Pastor's Report, March 2008

I happily offer a "Pastor's Report" at Board Meetings. Here is that report.


March 9, 2008

I was reminded this week, through some discussions on our Disciples of Christ listserv, of the importance of always remembering that the practical work of our church board is an important part of our overall congregational ministry. Making choices about where to direct our energies and our money should be a pastoral one -- not in the sense that “the pastor decides,” but in the sense that our decisions should reflect our faithful service to Christ and outreach in Christ’s name. (This is not -- or should not be -- an earth-shattering observation; I just pass it along.)

Things are going well from my perspective. I’ve almost learned everyone’s name perfectly (though I’m still learning all of the family connections). Worship is going well, and I am pleased with the attendance and discussions at our current Bible Study series on Paul’s letters. I’ve gotten some positive feedback from the “Pastor’s Blog”; I hope that it will grow into a helpful resource for us.

Our new secretary, Becky, has started this week. She seems excited by the job, and is very pleasant to be around. From my perspective, she has handled the job well, which is great.

She and I were reminded of an issue we need to face this week about building usage. There are several various forms and letters saved on the computer, but they do not seem comprehensive. (They also do not seem to entirely agree with one another.) We need to look over this issue to solidify policies -- in fact, it would be very helpful if we produced a one page sheet of rules/policies that we could distribute to interested parties.

Holy Week is nearly upon us. I know that we’re offering an ambitious week of services, per my desires. I do not know how this will turn out. I hope that the congregation finds this week of services meaningful. In my experience, I have found that the church as a whole does not quite know how to ably remember all of the aspects of Holy Week -- we do much better with our quasi-month long celebration of Christmas (because Christmas always creeps into Advent, regardless of our efforts to stop it). So this is my effort to try to offer a different model for celebrating Easter. In the newspaper, I’ve seen another model advertised; one local church is simply spreading out Holy Week over Sundays leading up to Easter (I think that means that the Entry into Jerusalem was remembered on Feb. 24). Which is simply to admit, there’s no established way to do this in our modern culture. I hope that attendance is strong (because I do think it’s important), but mostly I hope that Central Christian feels good about these services in hindsight.

While I’m thinking about upcoming worship, I should let you know that there will be several small changes to the order of worship, which will appear on Easter Sunday and following. I don’t think that these are major changes (mostly shifting the order of things slightly). Some of them are being made for theological reasons (the addition of a formal Invocation); some are just meant to correspond to my own worship rhythms. Please let me know what your reactions are.

Here is some information on my upcoming activities:

• I will be observing 24 hours of prayer and meditation from the end of our Maundy Thursday service to the beginning of our Good Friday service. If any pastoral emergencies arise, there will be a contact person (whose calls I will take).
• I do not yet know what my regular day off will be (probably Thursday, but I will know by the end of April). You should be aware that I will take Easter Monday off (to rest and recover from Holy Week -- this will be a common practice after Easter, by the way).
• My installation is scheduled for Sunday, April 20. Our regional minister will attend that day for that purpose. I also have a few guests from out of town who are planning to be here that weekend.

You may have noticed that I have not yet scheduled any vacation time. This is slightly unusual -- I imagine that I would normally take some time after Easter. This year, however, my vacation schedule is up in the air because both of my younger sisters are expecting (one is due in May and one in September). I will take some vacation time to visit them sometime after they deliver (not immediately). I won’t be able to offer as much advance notice as I normally would, but I will do the best I can. I imagine you understand.

Our regional minister has asked me to serve as a member of our regional team in a regional Disciples - Roman Catholic Dialogue. I have agreed to do so (and I have attended on meeting so far). I will keep you informed of these activities (probably mostly on the Pastor’s Blog). The next meeting, in Clarksburg, is Monday, April 7. And we have an overnight retreat planned later in the spring.

Reflections on Worship, March 9

I don't have many thoughts about worship yesterday. Again I was pleasantly surprised by the attendance yesterday, despite the less than excellent roads. And I was surprised that people seemed awake, given Daylight Savings Time.

For my part, I was not entirely awake. It probably is not much of a secret that your pastor is not a morning person. So the loss of the hour of sleep was not entirely helpful for me. It was especially obvious in the sermon (at least to me), which made it longer than anticipated. I try to be moved by the spirit, but preaching without notes requires a certain amount of discipline, which was hindered by my drowsiness. I hope it wasn't overly noticeable.

Otherwise, it was a pleasant Sunday -- the metaphorical calm before the storm which is Holy Week. Preparations for those upcoming services continue. I hope you are looking forward to them (in a spiritually appropriate way, of course -- it's not Christmas); I am.

Bible Study - Papyrus 46 at Univ. of Michigan

I enjoyed the Bible study sessions today on Philippians, partially because I just enjoy studying the Bible, partially because I really love reading Paul, partially because I enjoy being with you.

Here is the link I suggested to the information about P46, from the University of Michigan Library: http://www.lib.umich.edu/pap/k12/reading/Paul/index.html

Coming Up Sunday, March 9

On Sunday I will offer the final sermon in this year's Lenten series, "For Tough Cleaning Problems - Do Not Dilute": Solutions for Smelly Feet. The sermon will focus on the lesson of Jesus washing the disciples feet before the Last Supper, drawing on John 13. Is this an isolated incident, or can we learn something from Jesus' action?

Interestingly, this story comes soon after another story about feet, this one in John 12. Here Mary, the sister of Lazurus who featured prominently in our discussion of "Jesus wept," anoints Jesus' feet with a pound of very expensive perfume and wipes the feet with her hair. Like many of the recurring images in the Gospel of John, I do not think the similarity between these stories is accidental.

So we will consider the lessons of foot anointing and foot washing, expensive perfume and water, Mary and Jesus. One disciple grumbling about the flagrant waste of money and one disciple grumbling about Jesus' flagrant disregard of his social standing.

Jesus says to Peter, "Unless I wash you, you have no share in me." What does this mean for Peter? What does this mean for us?

I cannot possibly explore all of the issues in these two texts: the Gospel of John, more than even the rest of the Bible, is too rich to allow this in any single sermon. But I do hope to explore what these two stories meant then, and how they relate to us. Are our feet dirty these days? Do we need Jesus the Christ to wash them? Are our feet meant to be anointed these days? Who is our long-haired and extravagant Mary?

Bible Study update - An Apocalyptic Age?

During our evening Bible Study last week, I mentioned the Apocalyptic expectations of 1st Century Christians, who believed that Jesus' return was imminent -- part of a larger cultural, especially Jewish, expectation of the quickly approaching end of the world. I also suggested that I did not think we lived in a particularly apocalyptic age (I would date the most recent such age to the late 1700s to the mid-1800s).

As will happen when I offer such opinions, there was some disagreement. Here is a blog entry posted by Roger Curry last week on his blog (the first part of which is most relevant). Let the discussion continue!

Another Blog

Ok, I can imagine you saying, the pastor got me to look at one blog, but now he wants me to look at another one too. It is true that I have multiple blogs, each for different purposes, but I do not expect you to read all of them (especially given that I don’t seem to have time to update all of them as frequently as I should).

But I thought you might be interested in my other, explicitly religious blog, which I maintain with two other friends, called “A Moment of Prayer.” On this blog, you will simply find short prayers (hopefully updated on a daily basis, but we’re still working out the kinks). I probably won’t mention it often, but I don’t want to be accused of keeping it a secret. I will put in on a list of links on the side of this page.

Click here to go to “A Moment of Prayer.”

Reflections on Worship, March 2

How good it was to worship with so many of you on Sunday morning. And how good to be greeting in the morning with sunshine, instead of grey skies or rain or snow. And how exciting to see so many young people join us.

It goes without saying that it was good to have Brooks with us, sharing so joyously from his talents. He came in over the weekend partially to visit, but mostly to help with the preparations for the upcoming services, especially during Holy Week. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that he’s excited about the services (isn’t Brooks almost always excited?). I’m excited too. I think it will be a meaningful time for us. I hope that you will seriously consider joining us at these services. I think it is important for the church to join Jesus on the Holy Week journey from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday.

Anyway, I am listening to Sunday’s sermon as I’m typing up this entry. Several of you had favorable comments about the sermon, which is heartening; regardless of how I respond to any sermon, the point is to offer spiritual food for everybody in the congregation. And I believe that if I do my job prayerfully and faithfully, this will occur.

If I could have altered Sunday’s sermon, I would have explored the “Godfather” and “God the Father” comparison more. I should confess that this example suddenly came to me as I was getting into bed on Saturday night, so I didn’t have as much time to think it through as I might. (That’s not an excuse, just an explanation.) The comparison, especially concerning repentance, is striking. One is allowed to come to God, hat in hand, for a favor without God expecting anything else. But, after this first step on our faith journeys, how the relationship deepens. And as often as we ask God for favors, God in return asks us for things. Of course, this does not happen as an explicit exchange (‘if you want me to help your sick friend, you will donate an amount of money to the church’). But God reminds us that he has walked with us, has forgiven us, has loved us, and asks that we act according to our recognition of these things: feed my sheep, love one another, love your enemies, forgive each other, etc.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German theologian, wrote a book called The Cost of Discipleship while he was suffering persecution under the Nazis. It is an open question how much “discipleship” costs us. Grace is free; it comes with no strings attached. But God certainly has expectations and hopes for each of us. Well, we can explore that more deeply some other time.