Cruising

Reggie McNeal uses airports to describe what churches are supposed to be. Airports connect people to their final destination. They get it wrong when they think they are the final destination.

That got me thinking about it some more and I think I would add that a lot of churches think they are cruise ships. I know there are some of you who would argue that the ports of call on a cruise make all the difference in the world, but they really don't. What you really care about is what amenities the cruise ship has. You couldn't care less that the cruise ship isn't preparing you at all for your destination. It is the destination.

For disclosure sake I should mention that I have never been on a cruise. I'm more of a resort person. But I've heard you talk. You talk about service, swimming pools, shows, sports, and above all you talk about food. I wonder what percentage of passengers actually ever get off the boat. I wonder if cruise ships could simply sail over the horizon and turn in circles for a week and still keep everybody happy.

Churches get caught up in that too. We really only talk about a destination because it seems we should. We have to have something to put in our mission statement, after all. Instead we want to make sure everyone is entertained, having fun, and well fed. We really like it if they have a great program for our kids. That way we can be free of some of our parental responsibilities to have even more fun. We know that we are supposed to be on a journey of some kind so we like the idea of a cruise. We even make a port call every now and then to soothe our consciences a bit. Then it is back to the good life.

We need to get back to being connectors. We need to help people get to their calling in life. We need to be the best airports we can be but we can never lose sight of the fact that we are not the destination.

Fight

I really don't like ruining Christmas but I am a little concerned I may do just that with my sermon this Sunday. Christmas is one of those times of year when people take in the glittering lights, the piles of gifts, and, if they dig deep enough, an image of Mary & Joseph hunched over a beautiful baby Jesus laying in a manger. (It's usually a lily white baby Jesus too, but that's another topic.) These images make us want to sit back and say, "Awww, how precious."

In actuality that baby in a manger is the result of a decision to take up a fight, to get down and dirty with the gloves off, to go ahead and accept a battering, bruising, and bloody fight. The way I see it, God had a decision to make about this 3rd planet from the sun. Seeing the mess it was in, the simply thing to do would have been to obliterate it. It was hardly worth saving. Instead God decided redemption would be the better way so he entered the fight in the only way it would work, as a vulnerable baby born in a barn located in an insignificant town.

When I connect that baby in a manger with the God making that decision about this planet it changes things. That baby suddenly doesn't seem so warm and cuddly. It represents a gauntlet thrown down to Satan. It says God loves this world enough to fight for it and he has arrived, ready for battle. It's not a publicity stunt either. Otherwise God would have arrived with pomp and circumstances befitting a champion, and not in a lowly manger. He's not hiding behind 10,000 angels because he can't win the prize that way. He arrives naked with no gimmicks. This is serious. This is a battle. This is God confronting the enemy.

I hope I don't ruin Christmas for people by connecting the baby Jesus to a battle. (I know some people get tired of all the military talk we use all the time. But if we learned to fight like Jesus that wouldn't be a problem.) I hate to take away your "Awww" moment. But I do hope we'll learn to love enough to fight. Love our families, love our friends, and love our church communities enough to fight for them. Love others enough to fight for them. And love God enough to fight for him with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength.

Outdoors

Every now and then I get this urge to be outdoors. I get tired of my office. Tired of sitting behind a desk all day. Tired of not getting out there and enjoying God’s creation.

A friend sent my kids a subscription to a back packing magazine. They live in the southwest of the USA where they are surrounded by opportunities to take a hike. I thumbed through the mag and felt a strong urge to be anywhere but here.

I hate camping because whenever someone tried to take me camping I could never see the point of it. I guess I should qualify that by saying I don’t see the point of camping unless it is on the way to somewhere or to do something. Camping on a fishing or hunting trip I’m fine. Camping while climbing a mountain or hiking a trail, no problem. But camping just to sit around and swat mosquitoes, no thanks.

I grew up in Africa where I spent a lot of time outdoors. We climbed a few mountains but mostly we went hunting. I went to a boarding school that was surrounded by mountains, jungle, and grassland which provided ample opportunity to “get out there” and we took full advantage.

Planning a camping trip in those days began by gathering everything we thought we would need to stay warm, safe, and comfortable. We would place the huge mass of gear in the middle of an old army surplus sleeping bag liner and roll it up as tight as we could. After tying it all together we would balance it precariously on the back of a motorcycle, which took a lot more tying, and off we would go.

The word “road” had a lot of different meanings there. It could mean anything from asphalt to a track that was at least wide enough to squeeze a vehicle through. The latter would usually lead to a small village where a vehicle would maybe show up twice a year. From there we would take our motorcycles on footpaths that led farther out to the farms of the villagers. After going as far as we could it would be time to abandon the motorcycles and start hiking.

We would untie our gear from our motorcycles and throw it over our shoulders. I’m not sure we even knew what a backpack was in those days. We usually made it about 200 yards before we would realize we brought way too much junk. We would leave everything behind except for a pot of uncooked rice, salt, matches, canteen, and a tree hammock. We’d pick up the rest on the way back.

Those camps were never comfortable. We would always have good food (hunting is different there) but the hammocks would only be comfortable for a few hours and we were never warm enough no matter how big we made the fire. We never let that dampen our spirits though because the camp wasn’t the focus of the trip. It was the hunt, or the climb, or the hike. We wouldn’t have endured the hardship just to camp.

I lost a lot of my appetite for the outdoors over the years. I went hunting here in the US a few times but I never got away from the sounds of cars on a highway somewhere near by. Somehow that ruined it. I knew there were places I could go but I never went. I read Bryson’s book about his hike on the Appalachian Trail and thought it sounded great. But it was too far away.

My kid’s magazine has an article highlighting hiking opportunities in various regions of the USA. I eagerly turned to the Midwest section only to find that the nearest one is several hundred miles away. That kind of puts a damper on things.

Of course there are hiking trails in Indiana and I would probably be surprised if I took the time to check them out. For some reason I keep picturing myself trudging along the border of a bean field from one small woodlot to the next. But I’m sure there are nice trails available. It’s just that the thought of hiking in Indiana is not very motivating.

For now I’ll just think about it. I’ll picture myself alone on a trail stopping to take in an inspiring overlook. I’ll imagine the wind rustling in the trees and the sounds of the wildlife playing in their world. At least this way I can leave out the mosquitoes, chiggers, ticks, and thistle out of the picture.

Expression

I went to a wedding the other day. It was a friend's daughter and he officiated. I learned something.

It was a great wedding. The musicians were great. There were no glitches that I was aware of. And my friend did a great job. One thing I liked about the wedding was the simplicity. No tulle hanging everywhere. No mounds of gaudy flowers. Nothing outlandish. The sun shining through the stained glass windows bathed the whole place with a nice warm golden light that fit perfectly.

My friend did a great job of expressing himself both at the wedding and at the reception. But in spite of that I got the feeling that he wasn't satisfied with what he said. You could tell he was absolutely bursting with emotion. It was like he wanted everyone to know what he was feeling but didn't feel like he was doing those feelings justice. The words just weren't there. I think he might have been happier if he had the roar of a cheering crowd at a packed football stadium blasting through the sound system for a half hour. I tried to think of what I would say if I were in his shoes and drew a complete blank. I would have looked like a bumbling idiot and it is a credit to him that he did such a great job.

So this is what I learned. Those times when there are no words to express ourselves happen more often than we know. That's a good thing. That's what pushes human creativity. That's where beautiful art comes from. Beautiful music. Beautiful poetry. Beauty.

So I get it. I know that my friend was feeling a lot more than he could ever express with words. And while I get that I also get that I will never truly understand all that he was feeling. And that's a good thing too.

Economy

I recently read a report on financial giving in churches during the economic crisis. I won't post a link because those have a way of going bad after a few months but it was presented by the Alban Institute. I was a little surprised that only around 30% of the churches in the survey reported a decrease in giving in the first half of 2009. 37% percent reported an increase while the rest reported their giving stayed the same.

There are lots of explanations for the numbers and some of them are good. Church growth during the time period is a good example. Overall, I'm not sure there was enough information available to draw many useful conclusions.

But it did get me thinking about what should be the case. If you base the numbers on per capita giving to take out the affect of a gain or decline in numbers, shouldn't our churches mirror what is going on in our communities at large?

My first thought when I saw this survey was that an awful lot of church people must be lucky enough not to lose their jobs. But then I got to wondering if in some way the church tends to not welcome people with easily expendable, and therefore usually the first to go, jobs. Are we prejudiced in some way against people who are more economically vulnerable.

I wonder what would happen in Jesus' church. Actually, I think I know because, though I can't say for certain what is in the heart of people, I do think I have met people that belong to his church who are amazingly rich and desperately poor. I also know that he tended to attract the desperately poor while he warned the rich during his time on earth. That leads me to think that while there certainly are rich people who belong to his church they must be greatly outnumbered by the desperately poor. My conclusion is that watching the giving in Jesus' church would reflect what is going on in the larger economic picture.

I also think that Jesus' church would make a great leading economic indicator, if you could somehow get a hold of that number, because members of Jesus' church, especially the poor ones, are incredible givers. (Remember the story of the widow's mite.) If you saw the giving at Jesus' church going down you could be pretty sure that the economy was going to tank because the desperately poor, who give like no one else, would have stopped giving, not because they got disillusioned with it, but because they really had nothing to give. Likewise, if the giving in Jesus' church went up you could bet that economic recovery was on the way.

So what does it mean if our church finances go up, down, or stay the same? Maybe it means that God is blessing us. Maybe it means our guilty consciences are kicking in and we are actually giving a greater percentage of our income. Or maybe it means we aren't including a lot of people who we should include.

Gifts

I heard that some retailers are going to be dropping prices early this year. Have you got your Christmas list all ready? The discussion about whether giving Christmas gifts is good for our economy is an interesting one.

I just read an article by Tyler Cowen debating the issue against Joel Waldfogel's book "Scroogenomics." In the book Waldfogel apparently suggests (I haven't read it) that we shouldn't give gifts because people value the gifts they receive at only about 85 cents on the dollar. Since we spend approximately $60-$90 billion on gifts that 15% drop is a considerable loss. That 85 cent figure is probably high too. That puke colored sweater you got from your in-laws you probably value a lot less.

So there we have it. Clear cut case against buying presents. The Christian thing to do is to be a good steward and not by gifts. It will cut billions of dollars in waste.

But then Cowen muddies the issue all up again by pointing out all the intangibles that are associated with gift giving, or "indirect costs" as he puts it. One could add the stress involved in deciding what to get to the cost of the gifts along with many other factors to really drive up the cost of giving gifts. But then you also have to count the value of joy, celebration, love, not feeling forgotten or alienated, relational growth, etc. on the plus side. And what about all the valuable information you learn about yourself and your friends from the gifts you receive or don't receive. "How come Jim got such a nifty gift from Julie while all Julie gave me was a new pair of socks?"

The articles goes on to mention a lot more but the result is that it just isn't cut and dried. It is just another thing with which you have to live with the tension. So I hope everyone enjoys their holiday season while you roll that one around in your head.