On the Way: “What’s That in Your Hand, Mr. Adams?”
April 9, 2014 Last Sunday’s sermon looked at the conversation between God and Moses at the burning bush. We considered what it might mean for God ask us the question he asked Moses: “What Is That in Your Hand?” This is a potentially life-defining question to answer, one that invites us to look at who we are, what we do, and where we’ve been in light of God’s plans for us. It’s important to note that God’s question isn’t just for those contemplating professional ministry, and it’s not limited to God’s interest in our religious involvements. God’s question challenges us to consider every aspect of our everyday lives in terms of the impact God can have through us. That brings me to Mr. Adams and what his life suggests as a way of thinking about our own. I tell his story in my book, Blackbird Singing in the Dead of Night, and I think it’s worth retelling as an encouragement to think vocationally about the day-to-day particulars of our lives: The preacher Carlyle Marney liked to tell a story from his own childhood to clarify the concept of vocation. During his boyhood years, Marney’s family owned a contrarian cow named Daisy whose milk production offset her disagreeable temperament. Unfortunately, the genetic gift that made her such a great source of milk came with a price. Each time she calved she developed life-threatening mastitis. She would have died more than once had it not been for Mr. Adams and his unique sense of vocation. President of the small town’s bank and elder at the local Presbyterian church, he lived just across the alley from the Marneys. When Carlyle’s father called, even in the middle of the night, Mr. Adams would come running, bicycle pump and ointments and hot water in hand, ready to pump and soothe Daisy into production for another season. This, according to Marney, is vocation! But who is Mr. Adams? Was he neighbor, elder on a Christian mission, banker serving a very modest customer, or a cattle-loving veterinarian with a sympathy for a hurting beast whose name came from the side of a churn? Answer: He was all of these at once. But in the arrangement of the scenery of his life’s drama, he was living out his identity, using the special gifts, interests, experiences that gave him a role as a means of relation. And his work, his energy in relation, were all serving a proper relational end. The term for the whole—role, work, proper end, is vocation. And from which of these roles and ends is his identity derived? Answer: From none of them. He is all of them at once. This is an understanding of life that captivates me: the idea that God can weave the many-colored threads of my life into something of beauty and grace. Life is not something to compartmentalize into separate, unrelated parts, nor is it only a succession of days to check off the calendar. Life is a gift from God, meant to be lived:
On the Way:
Connect the Dots! Wednesday, March 26, 2014 Early in my days as pastor of First Baptist Church, Shreveport, I had a memorable luncheon conversation with Bryan, a young adult leader of the church. He said something like this: “I’m a very simple, down-to-earth person. Sometimes the big ideas of scripture go right over my head. When you preach and teach, I need you to ‘connect the dots’; that is, I need you to get very practical. Help me understand how to apply what the Bible says to my weekday life.” I was thinking about his request this morning as I reflected back to my message this past Sunday. We looked at Isaiah’s encounter with God in the temple and God’s question, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” (Is. 6:1-8) This is a “big-idea” Bible story that, unless we’re intentionally about it, can take us off on flights of grandiose conversation about saving the world that have no real connection to our everyday existence. So let’s consider just how down-to-earth God’s callings really are. To make the point, let me share a memory. Back in the 90’s, while pastoring Holmeswood Baptist Church in Kansas City, I attended a national conference that used the Isaiah 6 passage as its theme text. We were inspired to participate in God’s global-good-news agenda through prayer, giving, and going. I was tired but still floating on clouds noble aspiration when my plane landed back in KC. My welcome when I got back home brought me back to earth. One of the kids had gotten sick that day and come home early from school. The other one was in borderline panic mode because of a big project due the next day. Priscilla was juggling the kids’ needs while getting dinner together. She greeted me with a hug and these words: “Boy, am I glad to see you! I could use some help!” Here’s what struck me in that moment: Priscilla was being as missional as the speaker I had heard at the conference talking about her organization’s inner-city ministry in Detroit. Priscilla was right where God wanted her to be, fully invested in the very unromantic particulars of her parental and marital callings. And that, it also struck me, was exactly where I needed to be too. When God asks the question, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” he’s as interested in our being his conduit of love and justice right down in the trenches of our everyday lives as he is in our going off on great adventures in the city and around the globe. All of it matters. The key is to live life with a sense of calling, remembering to listen and respond to the missional tugs at work, home, and school as well as we do to the callings that draw us out on cross-cultural adventures for the sake of Christ. March 19, 2014
I usually travel back and forth between St. Louis and Kansas City in the Ford Explorer that you have so graciously made available to me for the purpose. Occasionally, however, I ride the train. With Amtrak as my chauffeur, I get to enjoy the landscape, catch up on my reading, and if I’m so inclined, use my computer and the internet to get my work done. I traveled by train this Tuesday, as it so happens, and Delilah Canning was nice enough to get me to the Kirkwood train station. In the course of our conversation she gave me the copy of a poem that seems particularly apt in light of our shared study of my book, Blackbird Singing in the Dead of Night. It highlights our faith conviction that though God has a way of transforming the meaning of our struggles. He knows how to take the hard stuff of life and use it to develop us. The poem uses gender specific language; but the truth and encouragement it shares is for all of us. When God wants to drill a man, And thrill a man, And skill a man When God wants to mold a man To play the noblest part; When He yearns with all His heart To create so great and bold a man That all the world shall be amazed, Watch His methods, watch His ways! How He ruthlessly perfects Whom He royally elects! How He hammers him and hurts him, And with mighty blows converts him Into trial shapes of clay which Only God understands; While his tortured heart is crying And he lifts beseeching hands! How He bends but never breaks When his good He undertakes; How He uses whom He chooses, And which every purpose fuses him; By every act induces him To try His splendor out- God knows what He’s about. - Anonymous During this coming Sunday’s adult-wide study of Blackbird Singing in the Dead of Night, we will discuss the Prologue and Part I of the book. Here are some reflection questions for you to consider as you read and prepare for Sunday’s discussion:
Prologue and Part I (chapters 1-7), “The Journey Begins” · [Related to the Prologue] I mention five possible explanations for my experience of the silence of God (pp. xxii-xxiv). Which of these makes the most sense to you? Can you think of other explanations? · [Related to chapter one] How would you put in your own words the significance of the book’s title? · [Related to chapter two] What are some of the ways a person can end up bargaining with God? Is it a good thing or a bad thing? Why or why not? · [Related to chapter three] My crisis of faith connected with a crisis of calling. What role does your faith play in career decisions and the choices you make about the way you live your life? · [Related to chapter four] What does it mean to you to live a values-oriented life? What would you identify as your own core values? What do you do to align and realign yourself with these values? · [Related to chapter five] As it relates to “non-anxious presence,” which is more challenging for you: feeling emotionally connected to others or separating yourself emotionally from the pressures and stress of others? What helps you balance these two sides of relationship? · [Related to chapter six] When is it hardest for you to trust in the providence of God? What do you make of Jesus’ reassurances about God’s loving attention to our daily needs (Mt. 6:25ff.)? · [Related to chapter seven] In chapter seven, I share this quote from G. K. Chesterton: “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult and left untried” (p. 40). What do you find most difficult about a life of discipleship? What are some of the keys for continuing our development as followers of Jesus Christ? Wednesday, March 5, 2014
Weekend weather did it to us again! In all my years of ministry we’ve never had to call off church twice in one winter. Oh, well; God’s the ultimate weather man, not I, and unscheduled breaks from the action can actually be a gift for overscheduled people. When ice and snow shut us down, we can rest more deeply and enjoy undistracted time with those who inhabit our homes with us. Tonight as you gather, take some time to share with each other about how you spent last Sunday. Had we met for Bible study and worship last Sunday, we would have launched into our study of the words of Jesus based on my book, Blackbird Singing in the Dead of Night. My plan was to orient you to the plan for both dimensions of the study, the personal one and our group times. We will do that this coming Sunday. For now, let me offer a few suggestions to get you started: 1. My book has 40 chapters, matching the 40 days of Lent. Since today is the first day of Lent, it’s the perfect day to begin reading the book, starting with the Prologue and Chapter One. On this schedule, you’ll complete your reading of the book on Maundy Thursday or Good Friday, depending on whether or not you incorporate the chapter “Later” into your final day’s reading. 2. I suggest that you consider a devotional approach to the experience, reading a chapter per day and using it as an opportunity for introspection and prayer. If you’ve already begun reading and have been reading more than a chapter per day, no problem! Still, you might consider going back to Chapter One for a re-read, incorporating the one-chapter-per-day approach into your Lenten experience. 3. Consider using a journal to record responses and prayers that grow out of your reading. Flag words and phrases that strike a responsive chord. Write in the margins of your book, if you’re so inclined. 4. Before each reading, ask God’s Spirit to enliven your reading, prompting you toward awareness and response as God sees fit. One way to do this is to precede each reading with the prayer of Samuel (I Samuel 3:10): “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.” 5. Pause between chapters and ask: What questions does this chapter raise for me? What thoughts, feelings, or desires does this chapter evoke in me? 6. In your closing prayer, invite God’s ongoing work in your life in light of that day’s reading. 7. Come on Sundays for Sunday School in the Fellowship Hall prepared to engage in conversation about the themes of the book that have arisen during each week’s readings. I look forward to sharing this experience with you, and I pray that the experience is as spiritually enlivening for you as the original experience was for me. Grace, power, and peace to you! |
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