the church geek

Yesterday, after watching the great Kansas/Davidson men’s basketball game I did some reflecting on the sermon I preached earlier in the day. As I thought about the game and about my sermon, I decided that my preaching suffers from one problem: It feels as if I seldom put together a complete game.

Sometimes, like Davidson, I can put in a good 33-35 minute effort, but I can’t seem to finish it off. Other times I have a good start and a great finish, but I have a lapse of 5 or 10 minutes in the middle. No matter how it happens, I seem unable to put in a full 40. (Now don’t worry this is a metaphor, my friends, I seldom preach for more than 20 minutes….)

More often than not I have a really good beginning; a story that catches people’s attention or a joke that gets at the heart of my sermon. Sometimes, but not as often, I have a great ending, something that sums things up and hammers home my point. Occasionally, I have a perfect story in the middle that captures the essence of my message.

But it seems like I’m seldom able to get all three phases of the sermon going all at the same time. Often I find the endings of my sermons to be too abrupt, like I just ran out of things to say and I’m not quite sure how to end it and tie it all together. Other times, especially when it feels like I have to do some background work explaining a particular scripture passage, it seems like I get bogged down in the middle.

I’m not really sure how to correct this problem, or maybe it doesn’t need correcting and it’s just a matter of my own perception.

As for yesterday’s sermon, I was away from the office for two days. While I did a lot of reading during the week in preparation, I didn’t actually sit down and start writing until Saturday (definitely not my preferred preparation process…) Sometimes that means I don’t have the time to find a good illustration or two, or I’m desperately trying to tie things together and my thought process is too slow to work under the time pressure. Sometimes it’s just delivery; I haven’t adequately gone over the sermon enough times to pull off a great delivery.

All that reminds me that the best strategy for me is to get started with my reading and my study on Monday…so I’m signing off for now and getting to work.

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Here are some photos I took this week of the sun reflecting on the water, which make for some interesting abstracts. I think I like the first one the best.

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1.) Johnny Baker points to some mind boggling images of consumption meant to help us think about the impact of our consumer habits on the world. Be patient, the images take a long time to load, but the wait is worth it.

2.) Tall Skinny Kiwi interviews Brian McLaren about some burning questions related to his new book “Everything Must Change.” I found the interview helpful as I process my own thinking about McLaren’s book.

3.) Here’s more commentary on the Obama/Wright flap. Here is a poignant cartoon and a blog post with some good observations.

4.) Here is a Christian creed that comes from the Massai tribe in Kenya. I’ve seen this before but think its worth linking to, especially since I spent a summer in Kenya in 1990 and visited a number of church gatherings in various Massai villages.

5.) This is really just plain frightening.

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This is my Easter Sunday sermon. A kernel of inspiration came from Tony Jones’ new book “The New Christians” where he makes mention of Shel Silverstein’s story “The Giving Tree.” The text was Acts 10:34-43.

There is a story. It’s a story about a tree. And it’s a story about a little boy the tree loved.

Everyday the boy would come by the tree and play, Picking up the tree’s leaves, playing make believe, climbing the tree’s trunk, and enjoying the tree’s shade.

All of this made the tree very happy.

But time passed. The tree was alone and it was sad.

One day the boy came by and the tree tried to get the boy to stay and play. But the boy asked the tree, “Can you just give me some money?”

The tree said “I’m sorry, I have no money. I only have apples. Take my apples and sell them in the city and then you will have money. Then you will be happy.” So the boy climbed the tree, took all the apples and sold them in the city. And the tree was very happy.

More time went by. The tree was all alone and it was sad.

One day the boy came by and the tree once again tried to get the boy to stay and to play. The boy said “I’m too busy. I want a house to keep me warm. I want a wife and a child. So, I need a house. Can you give me a house?”

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I realize it’s Tuesday and this “Meaty Monday” comes about 24 hours too late, we took a day off yesterday to rest up a bit after a busy Holy Week.

I’ve decided to wade in a little bit into the controversy between Barack Obama and his long-time minister Rev. Jeremiah Wright. These are just a few loosely connected thoughts from my perspective:

1.) I can’t remember who it was that said this, but there is a popular saying out there that the preacher’s job is to “comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.” I take that to mean that we shouldn’t always be in a position of agreement with our minister. He or she should be saying things that we may not agree with and that will challenge us.

2.) While I think Rev. Wright used a poor choice of words in saying “God damn America,” the whole of his message, from Sunday to Sunday, is what really needs to be judged not just a sound bite or two taken out of context. Also, it’s not just the preacher’s words that need to be evaluated. The preacher is more than words, the preacher is the sum of his/her character. How do they love their people? How does the message of their life compliment the words from the pulpit? Those are the questions we need to be asking. It’s quite possible to disagree with things said from the pulpit and still respect, love and stand up for your minister because of the integrity of the message and the entire package of the minister’s life.

3.) I had the chance to hear Dr. Wright preach a year or two ago at Dubuque Seminary. I walked away thinking “Wow, that sure was a challenge.” He said some things from the pulpit that I found difficult to hear and I am sure that others found difficult as well, especially considering the fact that he was preaching to a predominantly white, middle class, and male audience. But I also came away thinking that most of what he said was truthful, honest, spot on, and needed to be said.

4.) And speaking of being truthful, I’m going to raise some hackles with this one: Obama’s church is often criticized for being “Unashamedly Black and Unapologetically Christian.” What’s the big deal??? I mean think about most churches in America: Aren’t most of our churches “Unashamedly White?” they just don’t go around advertising it. Really, now, who is being more honest and truthful?

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New life has finally emerged from our front flowerbed.

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Blog world friend Bruce Reyes-Chow has tagged me on this PresbyMEME:

1. What is your earliest memory of being distinctly Presbyterian?

Hmmmm….since I didn’t grow up Presbyterian my earliest memories of being Presbyterian only go back about 10 years or so. About seven or eight years ago, when I was exploring my call to ministry and before I had totally committed myself to the PC(USA) route for ordination, a friend invited me to attend a Seminarians conference sponsored by PFR. That year it was held at Austin Seminary.

I was so impressed by the thoughtful engagement with the bible and with the witness to the gospel that I heard at that conference. It’s funny, the one line I remember from the conference is this: “I’d rather be in the PC(USA), we may argue and disagree about stuff but at least we aren’t arguing about whether creation happened in seven literal days.” It was a clear jab at stuff that was happening at the time in the PCA, but more importantly it said to me, the PC(USA) was where I belonged.

2. On what issue/question should the PC(USA) spend LESS energy and time?

I’m not sure there is any one issue we should spend less time and energy on. Conversation is good.

3. On what issue/question should the PC(USA) spend MORE energy and time?

The church has got to spend serious time and energy moving beyond the liberal/conservative divide and to acknowledge to one another where both sides have gone wrong. Then it needs to move forward in ministry, establishing new churches, and moving stuck congregations out into the world in mission and outreach.

4. If you could have the PC(USA) focus on one passage of scripture for an entire year, what would it be?

Tony Jones in his book “The New Christians” talks about the primary focus of the gospel is to be agents of reconciliation. I’d take his clue and have the church focus on 2 Corinthians 5:16-21. I’d ask the church to engage with the question, “In what ways both within the church and without can we embody the gospel’s call to be agents of reconciliation?”

5. If the PC(USA) were an animal what would it be and why?

I’d say the PC(USA) was a sloth. Seemingly thoughtful but also slow and plodding.

6.) For Extra Credit: Jesus shows up at General Assembly this year, what does he say to the Presbyterian Church (USA)?

I don’t know, but I bet we’d probably either miss it or weight it down with motions for amendments and a minority report.

I tag: Moose Poop, Islandpreacha, igeekrev, not prince hamlet, and Tribal Church.

The rules are simple:

* in about 25 words each, answer the following five questions;
* tag five presbyterian bloggers and send them a note to let them know they were tagged;
* be sure to link or send a trackback to this post;

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I forgot one item on my “Wednesday Roundup.” It’s not too late for you to enter a bracket into the “Decently and In Order” Tourney pool. Less than 24 hours to go!

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This is the final sermon in my series “Faithful Questions.” The sermon texts were Mark 9:19-29 and Genesis 18:1-15.

If you ever visit the French Quarter in New Orleans, you will probably see tarot card and palm readers with their tables set up down by the Cathedral on Jackson Square, offering their services to anyone who ask.

I had a friend who worked with a mission agency in New Orleans. Every Sunday afternoon right there in the midst of all those tarot card and palm readers, she would set up a little card table, an umbrella, and a small sign, and simply offer free prayer to anyone who asked for it.

On occasion I would spend a few hours with her on a Sunday afternoon. For the most part people walked by and ignored that table. Sometimes we’d sit out there all afternoon and no one would stop by and ask for prayer.

One time a young woman sat down at our table and asked us to pray. She shared a story of something that was going on with her brother, I don’t remember exactly what it was, but I think he was dealing with some sort of illness or was recovering from a surgery.

We bowed our heads, and my friend offered a prayer for this young woman. As we finished, the woman got up, gathered her things, thanked us, and then asked: “Do you know how much they charge for the tarot card readings??”

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1.) The Smart Pastor offers some good reflections on getting beyond the isolation of the pastoral office and investing some time in the community. I really need to follow his example.

2.) Did you know that you can check out any of the NCAA tourney games for free on your computer through CBS March Madness on Demand? Last year I watched all three of Vanderbilt’s games over the internet because that was the only way that I could see them. I hope video quality is a little better this year.

3.) In her post, Join the Resurrection Parade, Christine Sine offers an interesting Palm Sunday idea, something I think we could pull off at Knox next year. Of course, she may actually live somewhere where there isn’t snow on the ground on Palm Sunday. Even if you don’t read the post, go check out the great icon she uses to illustrate it.

4.) Johnny Baker points to some pretty short but cool Easter week videos. Don’t know if you can find a way to use them in your services or not, but they’re worth checking out.

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…because I gave up meat for Holy Week.

Well, actually I started to write an entry this morning and then decided I didn’t really want to talk about that particular topic, but then I never came up with anything else to write about. So sorry, no meaty Monday today.

That line that started my post? It’s attributed to my wife. She is very funny and often makes me laugh.

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This is another sermon in my sermon series “Faithful Questions.” The texts for this sermon where John 1:1-18 and Isaiah 55: 10-13. Primary sources for this sermon were NT Wright’s book “The Last Word” and Peter Rollin’s book “How (not) to speak of God.“

Today, in many churches before the scriptures are read you’ll hear the pastor say, “Listen now to the Word of God.” After they are read you’ll also hear, “This is the Word of the Lord,” and the congregation will respond, “Thanks be to God.”

We haven’t really developed that particular tradition around reading the scriptures here at Knox. Even so, when we talk about the Bible, I bet most of us think of it as the “Word of the Lord” or the “Word of God.”

When I asked folks for questions for this sermon series, as you might expect, there were a few questions about the Bible. They were along these lines:

* Does God evolve and/or does our understanding of God evolve?
* If so, should our Bible, which we call “God’s word” be updated?

For simplicity and to make an easy sermon title, I boiled them down to this one question:

* Is the Bible God’s “final” word?

To get at a good answer to that, the first thing we need to do is look at the purpose of the Bible. Today, people think of the Bible in all sorts of different ways: Some think of it as:

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1.) The most recent Decently and In Order podcast picked up my Techno-Sabbath post as a topic of conversation. They discussed their various perspectives on some of the issues I highlighted.

2.) In case you were wondering, Paul Wolfowitz really IS a shady character. My good friend Mark writes of an encounter with Wolfowitz in Rwanda.

3.) My favorite preacher, United Methodist Bishop William Willimon, by way of the Internet Monk, offers an interesting perspective on the story of Jesus and Zaccheus.

4.) I ran across this list of 100 spiritually significant films, but realize I’ve only seen about twenty percent of them and only one of the top ten.

5.) Hillary Clinton offers a few of her perspectives on faith and is promptly taken to task in the comment section for not affirming the sole significance of belief in Christ for salvation. Once again proving the difficulties of being a politician and holding nuanced positions on things. Talk amongst yourselves…

6.) Here’s another pretty picture for your enjoyment.

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When I was in seminary (I graduated about three years ago), I was all fired up about preaching from the Lectionary. There were a number of things that appealed to me about the lectionary and preaching from it:

* I liked the idea of having a standard list of texts to preach from carefully chosen by the lectionary committee. In theory that would ensure that I’d preach from texts I might not normally chose to preach from, and that over an extended length of time my congregation would hear from more of the Bible than they otherwise might.

* I liked the idea of having to struggle with a particular text that happened to be placed in front of me for that particular week. It would force me to focus and hone in on that passage and really wrestle with its meaning, struggling to hear a “word from the Lord” for my congregation in that week.

* I liked the regularity of the liturgical year, the various seasons of the church calendar, and the subsequent texts built around themes for those seasons. There is definitely something to establishing a regular rhythm for our common life together.

While I liked those things in theory, in practice, the lectionary just didn’t work out for me. Here’s what I found out:

* Sure, I’d learn from and wrestle with any given text, but when it came down to it, I had a hard time figuring out what the message of the text was for my congregation in that place and time. It almost seemed as if lectionary preaching was out of rhythm with what I was sensing the congregation really needed to hear.

* I also didn’t gain much energy or enthusiasm for preaching. In fact I often found it to be a dull and lifeless exercise. I also had a hard time finding sermon illustrations to fit with the text or creative entry points that would help the congregation enter into the text.

So, now over the last year or so I’ve gone primarily to preaching sermon series. In doing so, I have preached on a number of different themes. Focusing on things like: NT encounters with Jesus, living the spiritual life, Psalms you should know, questions of faith, the Apostle’s Creed.

I love it! I have found more energy and enthusiasm in my preaching. I feel more creative and as if the Spirit is more present in my preparation and in the preaching. I have had to wrestle with issues and doctrines of our faith in order to teach/preach them. I do more reading in preparation for my sermons. I have an easier time with illustrations and preaching paths.

I also think I’ve connected better with my congregation as a result. And more importantly, I think I’ve helped my congregation connect better with God and with others.

So far, this has been the only drawback I have identified: I just don’t end up doing as much in depth study on a particular passage. Unless I’m preaching through a book of the Bible or on a series of passages, my sermons are less tied to and drawn from a particular text. Which means, I don’t do as much exegetical work as I should and that bothers me a great deal!

Have you struggled with lectionary preaching? Have you ventured out beyond it?

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