ashes to ashes

ashes to ashes...

dust to dust...

earth to earth...

...but alive in Christ Jesus.

Grace and Peace

Ash Wednesday

Today is the first day of Lent, a season which we seek spiritual renewal. In this season we seek right relationship with God, with others, and with ourselves. I pray that this season may be more than a cross on the forehead and giving up chocolate. I pray that this season may embed itself deeply in our lives to remind us of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. I pray that through exercises like prayer, fasting, and serving, we as people may be renewed in the living God by the power of the Holy Spirit.

If you can't make it to an Ash Wednesday service, or are not sure what you think about the whole lent, Ash Wednesday "thing," then I offer you this video that I first saw in my worship class in seminary. It's powerful but simple. enjoy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sxKxGmLOf4&feature=related

Grace and Peace

crucifixation

In preparation for the Ash Wednesday service we are having here at Rolling Acres I purchased a crucifix from an online store. I bought it so that during the service people can have a visual of the sacrifice Jesus made for creation on the cross. Yet, I have to admit that there was an ulterior motive. For, the crucifix is currently hanging in my office by the door--a constant reminder to me of my Lord.

Yet, there are no doubt some good protestants reading this blog and saying to themselves, "crucifix? we protestants like our crosses empty." I have gotten a few such comments since the crucifix has been hanging up (no names or blames here), and I totally appreciate what lies behind those comments. I love the picture of the empty cross! I love that it reminds us that Jesus was taken down from the cross and put in the grave only to raise from the dead three days later! That is the best news I have ever heard, and in the words of a great new testament scholar, "it is the climax of human history!"

Yet, I have a question for us who prefer the empty cross to the crucifix: Is there such a thing as separating ourselves too much from the scandal of the cross? Does the empty cross that we have made into jewelry and bumper stickers create a little too much space between us and the horrid torture stake on which hung the savior of the world? The word for cross in the Greek and roman languages was as bad as any vulgar language we can think of today. The cross was a picture of everything evil and defeated in the world. The cross was torture. The cross was death. The cross was a failed messiah. The cross was a message from Rome to the rest of the world that they were in control. But something happened on that first Good Friday. Something happened that turned all that the world knew about the cross on its head--the whole of human history changed course. So then, the crucifix is a reminder that Jesus set about bringing us into union with God through that horrible sacrifice. Jesus initiated a new kingdom which was legitimized by the Living God on Easter morning. That's a powerful statement of Love and Grace.

So, maybe the crucifix separates us a little too much from Easter morning. Maybe the cross separates us from the sacrifice that was actually made and the monstrous beauty that is wrapped up in that image. Maybe no image is complete and it's impossible to get there. But, maybe the cross imagery and the crucifix imagery are both needed to give us a better picture of what we might never fully understand.

Just a few thoughts...what are yours?

Grace and Peace

Bring me your finest Creeds and Confessions

...taken from our February newsletter

I write this today in the middle of pouring over books and teaching manuals on the catechism. I have the privilege of teaching the senior high Sunday school this coming term. In that term I am planning to go over some aspects of the catechism and other doctrines of the faith. Sounds exciting right? Well, for me this stuff is amazing and inspiring but, I realize that not everyone seems to agree with me. In fact some of you might laugh when I use words like “amazing” and “inspiring.”

So, why the Heidelberg Catechism? Why the Belgic Confession? Why the Cannons of Dort? Why the Apostle’s, Nicene and Athanasian Creeds, (And hopefully the Belhar Confession soon)? A short answer—they give us a place to stand. This term was coined by a giant of the reformed tradition—Cornelius Plantinga Jr. Plantinga started to speak about these creeds and confessions as simply a place to stand as he himself worked to give church members a digestible form of the creeds and confessions. We go through our lives constantly wading through some of the toughest questions that are known to our world. We wade through them using the Bible, talking about them faithfully with those whom we share this journey. Yet, sometimes these questions are hard to wade through, sometimes the questions go over our head and, sometimes we feel as though we don’t have a place to start talking about how wonderful and deep is our God.

This is where these confessions and creeds come in to the discussion. Throughout the centuries faithful men and women have struggled to put into the words the massive mysteries of the faith. From St. Basil, Gregory of Nyssa and St. Thomas Aquinas to Martin Luther, John Calvin and even more recently, N. T. Wright, people have tried to add to the faithful conversations of the biblical witness. And so, that’s where we find ourselves. These confessions that we sometimes find boring, these creeds that we think are over stated, these are faithful witnesses to scripture that simply give us a place to stand. They give us a foundation so we can enter more deeply into the loving mystery of the vast truth of our Lord. That’s why I find them amazing and inspiring, because they help us with the greatness of scripture and the vastness of our God. They give us a place to stand.