keeping Christ in Christmas?

It's the same every year. I've already seen it in several places this year as well--in passing conversations, in suggestions for what we should talk about on the weekends at church for the Christmas series, and among Christian pundits on TV:

"Let's keep Christ in Christmas."

People:

Christ is already in Christmas. He's all over it. He's in every act of service, every ringing bell outside of Wal-Mart, every soup kitchen overflowing with volunteers, every can and food drive, every spirit of joy and thankfulness, and every beautiful Christmas decoration.

And he doesn't need our help to keep him there.

What he does need is for us to keep him close to our heart--to live with him richly from the absolute deepest part of who we are.

And if we do that, those around us will see that Christ is indeed in Christmas... without us having to convince them that he is, and without us feeling like we have to judge the materialist, the secularist, or those who wish to be politically correct.

Call it what you want--the Holidays, X-Mas, or even Super-Jesus-In-The-Manger-mas. But live in Christ before you claim the holidays in his name. My guess is that as you do, you'll find the most effective campaign for keeping Christ in Christmas is loving and being loved by him.

That's the message of Christmas after all, isn't it?

aversion

a⋅ver⋅sion

/əˈvɜrʒən, -ʃən/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [uh-vur-zhuhn, -shuhn]
–noun

1.	a strong feeling of dislike, opposition, repugnance, or antipathy (usually fol. by to): a strong aversion to snakes and spiders.

2.	a cause or object of dislike; person or thing that causes antipathy: His pet aversion is guests who are always late.

"Aversion." I used this word today in a conversation with a friend over lunch. It's a good one.

Earlier in our conversation today (as in, before I rocked the use of the word "aversion"), my friend and I were talking about people who had left our church in the past few years. Each person had a unique story, but shared a common underlying reason for leaving:

They didn't like the culture we were creating, the direction we were heading, and/or the means we were using to create it and move towards it.

And this is a very common occurrence in churches (especially in Protestant America)--and, in fact, the Church (universally and historically). Groups of Christian people--or, perhaps better put, groups of churched people--have collectively decided that their church/tradition is either:

-too liberal/worldly/cultural/wishy-washy

or:

-not conservative enough/faithful enough to tradition/God-focused enough/biblically centered enough.

It was the same in Jesus' day.

On the "left," (that is, to the left of Jesus) you had the Sadducees, religious/political Jewish leaders who thought it best to cooperate and even appreciate their Roman captors, encouraging Jews to look up to the dominant Roman/Greek culture and all of its trappings.

On the right (of Jesus), you had the Pharisees, Jewish leaders who thought that a life of strict obedience to God's laws and the Pharisaic prescriptions thereof, over and against Roman culture, was the godly way to go.

On the far right, you had the Essenes, a group of people who thought that the last days were upon them, that they were the only "faithful remnant" of God's chosen Jewish people left on the earth, and that as such it was of critical importance for them to be completely separate from the culture they found themselves in, and to create their own. So, they withdrew into these pseudo-monastic communitites, separate even from their conservative Pharisaic counterparts, to ride out the storm, maintain their purity, and wait for the coming doom of everyone around them.

And then on the extreme right, you had the Zealots--people who thought that violence was the only option, and that God was calling them to be instruments of his judgment on the wicked, pagan Roman invaders. Terrorism was their business, and they did it in the name of God.

Enter Jesus.

The Sadducees didn't like Jesus. He threatened their power relationship with the Romans, mainly by claiming that he was the coming Messiah, the long-promised Son of Man from the apocalyptic book of Daniel--God's instrument of justice to establish his kingdom forever on earth. The Sadducees had already chosen their king, and were reaping the benefits of that choice. Jesus threatened those benefits.

The Pharisees didn't like Jesus. He threatened their concept of God, and their perceived status before God. The God of the Pharisee rewarded obedience, and punished the disobedient. So, status was self-willed: the "more" obedient you willed yourself to be, the better position you had with God. But Jesus had a diffierent concept of what obedience entailed--one that fulfilled God's Law rather than extended it to human preference and conviction. Jesus celebrated with pagans whom he forgave and accepted... so they called him a glutton and a drunkard. Jesus showed preference to the whores, the white-collar cheats, and the common person who responded to his love with their simple faith and repentance... so they devised a plan to kill him. Jesus threatened their concept of a righteous (read: merciless) God and a righteous (read: self-driven) life.

The Zealots... well, we don't know what the Zealots thought of Jesus, at least from the biblical record. We know that Jesus reached out to them--even counted one of them as one of his Twelve. My guess is that the Zealots probably enjoyed it when Jesus stumped the Sadducees and Pharisees, and admired his courage before the power brokers of his day... but some probably thought he was unwilling to take it "far enough." It goes something like this: if you don't bang people over the head with the truth (and in the Zealot's case, literally bang them over the head), you're really just afraid to tell them the whole truth, or something like that.

As for the Essenes--they were probably too busy stockpiling food "Left-Behind-Series" style, writing about the wickedness of all of those around them. They were too busy longing for God to come save them from the wicked world to even notice this Jesus who claimed power to forgive sin and rescue people from their wickedness. It's more than a little ironic that they were so passionate about waiting for the Messiah that they failed to encounter the Messiah.

All of that to say:

The same patterns and categories of people that have existed for millenia in the Church still exist in churches today.

And:

I love being a part of a church that is an aversion (see, I tied it all together) to churched people, for the same reasons that Jesus was an aversion to the Sadducees, Pharisees, Essenes, and Zealots.

So:

Which group do you fall into?

And before you say "I fall into God's group," remember:

So did the Sadducees, Pharisees, Essenes, and Zealots.

insulated

After coming back from two days up in a deer stand, out in the woods overlooking the Mississippi, in the midst of the wind, the cold November rain (insert GNR reference here), the dawns and dusks, I came to this realization:

It is just so easy to be insulated.

Insulated. Not literally. Metaphorically.

It's so easy to be metaphorically insulated.

Here's how I get insulated:

Work. I'm a pastor. I live that vocation. Rarely am I not engaged with it (except for times out in the woods, like these past couple of days). I'm thinking about people, about how to do church, about who's doing what, about struggles, about vision, about values and church culture, about theology, about sermons, about communication, about staff dynamics, about elders and deacons, about musical style, and I could go on and on even longer than I already have.

I become insulated--surrounded by churchy things--so much so that it's sometimes difficult to engage with things outside of it.

Here's another way I get insulated:

Personal comfort. I lay on the couch. I eat what I want, when I want. I exercise when I want, and don't when I don't want to. I get insulated in my personal comfort to the point where things that just aren't as comfortable (but perhaps good for me) get pushed away.

And another way I get insulated:

Academia (for lack of a better word). I can think in lofty terms, write in lofty terms, keep up with the news, with current events, with trends, with opinions, with idealism. I have that vein in me. I enjoy reading about what people are saying, thinking, feeling, joking about when it comes to this country, our politics, our economy, the state of Christianity, the state of the evangelical church in America, it's relationship to the rest of America, etc. Sometimes I get insulated to the point where I go to an ivory tower with all of the other academics--people who think, talk, and write in the way that I do, at the expense of those who do not.

When did I come to this realization? Well, it was at about 5:45 am Wednesday morning, in the pitch dark, roaming the hills of Lansing, IA, unable to find my treestand, having slept for one hour the night before and just finished driving another two. And I thought to myself:

"Why do you like to do this? You're cold, you're tired, you're frustrated. Just go back to the car. Take a nap. Wait for it to get light. Then, if you feel like it, get up into the stand."

And then I thought:

"You're being a baby. When did you get to be a baby? When did the stuff in you get to be so soft, so easily overcome?"

So, I did what is incredibly difficult for an older brother to do: I walked to where I knew my younger brother was sitting, had him climb down, and show me to my stand (and yes, I heard about it for the rest of the weekend, and I'm sure I'll be hearing about it for the rest of my life).

But the alternative was worse. It was to settle for being soft. To be defeated. To become how I had been insulated.

Now, on the back end of the trip, I'm energized. I've regained some perspective. I've started back down a good path--one toward reclaiming some parts of myself that just plain get lost in the insulation of life. It's good to be gentle, but not good to be soft. It's good to be sensitive, but not good to be weak. It's good to be in church, to be comfortable, to be academic, but not good when that's all you are, and that's all you can relate to.

How do you get insulated?

help

In searching through the Google news feed today, I came across a headline that reads:

"Fannie Mae posts record $29 billion loss in 3rd qtr."

The subtext reads:

"Fannie Mae said on Monday it is losing money so fast it may have to tap the government for cash to avoid shutting down after the largest source of funding for US homes reported a record $29 billion loss."

And I'm sitting here, wondering:

How is a follower of Jesus supposed to view and respond to that?

This isn't the first time I've asked myself this question.  I would say that I've endeavored to have an informed, well thought out opinion about the economic crisis, so that I could converse and vote accordingly.  I've tried to weigh out the balance between mercy and justice--to live in that tension, even as it concerns financial policy.

But what struck me is this: $700 billion dollars later, this problem is not fixed.  They are asking for more money.

And that's scary.  It scares be because the presence of a large amount of cash was supposed to solve the problem.  Not instantaneously... but measurably, at least.  It did not.  It scares me because I think we're putting our trust in money--liquidity, to be more economically precise--rather than in the strength of character that comes from owning poor decisions, accepting the consequences thereof, and operating differently to change things over the long haul.

This makes me wonder:

-I wonder if we are too afraid to experience the pain of our poor financial decisions.  I wonder if we are willing to learn the hard lessons that come through grappling with the real consequences of our choices.

-I wonder if we're afraid to be tested.  I wonder if we're willing to live on a lot less, or if we're even able, having lived on more that we could afford, much less need, for so long.

-I wonder if we lack courage.

-I wonder if we crave freedom--pure, unadulterated freedom--like we used to.  Freedom from debt.  Freedom to give out of what we have earned.  Freedom to help those around us from the means that God has blessed us with, and the freedom to trust him with the rest.

-I wonder if the American people, apart from the American government, could or even would help one another through difficult times.

-I wonder if war is the only thing that has the power to bind us together, spurring us toward a common goal.  I hope not.

-I wonder if we are willing to endure discipline.

-I wonder why we expect so little from ourselves and so much from our government.

Several realizations are being reinforced in me through all of this:

-We are all connected.  All of us.  We are not just a group of individuals, each taking responsibility for himself or herself alone.  What I do affects those around me--my consumer debt, my education debt, my home debt, my whatever debt.  I'm giving my money away to people who may or may not use it appropriately.  And they may be giving my money away to people who either don't deserve it, didn't earn it, or will misuse it.  We are all connected in that way.

-The government should help the people, but should also help the people take ownership for their decisions.  Legislation should be passed and supported to help those who can not help themselves.  But laws should be enforced that penalize those who make unlawful decisions--including spending borrowed money without the means to pay it back.  

-The American people should strive for mercy toward one another, and justice for themselves.  This was inspired by a story that my grandmother told me recently, as we were discussing the economy, and the recent election (at the time of the conversation, it was the upcoming election).  She recounted what it was like when her and her then husband (my now deceased grandfather) made a bunch of poor money choices when they were first married.  She said, as-a-matter-of-factly: "You know, there wasn't anyone around to help us out then.  But, we knew what we had to do.  There were a couple of real hard years there, but we pulled ourselves out of it."  

Now, that doesn't negate our obligation to show mercy toward those in need.  I hope that a church family or community would see a young couple like my grandparents back then, come around them, and provide support for them to make it through.  But: I hope that their community would do it in such a way that encouraged my grandmother and grandfather to take responsibility for their actions, to admit to their fault, to accept the consequences, and to strive to live better.  Mercy should never replace justice.  It should work with it, work towards it.

That's the kind of help we should want, and that's the kind of help we are obligated to give.