Good News For Today

Many of you may know, but others may not, that the New Testament of our bible was originally largely written in Greek.  While some of our English bibles rely on Latin translations or other English translations as the starting point for their versions, the truest meaning of Luke’s gospel, Paul’s letters, or even Jesus’ words is found in going to the original language, discovering what it originally said, and translating that as best we can into modern English.

The translation of a portion of Mark 2:4, I think, makes this point well.  Mark 2 is the story of a paralyzed man who is healed and forgiven by Jesus after his four friends lower him through the roof of the house. In Greek, the phrase is “ἀπεστέγασαν τὴν στέγην”.  The four friends literally “unroofed the roof” to lower their paralytic friend down into the house. “Unroofed the roof” is awkward and clumsy in modern English, so translators work to make it read smoother and sound better to our ears.  The New International Version of the bible translates that as “they made an opening in the roof”, while the English Standard Version says simply “they removed the roof”.  In either case, translators went to the original meaning of the word or phrase and then translated it into words that were understandable for the modern reader or listener.

A good portion of our task as Christians could be summed up in similar terms.  We are Christian translators.  We make a 2000 year old faith relevant and understandable to a modern audience through our words and actions.   Sometimes this takes the form of adapting music, prayers, and sermons to modern musical instruments, the internet, websites, podcasts, and social media.  And sometimes this takes the form of taking a word like gospel, good news, and asking “What modern word or concept relays the core of this word in perhaps a more meaningful way to modern hearers?”  Perhaps joy or hope would work as the modern equivalent.  “Jesus Christ comes to bring hope.”

Again, in either case, as we go out and are sent out into the world by Christ, our task is to translate the good news into a language people can understand.  Like so many missionaries who were sent to the corners of the globe and then sat down to translate the bible into the native tongue, as Christians living in this modern world our task is to translate our faith into a language a broken and needy world can hear and understand.

223rd General Assembly

Every other year, the Presbyterian Church (USA) meets in a General Assembly to worship, discern, decide, and plan together for the ministry and mission of the church. Ministers and elders from across the country come as commissioners to make decisions that impact the church. Hundreds of observers come, as well, to participate in the worship, speak on particular issues, and observe the happenings of an action packed ten days. All totaled, there were more than two thousand people in attendance at this year’s GA.

This year was my first venture to General Assembly. I had watched from home via the internet livestream broadcast for the better part of the last decade. I had even registered to attend on multiple occasions, but something always got in the way (i.e. sickness, moving, or a baby on the way). I picked a great General Assembly to attend for my first time. This was the least contentious, most gracious, and friendly gathering in recent memory. It had more the air of a massive family reunion than business meeting. The worship services were uplifting and diverse. You got the full sense of the depth and breadth of the PCUSA in all the different voices that were included in each service. The music was amazing from a six hundred voice choir to soloists to various worship bands. The liturgy for each worship service was creative and showcased the best of our tradition and traditions from around the globe. The exhibit hall was filled with representatives of universities, seminaries, camps, organizations, travel companies, artists, and the PCUSA Store book store. Across the week and in venue after venue, I got the true sense of so much that is going right in the PCUSA.

There was business to conduct too. The PCUSA was active on a number of fronts as dozens of reports and resolutions came to the General Assembly for discussion. These ranged from changes to our Book of Order to the way our pension funds are invested to current issues like child separation, climate change, and the inclusion of LGBTGIA individuals. In all the committee meetings, discussions, and debates, I was struck by the great care and passion everybody had, the dedication, and the love for our denomination. Many commissioners and observers gave up almost two weeks to be in St. Louis to faithfully serve the church and that is exactly what they did.

This is not to say the PCUSA is not shedding members or closing churches, but there is a lot to be hopeful about in this denomination too. God is working and moving in the PCUSA. It was on full display in St. Louis. I hope that continues for a long time to come. 

Church

In the center of historic Dublin, Ireland sits St. Patrick’s Cathedral. The water well where St. Patrick baptized the first Christians in Ireland in the fifth century is immediately adjacent to the building. The day school that brought organized education to the area dates from 1547 and the choir school is even older founded in 1432. In a city full of old and ancient things, St. Patrick’s Cathedral is at its heart and one of the best examples.

St. Patrick’s Cathedral is more than a church though. On the bright, warm day I visited a few years ago, the grounds were servings as an outdoor lunch area for school children and adults alike with a number of people (trying to) tan in the early summer sun. The cathedral itself serves as a museum and gift shop throughout most of the week. The rear of the church, outer aisles, and transept are filled with items significant to St. Patrick’s Cathedral and to Dublin. Many famous and religious Dubliners were even buried inside the church and their monuments are prominently displayed. Filled with hundreds of visitors on a weekday, one could imagine what the Cathedral would be like on a Sunday or for a mass early in the morning.

Ireland, like America, is in the midst of a religious transformation. While Christianity is still the dominant religion by a large margin, the number of self-identified Christians in Ireland is decreasing as is church attendance. One of the most culturally religious countries in the world is on the decline. Within a few decades the rates of religiosity among the Irish might mirror America.

St. Patrick’s Cathedral serves as an interesting case study on the purpose and place of the physical church building in the modern landscape. In Protestant circles, the church is generally conceived as simply a place for worship and spiritual development. In other traditions, the definition is broader: the church as a religious center, civic museum (and gift shop), school, cemetery, gathering place in the midst of community. Many modern churches here in America even include books stores, gyms, running tracks, coffee shops and more.

Theologian Karl Barth defined the “church” as “the living body of the living Lord Jesus Christ”. St. Patrick’s Cathedral and so many others are joyfully reflecting that definition: worship meeting history meeting the everyday life. They are living and active bodies of faith in the world.

What is the church to you? What does and can that church look like today?

One In Christ

I am fascinated by the church. It is probably why I do this. We are the body of Christ, the living embodiment of the Son of God. How remarkable is that? We declare that we are his very hands and feet in the world. We preach his word. We worship him. We reach out to the rest of his people and gather them in together. We go out together to take care of God’s people hurting and alone in the world. We sit around tables together, either in the formality of the Lord’s Supper or the informality of a Sunday meal, and we get a taste of heavenly banquet in the Kingdom of God to come. I am amazed by that. Martin Luther took this activity so seriously that he wanted to move away from calling this thing we do together “the church” and instead favored “congregation”. He thought it better described our work together: congregating. I like that.  At the same time, the church is divided into an infinite amount of subdivisions – denominations, associations, conferences, para-church organizations, non-profit corporate entities, confessions, individual congregations and the like. And within these divisions, even more disunion according to theology, worship style, tradition, music, race, class, creed, ecclesiology, missiology, and on and on. The greatest witness that we are not fully one in Christ is how much the church is not one in anything we do or believe. In part, we reflect the great sorting that is taking place in the society in general. We self-identify and are classified into a million minute categories. And often, those categories exist over and against all the other categories. We are at odds with one another either in theory or practice.  A few years ago, I was at a worship conference and the conversation turned, as it often did, to diversity in the service - diversity of style, prayer types, music, people, technology, and more. How do we handle the dissatisfaction or grumbling that naturally ensues when people do not get what they like or want? The leader of the talk gave the example of multiple generations living under one roof as a model. Sometimes the kids will not like what a parent fixes for dinner. Sometimes grandpa might not like pizza night. Mom hates when grandma takes the children for ice cream before dinner on the way home from school. And yet, what unites them is greater than their differences. The unity of the family trumps all the ways in which they are pulled apart.  I think this is the great challenge of the church today. There is an ever-present tension between our unity in Christ and the reality that there are thousands of churches out there that may be closer to our personal preferences and theologies.  Nevertheless, we work and worship together in the church as an affirmation that we are one in the body Christ. We are Southminster Presbyterian Church. That we have new and old hymns and hymns from halfway around the world in worship is by design, but it is also a statement about the community we envision for ourselves. We are welcoming and inclusive of all. We hear sermons about pressing social issues alongside prayers of comfort and support for those down the pew from us. We gather around the bible for personal study and we go out to volunteer. At Southminster, it is a philosophy of both/and rather than either/or. If nothing else, it follows in the model of the Jesus Christ calling women and men, tax collectors and fisherman, thinkers and zealots, and so many others. I do this work because I believe without a doubt we are one in Christ. Let us work to make that a little more real every day. Blessings,Rev. Tim Blodgett

Southminster 75 and Beyond

When the Elders and Deacons of the church met in January for our Southminster Officer Retreat, one of the discussions was about “slaying dragons”. What histories, concerns, issues, problems, etc. are keeping the church from fully living into the God’s good future for us? What is holding us back in Brookside? What dragons have been slayed and where are we with the rest? We talked about losing members for x, y, and z reason, our invisibility behind the development on Peoria, and the decline of membership from the peak 20 or 30 years ago. It was a thoughtful and helpful conversation. The consensus was that we have done a great deal of work slaying those dragons, but there is still more work to do. One dragon we did not talk about in as much detail was the construction of the Community Center. It was a trauma for the church. We are thankful for its construction and the great ministry that is done from it now, but it was not an easy process. There were site and building issues. The finances became, perhaps, the greatest struggle. Fundraising was difficult. Asking the congregation again to give was challenging. Ending up with debt to carry was problematic. All of you that were here during that period know about all of this better than I do. It is a battle scar. We entered the Southminster 75 Capital Campaign with this dragon still looming. We also arrive here knowing that the church is in a completely different place than it was 10 years ago. Financially, we are remarkably blessed by the Center One development and the cell tower leases. The generosity of this congregation is amazing. Pledging increased even as we loss some key givers to death and relocations. The budget is cleaner, leaner, and nimbler than it has been. We are back to running surpluses and carrying money forward year to year. We are all much more hopeful about the future of this church.  The Southminster 75 Capital Campaign is a celebration of 75 years of ministry in Brookside. It is an affirmation of the next decades of ministry to come here. I think it can also be another dragon we slay together. The past of this church does not dictate our future. Previous struggles are not predictors of present circumstances. We can move towards the good future that God has planned for us. And we can do all of that together for the benefit of our ministry in Brookside and the Kingdom of God work we are doing here. On April 1, the Southminster 75 Capital Campaign begins. The campaign funds five projects across the church that would take place over the next two years leading up to the 75th anniversary of the founding of the church in 2020. While the projects will be completed in less than two years, we will continue to receive pledges until December 31, 2023 for a total of five years of giving.  The cost to complete all the projects including a new air conditioner, audio/video upgrades, and painting for the sanctuary, an elevator for the Community Center, a partial remodeling on Cottrell Hall, and updates to the east side exterior will be $350,000. $110,000 has already been pledged to the campaign before it even starts. The median pledge is $10,000 over five years or $2,000 per year. Easter Sunday, what will you give? How will you impact ministry in Brookside for the next 75 years? Will you help us slay this dragon?

Imagine Jesus

Picture Jesus. In your head, think about what Jesus would look like for you. Do you have that image? Is Jesus Caucasian with blond hair, blues eyes, and a kind smile? Does he have a beard? Or is he a darker complexion? Is he short or tall? What kind of clothes is he wearing? Jesus is definitely not in a three-piece suit, but is he wearing nice white clean clothes or is he more shabbily dressed? Is he in sandals or barefoot?While so many pictures of Jesus in church hallways and Sunday School classrooms may influence our vision of Jesus to some points of commonality, when we shut our eyes we are each seeing a slightly different version of the same person. In reality, Jesus looked how Jesus looked, but we cannot get back to a place where we can take a snapshot. We each see Jesus individually.The same is true of our understanding of Jesus’ life and ministry: each of us has our own perception of Christ. We emphasize different things. We care more about certain things than others. Like the gospel writers, we all have our own slightly different spins on the life of our Messiah. Only two of the gospels depict the birth of Christ and each in different ways. In the original ending to Mark, there is no post-resurrection appearance of Christ. Details change from author to author. The same is true for a hundred different parts of our personal understanding of Jesus. We include some things and exclude others. We like particular actions, but cannot understand others. More than ‘picking and choosing’, we fit together our own personal understanding differently. We imagine Jesus differently.The opportunity and challenge of that kind of faith is that each of us is responsible for how we envision Jesus Christ, his life, and ministry. The same is true for the rest of our lives of faith. Learning and growing is key in this reality of faith. You are not spoon fed an image of Christ. You discover and develop one. Whether that image is better or truer depends on our understanding and willingness to dig deeper in faith.As we continue in Lent, how are you discovering and rediscovering Christ? What do you see?

Love More

As we approach Super Bowl Sunday, I am reminded of an advertisement from a few years ago that was equally applauded as it was derided. Coca-Cola, the ubiquitous soft drink company and global presence, offered an ad featuring the song “America the Beautiful” sung in eight languages by Americans of different ethnicities. You may remember it. Many found the commercial to be beautiful and imaginative. Others were offended at the suggestion that “America the Beautiful” was sung in anything other than English.My first response was not about the patriotism of the ad or the beauty. My first response was “this looks like Pentecost.” Acts 2 describes Pentecost and the work of the Holy Spirit in the apostles. On that day, the Holy Spirit descended like a tongue of fire and it allowed the crowd to hear the apostles in their own language. The Holy Spirit allowed the gospel message to be taken and heard to the furthest reaches of the globe. The Holy Spirit helped a diverse world truly be one body of Christ. Of the eight languages of the Coca-Cola ad, I speak one, English, and have some passing knowledge of a couple of others, but I knew what they singing.  I witnessed a little of Pentecost in this Coca-Cola ad.The little piece of the Kingdom of God that we witness in Pentecost and the even smaller piece in the Coca-Cola ad points to a larger reality.  What God is doing in Jesus Christ and through the church is a ministry of reconciliation, of reuniting. What is divided by ethnicity, language, politics, inequality, and even religion will someday be rejoined into one body. That is our hope and our common mission. Regardless of how divided we are today, we are and will be one in Christ.Following close after the Super Bowl this year, is the overlapping holidays of Valentine’s Day and Ash Wednesday. Many ministers have asked themselves, “What can we do to mark this unusual intersection of days?” The popular song goes “They will know we are Christians by our love.” I think this is true and particularly so as these holidays cross paths. To be more exact, though, I think they will know we are Christians by who we love. Maybe that is how we can approach this February 14^th: Who do you love and how can you spend Lent learning to love more?

True Christmas Hope

By the time you read this, we will be in the middle of the 12 Days of Christmas. Yes, they come after Christmas not before. Epiphany will conclude the Christmas season on January 6. (We will mark the occasion the Sunday before on December 31.) All the weeks and months of preparation for Christmas will finally conclude. At some point, the Christmas tree will find its way into a closet or attic.For most of us, Christmas was the culmination of weeks and months of preparation. The stores pushed Christmas specials since September. All of the presents were wrapped and tucked neatly under the tree. Warm, clear weather allowed the insides and outsides of homes to be decorated leisurely for the last two months. In the church, this Advent time saw us journey through the prophecies about Jesus’ coming all the way to his birth. For weeks, we prepared our hearts and world for Jesus to arrive. We lived in a constant state of activity in lesson, song, and prayer looking forward to Christmas Day. We looked forward to the way this world was about to change.Ironically, we may prepare too well. For months, we prepared for this day and then when it arrives it is over. We may be better at the living out the Season of Advent than the Season of Christmas and beyond. And the same could be said about Easter. We do Lent well. We like to prepare. We do not know what to do once that preparation comes to fruition though. We arrive at the weeks following Easter and wonder “What is next?”The scene plays out in our living rooms on Christmas morning. After weeks of decorating and wrapping gifts, the whole thing is over after ten minutes of paper shredding and thank you hugs. And it happens in our churches. The decorations go up. The carols come out. We celebrate for a day and then go back to normal. The day that is supposed to change everything… doesn’t.I think that it is easier to prepare than to live in the reality of what has happened. It is easier to prepare for joy than to live a joyous life. It is easier to proclaim that the world is about to be transformed in this child who is coming into the world than to actually go out alongside him and change it. It is easier to say that we will be present with you in Jesus Christ than it is to be the presence of Christ in the world.My hope for you in this New Year and time after Christmas is that you will be truly changed by all the preparation that took place this Advent season. My greater hope is that it will not stop here.