Foolishness: 1 Corinthians 1

In Summary:

1 Corinthians opens with the standard greeting of a letter from the Apostle Paul. He tells who he is with (Sosthenes) and who he is writing to. In this case, that is the “church of God that is in Corinth.” He further specifies that this church is made up of those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be saints. 

He then expresses the blessing/greeting of “grace and peace” from God. From there, Paul reflects on his initial involvement with the Corinthian people and the beginning of the church. After that, though, there are problems to deal with and Paul is not hesitant to address them. He begins by addressing the division within the church. Apparently, the church had split into factions, some of which were drawn to various personalities who had led the church in times past. There is no firm evidence, or even a suggestion, that Paul, Cephas, Apollos, or anyone else had asked for a faction in their name. Further, the “I follow Christ” faction may not have been any less divisive than the others—just as today there are some who would exalt the “red-letters” of Scripture against the rest of God’s Word.

Paul addresses this, first by distancing himself from the faction and second by pointing to the true unification of the church: the Cross of Christ. 1 Corinthians 1 highlights that the community of Jesus, the Christian church, is not based on earthly wisdom or high birth. It is unified around a foolish thing, an unwise moment—the God who chose to die.

In Focus:

1 Corinthians 1:18 draws our attention for this installment. Take a look at the grand contrast surrounding the Cross: depending on where one stands with God, it is either foolishness or the great demonstration of the power of God. Christianity, with its message of surrender and a God who died, was not really an easy to market idea in the Roman world. After all, this was an empire of power and dominance. The gods that most people served were gods of heritage or convenience, whereas what Paul and his fellow Christians preached was that there was one God to worship and serve, and one God who also loved enough to die for all people.

That sounded foolish. Compared to gaining wisdom or living a stoic life, it does not seem like a great idea. And with the deferral of pleasure in exchange for sacrifice and devotion, it was not going to pass muster over many of the live-for-the-moment ideas that were in vogue.

Except that, to Paul and the Christians, it was more than just a life-altering idea. It was a life-saving evidence of the power of God. The Cross is the evidence that God in His power has not abandoned His love, and that He will save us from that the greatest danger we have: His own justice. It does not always make sense.

That does not make it untrue.

In Practice:

Here in the practical section is where I should tell you that we do not have to be wise or anything else in the world’s eyes. There’s some truth to that. But then again, we tend to get carried away and not bother with logic or learning….and then it makes it hard to show the love of God because we have not loved people enough to communicate with them.

First, though, the basic truth: Christianity does not make sense when compared to other belief systems. If you do it right, then you come closest to living and speaking like one who was perfect and did no one any wrong, and was killed for it. That is the direction in which our lives should be oriented: we are aimed toward sacrifice. Not toward achieving for ourselves. Nor does it work as a means to a different end but that—you cannot fake self-sacrifice for your own benefit. People will fall for it. God will not.

Second, though, consider this: Christianity does not have to fit the mold of the current trends of philosophy. In fact, it shouldn’t. There are bases of evidence and internal consistency that should be clear. 

Now, remember this, though: we’re talking about foolishness in the eyes of world philosophy. Not foolishness as in does clearly dumb things and then expects no consequences. For example, the Cross is foolishness to the world but truly the power of God. That does not equal “we don’t need doctors we have God’s power” or “we don’t need education, we have the Bible only.” This is the hinge of our beliefs: the Cross and the Empty Tomb.

Because the Cross is the power of God because Jesus did not stay dead.

In Nerdiness:

I’m going to be a lazy nerd and not deal with the authorship question. It says “Paul.” I’ll take Paul. 

I would advise you to look at Ben Witherington’s A Week in the Life of Corinth historical fiction novel.

The main nerd point: 1 Corinthians 1:2. “Called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ….”(ESV, mainly). Paul’s statement here highlights that there is a local church but also the church which expands to include all who call upon Jesus.

And then there’s the local church question: one per town? Perhaps so. New Testament descriptions seem to deal with the church of a city or the church of the whole world, with little regard for national boundaries. Just some food for thought.

Sermon Recap for February 19 2017

Good morning! Here are the sermons from this past Sunday:

 

Sunday morning (Audio download is here)

 

Note that I don’t really consider what I said Sunday Evening as a sermon—no real text.

Sunday Evening (Audio Download Here)

Just like always

Kevin Costner has made three baseball movies. Field of Dreams is good. Of course, James Earl Jones plays the Wise Old Man in the film. It’s hard for not to be good. I haven’t seen Bull Durham in ages. At least a couple of decades, and I wasn’t paying great attention at the time. His third one has stuck with me, though—better than “If you build it, he will come…” (Spoiler alert: it’s about playing catch with Ghost Dad.)

The third one is a bit less mystical. For the Love of the Game came out in 1999, and one night Ann and I rented it on VHS. We’ll talk about VHS later, Internet generation. Costner plays Billy Chapel, a 40-year-old pitcher for the Detroit Tigers. There’s a great story there, and I just spent 25 minutes skipping through a YouTube upload of it, but I won’t link it because it’s probably a copyright violation. I don’t remember how family-friendly the film is—but it’s not a kid movie. (Want a kid baseball movie? The Rookie, with Dennis Quaid. Watch the deleted scenes on the DVD. Or Blu-ray.)

Costner’s character, Chapel, has a habit for dealing with the crowd noise. Since he’s the visiting pitcher in Yankee Stadium, the viewer sees it several times and the filmmakers worked well to demonstrate the idea. You start with the noise, and the stadium goers are all in-focus. You can see them, hear them, and discern them. Then you hear Costner’s voiceover of the thought “Clear the mechanism.” At that point, the stadium is blurry, the crowd goes silent, and all you can hear is…nothing. Maybe the catcher. But that’s it. It’s his way of focusing, his mental trick. After a 19-year career, he’s used it and it works. You see it enough times to realize it’s probably something for every inning.

But somewhere around the seventh inning, the scene runs differently. I couldn’t find it in the YouTube to remember exactly where it is, but Chapel’s facing a batter, the crowd noise is growing, and you hear his voiceover, “Clear the mechanism…”

And it doesn’t work.

Being human, he does what ever human does: he tries it again. Automatically.

It does not work.

At this point, the viewer fears for Chapel’s impending perfect game. (If the viewer hates baseball movies, the viewer has moved on and didn’t get this far.) Can he control himself?

Chapel then mutters to himself, “Ok, then throw the ball over the plate, just like always.” (Note: quote isn’t precise because I couldn’t find it to transcribe perfectly.)

So, that’s what he does. Even with the noise that is leaking through his filter. Even with the pain in his arm. Even with the age and the worries and all the other stuff (like the flashbacks to his relationship with Kelly Preston) in his head, he reminds himself: just throw the ball. It’s what you do. Throw it.

Now, “spoiler alert” for a twenty-year-old movie that you weren’t renting this weekend anyway: Chapel goes on to throw a perfect game. He sucks it up, throws it over the plate with the noise, and makes it work.

Why tell you this? Why drag you through 500 words of Kevin Costner backstory for a blogpost?

To make this observation: sometimes, there’s not the inspiration that you want to have. Sometimes, there are noises and chaoses and focus issues and they all keep you from locking in to what you need to do. It happens. At least it happens to me.

I don’t always have great ideas to write, teach, and preach. (I may *never* have great ideas, but that’s another post.) And there are times I just don’t feel like it. I made a joke yesterday morning before church about how I got up and thought about going fishing…then I picked up the bass guitar and made a bass joke :)

But those days hit. Some preachers are perfect and never have those days. I’m not one.

Some days, I have to step up to the mound and throw the ball over the plate, just like I always do. And then trust that the results will work themselves out. Not because my effort doesn’t matter. Not because I can be derelict in preparation—keep in mind that our pitcher did his usual workout, preparation, and warm-up routine to prepare.

But because sometimes, the responsibility to do it must override the feelings of the moment. In a baseball game, there has to be a pitcher—and sometimes, a worn-down, imperfect pitcher is what you’ve got.

In life, we have those things that are on us. I have things that are on me—now, throw in the expected pious-sounding caveats about “with God’s help”—and that have to be done. Step up, and do yours. Throw the ball over the plate, just like every other time.

And then, that’s often when we actually see the work of God come through. Moses’ staff doesn’t change until he throws it. Lazarus isn’t raised until they move the stone. God can work without human help, but so often, He chooses not to do when His people are lazy, or when His people are strong enough to take credit for it.

Go out there, give it that one more shove, and do it again—if it is what you are commanded by God to be doing, do it one more time. And see the thing through to the end.

Book: Getting to “Yes, and…”

Well, this one’s a bit different from the usual fare of Bible materials and such. I’m working on broadening my horizons. Bob Kulhan’s book definitely stretched my thought processes. One thing we don’t do well in established churches is improv. Whether you leave it like that or add an “e.”

Here’s what today’s book looks like: (Picture is linked to the author’s webpage for his book.)

This probably isn’t the first think Bob Kulhan had in mind when he wrote Getting to “Yes And”, but here’s my first response: this book demonstrates exactly what we have lost in the general education of America as we set aside the arts for budgetary concerns. Seriously, you are working through an entire book written by actor/comedian about how to apply the same tools from drama/comedy improv to your business and see how things change and improve. If we would have been teaching and encouraging arts all along, the need would be very different.

However, somehow we lost sight of the idea that preparing people for life was about more than just comma splices and times tables. We misplaced the idea of stretching our minds.

This is where Getting to “Yes And” comes into play. Bob Kulhan has primarily been an improv comedy actor, but in recent years has worked to apply those skills in helping train business people to think outside the written plan. This book is an attempt to distill what many seminars and training sessions have taught.

First, of course, a comment or two about the book itself. The writing style is clear and organized. Since one tends to think of improv as jumping around a bit, it was good to see that Kulhan followed logical lines of thought in presenting his views. The nine primary chapters build well on each other. It is unfortunate that the publisher (Stanford Business Books) put the notes as endnotes instead of footnotes—there weren’t many and it would be better to have them accessible.

Overall, though, the writing style is easy enough to read without making one feel dumb while reading it. Somehow, too many books that aim for “accessible” use it as cover for “dumb.” Now, there are some classic business clichés present in the writing. For example, the old saw of “How do eat an elephant?” makes an appearance, as do a few others. The thing about such phrasings, though, is that they make the point.

Second, content. After all, content matters—grammar and writing style only pave the way for good content, they don’t replace it. Kulhan shares various stories of how he has worked with businesses to work improv sessions into corporate training. Especially helpful are the ideas about breaking through when structures get too siloed and the isolation is choking the business.

The opening content lays the groundwork of using improv for self-improvement. That’s a key component and increases the value for individual readers. After all, your boss may hate these ideas—and has a responsibility to make sure they are valuable before the business heavily invests them—so you will need to work out how much help you find first.

In all, this isn’t a light and funny book, though looking at Kulhan’s website shows he can be light and funny. It’s a good introduction to shaking things up in your mind, so that you can get more work done.

Practical points are included, as are tips for dealing with those who object and refuse to try. I like it.

Book provided in exchange for the review. And, yes, I would never have read it otherwise.

Moving forward to another thought process:

How does this relate to church/ministry world? We tend to adopt business practices without thinking through them, but here are some thoughts:

1. “Yes, and…” is the key here. We usually respond to new ideas with “no” or “yes, but…” and these two answers are practically the same. They are ways to shut down an idea. “Yes, and…” embraces a good idea and then suggests taking that energy forward to another problem at hand.

For example, we need to deal with handicapped accessibility at our church. We need to install an elevator, which is expensive. But the issue is this: we want to reach all kinds of people, so we spend money on outreach—yes! and, “all kinds of people” includes folks who cannot navigate stairs, so we see this as outreach work. Not just building code work.

But…what if nobody needs it? Then we ought to redouble our efforts to reach all kinds of people, including doing special work to reach those who will use an elevator…and whoever else we can find.

See, it builds.

2. Silos—this is what most churches are. There’s a nursery silo, a children’s department silo, a youth silo, a music silo, a men’s silo, a women’s silo, and so forth…and the typical response is that everybody needs a silo.

But then the farm stumbles. What happens when the women’s silo needs more space because somehow, the harvest is currently women? Think around it, build around it. What about when there’s a silo that you don’t really see long-term growth in, but it holds some valuable folks? They like this one thing…well, how do we spread that enthusiasm?

It’s a good plan to consider and spread the ideas across the whole farm.

Misplaced Weeks

Well, it’s been one of those weeks around here. First this went wrong, then that went wrong.

And then Angie’s cat went up a tree and wouldn’t come down. I couldn’t make the 30-40 feet necessary to get her down. So, every time we went outside, we heard her. Wailing. Sad, pitiful, hungry. We were trying to figure out what the best solution was. Naturally, that led to some lousy advice—no, you have never seen a cat skeleton in a tree. That’s true. When they start to get low on nourishment, they have seizures, fall out, and die on the ground. Yes, some things are funny when in normal times and not funny when a child is greatly bothered by what is happening.

After all, there’s a time and a place for everything. Face-to-face with a crying child isn’t that place. Anyway, the cat came down. Thanks to a tree service, that is. I greatly appreciated their work. The dumb fuzzball had gotten herself out on a branch she couldn’t get back from. As a result, she needed help.

Which, like any good preacher, I’m now finding as an illustration for all sorts of things.

One of them is time and schedule management. Sometimes I get out on a limb and then it’s hard to come back. I chase something too far to be able to get back to normal. That’s been part of this week.

What do we do?

First, we can get help. I’m not sure where that comes from in some cases. As a Christian believer, of course the answer is “God” but how does God work that out for us? That’s the bigger question. I’m reading up on time management principles and concepts, but one thing remains the same: it only helps if you don’t overrun the plan. Don’t get too far out on that limb.

Second, listen to the encouragers. Flufftail (aka Szechuan the Cat) got spooked while she was in the tree. There were several opportunities she could have taken to get down and she was being called to by people who loved her…but the gap was too much to overcome in her mind.

What do we focus on? The obstacles? Or the people who love us?

There are times that we misplace weeks and things go wrong. That’s unavoidable. What you do with it next is what matters the most.

So, you misplaced one. Get it together and pick up the next one.

Sermon Recap for February 12

The best-laid plans of mice and men are usually derailed by cheese. It's been a week that needed to be cheddar, or at least more gouda. I've felt creamed, shredded, grated, and cubed. Anyway, without any further ado, here are the sermon recaps from Sunday.

Here is what you'll find: after each sermon title, there's an "audio" link that allows you to play or download that sermon's audio file. Then there should be an embedded Youtube Link to the sermon.

If you'd like, you can subscribe to the audio feed here: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/east-end-baptist-church/id387911457?mt=2 for iTunes users. Other audio feeds go here: http://www.eebcar.com/sermons/feed

The video is linked on the East End Baptist Church web page here: http://www.eebcar.com/sermons-2/ or on my personal Youtube Page here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCJBGluSoaJgYn6PbIklwKaw?view_as=public

Thanks!

Morning Sermon: Matthew 22:1-14 (Audio here)

Evening Sermon: Matthew 22:15-16 (audio here)

Morning Outline:

The Generous King

The Invitation Mandate

The Judgment

Those who escape destruction

Those who defy salvation

Why?

Painful Obedience: Joshua 5

In Summary:

Joshua 5 opens with the people of Israel in the Promised Land. That’s a great start. Even better is the news that the kings of the Amorites and Canaanites are terrified by the work of God in the life of Israel. I like the imagery of Joshua 5:1 of melted hearts and breath taken away. 

Then, things get hairy for Joshua and the Israelites. Apparently, in the 40 years they have wandered in the wilderness, no one has observed the ceremonial rule of circumcision. This is a logical oversight: the wilderness era involved many pack-up and move outs, and there may not have been a healthy way to accomplish the circumcision of newborns. Or, perhaps, the generation that headed off to die in the wilderness (Numbers 14) was rebellious and simply refused. The text does not answer that question, because it is less important the reality. Why the men are uncircumcised is irrelevant. That they are uncircumcised must be addressed.

So, there in the shadows of Jericho, Joshua has flint knives made and the men of Israel are circumcised. Any man under forty goes through this painful observance. That would include, basically, the whole army. God highlights that this takes away the reproach of Egypt—the people are again marked as the covenant people of God (Joshua 5:9).

It is now recovery time for the Israelites. After all, that hurt…

In Focus:

This is not the only part of the obedience that hurts in this chapter. While the circumcision experience certainly hit the men, they would recover from it in a few days. Further, since the people of the land were terrified of the God who could hold back the Jordan River, there was little risk during that recovery time.

Instead, look on down in the chapter to Joshua 5:11. The people of Israel, after celebrating the first Passover in the Promised Land, eat some of the grain and other produce of the land. And at that point, the manna stops. No longer does God provide a day’s ration to be picked up. Instead, the people must live off the land. 

Which means work. They must till, plant, and grow what they will eat. True, they will eat captured food for a time—except for the cities that are totally destroyed. 

In Practice:

In our every day lives, there are fewer things we do not think about more than circumcision. That we do not consider this as a religious practice is based in the New Testament, though there are debates going forward about the medical practice. I have no interest in that discussion here.

Instead, let us consider a few factors:

1. As stated, the Israelites were living in sin by not fully obeying the covenant of God. They were not circumcising the boys. The important point was to recover obedience rather than fix blame. This is generally true for us today: recover obedience first. Fix blame only if necessary. This carries a necessary caveat: if the disobedience involves victimization of individuals, then proper consequences must follow. That is a different case.

But let us take as an example a church’s approach to youth ministry. Many churches have slid into a youth-ministry-as-entertainment approach. That’s sinful. It is far less important how or when you got there than it is to get out of there quickly. The work of the church is to proclaim the Gospel. 

Now, generally, any time you pull a ministry that has been fun back toward a focus, people get angry. People leave. Growth stifles for a time. Guess what? Obedience has consequences. 

2. Then, there was the need to personally correct the sinful situation. You have a stake in your own sin. Do what God commands to fix it. It may be difficult, but obedience has consequences.

3. Finally, the Israelites took in the blessing of being in the Land, but that resulted in a change in God’s provision. They could not live on the manna forever, but that did not make it any easier. Obedience, though, has consequences.

Those consequences may be personally painful or somewhat risky. They may result in more work in the long run. But if we do not take on the painful obedience today, then the long-range effects are devastating.

In Nerdiness: 

First, I left off Joshua 5:13-14 on purpose. I think they fit better with Joshua 6 and they tend to draw the most discussion on this chapter.

2. I find the implications of Joshua 5:1 interesting. It appears that the people of the area were more aware of what God could do than the Israelites were at times. However, given traditional religions, it’s possible that the Canaanites still misunderstood the nature of God and assumed a capricious and unpredictable deity rather than who God truly is. But their fear was well-grounded just the same.