So What Now?

It’s happened. Don’t you get it? It’s tomorrow! – Phil Connors, Groundhog Day

One of my all-time favorite movies is Groundhog Day (already alluded to once on this on this blog). It is the story of a weatherman who gets lost in one particular day (Groundhog Day) that continually repeats itself over and again. It is obviously an extended period, because over time he learns how to masterfully carve ice, play professional jazz piano and perform life-saving acts – all on the same day.

With the Easter season behind, a prevailing thought for me is, what now? The chocolate bunnies have been eaten and most of our Peeps (yummy!) have been beheaded and devoured – what do we do with our lives now that we are back to the ordinary?

By way of confession, with celebrations such as Easter, for a pastor the very human instinct is to feel the proverbial ‘letdown.’ In the process one becomes lost in a moment.

For Phil Connors, the main character in Groundhog Day (played by Bill Murray), the point is that he is full of himself, trapped in a world that only has room for what he wants, when he wants it. Sadly, I resonate (ask Katherine – she will confirm). And it isn’t until he realizes that he is on the planet to live for someone other than himself that he begins to accept his strange circumstance, and ultimately find relief from the imprisonment of that particular day (and ultimately, himself).

The resurrection isn’t the end of the Christian’s story – it is the beginning. And only the risen Christ can inform our hearts that we are free from the tyranny of self, and what He will do with the rest of our lives. But because we are unfinished we will always trend towards what is behind us.

Imperfect as it is, the past is safe while the future represents the unknown, and threatens to take us out of our comforts – out of our selves – this can be terrifying. But the risen Jesus invites us to enter into the wild unknown of His hopeful future with the promises that He will be with us (Matthew 28:20), and that He is making all things new (Revelation 21:5). It is an invitation to get over ourselves and find ourselves, all at the same time.

What a relief, and what good news…

peace.

PS I am taking a few weeks to retool and learn some things about blogging and design that will make for some changes. See you then!

He is Risen!

“Love is the victor. Death is not the end. The end is life. His life and our lives through him, in him. Existence has greater depths of beauty, mystery, and benediction than the wildest visionary has ever dared to dream. Christ our Lord has risen.”

Frederick Buechner, The Magnificent Defeat

My wife Katherine comes from the Moravian tradition. In my mind there is no more beautiful expression of the Resurrection than from the Moravian Church.

At 2 AM on Easter Morning the Moravian Church Band deploys throughout Old Salem (North Carolina), and begins to play hymns, preparing hearts for the celebration. After an early morning ‘watch’ in the dark, in which about 7,000 worshippers gather and sing, at dawn they pour out into the cemetery proclaiming the resurrection of Jesus with the traditional responsive acclamation, ‘He is Risen! He is Risen Indeed!’

Moravian gravestones are flat and each is exactly the same (children’s are smaller than adults), signifying equality in death. Each Moravian cemetery is called ‘God’s Acre,’ and in the rolling hills of Winston Salem there are few more lovely sights. What makes the tradition even more special is that on the Saturday before Easter, entire families scrub each gravestone and place flowers at them.

Throughout the rest of Easter morning, these thousands of worshippers are fed breakfast in groups. Everything about the tradition signals one truth: That Jesus, our Feast of Life, has conquered death, and He invites us to celebrate what He has inaugurated and what for us will one day be, in His good Kingdom.

And when from death I’m free, I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on;
And when from death I’m free, I’ll sing on.
And when from death I’m free, I’ll sing and joyful be;
And through eternity, I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on;
And through eternity, I’ll sing on.

Alexander Means

What good news.

He is Risen Indeed!

peace.

Egg Hunt Theology

‘Death used to be an executioner, but the Gospel has made him just a gardener.’ – Tim Keller, paraphrase from George Herbert’s Time

As I write, hundreds of children (and their parents) fill a small play area and a larger lacrosse field in search of thousands of brightly colored plastic eggs that contain all kinds of treats and candy. It is a lovely day and this adds to the spectacle of joy – Children with painted faces (yes, we’re a full-service church) – Parents – Volunteers – Staff – all together, enjoying, taking pics, pointing out eggs, and sharing the moment. I love it.

It caused me to think. This is the day we know so little of. What was Jesus doing in that grave that Saturday between His burial and His resurrection? We have hints in the scriptures, but suffice it to say that regardless of the actual details, even in the grave Jesus was no victim. We know that the Father had not abandoned Him (Acts 2:27), which is undoubtedly why, in his monumental sermon on Pentecost, Peter quoted David’s prophetic cry – “You have made known to me the paths of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence.” (Acts 2:28, Psalm 16:11)

To God and to the Lamb, I will sing, I will sing;
To God and to the Lamb, I will sing.
To God and to the Lamb who is the great I AM;
While millions join the theme, I will sing, I will sing:
While millions join the theme, I will sing.

I guess this is what those precious, loud, exuberant children bring to mind. By entering the grave, Jesus has begun to turn our cemeteries into playgrounds. The crazy thing is that if we had hidden the eggs among tombstones, the children would have been just as excited. Their world is that safe.

And because Jesus went to the grave, so is yours.

peace.

The Feast of Love

“On that day a fountain will be opened to the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, to cleanse them from sin and impurity.” – Zechariah 13:1

We call this day good – Good Friday. For Christ-followers it is the day we reflect on Jesus’ crucifixion. In a few hours we will have a simple Good Friday service, and together we will celebrate both the most terrible and the most beautiful of moments in human history.

“May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” – Galatians 6:14

Most terrible because it was a human injustice to put Jesus on the Cross. He committed no crime. He was sinless. He was God’s ‘spotless lamb.’ It was horrendous and humiliating for the Son of God to die a sinner’s death.

Most beautiful because it was for love.

“Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” John 15:13

Every image of deliverance and redemption in the scriptures were realized and fulfilled when Jesus died. God’s fierce rage towards sin was satisfied by the sacrifice of the Son He loves – for us. And in His death, we are forgiven.

This is our Feast.

peace.

How deep the Father’s love for us,
How vast beyond all measure
That He should give His only Son
To make a wretch His treasure

How great the pain of searing loss,
The Father turns His face away
As wounds which mar the chosen One,
Bring many sons to glory

Behold the Man upon a cross,
My sin upon His shoulders
Ashamed I hear my mocking voice,
Call out among the scoffers

It was my sin that left Him there
Until it was accomplished
His dying breath has brought me life
I know that it is finished

I will not boast in anything
No gifts, no power, no wisdom
But I will boast in Jesus Christ
His death and resurrection

Why should I gain from His reward?
I cannot give an answer
But this I know with all my heart
His wounds have paid my ransom

By Stuart Townend

The Feast of Hope

This evening, along with many congregations around the world, our church community will celebrate the night that Jesus met with His disciples in the Upper Room for what is commonly known as, ‘The Last Supper.’ Borrowing from a friend who pastors a church in San Francisco, for the past three years we have celebrated with a soup dinner, worship and the Lord’s Supper. It is a sweet time.

On the most surface of levels that night could not have been more disastrous for Jesus. Not only did He disclose his impending death, but also He had to arbitrate His friends’ objections, internal arguments and despair. Additionally, it was in that room that He confronted His chief betrayer, Judas. Later that evening He would be arrested, and the next day, put to death.

And yet there could not be a more hopeful dinner party than that evening, because in the midst of the sad news, the disappointed friends and the torment to visit Jesus until He died, came a promise: “I tell you, I will not drink of this fruit of the vine from now on until that day when I drink it anew with you in my Father’s kingdom” (Matthew 26:29).

Though His friends could not see it, Jesus assured them – and us – that the end would not be the end, but the beginning that would find its greatest expression in God’s Kingdom. Interestingly this was the one and only feast that we know of Jesus inviting His friends to during His earthly ministry. This was His feast. I suspect that the food was incredible.

But it was only a taste. And by instituting the Lord’s Supper, He assured us that until the Kingdom comes and He once again sits with us, He will be our Feast.

Jesus will always be enough. What good news.

peace.

Love’s Betrayal

If someone asks him, “What are these wounds on your body?” he will answer, “The wounds I was given at the house of my friends” – Zechariah 13:6.

For me, reading the events that led to Jesus’ death is sometimes like watching a movie for the tenth time, hoping yet again that someone would do something differently. It isn’t that I want redemption to be averted, but I hate that Jesus was betrayed – probably because in His story I am freshly confronted by my own daily betrayals.

Last night lowly Florida Gulf Coast University defeated mighty Georgetown University. I’m a native Floridian and never heard of the place! But this is how we want the movie to end, isn’t it. We want the weak to overcome the strong, the picked-on to trounce the bullies, yet every detail of the last week of Jesus’ life was plotted with full awareness that He would be abandoned in His time of weakness. It was God’s plan.

Valiant promises of loyalty from Jesus’ friends were unnecessary, if not impossible, if our Faith is to rest solely on God’s grace. Regardless of Peter’s bold assertions, he would be the first to deny friendship with Jesus. Such are our resolves…

In his book, By Grace Alone, Sinclair Ferguson offers that “The whole story of Jesus’ passion, His arrest, His trial, His suffering, and His public execution is one of appalling loneliness and isolation voluntarily experienced in order to restore us to fellowship with God.”

Even as He hung dying, Jesus cried to the Father out of His sense of forsakenness. This was His path – one He had to journey alone. Betrayed and left with no advocates, only affection would accompany His sorrow – leaving love to be our sole metric for grasping God’s grace.

Would anything else be real?

In this regard, I love Mike Yaconelli’s reflection, “Five years ago I decided to start listening again to the voice of Jesus, and my life hasn’t been the same since. He has not been telling me what to do, He has been telling me how much He loves me.” – Dangerous Wonder.

Something in us wants to hunt down our faults with righteous zeal. Believe it or not, this comes from our darker selves, not the gospel.

Friends, we are unfinished. This means that the road to self-perfection will always lead to disillusionment and self-righteous pride. It is an obsession that wrecks us, and robs us of believing that Jesus didn’t die to make us perfect, but to make us His. And the point of His betrayal and death is not that we blew it, but that even in our darkest moments, through Him and because of Him, we are not alone.

What good news…

grace & peace.

The Gospel according to Robert D’Niro

There is something in all of us that repels from weakness. I remember having to adjust as my dad declined while his disease slowly diminished him in every way until he died. This is probably why we love sequels where our heroes return fit as ever and every bit as brave. They feed our false notions of invincibility…

Recently, Katherine and I went to A Good Day to Die Hard for Valentine’s Day (hey, I’m a romantic, okay?). It was disappointing, to say the least (not the company but the flick) – Bruce Willis lacked energy, and towards the end of the film I said something like, ‘Wow, he looks old,’ to which Katherine responded by reminding me that he is old (with a detectable sense of, ‘Are you really this deluded?’) – Shock! My takeaway was that in the next Die Hard installment, John McClane (Willis’ iconic character) needs to die (Don’t worry, Bruce, I’ll never stop going).

In this regard, I can understand the disciples’ shock in the Upper Room when Jesus told them that He would die. For them, Jesus was making Himself less, and to be sure, He was. And they weren’t ready for Him to be weak.

But the other night we saw Robert D’Niro in Silver Linings Playbook. The movie was brilliant in spite of the fact that D’Niro looked like a little old man, which, in fact, he is. What made him effective was that he didn’t need to save the US from Russian terrorists. Instead, he played an aging, weak, broken old man while ‘blocking’ for Bradley Cooper, the lead actor. As always, D’Niro was tremendous, and in spite of the fact that I’ll always see him as Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull, he actually became more by making himself less, in enabling his young lead actor to shine.

This is the way of the Cross. It is the supreme demonstration in which we discover our true identity when we abandon self and live sacrificially for others. In this we discover that we are strongest and most influential when we embrace weakness.

It is the way of Jesus, and it is an intentional movement towards self-denial, all the way to sacrifice.

Hey, I don’t get it either, but I am drawn to what Jesus calls me to, because the alternative is to follow my instinct to clog all meaningfulness with ego – and that gets old real fast. Like John McClane, I mean… Bruce Willis.

Jesus didn’t call us to take up our crosses for our own sakes (Luke 9:23). It was a call to join Him in His work of redeeming the whole world, an invitation to be liberated from the dungeon of self.

Whoever knew Al Capone (Robert D’Niro, that is), could teach us so much about the gospel?

No matter how you cut it, and regardless of who speaks it, the gospel is always good news…

peace.