I’ve been thinking a lot about technology these days, and what has put me in this frame of mind has been my acquisition of an iPhone.  If you don’t know Apples tag line of “there’s an app for that,” sit down to American Idol and you’ll soon be up to speed.  iPhone commercials out-strip even drug commercials on shows where the demographic skews young and hip, a group in which I am an outlier.

Anyway.  iPhones are the latest in a line of “smart phones” that combine good old AT&T-style telecommunications with a slew of applications like email, scheduling and note-taking capabilities.  In fact, they are very handy gadgets to have: I can stay in touch with email on the go, get audibly reminded before an appointment, and can jot down notes to myself and others.  Smart phones are like having an office around wherever you go.

But they also do other things: you can play a mean game of Mahjong sitting in the doctor’s waiting room or surf the web waiting to pick up your daughter at school, and in addition to all of the office stuff, iPhones incorporate iPods as well.  And the care and feeding of my iPhone/Pod has consumed much of my spare time in the past few days.  With an iPod, you can spend an inordinate amount of time just putting music and album art into the thing, and getting it in sync with your computer.  It can become an obsession just as much as surfing the web, collecting stamps or reading every outing in a mystery series.  On the up side, I find myself not only “loading up” the iPhone/Pod for road trips, but listening to music more often in coffee shops or while cooking dinner.  My son Mike came in when I was washing dishes the other day and, after trying to get my attention, said I was like some blitzed-out teenager with earphones stuck in his head.  And this from a guy to whom I’d said the exact same thing not more than a gazillion times.

I wonder: are these technological advancements morally neutral?  That is, can they be inherently bad, or is it just the way we (mis)use them?  In my former life as a scientist, I would have once answered definitely the latter.  But now I wonder: iPods and the internet and even television can be very isolating.  You plug in those earphones or flip through that dial and you can be in your own little world, cut-off from family and friends.  In addition, they’ve made access to certain things much more handy—the incidence of sexual addiction has skyrocketed, for instance, since the advent of the World Wide Web.  Is it the fault of the technology, is there such a thing as or “evil” technology, or is it up to the people who use them to regulate their use?

Some religious folks put it this way: they are tools of the Devil to tempt us to sin, and old Scratch has a lot more to work with these days.  In these peoples’ minds, it’s best just to stay away altogether, lest they get hold of you.  Sometimes, I think they’re right (not about the Devil but about avoidance): rather than loading up the iPod I could be reading a book or—gasp!—interacting with my family.  But then, how could I listen to all those lost Warren Zevon tunes?  Decisions, decisions . . .

I suspect everybody knows this, but the flavor of theology Presbyterians adhere to is called “Reformed.”  Not just because we came out of the Reformation—there are other kinds of theology, such as Lutheran and Anabaptist that did as well—but because of our philosophy, our overall way of being a people of God.  Our motto is: Ecclesia Reformata, Semper Reformanda which people who understand Latin assure me means “The Church Reformed, Always to be Reformed.”  Note the passive voice in the second “reformed:” we do not reform on our own, some one or some thing reforms us.  And we believe we know who that Someone is: it is God who does the reforming, through the good offices of the Holy Spirit.  We are not to be reformed by the whim of any one person, or Session, or ecclesiastical body, but by the Spirit of God, blowing through our minds and hearts.

This principle is supposed to work at all levels of the church: at the national level, there is a laborious four-year process for this; it is assumed that the Holy Spirit is at work in it, and in my experience, it usually is.  We are also supposed to apply the Reformed principle at the local level, but this is where it often runs into trouble.  On one hand, there is not a well-oiled procedure in place within congregations to assure that it happens.  On the other hand, there is often resistance to change within a tight-knit group of people who love each other and the way they’ve worshiped God for (generally) a large number of years.  Therefore, even though congregations are supposed to be responsive to change under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, it often doesn’t happen that way.

Enter the Seekers process, designed to open ourselves up to the guidance of the Holy Spirit so we can respond responsibly—decently and in good order!—and continue to do God’s will here in 2009.  I am aware that many of you are waiting to see what will come of this endeavor, just as I’ve heard that some of you are tired of waiting, and are watching to see what is going to happen.  I cannot say as I blame you; it seems we have been talking about renewal for a long time.

Well, now that time is upon us: the waiting is over.  As I noted several weeks ago, your Session voted a resolution to explore the means by which Covenant might become a “destination church” for families with children with autism.  This is a direct outcome of the Seekers process: the idea came out of a Seekers-conducted open meeting last year at Summer Experience.  In the mean-time, it has percolated and gestated and a commission has been formed to study what that might mean, and it has been very busy, doing your work and, I believe, the work of the Holy Spirit.  As plans start to take shape, and your Session considers them, we will also be soliciting your input and opinion at small-group gatherings and keeping you constantly informed of what we have in mind.  Just as it takes a community to raise a child, so it takes the whole congregation to renew itself.  I am confident that we will step up to the plate and, by the grace of God through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, be renewed.

Monday night I was with a group of college students, leading a discussion of the film Gone Baby Gone, and it’s full of grist for the spiritual/theological mill (it’s also full of rough language, so beware if you’re sensitive to that type of thing). In the very first scene, the protagonist—a small-time private investigator named Patrick Kenzie—reflects on the nature of where he comes from and what he does. “It’s the things you don’t choose that make you who you are,” he muses, as the camera pans across the rough-hewn denizens of Boston’s mean streets, and then he tells about the time he asked his priest how to get to heaven and still protect his family. The priest responded by quoting Matthew 10:16—significantly, from the sending out of the disciples—“See: I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”

The twin themes of personal responsibility and mission wind throughout the film. We see that Patrick is a moral man, an upstanding man, but he is always running into folks from the seamier side—crack-addicts, drug-runners, murderers—that he went to school with or knew in some fashion. And the question becomes: why did Kenzie make it and they didn’t? Was it some personal choice they made, some wrong turn they negotiated that led them to ruin? Or was it their family and surroundings—as Kenzie implies in the opening scene—that was the prime determining factor? And how does he balance the needs of self—of family and personal satisfaction—with those of living a moral life, of doing the mission of God the priest quite literally sent him upon?

There are questions here that are fundamental in everyone’s lives, but they have special resonance with Christian discipleship . . . how much of who we are—where we have gone in life, how successful we are—is God’s good gift (albeit in the form of good, family upbringing, perhaps) and how much the choices we ourselves make? How much of our mission is us—our own efforts, our own choices, our own sweat—and how much of it is God’s? Of course, everything is ultimately due to the creator, but where’s the equilibrium, how do we balance the two? This question is especially germane in this Seeker process, as we seek to balance our natural desires to get off our rears and do something—we are, after all, doers in this church—and the real need to sit back and let God tell us what to do.

On another tack, how do we balance our need to protect ourselves and our livelihoods with the needs of God’s work? How do we balance our desire for a certain kind of church experience, one that “feeds” us, with the need to proclaim the gospel, to invite the un-churched and never-churched into our doors? How do we take care of ourselves and still reach out to others? The way we answer these questions as a congregation will have real impact on the future of our church.

Monday night I was with a group of college students, leading a discussion of the film Gone Baby Gone, and it’s full of grist for the spiritual/theological mill (it’s also full of rough language, so beware if you’re sensitive to that type of thing). In the very first scene, the protagonist—a small-time private investigator named Patrick Kenzie—reflects on the nature of where he comes from and what he does. “It’s the things you don’t choose that make you who you are,” he muses, as the camera pans across the rough-hewn denizens of Boston’s mean streets, and then he tells about the time he asked his priest how to get to heaven and still protect his family. The priest responded by quoting Matthew 10:16—significantly, from the sending out of the disciples—“See: I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”

The twin themes of personal responsibility and mission wind throughout the film. We see that Patrick is a moral man, an upstanding man, but he is always running into folks from the seamier side—crack-addicts, drug-runners, murderers—that he went to school with or knew in some fashion. And the question becomes: why did Kenzie make it and they didn’t? Was it some personal choice they made, some wrong turn they negotiated that led them to ruin? Or was it their family and surroundings—as Kenzie implies in the opening scene—that was the prime determining factor? And how does he balance the needs of self—of family and personal satisfaction—with those of living a moral life, of doing the mission of God the priest quite literally sent him upon?

There are questions here that are fundamental in everyone’s lives, but they have special resonance with Christian discipleship . . . how much of who we are—where we have gone in life, how successful we are—is God’s good gift (albeit in the form of good, family upbringing, perhaps) and how much the choices we ourselves make? How much of our mission is us—our own efforts, our own choices, our own sweat—and how much of it is God’s? Of course, everything is ultimately due to the creator, but where’s the equilibrium, how do we balance the two? This question is especially germane in this Seeker process, as we seek to balance our natural desires to get off our rears and do something—we are, after all, doers in this church—and the real need to sit back and let God tell us what to do.

On another tack, how do we balance our need to protect ourselves and our livelihoods with the needs of God’s work? How do we balance our desire for a certain kind of church experience, one that “feeds” us, with the need to proclaim the gospel, to invite the un-churched and never-churched into our doors? How do we take care of ourselves and still reach out to others? The way we answer these questions as a congregation will have real impact on the future of our church.

Monday night I was with a group of college students, leading a discussion of the film Gone Baby Gone, and it’s full of grist for the spiritual/theological mill (it’s also full of rough language, so beware if you’re sensitive to that type of thing). In the very first scene, the protagonist—a small-time private investigator named Patrick Kenzie—reflects on the nature of where he comes from and what he does. “It’s the things you don’t choose that make you who you are,” he muses, as the camera pans across the rough-hewn denizens of Boston’s mean streets, and then he tells about the time he asked his priest how to get to heaven and still protect his family. The priest responded by quoting Matthew 10:16—significantly, from the sending out of the disciples—“See: I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”

The twin themes of personal responsibility and mission wind throughout the film. We see that Patrick is a moral man, an upstanding man, but he is always running into folks from the seamier side—crack-addicts, drug-runners, murderers—that he went to school with or knew in some fashion. And the question becomes: why did Kenzie make it and they didn’t? Was it some personal choice they made, some wrong turn they negotiated that led them to ruin? Or was it their family and surroundings—as Kenzie implies in the opening scene—that was the prime determining factor? And how does he balance the needs of self—of family and personal satisfaction—with those of living a moral life, of doing the mission of God the priest quite literally sent him upon?

There are questions here that are fundamental in everyone’s lives, but they have special resonance with Christian discipleship . . . how much of who we are—where we have gone in life, how successful we are—is God’s good gift (albeit in the form of good, family upbringing, perhaps) and how much the choices we ourselves make? How much of our mission is us—our own efforts, our own choices, our own sweat—and how much of it is God’s? Of course, everything is ultimately due to the creator, but where’s the equilibrium, how do we balance the two? This question is especially germane in this Seeker process, as we seek to balance our natural desires to get off our rears and do something—we are, after all, doers in this church—and the real need to sit back and let God tell us what to do.

On another tack, how do we balance our need to protect ourselves and our livelihoods with the needs of God’s work? How do we balance our desire for a certain kind of church experience, one that “feeds” us, with the need to proclaim the gospel, to invite the un-churched and never-churched into our doors? How do we take care of ourselves and still reach out to others? The way we answer these questions as a congregation will have real impact on the future of our church.

I was listening to Paul Finebaum yesterday, and the whole show was devoted to the flap over what Barack Obama’s pastor said from the pulpit. I heard all kinds of opinions, from charitable ones—“we’re not voting on Obama’s pastor, we’re voting on Obama”—to not so charitable ones—“I wouldn’t vote for somebody who’d stay at that church after what he said”—to downright racist ones—“he threw his white grandmother under a bus, bet he wouldn’t do that if she were black.” And as I listened to all the arguments pro and con, and observed the main-stream media obsessing over it, I became increasingly sad. There has been almost no attempt to understand the context of Reverend Wright’s comments, no attempt to understand where he is coming from, no attempt to understand it at all.

One of the reasons this hits home for me, of course, is that I am a pastor as well. Every week we pastors get up in the pulpit and interpret the scripture for our congregation. And any pastor worth her salt will tailor how that interpretation is presented to meet the needs of her congregation. Furthermore, every pastor—just like every member in the pews—has well-thumbed areas of the bible, that if you look at them edge-on, will be dirt-stained with use. By the same token, every pastor—again, just like every member in the pews—has sections of their Bible that are unstained through lack of use. In other words, for a variety of reasons, we all avoid preaching on certain topics.

And the sections many in white, mainline churches avoid preaching are the Old-Testament prophets, which warn that God will bring any nation down that is not doing God’s will. Now this “not doing God’s will” business could mean a variety of things, but it usually involved idolatry—worshipping “foreign” gods—and how it treated what Jesus would call “the least of these.” I’m sorry, but it’s in the Bible—according to the Old Testament especially (but see for instance Matthew 25), God has destroyed nations because of the way they treat their citizens.

Do I take that literally? No, of course not. I do not believe that God will actively rain fire and brimstone down on countries that misbehave, and I would never preach it from the pulpit. But by the same token, I can see how African Americans might apply these texts to their own experiences in this country. It is only in the last 50 years of our 225-year existence that the laws in this country have changed so they don’t sanction segregation; economic parity is still a long ways off, as is equal treatment in our court systems. In my home state of Washington, for example, if you are black you are much more likely to be arrested for a crime; if arrested, you’re much more likely to be prosecuted; if you are prosecuted, you are much more likely to be convicted and if convicted, much more likely to serve time.

Would I say what Rev. Wright said from the pulpit? No. Do I understand where it is coming from? As much as I, a privileged middle-classed guy ever can, yes. No matter who you are “for” in this election, Democrat or Republican, white or black, I hope that this episode causes not further division, but further reflection; not further polarization, but further prayer; not further enmity, but further understanding.

And it’s true—he, like many observant Jews in this country, wouldn’t think of scheduling time away from family and synagogue during their most holy time of the year. But for many Christians, Holy Week’s just another week. Many—especially in the evangelical wing—ignore Lent altogether, and only vaguely pay attention to Good Friday, maybe joking about not eating meat or something. They go right to the celebration, right to the resurrection—after all, we are a resurrection people—just like they skip Advent waiting to get to the good stuff of Christmas. Other Christians celebrate Ash Wednesday with the black cross on their forehead, and maybe make it to a Holy Week service, but don’t really set the season aside for anything meaningful for their lives.

But you know, that’s what “holy” means—set aside, consecrated, reserved for a sacred purpose. And though we all have busy lives, with work and family commitments that compete loudly for our time and energy, it might not be a bad idea to try and move faith up the rungs of our priority lists a little bit. To spend a bit more time with the scriptures, in daily contemplation of where we are in the story of Christ’s sacrifice and redemption.

And it’s not too late to do that . . . depending on when you get this newsletter, we’re either on the cusp or in the middle of the Triduum, the Three Days, the heart of Holy Week. It begins at dusk on Thursday evening, and many churches—ours included—have a Maunday Thursday service to kick it off. “Maunday” is from the Latin maundatum, which means command. Maunday Thursday commemorates the Last Supper, (John 13:1-35), which culminates in the new commandment, that we love one another, just as Christ has loved us On Good Friday, we remember the crucifixion itself, when Christ was spiked onto a cross and died (John 18:1 – 19:30). Finally, on Holy Saturday, we remember when Jesus lay in the tomb (John 19:31-42). And something we can do, to find a space in these holiest of days, is to take these scriptures, read them in our homes, in our offices, or wherever, and meditate on them, think about them and their significance in our lives.

A well-known English cognate of poié? is “poetry,” and if you think about it, the cluster of meanings surrounding the Greek word applies to it as well. A major quality of poetry—often cited as what makes something “poetic”—is metaphor, yet another Greek cognate with the connotation of transference. In a metaphor, the meanings associated with one word (called the figure) are transferred to another (called the ground). Take for example Shakespeare’s well-known “All the world’s a stage”: “stage” is the figure and “world” is the ground. By comparing the two, meaning is transferred from stage to world—we ask ourselves, sometimes quite subconsciously, what is it about the world that is like a stage? Is it that it has a proscenium arch? Does the world have footlights or a curtain? We create meaning for “world” from its association in our mind with “stage;” what results is a new, enriched, meaning constructed in our heads.

That’s why it’s appropriate that an art-form consisting largely of metaphor be called “poetry.” At its best, the words of a poem create within us a rich associative construction of meaning, far beyond what might be expected from the sparse words on the page. Like its Greek cognate implies, good poetry creates, makes and constructs. In that sense, a poem is like we are: created to create.

The Seekers have produced a first-draft of a vision statement that is very deliberately a poem: we want to create in everyone’s minds a slew of possibilities, a rich variety of possible futures for our church. We want the congregation dreaming, creating, constructing, and if you nail it down too early, if you make it too concrete, it shuts down other possibilities. If, instead of “we stand in the gaps,” we write “we provide dance-lessons, arts-programs and breakfast for shut-ins,” it closes off possibility. So read the poem, admire it for what it is—a first draft of an eventual guiding vision—and tell us what you think, where it needs to be tweaked and shaped and molded. But most of all, let the words work on you, let them interact within you, let them create within you visions of what might be.

[This week's Pastor's Page featured an article by Toya Richards from the Presbyterian News Service; the original can be found here.]

The Christian life is variously symbolized as a way, a path, a walk . . . Jesus used the symbolism himself: “Enter through the narrow gate,” he said, “for the gate is wide and the road is easy that leads to destruction, and there are many who take it. For the gate is narrow and the road is hard that leads to life, and there are few who find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14) And though we automatically think destruction equals hell and life equals heaven, we shouldn’t be so hasty. In fact, the context of these verses—Jesus is talking about how we treat others in life and following after false prophets—shows that he’s not talking about the after-life, but what goes on here and now in this one.

The way of integrity, of treating your neighbors as you would like to be treated, of not running after false profits, is a narrow way . . . we have something within us, something that seems to be passed down from person to person, something that our forebears in the faith posited as an “original sin” that makes that way difficult at best. Paul put it well: “I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.” (Romans 7:15). For Paul, sin was a thing, a force, an entity that lived within us like some ravening beast, a dark force that warred within us with the Spirit of life.

In addition to that which is within us are those things that are without—our entire culture, what Paul would call “the flesh” (no, it doesn’t refer primarily to sex), is stacked against our following the way of life. Far from doing to others as we would have them do to us (Matthew 7:12), the siren song of wealth and power says it’s ok to beat others out of their livelihood in the name of the free market, in the name of some warped version of evolution called survival of the fittest . . . and every message we’re sent by the media reinforces that viewpoint. The gate is indeed wide, and there are many who take it, that leads to the destruction of relationships, of families, of lives. Our culture sees to that.

But Jesus says “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” (John 10:10), and this abundant life is ours if we enter through that ol’ narrow gate . . . but how do we do it? What constitutes “entering through the narrow gate?” Well, elsewhere in John he says “Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me.” (John 15:4). It’s this “abiding in him” that is the narrow way, the way to life. And it’s the bearing of fruit, what Paul would call “fruits of the Spirit” (Galatians 5) that is this abundant life.

Here at Lent, we’re encouraged to explore this “abiding in Jesus” more thoroughly . . . the spiritual practices we recommend and encourage at this time are nothing more (or less) than ways to abide in him as he abides in us. As we study scripture, pray and listen quietly for God’s voice, we go further down that narrow way, the way that few are able to travel, that leads to life.