With that in mind, here are James Lipton’s famous questions that he always asks famous people in his “Actor’s Studio”. The answers here are mine, but you could ask them of yourself — just for fun.

1. “What is your favorite word?” – Yes.

2. “What is your least favorite word?” – Busy.

3. “What turns you on creatively, spiritually or emotionally?” – Revelation, some fresh insight I’d never heard of or thought of before.

4. “What turns you off?” – mean people. Rudeness. Cold-heartedness. Greed. … this one is too easy.

5. “What sound or noise do you love?” – the sound of a kiss by two people who are in love

6. “What sound or noise do you hate?” – a slamming door.

7. “What is your favorite curse word?” – I try not to curse (too much), but I’m kinda fond of the word “bitch”, said affectionately to snarky friends, of course.  (Sorry, mom!)

8. “What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?” – the one I dreamed of for years: University professor.

9. “What profession would you not like to do?” – oh, so many! Politician, for one. Salesman. Doctor. Attorney, accountant … all kinds of things.

10. “If Heaven exists, what would you like to hear God say when you arrive at the Pearly Gates?” – Thank you. I needed that done.

… At least for this year.

And it struck me: I’ve never in my life seen a preacher laughing while praying in church.

How ridiculous. Why are we always so serious, so “religious” about talking to God? Laughing, expressing our humor with God should be the most natural thing in the world. And I think it’s because even after all these generations of being a supposedly “Christian nation”, of being the most overly-churched, overly-exposed people to the Gospel in the entire world, we still have it ALL wrong. We still have very little idea what that “Gospel” is really all about. But then again, religious people are almost always the last to grasp the simple truth.

What Good News?
When Jesus first started doing public ministry, way back 2000 years ago, the very first words he said were: “The time has come. The Kingdom of God is here. Repent and believe the good news!” (Mk 1:15). I was rereading this a few days ago, and I was stumped by the phrase. “Believe the good news”? What good news? Mark, the gospel writer, never explains what that is. Of course, it had to be related to the Kingdom arriving, but what did that really mean? Well, we have four gospels — Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John — and each describes the same events from different perspectives. Like four people at a party, each will remember and highlight certain things that were particularly important to him, bringing out details that the others may have overlooked. So I flipped over to Luke’s account to see if he could fill in the missing details: what good news?

Jesus went to Nazareth where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue … The scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:
The Spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners,
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.
Then he began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” Everyone spoke well of him and were amazed at his gracious words” (Lk 4:16-22).

There It Is
And there it was — the good news. And these religious folks, these people who had read their Bibles all their lives, were amazed at what he was teaching them. Jesus didn’t just read to them, he “began by saying to them”, so he must have spent some time elaborating, explaining, telling them familiar truths in a way they’d never heard before. He opened their eyes for the first time in their lives to the true heart of God, hidden in words they already knew so well. And this is it…

That religious prison you’ve been living in all your life — you’re free from it. That view of God you’ve had all these years, the God who counts your sins, the one whom you try so hard to please but keep failing — here’s a different view. See the Father in a new way: not through laws and rules and religious lifestyle, but in simplicity of a loving relationship. Don’t be blind anymore to the true character of God. Open your eyes and see. That oppression you’ve been living under, the frustration of constant failure to live up to other people’s expectations and rules and regulations, trying to force you into a mold of “holiness” — you’re released from all that. Oh, and by the way, the time has come, your King is here now, and that means you NOW live in a time of God’s favor. You’re accepted, you’re loved, unconditionally, just as your are, right now, independent of your ability to live up to all these legalistic standards. It’s a whole new world, a whole new age. You are completely free from all that old stuff, and you already have God’s blessings and favor. It’s yours now. And you don’t have to do anything to have it except believe it. That’s the good news!

So why are we so serious, so religious, so legalistic about our relationship with God — even after two thousand years — when it’s so simple? In a single word, the heart of the good news is freedom. Freedom from ANY rule or protocol or standard of behavior required to enjoy the company of the Creator of the Universe in your normal, day-to-day life.

Real Life
But what does look like in real life? Simplicity itself.

You know those rules people told you about, things you had to do to please God? Or those things you weren’t doing, and that’s why God wasn’t pleased with you? Throw them all out.

You know how you were told you couldn’t wear too much make-up because it would displease God? Or how your hair was too long? Or that that tattoo you had on your arm was a sin? Or your dress was too short, or your ear was pierced too many times? Or how you went dancing last night, or had too many drinks — or that you had a drink at all? It’s all garbage. To use the language of the Old Testament, that shirt you are wearing was made from two types of fabric: you’re a sinner. You cut the hair at the corners of your head. God is displeased. The tassels on your shirt are not showing in public — you failed. You walked too far on the Sabbath. You must die. You didn’t bring your whole tithe into God’s house — you are cursed. You ate shrimp for dinner last night — you are an abomination. You had pepperoni on your pizza — you must be outcast and shunned. Or — hold on to your hats, ladies and gentlemen — the person you love is the same gender as you. You are abhorrent to God, and your blood is on your own hands. Rubbish. It’s all garbage.

That’s why the Apostle Paul, who used to be one of the biggest legalists of his time, could say, “God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins. He canceled the written code that was against us and that stood opposed to us, with all its regulations. He took it away, nailing it to the cross. … Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink …” (Col 2:13-16).

News Flash
The great news flash of Jesus is this: none of these rules has ANY intrinsic spiritual value. Not one of these can make you holy, and none of these has the power to make you unholy. The good news is that you are free from all these regulations and standards. And anyone who tries to impose these on you again as a way of pleasing God is a liar, a prison-keeper, someone who wants to put you in chains — against the very Declaration of Freedom Jesus himself proclaimed.

You are FREE from the prison of religious rules and restrictions.
You are RELEASED from the oppression of other people’s expectations of your life as a way of having a relationship with the God who loves you.
The true image of your Father is RESTORED – one who accepts you, loves you, without any condition. And that blindness which kept you from seeing his true nature, which always made you think he was angry with you — it’s gone.
And on top you your total freedom, here’s the bonus. You walk in God’s FAVOR, whether you feel like it or not.

You were poor because all this freedom was kept from you. You walked alone in the misery of your life because religious people all around you told you that you had to take on the burden of all these rules and laws of “godly living” in order to have the blessings that are already yours.

This is the good news. You are FREE. You are FAVORED. And when you walk in that simple, uncomplicated relationship with the Father who loves you, you will slowly begin fulfilling “godly standards” automatically. You won’t want to kill or steal. You won’t want to disrupt the beauty of someone’s marriage by having an affair with one of the spouses. You won’t want to gossip or bad-mouth your boss or that irritating co-worker because you know in your heart how hurtful that is. You’ll start feeling compassion for your neighbor who’s trying to deal with screaming kids. You’ll be concerned about that old woman down the street who can’t afford groceries. As you walk in the freedom of God’s love, your heart will be transformed. Any code of behavior that God is concerned about will be written on your heart, and you’ll do them naturally as you grow. No rules. No one telling you what you must do. Just natural living. Free.

The good news is it’s already done. The time has come. Your King has arrived – and he wants an intimate relationship with you! You can have peace with God, you can have the wonders of his friendship, and it all comes without a rulebook. The good news is you can tear up that old rulebook and throw it in the garbage where it belongs.

Anything else is worthless. It’s nothing more than legalistic prison. You are free. You are released. You can see God as he is. And he is already pleased with you: you already walk in his favor. Because of Jesus, there’s nothing you need to do except believe it.

And that’s good news worth celebrating!

“Praise God to whom all blessings flow. Praise him all creatures here below. Praise him above, ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Amen.”

Only he got one word wrong — as some of you may have already noticed.  I grew up in church where we sang this almost every Sunday, so it jumped off the screen at me.  And it’s always those little windows of time when you see something old in a new light that spark fresh insights.  That one little word makes a huge difference.

“From whom” not “to whom.”

Big deal; who cares?  Okay, call me knit-picky, but it effects how we view God, how we view our relationship to him — how we view life.  God deserves our praise, to be sure.  And my mom taught me at a young age the incredible power that is released into our lives when we praise God in the middle of our difficult circumstances.  There’s value in that; it’s honorable to send your blessings to God.  As that cranky old oatmeal commercial guy used to say, “it’s the right thing to do.”

But we miss a powerful point about the character of God and his amazing love for us if we get that word wrong.  “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of heavenly lights, who does not change like the shifting shadows”, James tells us.  God is a generous God, a giving God. One who pours out good stuff on us, just because he loves us.  And he doesn’t quit when we mess up.  He doesn’t change his mind.  Like that powerful revelation in Exodus when he proclaims his name to Moses: “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love … (Ex 34:6).

That good stuff is for us.  And if we miss that point, we’re missing out on some jaw-dropping grace, some amazing love, some unheard-of favor.  Not because of who we are, or the fact that we’re constantly buttering him up with our praise.  Just because that’s who he is.

“Praise God from whom all blessings flow.”  That’s your heritage.  That’s your birthright.  We can love him all the more because of his love for us, because he is constantly pouring out blessings — even when we don’t see or feel them.

“Praise God from whom all blessings flow.” That one little word can turn your whole day around.

Okay, I’ll admit I can’t recall ever having actually read an Agatha Christie novel, but I’ve seen the Murder on the Orient Express movie. That counts, doesn’t it?

The same goes for the Bible. Now, before you go “oh, that Bible stuff again”, hold on for a second. This could be important — maybe even life-changing. Faith and a relationship with God may not occupy center stage in your life as it does with some of us fanatics, but I’ll bet you’ve got some thoughts about God, about who he is, what he likes and dislikes, whether or not he’s tallying merits and demerits on his infinite abacus. What’s the first image that comes to mind when someone mentions “God”?

And that’s the point. Most of us get it wrong. Our impressions are based on images from Renaissance art, or Hollywood movies, or (even worse) fire and brimstone preachers. Church can really mess you up sometimes if you let it. And, frankly, a lot of those preachers don’t know much more about God than you do — I mean really, his personality and character, his heart, not just Bible facts and head-stuff. If they did, we’d see a lot more water-into-wine miracles happening all around us, a lot more Hanukah lamp-oil generation, and a lot less public stonings.

So let’s go back to the opening scenes. Let’s let God introduce himself. Scrap the images we’ve been carrying around most of our lives about what God is like, and let him tell you himself. What does God want you to think about him?

Act I, Scene i
Famous first words — everybody knows them: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Book of Genesis, chapter one, verse one. And we could camp out here for a while, but I am especially moved by the next sentence. “Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.”

There’s an image for you. “Hovering.” The Spirit of God was hovering over it all, over the mass of chaos and emptiness. And out of that mess, he brought order and life. Good life. (And if you happen to be going through some chaos in your own life right about now, that simple thought may hold the key to keeping you sane.) This is who God is. This is how he introduces himself. The hovering one.

The English language doesn’t do this justice. The word used there is a rare one in Hebrew. It only occurs 3 times in the entire Hebrew Bible, and those other references paint a powerful picture of what’s going on here. The image is the protective action of a bird, caring for its young, wings spread over them in the nest, fluttering. In fact, that is a better translation than “hovering”: fluttering. The other reference in Deuteronomy describes this protective love God has for his people: “In the desert God found Jacob, in a barren and howling waste. He shielded him and cared for him; he guarded him as the apple of his eye, like an eagle that stirs up its nest and hovers over its young, that spreads its wings to catch them and carries them on its pinions” (Dt 32:11). (The third passage, Jer 23:9, reads “all my bones tremble…”, reinforcing the “fluttering” action inherent in the word.) God introduces himself, as soon as he steps onto the stage, as the protective, caring one. His Spirit flutters over the empty stuff of time and space, and embracing it between wings of love, transforms it, nurtures it into his beloved creation. This is your God. This is how he wants you to see him.

Another Self-Revelation
Later in the story, when Moses is dealing with the harsh realities of leading a strong and stubborn people, he confronts God and demands a greater revelation of him. Kind of like “If these are your people, then I’m gonna need to know you better so I can lead them better.” He wants to see God face to face. Of course God knows this would kill him; Moses would vaporize in the unfiltered presence of full glory. So God puts him in a cleft in the side of a mountain, covers him protectively with his hand, and then passes by, declaring his name, revealing himself to Moses: “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion, and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished…” (Ex 34:6). God describes himself in the way he wants to be perceived and understood by us. Compassionate. Gracious. Overflowing with love and faithfulness. Loyal. Forgiving. And Just.

How have we missed this? How have we turned this loving, protective, caring, compassionate and gracious God into something other than that? How have we turned him into a vindictive, white-bearded and cranky old man, catching us in every fault, every sin, every failing and mistake? Maybe it’s human nature. We know God is perfect, and our imperfections are glaring in comparison. We think he must be angry or displeased or at the very least disappointed by our shortcomings. But, as King David once noticed, he knows that we are but dust, he knows we fail. And he loves us anyway. He eagerly accepts us back into his presence — full of grace, compassion and love.

The Final Word
God’s own people may be the worst at misunderstanding him. Jesus one day stood with his protégés in the Temple of Jerusalem, surrounded by religious people, some hungry, some self-satisfied. And he called out with aching heart, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem. You who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you. How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings. But you were not willing…” (Mt 23:37). As he faced rejection by the people he came to love, Jesus again and again showed the heart of the Father, even in the very choice of his words. He longed — and continues to long — to gather us under his wings of love. Yet we are so often not willing. We don’t get it. But this is your God. This is how he wants you to see him.

We may have missed this introduction. We may have skimmed past it, or may have never seen the spotlight shining on him as he bursts onto the stage of creation and into our personal lives. But this is the description of the main character in history. Hovering — fluttering — over us, gently caring for us as a bird sheltering its young under loving parental wings. This is the Eternal Father, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love, full of forgiveness. If we miss this crucial character profile, we’ll read the rest of the book with the wrong impression. We’ll walk through our day to day lives seeing God as someone other than he really is.

Opening scenes are important. They set the tone for the rest of the story. And sometimes we need to go back to page one to get it right.

The article was about an advertising company in Australia reversing its decision to pull an HIV Prevention ad from local buses. They’d run it, gotten some negative backlash from the public, so they pulled the ads. Then, after a second wave of public outcry at the recall, they reinstated it. Simple business flip-flop. The ad was sponsored by the Queensland Association for Healthy Communities, and the image was of two men embracing, holding an unopened condom. Pretty tame stuff compared to what people see on TV these days. What was the big deal? The photo wasn’t shockingly offensive, and the purpose was to save lives, so what was all the hooplah about?

Those pushy Christians were at it again. Turns out that the initial complaints came from a certain “Christian lobby”, trying to control the world again. Once the company realized it was a targeted political campaign by this group, they reversed course and put the ads back up.

And I thought, doesn’t the Church have anything better to do? Isn’t this exactly why people never turn to the Church when they are in real spiritual need? The world — people, real human beings — see the Church as a bizarre  organization full of angry people bent on putting society into a strangle-hold to preserve some artificial traditional values as though they originated on Mt Sinai. Is this what the Kingdom of God has become all about? People so focused on gaining power over others, controlling TV, schools, making laws about who other people can or cannot love and build families with? Since when has Jesus’ commission been to become the “God police”? No wonder nobody outside the Church takes the Church seriously.

The Great Commission is and has always been to make disciples. And the purpose was not to build a society of religious clones, marching to the same tune of morality and religious beliefs. The point was to bring lost and hungry people back into a relationship with a God who loves them.

When Christians fail in this mission — or substitute some other agenda in its place — the inevitable (and only) result is a mockery, an empty shell of ritual and tradition. One might as well paint “Ichabod” over the buildings in huge red letters — “God doesn’t live here anymore.”
Church folks regularly bemoan the exodus of the youth. Congregations become greyer and more wrinkled, as younger generations see the Church as irrelevant, out of step, offering nothing. Holier saints pray for revival, expressing their desire for this generation to see the moving of God with power as they may have seen in years long since passed. But then they load upon their brothers and sisters a burden of rules, regulations, traditions, and lifestyles — legalism, by any other name — and wonder why no one is pounding on the church doors to get in.

When we, as believers, focus less on eliminating “safe sex” advertisements from public buses, and start focusing more on the hurt, on those in need, on introducing those who hunger and thirst for “something more” to a God who loves and embraces them, that’s when we’ll see those days of “power” again. That’s when the Spirit of God will move again in our congregations in ways that caused previous generations to impact their neighborhoods and cities. Not by laws. Not by protests and targeted email campaigns. But by the Spirit. When we get back to what’s actually important to the heart of God, that’s where the Presence of God will manifest.

If we want a “real” move of God, if we want the “real thing”, then we’ve got to start focusing on what’s “really important” to Him. And that won’t be protesting civil union laws in Illinois, or condom ads in Australia. It will be getting back, once again, to the primitive message of “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink …” Maybe then the world will start taking Christianity and the Church seriously again. And until that time, we don’t deserve their attention.

What could be possibly one of the most boring verses in the entire Bible suddenly jumped out at me with such intensity and meaning, I just had to stop and stare at it for a while.

Jacob was a weasel. He was a trickster, somebody well-skilled in passive-aggressive behavior. He was a mama’s boy and a manipulator. He let people walk all over him. He was weak and wimpy. And I’m sure he was full of insecurities and self-doubts, and maybe even a little self-hatred. (Hey, kinda like a lot of us!) But he was also a man with a destiny. He had a role to fill in divine history, and God wasn’t gonna let a few personality flaws interfere with his ultimate plans.

So there he was, hanging out in Beersheba, a dusty little spot on the map, barren of life and luxury except for some scrub grass suitable only for livestock and a few wells his grandfather had dug. Not the kind of place to build a name for yourself. Not even the kind of place to build much of a life. But he wasn’t stopping there. He was on his way to Haran, a rich, exotic city sitting on the trade routes of civilization, looking for a wife and his future. Caravans carrying goods from Mesopotamia to Egypt, from Persia to what is now Turkey passed through that city, and it was known for it’s gold, spices, and precious stones. He was going from the southern most outpost of fertile land to the excitement of the big city in the north. But it wasn’t the city that held the key to his destiny. It was the journey itself.

“When he reached a certain place, he stopped for the night …”
For many of us on the journey to new life and purpose, we overlook this important aspect: sometimes you just gotta stop moving, and camp out for a while. Something was about to happen to Jacob — he was hours away from that famous vision of angels ascending and descending the ladder between earth and God, a new revelation of God and about himself — and if he’d forced himself beyond that resting spot, if he’d continued his journey through the night in a hurry to get where he was going, he would have missed it. Like him, most of us tend to be restless. We’re running ahead at full steam, trying to escape (or at least change) our current situation, and reach the next stage of life, something better and more meaningful. But if we don’t slow down, if we don’t take advantage of our current situation, if we don’t learn whatever it is we’re supposed to glean from the present experience, we won’t be ready for that next step. Sometimes we have to slow down enough to listen.  And for once, perhaps for the first time in his life, Jacob doesn’t blow the opportunity. He rests. And then God speaks.

“I am the LORD, the God of your father Abraham and the God of Isaac.”
What’s missing here? Those of us who grew up in Sunday School can fill in the blanks. The title always goes “the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” But that hasn’t happened yet. Jacob already had some years and experience under his belt, but he hadn’t come fully into himself yet. He hadn’t realized his full identity, nor had he developed a satisfactory relationship with God. His faith was still with the God of his fathers — or to put in another way, it was his parents’ religion. He had yet to really make it his own. But it’s during this journey that all that changes. It’s in the desert, in the sand, in the middle of nowhere on his way to somewhere, that God becomes real to him. And his life is changed from that moment on. After this trip, the God of Abraham and Isaac becomes the God of Jacob.   A new relationship, a divine partnership, is born.  And when that happens, nothing remains the same.

“I will give you and your descendants the land … You will spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south. And all peoples on earth will be blessed through you …”
It’s here, at this place of camping out, this place of quiet resting, at a break in the running, that Jacob gets the promise of the destiny he’s been looking for. God assures him that he will ultimately come into his own: he’ll inherit the land. But more than that, the purpose of his life is suddenly made clear: through him the whole earth will be blessed. It’s at this moment, at that rest-stop on the journey, that his life suddenly comes into focus. He is somebody. He has hope and a future. He is worth something.  All that scheming and manipulation, that striving for recognition and favor, the tricks and deceit, even his passive weakness, have not disqualified him from a purpose-filled and fulfilling life.  His mess-ups couldn’t shake the love and favor of God for him.

And on top of that, God promises to watch over him: “I am with you, and will watch over you wherever you go … I will never leave you …”  A new depth and quality to his life appeared out of nowhere in that moment.  It’s the breakthrough he needed in his quiet desperation, proof that his life had significance, that the world would be a better, more blessed place because of him.

His story continues, and a few chapters past this passage is another well-known event in his journey. It’s years later. He’s arrived in Haran, married the woman of his dreams (actually, got four women in the process), had eleven sons, and with God’s favor had become prosperous, despite his flawed character. And on one lonely night, still seeking to fill the void in his soul, he wrestles with a divine stranger till daybreak (Gen 32:24). Even though he’d achieved many of his goals — the love of a life-partner, a family of his own, the successful business — he’s still longing for deeper fulfillment. And he refuses to let the stranger go until he gets something from him: “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” But that’s exactly what the divine visitor came to do, and he gives Jacob a new name: “Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men.” That life of constant struggle — deep within himself, with others around him, his family, and with God — God uses as material to forge his new identity. Though his journey in life would continue on for many more years, that part of the search for identity was finally complete. He now knew who he was, and what he was all about.

And none of this would have happened if he’d stayed in the dust bowl of Beersheba, if he hadn’t left his father’s house in search of his destiny.

For many of us, this is the story of our lives.
We’re restless and wanting more. We feel dissatisfied and unfulfilled where we are right now, and we have this nagging feeling in our guts that “there has to be more than just this.” There is.  A lot more. Your job is not done; your life is not stalled out. You are not stuck in the mud, or in the rut of your day to day grind. For those wanting more, there is new purpose and greater significance; there is a coming into your true identity, becoming all you were meant to be; there’s a deeper relationship with God, and a more fulfilling destiny — something bigger than yourself, something that will impact the world around you.   But it all happens along the way. It happens in the journey.

So don’t stop pressing. Don’t stop seeking God for more. Take advantage of where you are now, learn what you can, grow in the place where you’re planted — you’re more likely to hear the revelation you need to get you to the next step when you’re still enough to listen.  But don’t think that’s where your journey ends. You may be in a dusty spot, hanging out by a few wells of water, surrounded by little more than herds of sheep and goats, but Haran is calling. The fullness of your God-designed identity and destiny still await you. And this is God’s promise to you, as well as to Jacob. Don’t quit. Don’t give up. You’re gonna make it. You’re on the road from the dust bowl to your destiny.

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Shabbat Shalom, y'all

I grew up hating Sundays. (My poor mom is probably feeling all guilty about that now. Sorry, mom.)

Sunday was church day. It was “the Lord’s Day”, and we were supposed to honor God by getting dressed up, sitting through tedious (to me) sermons, singing some dreary songs, spending the afternoon quietly resting (impossible for us kids), and then enduring another church service in the evening. And, seemingly all too often, the day ended with an after-service scolding for bad behavior during church. I couldn’t wait for Monday to roll around again.

Somehow we got the impression that Sunday was reserved for somber activity. It was not to be profaned. It even had one of the big 10 Commandments protecting it. It wasn’t until I got to spend a lot of time with Jewish friends that I discovered the heart of the Sabbath.

Okay, first, let’s dispense with the academics. Yeah, Sunday is not technically the Sabbath. Saturday is. So, can we Christians get off our high horse about protecting the “holy day” considering we’ve even got the wrong day? And “the Lord’s Day” does not mean the day belongs to the Lord — everyday belongs to the Lord. That term came into use during the earliest days of the Church to commemorate the day Jesus was resurrected, and mostly among Gentile believers. Jesus’ first disciples were all Jewish, and they continued celebrating the Sabbath on Saturday like Jesus had done.

Honestly, though, I don’t think God is terribly concerned about the correctness of the day. He is more concerned that we honor its purpose and intent. That we take a much-needed break from doing our normally scheduled routine, that “sweat of the brow” stuff, and use the day to re-energize, relax, enjoy some peace, get back in touch with real priorities in life, and even renew our connection with him. It’s a day when we’re not preoccupied with everyday chores and concerns. So, with that in mind, here’s a little gift of liberty to my hard-working friends: if you can’t take off work every Sunday (or Saturday), use whatever day you do have off as your Sabbath. Going to church or temple is not a requirement of the day; it’s just a perk.

And here’s another key distinction: the Sabbath is for “celebrating”, not sitting around, “quietly resting” as though we were in mourning. My Jewish friends would gather for a huge Friday night dinner (Shabbat begins sundown Friday and ends sundown Saturday). Fresh flowers would be on the table. Candles would be lit. There’d be prayer, thanking God for the food and for the gift of the Sabbath, recognizing how he sanctified it, setting it apart, for special use. And then there’d be wine, and good food, laughter, talking, enjoying each other’s company, and maybe even dancing. We “honored” the Sabbath by celebrating it as a holiday. So much so, in fact, that it’s tradition to eat three festive meals during the day. It is a gift from God for our enjoyment. As Jesus himself reminded us, “Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath” (Mk 2:27).

Sure, there are some restrictions on the day. That’s part of its purpose. My religiously observant friends wouldn’t drive on the Sabbath. They wouldn’t cook — that’s work, so all meal preparations were done the day before so we could just enjoy the day. Some of them wouldn’t watch TV or carry things. As a Christian embracing liberty as my spiritual right, I sometimes found some of their personal choices a bit over the top, but that was their way of ensuring they reaped the full benefit of the peace of the day. “Shabbat Shalom”, the blessing spoken to each other, is a hope and a prayer that we would find sufficient grace and peace to restore us and equip us for the coming week. And that, I firmly believe, is what is in the heart of God when he instructed us to “keep the Sabbath”.

It’s not about being quiet. It’s not about whether you watch football on TV or go to the movies on this holy day. And (sorry, Pastor), it’s not even about whether you make it to church or synagogue. It’s about taking time off to gather together, enjoy each other, and enjoy God in our company (that’s where church fellowship can be a special blessing). It’s about recognizing this amazing gift of grace given to us — a day every week when we can shift gears, slow down, reconnect, and celebrate life. God planned it that way from the beginning. And not just for my Jewish friends. For all of us — it was given to Adam and Eve before there was any such thing as Jew or non-Jew. It’s our birthright as humans, for anyone who will receive it as part of God’s design for us.

“If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath, … if you call the Sabbath a delight, and the LORD’s holy day honorable, … then you will find your joy in the LORD …”, the prophet Isaiah tells us (Isa 58:13-14).

It’s about joy. It’s about rest and reconnecting. It’s a celebration of life. The Sabbath is a “delight”! And we should treat as such.

So … Shabbat Shalom, everybody. May whatever day you choose as your Sabbath be one of joy and refreshment, family and friends, good food and fellowship. It’s your inheritance from God. Enjoy it.

Okay, not the most gracious thing I could have done. It just struck me as so commercial, so off track, churches asking for money. Looking back on that now, I’m almost surprised that I was even surprised by that. We’d all been burned by the constant money-begging on Christian television, and I guessed we’d all moved past that. My thinking: “If you were really doing the work of God, the provision would automatically be there already, right?” But some of my friends didn’t mind those offending statuses at all. Operational expenses weren’t automatically met by generous donors acting as the hand of God. How else are these organizations going to keep doing the good work unless they ask for support? “You have not because you ask not …”, as one friend reminded me.

Hmm. My friends were probably correct. But I was still left with that sour taste in my mouth. Something about this just isn’t right.

Then I happened across the profile of a pastor friend of mine, and noticed that he’d gone back to school to pick up some technical training and certification. He already had a college degree (in the non-money making field of Biblical Studies), but was now needing more (other) training to make a living. That really hit me — with a sadness that overshadowed my earlier offense at those solicitation requests. And I was suddenly struck by how many pastors I know who have to be bi-vocational. They’ve accepted the call of God to tend his people, and they’re carrying the joys and responsibilities of that task nearly full-time. They teach. They spend time daily preparing their sermons and lessons. They pray, spending time keeping their spiritual ears tuned to God, lifting the needs of their flock before the Eternal Throne. They counsel hurting people on the phone. They visit the sick in the hospital, they answer phone calls in the middle of the night, they meet people who just “need to talk” for lunch, for dinner, for breakfast, for coffee. They go to endless meetings: meetings in the community, meetings at the church, networking with other organizations that effect the community they shepherd. They’re touching lives and making an impact. And they do all this joyfully. They love it. They find purpose and fulfillment in it. Well, most of it, anyway.

But then they have to go to their “other job” to pay their bills, to put food on their table, to have medical insurance. And family life? Those blessed with spouse or children hardly get to spend any time with them at all.

Sacrifice, I think, we all expect of our holy men and women. Sacrifice is part of the call.

But what about us? What about those of us on the receiving end of all this sacrifice? We gladly spend time with our pastors; we’re quick to call them when we need them, when we’ve lost our job, or when our child is sick or a relative was taken suddenly to the Emergency Room. And we’re thrilled that we finally found a church where we belong, where we fit, where we can reap the rich benefits of good teaching and spiritual community. And, thank God, our pastor never annoys us with sermons on giving. Thank God he’s not out for our money.

I’m all about grace. I’m all about liberty and freedom from religious obligation. We’ve received such a treasure in the Kingdom of God. We’re free. We owe no man any obligation, we’re under no pressure to conform, to live up to other people’s religious expectations of us. This is our heritage. This is our right as children of the King. But in celebrating our liberty, have we forgotten the responsibility that comes with it? Being the beneficiaries of such extravagant grace and liberty, aren’t we also under the obligation to help others come into their inheritance? Aren’t we also to share in the burden of ministry? The Apostle Paul said that anyone who receives instruction in the Word must also share all good things with his instructor (Gal 6:6). That is, if we are blessed, if we enjoy the freedom we’ve been taught to walk in, then we must financially support those who led us to this place of grace. We must take care of our shepherds. As Jesus himself told us, “the workman is worthy of his keep” (Mt 10:10).

And more than that. What about the work itself? That “Great Commission” thing was given to all of us. Most of us don’t have the gifts, the abilities, or the time to make this our primary function in life. But we can participate by supporting those who do.

As Paul again tells us, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved — this relationship with God, this freedom, belongs to everyone.
But how can people call on someone they’ve never heard of?
And how can they hear unless someone teaches them?
And how can someone teach unless they are sent? (Rom 10:13-15)

Those of us not called to bear the sacrifice of full time ministry must pick up the slack and support those who are. “How can they preach unless they are sent?” That is our job: to “send” them.

Those few Facebook statuses requesting year-end donations are an embarrassment. But not for the organizations requesting them, as I at first thought. They are an indictment against us, against those of us who reap the benefit of all the great teaching, of all the comfort and encouragement our pastors lavish on us, against all of us who enjoy the warm fellowship of community our shepherds have created for us. Those people and organizations on the frontlines, plowing the road for us, making our lives easier, those taking the Good News of restored relationship with God to people and places who still need to hear it — why are they carrying this burden all alone?

Paul continues: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!” (Rom 10:15). We can be beautiful too. We can share in the blessing by sharing in the responsibility.

Our preachers may be reluctant to lay the burden on us. You may not hear pleas from the pulpit for financial support for all the ministries and services we take for granted, for all the words that have changed our lives. But as people who enjoy royal citizenship, we need to step up and take more seriously the duties of that citizenship. Wherever we have benefited, whoever has enriched us — we owe them our lives.

I wish I’d never have to see one of those solicitations again. Not because these ministries need our support to continue the work, but because we degrade them by making them beg. They shame me. They shame the Church. They remind us that we are lazy, ungrateful, and selfish. They’re a finger gently pointing in our faces that we are not shouldering our share of the job. We need to do better. And I promise, from now on, I will.

“A tree is known by its fruit,” Jesus tells us.  If we’ve enjoyed the fruit, we should support the tree.

Interesting quote. But it got me thinking: Thank God, my God is not like that.

It reminds me of something we hear all the time in pious circles: don’t ask God for patience. Patience comes through suffering — and you sure don’t want that.

You know, I suppose there is some biblical basis for that statement. Doesn’t James tell us, “the testing of your faith develops perseverance”? Sure, we can learn patience through suffering and difficulty, but isn’t it also one of the fruits of the Spirit? “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control” (Gal 5:22). It’s a characteristic that is developed in us by God’s Spirit as we mature. Maybe it doesn’t always have to come as the result of long suffering. Maybe God isn’t always that harsh: “I want you to grow up, so I’m gonna throw a bunch of hardship your way …”

I’d rather think of God in the terms Jesus described him. “Who among you who, when your son asks for a loaf of bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give what is good to those who ask Him!” (Mt 7:9-11).

What kind of parent would say, “Ah, son, Ah daughter. You ask for a good thing, like patience, so I must torture you now”? The same goes for other things in our lives. If we ask for something that might harm us, do we think God would punish us by actually giving it to us? What kind of Father is that?

What if we take the flipside of Jesus’ saying? “If your hungry son asks for stone, won’t you give him bread instead? If he ignorantly asks for a serpent, will you give it to him? If he mistakenly asks for a scorpion, won’t you give him an egg for breakfast instead? If you, as messed up as you are, wouldn’t give something harmful or dangerous to your children even when they ask, how much more would your Father in heaven also not do such a thing?”

We gotta stop thinking of God as some kind of impersonal machine, dolling out trouble when we ask for a virtue because that’s the formula: trouble leads to patience. This God, who loves us so much he actually came down to physically walk and talk with us in the flesh, we gotta stop seeing as a ruthless, heartless Cosmic Force.

If I ask for something that might harm me, if I’m desperately praying for an answer that might actually be dangerous for me, or cause me greater pain, I’m comforted to know that my Father — a wise and loving parent — cares enough to say “No”. He has no problem saying, “you don’t need that now” or “no, that’s not good for you — you can’t have that.”

I wanna turn that Italian proverb upside down. This is the truth I embrace. “When God wishes to bless us, he doesn’t always answer our prayers.” I’m happy God sometimes says “no.”

Just something to chew on …

You know that story of the Good Samaritan in the Bible? It’s a bit troubling to me. I don’t like it, because it places demands on me that are inconvenient. But here’s the bottom line: if you want a real relationship with the Eternal God, it will only go as far as your involvement with other people.

In that story, in Luke 10, a religious expert comes to Jesus and asks his advice. “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Sounds heavy, but really the guy is just expressing the emptiness he’s feeling inside. He knew his Bible; he lived it as best he could. He was an expert. But something was still missing; he knew it, but he just didn’t know what it was. So he asks the guy who had become famous for his connection with Heaven, who’d healed all kinds of diseased and injured people, who’d set people free from dark forces in their lives. Surely, he would know. And Jesus, being the good Jewish rabbi that he was, turns the question back on the man: “What is written in the Torah; how do you read it?” And the man responds with the classic and correct answer: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself.” “That’s right,” Jesus affirmed, “do this and you’ll have life.”

Standard Answers Won’t Do

But it was the standard answer the man knew his entire life. And it wasn’t enough. So he probes deeper, “but who is my neighbor?” Basically, I believe the man is asking Jesus to show him how to make it work. “What does this look like in real life? How am I supposed to do this?”

And then comes the famous parable. A man is walking from Jerusalem to Jericho and gets way-laid on the road by robbers. He’s beaten and left half dead on the side of the road. Two religious types, a priest and a Levite, walk by, see him laying there, and cross over to the other side of the street to avoid him. But a Samaritan sees him and has pity on him. He walks over to him, cleans his wounds with wine and oil, bandages him up, places him on his donkey and takes him to an inn where he pays the inn-keeper to care for him. Which of these acted as a neighbor to the beaten man? Obviously, the Samaritan. The point is simple enough, and the religious expert gets it.

Catch the Details

But there is some really rich subtlety in this story we might easily miss. Jesus describes the beaten traveler as “half dead”, and I’m struck by his choice of words. I think they’re deliberate. After all, the original question he was asked concerned obtaining eternal life. So the word-play involving life and death would be striking. And our impression of the two men in the story who walked by, ignoring the injured man, would naturally be one of revulsion. “How cold-hearted. How hypocritical. And they call themselves ‘religious,’ that priest and Levite. That wounded man may be half dead, but those two guys are completely dead inside. The Samaritan, on the other hand, taking compassionate action to help the man, now he is fully alive, fully in-tune with his humanity. He’s the one with ‘true religion’; he’s obviously got a clue about what true godly life is all about.” In Jesus’ deliberate choice of words, we can already see what is involved in “inheriting eternal life.” It’s not about what happens to us after we die; it’s not just about life in the “age to come.” It’s about the quality of the life we live in the here and now. We can go around as religious zombies, dead to those around us, or we can live a rich, fulfilling life involved with others. When God’s life invades us, it will change the way we interact with people.

And look at what that Samaritan man actually does. He sees the beaten victim and is immediately moved by compassion. In the story, this is the first reference to any kind of emotion, any type of personal connection with the robbed man. The Samaritan is emotionally engaged in the situation and with his fellow human being. Next, he cleans and bandages the man’s wounds, he touches the man. He gets his hands dirty. He is now physically as well as emotionally involved in the man’s plight. Then he puts the man on his donkey and takes him to a place where he can recover. That means he has to walk. He gave up his own comfort to help the man; he readily puts up with the inconvenience. And finally, he even pays the man’s medical bills. This Samaritan was fully engaged in the situation — emotionally, physically, materially and financially. He knew what life was all about. He had what that original seeker was missing.

Full Impact

The full impact of this can be seen when we go back to the answer Jesus elicited from the religious leader. What is needed to participate in the divine life? “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength … and love your neighbor as yourself.” In answer to the man’s follow-up question, “But how do I do this?”, Jesus shows that loving God is inseparable from loving people. If we are supposed to love God with all our hearts, minds, souls, and strength, then those are exactly the same qualities we must use to involve ourselves with others. Like the Samaritan, we must love others with all our hearts, souls, minds, and strength. That is what loving God is really about.

To put it another way, “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but closes his heart against him, how can the love of God be in him?” … “If anyone says ‘I love God’ yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. … Whoever loves God must also love his brother” (1 John 3:17; 4:20-21).

Interestingly, in the Gospel account, Jesus turns the religious man’s question around. Instead of asking “who is my neighbor,” we should be asking, “who can I be a neighbor to?” You can’t claim to have a deep sense of spirituality or a great love for God while at the same time ignoring the needs of people around you. To love God, you must love your neighbor, you must be fully engaged with those around you — emotionally, physically, materially and financially: with your heart, your soul, your mind and your strength. In a word, it’s about relationships. It’s about real human-to-human involvement. If we want a more meaningful life that only a closer walk with God can bring, that’s what we must do. “Now go, and do likewise,” Jesus tells us.

So the next time someone asks you to help them move, you may just have to double-check your initial reaction. “Help you move? Of course I will.”