Back Home: Declutter Project

 Kelly and I returned home on Wednesday, August 20 and on Thursday we commenced our decluttering project with good energy. We started in the garage.

When the house was built in 1960 a two car garage with a carport overhang was built. The garage has two separate doors -- but no access to the inside of the house (an interesting story for another day.) When we moved in we had access to both sides, but over time and with the building of the new Providence Christian Church, and the birth of Kelly's business, Stablemate Creative, along with the passing of grandparents and parents, we lost one side to stuff. Let's call it clutter. The clutter was a combination of boxes full of art project files, client files, tools, toys, soccer balls and cleats, and some things that are best described as, "oh, that's a nice box. We should keep that."

Thursday, that began to change. And we did a lot that day.

Here is the big thing for me from that day. I have a footlocker that belonged to my mother's younger brother, my Uncle David. I have had it since college days (1977-81, then 81-84 for grad school.) It was full of well-organized class notes, research/term papers, tests and such from every college course and every graduate course I took. Why did I keep all those? I don't know. But they are gone now. The footlocker is still here, because it's a good box. But the history of my academic career went to be recycled. And it didn't bother me at all. In the process, a couple of gems were found, and sorry to Dallas, but those are staying until I am gone from this earth.

Friday brought more work and more good experiences clearing out the garage. We are now within a couple hours work of reclaiming the lost side. But, a new issue has arisen. The lost side garage door opener broke several years ago, but now the other side is going too. Plastic gears, y'all. 

More later.

Jerry

Sabbatical 2025: Day One

 

First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Winchester, KY has given me a sabbatical with some financial support this year. It runs from AUG 18 - OCT 18. I have an organizing idea that has helped me set up some travel and experiences during that 60 days. That organizing idea is to look at art, specifically Impressionism, Fauvism, Pointillism, and Modernist paintings, to learn about the creative process of painter/artists. Is there something I can learn from their processes that helps me develop a creative process for crafting sermons?

 

The first experience is to travel to Chicago with Kelly to visit the Chicago Institute of Art and its Special Exhibit of Impressionist painter, Gustav Caillebotte. Today, Kelly and I spent 3 hours walking the galleries of the museum. What a collection. The interpretive signs next to the galleries and paintings were well-written and helpful. The Caillebot Exhibit was especially interesting since the paintings spanned his career and one could see a progression of the artist's style and a clear movement into Impressionism. 

 

I am an Inductive preacher. My seminary Homiletics professor taught a deductive style of preaching whereby you state the main point of the sermon at the outset, then in outline fashion you should make three main points adding a poem or a joke. Seriously. That's what I was taught. Inductive preaching may well hint at the main point early, but the listener is asked to go on a journey, reflect on the passage of scripture, look for intersections with their own lives, and the main point is certainly at the end. Sort of like reading a novel or watching a movie. And the listener is expected to draw their own conclusion.

 

According to Wikipedia, Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage of time), ordinary subject matter, unusual visual angles, and inclusion of movement as a crucial element of human perception and experience. Impressionism originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s. The Impressionists faced harsh opposition from the conventional art community in France.

 

Inductive Preaching is a movement which intends to be dialogical, and includes the listener to add to the sermon journey through reflection. It arose as a reaction to preaching that was monological and proclamatory. Inductive preaching has nuance and visible brushstrokes. Deductive preaching has clear lines and clear progression. Inductive preaching allows form and color to blend. Deductive preaching is angular and fixed.

 

Yes, that’s some mixed metaphors, but it encapsulates why Impressionism is of interest to me and my preaching. And that’s why we started with the Impressionist exhibit in Chicago today. Plus, it was Kelly’s birthday last Friday and this helps extend the celebration.

 

Here are some pieces that spoke to me today.

Thanks for following along. I will post every day (mostly).

Jerry

 

Sabbatical 2025 Begins

After worship today my 60 day sabbatical began. This is a very brief post because we got things to do. Kelly and I drove to Chicago today. We are in the Westin on Michigan Ave. Not swanky but a great location. Tomorrow we will head to the  Bean and the Chicago Institute of Art. There will be photos and more talk tomorrow. Thanks to the very good folks at Frost Christian Church in Winchester KY for this opportunity. 

Peace and love to all. 

Jerry 

What Do You Know to be True of God?

 

Nebula M78

 What do you know to be true of God?

 

A colleague texted me that question this morning. Here's my response:

 

God does not exist in a way humans can say that "God is" or that God "exists." God is outside time and space and thus is not constrained by creation. God's nature is creativity.

I believe the nature of God is love.

I believe God delights in creation and creatures.

I believe God does not keep a record of rights and wrongs like a scorecard as justification to send some of us to a fiery eternity.

I believe God wants to be in relationship with every creature and all of creation until, well beyond my ability to conceive how long.

God can't change what humans do. Our mistakes are our own. Neither does God rescue the good and let the bad live in punishment.

It was a hastily constructed text response, but it gets tot he essence of what I believe to be true of God. In this space though, let me add a bit more.

I believe we are created in the image of God by God's design. 

I believe that, in Jesus, we see the fullest revelation of God in human form.

God is our constant companion. There is never a moment we are apart from God's presence.

Peace be with you,

Jerry

Sermon from Epiphany 3 C, January 23, 2022

 

EPIPHANY 3 C

JANUARY 23, 2022

LUKE 4:14-21

“THE REVOLUTIONARY GOSPEL”

 

¹⁴Then Jesus, filled with the power of the Spirit, returned to Galilee, and a report about him spread through all the surrounding country. ¹⁵He began to teach in their synagogues and was praised by everyone. ¹⁶When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, ¹⁷and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written: ¹⁸“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, ¹⁹to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” ²⁰And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. ²¹Then he began to say to them, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

 

John Lennon penned these words, “You say you want a revolution, well, you know, we all want to change the world.” Yes, but, not everyone agrees on how it should be changed.

 

The Gospel lection for today begins with these words, “Filled with the power of the Holy Spirit...,” which Jesus received on the day of his baptism (Luke 3:21-22), Jesus began his ministry in Galilee. That is where we begin today. Jesus has emerged from his baptism consumed by the power of the Holy Spirit. Emboldened by the power of the Holy Spirit. Everybody in the towns and villages around the Jordan River started talking about his preaching. Communities invited him to teach in their synagogues. He was in demand because his preaching was powerful and new. Unlike any they had heard. It seemed empowered from beyond.

 

The Gospel writer Luke makes a big deal of the Holy Spirit, both in the Gospel and in the Book of Acts. In fact, in the Acts of the Apostles, the official name of the book in the Bible would be better entitled, the Acts of the Holy Spirit. In Acts it is the Holy Spirit that is the primary actor, moving the early community of believers outward from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8).

 

It was THAT Holy Spirit that had inhabited the whole being of Jesus and it was pushing him forward into the world. The Spirit of the Lord was upon him, and he went out preaching in a world that might not ultimately welcome the good news he was preaching or even see it as good news. There were many people who responded positively to his message. Luke says that the people praised his preaching. They thought well of him. He seemed to be the small-town boy making it big. Of course, we know, because we know the whole story, that as time passed and the message of the Holy Spirit infused Jesus began to sink in not everyone was impressed.

 

Where we find ourselves in Luke today is for Luke the launch of Jesus’ ministry in Galilee. Jesus had come home to Nazareth where he was graciously invited to offer an interpretation of the scripture reading for the day. Jesus was enjoying a growing celebrity in the surrounding communities, so it seemed proper to invite him to his home synagogue to bless them with a bit of his Spirit-infused wisdom.

 

Luke tells us that Jesus was handed the Isaiah scroll, from which he read a word from Isaiah 61 about the ministry of the Spirit, which served to anoint a preacher who would bring good news to the poor. One is sure that Jesus read the text faithfully as he spoke the words of Isaiah detailing the nature of this good news.

 

Captives would be released.

 

The blind would receive their sight.

 

The oppressed would go free.

 

The year of Jubilee would be proclaimed.

 

Surely, the congregation at the synagogue knew these words. They were words of hope for a nation of Israel that had for centuries been overrun, enslaved, exiled and diminished. Isaiah’s Spirit-inspired message is one of justice and mercy, of righteousness and freedom, and no doubt it was solace for the weary Hebrew soul.

 

When Jesus finished reading the passage he sat down, and with every eye in the congregation focused on him, they awaited his wisdom on this passage. What would the famous teacher have to say? What fresh understanding would he bring?

 

“Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.”

 

In other words: I’m the one Isaiah spoke of. By the power of the Holy Spirit I am going to do these very things. You say you want a revolution? It starts today, with me.

 

We all want to change the world, but we don’t all agree on how it should be changed, or what it should look like after the changes. For Jesus, the blueprint for revolution was this passage from Isaiah 61. It was controversial and revolutionary from the start, from the moment he sat down and told his hometown powerbrokers that he was the one, powered by the Holy Spirit, that was ushering in a change. The world was about to turn upside down, and inside out.

 

Each year on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. day our Facebook feeds, our Twitter timelines are filled with quotes. Each one of them important and inspirational. Dr. King reminds us that we are called to something bigger and more important than our own selfish desires. He calls us to a blessed community where all are valued. He was not always so beloved, as you may recall. In the 1960’s his was a message that was roundly rejected and so was he. Dr. King was not only a controversial figure, he was loathed. The FBI investigated him actively. He was the subject of violence and threats daily, and his family as well. Even his clergy colleagues urged him to tone down his rhetoric. In Birmingham, AL the clergy colleagues wrote a letter published in local papers asking him not to engage in public demonstrations for the poor, the incarcerated and the oppressed in their town. Dr. King, infused by the power of the Holy Spirit kept working for what he believed Isaiah and Jesus called him to do. Then, one day, he was murdered from afar.

 

Revolutions that unseat power can extract a price; I suppose. Jesus surely was not oblivious to that when he stood to read the scroll from Isaiah, nor when he sat down to proclaim its fulfillment in the hearing of his hometown neighbors; the people he had known and who had known him all his life. The audacity of the carpenter’s son. Who does he think he is?

 

Ah, we love Jesus. 2000 years since his passing we who are Christian proclaim our love for him, but his words of revolution and transformation and systemic change are often ignored by a church that is comfortable and entrenched. His words that so offended the people of his hometown and of his own faith that they openly plotted his demise often barely intersect our lives.

 

Where is the power of the Holy Spirit now? How do we find the revolutionary Jesus in sermons whose transient truths are as fickle as the Kentucky weather?

 

Once upon a time, long ago, a person said to me after worship that they would have preferred I preach less social justice and more gospel, more good news. OK. I heard you. But I respectfully disagree with your premise and your conclusion. Look how Luke introduces the ministry of Jesus here. “God has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

 

Here is how I read this. If the Good News we proclaim as a church, if the Gospel we are preaching isn’t good news to the poor, isn’t good news to the captives, isn’t good news to those who are blinded, isn’t good news about freedom for those who we have systematically oppressed, isn’t good news about the Kingdom of God on earth as it already is in heaven, then it isn’t the Good News that the Holy Spirit inspired in Jesus.

 

Is that radical? Is that revolutionary? Yes. If it wasn’t then the Jewish religious authorities and the Roman oppressors wouldn’t have paid him any attention. People wouldn’t have given up everything they own to follow him. And the world would have just kept on going as it was. Without hope. Without a promise. Without a savior. Without the revolutionary Jesus.

 

Jesus, standing with the scroll of Isaiah in his hand in the synagogue where he grew up and was on the cradle roll, where attended Hebrew school; looked at the people who had known him since birth and dreamed of a world infused by the Holy Spirit, where the oppressed were set free, where the blind recovered their sight, where the poor received good news and where the Kingdom of God broke into Galilee like it already was in heaven.

 

Today, he told them, I am going to make good on this passage. And he did. All his days from that day forward were spent doing just what he said he would do. Just about every moment of his every day forward was spent working on good news to the poor, recovery of sight for the blind, setting the oppressed free and proclaiming God’s Kingdom come to earth.

 

I have to ask myself when I prepare a sermon every week. Every week. How can I be faithful to the text, to the Good News? If you take it lightly it doesn’t really amount to much. If you take it seriously, well, then you must call yourself as the preacher and the church as your hearers to account. Jesus has told us what the Good News is. May the same Holy Spirit that emboldened and empowered Jesus infiltrate this community until there is Good News for all. Amen.

My Uncle David

 1 3 2022

My Uncle David died tonight. My heart is broken. He was my Mom's younger brother. 82 years old.

When I was just five, he asked me if I wanted to ride in an airplane. At the time he was a CFI, Certified Flight Instructor with Spartan Aviation in Tulsa. It thrilled me, this idea of flying. It quickly turned to dread as he fired the engine and we began to taxi. But, it was a harbinger of things to come for me. In 1996 when I had put a little money together I began to realize my dream of flying. It was because of Uncle David I loved airplanes.

When I was a child I began to draw WWII era fighter planes and I became fairly proficient at it. It was Uncle David that gave me a love for these high performance planes. On the wall of his house there were two paintings of Spitfires. They inspired me.

As a small child I used to love to ride in the car with Uncle David. He had an Austin Healy, then a 1967 GTO. When I was in grad school he had a 1979 Corvette. Yes, I drive a sports car today. Yes, it was his influence on me that caused me to love a sports car.

When I graduated with my Masters Degree from TCU, Uncle David took me to Nieman Marcus and bought me a $400 overcoat, in 1984 dollars. He believed I would need that overcoat and that I would need to look professional, and he was proud of me. I did need that overcoat in the Kentucky winters. I did need to look professional, and though that coat no longer fits me (it's a size 36) I still have it to this day. The gift itself matters to me. It means something to me that he did that. I will possess that coat until the day I am called to the life beyond. 

I am crushed tonight. He was my light. He was my example. Now he rests eternally with his mother and father and his sister, my beloved Mom. There is only slight consolation in this. COVID destroyed his ability to breathe, to live, to hope at all. Through many dangers, toils and snares he had already come, but this one was too much. My heart is crushed.

There is so much more I could write and say about Uncle David. He meant the world to me. That's all that really matters.

Peace and Love,

Jerry

Where Are We Headed?

 

February 4, 2021

The pandemic has eased a bit over the last week. About 9% fewer new cases across the United States in the past week. That's a good trend. Many among us have already received the first dose of either the Pfizer or the Moderna vaccine for COVID-19. That's also a good trend. In Kentucky teachers and administrators have been among those targeted to receive the vaccinations early because we all want our children back in school, and we all want our teachers safe. In Clark County where I serve at First Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) all educators and support staff of Clark County Public Schools who were willing to receive a vaccine have had their first round. Yet another good trend -- save for the several who refused the vaccine.

With the decline in new infections and the vaccination doses increasing in speed, there is hope that we will emerge from this exile and find ourselves on the other side of it. But, where are we headed? Will the other side of this be a land flowing with milk and honey or a foreign soil to which we have yet to acclimate? I tend to believe it to be the latter. Here's few thoughts about where we might be headed.

There is a terrible trend in the United States where People of Color are NOT getting vaccinated in a number that will significantly reduce the proliferation of the disease. The data produced on those vaccinated to date shows overwhelming evidence that People of Color are not getting the vaccine at anywhere near the rate of whites. Why? I am not qualified or knowledgeable enough to say, but I do know this. Healthcare has been distributed disproportionately between whites and people of color for a very long time. Data shows that income for whites is disproportionately higher than for people of color. And that's just the United States. People of color across the globe have been historically underserved. 

The equitable distribution of the vaccine is a raging debate. The UK and Europe are engaged in a battle over vaccines. Portugal is inundated with new cases, and in South America and sub-Saharan Africa, in India and among the poorest of the poor across the globe vulnerability to COVID-19 and access to vaccines are major hurdles. 

We are learning a new reality about how small the world is, no matter national origin or ethnicity. If someone, somewhere in the world is sick, it can and almost certainly will travel across national borders. That is the case with the new strains of COVID-19 that have proliferated in the last month. They are more transmittable and therefore are more deadly, and the effect will be disproportionally worse for People of Color. 

So, I am inclined to believe that where we are headed isn't the place we may hope we are. People keep saying, a return to normal. I do not think that phrase means what they think it means. Normal has always been a relative and subjective term, but the normal ahead of us may stretch our definition of normal.

Having offered those thoughts I would also assert that I am not a complete skeptic. I am, at least in part, a believer in the power of humans to overcome obstacles. So, I hope that where we are headed includes a renewed focus on equity; an equity that respects the dignity of every human and provides access to healthcare at a previously unprecedented level. If that's where we are headed that will be a good trend, too.

And speaking of equitable distribution of healthcare -- if the rollout of this vaccine has shown us anything about subsidized healthcare it is this: you offer people a lifesaving drug for free and they will take it without asking who is paying for it. Lots of people say they don't want subsidized, socialized, communist healthcare until they need it to save their lives and couldn't otherwise afford it.

So, I am hopeful that one of the places we are headed is a more equitable distribution of healthcare resources. 

Where else are we headed? If the capital insurrection/attempted coup is any indication of the direction we are headed then we might be tempted to lament. Still, I believe the general response of shock and horror to the most egregious act on American soil I have witnessed in my lifetime is more indicative of America as a whole. The overwhelming majority of American people were horrified at the sight of insurrectionists hunting down congress members, building a gallows and calling for the hanging of the Vice President. Horrified may be a mild word. So, as bad as it was, and it was the most undemocratic, scary moment I have seen, I believe that our country will repudiate political violence and vengeance when history is written. Further, I believe that as dangerously close as we came to a dictatorship that the long course of history from these moments forward will arc toward democracy. If so, that will be a welcome trend.

Where are we headed? I really don't know. I really don't. I simply have hope that our better human side will prevail, even though, and I say this with a heavy heart, the Church of Jesus Christ has had a hand in fomenting the unrest, the insurrection, the refusal to accept defeat and promulgated the idea that somehow God had hand-picked the 45th President -- and thus electing the 46th was a rejection of God's will for our country. And that is sad. 

This is longer than I intended so let me finish by saying that wherever we are headed the sad isn't over, and the way is still long. May God be our guide. May peace be with every living human, animal and plant. May where we are headed be where God is calling us to be.

Peace be with you,

Jerry