a new spiritual year begins

Today is very exciting. Why? Because we're moving from Year A to Year B on the Revised Common Lectionary Calendar! "Wow, you say . . . What's so exciting about that?" It's exciting because a whole new year is in front of us. "But isn't that what happens New Year's Eve?" Well. . . yes, if you are basing your life on the milestones of the secular calendar? "But why pay attention to any other calendar?" Because it brings a spiritual rhythm to life that infuses each moment of each secular day with divine significance.

The Revised Common Lectionary (RCL) is based on a 3-year cycle (Years A, B, and C). One of the distinctives of each of the 3 years is the variation in Old Testament readings during the normal (non-holiday) parts of the spiritual year. Year A focuses on the Exodus narratives; Year B on the Monarchial narratives; and Year C on the Prophets. For more information on the RCL see the FAQ page.

Personally, I find it tremendously challenging and exciting to be part of a larger community that is reading and responding to the Scriptures together. This is what the RCL offers us.

In addition to entering a new spiritual year, we've entered a new spiritual season, having just transitioned from Ordinary Time (the Season of Nurture and Growth) to Advent (the Season of Expectation). I am expecting God to do great things in my life and in yours in this new spiritual year and season.

Are you longing for something more than the secular rhythm of Black Friday (today), Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Eve, punctuated by mind-numbing commutes? May this new church year and new spiritual season be a call for us to commit ourselves anew to being the church (the people of God committed to the way of Jesus) in the world (God's marvelous creation suffering from sin and desperately in need of redemption and reconciliation).

the millenial maze

1 Thes. 5:1-11
For Sunday, November 16, 2008
Proper 28

One of the great things about a pre-set reading and worship plan is that one encounters texts to which current priorities wouldn't draw attention. 1 Thes. 5:1-11 is one of these. I think many evangelicals would avoid preaching on this chapter because of its connection to the notion of the Rapture as conceived by dispenstational eschatology (study of end times). Eschatology was... so 70's and Hal Lindsay. Let's just move on, shall we?

The contemporary evangelical church tends to put eschatology on the shelf. This is a mistake. If we as a people don't have a sense of where we're going we'll soon lose sense of who we are. Regardless of whether one's eschatology is pre-millenial, dispensational, post-millenial, or amillenial, it's vital that we understand ourselves to be a kingdom people on our way to a heavenly kingdom in which all the present injustices and wrongs will be made right. If we lose this then our salt loses its saltiness and our light gets hidden under a bushel.

My own thinking on eschatology has changed over the years. In seminary I was a committed pre-millenialist although not of a dispensational bent. However, further reading and reflection on the book of Revelation as well as its connection to key Old Testament and New Testament scriptures has led me to a current position of amillenialism. I think its important for each of us to know where we stand and why. It's not nearly as important for all of us to agree.

This is the conclusion theologian Stanley Grenz reaches in his wonderful book "The Millenial Maze". If you want some help navigating your way through the important question of eschatology, Grenz is a wonderful guide. He concludes his book with this:

The eternal reign of God has dawned . . . and will one day dawn in its consummated fullness. The God who has reconciled us to himself through Christ will one day bring us into full participation in the grand eschatological community of his divine reign. This is the vision that should inspire us in this in-between era to seek to be a kingdom people now and to proclaim now in word and deed the good news of the coming eternal reign of God. . . Will we as the church be motivated by the vision of God's ultimate future to be about the Lord's business in the present era until Christ comes in glory and splendor?

now what for America?

Why is our country in so much financial trouble. Chuck Colson's recent Breakpoint column offers an insightful response. As Alexandr Solzhenitsyn said, "All this has happened because we have forgotten God." Chuck says:

We have also forgotten that American democracy—indeed Western Civilization itself—is the product of the Judeo-Christian understanding of God and humanity. Without that revelation that man is created in the image of God, our founders never would have recognized the unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Indeed, as I and others like Rodney Stark have argued, modern science and education, liberal democracy, capitalism flourished in Western civilization precisely because of the Judeo-Christian worldview.

. . . Is God responsible for credit markets collapsing around the world? No. We’re responsible. Because instead of worshiping God, we’ve worshipped false idols of the marketplace, credit card companies and cheap mortgages. We’ve put our own appetites over our duties to God and neighbor.

The column closes with a challenge which I commend to our mutual attention: "So this is no time for Christians to go into the bunkers. No time to wail or moan over our retirement plans. This is a time to repent, to pray more, to give more. It's time for Christians to lead, encourage, and minister to a faltering country in a faltering economy."

living on the shoulders of God's blessing

Joshua 24:1-3a, 14-25
For Sunday, November 9, 2008
Proper 27

Places are important to us. We remember the place we were born, the place we were married, and the place where our father died. Places are important to God too. This is why the final chapter of Joshua chapter 24 begins with reference to a place: Shechem: "Then Joshua assembled all the tribes of Israel at Shechem."

Why Shechem? If you have a Bible with cross-references it becomes readily apparent in the reference to Gen. 12:6. In Genesis chapter 12 the Lord had said to Abram, "Leave your country... and go to the land I will show you." Abram went, and where was the farthest point to which he traveled? Shechem: "Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem" (Gen. 12:6).

This city, known today as the Palestinian city of Nablus, is known as the most beautiful spot in all of Central Palestine. At this farthest point to which Abraham travelled God said to him, "Okay, now that you've traveled this far, guess what? This is what I'm going to give you... all of it."

Fast forward now to Joshua's day. The point of gathering the twelve tribes here once again was to say, "Despite all we've been through (Egypt and the desert wandering) do you see how God has fulfilled his promise to Abram by pouring out his blessings upon us?" This is why Joshua then says essentially, "Look, I don't know who you are going to serve with your life, but given the fulfillment of God's promise we are witnessing here today, as for me and my house, we are going to serve the Lord" (Josh 24:16).

The name Shechem means literally, "God's shoulder." Joshua is saying this: "Look at the blessings we have received. Do you think we amassed these for ourselves? Think again. We are living on the shoulders of God's gracious blessing."

What about us? Have we really pulled ourselves up by our own bootstraps, or like these Israelistes are we actually living on the shoulders of God's blessing? If the latter, what will be our response: to take him for granted, . . . or to commit everything we have and are to God's cause and glory?

I'm with Joshua: as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.