the church geek

One of the best things about being out at Princeton this week at the Institute of Theology are the worship services in Miller Chapel. All I can say is wow! Martin Tel is a gifted worship leader and he plays a mean pipe organ to boot!!

Now lest you think the worship at Princeton Seminary is just stodgy old hymns, I’ll fill you in on a bit of a secret: The worship has been eclectic across the board: gospel, world music, hymns, praise choruses, taize….you name it we have sung it.

It’s been a blessing to sing at the top of my voice (though I’m not sure that’s a blessing to the people standing next to me!) and to be in a chapel that feels like its about to explode with praises to God. I sure wish I could bottle up these worship experiences and take them back to my congregation.

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This week I am at Princeton Seminary, in NJ (the motherland for many Presbyterians) attending the week-long Institute of Theology. The topic for the week is “Reclaiming Trinitarian Faith.” It is a very appropriate and timely topic considering the controversy stirred by the PC(USA)’s reception of a paper on the Trinity at last week’s GA.

Daniel Migliore, the Author of “Faith Seeking Understanding” (which is by the way one of the most helpful books on reformed theology) and one of the members of the committee that put forth that paper is teaching a seminar and will be helping walk us through the paper later in the week.

Today he helpfully talked about the difference between the surface grammar of the trinity vs. the deep logic that is inherent in the Trinity; or the fact that the language we use to speak of (and to argue about!) the Trinity will always fail to precisely nail down the mystery of the Trinity. Even so, there is a deep logic beyond language that is inherent in God as the Three-in-One.

Somewhat along those lines, Sharon Ringe, the leader of today’s Bible study on the roots of the Trinity in the gospel of John had this to say about the gospel’s relentless “Father” language used by Jesus (the following is a rather poor paraphrase.):

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Our Executive Presbyter writes from General Assembly:

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“Mother, Child, and Womb”’

“Rock, Redeemer, Friend”

“Lover, Beloved, Love.”

These are some of the proposals for names of the three persons of the Triune God offered in a paper on the Trinity which was “recieved” (but not approved) yesterday by the General Assembly of my denomination, the PC(USA) .

I wish there had been further thought about these particular proposals. What I find wholly inadequate is that in our desire to inclusively name the trinity what always gets lost is the sense of relationship of three persons within the unity of the triune God.

Now, I think I’m as sensitive as the next guy and I always strive to be careful to ensure that I’m not constantly refering to God as “He,” but when it comes to speaking of the nature of three persons of the Triune God in perichoretic relationship, one with another, there is still no better formula than “Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.”

I can’t even begin to wrap my head around what “Lover, Beloved, Love” means. And what the heck does referring to the Holy Spirit as “Womb” mean? I just don’t get such poetic language; maybe it’s because I’m an engineer by undergraduate training and an analytical person by nature. So if that’s the case forgive me for being so obtuse.

I think by now most of us (at least Pastor types within our denomination) are sufficiently aware of the real limits of our language to capture the nature of the divine. Even at my fairly orthodox seminary, this point was hammered home.

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Most of us at one time or another, have gazed up into the crystal clear night sky, looked upon the million of stars, and have had the experience the Psalmist poetically captures in these words:

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established; what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?

If the Psalmist who wrote those words several thousands of years ago felt tiny when looking up at the night sky, imagine how much more insignificant he’d feel if he lived today.

Since those words were written so many thousands of years ago, science has exponentially expanded our understanding of the size of the universe beyond anything the psalmist could have ever imagined.

Now, NASA’s Voyager after 25 plus years of travel sends back data and images from the very edge of our solar system. And, over 3 million home computer users in the SETI program analyze radio telescope data in an attempt to discover if extraterrestrial life is somewhere out there.

Within the vastness of the universe that continues to expand second by second, how can we not feel lost? In the swarm of a planet populated by countless billions upon billions of people, how can we not feel totally insignificant?

Martin Marty, Professor of Religion at the Univ. of go, observes that there are four basic questions for those of us who live in the late modern world:

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* Do you ever find that when you need them the most, you do not have the words to pray?

* Do you ever have feelings or emotions that you think God finds unacceptable?

* Have you ever been in such grief, anguish, or personal turmoil that you’ve wondered where is God?

* Have you ever wondered at the marvel and mystery of life and questioned its purpose?

* Has your heart ever soared in praise and thanksgiving to God?

* Have you ever been disgusted that justice goes un-served and that wickedness is rewarded?

If you identified with any of those concerns then my sermon series “Psalms Everyone Should Know and Why” is for you! And if you didn’t then maybe we’d better get a doctor over to see if you have a heartbeat.

For thousands of years, people with these and other thoughts, feelings, and attitudes have turned to the pages of the Psalms for no other reason than that they are about the stuff of life.

Within the pages of the Psalms, people have found comfort and solace; wisdom and instruction. They’ve found answers to some of life’s toughest questions and in the times when they’ve discovered that there are no answers they’ve found it’s okay to vent their frustration.

They’ve also found words to express what’s going on in their heart of hearts and within their deepest emotions. And perhaps more importantly, they’ve found that God is big enough to handle anything, without exception, that can be thrown at God.

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Well here’s my list of potential Psalms for my sermon series “Psalms Everyone Should Know and Why.” What do you think?

Psalm 1 - (I would certainly include this one on any list, but I already preached on it a few weeks ago so it disqualifies for this series.)

Psalm 2 - A Royal Psalm declaring the sovereignty of God while yet acknowledging the reality of opposition to God’s reign. “Why do the nations conspire and plot in vain?” Quoted 3 times in the NT.

Psalm 8 - A Song of Praise. Verse 4 says it all “what are humans that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?” Also quoted 3 times in the NT.

Psalm 22 - A Psalm of Lament - The psalm presents both complaint and trust. It was quoted by Jesus: “My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?” and figures predominately in the Passion story.

Psalm 32 - Psalm of Thanksgiving/Wisdom Psalm declaring the blessedness of those whose sin is forgiven. “Happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.” It’s a hard choice but this one wins out over David’s Psalm 51.

Psalm 80 - A Communal Lament. I include this one because I need to wrestle with my uncertainty about how such communal laments apply to us (do they apply to us nationally, or as a church, or in some other way?)

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I’m currently working to put together a sermon series for the summer on “Psalms Everyone Should Know and Why.” With 150 of them to choose from its no easy trick to distill them down to a list of seven or eight essentials.

Mind sharing what Psalms are either your favorites or that you deem essential?

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This week in my sermon, I daringly admitted a weakness to my congregation: “I don’t know about you,” I said, “but even as a Pastor, I have a tendency to see prayer as a difficult task. It’s easy for me to fall into the trap of thinking that it’s something I must do because I’m supposed to. So usually when I think of prayer the first thing that usually comes to my mind is a sense of guilt. I often think “I don’t pray enough” or “I don’t pray like God wants me to.”

I suspect this is how many of us feel about the work of prayer, especially if we’ve grown up in a tradition where “true” prayer is always spontaneous and from the heart. Scot McKnight in his recent book “Praying with the Church: Following Jesus Daily, Hourly, Today” offers a way of refreshment to those of us who are tired or feel pangs of guilt whenever we think about prayer.

Scot does not offer a new way of prayer. Instead he helps us look afresh at an ancient way of set prayers at fixed times of the day which has been tried and tested throughout the centuries of church history. Scot helps us discover that this way of prayer actually goes back further; to the practice of the ancient Hebrew people, and even more importantly, to the practice of our Lord Jesus Christ.

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I’ve not posted a “Sermon Snippet” in a while mostly because it takes a bit of time for me to condense a sermon to what seems like a manageable size post. Today, I’ve decided to post my Pentecost Sunday Sermon in its entirety with a few minor edits mostly because I thought all that was written and said was essential to the core of my sermon. (Sorry if its too long, you can just ignore!) The text was Romans 8:22-27 and the title was “We’ve got the Power.” (pretty original, huh?)

The world seems like a pretty dangerous place to live. For instance, at unexpected times nature has a tendency to rise up and unleash its terrifying power in surprising ways.

Just under two years ago a tsunami wiped out whole swaths of land in the Pacific Southwest taking along with it hundreds of thousands of people out into the sea. Last summer a devastating hurricane wiped out the levees and destroyed whole sections of the city of New Orleans.

We haven’t helped things along either. The scientific community tells us that our environmental situation has become a nightmare. The earth supports life by delicately balancing many different variables. Change just one or two of them and things end up totally out of whack.

Turn away from nature and the news isn’t much better. This year is already the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks of 9/11. And even in supposedly safe places to live like Cedar Rapids abuse, violence, murder, illness and premature deaths are part of our world.

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I am pleased to be joining in on this special blog tour featuring Scot McKnight’s new book Praying with the Church: Following Jesus Daily, Hourly, Today. My post will appear on June 8th.

Paraclete Press announces a blog tour of Scot McKnight’s Praying With the Church - We hope you will take the time to find out what people are saying about this important new release, and take advantage of our special offer below!

Schedule of Blog Tour
June 5th:
www.jesustheradicalpastor.blogspot.com
June 6th:
www.theocentric.com
June 7th:
www.transformingseminarian.blogspot.com
June 8th:
www.thechurchgeek.com
June 9th:
www.inamirrordimly.com
June 12th:
www.willzhead.typepad.com
June 13th:
www.mattritchie.blogspot.com
June 14th:
www.inhiscourts.blogspot.com
June 15th:
www.vans.missionthink.org
June 16th:
www.thetimehascome.wordpress.com

Special Offer for the month of June only:

Purchase Scot McKnight’s Praying with the Church and McKnight’s best selling book The Jesus Creed and you will receive your copy of The Jesus Creed for free! Reference coupon code PRBLOG and call 1-800-451-5006 or order on-line. (when ordering on-line you must enter both books on the order)

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