Emergent Brethren

Hi,

Our church is doing a Lenten series based on the Psalms. I was invited to write a few Lenten devotionals for our church website. In case you are looking for something devotional, I offer this:

Fear is a huge motivator that affects our behavior and emotions. In our community group curriculum we read, “Fear is also at the root of our self-protection mechanisms (defensiveness, contempt, criticism, shame, stonewalling, etc.). As eroding as these things are, the worst thing about fear is that it keeps us from love. . .”

In thinking about “Fear” today, I want to take a look at Psalm 3. In the NIV we read, “O LORD, how many are my foes! How many rise up against me! Many are saying of me, “God will not deliver him.” (v.1-2)

I often get a kick out of how Eugene Peterson paraphrases scripture in The Message, “God! Look! Enemies past counting! Enemies sprouting like mushrooms, mobs of them all around me, roaring their mockery: “Hah! No help for him from God!” (v.1-2)

There are different kinds of fear that affect all of us. At times, we, too, may feel surrounded by insurmountable fears! Some might include going to the dentist, being rejected by a close friend, not doing well on a test, not living up to expectations of your boss, etc. Some fear we anticipate, like the test or dentist appointment. Other fears can come upon us when we least anticipate it.

Last year, after twenty-nine years of employment, I was laid-off. I can’t say it was totally unexpected, but I was still surprised. For months afterwards, I experienced a new kind of fear. It’s one that I’ve not experienced before: fear of what might happen in the future, specifically, financial failure.

This is not a fear that I think about during my waking hours. God is providing in marvelous ways! Instead, this is a fear that can haunt me at night. It wakes me up with crazy thoughts!!

Pastor Matt said the first thing we need to do when we are afraid is to face our fear. I find that when I’m awakened in the middle of the night, the best thing I can do is get-up to journal, read the Bible, and cry-out to God, as David did. I find spending time in these activities to be so much better than wrestling in bed, trying to sleep, with crazy thoughts spinning in my mind.

Fear of what we’re facing can sometimes cause us to doubt that God is really present in our situation. At the Mt. Helix Community Group this week, we had an ice-breaker activity of writing acronyms for the word, DOUBT. I want to share two from our group. Here’s the first one:
D – Disbelief
O – Often
U – Unwittingly
B – Brews
T—Torment

I like this one because when I don’t face my fear, I do feel tormented! In addition to the activities named above that help, I’m a part of a great small group of guys with whom I can share anything. Having this kind of support is invaluable in so many ways!

The second acronym is this:
D – Devoting
O – Ourselves
U – Until
B – Belief
T – Transpires

Sometimes, in spite of what we are feeling, we need to move forward in our faith walk. This may even mean leaning on others to help us trust God in facing our fears. Moving forward can help us find a better place to be with God, to see and experience God’s blessings.

In verses 4 – 5, David writes, “To the LORD I cry aloud, and he answers me from his holy hill. I lie down and sleep; I wake again, because the LORD sustains me.”

In his crying aloud to God, a wonderful transformation takes place! Peace comes to David so that he can sleep. The next day he awakes and feels the Lord’s strength and power to sustain him.

How do you experience God in the midst of your worst fear? How do you find strength and help from God? What’s your story?

Jeff Glass

Veritas is planning on having our first “Love Feast” (I really don’t like the name….seems like a throwback to the Sixties, or honestly the name of a 70’s Porn Movie) on Sunday October 11. As I began to plan the gathering I sent out a preliminary gathering plan to our Core Group for feedback and their thoughts. This has turned into an e-mail conversation focusing around the feetwashing part of the gathering. I thought I would post some of the thoughts of the Core Group, and get your feedback. What do you do with Feetwashing? Do you do it, do you offer another way of serving each other (handwashing), do you find a modern equivalent, do you forgo the feetwashing altogether? Would love to hear your thoughts and comments.

Here are the comments from my Core Group:

Do we have to wash feet/get our feet washed? I get the whole Jesus got dirty in connecting with us and we need to be ready and willing to get dirty too- and I def think I do that with people (in the mental/emotional/spiritual sense); but is there any alternative for people who don’t want to do that?

am I just being weird over nothing? Totally not trying to be a party pooper….
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To all,

Carmella brought up the same concerns I struggled with about this tradition. Below is my experience

I have been involved in the brethren faith for 5 years and until about a year ago never even considered going the twice annual service where foot washing is performed.

A) I was grossed out
B) I was embarrassed
C) I was cool with washing someone elses feet but didn’t want anyone to do mine.

A. It wasn’t anything gross. A basin is filled with a very mild bleach water solution. The washee placed his feet into or on the edge of the basin and you cupped your hands and poured water over the feet. you then took a towel and dried them.
B. While I was nervous my feet would somehow ruin the entire event my foot washing went just like everyone else. No one singled my tootsies out for ridicule
C. Willingness to humble myself but refuse to let someone humble themselves before me defeats to whole point of the tradition.

It’s funny I remember the last hour or two before the service being really freaked out and now I’m just meh.

The service was moving and I understand why it is a tradition is some denominations. It will never be my “favorite” service but I hope everyone will try it once and then we as a community can discuss it further. I do believe that in experiencing it you will find something of significant worth.

Ray

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I grew up in a church that regularly did feetwashing and i still don’t like it. Frankly, I have trouble seeing the point. Jesus showed hospitality by caring for his guests who had traveled to be with him. It was especially shocking that a rabbi would do something normally done by a servant. So do we do exactly as Jesus did even though we live in a different culture? Or do we show hospitality in a way that people would be shocked at our humility?
And regarding hospitality, I think we need to turn around our definition to truly understand the concept. In many cultures, hospitality means that you recognize your visitor as someone sent from God with a message or gift for you and you are blessed to have that person visit you. How would we treat people that God sends to us? Would you tell them to take off their shoes so you can wash their feet if that is uncomfortable for them?
I do love the Love Feast idea and if we do the feetwashing thing I’ll do it while gritting my teeth.
Brian

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Just to throw out a different point of view… For me, the footwashing service has always been the most meaningful service. I don’t think it’s as much about hospitality as service. It’s about humbling myself to someone else in the same way that Christ did, as well as allowing someone else to serve me, which in our culture I think is the harder part. I’m not sure there is a modern day equivalent. It certainly isn’t about forcing someone to do something that is uncomfortable for them, and I would assume that anyone that wouldn’t want to do it could just “pass”.

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I grew up with this practice and so I can understand how some people would find it meaningful. I might even find it meaningful if I were with others from my same church tradition and who I knew were comfortable with the practice.

But when I think about some of my neighbors or friends coming and being confronted with this practice, I can almost imagine their aversion to it.
And this makes me uncomfortable. If we do foot washing together but fail to communicate the message of servanthood/hospitality what is the point?
Are we then just serving ourselves? Would those who find this a new
practice really understand what we are trying to do? If we really want
to show service and hosipitality to others and one another, how do we best
communicate that to our current culture? Foot washing was as common and
normal to those of Jesus’ day as going out for coffee is for us. We don’t have servants so much these days so it makes it hard for us to understand and feel the impact of what Jesus really did. I think it’s important for us to find a way in our current culture to show each other love and service in a way that’s completely understood and impacts people.

Ranita

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So as you can see we have a very thoughtful team and one that is concerned about the “other” and those who aren’t yet Christ followers. They are aware of contextualization and understanding culture. They have great insight. I don’t want to do something just because that is what we do, or because we are Brethren. What are your suggestions regarding Feetwashing? Any and all thoughts would be helpful.

Thanks,
Ryan Braught
Veritas
www.veritaspa.org

A few years ago at the National Pastor’s Convention, one of the freebee’s given to everyone was the just released book called Chasing a Lion on a Snowy Day: How to Survive and Thrive When Opportunity Roars (by Mark Batterson, Multnomah Press). As I was clearing-out some stuff from my office last month, I ran across this book. I thought it might be a good one to take on our vacation/job hunting trip to Hawaii. I was right, there’s lots of inspiration in this book!

The book is based on an obscure story in the Old Testament of Beniah, who chased and killed a lion (2 Sam. 23:20-21). It’s not a story I remembered in my Old Testament reading, but it now certainly is a story that has impacted my life.

There are many great quotes that I’d love to share, but it would take-up too much room here. I scanned the book, after reading it to pull-out my top 10, but have decided that even that’s too many.

So, here are a few of my favorite quotes:

“. . . success is making the most of every opportunity. Spiritual maturity is seeing and seizing God-ordained opportunities. Think of every opportunity as God’s gift to you. What you do with those opportunities is your gift to God. I’m absolutely convinced that our greatest regrets in life will be missed opportunities.” p. 17

“Guaranteed Uncertainty: To be certain of God means that we are uncertain in all our ways; we do not know what a day may bring forth. This is generally said with a sigh of sadness; it should rather be an expression of breathless expectation.” quote from Oswald Chambers, p.79

Faith doesn’t reduce uncertainty. Faith embraces uncertainty. p.85

Jesus never promised security. What he promised was uncertainty. . . I know that part of us wants God to take us to a 3 act play with a clearly defined plot. . . But Jesus takes us to the Improv instead. We want the entire script up front, but that would undermine our dependence upon the Holy Spirit. Following Jesus and keeping in step with the Spirit require the art of improvisation. We’ve got to develop an affinity for uncertainty and lear to enjoy the journey.” p.90

“Have you read the Bible lately? Faith is risky business. The goal of faith is not the elimination of risk. In fact, the greatest risk is taking no risks.” (Think of the Parable of the Talents) p. 109

Failing to take a risk is almost like losing a jigsaw puzzle piece of your life. It leaves a gaping hole. When we get to the end of our lives, our greatest regrets will be the missing pieces.” p. 115-116

To the average person, the circumstances presented to Benaiah were problems to run away from, not opportunities to be seized. But Benaiah didn’t see a 500 pound problem. He saw a lion skin hanging in his tent. p. 132-133

This book probably means a lot more to me now, than if I had read it 3 years ago. I now find myself in a situation I didn’t choose (being laid-off by the Mission and Ministry Board). A few people have tried to encourage me to see this as a time of new opportunity, of pursuing dreams and passions that I might not have done by staying in my former position. So, I’m here in Hawaii with my wife to explore a dream we’ve had for 10 years: living here and serving God.

The author, Mark Batterson, also writes on page 30, “God wants you to get where God wants you to go more than you want to get where God wants you to go.”. What a comforting thought! God is seeking to guide us in greater ways than our seeking to be in God’s will. But as the author says over and over again, we have to take risks, and not wait for every detail to line-up before stepping out.

How do you take risks? What needs to be in place before you “step-out in faith”? What’s your dream? What steps do you need to take to reach that dream?

I’d love to hear from you!

Jeff

Last night, my wife and I watched Wall-E, a movie we got from Netflix. This is an 2008 academy award winning Pixar film about a robot left on earth, after the humans had destroyed it. A probe named, Eva, arrives and a love story begins. Later, you find out that many of the humans that left the planet are in a huge space ship waiting for the time to come back to earth. When Eva discovers a green plant growing on earth, it goes back to the space ship to inform them of the discovery of “life” on earth. This starts the chain of events that brings the humans back to earth to repopulate it. (If you haven’t seen the movie, there’s a lot more to it than what I write here.)

As I watched the movie, I thought, “This is awfully heavy material for a children’s film!” One of the major focuses of the movie was how terrible humans have treated our planet. It shows the planet as a virtual wasteland, filled with garbage made by people. Wall-E is a machine whose purpose if to box and stack-up the garbage to clean things up. While watching the film I thought there are several scenes in it that could be used to illustrate a sermon on caring for creation.

Later on, after we finished watching the movie it dawned on me. . . this is a highly adapted story of Noah’s Ark in a science fiction genre. Garbage all over the earth is symbolic of the flood of water in the Biblical story. Eva is symbolic of the dove sent-out by Noah to find signs of land. The space ship. . .

Have any of you seen this film or used it to illustrate your sermon(s)? What other movies have you watched lately that would be good fodder for a sermon?

Here is a quote from Scot McKnight’s book “Embracing Grace”… “A local church always performs the gospel it proclaims. This may sound odd, so let me emphasize the world “always”. A church always performs the gospel it proclaims because its performance is its proclamation. If you look at a church and what it does and how it operates you will see the gospel of that church. The important point to make here is that the deepest indicator of that church’s gospel cannot be limited to the pastor’s sermons or the Sunday school teacher’s teaching or the doctrinal statement’s affirmations, or the summer camp offerings, of the aesthetic expressions. The sure indicator of the gospel in a local community is how those Christians live.”

Now here is Scot’s definition of gospel… “The gospel is the work of God to restore humans to union with God and communion with others, in the context of a community, for the good of others and the world.”

Interested in knowing what you think!