Pigs don’t ask questions

I am not sure what it was about hearing that scientists had mapped the genome of a domestic pig that so captured my attention.  Perhaps it was all the other stuff that I would have thought needed to be done before we got around to a genetic map of pig DNA. Once again I was not consulted, go figure.

Lawrence Schook is a University of Illinois professor of biomedical science and the leader of the research team that mapped the pig genome.  When asked, he said that the biggest surprise that resulted from the project was the similarity in sequence and structure between the pig’s DNA and that of human DNA.  As I look at the clutter on my desk, I am thinking that Dr. Schook should not be surprised.

The truth of the matter is that I already knew there were similarities between humans and pigs, positive similarities.  I had a young man in my first youth group out of seminary who had a heart defect.  The surgeons at Duke went in and replaced his bad valve with — you guessed it — a valve that they took from a pig.  At the time, I had never heard of such a  thing, but it worked out quite well for that young man.  After recovering from his surgery, he led our church youth league basketball team in points, steals and heart.  You probably always thought that the best thing that could come from a pig was bacon; now you know that there is more to a pig than you might have thought.

It may seem obvious, but if we share genetic similarities with pigs, how much more similar are we to other human beings.  Granted there are different kinds of people in the world.  To be honest, some of those differences are more than I can understand or be comfortable with at times.  Yet, I have to believe that a father in China wants what I want for my children — good health, meaningful work and a happy life.

Why are there so many religions in the world?  I believe that there are so many because we as human beings have a desire inside of us to be connected with something larger than ourselves.  A Buddhist in Taiwan, a Muslim in Detroit, and a Presbyterian in Knoxville all seek to find meaning that is greater than their day-to-day experience of life.  What holds it all together?  What gives meaning to life?  Some would suggest that the work of scientists like Dr. Schook lessen the need for these kinds of questions; that somehow the answers to life most pressing question are to be found by looking at a test tube or through a microscope.

While I marvel at the information and knowledge that continues to emerge from laboratories around the world, I do not feel any less of a need to know God and to be known by God.  The pressing questions of life do not reside in a laboratory or a classroom, though there is much good to be learned and discovered in both places.  The questions that each of us must find answers to reside in that thin place between ourselves and the holy.  Who am I?  Who am I to be in this world?  What am I to do?  What should my neighbor expect of me?  What does God expect of me?

I am pretty sure that pigs don’t ask these sorts of questions and so they miss the joy of discovering meaning and joy in living life.  Likewise, when we don’t ask these sorts of questions, we too miss the meaning and joy that God intended to be ours.

Blanket Blessings

Dr. Roy Honeycutt, then president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, was at Carson-Newman College to preach a campus revival during my senior year.  I remember very little of what he said except that in one service, he did preach from the 28^th Chapter of Isaiah.  The verse that has stuck with me all these years is verse 20: “The bed is too short to stretch out on, the blanket too narrow to wrap around you.”  I think this verse has stuck with me because it is just so very true.  What it is more uncomfortable than a bed that is too short, unless it is a blanket that is too narrow.  What is more pleasant than a comfortable bed and warm blanket on a cold night?

We cannot ponder such a question without being mindful of the many people who do not regularly, if ever, enjoy the simple pleasure of a comfortable bed and warm blanket.  I was recently reminded of those who have no place to sleep and no blanket to keep them warm while watching the trailer for the upcoming movie about the life of Michael Oher, The Blind Side. Oher grew up on the streets of Memphis, literally raising himself.  In the clip from the movie, Oher’s adoptive mother is getting him settled into his new bedroom.  He says, “I never had one.”  She says, “A room of your own?”  He says, “A bed.”  The young man had never had a bed of his own.

To be without bed or blanket is a hard thing, especially when you consider that one of the things that we all have to do every day is to sleep. To have to sleep in less than restful conditions is not really rest at all.  The prophet Isaiah creates just such an uneasy picture to describe the relationship between God and those he is preaching to.   For those who have strayed from their covenant with God, life is as unpleasant and as frustrating as a night spent in a bed too short, trying to stay warm with a blanket too narrow.  This is what life will be for those who led Israel to excessive indulgence and away from justice and mercy.

A blanket is a small thing unless you don’t have one when one is needed.  A blanket given may seem like an insignificant gift, but to receive a blanket when one is cold is no small thing.  Neither is it a small thing to give a blanket in the name of Jesus.  In so doing, followers of Christ put flesh on the idea that the church is the body of Christ.  The church being the presence of Christ in a world full of restless people, that all too often ignore their worn out souls, that have found no rest in a bed too short with a blanket too narrow, means offering a different way of ordering life.  Giving a blanket to someone who is cold becomes both an act of faith and a word of testimony.  It is an act of faith in the life and teachings of Jesus.  It says that we believe that if he taught us to pray “. . .thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven…” then we believe that it is coming.

Giving expresses that belief and bears witness to it.  God is at work in our world and God has invited us to join in the work of announcing the reign of God in our lives and in our world.  Whether we are giving blankets to the homeless in our city, dollars to send workers to the uttermost parts of the world, or our prayers for the peace of neighbors near and far, we are bearing witness to the reality of the coming of the kingdom of God.

The kingdom of God is coming. Let us give ourselves to it cheerfully and sacrificially so that the presence of Christ might be made real in a world that grows colder each day.  Let us live in the light of his love showing the way with our words and actions, the way to warmth and rest.

The Picture of Health

Thanks to my friend Bill Nieporte for sharing this picture.

The Insightful Beggar

When I came out the back door of the church, I immediately saw him. I stood their watching him for a moment before he noticed me. When he did notice me standing there, he did not acknowledge my presence. Instead, he tried to act as if he had not seen me or I him. But I knew that he had seen me because he picked up the pace of his activity. He hurriedly tossed his last bag of trash into the church’s dumpster, hopped in his car and sped away. In broad daylight, he had just stolen space in our dumpster for his trash.

Why did that guy feel the need to use our dumpster? Maybe he does not have the money to pay to have his garbage picked up curbside. Perhaps he did not have time to go all the way over to Oak Ridge highway to the convenience center where there are dumpsters with ample space provided by Knox County for residence of Knox County.

He was not the first person to toss their garbage into our dumpster and he will not be the last. Every time I see someone doing it, I remember a night long ago in inner-city Louisville, Kentucky. Patti and I were in seminary. We had not been married long, less than year I believe. We lived in a small, two room apartment on the third floor of the Jefferson Street Baptist Chapel. I was taking the trash out to the dumpster and as I stepped out of the back door of the building, I heard something move in the dumpster. The sound frightened me significantly. I went back in the building. The trash could wait until morning. I did watch from a window as a man climbed out the dumpster and made his way into the night.

Which brings us to Bartimaeus, the blind beggar on the side of the road as Jesus and his disciples are leaving Jericho. The dumpsters make me think of Bartimaeus because he is beggar. He stays alive by collecting what others toss his way, what they can do without. He stays alive with a coin here and scrap there tossed his way. What is the purpose? So that he can do it all over again the next day? What kind of existence is that? It is the kind that is not well thought of by most of us. At best we pity people like Bartimaeus, at worse we have scorn for them and their willingness to live off the efforts of others, not willing to work for their on bread like the rest of us.

What we almost always fail to see when we see people like Bartimaeus is what they might reveal to us of ourselves. Why the pity? Why the scorn? Why do we find their plight so heart-breaking, so repulsive, so moving or so frightening? We think we are asking questions about the beggar, but if we listen a little deeper, we hear the beggar answers questions, not about himself, but about us.

Amazingly, if we pay attention to Bartimaeus, we discover that he understands something way ahead of the rest of us. Bartimaeus gets it. He cries out to Jesus and calls him the Son of David bestowing on him the Messianic title as Jesus and his disciples leave Jericho and make their way to Jerusalem, the City of David. How is it that a blind beggar sitting on the side of the road can see what no one else can see before anyone else can see it? For all we know Bartimaeus might have climbed out of his own dumpster that morning. How can he possibly know that the King is coming, that Jesus is the one. Have mercy indeed.

There are many like Bartimaeus who in their own way sit beside the roadways of our lives. What would they say to us if we listened? If we responded to them with something other than pity or scorn, what might we learn about ourselves and God’s calling on our lives?

Bono Speaks

Bono sings some great songs, but does he ask the right questions?

The Nobel Peace Prize is the rest of the world saying, “Don’t blow it.”

But that’s not just directed at Mr. Obama. It’s directed at all of us. What the president promised was a “global plan,” not an American plan. The same is true on all the other issues that the Nobel committee cited, from nuclear disarmament to climate change — none of these things will yield to unilateral approaches. They’ll take international cooperation and American leadership.

Does the rest of the world have a right to expect leadership from the United States?

Health Care and Abortion: Coercion or Compassion?

A Public Religion Research poll released in September indicates that 83% of conservative religious activists identified abortion as the most important issue on which to focus their energy. At the same time, only six percent of conservative religious activist identified universal health care coverage as an important issue.

This disparity in concern between universal health care and abortion among conservative religious activists raises some interesting questions when one considers that Belgium and the Netherlands have two of the lowest abortion rates in the world and also universally provide extensive pre- and post-natal health care for mothers and children. As Glenn Stassen pointed out in 2005, “Belgium and Holland have the lowest abortion rates in the world (6.8 and 6.5 per 1,000 women of childbearing age in 1996, compared with 22.9 in the U.S). This is because, though abortion is legal, those countries provide strong support for mothers and babies. By contrast, countries in Latin America, where abortion is illegal but mothers are not well supported, have among the highest abortion rates.”
(The Christian Century) February22, 2005

Whether or not the intention of the universal coverage in those countries was to bring about a lower rate of abortions, it would seem to be a least one of, if not, the major factor in contributing to such a low rate of abortions. So I wonder wouldn’t it be worth a try? Maybe universal health care in the United States would not reduce the rate of abortions to the levels found in Belgium and Holland, but wouldn’t any reduction be better than no reduction or even an increase?

What really matters most in the abortion debate, that abortion be made illegal or that fewer abortions are actually performed? In Latin America where abortion is illegal except for in Cuba, the abortion rate is higher than in the United States. Making abortion illegal does not make it go away.

If laws will not stop abortion, perhaps compassion would at least reduce its frequency. People coerced to to good rarely do good for long. Compassion and care might just do what coercion and shouting have been unable to accomplish.

Hating Others is not a Teaching of Jesus

Someone had done or said something and I said “I hate” whoever it was that had done or said something. Now I have no memory who it was that said or did something that caused me to say “I hate.” What I cannot forget is my baptist grandmother bending down to say to me, “Eddie, we don’t hate anyone. We may not like what they do or say, but we do not hate anyone.”

In Saturday’s News-Sentinel, Thomas H. Kevil used a rather broad brush to ask a rather troubling question of Baptists. The question he asked: “Do Baptists condone this type of hatred being preached from the pulpit?” The “hatred” he referred to came from the pulpits of two Baptist churches, one in Arizona and one in California. The pastors in both of those churches have expressed their dislike for the sitting president of the United States to the extreme of praying for his death.

What Mr. Kevil obviously does not understand is that there is a great deal of diversity among Baptists. Furthermore, he seems to be unaware of the fact that not all Baptists are connected in a formal organization. While there are groups of Baptist churches — for instance the Southern Baptist Convention, the National Baptist Convention and the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship — some Baptist churches are independent, belonging to no group at all. Even if a Baptist church belongs to a convention, it still maintains its autonomy, which is to say that there is no outside authority or hierarchy that can tell a congregation of Baptists what to do. The truth of the matter is that anyone with a place to meet, a sheet of plywood, a couple of signposts, a bucket of paint, and a handful of people can start his or her own Baptist church. There are neither forms to fill out nor any central office from which to seek permission.

The peculiarities of Baptist doings are often lost on the uninitiated. Mr. Kevil is not to be faulted for being uninformed with regard to the different ways that Baptists think about and practice their faith. That being said, his question is a fair question, given the behavior of some who wear the label. Do Baptists condone hatred? While feeling the need to answer such a question borders on the surreal, let me boldly and confidently say that most,if not all, Baptists do not condone hatred. The great irony of the question is that the first Baptists were the hated ones. They were persecuted for being different. Their lives were threatened because they did not conform to accepted norms regarding the practice of religion. In England and in colonial America, early Baptists were jailed, flogged, and scorned because they sought to practice their faith according to the dictates of their consciences, rather than by the creeds of majority opinion and legislated religion. They did not seek to impose their beliefs on others, only asking for the freedom to worship God as they were led by the Holy Spirit and their understanding of scripture. Modern day haters who unscrupulously lay claim to the Baptist name bear a much greater resemblance to those who bullied and harassed early Baptists rather than the men and women who refused to conform to the religious expectations of their neighbors. The very name Baptist was a term of derision used to express the scorn that those in the religious establishment felt for early Baptists.

The answer to the question is no, Baptists do not condone hatred. That the question even needs to be asked is a travesty and a shame. That someone could assume the name of Baptist and behave in such a way that the question is even prompted, dishonors the lives and sacrifices of those first Baptists. To be a Baptist is to be a follower of Christ, the One who took on flesh, that the world might know the depth of God’s love.

An experience with that love leads most Christians and Baptists to condone love and not hate, life and not death. While we all possess a soul competent to relate to God and to learn the ways of God, we do not all arrive at the same conclusions nor convictions. My understandings may be similar to those of others, yet not identical. The degree to which my understanding of God impacts the choices I make in my day-to-day living varies from those others. So I do not presume to speak for other Baptists when I say Baptists do not condone hatred. Other Baptists are fully capable of answering for themselves. In the same way, I do not presume to speak for others when I say that I do condone both the love and the life that God invites us to share with one another.

I pray for health and well-being of our president, and that God would grant him wisdom for the task before him. I am convinced that my Papaw Ledford, deacon and charter member of Ozone Missionary Baptist Church and a man who voted for Nixon twice, would not have it any other way. It is the Christian thing to do and it is the Baptist thing to do. Hating other people is not a teaching of Jesus.

Being the presence of Christ.

What a gift it is to have friends come and visit. We had a friend visit with us this past Sunday. His presence with us was a visible reminder that other people who live in other parts of the world experience life differently. Not only are their day-to-day lives different from ours, but also the challenges they face and the trials that they endure. Our friend’s retelling of the murder of his colleague poignantly underscored in a somber way those differences.

Our friend and his family spend most of their days in a place far different from our East Tennessee. Yet, we do share a common faith, a common experience of grace and redemption. Out of that experience of grace and redemption, we share a common calling. It is a calling to be the presence of Christ as we live out our lives. We are called by the profound act of love demonstrated to us and for us in the life, teachings and death of Jesus Christ. We are to extend grace as it has been extended to us, to give hope as it has been given to us, and to show mercy as it has been shown to us.

We share a common calling with those around the world who have heard the voice of the one who said to us “. . . come unto me and I will give you rest.” We are called by the same words: “Go ye into all the world,” “When you have done unto the least of these,” “Love your neighbor as yourself,” and “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” We are called with the same words to the same calling, though we are called to different tasks in different places.

Our friend will return next month to the place that God has called him and his family to serve. He goes with courage and great faith to do what God calls each of us to do, wherever we find ourselves, to be the presence of Christ. Even though we are surely called to be Christ to those around us wherever we are, we should not dismiss too easily the idea that God might very well have a task for us that would require no less courage, nor less faith, than that of our friend and his family as they return to the place they call home. May our prayers rise continually for their safety and well-being.

Last month, you brought to the altar over 500 pairs of shoes and offered them to the Lord. Those shoes were delivered to the Western Heights Baptist Center. They will be given to men and women, boys and girls who need them. They will be given as a tangible reminder that in the midst of their need, they are not alone in this world, but that Christ is with them. Giving shoes to protect the feet of the needy is being the presence of Christ.

This month is our Tennessee Partners in Missions offering as well as the month that we collect blankets for Lost Sheep Ministry for the homeless. The gift you give to the mission offering will be used by six ministries across the state as they seek to be the presence of Christ. The blankets will be given to homeless people in our city to warm them this winter. Again, participating in either or both of these offerings is a way that you are the presence of Christ in a world that longs for his grace and peace.

With courage and faith, let us be the presence of Christ together so that all may know the joy and hope that we have found in him.

Hanging by a Thread

I was on my way into worship Sunday when I looked down and noticed a button on my coat hanging by a thread. How does that happen? I wear this suit a couple of times a month, and when I do wear it all I do is talk to people and shake hands. I do not wear it when I am performing any sort of manual labor or doing any sort of physical activity. All I do is preach in it, and yet here is a button hanging by a thread. What was it that put so much stress and strain on the button that caused the thread holding it to break? How did that happen?

Asking how it happened might be a useful question if finding the answer would help to do something to keep it from happening again. But what I am really saying when I ask “how did that happen?” is that I don’t believe that it did happen. Yet, hanging by a thread right before my eyes is proof positive that it did, in fact, happen.

How did it happen? I do not know. I try to remember something — anything. Did it get caught on a door that I was opening? Maybe when I was hugging someone it got caught on something. I don’t know, but there it is hanging by a thread. It happened.

The really frustrating element of this hanging button episode is that I was the person who sewed it on my coat before. Yes, the button that I looked down and saw hanging by a threat on Sunday was a replacement button. Its predecessor disappeared more than a year ago, and I have no better explanation for its disappearance than I do for why its replacement is hanging by a thread — except that I did not do such a good job of sewing it onto my coat.

At least I did not lose this button. No, I saw it hanging by a thread. So now I do not have to go find a matching button. That is good because I have already used the one replacement button that came with the suit.

There are times in our lives when we feel like a button hanging by a thread. How did this happen? What did we get snagged by or caught on? What did we do to get ourselves into such a situation?

Maybe the thread represents our hope, our determination, or even our faith. Whatever it represents is nearing exhaustion. There is only a thread of it left to hold us in place. Without that thread we are loosed to go wherever it is that lost buttons go to.

I did not lose that button that I saw hanging by a thread from my coat on Sunday. No, I went ahead and tore it off and stuck in my pocket. Later, I will sew it on again. Hopefully, this time I will do a better job and it will be more secure and more permanent. I would rather not have to do it again, but you never know with buttons.

God can come to us in those times when we are feeling like a button hanging by a thread. God can tear us loose from the uncertainty and insecurity of the thread we so desperately cling to and hold us firmly and lovingly. In time, we find ourselves reattached by the tender hand of God to abundant life for which he created us and redeemed us; this time, attached more securely and with less uncertainty. Having been touched by the merciful fingers of God at our moment of great fear, we are no longer hanging by a thread

Salt and Peace

When I read Jesus’ words about stumbling, I cringe. For the person who causes a little one to stumble, he states emphatically that drowning would be a more pleasant consequence than whatever it is that will eventually befall such people. Then, with brutal bluntness, he declares that chopped off hands and feet and plucked-out eyes that have caused one to stumble are preferable to hell, where the worm never dies and the fire is never quenched.

His exaggerated language certainly grabs the attention even in a twenty-first century culture desensitized to violence and brutality. Why such graphic language to make his point? Maybe because it is an important point and he wants to make sure that we get it. So he says what he says, and we come away knowing that his overstated word choice is only a literary device to underscore the importance of his point. But still, there is a faint whisper somewhere in our head that wonders if maybe he really meant what he said just the way he said it.

Spiritually speaking, could we ever find ourselves in a situation similar to Aron Ralston? Ralston was the hiker who got his hand and forearm pinned beneath a boulder in Utah’s Bluejohn Canyon. After five days of being trapped, he cut off his arm in order to save his life. No exaggeration, no hyperbole, he just did it because he realized that he was going to die if he did not do it.

While I am confident that Jesus does not intend for us to mutilate ourselves, I am just as certain that he does desire for us to handle our spiritual lives with a sense of urgency — to follow Christ as if what we do or do not do matters — knowing that in following him, we are making decisions that are a matter of life and death. We make our way in a world that is fraught with pits and snares eager to take from us the life that Christ has called us to.

After his vivid admonishment to separate ourselves from whatever would cause us to stumble, Jesus speaks of salt, and of being at peace with one another. What does it mean to have the salt in us that Jesus speaks of, and to be at peace with those around us?

I learned this week of the death of Chris Leggett. Chris was murdered on June 23, of this year in Nouakchott, Mauritania. Two days after his death, al-Qaeda issued a statement claiming responsibility for his death. Chris lived and worked there with his wife and four children. His job was to create learning opportunities for the poor in Mauritania’s capital and throughout the country. His work took him to prisons as he helped former inmates re-enter society. The training center where he worked taught people skills that would help them get jobs. The small business loan program that he directed impacted the lives of numerous people.

Chris grew up down the road in Cleveland, Tennessee. He attended First Baptist Church there, and graduated from Cleveland High School. He continued his education at Cleveland State Community College and the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Chris walked in and around many of the same snares and pits that we have, yet he did not let them keep him from living the life to which Christ had called him. He was full of the salt of which Jesus speaks. He lived and died seeking to be the peace of Christ for those with whom he was sharing his life. May we each so flavor the lives that we touch as well as those that touch ours.