Sunday is Reformation Sunday - the anniversary of Martin Luther posting his 95 THESES on the sanctuary door in Wittenburg, Germany, in an act that sparked what we now call the Reformation. I wonder how many people in the pews in Presbyterian churches Sunday could describe what the Reformation was or what it means to be part of the Reformed tradition.
In fact, I suspect that there are many in our pews on any given Sunday morning who would have a hard time articulating what it means to be Presbyterian, at least from an historical or theological perspective. Should we rejoice or lament over that reality?
this week's sermon reflects on the growing lack of denominational loyalty. I may even push the reflections to consider how we interact on a broader scale as we live a time when our neighbors may not be Methodist or Baptist, but Muslim or some other non-Christian tradition.
Should we embrace the lack of loyalty to the Presbyterian church and focus on our Christian calling with little regard to being Reformed and Presbyterian? Or should we work to indoctrinate members and potential members in the Presbyterian tradition?
Luther's mantra was "the Church reformed always reforming." How are we re-forming now, and how do we live out our Christian calling in that context?
Peace,
Richard
Friday, October 29, 2010
Monday, October 25, 2010
Reflections on "Sex That Matters"
Someone asked me if I was worried about people being upset with the sermon. I was not worried that that I would upset someone over mentioning sex from the pulpit; but, I did worry that this topic, which I consider to be an important issue in our world today, would not engage people.
The transition from the homosexuality issue to the other sexuality issues in our world today, seemed to work fine. but, it also means that I did not address from the pulpit that thorny issue in the Presbyterian denomination. And, I won't address it in this sermon series. In part, my preaching silence is because I do not think this issue matters to the next generation of church members. I think the older generation clings to the issue because we are more comfortable with the traditional thinking and standards surrounding this issue. But, as the next generation lives with people openly acknowledging their sexuality, people who have gifts for ministry and show the love of Christ in their actions, the issue will seem less important. Likewise, the proliferation of so many other sexuality issues will demand much more of the focus of the church in the 21st century.
So, here are my sermon notes from yesterday.
Introduction: As you know, I have been preaching the fall on how to be a Christian in the 21st century. this week I experienced a bit of 21st technology. I received a FB message from a former member of the church I served in KY who now lives in CA. She is a FB friend of mine, so when I posted by blog with my thoughts as I prepared this week's sermon, she got notice of the blog, including the sermon title. She responded with a message about my sermon title. To which my wife add a FB comment about my daughters being apprehensive about the sermon. I suspect that sermon will not be quite as exciting as the title sounds.
In the Presbyterian Church circles, most conversations these days that involve sex deal with the questions surrounding homosexuality. Should we ordain self-avowed homosexuals? Or how do we stick to a traditional definition of marriage.
The church is focusing focusing on an issue that the world, at least the Western world, and the younger generation does not seem to care about nearly as much.
That's not to say, if the the world does not think it's an issue, the church should not care about it, but I do think it challenges the church to examine where it puts its energy, particularly in a world with many issues revolving around sexuality.
I have the suspicion that we want to keep focused on the issue of homosexuality because then we do not have to engage other issue of sex that matter as well, if not more than the issue of homosexuality.
Move 1: What other issues?
a. Internet pornography
1. On the Web, there are both commercial and free pornography sites.
2. As of October 2008, about one quarter of employees visit Internet porn sites during working hours according to Nielsen Online. (Wikipedia, Internet Pornography)
3. The production of child pornography has become very profitable, bringing in several billion dollars a year, and is no longer limited to pedophiles. notes that there is "overwhelming evidence that [child pornography] is all but impossible to obtain through non electronic means." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_pornography)
4. I now include in my pre-marital counseling a series of questions about
b. Cyber bullying over sexuality
1. Rutgers student who committed suicide.
2. Allegedly some of his fellow students hid a camera that captured him kissing another male.
3. Broadcast this to others.
4.Embarrassment about his sexuality issue and the invasion of his privacy led to the student's suicide.
c. Divorce
1.Different figures, but roughly 45% of the couples that get married today will divorce http://www.divorcerate.org/
2.Divorce rate is higher for evangelical Christians (Barna Research, as quoted on http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_dira.htm
3.Living together – higher divorce rate; indicators show that people who chose to live together on average
d.Infidelity in marriage
1. Infidelity rates are getting higher and higher in the American society. Here are some infidelity statistics based on a survey by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago:
25 percent of men have had extramarital affairs
17 percent of women committed adultery
2. Another 20% have emotional affairs.
3.Only 35 percent of unions survive an extramarital affair. http://www.infidelity-etc.com/index.php/4
4.Do not underestimate the role of the Internet in this issue. The ability for people to engage with others over the Internet, without having to sneak off somewhere to see each other, has created more opportunities http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidelity
5.Plus, the social web-sites like FB and MySpace allow for people to meet up and become infatuated with the computer image of someone, which no surprise may seem more exciting than the day-to-day image of one's spouse.
e.Premarital sex:
1.Currently 46.8% of all high school students report they have had sexual intercourse. The percentage of high school students who have had sex decreased 13.3% between 1991 and 2005 (54% to 46.8%). 2005 CDC Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance
2. Casual sex.
Move 2: How are we to respond to these sexuality issue out of our Christian calling?
a. At the heart of our response is how we view God.
1.Is our primary image of God as the judge, who creates a world of black and white choices; a God whose purpose is to decide who is in (those who can abide by the rules). Drawing a line in the sand.
2.Or, do we fundamentally, see God as liberating us and inviting us to grow into the image of God that calls us to be in right relationship with God and one another?
3.Of course, the reality for most of us is that we mix those images.
4.In the passage to the Colossians, I think we see this mix. There is both a list of things to do and not do for those early Christians, but also the overarching call to grow into the fullness of Christ, which I think defies the draw a line in the sand mentality.
5.Or, Isaiah's prophecy speaks of the eunuch and the foreigner who are welcomed, the one who was outside the sexual norms and the stranger in the midst, being welcomed by God. But, there is also a reference to their making right sacrifices.
b. McLaren story: a Kenyan graduate student attended the church he served. After a communion service, McLaren found the Kenyan sitting in his seat, with his head in his hands crying. “Are you okay?”
“These are tears of joy.”
“What happened?”
“It is my first time to take communion.”
“but I thought you had been a Christian since you were a child?”
“I have been. But I am the child of the third wife.” He went on to explain that at the time the Anglican Church in Kenya had a policy for polygamous converts to the Christianity. Only the children of the first wife could participate in the Lord's Supper. “Today, when you said that all were welcome to the Table, I realized that here I am not the child of the third wife. I am simply a Christian [child of God], and I am welcome at the Table.” (Brain McLaren, A New Kind of Christianity, 186)
c.It is easy to here that story and see where the black and white approach of the church in another culture misses the gospel that welcomes all people to our Lord's Table.
1.So let's look a little bit closer to home.
2.Consider the issue of pre-marital sex.
3.I am the parent of three girls, two of whom are in high school now.
4.I can easily subscribe to the image of God who says Christians do this and not that.
5.Very black and white. Line in the sand. As least as it relates to the sexuality of my daughters.
6.But, how does that speak to what it means to be made in the image of God that calls us into relationship?
7.In all the conversations and discussions I heard as a kid, or have had with youth groups or others as an adult, parent or minister, let me share with you the most compelling argument I ever heard for not engaging in pre-marital sex.
It was a minister. He was speaking to a group of high schoolers. He was not the hip minister, but the older minister (about my age now!). It was not a God said you should do this or that.
He spoke about how sex was the most intimate moment two people could share. How it was designed as an deep expression of love to be shared between two people.
And he spoke about relationship. How God desired us to have a deep, abiding relationship with another person. A relationship between two humans that God gave us as gift (I am indebted to Dr. John McCoy for having shared this story with the high school youth group).
8.If a study were done with those high schoolers who heard that conversation, would they have a lower rate of engaging in premarital sex? I do not know.
9.But, I think that spoke to the issue in a more meaningful way, in a way that invited the high schoolers to understand their sexuality as a gift from God, and a call to see their sexuality in the context of their calling as people made in the image of God.
e. Divorce rates and infidelity.
1.Again, it is easy to draw a line in the sand.
2.But, missing from that position is the conversation about what it means to be in covenantal relationship.
3.How to live in relationship with one another and how to deal with broken relationships.
4.It is painful to hear divorced people describe how their faith communities failed them and how they left those communities because they did not feel support, or because the faith community drew a line in the sand and included one of the spouses and excluded the other.
5.We have to do better.
f.Internet pornography and cyber bullying.
1. they do not reveal the image of God, but show forth broken relationships.
2. Clearly, those who engage in bullying see the others as outside of their relationship.
3. Think about how pornography violates the relationship between two people.
Conclusion: How we respond to matters of sex does matter.
It speaks to how we view God and how we live out our calling as disciples of Christ.
The transition from the homosexuality issue to the other sexuality issues in our world today, seemed to work fine. but, it also means that I did not address from the pulpit that thorny issue in the Presbyterian denomination. And, I won't address it in this sermon series. In part, my preaching silence is because I do not think this issue matters to the next generation of church members. I think the older generation clings to the issue because we are more comfortable with the traditional thinking and standards surrounding this issue. But, as the next generation lives with people openly acknowledging their sexuality, people who have gifts for ministry and show the love of Christ in their actions, the issue will seem less important. Likewise, the proliferation of so many other sexuality issues will demand much more of the focus of the church in the 21st century.
So, here are my sermon notes from yesterday.
Introduction: As you know, I have been preaching the fall on how to be a Christian in the 21st century. this week I experienced a bit of 21st technology. I received a FB message from a former member of the church I served in KY who now lives in CA. She is a FB friend of mine, so when I posted by blog with my thoughts as I prepared this week's sermon, she got notice of the blog, including the sermon title. She responded with a message about my sermon title. To which my wife add a FB comment about my daughters being apprehensive about the sermon. I suspect that sermon will not be quite as exciting as the title sounds.
In the Presbyterian Church circles, most conversations these days that involve sex deal with the questions surrounding homosexuality. Should we ordain self-avowed homosexuals? Or how do we stick to a traditional definition of marriage.
The church is focusing focusing on an issue that the world, at least the Western world, and the younger generation does not seem to care about nearly as much.
That's not to say, if the the world does not think it's an issue, the church should not care about it, but I do think it challenges the church to examine where it puts its energy, particularly in a world with many issues revolving around sexuality.
I have the suspicion that we want to keep focused on the issue of homosexuality because then we do not have to engage other issue of sex that matter as well, if not more than the issue of homosexuality.
Move 1: What other issues?
a. Internet pornography
1. On the Web, there are both commercial and free pornography sites.
2. As of October 2008, about one quarter of employees visit Internet porn sites during working hours according to Nielsen Online. (Wikipedia, Internet Pornography)
3. The production of child pornography has become very profitable, bringing in several billion dollars a year, and is no longer limited to pedophiles. notes that there is "overwhelming evidence that [child pornography] is all but impossible to obtain through non electronic means." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_pornography)
4. I now include in my pre-marital counseling a series of questions about
b. Cyber bullying over sexuality
1. Rutgers student who committed suicide.
2. Allegedly some of his fellow students hid a camera that captured him kissing another male.
3. Broadcast this to others.
4.Embarrassment about his sexuality issue and the invasion of his privacy led to the student's suicide.
c. Divorce
1.Different figures, but roughly 45% of the couples that get married today will divorce http://www.divorcerate.org/
2.Divorce rate is higher for evangelical Christians (Barna Research, as quoted on http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_dira.htm
3.Living together – higher divorce rate; indicators show that people who chose to live together on average
d.Infidelity in marriage
1. Infidelity rates are getting higher and higher in the American society. Here are some infidelity statistics based on a survey by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago:
25 percent of men have had extramarital affairs
17 percent of women committed adultery
2. Another 20% have emotional affairs.
3.Only 35 percent of unions survive an extramarital affair. http://www.infidelity-etc.com/index.php/4
4.Do not underestimate the role of the Internet in this issue. The ability for people to engage with others over the Internet, without having to sneak off somewhere to see each other, has created more opportunities http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidelity
5.Plus, the social web-sites like FB and MySpace allow for people to meet up and become infatuated with the computer image of someone, which no surprise may seem more exciting than the day-to-day image of one's spouse.
e.Premarital sex:
1.Currently 46.8% of all high school students report they have had sexual intercourse. The percentage of high school students who have had sex decreased 13.3% between 1991 and 2005 (54% to 46.8%). 2005 CDC Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance
2. Casual sex.
Move 2: How are we to respond to these sexuality issue out of our Christian calling?
a. At the heart of our response is how we view God.
1.Is our primary image of God as the judge, who creates a world of black and white choices; a God whose purpose is to decide who is in (those who can abide by the rules). Drawing a line in the sand.
2.Or, do we fundamentally, see God as liberating us and inviting us to grow into the image of God that calls us to be in right relationship with God and one another?
3.Of course, the reality for most of us is that we mix those images.
4.In the passage to the Colossians, I think we see this mix. There is both a list of things to do and not do for those early Christians, but also the overarching call to grow into the fullness of Christ, which I think defies the draw a line in the sand mentality.
5.Or, Isaiah's prophecy speaks of the eunuch and the foreigner who are welcomed, the one who was outside the sexual norms and the stranger in the midst, being welcomed by God. But, there is also a reference to their making right sacrifices.
b. McLaren story: a Kenyan graduate student attended the church he served. After a communion service, McLaren found the Kenyan sitting in his seat, with his head in his hands crying. “Are you okay?”
“These are tears of joy.”
“What happened?”
“It is my first time to take communion.”
“but I thought you had been a Christian since you were a child?”
“I have been. But I am the child of the third wife.” He went on to explain that at the time the Anglican Church in Kenya had a policy for polygamous converts to the Christianity. Only the children of the first wife could participate in the Lord's Supper. “Today, when you said that all were welcome to the Table, I realized that here I am not the child of the third wife. I am simply a Christian [child of God], and I am welcome at the Table.” (Brain McLaren, A New Kind of Christianity, 186)
c.It is easy to here that story and see where the black and white approach of the church in another culture misses the gospel that welcomes all people to our Lord's Table.
1.So let's look a little bit closer to home.
2.Consider the issue of pre-marital sex.
3.I am the parent of three girls, two of whom are in high school now.
4.I can easily subscribe to the image of God who says Christians do this and not that.
5.Very black and white. Line in the sand. As least as it relates to the sexuality of my daughters.
6.But, how does that speak to what it means to be made in the image of God that calls us into relationship?
7.In all the conversations and discussions I heard as a kid, or have had with youth groups or others as an adult, parent or minister, let me share with you the most compelling argument I ever heard for not engaging in pre-marital sex.
It was a minister. He was speaking to a group of high schoolers. He was not the hip minister, but the older minister (about my age now!). It was not a God said you should do this or that.
He spoke about how sex was the most intimate moment two people could share. How it was designed as an deep expression of love to be shared between two people.
And he spoke about relationship. How God desired us to have a deep, abiding relationship with another person. A relationship between two humans that God gave us as gift (I am indebted to Dr. John McCoy for having shared this story with the high school youth group).
8.If a study were done with those high schoolers who heard that conversation, would they have a lower rate of engaging in premarital sex? I do not know.
9.But, I think that spoke to the issue in a more meaningful way, in a way that invited the high schoolers to understand their sexuality as a gift from God, and a call to see their sexuality in the context of their calling as people made in the image of God.
e. Divorce rates and infidelity.
1.Again, it is easy to draw a line in the sand.
2.But, missing from that position is the conversation about what it means to be in covenantal relationship.
3.How to live in relationship with one another and how to deal with broken relationships.
4.It is painful to hear divorced people describe how their faith communities failed them and how they left those communities because they did not feel support, or because the faith community drew a line in the sand and included one of the spouses and excluded the other.
5.We have to do better.
f.Internet pornography and cyber bullying.
1. they do not reveal the image of God, but show forth broken relationships.
2. Clearly, those who engage in bullying see the others as outside of their relationship.
3. Think about how pornography violates the relationship between two people.
Conclusion: How we respond to matters of sex does matter.
It speaks to how we view God and how we live out our calling as disciples of Christ.
Friday, October 22, 2010
"Sex That Matters"
The sermon title may be more exciting than the sermon! When we discuss issues related to sex in the Presbyterian church, we generally are discussing the issue of gay and lesbian marriage and the ordination of gays and lesbians. In recent years, we have also spent time discussing the definition of marriage, but again the issue is typically focused on how to deal with same-sex couples. As I envision the issues related to sex that Christians have to deal with in the 21st century, I believe that our focus on gay/lesbian issues keeps us from dealing with issues that impact more of our lives. How are we addressing Internet pornography and its rampant use? How do we speak about pre-marital sex and/or abstinence? What are we to make of divorce rates that are higher among Christians than non-Christians in the United States? As I ponder those issues, I am struck that our first reaction is to set standards and draw lines in the sand. I certainly feel that need when thinking about my daughters dating! Is it possible to re-frame our responses by focusing on right relationship and tying our sexual lives to our lives of discipleship? As I write that, I find myself saying, "Really. Richard do you really think that talking about discipleship will make an impression when faced with sexual desires?" Perhaps not, but how else can we connect our sexual lives with the grace and love of God and our growing into new creations?
Love for you send me the answer by Saturday night!
peace,
Richard
Love for you send me the answer by Saturday night!
peace,
Richard
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
"FB or Image of God?" reflections and text
A person who heard this sermon on Sunday and the one before on Twitter suggested that I like Facebook (FB) and I don't like Twitter. Let me reiterate -- I did not intend to pass judgment on Twitter or FB; they are part of the reality of the world we live in now. The question for Christians is how do we live out our calling as disciples of Christ in the world of Twitter and FB.
They both offer us opportunities for community (in a different way than gathering in person) that make connecting more accessible, in some ways. But, there are also big challenges: primarily, the worldview that sees being connected as optional and of our own choosing and the focus on self. To live as people created by God to be in relationship with others and to identify ourselves as people called by God, flies in the face of the Twitter/FB world that seems to be about what we choose in terms of relationships and ministries. Moses, Jonah and Mary, to name a few, discovered that to be connected to the mysterious demanding God who created us often leads us to do things and to go places we would never have chosen.
Here are my notes from Sunday's sermon.
Introduction: FB is Facebook. Facebook is another of those 21st century technological tools like Twitter.
FB is done on a computer, or at least a device that has computer access.
A person creates an account. You announce to the world who you are:
1.Can post comments.
2. Photos.
3.Quotations from songs or famous people.
4.Biographical information.
5.“What's on your mind?” You are encouraged to post what's on your mind so others can read about you.
You have friends on FB.
1. People who befriend you.
2. They have access to your photos and comments.
3. In fact, when you post something new, your friends are notified so that they can go read about you.
4. You can also chat, that is, have an on-line conversation with Friends who are also on-line.
FB is about image. Photos we might post; quotations from others we list that we use to express who we are; or at least who we want others to think we are.
I have been pondering FB and a theological understanding of being created in the image of God for some time,
A few words about being created in the Image of God –
a. Most underdeveloped theological understanding we have.
b. Shirley Guthrie begins his conversation about being made in the image of God by creating a scenario: you meet a perfect stranger whom you immediately like. IN the conversation, the stranger asks you, “Who are you, really?”
1.What would be on the list?
2. How many of the items on your list are relational? I am a father, or sister
3. How many items are purely intellectual or physical? I have green eyes.
As you review that list, does it become apparent that you understand yourself as being made in the image of God, that at the core of your very being we find that each of us is a child of God?
Move 1: Image of God means to be in relationship.
a. Genesis.
1.Created in the image of God means being made male and female.
2.That implies that to be made in the image of God means we are in relationship.
3.No surprise, I suppose, since we know God as the Trinitarian Father, Son and HS.
4.Uniquely relational.
5. God made male and female. It means that we cannot find our true identity in isolated, individualistic autonomy.
b. FB provides opportunities for relationship.
1.Birthdays
2.Messages between people.
3.Crisis – notes of support get posted.
4.Lots of varied interactions. Two years on FB; more interactions, real and meaningful conversations with college students and members who are living away from Troy in the past two years, than I did in the 15 yrs of ministry combined.
c. Seems to create an atmosphere where community
1.Suggestions about friends.
2.Constantly being updated about your friends.
3.Hard to not connect with what's going on in someone else's lives.
d.FB can also damage relationship
1.IN some ways, it seems to me that people seem freer to express their anger or dissatisfaction when able to post something passively, instead of having to see the look on the person's face.
2.Or, instead of telling one person you are mad at so and so, you recount the story on FB, and now lots of people are reading about the problem.
3.Just as FB can create relationship, it can also easily break it.
Move 2: FB can create a false sense of who we are.
a. To live in the image of God is to give up idolatry of self and idolatry of others and other things.
1.FB invites us into idolatry of self.
2.To focus on ourselves, and our thoughts, and our needs.
3.Being a child of God is not enough – we need to create an appropriate image of ourselves, that may be more about worship of self than truth about self.
b. Dan Migliore, a theology professor at Princeton Theological seminary, notes that “human beings are restless for the fulfillment of life not yet realized.” that we continually search for physical and emotional satisfaction.
1.can FB lead to fulfillment?
2.I think that FB carries with it the false allusion that If you post the perfect photo, or the just right quote, or you express yourself perfectly in a post, you can find fulfillment.
3.AS Christians, however, we would argue that our fulfillment can only come in right relationship with God, living as a child of God, in right relationship with others.
4.Ultimately, FB cannot give us that.
Move 3: Being created in the image of God is not a state, but a movement toward a goal.
a. I Corinthians – we are being transformed.
1. Back to the Guthrie list. He notes that if we are being honest in the list, we will discover is it full of self-contradictions.
2. That who we say we are and who we really are at any given moment do not always fits together.
3. We are not quite who we want to be.
b. IN some ways, FB expresses that well.
1. You can continue to update your image.
2. Everyone is in flux.
c. The challenge, of course, is to connect that changes we are making, the changes we acknowledge in our lives, with the new creation God calls us to be.
1. As we think about being made in the image of God, we have before us the example of Christ, the one who lived perfectly in the image of God.
2. AS followers of Christ, we move toward that image of how he defined what it means to be human.
3. A daunting task we never quite manage, but a task to which we are continually called.
Conclusion: “Who are you really?” Ponder that list. Look and see who you say you are. Look at see if you are living as a FB image of your own creation, or as a child of God.
They both offer us opportunities for community (in a different way than gathering in person) that make connecting more accessible, in some ways. But, there are also big challenges: primarily, the worldview that sees being connected as optional and of our own choosing and the focus on self. To live as people created by God to be in relationship with others and to identify ourselves as people called by God, flies in the face of the Twitter/FB world that seems to be about what we choose in terms of relationships and ministries. Moses, Jonah and Mary, to name a few, discovered that to be connected to the mysterious demanding God who created us often leads us to do things and to go places we would never have chosen.
Here are my notes from Sunday's sermon.
Introduction: FB is Facebook. Facebook is another of those 21st century technological tools like Twitter.
FB is done on a computer, or at least a device that has computer access.
A person creates an account. You announce to the world who you are:
1.Can post comments.
2. Photos.
3.Quotations from songs or famous people.
4.Biographical information.
5.“What's on your mind?” You are encouraged to post what's on your mind so others can read about you.
You have friends on FB.
1. People who befriend you.
2. They have access to your photos and comments.
3. In fact, when you post something new, your friends are notified so that they can go read about you.
4. You can also chat, that is, have an on-line conversation with Friends who are also on-line.
FB is about image. Photos we might post; quotations from others we list that we use to express who we are; or at least who we want others to think we are.
I have been pondering FB and a theological understanding of being created in the image of God for some time,
A few words about being created in the Image of God –
a. Most underdeveloped theological understanding we have.
b. Shirley Guthrie begins his conversation about being made in the image of God by creating a scenario: you meet a perfect stranger whom you immediately like. IN the conversation, the stranger asks you, “Who are you, really?”
1.What would be on the list?
2. How many of the items on your list are relational? I am a father, or sister
3. How many items are purely intellectual or physical? I have green eyes.
As you review that list, does it become apparent that you understand yourself as being made in the image of God, that at the core of your very being we find that each of us is a child of God?
Move 1: Image of God means to be in relationship.
a. Genesis.
1.Created in the image of God means being made male and female.
2.That implies that to be made in the image of God means we are in relationship.
3.No surprise, I suppose, since we know God as the Trinitarian Father, Son and HS.
4.Uniquely relational.
5. God made male and female. It means that we cannot find our true identity in isolated, individualistic autonomy.
b. FB provides opportunities for relationship.
1.Birthdays
2.Messages between people.
3.Crisis – notes of support get posted.
4.Lots of varied interactions. Two years on FB; more interactions, real and meaningful conversations with college students and members who are living away from Troy in the past two years, than I did in the 15 yrs of ministry combined.
c. Seems to create an atmosphere where community
1.Suggestions about friends.
2.Constantly being updated about your friends.
3.Hard to not connect with what's going on in someone else's lives.
d.FB can also damage relationship
1.IN some ways, it seems to me that people seem freer to express their anger or dissatisfaction when able to post something passively, instead of having to see the look on the person's face.
2.Or, instead of telling one person you are mad at so and so, you recount the story on FB, and now lots of people are reading about the problem.
3.Just as FB can create relationship, it can also easily break it.
Move 2: FB can create a false sense of who we are.
a. To live in the image of God is to give up idolatry of self and idolatry of others and other things.
1.FB invites us into idolatry of self.
2.To focus on ourselves, and our thoughts, and our needs.
3.Being a child of God is not enough – we need to create an appropriate image of ourselves, that may be more about worship of self than truth about self.
b. Dan Migliore, a theology professor at Princeton Theological seminary, notes that “human beings are restless for the fulfillment of life not yet realized.” that we continually search for physical and emotional satisfaction.
1.can FB lead to fulfillment?
2.I think that FB carries with it the false allusion that If you post the perfect photo, or the just right quote, or you express yourself perfectly in a post, you can find fulfillment.
3.AS Christians, however, we would argue that our fulfillment can only come in right relationship with God, living as a child of God, in right relationship with others.
4.Ultimately, FB cannot give us that.
Move 3: Being created in the image of God is not a state, but a movement toward a goal.
a. I Corinthians – we are being transformed.
1. Back to the Guthrie list. He notes that if we are being honest in the list, we will discover is it full of self-contradictions.
2. That who we say we are and who we really are at any given moment do not always fits together.
3. We are not quite who we want to be.
b. IN some ways, FB expresses that well.
1. You can continue to update your image.
2. Everyone is in flux.
c. The challenge, of course, is to connect that changes we are making, the changes we acknowledge in our lives, with the new creation God calls us to be.
1. As we think about being made in the image of God, we have before us the example of Christ, the one who lived perfectly in the image of God.
2. AS followers of Christ, we move toward that image of how he defined what it means to be human.
3. A daunting task we never quite manage, but a task to which we are continually called.
Conclusion: “Who are you really?” Ponder that list. Look and see who you say you are. Look at see if you are living as a FB image of your own creation, or as a child of God.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
"FB or Image of God?"
I have been reflecting on how we use Facebook (FB). ON the positive side, I know that FB has allowed me to connect with people that I would not have connected with otherwise. In particular, I have found that FB has allowed me to have conversations with college students and members who do not live in Troy in a way that had not been possible before I joined FB. I certainly have been more aware of prayer concerns and issues from members and friends of the church who do not live in town. Some of them receive the elink, so then they read the prayers concerns in the next week's elink, which connects them with the prayer life of this congregation.
But, I also read FB comments that make me wonder why the person would say that, particularly in a public place. And, I read the status of people, and worry about their state of mind and wonder how they could feel that distanced from love and support.
It has occurred to me that in some ways FB users need to be reminded that we are created in the image of God. That God has laid claim on us and we are works in progress as we move toward that new creation God desires of us that also reveals God's image. How would it change a FB comment about another person if we began our comment with, "So and so is a child of God..." and then completed our thought? Or, how differently might we post a status about ourself if we claimed for ourselves the title "Child of God?" Instead of tearing ourselves apart or falsely proclaiming our greatness, we might temper our thoughts with the recognition that God is working in us. We are not finished, but God is with us.
Do you have some positive or negative experiences of FB you would like to share?
Peace,
Richard
But, I also read FB comments that make me wonder why the person would say that, particularly in a public place. And, I read the status of people, and worry about their state of mind and wonder how they could feel that distanced from love and support.
It has occurred to me that in some ways FB users need to be reminded that we are created in the image of God. That God has laid claim on us and we are works in progress as we move toward that new creation God desires of us that also reveals God's image. How would it change a FB comment about another person if we began our comment with, "So and so is a child of God..." and then completed our thought? Or, how differently might we post a status about ourself if we claimed for ourselves the title "Child of God?" Instead of tearing ourselves apart or falsely proclaiming our greatness, we might temper our thoughts with the recognition that God is working in us. We are not finished, but God is with us.
Do you have some positive or negative experiences of FB you would like to share?
Peace,
Richard
Monday, October 11, 2010
"God Tweeted"
I continue to enjoy preaching on issues that seem pertinent to our lives as Christians in the 21st century. I saw lots of heads nodding yesterday as we reflected on Twitter. I hope the nodding heads were not because people were hearing me say that Twitter or technology is bad. I absolutely do not believe Twitter is bad. But, we need to recognize how the church is called to respond and minister in the world of Twitter.
As I look to the future, I see the church's calling to be a place where people can find both community and a place for theological exploration becoming more essential. In a world where it seems that we get all the choices, we need to hear God's claim on our lives and submit to the sense of calling in which God sends us, rather than we choose. I also want to announce to the world that we believe God is at work and that God's work is a little more complicated than can be described in a Tweet or contained in a bumper sticker slogan.
Here are my sermon notes from yesterday.
Introduction: Confession – I do not Tweet. Most of what I know about Twitter (the name for the process in which people Tweet or follow Tweets) I have read or heard from those who do Tweet. But, I know that it is becoming the rage in the world of instant communication.
The way it works is something like this. There are two sides to Twitter communication. One person creates a Twitter account (anyone can do it with computer access). Then, they can begin posting Tweets. Short, less that 140 characters, comments about whatever they want.
Then, other people sign up to follow someone's Twitter account. They then have access to all the tweets (the short messages) that someone puts out.
Concrete example – Mario has a Twitter account. If I wanted to, and I don't think I do, I could become a follower of Mario's Twitter account, and then I would have access to all the messages that Mario would post.
I also know that Twitter is now a big deal. In the first quarter of 2010, 4 billion tweets were posted.[citation needed] As of June 2010, about 65 million tweets are posted each day, equalling about 750 tweets sent each second, according to Twitter.[24]
Twitter's usage spikes during prominent events. For example, a record was set during the 2010 FIFA World Cup when fans wrote 2,940 tweets per second in the 30 second period after Japan scored against Cameroon on 14 June 2010. The record was broken again when 3,085 tweets a second were posted after the Los Angeles Lakers' victory in the 2010 NBA Finals on 17 June 2010.[25] When American singer Michael Jackson died on June 25, 2009, the Twitter server crashed after users were updating their status to include the words "Michael Jackson" at a rate of 100,000 tweets per hour.[26]
over a 2-week period in August 2009 from 11:00a to 5:00p (CST) and separated them into six categories:[39]
Pointless babble — 41%
Conversational — 38%
Pass-along value — 9%
Self-promotion — 6%
Spam — 4%
News — 4%[39] (Information taken from Wikipedia, 10/8/10)
God spoke through a burning bush; God spoke through prophets; God spoke through a donkey.
If God were to create again in today's context, the Genesis story might read: “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then God Tweeted, "Let there be light"; and there was light. (Genesis 1:1-3 NRSV)
I want to reflect on what it means to be a Christian in a world of Twitter. Not to say Twitter is good or bad, but to think about how we live with Twitter.
Move 1: Tweeting exemplifies the me, me, me approach to life.
a. When a person creates a Twitter account, they being using it to share about himself or herself.
1. What did she eat for breakfast
1.where is he?
2.What is she doing?
3.Basically, when a person tweets, they show something of an obsession about themselves.
b. Likewise, if you sign up to follow someone, you are signing up to hear all about that one person.
1. What do they think about something.
2. What are they doing?
3. Let's say you wanted to know more about Lindsay Lohan – you could sign up to follow her on Twitter, and you could learn all about her life, her struggles and the world as she sees it.
c. Into this context, the church has an obligation to remind people of our connectedness to people and the world beyond ourselves.
1.To notice others, even those we would not choose to follow.
2.From our Christian perspective, community is the place to which God calls you, sometimes not even of our choosing, but a place we find ourselves sent to live out our calling as disciples of Christ.
3.And we are called to notice and minister to people with whom we might not choose to connect.
4.In the world of Twitter – we choose the people we want to follow and we focus on that person.
5.In the world of discipleship, God chooses where we are sent and we focus on those people who need to know the love of Christ.
d. We remember as we read the opening verses of Genesis that when God spoke, God had a purpose.
1. God saw chaos, and spoke to create.
2. God created for the purpose of being in relationship with us and for putting us into relationship with one another.
3.God spoke to create as an expression of God's love.
In a world of Twitter, we need to stand as a reminder that God calls us beyond ourselves into loving relationships..
move 2: Tweeting makes things short and sweet.
a. Limited to 140 characters
1.I read an article recently where someone described how he loves Twitter because it forces him to be creative as he figures out how to express himself in such a limited way.
2.Twitter is sort of like a bumper sticker.
3.In some ways, maybe that is good. Sometimes we make things to complex. I have certainly been in meetings when the conversation goes on and on without resolution. A 140 character limit might be helpful at times.
b. but, God demands more from us than a bumper sticker theology and faith.
1.Hard to describe the mystery and majesty of God in 140 characters.
2.When we face the challenging questions of our faith – where was God on 9/11? or why is my 35 yr old brother dying while my 95 yr. Old great grandmother still lives? Or how a God whose ways often seems hidden, yet a God who still searches us out -- 140 characters will not cut it.
3. Don’t Eat Alone, blog by Milton Brasher-Cunningham, 12/8/09 Shane Claiborne wrote an article for Esquire magazine and said something that connects here, I think: “The more I have read the Bible and studied the life of Jesus, the more I have become convinced that Christianity spreads best not through force but through fascination. But over the past few decades our Christianity, at least here in the United States, has become less and less fascinating. We have given the atheists less and less to disbelieve. And the sort of Christianity many of us have seen on TV and heard on the radio looks less and less like Jesus”
4. I believe as God's people we are compelled to resist the temptation reduce God to a bumper sticker. Instead, we need to invite others to explore and discover God in meaningful ways that cannot be found on a bumper sticker or in 140 characters.
Move 3: Twitter does not encourage engagement.
a. Basically, Twitter is a passive from of communication.
1.One person writes.
2.Another person reads.
3.It might be entertaining – I have heard, for instance, that Chad Ocho Cinco the wide receiver for the Bengals makes really entertaining comments for those who follow his Twitter account – but it does not engage the persons with each other
b. The Biblical story tells of a God who engages us.
1. Prayer may seem at times like one-way communication, but then we have these thoughts, or we focus on hearing from God and we have these insights.
2. Discipleship calls us to engage God – to be in relationship with the one who challenges us, who nurtures us, who sends us.
3. We have this dynamic, relational God to share with the world, which becomes even more important in a world of passive communication like Twitter.
Conclusion: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
Tweeting may be a great tool for communication.
God could tweet if God wanted to.
Instead, God sent the Word to become flesh.
As I look to the future, I see the church's calling to be a place where people can find both community and a place for theological exploration becoming more essential. In a world where it seems that we get all the choices, we need to hear God's claim on our lives and submit to the sense of calling in which God sends us, rather than we choose. I also want to announce to the world that we believe God is at work and that God's work is a little more complicated than can be described in a Tweet or contained in a bumper sticker slogan.
Here are my sermon notes from yesterday.
Introduction: Confession – I do not Tweet. Most of what I know about Twitter (the name for the process in which people Tweet or follow Tweets) I have read or heard from those who do Tweet. But, I know that it is becoming the rage in the world of instant communication.
The way it works is something like this. There are two sides to Twitter communication. One person creates a Twitter account (anyone can do it with computer access). Then, they can begin posting Tweets. Short, less that 140 characters, comments about whatever they want.
Then, other people sign up to follow someone's Twitter account. They then have access to all the tweets (the short messages) that someone puts out.
Concrete example – Mario has a Twitter account. If I wanted to, and I don't think I do, I could become a follower of Mario's Twitter account, and then I would have access to all the messages that Mario would post.
I also know that Twitter is now a big deal. In the first quarter of 2010, 4 billion tweets were posted.[citation needed] As of June 2010, about 65 million tweets are posted each day, equalling about 750 tweets sent each second, according to Twitter.[24]
Twitter's usage spikes during prominent events. For example, a record was set during the 2010 FIFA World Cup when fans wrote 2,940 tweets per second in the 30 second period after Japan scored against Cameroon on 14 June 2010. The record was broken again when 3,085 tweets a second were posted after the Los Angeles Lakers' victory in the 2010 NBA Finals on 17 June 2010.[25] When American singer Michael Jackson died on June 25, 2009, the Twitter server crashed after users were updating their status to include the words "Michael Jackson" at a rate of 100,000 tweets per hour.[26]
over a 2-week period in August 2009 from 11:00a to 5:00p (CST) and separated them into six categories:[39]
Pointless babble — 41%
Conversational — 38%
Pass-along value — 9%
Self-promotion — 6%
Spam — 4%
News — 4%[39] (Information taken from Wikipedia, 10/8/10)
God spoke through a burning bush; God spoke through prophets; God spoke through a donkey.
If God were to create again in today's context, the Genesis story might read: “In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters. Then God Tweeted, "Let there be light"; and there was light. (Genesis 1:1-3 NRSV)
I want to reflect on what it means to be a Christian in a world of Twitter. Not to say Twitter is good or bad, but to think about how we live with Twitter.
Move 1: Tweeting exemplifies the me, me, me approach to life.
a. When a person creates a Twitter account, they being using it to share about himself or herself.
1. What did she eat for breakfast
1.where is he?
2.What is she doing?
3.Basically, when a person tweets, they show something of an obsession about themselves.
b. Likewise, if you sign up to follow someone, you are signing up to hear all about that one person.
1. What do they think about something.
2. What are they doing?
3. Let's say you wanted to know more about Lindsay Lohan – you could sign up to follow her on Twitter, and you could learn all about her life, her struggles and the world as she sees it.
c. Into this context, the church has an obligation to remind people of our connectedness to people and the world beyond ourselves.
1.To notice others, even those we would not choose to follow.
2.From our Christian perspective, community is the place to which God calls you, sometimes not even of our choosing, but a place we find ourselves sent to live out our calling as disciples of Christ.
3.And we are called to notice and minister to people with whom we might not choose to connect.
4.In the world of Twitter – we choose the people we want to follow and we focus on that person.
5.In the world of discipleship, God chooses where we are sent and we focus on those people who need to know the love of Christ.
d. We remember as we read the opening verses of Genesis that when God spoke, God had a purpose.
1. God saw chaos, and spoke to create.
2. God created for the purpose of being in relationship with us and for putting us into relationship with one another.
3.God spoke to create as an expression of God's love.
In a world of Twitter, we need to stand as a reminder that God calls us beyond ourselves into loving relationships..
move 2: Tweeting makes things short and sweet.
a. Limited to 140 characters
1.I read an article recently where someone described how he loves Twitter because it forces him to be creative as he figures out how to express himself in such a limited way.
2.Twitter is sort of like a bumper sticker.
3.In some ways, maybe that is good. Sometimes we make things to complex. I have certainly been in meetings when the conversation goes on and on without resolution. A 140 character limit might be helpful at times.
b. but, God demands more from us than a bumper sticker theology and faith.
1.Hard to describe the mystery and majesty of God in 140 characters.
2.When we face the challenging questions of our faith – where was God on 9/11? or why is my 35 yr old brother dying while my 95 yr. Old great grandmother still lives? Or how a God whose ways often seems hidden, yet a God who still searches us out -- 140 characters will not cut it.
3. Don’t Eat Alone, blog by Milton Brasher-Cunningham, 12/8/09 Shane Claiborne wrote an article for Esquire magazine and said something that connects here, I think: “The more I have read the Bible and studied the life of Jesus, the more I have become convinced that Christianity spreads best not through force but through fascination. But over the past few decades our Christianity, at least here in the United States, has become less and less fascinating. We have given the atheists less and less to disbelieve. And the sort of Christianity many of us have seen on TV and heard on the radio looks less and less like Jesus”
4. I believe as God's people we are compelled to resist the temptation reduce God to a bumper sticker. Instead, we need to invite others to explore and discover God in meaningful ways that cannot be found on a bumper sticker or in 140 characters.
Move 3: Twitter does not encourage engagement.
a. Basically, Twitter is a passive from of communication.
1.One person writes.
2.Another person reads.
3.It might be entertaining – I have heard, for instance, that Chad Ocho Cinco the wide receiver for the Bengals makes really entertaining comments for those who follow his Twitter account – but it does not engage the persons with each other
b. The Biblical story tells of a God who engages us.
1. Prayer may seem at times like one-way communication, but then we have these thoughts, or we focus on hearing from God and we have these insights.
2. Discipleship calls us to engage God – to be in relationship with the one who challenges us, who nurtures us, who sends us.
3. We have this dynamic, relational God to share with the world, which becomes even more important in a world of passive communication like Twitter.
Conclusion: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.
Tweeting may be a great tool for communication.
God could tweet if God wanted to.
Instead, God sent the Word to become flesh.
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
God Tweeted
This week I am playing with the way we talk to each other and how God spoke. What can we learn about God from Tweeting, or how should our tweeting be informed by God? What does it mean to speak of Jesus as the Word incarnate when we now live a world that allows us to rapidly spew words across the world, but also encourages brief conversations?
Friday, October 1, 2010
It's a Small World
The background for this Sunday's sermon is easy to state -- the world seems smaller with the communications and technology available. Imagine how Skype and its ability to allow us to talk and see people around the world shrinks the world. I do not think anyone would disagree with that premise.
But, what are the implications of this this shrinking world for Christians? Are we more connected now with our brothers and sisters in Christ? Does knowledge or ease of access equate to being in relationship with others?
How has your faith life been impacted by the shrinking world?
Peace,
Richard
But, what are the implications of this this shrinking world for Christians? Are we more connected now with our brothers and sisters in Christ? Does knowledge or ease of access equate to being in relationship with others?
How has your faith life been impacted by the shrinking world?
Peace,
Richard
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