The Dangers of Christian Nationalism

(This sermon was delivered at Greensboro United Church of Christ on July 3rd, 2022. If you prefer listening and watching to reading, the video is here.)

In preparing to preach each week, I always begin with a text from scripture. The text provides the theme and title for the sermon. I did not do that this week. This week I started with a title, the dangers of Christian nationalism. For me, that title points first toward the Exodus passage that we just heard, then to two passages in Matthew’s gospel where we see Jesus speaking out of his understanding of our Exodus text.

The Exodus text brings me to an affirmation that there is only one God worthy of my worship, only one God in which my life rests. That God holds me like no other thing in my life. To be sure, I love other things. I love my family. I love my church. I love my country. I love University of Tennessee football. But those things are not God. When I start thinking and living like one of them is God, my life gets out of balance.

I am the Lord your God, have no other gods before me—-and don’t take my name in vain, don’t misuse my name.

That prohibition seems particularly germane when we think about Christian nationalism. I believe that many Americans want to believe that our nation trusts in God. We plaster God’s name all over our money. And we turn around and spend 766 billion of those dollars on weapons of war. I am hard pressed to understand how that is an action of the people who trust in God. It makes me think that we trust in the manufacturers of armaments at least as much as we trust in God.

To be able to say that we trust in God while we are arming ourselves in such an exorbitant fashion makes me think that if we are honest, we want to at least say “In God and armament manufacturers we trust,” if we are honest. If we are not honest, we distort our religion so that it makes it all normal for us to be pious and religious sounding while trusting in lots of other things beside God. Could there be a more insidious way for us to use God’s name in vain?

Two questions we need to answer as we explore these texts. First, what is Christian nationalism? Second, why is it dangerous?

According to Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the term “nationalism” is generally used to describe two phenomena: the attitude that the members of a nation have when they care about their national identity, and the actions that the members of a nation take when seeking to achieve (or sustain) self-determination. The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics defines nationalism as a set of beliefs about the nation: its origins, nature, and value. Of course, more has been said about nationalism, much more.

What happens to nationalism when a particular religious viewpoint is added to it? When we christianize nationalism we adopt “. . .a cultural framework that idealizes and advocates a fusion of Christianity with American civic life. Christian nationalism contends that America has been and should always be distinctively “Christian” from top to bottom – in its self-identity, interpretations of its own history, sacred symbols, cherished values, and public policies – and it aims to keep it that way. But the “Christian” in Christian nationalism is more about identity than religion. It carries with it assumptions about nativism, white supremacy, authoritarianism, patriarchy, and militarism”( WhatIsChristianNationalism.pdf (bjconline.org).

Joseph Williams, professor of religion at Rutgers University, sees “Christian nationalists insist(ing) that the United States was established as an explicitly Christian nation, and believ(ing) that this close relationship between Christianity and the state needs to be protected—and in many respects restored—in order for the U.S. to fulfill its God-given destiny.” Therefore, Christian nationalists go to great effort “to secure a privileged position for Christianity in the public square that often coincides with efforts to preserve the historical status quo on issues of race, gender, and sexuality.”

Therefore, for the purposes of this sermon, we could say that Christian Nationalism seeks to impose a particular understanding of Christianity and a particular version of American history on the policies, laws and practices of our nation so that the two are wedded together in way that gives privilege to the right sort of Americans while harming those not considered American enough or Christian enough by said policies, laws and practices.

Why is Christian nationalism dangerous?

Why were the Crusades dangerous?

Why was the inquisition dangerous?

Why were the Salem witch trials dangerous?

Why was the Holocaust dangerous?

Christian nationalism endangers our life together for all the same reasons.

One of the chief dangers of Christian Nationalism lies in the way it identifies those who are a threat to its idealized vision of America’s past and its insistence on a present that grants it the privileges to which it assumes entitlement. All that matters is what happens to true Americans. Christian nationalism ignores those who have been excluded, persecuted, enslaved, forced to migrate, denied the vote. In doing so, Christian Nationalism, has looked at and treated whole groups of people as something other than human beings created in the image of God and endowed with certain inalienable rights. No Christian Nationalist would justify treating a true Americans or true Christian in that way, but for those who are other than true American and true Christian, there are no such reservations.  Throughout the history of our country, there have always been those who were other, other than true American, true Christian.  The people who were on this land when Europeans arrived, Enslaved Africans and their descendants, the Irish in the 1840s-50s, Chinese in the 1880s, Italians in the early 1900s, Jews in the 1930s, and Muslims in the 2000s. To survive, our LGBTQ+ siblings have had remain invisible for most of the time our country has been in existence. The 2^nd class status of women is a core value of Christian Nationalism all the way from a constitution that gave them no right to vote right up to a week ago Friday.

To be clear, the othering of some Americans by the Christian Nationalist mindset is not a practice that is confined to our history, it is ongoing. This week in Ohio after the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health case that overturned Roe v. Wade, an Ohio state law went into effect making abortion illegal for anyone who has been pregnant for 6 weeks or longer. A 10-year-old rape victim, 6 weeks and 3 days pregnant, could not access the care she needed and that her parents sought for her in her home state. She nor those responsible for her care were deemed American enough to decide what care she needed nor to access that care in her home state.

The Courts ruling in Kennedy v. Bremerton in favor of Coach Kennedy’s post game prayers leaves the high school athletes of other faiths, of no faith, or who understand Christianity differently than the Coach with little recourse. If they want to play, they are going to have to pray. They are not American enough to have the freedom to exercise their understanding of religion in their own way or to exercise no religion at all.  

Similarly in Maine, the court’s ruling in Carson v. Makin forces Maine taxpayers to pay for religious education without regard for how that religious education agrees or disagrees with their understanding of faith and spirituality. They are not American enough to have the freedom to expect public school dollars be used to pay for a public-school education.

The most frightening example of the danger of Christian Nationalism has been brought to light by the January 6^th hearings. On that day, the target of Christian Nationalist was not a law, a practice, or a policy, but the makers of laws and policy. The ones not American enough were elected members of Government.

These are just a few examples of how Christian Nationalism endangers our democracy. While these dangers are real and they are grave, I am even more concerned about the danger Christian Nationalism poses to our faith. For us, as followers of Christ, watching the misuse and abuse our sacred scriptures and practices erode the message at the heart of those scriptures and undermine the foundation of those practices is a painful thing through which to live.  

We shall have no other gods before me.

Or text this morning makes it plain that if we are going to order our religious life and our understanding of spiritual matters in accordance with the teaching of scripture, and there’s only room for one God. One recipient of our devotion. One entity in which our lives ultimately rest. I am the Lord your God; you sure have no other gods before me.

In Matthew’s gospel, chapter 6, we see Jesus expressing his understanding of what it means to have no other gods before God.  In verse 24 he says, no one can serve 2 masters, or slavery the hate the one and love the other or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth. Remember where and when Jesus is speaking, 1st century Palestine. He is not living in a free and independent country free to make its own decisions. No, it’s an occupied territory under Roman rule. What Jesus is saying in this context is that if you are serving wealth, you cannot be serving God. Presumably you would have to have made some kind of deal with the Romans, a less than ethical deal. A deal that meant you gave a part of yourself to the deal that should only have been given to God. For Jesus, worshipping God was not just something that happened in a religious space like the temple, but it was a matter that touched every aspect of life. Serving God meant in the temple, at home, at rest, at work, and everywhere in between.

The history of our country is full of examples of Christians who were trying to serve two masters. Most notably, the way the church in America used the Bible to defend chattel slavery. Not to mention the Trail of Tears, Jim Crow, new Jim Crow, and the prison industrial complex that disproportionately incarcerates black and brown bodies.

Jesus understood, and he wanted his followers to understand that serving God not only meant saying yes to God, but it also meant saying no to that which was not of God.

In the 22nd chapter of Matthew, Jesus is asked a question about paying taxes to the emperor of Rome by some Pharisees. They likely did not think it was lawful or right for them to be paying taxes to the government that had invaded their country, but if Jesus agreed with them and answered no they might report him to the Roman authorities and get him arrested for starting a rebellion. If he answers yes, then he loses his crowd. None of them think it’s right to be paying taxes to invaders and occupiers. Jesus answers neither yes nor no. Instead, yes record did he ask whose image is on the coin. When he hears their reply, Caesar, he tells them to give to Caesar that which bears Caesars image. Then he tells them to give to God that which bears God’s image. Namely themselves. Give your coins to Caesar, but you, you created in the image of God people, give yourselves to God. You who bear the image of God, give that to God. No one or nothing is worthy of that image other than God. Caesar can have your coins, but your heart and your hopes, your soul and your dreams, your spirit and your aspirations, those belong to God. Give yourself to God and see what happens.

It is in that freedom of choice that we are truly able to experience and discover the mystery and wonder of being connected to God. That is not a choice anyone else can make for us. And it’s certainly not a choice that anyone can push us into or guilt or shame or pressure us into. But if we freely choose to open ourselves to God, we enter the mystery of the Christian life. Henri Nouwen help us see that is not our work to do, but God’s gift to us to be received —  receiving a new life, a new identity, which depends not on what we can achieve, but on what we’re willing to receive.

Our participation in this thing that God is doing in Christ, our participation in Christianity must be voluntary. It cannot be produced by government edict nor social custom. If our participation in it is anything other than voluntary then what we are participating in is something other than the movement that God started in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

God longs for an intimate, loving relationship with each of us, and all of us, but God does not force God’s self on us. God yearns and longs for us, God whispers and prods us, God invites and calls us, again and again. God waits for us…. to realize we’re free. For freedom Christ has set us free.

Free from any religious system, spiritual path, or destructive ideology that would have us to look at ourselves and others as anything other than human beings beloved by God.

Free from being coerced, shamed, guilted, belittled into religious conformity.

Free to love as we have been loved.

When the government acts to impose the practices of our faith on our fellow citizens in an involuntary way, as the US Supreme Court has done in at least three cases during this recent session, The government does harm to the cause of Christ and abuses the heart of our religion. Christianity that is not freely chosen is not Christianity.

Every emperor since Constantine has offered some privilege to the church. And with every acceptance of such privilege, the church became less the company of the faithful called by God and more of an appendage of the empire, a tool to serve the aims and aspirations of the state.

Our resistance to any movement or ideology that tries to make the Christian religion about something other than loving God and loving others is vital to our growth and development as followers of Christ both as individuals and as a congregation.

When people call themselves Christians and use the Jesus story to exclude, we have to say no.

When people call themselves Christians and use the Jesus story to deny the human dignity of some of us, we have to say no.

When people call themselves Christians and use the Jesus story to threaten the lives of those who do not meet their criteria for being American enough, we have to say no.

We have to say no to all of that because with Jesus there’s really only one thing, people to be loved. neighbors to be loved, enemies to be loved.

Rush, Reminder & Revival

Monday was my first Martin Luther King Jr. day in Alabama. There was a march this morning. It ended in front of Franchise Missionary Baptist Church here in Phenix City. Before any marchers could be seen from the church, three police officers on motorcycles came into view. The officers were leading the march with their blue lights flashing. I imagine that the same thing was true for parades and marches all over the country today. There were police officers at the front leading the way. While it may be routine now for law enforcement to lead such parades and make sure that they come off in an orderly fashion, such has not always been the case. Their efforts to do so on this day gave me a rush, a reminder and a revival.

The rush was a feeling like the one I get when I see something good and pleasing. It was like the feeling I get when I see a friend or family member that I have not seen in a long time. It may have even approached that feeling I get when I watch a young daughter or son seeing a parent for the first time after a deployment overseas serving our country. The news we hear so often is not good news. Even when we hear good news, there seem to be detractors who try to convince us that it is not as good as we think it is or not good at all. It is possible for us to start thinking that good acts or good words are no longer possible in today’s world. However, good does still happen. I saw it happen as people marched to celebrate progress made and to advocate for even more. I heard it from choirs singing and from a sixth-grader reciting Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech.

The reminder was embodied in the message of the man the day commemorates. Dr. King’s aim in life was not to have a day named after him. His aim was not solely to lead a movement that would achieve civil rights for African-Americans. His focus was larger than that and more profound. Dr. King was a preacher of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. His concern was for the human race. Like Jesus, he was particularly concerned for those who were poor. He worked on behalf of people, black and white, who suffered in a social and economic system that kept the American dream just out of their reach.

The revival starts when I am mindful of those folks who still live somewhere beyond both the fruits of the American dream and the embrace of Jesus’ just and merciful kingdom. Not just in our country, but in our world there are those who scrape by with inadequate food, water and health care. Jesus had something to say about them. When we see them and give them food, water and treatment, we see Jesus and give him food, water and treatment.

One time a lawyer ask Jesus a question, “Who is my neighbor?” The question still serves as an effective way to shape and form our lives in the image of Christ for the sake of others. Jesus told the lawyer a story about a man who fell among thieves. They beat him and left him to die. A priest, a Levite and a Samaritan passed by where he was laying wounded. One of them stopped to help. Jesus asked the lawyer, “Who was a neighbor to this man?”

“Who is my neighbor?” Jesus’ answer forces us to rethink our own answer. Jesus’ answer cuts across boundaries. Human labels and categories do not determine who our neighbor is, at least not as Jesus understands neighbor. Jesus’ approach is simpler. Is the person a person? Is the person created in the image of God? Then the person is a neighbor. Answering the “who is my neighbor?” question is easy for Jesus. The question that is more difficult to answer is implied in the conclusion of Jesus’ story. Will you be a neighbor? Will you be a neighbor to someone different from you?

Dr. King marched to make the neighborhood larger for us all and to show us that there is room for each of us in that neighborhood. I believe he learned about being a neighbor from reading the stories that Jesus told. The Kingdom of God comes near when we recognize the hungering, thirsting, needy Christ in the face of our neighbor. We step into the Kingdom, if for just a moment, when choose to be a neighbor to the person in front us who needs the love and mercy of God.

Free at Last

This week marks the forty-fifth anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He was shot and killed on April 4, 1968, while standing on the second-floor balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. The year was 1969 and I was five years old when I first heard Dr. King’s name. I was sitting in a car listening to a radio report about James Earl Ray, the man who shot Dr. King. With the exception of three days in June of 1977, when he and six other inmates made an escape, Ray would spend the remainder of his life at Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary in Petros, Tennessee, not far from where I grew up.

When the radio report was complete, an adult in the car said, “I would like to shake his hand.” I remember being uncertain about whose hand was in question, but the conversation that followed among the adults in the car made it clear that Ray’s hand was the one that deserved of a shake. This left me uncertain about what a man might have done that would cause someone to want to shake the hand of the man who had shot him. Up to that point in my life, all the indications I had received were that killing someone was not a good thing to do.

Slowly, but surely over the next several years, I would learn about slavery, race relations, civil rights and the strongly held opinions of people both inside and outside of my family. In college and seminary, I began to see the significance of the role that the church played in motivating Dr. King to do the things that he did. The civil rights movement for Dr. King was an expression of his understanding of the Bible and an outgrowth of his relationship with God. I do not recall many, if any, references to Dr. King’s faith during my growing up years. However, he was a product of the church.  What became the civil rights movement was for him merely doing what God had called him to do as a Baptist, as a preacher, and as a follower of Christ. He was sharing Christ’s love.  Not everyone understood the importance of Christian faith to participants in the civil rights struggle, but Dr. King made the point in a foundational way in his last speech given in Memphis, Tennessee the night before he was killed:

Bull Connor (Sheriff in Birmingham, Al) next would say, “Turn the fire hoses on.” And as I said to you the other night, Bull Connor didn’t know history. He knew a kind of physics that somehow didn’t relate to the transphysics that we knew about. And that was the fact that there was a certain kind of fire that no water could put out. And we went before the fire hoses; we had known water. If we were Baptist or some other denominations, we had been immersed. If we were Methodist, and some others, we had been sprinkled, but we knew water. That couldn’t stop us.

More to the point of the importance of Dr. King’s faith, as he challenged our nation to live up to the ideals upon which it was founded, was the peace and the strength that he found in it in the face of bitter resistance and threats to his life. He obviously spoke out a deep trust in and complete reliance on God that night before he was shot.

Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop.

And I don’t mind.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!

And so I’m happy, tonight.

I’m not worried about anything.

I’m not fearing any man!

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!!

Let us always choose to love even when others, maybe many others, would choose to hate. Let us have eyes to see all the ways the Lord is coming to us and may the love we share with others be visible sign of the Lord’s coming to them.

Church being Church

You may have heard the saying, “hard times don’t build character—they reveal it.”   That saying was much on my mind this week as you, the body of Christ at Ball Camp, walked with the Lethgo family during their time of grief and loss.  There are few times in our lives more difficult than when we face the loss of a loved one.  Watching you be the presence of Christ to a family facing just such a loss was truly a blessing.

Your ministry to them to them was a wonderful answer to the question of what the church is and what the purpose of Ball Camp Baptist Church is.  The news came to us Sunday morning and we started to pray for this family.  Someone was already talking with the family helping to answer questions and make arrangements.  The sanctuary was made available for the funeral service as it always is when a member or friend goes to be with the Lord.  The choir loft was full for the service and there was room there for friends and family who wanted to join in the singing.  Every time I hear our choir sing How Great thou Art at a funeral service, I grow more confident in the promise of heaven.   More than that, I long for it more when I hear them sing.  Somehow it just seems closer when they proclaim it with such power and beauty.   Dr. Leonard Markham’s willingness to return to Ball Camp to preach Gibby Lethgo’s funeral is testimony to the reality that once you have been a part of Ball Camp, experienced the working of God in this place and with our people, it stays with you even when life moves you to other places.  Many of you were here during the receiving of friends and for the service, and by your presence you reminded this family of the promise and presence of Christ.  Of course, on the day of his burial you continued to speak love and support to this grieving family by graciously and wonderfully feeding them when they were hungry.  So like Christ to meet such an everyday, ordinary need in the midst of difficult times.

For many different reasons, we do not always have the opportunity to minister in so many ways to a family suffering the loss of a loved one.  This week, you did and it was a beautiful sight to behold.  No definitions, no explanations, and no words could provide a better understanding of what the church is supposed to be than seeing you and what you have offered to, and been for, this family as they have walked through the cold, dark valley of the shadow of death.  You have been rod and staff to them.

As people of God, saved by God’s grace and made a part of the family of God by God’s unconditional love, we are able to be in constant conversation with that loving and gracious God.  That love and grace shapes our living so that we proclaim with word and deed the truth of it.  Today as we pray, “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil” we are reminded that we do not face our trials alone.  God has brought us together: “Lead us not,” “deliver us.”  By God’s grace, what we face, we face together and as we do that we see clearly the substance and depth of Christian community.

More than that, we bear witness to the truth of the Gospel.   Jesus told his disciples that he would never leave them nor forsake them, but that he would be with them until the end of the age.  When followers of Christ act and minister in the ways that you have this past week these words of scripture come to life before our very eyes.  They take on flesh and bone as you seek to be the presence of Christ to one another.

Thank you for your faithfulness to the teachings of scriptures and to the commands of Christ.

In the presence of Christ

He came into the office talking, and stopped only to take a quick breath, after which he continued sharing the details of his plight.  All was punctuated by pulling up the front of his shirt and revealing the most painful looking herniated intestine that I have ever seen.

Several attempts to direct the conversation and get some sense of what might help stabilize his financial situation only resulted in more details about his circumstances, and more views of the cantaloupe size knot on his stomach.  I wanted to get some idea of what could be done to help him until his disability check started.  He wanted whatever I was going to do to be done right then.

He may have wanted more, but what he got was $25.00 worth of gas.  Back in the day, we used to give folks like him a fill-up.  That policy changed the last time gas prices rose to over four dollars a gallon.  The new policy works well.  I spend almost no time worrying about whether or not someone requesting help deserves it or really needs it.  I would much rather give some who did not deserve it $25.00, than fail to help someone who really needed it because I perceived them to be unworthy of help.

He seemed happy with $25.00 worth of, not gas, but diesel.  I bought him diesel because that is the kind of fuel that one puts in a Mercedes.  Granted it was an old and beat up Mercedes, but a Mercedes nonetheless.  Truly, there is so much story to tell and just not enough time or paper for all the details.

After a quick trip up the street for fuel, I am back in the office reflecting on what just happened.  Without thinking, I find myself somewhere in the vicinity of Matthew 25.  You recall the passage, don’t you?  “Lord, when did we see you in need of fuel and purchase for you $25.00 worth of gas?”  The King replied, “When you bought fuel for the least of these my brothers and sisters, you bought it for me.”  I felt good because I had just done something for the least of these.  I would not have wanted the goat question stuck in my head.  “Lord, when did we see you in need of fuel and not purchase it for you?”  The King replied, “When you did not do it for the least of these my brothers and sisters, is when you did not do it for me.”

So I felt as good as you can feel when you buy $25.00 worth of fuel for someone who needs a lot more than $25.00 worth of fuel.  What I did not feel so good about and, if fact, what was a little disturbing to me, was how desperate this man had been.  The man who had reminded me that to help was to help Christ, had been almost frantic for help, and almost overjoyed with $25.00.  He was desperate and frail, and his desperation and frailty quickly reminded me of Christ in the garden praying for the cup to pass; and Christ on the cross praying for the forgiveness of those who nailed him to the cross.

We like for our heroes to be big, strong and larger than life. We expect them to be able to face down any challenge and overcome any obstacle. Yet our salvation comes not from Christ’s willingness to be a larger-than-life human being, but from his willingness to be a real life human being.  By his wounds, we are healed.  In his brokenness, we are made whole.  It is not his strength that saves us, but with his frail vulnerability that he invites us into the Kingdom of God.  Whether at the manger in Bethlehem, the cross at Calvary, or the fuel pump at Weigel’s, he invites us to embrace him, to touch him, and meet his needs as we experience the power and the presence of the risen Lord.

Who are we?

Who are we?  I Peter 2:9 says that we  “. . . are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”  We are a people whose race is determined not by physical characteristics or ancestry, but by the call of God on our lives. As priests, we open the way for others to discover and to be embraced by the one who has brought us into the light.  We are a set-apart people or nation defined not by geographic boundaries, but by the love we demonstrate to others. 

In a world that is divided by race, gender, social and economic status, religion, and a host of other ways, what is significant about who we are?  If we are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, what difference does that make in our lives?  It can make a huge difference.  If we embrace who we are, then every day becomes an opportunity for us to proclaim the mighty acts of the one who called us out of darkness.  We proclaim those deeds sometimes by telling the story of who Jesus was and what he did, but always by embodying his thoughts, his values and his actions in our lives.

As a  “. . . chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people. . .” we are set apart — different from that which surrounds us and sometimes overwhelms us.  We, the church, find ourselves living in a nation and in a world that often bears little resemblance to the kingdom of God.  Nevertheless, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”  We live to proclaim another way.  In living as God has called us, we redeem this world so that politically, socially, spiritually, economically, and morally it looks and feels more like the kingdom of the one who sent out the twelve saying “…as you go, proclaim the good news, ‘the kingdom of heaven has come near.’”   That is the mark toward which we ought to aim our lives, that those whom we encounter would experience the wonder of God’s grace, the depth of God’s mercy and the nearness of heaven from our actions and our words.

As the church, we are not always such a people.  In fact, in some ways the church has become an impediment to grace, mercy and the nearness of heaven for some people. Bad experiences, judgmental words and “holier than thou” attitudes have left them cut off from God and convinced that there is no good reason to do anything to remedy the situation.  They conclude confidently that if God is anything like those who so freely speak for him, then grace and mercy are not to be found.

Yet, we know that such is not the case.  We know God is gracious and that God’s mercy is deep and wide.  God has freely given that grace to us.  We know that God loves us.  So, it is all the more imperative for us to be the race, the priesthood, the nation, and the people that God has called us to be.  In darkness, we did not know God.  We did not know God’s love for us.  In knowing God and sharing God’s love and grace with others, we move further into that marvelous light. In denying others God’s mercy, failing to share God’s love with others, we not only push them back into the darkness, but we turn our own lives back toward the darkness as well.

Who are we?  We are the church, the body of Christ, living according to his call on our lives, to his teachings in our minds, and to his love in our hearts, so that the darkness of this world might be overcome by his marvelous light.

Seeing God in our Weakness

In spite of what you may have heard this week, we have not started an ark-building ministry at Ball Camp Baptist Church, though there were times on Monday when I wondered if some sort of watercraft might be necessary to get around, considering how much water was falling from the sky.  Who knew that so much rain could fall in such a short amount of time?  Fortunately, our facility stayed dry on the inside.  This is no small gift when we remember some of the problems we have dealt with in recent years.

Some of our neighbors were without electricity during Monday’s storm.  I had one friend in Chattanooga who was without power for 19 hours.  She was excited to have power again after going without it.  “We don’t realize what we take for granted!”  Electricity is one of the many aspects of 21^st Century living that we have grown accustomed to experiencing without thinking about it.  We take for granted conveniences that caused eyes to pop and minds to swirl when they where first introduced.  Those conveniences have given us more control over lives, more time to do what we want to do, as well as what we need to, and in some cases to do those things better.  When they are taken away from us we are limited and vulnerable, no longer able to do and control the aspects of our living that we could with them.

Those moments that startle us and reveal to us our vulnerabilities do not come to us only when the electricity is not working.  We get reminders of the ways that life is beyond our control all the time.  As our children cross developmental milestones, we learn new ways where we are not in control.  When the company we work for closes its doors for the last time, we get reminded of our vulnerability.  Unexpected news from the doctor does the same thing to us.  We don’t like being vulnerable or out of control.  We seem programmed to respond to such situations by trying to minimize the ways that we are vulnerable.  We work to get some kind of control over whatever it is — our children, our career, or our health — that has disturbed our sense of being in charge of our lives.  We do our best to quickly move on and move beyond the situation and the uncomfortable feelings that came with it.

If we pause in the midst of our crisis, or take some time after it passes to reflect upon it, we might be surprised at what we see mingled in the reflection of our own vulnerability and weakness.  Is there anything more vulnerable than a newborn baby?   Who needs more help than a little baby needing to be bathed, fed and loved?  Yet, because of God’s great need to be in loving relationship with us, God became not just human, but the most vulnerable of humans needing to be fed, bathed and loved.   Henri Nouwen describes God coming to us this way:  “Who can be afraid of a little child that needs to be fed, to be cared for, to be taught, to be guided?  We usually talk about God as the all-powerful, almighty God on whom we depend completely.  But God wanted to become the all-powerless, all-vulnerable God who completely depends on us.  How can we be afraid of a God who wants to be ‘God-with-us’ and needs us to become ‘Us-with-God’?”

The mystery and wonder of God is that God wants to be loved by us as much as God loves us.  On the good days, we may take for granted the goodness of God’s provision in our lives.  On the days when we feel like we are not in control of our lives, we can recall that God has taken away the distance that once separated us from God, not with God’s great strength, but with God’s willingness to become a child laying in a manger.

Responsible Teaching about Sex

An edited versions of this post appeared in the February 19 edition of the Knoxville News-Sentinel.

We should be able to reasonably expect our public school educators to respond to the questions and concerns of parents in a timely, professional and helpful way while never compromising the central task of providing the fullest and best education possible to our children. Their job is a difficult one in a county as broad and diverse as Knox County.  Nonetheless, parents ought to always be seen as vital participants in the education process. In the same manner, parents ought to act with due appreciation for the vital task we ask our school system to accomplish each day.

There are many reasons why parents choose our public schools to provide the education of their children. Some parents do not have a choice. Public schools are the only schools financially within their reach. Some parents choose public schools because they want their children to attend the same schools that they attended. Other parents choose public schools because they understand that our nation’s strength lies in a quality education for all students and that their participation in our public schools adds to the quality and richness of that education as well as the strength of our nation.  Still other parents choose public education for their children because neither the narrow sectarianism of the church school nor the exclusivity of the private academy satisfies their understanding of what education ought to be in a democratic society.  Choosing to send ones children to public school should never be seen as an opting out or unwillingness to participate in the vitally important task of education.  School administrators ought to expect parent participation and parents ought to expect to participate.

The recent events at Hardin Valley Academy around a Planned Parenthood presentation might have been less disturbing and frustrating if more and better communication had occurred. Unfortunately, that did not happen.  The topic was a sensitive one about which parents obviously had strong feelings. The failure to adequately inform parents about their options regarding this class presentation was most unfortunate as was the administrations tardiness in responding to the parent’s legitimate inquiry.

Interestingly, figures recently released by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention indicate that the birth rate among teenagers in the United States is down significantly. In fact, the birth rate among girls ages 10-14 in 2009 was lower than it had ever been since data began being collected in 1940. At the same time, the number of births among girls ages 10-14 in 2009 had not been so low since 1950.  The birth rate and the number of births among older teens also decreased appreciably.

Ignorance does not serve us well. Education does work. To be certain, most parents would prefer for their children to be in a committed marriage relationship before becoming sexually active. However, not all young people will wait until they are in such a relationship. For those who chose not to wait, real facts and accurate information are of vital importance if we are to keep teen birth rate numbers in decline.  Failing to adequately educate our children can only result in an increase in unwanted pregnancies and an increase in the number of abortions among teens.  Let’s talk more, communicate better and share information with our children in age appropriate ways so that all of our children can be adults before they start having children of their own.

A Thought from Thomas Kelly

Most of us are reticent about speaking our deepest thoughts, or exposing our inner tenderness to public gaze. And much of this reticence is right. But there ought to be some times when, and there ought to be some people with whom, we open up our hearts on the deep things of the spirit. Normal religious development cannot take place in a vacuum occupied solely by you and God. We need friends of the soul. Fellowship is not an accidental addition to religion. It is the matrix within which we bear one another’s aspirations.

Do you have people with whom you feel it right to open your heart? If you have not, if you are stilted and stiff and embarrassed, and have no one to whom to confess, not your sins, but your joys, you are indeed an unfortunate soul. George Fox has a counsel which I prize very much: “Know one another in that which is eternal.” Churches ought to be places where men may know one another in that which is eternal. But in many a church the gulf between individuals on the deep things of God is an impassable gulf, and souls are starving and dying of inner loneliness. Would that we could break through our crust of stilted, conventional reserve, and make our churches centers of a living communion of the saints.

The last depths of conversation in the fellowship go beyond spoken words. People who know one another in God do not need to talk much. They know one another already. In the last depths of understanding, words cease and we sit in silence together, yet in perfect touch with one another, more bound into the common life by the silence than we
ever were by words.

from Reality of The Spiritual World

by Thomas R. Kelly

Just a Game?

There are occasions when football is more than just a game; times when it reminds us of our better selves. Visitors from Oregon took the time to write a letter to the News-Sentinel expressing their kind regards for the hospitality they received while visiting Knoxville for the Tennessee/Oregon game. They were particularly impressed when The Pride of the Southland turned to face the section of the stadium where most of the visiting Oregon fans were sitting played the Oregon fight song.

That impresses me as well. Every time that I am in the stadium, hearing Tennessee’s band play the visiting team’s fight is one of my favorite parts of the game day experience. When you think about how much “Rocky Top” means to Tennessee fans, you have to consider that other fans appreciate their fight song just as much.  There is nothing quite as comforting as hearing something familiar when you find yourself in a strange and new place. One could argue that the band is doing too good of a job at making guests feel welcome, but I don’t think so. I think their playing the visitor’s song is a kindness and courtesy that speaks well of the University and the State.

What is also interesting to note is what does not happen after the band plays the visitor’s fight song. The Tennessee fans remain Tennessee fans. No one takes off their orange and starts putting on the other team’s colors. The band definitely does not forget how to play “Rocky Top.”  In other words, it is possible to be kind and respectful to people who are different from us without ceasing to be whom we are. We do not sacrifice our loyalties by being thoughtful and courteous to those whose loyalties are different from ours.  In a world that seems excessively prone to the darkness of division and discord, a little thoughtfulness can be a great light.

Still another instance of football pointing us toward our better selves occurred when Ike Ditzenberger scored his first varsity touchdown. Ike is a seventeen year-old junior at Snohomish High School in Snohomish, Washington. What makes Ike different from his teammates and most every other high school football player in the country is that he has Down syndrome.  Every day at practice, on the last play of practice, Ike’s coach calls his play. The quarterback hands the ball to Ike and he runs it in for a touchdown.

Last week with ten seconds remaining in the game and Snohomish trailing Lake Stevens by a score of 35-0, Ike Ditzenberger entered the game to run his play. Run he did, fifty-one yards all the way to end zone. At the end of his run, he was very happy.

Yes, I know that the only reason he scored was everybody on the field wanted him to; and that if the opposing team had wanted to, they could have easily tackled him. But they did not. Because they did not, Ike was able to realize a life-long dream. Sure, his team lost; but they are not losers. People who help other people achieve long-held dreams are winners. People who create experiences of great joy in the lives of others are winners. People who share the bright lights of Friday night with one who some might think has no business being there are winners.

These two events could have taken place anywhere, and they could have involved most anyone. What makes them special to me is that they just seem to ooze Christ likeness. If Jesus was the drum major at the University of Tennessee, I can easily see Him playing the visiting team’s fight song. If He was a high school football coach, I would not be at all surprised to learn that He found a way to get a player with special challenges onto the field.  Christ came into the world to heal brokenness and to reconcile division. There are times when we are reminded that He is still at work doing just that. There are times when those reminders come from unexpected places, even football fields.