intersections

Rev. Jeremiah Wright on Bill Moyers Journal

Did any of you catch the interview that Bill Moyers had with Rev. Jeremiah Wright on Friday? I didn't see it when it aired, but I saw it online and it was very, very good. For an hour, without commercial interruption, Rev. Wright shared very personally and directly about his life, ministry, Trinity Church and his comments that have become so controversial lately. Bill Moyer probably spoke for about 5 cumulatively on the broadcast.

I have not waded into this controversy on this blog, but I have shared others places. But today I am here to say that if you have been effected by this controversy or have taken a stand on it, you really must watch this interview. He is intelligent and articulate. He is definitely not the whacko that some in the media have tried to make him out to be. I am convinced that this is a man of God!

Watch the interview here (in two parts)

The importance of small stories

Thanks to Gary Burns, who recorded this on his digital camera, and Alexander Carpenter, who somehow got it loaded into blip.tv, here is the last half of my sermon at SONscreen. It's also been posted on the Spectrum blog here.

SONscreen fun

Click picture to enlarge

Well, SONscreen Film Festival turned out to be a great time. I got to meet people I've never met, reconnect with friends from around the country, and basically be inspired by an emerging crowd of young, talented filmmakers. We saw some really inspiring stuff along the way.

Of course, the highlight of the weekend for me was watching our worship team lead worship for the gathered group of festival-goers. I really enjoyed the opportunity to speak to the group and I think my message went over pretty well. I hope some of you that heard it might interact with it here. If you weren't at SONscreen, you can download the audio file below. I'd love to hear what you think.

Telling Our Stories (right click to "Save As") | More photos after the jump

See Stephen Eyer's post on Adventist Filmmaker.com

UPDATE: Here's another report by Adrian James from La Sierra University on the Spectrum Collegiate Blog.

My sermon at Crosswalk is now online

The sermon I gave at the Crosswalk Church on February 2 is now online at the Crosswalk Church website. The sermon is entitled, The Corporation, and is essentially a theological response to the corporation and the form of life embodied by free-market capitalism. If you haven't seen the documentary film, The Corporation, I highly recommend it. I'd love to hear what you think of the message after you listen to or watch it.

Preaching at Crosswalk this Sabbath

This Sabbath I'll be preaching at Crosswalk Church in Redlands, California. My sermon will kick off Crosswalk's periodic "Crosswalk Goes to the Movies" series. I'm not sure that's what they call it, but you get the idea.

As you can tell from the image above, the film I'll be speaking about is The Corporation. This is a powerful film that I have seen three times now which talks about the way corporations act as individuals without accountability in our society and destroy not just people, but whole communities and the entire ecosystem. This is a film that has launched a movement.

I'll be using this film to open up a conversation about two things, basically:

1. How Christians must stand against this kind of corporate imperialism and be agents of justice for the poor that get trounced by this kind of "free-market fundamentalism" and
2. At a deeper level, how Christians have been scripted into a capitalist narrative that has become, in Tom Beaudoin's telling expression, a kind of "theocapitalism," and how the gospel is an invitation for all people (including Christians) to re-narrate our lives according to the good news of God's reign.

This is something I've been wanting to work on for a long time, so this has been good research and thinking for me. This is not the kind of preaching I do on a weekly basis, so I'm being stretched. If you're in town, come join us!

The Grace of Preaching the Lectionary

Today is Christ the King Sabbath - the last Sabbath of the Christian Year. Next Sabbath begins the new year with the season of Advent.

For approximately 13 months now I have been preaching from the Revised Common Lectionary. There are some amazing online resources that are incredibly helpful in preaching the lectionary. My favorite is a site called Text Week. In addition I have found the New Proclamation series of lectionary commentaries extremely helpful and insightful. But nothing replaces simply dwelling in the text and allowing the text to read your context and speak into the congregation's life.

I have been leading my congregation in the observance of Advent for the past 7 years and Lent for about the last 5 years, but this is the first year I have preaching an entire cycle through the lectionary.

I highly recommend this discipline. It is a rich gift that has been given to the church through the centuries. For myself and my congregation, we have found that God has met us in the text in surprising ways. Without fail the text for a particular week (and this year I have been strictly holding to the Gospel reading for the week) has been precisely what our community has needed. You would have to be here to fully appreciate the grace we have found in this.

The lectionary takes the the preacher out of the driver's seat and places the text of scripture in the central role. Rather than me trying to figure out "what my congregation needs to hear" we simply approach the text with hopeful expectation. I have preached more "difficult passages" this year than ever before in 13 years of ministry.

I frequently explain to my congregation what I am doing, but I'm not sure it has become part of their consciousness just yet. Others observe a change without directly referencing the lectionary. One member approached me with great surprise one day, saying that she heard some other preacher speak from EXACTLY THE SAME TEXT on Sunday that I spoke from on Sabbath. "Imagine that!" I thought to myself.

Next Sabbath begins my favorite season of the church year - Advent. It is also the richest season for Seventh-day Adventists. I will hopefully write more about Advent during the next four weeks. Hope is an Advent virtue, after all.

Anyone else out there preaching the lectionary?
If so, what have you learned?
Is anyone tired of trying to be clever week after week?

Jesus Was A Homeless Guy

This picture is on the cover of the bulletin for tomorrow's worship service. I really like this. I found it here.

I'll be preaching from the Gospel reading for the 5th Sabbath after Pentecost: Luke 9:51-62.

When the days drew near for him to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” But he turned and rebuked them. Then they went on to another village.

As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” But Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus said to him, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

UPDATE: You can hear the podcast of this sermon (from 6/30/2007) here.

Trinity Sabbath

Since before Advent the Hollywood Adventist Church has been following the liturgical calendar and we have preached from the gospel texts of the Lectionary, Year C. I have preached from the lectionary during Advent/Christmas and Lent/Easter for years. This year I have done more with it than ever before. But that's a different story...

This past Sabbath was Trinity Sabbath. Trinity Sabbath/Sunday is universally described as one of the most difficult preaching tasks of the year. I concur.

Here is the gospel reading we gathered around this past Sabbath:

“I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.

You can listen to the sermon or subscribe to the Hollywood Church's podcast here. (Right click here to download the MP3 to your hard drive). If you do condescend to listening to this 26 minute message, I would love to hear your thoughts in the comments. What I am seeking to wrestle with is what does it mean, in practical terms, to live our lives with God; being caught up, as Jesus describes, into the very life of God?

Here is the punchline of my message (inspired by Eugene Peterson's, The Message, translation of the above text) for those who don't have time for the whole sermon:

Jesus says, on the eve of his death, that the Spirit will come and teach you everything I have said to you - to help you make sense out of my teachings and interpret the events of your life in the light of my words and teachings.

Adventism is not known for it's strong Trinitarian roots. I have learned Trinitarian spirituality from my Christian sisters and brothers of other faiths, not least Orthodox Christians.

The Challenge of Sentimentality and the Importance of Advent

While I admit to not following this closely, it seems the pundits have resumed the “war on Christmas” debate. Remember all the attention from last year? So, what is the war on Christmas, according to these folks? It’s the loss of “Christmas” language, remember? It’s about pluralism; about the fact that we can’t say “Christmas trees”, they’re “Holiday trees”.

Now, the big deal is that Walmart is again calling their trees…”Christmas Trees.” And this is a major victory for Christianity in America! All is well again!

Okay, I know, the whole thing is a little silly, but here’s where I think it’s actually tragic if we get caught up in this nonsense. Christmas is truly in danger, but its primary threat is not from pluralism in America. I don’t even think that’s a significant threat. The greatest danger is not even commercialism (that’s where you thought I was headed, wasn’t it!) The commercialization of Christmas is an very important challenge we must face, but it is a result, not a primary factor.

The great danger facing Christmas is Christians who sentimentalize it. Once we’ve sentimentalized Christmas – de-clawed it – neutered it – tamed it; once we’ve reduced Christmas to sentimentality, it lays wide open to every abuse.

We Christians have given away Christmas. And this is why Advent is so important. Advent helps us take Christmas seriously. Christmas is too big, too important, too vital to the Christian story, to just dive into it all of a sudden. And it is certainly too important to hand it over to the “free market.” So our forebears, by God’s grace, developed the discipline for the church to prepare for Christmas for four weeks.

But what do I mean by sentimentality, you must be wondering? You see it all around you, don’t you? In our culture today Christmas is a rich celebration of family and friends – gift giving and receiving – good food and drink. In many ways, Christmas embodies the best about humanity. And as far as that goes, I love it. I love the warm feeling and the cozy evenings, the lights and the food. The smell of gingerbread lattes at Starbucks! It’s glorious. I truly love that Christmas.

The problem is, that Christmas has nothing to do with the coming of Christ into our world. Modern western civilization has created this almost completely secular vision of Christmas. What role does Jesus play in the modern Christmas? And this is where maybe the conservative pundits have a point. Jesus, in this secular vision, is a cuddly, cute baby with a warm glow about him set in an idyllic barn setting. What could be better?

But again, this isn’t the way the story goes, and we Christians have almost completely forgotten the story. But (and this is where the pundits get it wrong) it is not someone “out there” stealing our precious Christian Christmas. It is we Christians who “gave it away! So it is vitally important that we begin Advent at the end of the story, talking about the re-appearing of Messiah.

These words are from my sermon from December 2 - the First Sabbath of Advent. You can listen to the sermon here or subscribe to the Hollywood Adventist Church Podcast here.

I realize this post is about a month or three weeks too late, but better late than never, right. What are your thoughts about the sentimentalizing of Christmas or the danger of sentimentality, in general? One of the central tasks of the missional church is to help the people of God remember and reconnect with the story of God. This is the rational behind much of what I've written here.

I wish I had time to post about the irony that, for the most part, ADVENTists don't celebrate ADVENT. I have my suspicions about why. What are your thoughts? Did you celebrate Advent growing up? Why or why not? What are your thoughts about Advent now?

All Saints stands up to the powers

Some of you will remember that at the end of 2005 the IRS initiated an investigation into the tax-exempt status of All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena. I wrote about this issue on this blog (click here). Well, here's the rest of the story...

Last week the IRS serve two summons to the All Saints Church: one for all documents (emails, newsletters, notes, letters, etc) produced around the time of the sermon in question and one for the Rector, Rev. Ed Bacon, to appear before the IRS. Yesterday All Saints held a press conference to announce their course of action. Their decision: resist these two summons and take the issue to court. You can read the details of their decision as well as many other things relating to this investigation and the press release from yesterday's press conference by clicking here.

All Saints circulated by email an invitation for faith leaders from around the region to join them on the chancel steps for the press conference (see photo above). I was able to rearrange my schedule for the day and stand on the steps with them. It was a momentous occasion! We eagerly await the outcome of this case.

Progressive Christians Uniting had an excellent write up on their blog today as well. And I'm sure by Googling this issue you can find enough reading to keep you busy for a while. I wonder what the Religious Liberty Department of the General Conference has to say about this issue.