Wesleyan Economics

My first adventure as an entrepreneur came when I was just a young boy.  I went downtown in Waycross and hawked boiled peanuts for ten cent a bag.  I remember selling all my bags and coming home with $3.60.  It was then that my mother taught me my first economics lesson.  She said I should pay for the cost of the peanuts.  She would not charge me for her labor.  I did as she said and still had what seemed like a nice sum to a boy who had nothing in his pockets at the beginning of the day. The next part of the economics lesson caught me by surprise.  

"You need to take out 10% of what is left and put it in the offering plate tomorrow when we go to church.  The first 10% goes to God," she said as she concluded the lesson.  As I got older and became a more serious wage earner, I practiced and preached that spiritual discipline for two reasons.  It was Biblical and my mother taught me to do it.  On the way to where I am now, I learned the tithe was nothing to brag about; it was the minimum.  More recently I have been thinking about something John Wesley said about money in one of his sermons.  "Earn all you can, save all you can, and give all you can," surely makes a good three point sermon for any preacher.  

What has stayed with me during these recent reflections is the last phrase, "give all you can."  It is a word which takes us beyond being satisfied with giving God the minimum which is an easy choice to make.  There are many coffers of resources with which God blesses us. Whether we are talking about giving money, or our time, or our energy, or anything else, giving all we can is always a better choice than being satisfied with the minimum.

Before the Rising Sun

Before the rising sun came, 

the dream that tagged along, 

went, and I wondered, where?

Is it so for the other old men?

Do they dream dreams like me

to wake and watch them flee

before the cock a doodle do?

'Twas such a good one, too,

this now gone dream of mine.

I long to find it in memory,

to know again it is mine, 

but, alas, what has come

like all things that are here,

is gone to be no more.

If dreams reveal our soul,

I must venture forth now

without knowing the way

which in the dark unfolded.

Must I now step amiss

and stumble on some path

not intended for this day? 

O, Revealer, of all that is,

of all that is not yet to be,

guide these faltering feet,

make the dream a vision

wider than a single night,

one that will show the way

to this searching soul of mine.

Watch Out!

Prejudice is a hard thing to lick.  Real prejudice is rooted deeply in us because of the modeling influence of the important and influential people in our lives.  It can also be so imbedded in the culture around us that we do not see that it is evil, only that it is acceptable.  The Apostle Paul tells a telling story on Simon Peter in his letter to the Galatian Christians.  Peter, of course, has an impressive resume.  He was a disciple of Jesus for three years and not just any disciple, but one of three who were often pulled apart from the others for special moments with Jesus.  

He was the rock upon which Jesus said the church would be built and on the Day of Pentecost, he and the others were overpowered and filled with the Holy Spirit.  A disciple became a Spirit filled Apostle who preached the new church's first sermon at Pentecost.  Being a Jew, Simon Peter grew up in a culture that regarded non-Jewish people as second class.  Peter's culture taught him there were Jews who were God's chosen and everyone else was a Gentile whose status might have been a little higher than slaves, but not much.  

It would seem that a man so spiritually blessed would live by that word the Apostle Paul wrote.  In Romans 10:12 Paul wrote those revolutionary words,  "For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, the same Lord is Lord of all."  When Peter went to Galatia to visit Paul and the churches he willingly ate with the Gentile converts, but when Jewish members of the Jerusalem Church came, Peter would no longer eat with the Gentiles.  Paul called Peter out for his hypocrisy that was birthed by a life time of prejudice against the Gentiles.  Be careful when saying, "I am not prejudice" for unless our heart is completely surrendered to God, it is likely to show up and surprise us. 

Rings and Repentance

I am a misfit in this society of ring wearers.  I grew up with the notion that rings are worn on the fingers of the hand and nowhere else.  Today rings are worn on the ears, the lips, the nose, the navel and other places which I leave to your imagination.  My problem with the ring wearers is my reaction to them.  I see them and immediately begin a process of mental devaluation.  I am not bragging.  I am confessing.  What I am doing is letting a judgmental spirit have a place in my heart which is surely troublesome to the Holy Spirit who is working to make my spirit reflect the heart of Jesus.   

This problem of mine, dare I call it sin, slapped me in the face the other day in worship.  I was visiting a church which I had never attended.  I saw a man dressed in the robe of the clergy.  His back was to me as I tapped his shoulder to ask a question about the Sacrament which was going to be offered.  When he turned around, I immediately saw his nose ring.  It was a small thing, but suddenly it was all I could see.  As I sat there in the pew, I started building my case against the young man.  Before I finished, he stood and preached a sermon I wish I could have preached.  It was indeed a Word of the Lord.  

As the holy bread was placed in my hand and I dipped it in the cup, I had much to repent.  Prejudice does not always show itself in something as obvious as skin color, but in the small and subtle ways we allow ourselves to put on robes of self righteousness and see ourselves and others in a way that is displeasing to God.  To live in a way that displeases God can only be defined as choosing sin.  Prejudice does this.  It drops in upon us in unguarded moments and the only real answer to the problem is a heart surrendered completely to the Holy Spirit.

The Demons of Prejudice

I am old enough to have memories of a day when prejudice was an accepted part of the fabric of the culture in which I lived.  It was a day when the signs of segregation were painted in bold letters that separated "whites and coloreds" at water fountains, a day when the illusion of separate but equal was accepted, and a day when white supremacy was the new master.  While some declare "not enough," we have come to a place where blacks and whites live more as one community rather than two.  

This is not to say that prejudice has disappeared.  It still raises its head to sow division, discord, and even hatred among people who choose to focus on differences instead of commonality. If given a free rein it can send people onto battlefields to kill one another.  The history recorded in books and the history being written reveals this awful reality.  Recently, while reading the Old Testament book of Ruth, I saw it as a story which was something more than a love story, or a narrative that recorded an important lineage thread.  Perhaps, it was because I had just finished reading the book of Judges where prejudice led to horrific battles where thousands were killed that I saw that the tiny book of Ruth pointed out how people who are different can choose to live together.  

It is a book from the Old Testament which points out that people can live honoring each other's traditions, respecting one another and their values, and creating communities of mutual care. In some ways it is a precursor of the not yet seen world of Jesus where neighbor was re-defined and prejudice was overcome by the heart transforming love of the Christ.  The world of the Incarnate Christ was certainly not a world empty of prejudice and the demons it gave birth.  In a world not so different than our own, Jesus showed us to the way to live in peace with one another.  

The Church Sign

For at least two years I have read a church sign which says, "Time Changes.  Jesus Does Not."  I have this thing about church signs.  The surest way to get people to ignore them is to never change them.  If this is their goal, the church down the road has accomplished it.  My problem is that I still read it.  Do I hope it might be changed?  Maybe, but after two years, I surely should let that hope die.  I have finally decided the church should at least add one more line to the sign which would read, "And Neither Does this Sign!"  

Though this church sign is likely to be the same when Jesus comes, everything else is changing.  Some of the change is harmful and some beneficial.  Some of it leads to a better world and some of it has within it the seeds of destruction.   History has shown us that the institutions of our society are slow to change and only change as a result of some kind of reaction that is revolutionary.  Institutions being threatened build their last bastions behind self-preservation.  The church as an institution seems to thrive in the world of "this is how we have always done it."  

It matters not if the church has been around several hundred years or just since yesterday.  The temptation is always to settle into a pattern of operation and to embrace a document of direction that makes change possible only by divine intervention of the Holy Spirit.  In too many places the church has lost that revolutionary spirit that became present on the Day of Pentecost.  The church in the book of Acts did not exist to fill its coffers, or to build shrines, but to share Jesus with the world.  The world does not need another political party, or another ism, but a church that is willing to shed the robes of the status quo for the revolutionary spirit of Jesus.

The Blessings of the Farm

I have learned many things from the farm.  It has been a place that has required a lot of sweat and work.  From the beginning it was my intent to tend it with care.  I  want to leave it without some heavy footprint to tell those who come after me that I was here.  I have done things like planting grass to stop good soil from washing downhill to the branch.  I have planted and pruned pecan trees, picked up dead fallen limbs, and harvested whatever crop it gave the land.  I have grown hay and provided a small herd of cows a home.  It often seems that there is no end to the things the farm ask of me.   

I somewhat expected this, but not to the extend that I experience it.  What has been surprising is the way the farm has given back to me.  If I have blessed it with attentive care, it has blessed me a thousand times more.  I have been blessed by the silence which fills this place.  In that silence I have learned to hear the soft but sure voice of God.  I have been blessed by the wisdom I have heard.  I have been blessed by many farmers who have been helpers and mentors. I have been blessed by the way the farm has filled my life with an awareness of creation.  I am not the person who left the pulpit and came to the farm and hopefully the man I have become is one that pleases the God who entrusted this land to my care.   

One of the most transforming lessons the farm has taught is that it does not belong to me.  My name is on the deed in the courthouse, but I have come to think of the farm as belonging not to me, but to its own self.  It has seen many like me come and go and there will many who will walk and work this place behind me.  The land is the constant.  It is never really owned by any of us.  The owner is, of course, the Creator God who has enabled me to share a span of time with the land that has given me a home and roots on this earth. What a wonderful blessing it has been and continues to be.