“Which Road Will You Walk?”

This is the message that I gave at Grannie Annie’s Kitchen (Grace UMC, Newburgh) on Saturday, September 21^st for the 18^th Sunday after Pentecost (Year C). The Scriptures for this Sunday were Jeremiah 8: 18 – 9: 2, 1 Timothy 2: 1 – 7, and Luke 16: 1 – 13; I focused primarily on the passage from Jeremiah but used thoughts from the other two readings as well.

If I were to list my favorite things, as a poem I would use Robert Frost’s poem “Two Roads”. It speaks of two roads diverging and the writer having to make a choice as to which road they will walk down. One road is well traveled while it appears that no one has ever traveled down the other one. How often is this choice the one we have to make, of choosing the road that everyone else is traveling or taking a new path, one that has never been tried.

Sometimes you have to take the road every one travels; if you want to get to Beacon from Newburgh, you almost always have to take the Newburgh-Beacon bridge. But that’s not to say that you can’t go down to Bear Mountain and cross over there; or go up to Marlboro and cross over to Poughkeepsie. But it is so much easier to use the Newburgh-Beacon bridge because it is shorter and more familiar.

How much of our life is like that, where we will take the easier path, the shorter path, the one that everyone else takes? Sometimes, it is the best way to go but often times, just because everyone else does it doesn’t necessarily mean that it is the right thing to do.

In preparing these notes, I turned to my prayer guide for some thoughts to help my thinking and writing. I don’t know who James Allen was but in his book, “As A Man Thinketh”, he wrote the following.

The soul attracts that which it secretly harbors; that which it loves, and also that which it fears; it reaches the height of its cherished aspirations; it falls to the level of its unchastened desires, and circumstances are the means by which the soul receives its own.

Every thought-seed sown or allowed to fall into the mind, and to take root there, produces its own, blossoming sooner or later into act, and bearing its own fruitage of opportunity and circumstance. Good thoughts bear good fruit, bad thoughts bad fruit.

The outer world of circumstance shapes itself to the inner world of thought, and both pleasant and unpleasant external conditions are factors which make for the ultimate good of the individual. As the reaper of his own harvest, man learns both by suffering and bliss.

Following the inmost desires, aspirations, thoughts, by which one allows oneself to be dominated (pursuing the will-o’-the-wisps of impure imagining or steadfastly walking the highway of strong and high endeavor), a person at last arrives at their fruition and fulfillment in the outer condition of life.

The laws of growth and adjustment everywhere obtain.

This says to me that we have two choices, one that will lead to the good life and one that will lead elsewhere. Now, this good life is not necessarily that “good” life of the secular road. That’s what leads Jeremiah to cry out over the imminent destruction of his people. They have been chasing the “good” life and now they will reap the penalty.

I go back to something that I have said before but it is always worth repeating, when you come to this place, you leave your baggage behind.

This is a place of renewal, a place to find that one thing that will turn your life around. Last week I spoke of the transition of power that was taking place, of Paul’s retirement (actually, his impending execution) and Timothy taking over the mantle of leadership.

In that portion of the letter that is part of this weekend’s lectionary, Paul continues instructing Timothy on what he is to be doing. Timothy is to continue telling everyone about the Good News, that Jesus Christ came for everyone, not just a few people but for everyone.

He, Timothy, is also to pray for everyone including the leaders of the community so that they make the decisions which will allow each one of us to live the life we are supposed to live.

And that leads me to the other note that I found in my preparation. It is a prayer by Henri Nouwen, a Catholic priest and scholar. It speaks to what we must do, both in prayer and in life. Hear this prayer,

O Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, have mercy on me, a sinner. I am impressed by my own spiritual insights. I probably know more about prayer, meditation, and contemplation than most Christians do. I have read many books about the Christian life, and have even written a few myself. Still, as impressed as I am, I am more impressed by the enormous abyss between my insights and my life.

It seems as if I am standing on one side of a huge canyon and see how I should grow toward you, live in your presence and serve you, but cannot reach the other side of the canyon where you are. I can speak and write, preach and argue about the beauty and goodness of the life I see on the other side, but how, O Lord, can I get there? Sometimes I even have the painful feeling that the closer the vision, the more aware I am of the depth of the canyon.

Am I doomed to die on the wrong side of the abyss? Am I destined to excite others to reach the promised land while remaining unable to enter there myself? Sometimes I feel imprisoned by by own insights and “spiritual competence.” You alone, Lord, can reach out to me and save me. You alone.

I can only keep trying to be faithful, even though I feel faithless most of the time. What else can I do but keep praying to you, even when I feel dark; to keep writing about you, even when I feel numb; to keep speaking in your name, even when I feel alone. Come, Lord Jesus, come. Have mercy on me, a sinner. Amen.

Now, I will be honest. Those words perhaps mean more to me and my own struggle in the faith than they may have meant for you. But if one pauses and thinks about one’s own life, those words, perhaps in a slightly different tone, are words that you might have spoken.

What if you were one of the those whom Jeremiah was crying out about? How would you feel? Would you not wonder where your hope, your salvation might be?

There are a number of instances where Jesus alludes to the abyss, the distance between each one of us and Him. And it is clear that we cannot shrink that distance, no matter how hard we try. But Jesus has the ability to bridge that gap and bring to us that which we seek, if we just reach out to Him.

In those times when we feel alone, or helpless, or powerless, we know that Jesus will be there. We also know that He will be there in the times of plenty and bounty, times when we are apt to ignore Him and think that we did it ourselves.

Each person comes to this point on their own and they must make the decision about what comes next on their own. But each of us, having in someway been there, can help find that path, help each person find Christ in a world that often doesn’t want us to find Him.

We come to a crossroads in life and we must decide which path to take. That is the call we make this morning, “which road will you walk?”

When Life Doesn’t Go As Planned

As Bob writes, you may not be a follower of the Cardinals like Bob and I are but this is something that goes beyond sports.

A Grace-Filled Life

Every one of my readers has been in the situation of things not going as planned. Maybe it was a sweetheart in high school who didn’t see life as we did and went another way. Or a job that didn’t pan out as we expected. Or health concerns rearing their ugly head at the absolutely worst time of our lives. I could go on–the list is endless.

I realize the majority of you don’t care for baseball, especially the St. Louis Cardinals but I am asking you to put that aside for a few minutes and read this story about one of the Cardinals’ player, Jason Motte. Back in spring training this year, Motte injured his elbow and needed season ending surgery.

The shelf life of a professional athlete is very short, so for Motte sitting out this year has been difficult. It could have been the most depressing time…

View original post 299 more words

“Texas On My Mind This Monday Morning”

Yes, I know that there is a song entitled “Georgia on my mind” and I was probably thinking of a version that Willie Nelson sang. But the one that should have come up was the Ray Charles version. And it checking this out I discovered that the original song was written by Hoagy Carmichael and Stuart Gorrell in the 1930s. 

It has been suggested that Gorrell wrote the lyrics for this song with Carmichael’s sister, Georgia, in mind. But the way the song goes, it could easily be about the state of Georgia as well (which is how I have always “heard” it).

What this does though is speak to the issue and the reason for having Texas on my mind this Monday morning.  There are times when what we know is not always the case.

If you don’t know by now, you need to know that I have lived in Texas on two separate occasions in my life. And those times, coupled with growing up in the South, have provided a different view of this country and this world. I just wish that other people had a wider view of the world but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

We tend to see the world in terms of where we are and how we grew up. We figure that things happen the same way everywhere and we don’t realize that is not always the case.

The Texas Board of Education is once again thinking about science textbooks. And this means that members of the board are, once again, looking at the inclusion of creationism and intelligent design in science textbooks (both biology and elementary level).

Now, why should this matter to you, especially if you don’t live in Texas? First, the decisions that the Texas Board of Education makes concerning textbooks affects every public school in the state. And because of the number of books that this represents, publishers tend to follow the decision very closely. This means that decisions concerning textbooks in New York will be affected, influenced, and decided by the decisions made in Texas. So Texas should be on your mind this Monday morning.

I have some other thoughts about what it is that we believe and what we know, both in terms of the Bible, religion, faith and education in general but I will hold onto those thoughts for a while.

Let’s just say that we need to look at the direction our educational process is taking and asking if it is preparing us for tomorrow and the solution of problems that haven’t yet developed. Our educational process does help solve problems but only problems for which we already know the answer. What will we do when we are faced with an entirely new problem, one we have never envisioned or encountered?

“A Reflection Of A Past Life; A Vision Of A Future Life”

This is the message that I presented at Grannie Annie’s Kitchen this morning, Saturday, September 14^th. I am using the Scriptures for the 17^th Sunday after Pentecost (Year C) – Jeremiah 4: 11 – 12, 22 – 28; 1 Timothy 1: 12 – 17; and Luke 15: 1 – 10 – but am focusing on Paul’s words to Timothy.

We served some 93 people this morning. My thanks to the 10 volunteers who helped serve the people and then clean up. Please contact me if you are interested in being a part of this ministry in some way.

I had a choir director a few years ago who was always encouraging us to sing with a little more feeling; so that it meant something to us. This was, to be sure, a departure from the way most of that particular choir had been raised in the Methodist Church. And that in itself was a little unusual because one of the things that early Methodists were known for was their singing.

But over the years that part of Methodism seems to have disappeared. I see this in both the traditional and modern hymns we sing and how we sing. There is no feeling to the song, just some words put forth with a musical accompaniment.

Now, this isn’t necessarily a piece about music or singing but rather about how one feels, whether it be in singing or in everyday tasks. It is about the life that we have and the life that we lead. How do others see us? Do they see us as individuals who struggle with life, very sad, often angry, and certainly not blessed? Or perhaps they see us as people who are able to love, in spite of their present status or troubles, patient in trials, rich in hope, strong in adversity. Can they bear witness to the knowledge that every day God is present in their lives and that He has provided for them as He does for the sparrows in the sky?

John Wesley called this holiness, the act of living a life that displays an active love of God and neighbor that penetrated every part of their life. Those passing by could see the fruit of this holiness.

Now, we need to understand that holiness is not an all or nothing thing. You may have some holiness but you need to continue working on it, otherwise you risk losing what you had. Now, you also have to understand that you cannot gain this holiness by doing good works. Lord knows, Wesley tried and he failed.

I think we know many people who think that they have this holiness, if not because they are doing good things, then because they walk around proclaiming how their lives are blessed, and by contrast, yours is not. That very attitude, which I saw growing up and which I still see today, almost drove me from the church.

That sort of attitude is very closed and not open to life and what we might encounter each day. And a closed life fails to recognize that we need to have an openness to the creativity of life to which God calls us.

But in our move to a truly open society we must be always ready for the surprises that will spring forth, both those that assist in the creative process and those which threaten to destroy the creative process.

We must be aware that there is more to life than just what happens each day. If we are not willing to look for that which is beyond the boundaries of our thought, we can find ourselves quite easily caught in the present, with no hope for the future.

We have to ask ourselves if there is some power that breaks through into our lives and frees us from those forces that would limit what we do and constantly threatens us with destruction?

When we hear of the life of John Wesley, we know that he had developed a method for living, a method for achieving the knowledge that salvation was his. But we also know that this method did not work because it lacked one singular item, the presence of the Holy Spirit.

It would not be until that moment that we have come to Aldersgate that John Wesley would know that one could not work at gaining that feeling; that it came with an open heart and acceptance of the knowledge that Christ was the truth, the way, and the life.

It was that singular sensation of his heart being strangely warmed that told him of the presence of the Holy Spirit and that gave him the ability to take the Methodist Revival to a higher and more successful plane.

I chose the reading from 1 Timothy for this morning because we have Paul telling Timothy that his life had changed because of Jesus. It does not matter what translation of the Bible one reads; Paul points out that his life was pretty worthless before his encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus. And how many of us have a life like that, one full of invective, arrogance, hatred and ignorance? How can we ever expect anything good to come out of a life like that. And yet Paul says that because of God’s grace he was able to be saved.

In the passage that we read today, Paul is passing on to Timothy the mantle of leadership. And each one of us, whether we know it or not, whether we truly understand what lies before us, also receives that same mantle. Each one of us understands and knows in our heart the evil, the sin, and the violence that encompasses this world. And in accepting Christ as our Savior we are able to cast aside, as Paul did, that evil, that sin, that violence and rely on the merciful God who can bring good out of evil.

We are now in a position, as was Paul, to received forgiveness and then be in a position to pass it on to others.

When John Wesley began the Methodist movement, he did so by looking out to world. It was when he took Christ into his heart that his life began to change and the Methodist movement began to change the world.

My challenge to you today is look at where your life is at today. Perhaps you need to bring Christ into your life. Now is the time to do so, to say that I repent, I cast aside all that I once was and begin a new, with Christ in my life.

If you have accepted Christ in your life, then you need to seek ways that will enable your own holiness, your own love of God become more visible.

Without Christ, our lives will always be a reflection of our past; with Christ, we have a new vision for the future. Our challenge will always be to decide what we want to see.

Thinking Outside the Box

As one who works in two areas, I always am on the lookout for papers and thoughts that discuss the idea of “Thinking Outside The Box”. While you may not understand some of the terminology that is used in this paper, you should be able to grasp the significance of what Alison is talking about.
It is interesting that I discovered this paper by accident (though serendipity may be a better word) but some of my research would overlap what she is interested in.

a1tg

I recently had the opportunity to attend a conference that is completely outside of my field of study. I study bioinorganic chemistry and do most of my work on small metalloproteins, so I spend a lot of time thinking about fundamentals like inorganic spectroscopy, biophysics, and biochemistry.  I managed to have some interdisciplinary experiences early on and these likely influenced my choice of a Chemical Biology program over the more traditional programs that I was also admitted to.

This past week I saw some talks at the Goldschmidt, which is one of the largest geochemistry conferences. While there, I spent most of my time at the bio-geochemistry talks, since that’s what’s most interesting to me, and stuff like vulcanism (it’s a thing, I swear) and mantle chemistry is totally out of my reach. I have long had an interest in applying some of my skills to environmental problems and…

View original post 489 more words

Cakes and Quacks: Do Evangelicals Worship Democracy More Than Christ?

This is a very interesting piece to read and then, perhaps more importantly, think about. Dr. T

Mercy not Sacrifice

[Guest-post from fellow Virginia UMC pastor Jason Micheli: please check out his blog Tamed Cynic!]

Trolling the news, two separate but related stories have stuck in my theological craw of late.

Two stories that strike me as adventures in missing the plot. The Gospel plot.

View original post 999 more words

“Where Do We Go From Here?”

A few years ago I wrote a piece entitled “Maybe We Study War More Often” that still remains as the most commented piece on my blog. A few years after I posted it I found out that I was arguing against a bumper sticker and I am still not sure what that infers. But I do know this today, we definitely need to study war more often, if for no other reason than it will help us to know what to do at times like these.

We have failed to understand the lament of Robert E. Lee after the battle of Fredericksburg, “It is well that war is so terrible, lest we grow fond of it.”

Now, I do not consider myself a pacifist or a conscientous objector. But I am adamantly opposed to war, if for no other reason than I have read the words of my grandfather’s diary from World War I and can sense how he felt, know some of the comments my father made about the war in the Pacific and what might have happened, and grew up in the shadow of B-52 bombers on the ready ramp and Titan II missiles ready to roar out of their holes in the ground during the 1950s and 1969s.

But there is something about this culture of ours that seems to feast on war, to send our youth off to foreign lands to be killed, wounded, maimed, and forgotten. And now we are on the verge of declaring war on Syria, if not by words, then by our actions. And it seems like almost everyone, their neighbors, and their friends want this war.

But are we prepared for what will happen? Are we totally prepared to take any sort of offensive action and not expect some sort of response somewhere in this world? Our leaders may say that we are taking out the Syrians’ ability to use chemical weapons but that doesn’t mean that they won’t respond by some other means. You mean to tell me that we know where all the nuclear weapons ever manufactured are and who has them? You mean to tell me that there won’t be some sort of response?

I was only 6 when Freedom Fighters in Hungary sought to overcome the communist dictatorship that ruled their country. It is my undestanding that this country refused to act in aid to those individuals, despite our own anti-communism stance, because we were afraid that the Soviet Union might just possibly use nuclear weapons.

All you have to do is go back and look at either “Thirteen Days” or “The Missiles of October, part 1″ and “The Missiles of October, part 2”; you decide if the world would still be here today if we had taken out the Russian missiles in Cuba as the military had suggested.

We keep thinking we are pushing the envelope but we may very well be pushing a balloon and sooner or later that balloon will burst. Then what will we do?

And you know something else, whatever we do, no matter how good our intentions are, we will be at least two years late in dealing with this problem. We should have done something two years ago before the civil war in Syria got to the point it is at today.

Yes, I know that it is a civil war but it was started in the fires of the Arab Spring that brought democracy to Tunisia and Egypt. We should have provided assistance then; instead we let the people of Syria suffer while their brothers and sisters fight for their freedom.

I am not arguing for intervention then nor now but I am saying that we should have been doing things that would have kept this day from arriving.

And if we don’t radically change our thinking now, we might find that there will never be any chance to do anything at all.

Let’s face it; we spend more money on war and destruction than we do on peace and construction. And as long as we do that, we will never be in a position where we can offer a path to peace.

I don’t want this country to go to war, be it deemed legal or not. But if we do go to war, then we had better be prepared for the consequences of this act. I am afraid that the dogs of war are barking so loud that one cannot hear the soft cooing of the doves of peace.

And while we prepare to go to war, we must also prepare to place a world of peace in its place. We cannot afford to keep going to war every few years just to satisfy our urge to settle differences violently. Each time we do this, we diminish the chance for true and lasting peace.

So I ask, “where do we go from here?”

“Guess Who’s Coming To Breakfast?”

This is the message that I am giving at Fort Montgomery United Methodist Church in Fort Montgomery, NY this Sunday, the 15^th Sunday after Pentecost, September 1^st. The Scriptures for this Sunday are Jeremiah 2: 4 – 13; Hebrews 13: 1 – 8, 15 – 16; and Luke 14: 1, 7 – 14. The service begins at 9:30 and you are welcome to come on in.

Some years ago (a senior phrase for I can’t remember when) the comedian, actor, musician, and entrepreneur Steve Allen created what some called the “ultimate talk show”. Fortunately, if one does remember certain aspects of something, it is likely that one will find what they are looking for somewhere on the Internet.

Presented on PBS, The Meeting of Minds featured guests who played important roles in history. Guests included Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, Queen Cleopatra of Egypt, Marie Antoinette, Florence Nightingale, Thomas Paine, Frances Bacon, Thomas Jefferson, Voltaire, Charles Darwin, Theodore Roosevelt, Ulysses S. Grant, Thomas More, Karl Marx, Galileo Galilei, and Attila the Hun. Characters from Shakespeare’s plays were the guests on one show.

Allen noted that he felt that putting the greatest figures of all time together and have them interact with each other provided an interesting way to understand the world around us today and to prepare us for tomorrow. (notes from “Meeting of Minds”)

Along those lines, when I first began blogging, I was asked in an on-line interview to identify my “spiritual heroes”.

I listed Peter, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Dr. Meredith Eller (one of my college professors), and Clarence Jordan and gave a brief explanation of why I chose those four individuals. Bonhoeffer, Eller, and Jordan were chosen because of the impact their lives had on my own life. And while I was thinking of the impact their lives had on my life in the secular world, I quickly found that it was very difficult to separate the secular world from the spiritual world. And what each of these individuals meant to my spiritual life is perhaps one of the reasons why I am where I am on this journey with Christ today.

The choice of Peter as a spiritual hero probably had to do more with what I thought we had in common from reading about him. If I were to prepare this list today and keep one of the twelve disciples on it, I would probably pick Nathaniel Bartholomew. It isn’t that Peter has dropped off the list but I find that at this time of my life I perhaps have more in common with Nathaniel than the other disciples.

Nathaniel Bartholomew was said to be the scholar of the group. Tradition has it that he went to Georgia with Thomas on his mission trip after Pentecost. While the Georgia that Nathaniel and Thomas traveled to is not the Georgia in my own life, it offers a connection, both in terms of spiritual heroes and in terms of Methodism, that is so much a part of my life today (adapted from “Who Will Be The One?”).

Along that train of thought, if I were to have a series of these meetings, much in the manner of Steve Allen’s work, I would have dinner with Isaac Newton, Joseph Priestley, and Robert Boyle. The choice of these three individuals is in part because of my own background in chemistry, physics, and mathematics.

I would hope that you know who Isaac Newton was and that your memory of high school chemistry hasn’t faded to the point where you have forgotten that Joseph Priestley was the co-discoverer of oxygen and Robert Boyle is considered the father of modern chemistry. It would be nice to have these three gentleman at dinner so that we could discuss many things and perhaps Newton could help me with that calculus problem that has bothered me all these years.

But any discussion with these three individuals would be more than simply a discussion of chemistry, physics, and mathematics; it would also be a discussion of God, Christ, and religion. While many individuals know of the scientific background of Newton, Boyle, and Priestley, very few are aware of their religious backgrounds.

Newton was required to take a religious position upon graduation with each of his three degrees but was able to get an exemption from that requirement. Boyle’s early writings were more of what we would call religious tracts rather than chemistry research notes. Priestley was a Dissenter, one whose beliefs differed from the orthodox view of the Church of England. His views about the nature of God would ultimately lead to his departure from England and move to America. Each of these individuals saw God as a part of their own life and the reason for their research; it was and continues to be a statement radically different from the views of many concerning science and faith in today’s society.

I would also invite the former Governor of Texas, Ann Richards, and my favorite political writer, Molly Ivins, to have dinner with my wife, Ann, and I. To understand who these ladies were and why I would invite them to dinner I need to retell a story that Molly Ivins wrote about Governor Richards and that I posted on my blog in “Three Women of Texas”.

At a long-ago political do at Scholz Garten in Austin, everybody who was anybody was there meetin’ and greetin’ at a furious pace. A group of us got tired feet and went to lean our butts against a table at the back wall of the bar. Perched like birds in a row were Bob Bullock, then state comptroller; moi; Charles Miles, the head of Bullock’s personnel department; and Ms. Ann Richards. Bullock, 20 years in Texas politics, knew every sorry, no good sumbitch in the entire state. Some old racist judge from East Texas came up to him: “Bob, my boy, how are you?”

Bullock said, “Judge, I’d like you to meet my friends: This is Molly Ivins with the Texas Observer.”

The judge peered up at me and said, “How yew, little lady?”

Bullock, “And this is Charles Miles, the head of my personnel department.” Miles, who is black, stuck out his hand, and the judge got an expression on his face as though he had just stepped into a fresh cowpie. He reached out and touched Charlie’s palm with one finger, while turning eagerly to the pretty, blond, blue-eyed Ann Richards. “And who is this lovely lady?”

Ann beamed and replied, “I am Mrs. Miles.”

I trust that you understand the humor and irony of this story. I grew up in the South during that period of time when the color of your skin was the determinate factor in one’s acceptance in society and it was very easy to understand that judge and his behavior. But I also understood Ann Richard’s sense of irony and her ability to put ignorance in its place.

Perhaps you have wandered into some meeting and received a similar greeting as the one given by the judge in my little story. And while I hope that it has never happened to you, I know of too many situations where a visitor to a church has, in fact, encountered a similar greeting. And I would hope that if you were the witness to such a greeting, your response would be as much like Ann Richards as it might be for Christ to greet someone lost.

Now, the term for all of this is “Radical Hospitality”, one of the five fruitful practices of a vital and viable church (see “Five Practices with Robert Schnase”.

Robert Schnase provides two definitions for this idea, the first that focuses on the congregation; the second which focuses on the individual.

Congregations that practice Radical Hospitality demonstrate an active desire to invite, welcome, receive, and care for those who are strangers so that they find a spiritual home and discover for themselves the unending richness of life in Christ. Radical describes that which is drastically different from ordinary practices, outside the normal, that which exceeds expectations and goes the second mile.

In our personal walk with Christ, radical hospitality begins with an extraordinary receptivity to the grace of God. In distinctive and personal ways, we invite God into our hearts and make space for God in our lives. We say Yes to God and open ourselves to the spiritual life. We accept God’s love and acceptance of us. We receive God’s love and offer it to others.

Now, radical hospitality is not really a new idea. After all, what did Jesus say to the 72 he sent out on that first mission trip? And did the early circuit riders, including the many who traversed this part of the Hudson Valley some two hundred and fifty years go, make it from charge to charge? If it were not for the hospitality of the churches and the individuals who welcomed those 72 and the early circuit riders, the chances are the church would have died a long time ago.

And, as noted in the reading from Hebrews for today, how many times did someone unknowingly feed one of God’s Angels? How many times did one of the early followers of Jesus in those early post-Easter days greet a stranger and tell them the story, only to find out it was Jesus they were talking with?

But it would seem today that hospitality is, in itself, a radical notion; something that should never be tried. We have regressed from the idea that anyone may enter into God’s House to the notion that the sanctuary is a place for only a privileged few. And while we may think that this is acceptable, we ignore the words of the prophets, such as Jeremiah, who warned the people that in doing so they were deserting God.

Dan Dick started one of his blogs a couple of years ago with a note about a conversation he had recently.

I was talking with a small group of young adults about the potential of the church to transform the world. My argument was simple: if we would strive to find a meaningful way to engage 7 million plus United Methodists in the United States in some form of life-affirming missional service, we could impact the very roots of a wide variety of social ills. Snorting coffee, one young woman barked derisively, “Are you serious?” I confirmed that I was, and she replied, “The churches I have been to are some of the most inward-focused, uninvolved, cautious, conservative, and apathetic groups I have ever known. Sure, there are a few individuals in the churches who get their hands dirty, but very few. (Adapted from http://doroteos2.wordpress.com/2011/02/18/are-you-serious/) – I first used this in “A New Set of Guidelines”

Despite having the advantage of knowing what happened to the people of Israel, despite hearing the words of the Old Testament prophets warn against turning from God, we go out and do the same things over again and 1) we don’t even see what we are doing and 2) we wonder where we are going wrong!

At least today we are aware that we are in trouble but no matter how hard we try we can’t find a solution because we don’t know what the problem is.

So how do we do that today? How can we, how should we show the love of Christ in a world where hospitality is often times a forgotten word? How do we engage in radical hospitality when the thought of many people is to not let people in? Maybe we need to step back and reflect on how we got here.

Let us go back to Jesus telling the people to open the doors of the banquet hall and invite all who can come to come, even if they are unable to repay the host (and I can hear almost every finance chair across the country cringing in their sears at that thought). Let us remember the hospitality shown by the early post-Easter church, even when to openly declare your faith probably meant persecution, arrest, trial, and execution.

Let us remember that we are the inheritors of a movement that gathered in the homes of believers and invited not just believers but non-believers to be a part of their community. Let us also remember that we are also the inheritors of a movement that faced intense opposition and persecution, and I am not necessarily speaking of the early, post-Easter Christians.

Methodism here in America was often marked by the clergy of other denominations denouncing Methodist preachers for “preaching delusions,” “working to deceive others,” spouting heretical doctrines,” and “promoting wild singularities”. These “wild singularities” included dramatic preaching, exuberant worship, and weekly class meetings where members shared their inner most selves.

Also, in the 17^th and 18^th centuries, many of the states supported established churches and these entrenched denominations did not welcome new religious groups. In some places, it was against the law for non-established religious groups to hold services. (adapted from The Heritage of American Methodism, Kenneth Cain Kingham)

Isn’t it nice to know that once we were the rebels, called by Christ to preach the Gospel wherever and whenever? Isn’t it frightening to know that we are know like everyone else?

How was it that this church and all other churches in this area along the roads that parallel the Hudson River came into being? At a time when the people cried out for the Gospel, when the people cried out for spiritual freedom as much as political freedom, the early Methodist circuit came bringing the Good News.

But where, if they could not meet in established churches, could they meet? What was it that the writer of Hebrews told those who received that letter?

So let’s go outside, where Jesus is, where the action is—not trying to be privileged insiders, but taking our share in the abuse of Jesus. This “insider world” is not our home. We have our eyes peeled for the City about to come.

It’s easy to see that they took the heed of the Hebrews and meet outside the confines of the regular church.

We need to recapture that spirit, if for no other reason that it will help people understand why we are Methodists. It was at those gatherings that we began to understand why we are called Methodists. To gather at one’s home was often times the only way they could worship.

But I think it is important that we do more than simply meet in other people’s homes, much in the manner of the early Methodist classes. I think that is important because if we do is transfer the church from the church building to someone’s house then we do nothing that solves the problems that we face. We must find ways to do church outside the framework of “normal” church.

In the vernacular of today, how can we “do” church without “doing” church? The one thing I cannot do on a single Sunday morning as the guest of the congregation is tell you how to do this. You know more about what you have, what skills and capabilities you have and where to draw your resources from; all you have to do is look. The question then become what ideas can you draw from to decide what it is that you all can do. I can say, as I said last week, that one should take the Spiritual Gifts course offered by the NY/CT District. This course will give you some idea of what your gifts are and what you can do to utilize those gifts.

How can I see church outside the church? We are so used to church on Sunday we forget the role the church played in communities the rest of the week. And with so many other groups grabbing Sunday time for their events, maybe we should take some other time to offer people that all too critical moment away from the secular world.

We must ask ourselves today how we can be witnesses to the crucified servant Lord. Our answer must be rooted in knowing that we are to be with him in the midst of the world’s needs, by His grace seeking to be the signs of his ultimate fulfillment and not the bringers of that fulfillment. In doing so we free ourselves from the conformity of the world’s self-assertive way and transformed into the way and manner Christ assumed in his ministry for us.

I used this quote from Will Cotton, the Senior Pastor at St. Barnabas UMC in Arlington, Texas, and the pastor whose words and actions were instrumental in my beginning this part of my own personal journey with Christ last week but they bear repeating today. He wrote that he sees a different ministry for the church in the coming years.

The 21st century (for at least the rest of our lifetimes) in ministry will not be primarily about the local church. Churches and denominations will be wise to train people for ministry in secular situations. The gospel is returning to the streets, the marketplace, the classrooms, the chat rooms, the homes and even the bars. My job description has shifted in response to the leading of the Spirit. I am not just a performer of ministry; I am a leverage person, equipping people for ministry in places I will never be able to go. I used to lead Bible Studies with up to 80 people in them and they were enjoyed. But two years ago, I moved to more intensive studies that prepare leaders who then start classes, small groups, and even lead “in the marketplace” studies and support groups. My favorite book on this shift is Missional Renaissance by Reggie McNeal. My two CLMs came out of those classes. If I train 15-20 people (which I do at near seminary level with some texts actually from Course of Study for local pastors) and they lead groups of even 10 people, then the yield is three times what I was doing in the large studies before. The Church you and I are a part of will be so different in just 20 years from now, and the truth is, no one knows what it will look like (nearly every Bishop worth his or her consecration will tell you that). But the shift from church-centered ministry to community-centered ministry is part of it.

The church today, wherever it may be located, on a country road somewhere, in the suburbs of a city, or even on a street corner in the city, can no longer just be a Sunday only operation. It has to be, quite literally, a 24/7 operation. It can no longer be the repository of holy relics; it has to be the source for all who seek answers. It has to be a fulfillment of the Gospel message to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, lift up the downtrodden, and bring hope to the lost and weary. (from “Thinking Outside The Box”)

So, let me invite you to be a part of Grannie Annie’s Kitchen on Saturday mornings at Grace UMC in Newburgh. Come and be a part of the worship that we offer every Saturday morning and come and be a part of a community of sixty to seventy souls that gathered for the breakfast Ann has prepared.

This is not an invitation to come and work, though that would be nice. But I also think that to just come and sit with those who have come would be just as nice. We open the doors to the community at 8 and begin our brief worship service at about 8:10 – this Saturday Pastor Jeff will lead the worship and offer communion; Lay servants in the district have the chance to lead the worship on the other Saturdays of the month; call me if you are interested in that aspect).

And maybe, as you sit in a different setting but experience the presence of the Holy Spirit, which I truly believe is present at that time each Saturday, an idea will come into your mind about what you can do.

We did not set out to change the world when we began Grannie Annie’s Kitchen, only offer a decent and nutritious meal to who all who came.

But in the Spirit of those who offered meals to the weary travelers of the Old Testament, in the Spirit of those who offered meals as part of the worship, so we have begun opening the doors to God’s Kingdom just a bit wider.

So I will hope you will accept this invitation, just as I hope that you will accept the invitation that Jesus gave to you when he told the host to open the doors of the banquet hall. And I hope that you will then let the Holy Spirit come into your heart and mind and soul and empower you to invite others to be a part of that wonderful banquet found in God’s Kingdom.