The Sounds of Silence

Hello darkness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence

The weekend begins with the brutal, tragic, and paradoxically beautiful death of Jesus Christ. And then there is silence...

It is almost as if time stands still - everyone staring at the limp, beaten and broken body on the Cross. And then they watched as the body is taken down, placed in a tomb and then left alone.

Everyone, followers of Jesus, haters of Jesus, could do nothing but wait. And so they did: wait, wonder, hope. Is He the Christ, the Messiah? or is He nothing more than a false promise, a dream breaker, hope wrecker?

Today should be a day of contemplation for the Christian church. Today should be a day of wonder for the world at large. Who is this man called Jesus? And what does He want with me?

Truth is, we do not have to remain friends with the darkness. The sound of Saturday's silence is the rumbling of love that explodes from the empty cross of Sunday. This weekend we, the Church, must celebrate the hope of heaven. That is, the Kingdom of heaven is here and the world needs it just as much as we do and did. So what if...

What if today we started living the hope of tomorrow? What if we lived out the hope of heaven (the not yet) in the midst of the reality of earth here and now? I truly believe that as followers of Christ we can be history makers today--do you? Don't let Satan fool you, our human response to what God has done on our behalf makes a real difference to God--He (God) loves the whole of His creation. The God who is for us and with us in Jesus Christ wants us, by the Spirit’s power, to be for and with one another so that together, we the Church can be for the world.

Time for us to step into the sound of Saturday's silence so that the eruption of Sunday's glorious love will explode from our words, our actions, our lives! Time to say hello to the brightness and the beauty of the Cross - our old friend who has left the indelible vision of of heaven today in our mind's eye and on our heart!

The time is now for us to be the sweet melodic sound of redeeming love for a world swept away by silence...

Holy Thursday Batman!

Today, the Thursday before Good Friday and Easter Sunday, is referred to as "Maundy" or "Holy" Thursday. On this day throughout the annals of Church history, you would find that many set apart this day as one of remembrance  Such remembrance would be accounted for through the sacred meal known as communion. On this day Christians recall Jesus' last meal, the Last Supper. 

I wonder today in the midst of all our "worldly" business, how many will stop and even give a thought of one of the most significant evenings in the course of history? This was no ordinary meal as it represented Jesus' life - it represents the Christian life. The Eucharist is not simply a meal, it is an act - an act of sacrifice so as to give life to the other. That is, we are called to give of ourselves (to be willing to break our body and pour out our self)  so that the world might come to know the insane love of Jesus - the life-giving love of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

What's more, on this night, not only did Jesus break bread with his friends, but He gave us the ultimate example of what it means to be a leader...He washed the feet of his disciples. That is right, in the fourth Gospel we read how Jesus elevates His performance through the washing His disciples feet ( John 13.1-17). 

Theologian Karl Barth writes:

How emphatically the latter Gospel emphasizes the fact that the service of Christ is His true power and majesty and therefore the grace by which man receives His life! - the revealed grace of God which was already the secret of the Old Testament, though operative then only in a vertical movement from above. In the New, however, it has really come down into the depths and manifested itself there, becoming itself service in accordance with this end of its way. The action of God which absolutely precedes all human action and therefor all human service is that He has placed Himself wholly and unreservedly in the service of humanity as revealed and effectual in the service of Jesus. 

When reading through the NT continuously we are reminded how God Himself acts and how He is revealed as a Servant and in this way as the Lord, in the person of Him who made Himself of no reputation and took upon Him the form of a servant (Phil 2.7). The form of a servant is not a popular concept in today's society. The reality of giving of our selves – Self-sacrifice - is not a popular issue or philosophy in a society that says win at all costs. The Christian reality of sacrifice for the sake of the “other” is the ultimate paradox. How so?

*By placing the "other" before the "self" we actually gain life thereby bringing about glory and victory
*We become first when we are last
*We live when we die - life through death

The question we must ask ourselves as we prepare to celebrate the culmination of the life of Jesus - are we, through the Holy Spirit, participating in His life, His way & His truth or do we expect Him to participate in our way, and truth and life? Are we building a worldly border around our bodies so as not to be broken, or are we willingly being broken and pour out for the sake of the world? Do we expect not only to be seated at the "supper," but to be served? Or are we "stepping" into the life of Christ, joyfully kneeling down on the floor so that we might scrub the foot of the "other?" Amen Jesus!

Locked Inside Your Heart Shaped Box

When you make a decision do you tell everyone by letting off some smoke from the chimney? Sounds silly but as many of us know, this is exactly what happened at the Vatican on the 13th of March 2013. And while most of us do not "literally" puff smoke out of a chimney to indicate the result(s) of our decision(s), we can (and often do), however, give off smoke screens with our actions that indicate our heart's intent. That is, when our actions do not coincide with our words - when our hearts are nothing more than an empty heart shaped box, the actions we blow off for the world are covered in the smoke of artificiality.

What then, is locked inside your heart shaped box? Better yet, who? Who you are determines what you do...Being goes before purpose or action. But this is not how much of the world lives. So often, we allow earthly things, items, people, to determine who we are, and thus, what we do. During this week (called Holy Week for the Church) might we contemplate what it is that we fill our hearts with?

"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled" (Mat 5.6). To hunger and thirst for righteousness means to reorient the typical human perspective. To hunger and thirst for righteousness means that we must think beyond ourselves - it means that we are to think of the other. And this my friend is simply not what we are accustomed of doing...

Think of today's news, commercials, t.v. shows, marketing schemes...We are constantly told that life is about me. It is perfectly acceptable and even expected to hunger and thirst for self-promotion which ultimately is self-preservation. A message that calls for people to look out for the other is a counter-culture message - the antithesis of today's me-for-me mentality.

Only through and from the Father Son and Holy Spirit is meaning determined, and as theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar writes, through the Absolute, "we find not only the ultimate meaning of reality as such, but also, beyond that, the ideality that provides the meaning, or determines 'what ought to be,' which is the ultimate measure of the truth of reality." In opposition or rather in contradistinction to the autonomous story, the cosmic drama of the Godhead illumines the interaction of the protagonist—Christ—with the creature through the direction of the Holy Spirit. Such interaction plays out through the multiple scenes—intersecting narratives—of the characters upon the stage of creation thereby allowing the realization not only of what our performances are, but what they are to become.

Our current frame of reference of individualism that transforms relationalism into a consumerist transition must give way to an interpersonal view of life and its freedom as revealed through the salvific performance of Christ so as to engage the structures of evil head-on. In place of the evidence that demands the verdict that Jesus is Lord, what is required today is the verdict Jesus is Lord demanding evidence in our lives that He is Lord—as exemplified in the witness of St Francis of Assisi or Dr. John M. Perkins. The values of the Christian faith must be those that reflect the values of God’s heart or else they are nothing but an empty heart shaped box:

    She eyes me like a Pisces when I am weak
    I've been locked inside your Heart Shaped box, for weeks
    I've been drawn into your magnet tar pit trap
    I wish I could eat your cancer when you turn black


 
    Hey!
    Wait!
    I've got a new complaint
    Forever in debt to your priceless advice
    hey
    wait
    I've got a new complaint
    Forever in debt to your priceless advice

So what is locked inside your heart shaped box?

What's So Funny about Peace, Love & Understanding

Elvis Costello asks, "What's so funny about peace, love, and understanding?" How do we answer such a question? Seems like today all three are quite comical. Peace - laughable. Love - yeah who really knows what it means to love. Understanding - only if you take my truth to be the ultimate foundation of understanding.

What really do peace, love and understanding mean? And who even cares whether or not we have peace or if we understand one another, let alone love each other? The one people that should care...the Church.

What if the Christian church stepped into God's radical, insane love? Maybe the world would come to recognize the profound need for peace, love, and understanding. And in doing so, the world just might be a better place to live.

Now in Farlowesque performance, what if I push the envelop just a little further...What if I throw in the reality of hell? That is, any comprehension of love, peace and understanding should seek to incorporate the realities of heaven and hell - if a Christian answer is to be rendered.

Now you might be asking, "What does a discussion about truth, love, peace, understanding, have to do with hell or heaven for that matter?" In some ways I think everything. I think any discussion that deals with love, with peace, with understanding, must, from a Christian standpoint, delve into the realms of heaven and hell as both represent the reality of eternity. And then we must ask, where are heaven and hell? Who will see heaven and who will see hell? Might it be true that in the end, God's love wins and and all will be saved?

In talking about hell I am reminded of the play No Exit, written by Jean-Paul Sartre with its depiction of hell as three self-consumed individuals locked up in a room with no escape, and whose eyelids cannot shut. As one of these three damned souls from the play exclaims, "hell is other people."

Today in a very real sense, heaven and hell are heart issues. Heaven abounds in hearts bent on loving God and loving the other. Hell resides in hearts and lives that are turned inward, consumed in self-love as opposed to being drenched in Savior love. The predominance of our self-love mindset today makes it very difficult to see how diabolical this orientation is, and blinds us from seeing that by turning inward we close ourselves off from making our exit and entering into true freedom.

It is a self-centered heart's orientation that continues to attempt to step beyond the performance of Christ, or simply say ‘no’ to His invitation. But this does not have to be the last word or society's final act. Through the church's incorporation into Christ’s reconciliatory performance we not only encounter our salvation, but through the leading of the Spirit, can bring this hope to the ends of the earth, thereby assisting in the mass exit of hell. We can, through a performance drenched in love, bring peace and understanding by giving people heaven now. I guess then, the answer to Costello's question is "What are you doing to close the gates of hell?" And in closing these gates we elevate the truth and reality of love, peace and understanding - nothing funny about that!