Birthday Bashing

I saw them yesterday and then again today on the journey home from Albany. It was one of those small towns which dot the South Georgia landscape. One yard after another had a red manufactured road side sign which read, "Happy Birthday Jesus." Now I must confess to attending a few Birthday Parties for Jesus complete with cake. In December someone decides a birthday party for Jesus would make for a good children's event at church. I have never planned one, but have walked in on more than a few. To be honest is to admit that there is something inside which screeches like a finger nail scraping a chalk board whenever this birthday for Jesus business shows up.

It has never seemed like good theology. The "Happy Birthday Jesus" signs are trivializing. People have birthdays, but I am not sure it is appropriate to use the human method of calculating years when speaking of the One spoken of with the sacred words, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God" (John 1:1-2). For those who might wonder about the identity of "the Word" John later goes on to proclaim, "And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us" (John 1:12). No one really questions the fact that "the Word" and "Jesus" are one and the same.

All this birthday stuff is like saying, "Let us make Him in our own image." Folks have done such for a long time. When we talk about Jesus we use words such as Transfiguration, Resurrection, Ascension, and Glorification. Christmas does not call us to celebrate His birthday, but the Incarnation, the news that God has chosen to be with us. No matter how much we might try, it is not a human event to be celebrated with a party, but a divine event which should be remembered on our knees.

The Stowaway

Guess it could be called a stowaway. A "Stowaway Card." It showed up the other day in a book not opened for awhile. Clergy business cards often were used to let people know I had stopped for a visit, but also to write down things I wanted to remember later. On some occasion I came across some words from the ancient church father, Augustine. On the back I wrote a quote I wanted to remember later. "Be always unhappy about where you are. If you want to reach where you are not, if you are pleased with what you are, you have stopped already. If you say, 'It is enough' you are lost. Keep on walking, moving forward, trying for the goal."

Perhaps, Augustine had been meditating on the Apostle Paul's letter to the Philippian Christians. To them he wrote words like, "I do not consider that I have made it my own, but this one thing I do; forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus (Phil. 3:13)

Both Augustine and Paul speak volumes in a few words about this journey we have undertaken. We need not be leery of those whose words speak of a different place on the journey. The only ones to worry about are those who speak words which speak of arriving. There are a lot of folks on the road with us. The backs of others ahead can serve the same purpose as our back does for those behind. They can provide an invitation to "Keep on walking" and to "strain forward to what lies ahead."

Wondering

For the first time in over 15 years there has been no Advent Cactus to alert me to the approaching season. My Advent Cactus was given to me anonymously while pastoring the Vidalia Church and sat in my office as long as I did. It was watered ocassionally, neglected most of the time, yet, a week or two before the Advent Season it would always start showing pink buds which would soon blossom. Each year I watched in amazement and gratitude for its faithfulness. When I left Richmond Hill for retirement, I gave the Advent Cactus to a staff member as a parting gift. It was for me more than just a plant. It was a treasure.

Perhaps, the plant never made it to this Advent Season. Maybe it missed its owner of all those years and wasted away! Or, maybe it could not stand the shock of an owner who looked after it. Nonetheless, I have found myself wondering about it during these early days of Advent. Without its pink announcement to alert me, Advent almost slipped up on me. So, here I am wondering. Wondering. Not a bad thing to be doing during a holy season of waiting and expectation.

This Advent season will surely be different for me as I have journeyed from a place behind the rail to a place in front of it. Yet, this growing awareness within that something is about to happen is so present with me. The Advent hymns are rising out of my spirit as surely as they do from the pages of the hymnal and there is once again the deep desire to read and hear the sacred readings of the season. Instead of seeing pink buds, there is a sense that the Spirit is stirring within me, saying, "Something is about to happen!" And I find myself waiting, expecting, and wondering all over again!

The Frame

For so long life was framed by the seasons on the Christian Calendar. Time passed according to its relationship to Easter morning. The seasons of Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, and Pentecost were noted more than the ordinary seasons of the calendar such as Fall, Winter, Spring, and Summer. One of the things noticed in these early days of retirement is that life is framed differently. While I am not always sure which Sunday it is in the season of Pentecost, I am aware of things like the time of sunrise and sunset. Changing seasons are noted not by changing colors of paraments, but by changing temperatures, the location of the rising sun, the color of trees and fields, and even clouds in the sky. The Sanctuary is not inside a building, but is now much larger and there is no going in or out of it. The sacred smell of candles has been replaced by the sacred smell of earth. The frame of life is different.

Still, however, there are those moments which must somehow be remembered and observed. All Saints Sunday is one such moment. The place I worshipped had no "All Saints Sunday" worship, the space around me was not filled with the refrain of For All the Saints, and there was no reading of the honored dead who live now in heavenly place. While the structured moment was missed, the sacred opportunity was not. During that week I found myself remembering and calling the names of those souls important to me who had passed from this life to the life to come. The hymn of the day became my theme song for the week.

We worship in the sacred spaces all around us. They come in all sizes and shapes. As long as we carry a heart filled with love for God and one bent on faithfulness, He will surely be pleased with our worship. What He sees is not our elaborate ritual or the lack of it, but our heart. Blessed be His name! Blessed be His Name!

Ron

I found out today that Ron died last Friday. When I was pastor at the Vidalia Church, Ron Southerland was the priest at the local Episcopal Church. During this ten year pastorate, a small group of us met weekly at the Episcopal Church to talk about preaching, but mostly to share our lives together. The group changed from year to year as some left and others came, but Ron was always there. For almost 20 years he served the people of this community of faith. He left an imprint on them and upon those of us who weekly drank his coffee, laughed at his humor, and left thinking about what he had shared with us.

Though we were equals around the table, we all knew Ron was our mentor. He was our leader. He was an earthy kind of guy who had fought some battles. He won some and lost some and was always willing to talk to us honestly about both. Ron shared more than theology and preaching and jokes. He shared with us how to be real. He modeled it for us. My favorite "Ron quote" is, "Just remember there is a God, and she ain't you." He had a unique way of jarring us, making us think, and keeping us from taking ourselves too seriously.

Since my departure from Vidalia, I have missed Ron. And while I am grateful he has come fully into the presence of the Christ he lifted up, I shall still miss him. There is no other option. He allowed me to become a part of his life and he has been and shall always be a part of mine.

June 8

June 8 is a good bit in the past now, but still remembered. On that day I did something folks only do once in a lifetime. I gave a retirement speech to the Annual Conference.

"Bishop King, members of the Annual Conference, I stand before you today with a grateful heart. I am grateful for my wife Lynn who has been my spiritual partner for over 40 years. I am grateful for two adult daughters, Jennifer and Leslie, who grew up in parsonages and are both young women of deep faith. I am grateful for my grandsons, Will and Josh, and Fletcher who will be born in about a month. I am grateful for my Mother, a strong woman of faith, whose marriage to Ray Wilder, Jr. when I was twelve, enabled me to become a third generation clergy member of this Annual Conference. And, I am grateful for the good people of the churches I have served during these 39 years: the people of Stapleton, Bethel, and Zoar, churches on the Stapleton Charge, the people of the Tennille Church, the Talbotton Church, the St. John Church in Columbus, the people of First Church, Vidalia, the Perry Church, and the Richmond Hill Church. I am grateful for the set apart members of this community who have provided me a spiritual home, a place where I have always sensed belonging. Most of all I am grateful to God for calling me, a young boy not yet 18 years old, to preach the gospel and for giving me a place to preach for what has been a lifetime of Sundays. He surely must have been scrapping the bottom of the barrel on the day He called me to preach His Word. Father God, thank You. Father God, thank You.

The Invitation

A few days ago a wedding invitation showed up in the mailbox. It came from someone I remember as a child. Molly was the first child of Burley and Debbie. I had the privilege of baptizing her a long time ago when I was pastor at the St. John Church in Columbus. It turned out to be a three generation baptism. Her Dad who was not a believer before her birth came to faith in Christ, in part, through the miracle of her birth. I had the great joy of baptizing him as well. After his baptism this father started sharing his new faith in Christ with his mother who was terminally ill with cancer. I still remember the day we gathered at her home to receive her profession of faith and baptize Molly's grandmother.

When I opened the card and saw that Molly was about to be married, I was honored to be remembered by this family from so long ago. Neither could I help but to have my heart warmed by the remembrance of the way that God allowed me to have a small part in the faith journey of these three family members. This story of faith in Christ has found found a place in many a sermon preached over the years and its witness has inspired many gathered congregations.

The invitation reminded me of what ministry is all about. You would think from eavesdropping on the Administrative Board meetings of most United Methodist Churches that ministry is about money, building maintenance, and power politics. Time obliterates those kinds of things. The number of new members received in a certain year may have seemed important at the moment, but has long ago been forgotten. What is remembered and carried in the heart with such joy and gratitude are stories of faith, stories like the three generation baptism. Those are the only ones which really count!