship experience, full of music and shouting and energetic movement. “How they cut loose together,” writes Presbyterian author Frederick Buechner. David and God were “whirling around before the ark in such a passion that they caught fire from each other and blazed up in a single flame” of magnificence. Not even the scolding that David got afterward from his wife, Michal, could dim the glory of their dance.

David does quite a dance before the ark. It’s nothing if not “enthusiastic,” a word that originally meant “in God” (en theos, in God). And David’s wife, Michal — the daughter of Saul, his rival for the throne and first king of Israel — absolutely hates it.

We can sympathize with Michal, can’t we? She wasn’t an evil woman, but she had a hard time with David’s enthusiasm. Today, when Christians from a nation such as Ghana bring their offerings forward in worship, they move in a dance of celebration and liberation and joy in the Lord. But many American Christians struggle with this. After witnessing a Ghanaian offering, one woman said, “If they want to worship that way, fine with me. But don’t bring it into my sanctuary. They were running up and down the aisle, hollering, ‘I’m happy, I’m happy’ … Well, as I say, if they want to do that, that’s their business. But why do I have to sit and listen to it?”

Most of us don’t want dance in worship. It feels awkward, embarrassing, and inappropriate.  As the woman said, “Don’t bring it into my sanctuary.” NIMS. Not in my sanctuary. 

The dancing we do in church tends to be a whole lot of nothing — we just stand still (if indeed we’re standing) or sit still, hardly moving a muscle. Our worship of God involves our minds, our hearts and our tongues, but rarely our whole bodies.  Michal, David’s wife, would certainly approve.

There’s a serious problem with this though, and it has nothing to do with whether we actually allow dance in worship or not. The real issue is our lack of enthusiasm. We have become so concerned with feeling awkward, embarrassed and inappropriate as Christians that we have choked much of the enthusiasm out of our service to God.  And if we aren’t enthusiastic, we aren’t en theos, in God.

So how do we get back into God? An excellent start is to learn the steps to good dancing and apply them to Christian discipleship. These include teamwork, breathing, studying and a willingness to have fun.

Teamwork

Dance is a team effort, even when dancing a solo.  Learning to dance on your own without any help or coaching or instruction won’t get you very far.  We all need to learn from others in the same way infants and toddlers learn from their parents or caretakers: by example, by watching and trying.  Teachers and coaches encourage us to learn and grow, pushing us to climb to new heights and reach new breakthroughs.  The late Tom Landry once said, “The job of a football coach is to make men do what they don’t want to do, in order to achieve what they’ve always wanted to be.” 

Growing as a disciple of Jesus Christ is done in a community of faith, a team of fellow believers.  The job of faith communities such as ours is to love, honor and encourage one another to mature into who God called them to be.  Christian faith doesn’t happen in a vacuum or completely on your own.  Faith in Christ is built on relationships with one another through the love and grace of God.  It’s about teamwork.

Breathe

Good breathing is vital to good dancing.  If you don’t breathe efficiently, then you don’t get the maximum amount of oxygen you need.  You won’t have the energy and stamina to dance very long.  Breathing is important.  Years ago, when aerobics videos were big, Jane Fonda had a famous mantra, “Don’t forget to breathe!” 

As disciples we must breathe in the breath of God, the spirit of God, so that we can do the mission God has called us to do.  For the breath of God gives life; the same breath Adam received when he was created; the same breath that raised the dry bones into a vast multitude.  To serve God, we must open ourselves to this same life-giving spirit that leads us in our ministry to make disciples of Jesus Christ.  We breathe in the spirit of God through prayer, reflection and meditation.  And when God fills us up, we are inspired.  We have inspiration, which means, “to breathe into” or “fill with the spirit”.

David breathed in the spirit as he danced and he had the energy and stamina from God to do it.   

Study and Practice

There is good dancing and there is bad dancing.  What’s the difference?  Study and practice.  Dance is bad even dangerous when it is not of God; when it is human-centered form of entertainment.  Our New Testament text tells us about how a certain dance was used not to praise God but to put John the Baptist to death. 

King Herod is throwing himself a birthday party, and he is so pleased by the dance of his daughter that he says to the girl, “Ask me for whatever you wish, and I will give it” (Mark 6:22). After consulting with her mother, the little girl rushes back to Herod and requests, “I want you to give me at once the head of John the Baptist on a platter” (v. 25). 

Herod is deeply grieved by this request, yet he doesn’t want to refuse the girl. Herod loses his head while watching the beautiful dance, and now — to keep a promise — John the Baptist is going to have to lose his.  This kind of dance is not of God, but disconnected from God; a true hell on earth.  So Herod sends a soldier of the guard, and in short order John is killed and his head is placed on a platter for the girl and her mother (vv. 26-28).  Herod lost connection to God and murdered an innocent man.

The Bible says that dance is good if it is truly in God.  David’s dance is one that praises God and is God-centered.  God is the centerpiece of David’s life and it must the centerpiece of ours.  God wants us to feel passion and excitement like David.  God wants us to cut loose and risk it all for him?  Are we willing to do that in our church family?

Have Fun!

When do most of us dance?  Aside from those who take dance classes, maybe it’s at a wedding reception, a night club, the prom or a school formal or a honky tonk bar or even gym class.  I used to have to square dance in high school for gym class.  At first I thought it was silly.  I was very self-conscious and uncomfortable.  But once I did it a little bit and started to get the hang of it, it was a lot of fun.  I looked forward to everyday.  When I finally relaxed, dropped my defenses and got into it, I had a lot more fun than if I had not tried it. 

All these examples are fun occasions; times of celebration and joy, even square dancing in gym class.  You can’t dance well if you’re not willing to relax and have fun.  This holds true with our spiritual walk with Jesus Christ.  If we do the same ministries and activities in our church every year without any joy or enthusiasm, then we are not walking with Christ.  Jesus tells his disciples, “As the father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love”. (Jn. 15:9)  And two verses later Jesus says, “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.” (Jn. 15:11)  Jesus declares to us that as his disciples we are secure in the love of God in Christ.  With this certainty, we are free to dream new dreams and form a new vision for what it means to be the church of Jesus Christ in the 21^st century.  When we step out of our comfort zones in faith and have fun, our joy from God may be complete.  With the gifts we’ve been given from God and the trust we have in Christ, we have an inner confidence that we can strive to become the person we were made to be.  We don’t have to worry about being superhuman and saving the world because we serve a Savior who has already saved the world.  Christians aren’t better than anybody else, they’re just better off.

So cut loose. Share the love. Feel the joy. By combining teamwork, good breathing, careful study and practice, and a willingness to have fun, we’ll be able to serve the Lord as his disciples with the same enthusiasm King David had before the ark.  Amen.