Month: January 2009

  I have been off the red letters for a few days so now I am going to spend the next few posts on them alone. In the past few weeks I have been reviewing the various commentaries on the Lord’s prayer. Quite frankly many of them aren’t very helpful to me. No one seems to be able to come right out and say what they think they mean in plain talk. Many theologians have “theologian speak”, that is fancy words they throw around, to describe the Lord’s prayer but nothing that the average Christian can make much sense of.

This is probably the most spoken prayer in Christianity and that is as it should be since it came word for word from Jesus Himself. But, I wonder how many people seriously think about what the words mean or do we just parrot them? I admit that I am guilty of the latter on occasion. I am not talking about sitting down and studying what others have said about it but instead trying to form your own opinion guided by the Holy Spirit.

As I say in my “about me” tab I am not a clergyman or a theologian but I am going to humbly attempt in the next few posts to put down my personal feelings about the Lord’s prayer. Some who read this will likely say “how dare he give us his thoughts on the Lord’s prayer; after all theologians have spent a life time trying to do this”. I am also sure there are those who believe quite differently than I as to the meaning of these words and that is quite as it should be. I certainly don’t claim to have an inside track. We each have to find our path to the Lord but it should be a personal path, not a public thoroughfare that we are guided down.

I am an admitted “cafeteria Christian” in that I do not fall lock step in line behind any particular Christian denomination. Instead I take to heart different aspects of different Christian circles. In my mind some denominations have much to offer and yes, some have very little. So I’m sure my humble interpretation of the Lord’s prayer will be different from many of you and certainly not aligned with any particular theologian. In fact it will probably be quite different most of them. I deem the Lord’s prayer and Christianity in general to be a call to action. More on the general theme of the Lord’s prayer in my next post. And following that I will address each individual petition.

Why do Christians and other religions put such value on the places where their deities or prophets roamed? Jerusalem and its environs have been in a steady state of conflict from before Jesus’ time until now and will probably remain so in the future. It seems like there are constant fights going on over that ground. That is because three of the world’s major religions claim the area as part of their traditions. We seem to idolize the land on which our religious leaders roamed more than the teachings they gave us. I know I am going to offend several of you here but I have to say it. It’s just dirt much like the dirt outside each of our houses. Instead of worshipping the land we should set our hearts on living our lives as Jesus taught us.

I had a completely out of the box idea on foreign policy that I will share with you. Why don’t we dig up six inches of dirt from all over Israel and move it to South Dakota and then offer South Dakota as free sanctuary to all the people who will promise to peacefully live there. That would certainly reduce the reasons for conflicts in the Middle East. I’m sorry but I haven’t worked out the details of what to do the those folks who presently call SD home .

I know, I know that is absolutely not even in sight of the box but I’m not sure any other solution will ever end the conflicts in that part of the world. As Jesus said those who live by the sword shall perish by the sword. Constantly fighting and killing each other is just not the solution but is instead a drastic symptom of our failures. Let’s listen more closely to Jesus’ words rather than where he roamed. It’s just a place.

I am going to do a cross blog thing today. I promise not to do it often. Trevin Wax, who is an author and pastor of a Tennessee Baptist church has a blog entitle “Kingdom People”. He has quite a large and loyal following. Wednesday’s post he questioned the “smug superiority” of the United States especially given the recent inauguration. The post below is a comment I posted on his site. To see his entire posting go to http://trevinwax.com/2009/01/21/echoes-of-babel-our-new-national-sin/

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Trevin:

As usual I will take a somewhat contrarian view of some of your statements on this post. Before I start I want to acknowledge that I agree with you on much of the beliefs underlying your message. But I do take exceptions with the examples you use to justify them. Let me comment on your direct words.

•  “I sense that we as Americans are facing the rise of a new national sin – one that is more subtle and even deadlier than the sins of our past – one that is common to all other empires that have risen and fallen throughout the ages …..
  “I hate to be the one to pop the balloon of our collective national pride in this historic moment, but I sense that we as Americans are facing the rise of a new national sin…. A smug sense of self-righteous superiority that usurps the rightful throne of God.”

Yes, you are the party pooper aren’t you (ha). If you see a smug sense of self-righteous superiority then you must be looking at the last eight years not the coming years. Mr. Bush’s black and white worldview certainly had a smug sense of self-righteousness about it. “We will bring all the nations of the world, kicking and screaming if necessary, into the fold of democracy” Now that is I call smug and totally naive.

What do I see for the coming eight years? I see a country that will finally restore a sense of the “common good” which Catholics are the long term standard bearers (I do admire them for that). I see a government that will return to trying to unify us as citizens of the United States but even more importantly of the world. If only there were the same drive of unity among us Christians maybe we could begin unifying the 35,000 different denominations and seeking the Lords will to be one and He and the Father are one. I see a nation that will strive to be “our brother’s keeper” not one that pushes “ownership” meaning you are on your own.

• “the average citizens fawning over Obama as if he were the Messiah”
   

I think you are confusing the man with the message. I don’t think the average citizen sees Obama as anything other than a man with inspiring goals for us as a country. There is nothing wrong with attempting, even in the smallest degree, to make God’s kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. The Lord tells us all to do that and it certainly refreshing to see our civil leaders following that theme. After the arrogance of the last eight years it is certainly refreshing indeed! 

I could say that reading your daily blog and all the “right on” comments you receive almost every day that your readers are fawning over you as if you were the Messiah. That would be unfair to you just as it is unfair to put that tag on President Obama.

• “we can see that what truly unites us as a nation is a sense of superiority over the rest of the world, a belief in America as our savior, a naïve assumption that our cause is always right.”

 Again, I assume you are critiquing the last eight years and not foreseeing the coming years? Is there anything wrong with having a hope and a desire to see a better world than what we have seen in the recent, and even distant’ past? If I approach the world totally in the Pauline mode of being a poor miserable sinner unable to do absolutely anything right then I would say yes any hope is smug superiority. I instead choose to say that through the Lord we can make the world a better place. I don’t call that a “sense of superiority”, I call it a dream to be chased. There is certainly nothing wrong with having dreams especially when they are centered around Jesus and Isaiah’s’ words.

•  “How many examples of government injustice have to take place before we realize that Christ’s Church is still the greatest force for good in the world?”

I only wish that Christ’s Church were the greatest force for good in the world. If that were true we certainly wouldn’t have to rely on civil government to promote the common good and to make sure our ‘brothers’ are taken care of. But instead what we see is that churches today spend more than 90% of their donations on themselves. They buy ever bigger and bigger temples while the least of these are suffering and dying in our own streets and in most third world countries. You might say that is NOT Christ’s Church and I would certainly agree with you. But that is the face of Christianity today, like it or not.

• “Nations rise and fall, but the Word of the Lord stands firm forever”
  

This is one point that we are in total agreement on. That is a nice way to end this discussion so I will stop here. Thank you for your blogs. They are certainly thought provoking.

 Just what does it mean when Jesus said “You are the salt of the earth.” That phrase doesn’t have much meaning for us today but it was very clear to those who lived 2,000 years ago. About the only thing we hear about salt today is that we are getting too much of it in our diets. Too much salt can result in high blood pressure which can lead to heart attacks or strokes. So, was Jesus condemning us by saying we are the salt of the earth?

Salt back in Jesus’ day was a very scarce and valuable commodity. Among other things it was used for preserving meat. If you didn’t have salt your life was much more challenging. So, to say that you are the salt of the earth meant that you were very valuable and much needed. These words are a short distance past the Beatitudes. It is important for us to always realize that some things in the bible just don’t mean the same thing today as they meant back then. This, in my opinion, includes some of the sexist comments made by Paul about women being quiet in church. Women were definitely thought to be inferior to men in Christ’s day. But, that does not mean that it is meant for all times. Indeed, Jesus by his actions showed that he didn’t believe it either.

 I’m going to move away from my focus on the red letters to look a little at what St. Peter said in the book of Acts

 Acts 2:14-21

Then Peter stood up with the Eleven, raised his voice and addressed the crowd: “Fellow Jews and all of you who live in Jerusalem, let me explain this to you; listen carefully to what I say. These men are not drunk, as you suppose. It’s only nine in the morning! No, this is what was spoken by the prophet Joel:

“‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.

I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’

 These are some powerful words from St. Peter. Many Christian churches say that since Christ has come and saved us that there is no longer a need for prophets and therefore God has not sent any. But these verses say that sons, daughters, servants and others will prophesize. Maybe the church distinguishes between the act and the person? At the other end of the spectrum, there are churches that claim that their pastor is a prophet and the congregation therefore has an inside track to God’s plans. I was a visitor at a church like this once and they seemed to be praising the pastor/prophet almost to the exclusion of Jesus Christ! I believe that those preachers are letting their pride take over a big part of their lives. That is very dangerous for themselves and of course their congregation.

I just don’t know what is the right answer for accepting people who call themselves prophets in the coming days.