A Horrible Story

Hidden in the pages of the Old Testament book of Judges is the story of Jephthah, a mighty warrior of Gilead.  It is such a horrible story.  It seems to defy understanding.  "...the Spirit of the Lord came upon Jephthah..." (Judges 11:29), but still he was afraid as he stood on the eve of a great battle with the Ammonites.  In an effort to secure the victory, he made a vow to the Lord, "If You will give the Ammonites into my hand, then whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return victorious...shall be the Lord's, to be offered up by me as a burnt offering." (Judges 11:30-31).  When he returned home victorious his daughter, his only child,  comes out  of the house with timbrels and with dancing.  (Judges 11:34).  The story ends with the Scripture simply saying of this warrior and father, "he did with her according to the vow he had made."  (Judges 11:39).    

Try as we might to make it spiritually palatable and some commentators do, it is a story that is so repulsive it makes us sick to read it.  The only way to make any sense of the story is to see it as an example of how sin can destroy us and all those we love.  The Lord did not require the vow.  It was already in His heart to give the victory to Jephthah.  The vow was Jephthah's decision.  Human sacrifice was clearly forbidden by Yahweh. (Leviticus 18:21, Deuteronomy 12:3, 18:10-12).  Baal worship which was practiced by the tribes of the region as well as the Hebrew people themselves from time to time allowed for human sacrifice.  Jephthah's vow was not something required or desired by the Lord and was birthed from the sin in his heart.  It could reap nothing but destruction.  

What may seem like an ancient barbarian story that has no relevance actually has a great deal of relevance.  It speaks to those of us who try to live in the world that calls us to get ahead and accumulate at any cost while Jesus calls us to put self aside for the sake of the Kingdom of God.  Standing in both worlds is impossible.  We must decide where we want to stand.  Jephthah speaks to us of the disaster inherent in the sinful choice.  

Sixty Years on the Road

It occurred to me a few days ago that it has been sixty years since I knelt by my bed in a Methodist parsonage and received Christ into my life.  While that moment was not my first encounter with God, it was the one that has carried me through this long journey.  When I was seven years old, my father died which resulted in a conclusion that there had to be a God and there had to be a heaven.  I could not conceive of any other alternative.  At age seventy-eight, I still stand by the conviction of my childhood except now I would not use the words, "had to be."  Instead, I would use the words "there is." 

I was baptized at age nine by a pastor who my mother would later marry and the influence he had on my faith journey could never be measured.  Though baptized I can only confess to dabbling with what it meant to be committed to Christ during my teenage years.  I went to many altars during those years, but nothing really took with holding power until that night in the Alamo parsonage.  I have not made that moment of beginning the whole of my story, but being the beginning, it will always be an important part of it.  

While there are many people of faith in Christ who speak not of a moment of beginning, but of a lifetime of not knowing what it is to live without loving God, we are all somehow mysteriously given a life which can only be described as a new creation.  While there are many who have cast a strong and lasting shadow of influence on our life, there is not one who has worked the miracle of change and transformation as has Christ Jesus.  Like the father of the prodigal son parable, He is the One who enables us to know home.  We were marked with His holiness at conception and though we choose wandering, He waits with patience for us to turn toward the home He has been preparing and holding for us.  I am grateful for both his patience and His grace. 

A Freight Train of A Word

I cannot really say that I remember hearing the word before I arrived at Asbury College in 1968.  It is a word that carries enough letters to be a long freight train.  I ran into again a few days ago as I was reading a daily devotional from Oswald Chambers' "My Utmost for His Highest."  I started using the devotional guide back in my Asbury College days and ever since it has been no further than a reach away.  After his death in the early part of the 20th century, Oswald's wife actually compiled the readings from his talks, writings, and devotionals.   

A few days ago I read, "Sanctification is not my idea of what I want God to do for me; sanctification is God's idea of what He wants to do for me and He has to get me into the attitude of mind and spirit where at any cost I will let Him sanctify me wholly."  It is a word that brings to mind I Thessalonians 5:23 which says, "May the God of peace Himself sanctify you wholly..."  The New Revised Standard Version of the Bible has the word "wholly" reading "entirely," but in this instance I am going to hang on to the way I memorized the verse.  For many of today's believers that freight train of a theological word is scary.  It is scary because it is misunderstood.  

The sanctified are not some group of spiritually elite souls removed from the trials and temptations of life, but those are seeking the help of the Holy Spirit so that they can leave a life of total surrender to God each day.  Though both Scriptural and Wesleyan, it is not really preached or taught in a way that calls those committed to Christ to step into a life of absolute abandonment to God so that the Holy Spirit is free to do with us, to shape us, and to lead us regardless of our own desires, wants, and wishes.  

A "Do Over"

What is done is done and cannot be done again.  As one of John Wesley's worn out preachers, I look back from time to time and wish I could do some things differently.  I was always convinced that worship was one of the most important ministries of the church and worked in a very intentional manner to be faithful to that conviction.  Having said this, there are still things I would do differently if I could be given a "do over."  One of those things is that I would make more space for the Sacrament.    

I know our historical tradition is one of a pulpit centered ministry.  Circuit riders preachers showed up, but certainly not every Sunday.  Though Wesley encouraged the Methodists of England to go to the Anglican Church for weekly communion, such never happened in the rapidly expanding American frontier.  In the South in which I lived as a boy, the Holy Sacrament never really had the place of importance that it did for Wesley.  When I was ordained the church in many places offered the Sacrament only quarterly.  In the span of the years, the first Sunday became a Communion Sunday which is the practice of most Methodist churches of the day.  

While the Sacrament was offered with more frequency, some of the back room conversations revealed a strange reluctance.  In some places people stayed home because it was not real church.  Preachers often lamented the way first Sunday offerings were down because of lower attendance.  And even now, the liturgy is so neglected that most have forgotten "The Prayer of Humble Access" and the Prayer of Consecration is done so quickly it would be missed by God if He blinked His eyes. The moment of the Sacrament is no longer entered into reverently, but raced through as it must be done by noon.  If I had a "do over," I would be more intentional about reversing what was then a trend, but is now something that has been incorporated into the life of the church as normal and enough.

A Different Rhythm

Years ago I taught several sessions about worship to a group of young preachers.  It was mostly about how to lead worship.  Looking back is to realize what I offered was mostly about how to do worship.  While there was nothing wrong with what I presented back then, if I were to do it over today, some things would certainly be different.  The passing of some twenty years, the experiences of those years, and hopefully the way the Holy Spirit has been nudging me to move has revealed some things that apparently were invisible to me back then since I seem not to have seen them.   

While I know it sounds redundant, worship should create a place for worship.  The church seems to have moved far away from worship even though what it does still goes by that name.  Worship is more synonymous with entertainment and performance.  It is so choreographed that the Holy Spirit has no room to wiggle in.  It creates spectators instead of participants.  The rhythm is a hurried one.  There is always movement.  Seldom is there any silence, or time for being.  Even though the walk by communion participants are invited to kneel at an altar after receiving the Sacrament, the very atmosphere is one of come quickly and hurry to your seats.   

There is no place for being anymore.  Maybe it never existed.  Maybe it existed only in a memory that is filled more with fantasy than reality.  Maybe it is the part of worship for which my heart longed, but could not find.  What gave birth to all these thoughts on worship was attendance at a service of worship in another tradition where the preacher sat down after the sermon and there was simply silence for what seemed like several minutes.  No one jumped up to announce a hymn; the people just sat in a silence that gave opportunity to reflect on what had been proclaimed as the Word of God.  It made me think that the church needs to find a different rhythm for worship, one that allows not for doing, but being.

The Unresolved

When Jacob fled the home of his father, Issac, it was to escape the wrath of his brother, Esau, whom he had cheated out of his birthright.  As he walked that road of looking over his shoulder, he acquired many of the things men seek to acquire, but there finally came a time when the desire for home could no longer be ignored.  As he prepared himself to meet his brother, he was fearful.  

On the night before the meeting, he sent his wives and all his possessions ahead across the final stream to be crossed.  He was at that moment separated from his two wives, his eleven children, and everything he possessed.  Everything dear to his heart and all the wealth which gave his life identity was on one side of this stream and he was on the other.  The Scripture says, "Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak."  (Genesis 32:24).  It was a strange wrestling match.  All through the night the struggle continued.  Just before the sun rose, the struggle ended with Jacob being "...struck...on the hip socket at the thigh muscle."  (Genesis 32:32).  Jacob limped till the day he died.

It is strange that the story identifies the one who wrestled with Jacob as a man.  (Genesis 32:24). Jacob knew differently for during the struggle, the man said, "You shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for  you have striven with God..." (Genesis 32:28) and later Jacob would say, "...I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved."  (Genesis 32:30).  It is a story full of mystery.  Certainly, it is possible it is the story of a dream which reflected Jacob's fear of possible retribution from his brother, but it could have been a dream of a life which had been lived with the guilt that had been a part of his life since the day he decided to take his life in his own hands instead of trusting God with it.  Perhaps, you and I have had such dreams as we wrestled with the unforgiven issues in our own life.

Crucified

When I read Paul saying, "...the world has been crucified to me and I to the world," (Galatians 6:14), I could not help but remember the Desert Fathers a few centuries later who spoke of going to the desert as a way of escaping a shipwreck of a society.  In both cases the word is separation.  Both realized life in Christ and life in society is not possible.  Of course, this sounds strange because everything we have learned about the Christian life calls us to be the presence of Jesus in the world.   

We remember, too, something Jesus said in the passage known as the High Priestly Prayer.  As we read John 17:14-16 we hear Jesus praying, "I have given them Your word, and the world has hated them because they do not belong to the world.  I am not asking You to take them out of the world, but I ask You to protect them from the evil one.  They do not belong in the world, just as I do not belong in the world." Again we find a word about separation and belonging.  What Paul was declaring is that we cannot allow ourselves to be influenced, directed, and controlled by the values of the world and for Paul the only way to maintain this way of life was to consider himself one to whom the world had been crucified which means it, therefore. no longer has any bearing on how he lives.  

The Apostle Paul calls us in many places to the surrendered life, the abandoned life, the life where all that matters is serving and living for Christ.  The kind of crucifixion of which Paul speaks is one where things like accumulating, looking out for number one, and climbing some ladder which makes us feel more important no longer have any influence over us.  The kind of crucifixion of which Paul speaks is the one where the Holy Spirit has absolute control over our heart.  Only then is our self seeking and self serving ego crucified.