For Such a Time as This

There is no better time than now to be a member of a church, to be part of a faith community.

Because the times in which we live … frankly, they suck.  We live in a time of perpetual crisis — hurricanes, fire, threat of war, mass migration, and political instability. We careen between chaos and insecurity. We are finding it harder and harder to feel optimistic about the future.

I believe that the Church exists for such times as these. The People of God are uniquely equipped to endure, persist, and remain filled with hope, even in times of distress.

This Sunday, we celebrate Back to School/Church Sunday, and I hope you will indeed come back to church, if you have been missing lately. I think you know that being with other people of faith makes you stronger and wiser. If these days and months have been troubling to your soul, then come back to church and follow the way of Jesus with us.

The people of Kessler Park UMC are not escapists; we don’t retreat into our sanctuary in order to hide from the world’s realities. No, we gather to be reminded of the reality of the Kingdom of God, which surrounds us. We come to be reoriented to the truth that God is at work in our world, despite all appearances. And we are challenged to join God in this work — a work that increasingly demands our active participation.

Our schedule of programming this fall is also meant to encourage involvement — not just in the church, but in our world. Here’s what it looks like:

Sunday schedule
9:30 am   Chancel Choir rehearsal
9:45 am   Sunday School for all ages: Beginning this fall, children in the nursery will also be following Sunday School curriculum. Plus we are launching a brand-new adult Sunday School class, led by John Ogren.
11:00 am   Worship
4:00 pm   Methodist Youth Fellowship, Youth Room
4:00 pm   Worship at The Meridian: Weekly half-hour worship with Holy Communion at The Meridian at Kessler Park, 2522 Fort Worth Ave. If you are interested in being a volunteer, contact the church office.
5:00 pm   Pastor’s Bible Study, Conference Room: A freewheeling, loosely-organized conversation about the Scripture text which Wes will be preaching about the following Sunday. Bring your own Bible and lots of questions!
6:00 pm   Fellowship in the Chapel
6:30 pm   Real Life Faith with Rev. Magruder, Chapel: This class will investigate the intersection of faith and community, and take a hard look at the issues which confront us in the light of Scripture, faith tradition, reason, and experience. Topics will change each month: September — Islam; October — Immigration; November — Race and Religion; December — Israel and Palestine.

Wednesday schedule
5:00 pm   Children’s Choir rehearsal
5:45 pm   Dinner served, Fellowship Hall: If you or your group would like to prepare dinner as a fundraiser, please contact the church office.
6:30 pm   Kids of Character
                 Youth Time, Youth Room
                 Lay Christian Pastoral Care Giving, Fellowship Hall: New class led by Mike Smith and Ken Kelley on pastoral caregiving for the layperson, defined as “the mutual concern of Christians for each other and for those persons in the world for whom God loves.”
                 Social Justice Team, Chapel: New class led by Susan Baxley and Rev. Wes Magruder, which will lead to the formation of a Social Justice team at the church. Learn the difference between mercy and advocacy as we address injustice and inequality.
                  Kessler Ringers rehearsal, Sanctuary
 

Harvey, Noah, and God's Saving Work

If you took a close look at my stole last Sunday, you might have noticed that it was a detailed illustration of the story of Noah’s ark. It’s a beautiful piece of art, but I don’t wear it often because it doesn’t fit any church season very easily.

However, you can guess why I chose to wear it last week. And I’m going to wear it again this coming Sunday.

I keep finding myself reading and re-reading the story of the flood in Genesis these last few days. I’m searching for some kind of interpretive clue for making sense of the tragedy unfolding in Houston these days. Unfortunately, it is difficult to find comfort in the Noah story.

For one, according to Genesis, God causes the flood — no, to put it bluntly, God uses the flood for genocidal purposes. He wanted to purge the earth of human beings and start all over. So he picked Noah, who seemed like a good guy at the time, and gave him alone the lifeline he and his family would need to survive the flood.

I don’t believe that this is really the true explanation for the flood, let me be very clear. I do believe that there was a big flood in the ancient past; other ancient civilizations and cultures also have stories of a major, earth-altering flood. But the Noah story sounds like a very early, weak attempt to make sense of its widespread destruction, which is something we humans are always trying to do.

When tragedy occurs and disaster strikes, we work hard to make sense of it. We find it very difficult to accept the idea that storms happen because of a complex of factors related to atmosphere and barometric pressure and winds. We shrink from the thought that sometimes random things happen, or that accidents occur.

Sometimes the human authors of the Hebrew Scriptures struggled with this very tendency. They found it easier to ascribe a cause to the flood; since the only thing that could possibly cause a worldwide flood was God, then obviously, God must have caused the flood. And why? Well, isn’t it obvious that people can be evil?

It might have made for a plausible scenario for early civilizations, but the story sounds absolutely horrifying to 21st century people. This doesn’t sound like the God we know, nor like the God we come to know in the rest of the Bible.

When I consider the “meaning” of Hurricane Harvey and the subsequent flooding, I don’t ask, “Whose fault is it?” I’m not angry with God for “letting it happen,” nor do I think God caused it to happen.

Rather, when I look at what is happening in Houston, I see God at work in the aftermath of the storm through all the ordinary people who have put their own lives on hold to be in service.
Haven’t we all seen God at work in extraordinary ways? We have seen scores of inspiring photographs and videos of people helping people. We have watched journalists reaching out to assist elderly Alzheimer’s patients, uniformed officers carrying women and children, and teenagers piloting boats and canoes down flooded streets to save families. Every time we see someone else being saved, we are watching God’s salvation work happening.

This Sunday, we have the opportunity of participating in this salvation work. As a church, we are joining together to put together a number of flood buckets, which will be immensely helpful over the coming weeks as the flood cleanup begins. The church will provide the five-gallon buckets, but we need you all to bring the supplies. Here’s a list of what is needed, and you’re invited to bring them this Sunday morning. Bring them to your pews with you, because the service will be interactive and participatory. We’ll be putting together flood buckets AS an act of worship, and taking Holy Communion, too. See you Sunday morning!

A Call to Action for People of Faith

Every morning, I wake up, turn over and pick up my phone. I have an alert set to directly receive any tweet sent by the president. Most mornings, there are two or more tweets awaiting my view.

I do this because I want to know what he said BEFORE I begin my quiet prayer time. I need to know HOW to pray and HOW to orient my mind and soul before starting my pastoral work.

Lately, however, the president’s words have been haunting more than just my morning thoughts; my daily thoughts and nighttime dreams are full of his scandalous ruminations. Every time you think it can’t get any worse, it does. Yesterday’s scandal is rapidly replaced by today’s scandal, which will be off the radar as soon as tomorrow dawns.

I hear often from friends, church members, or Facebook/Twitter friends, something like this: “This is all so upsetting, but what can we do? What can I do? What can anyone do?”

I want to answer that question. It’s important. Especially for people of faith. If you haven’t noticed, the religious folks closest to the president have been close to mum about the Charlottesville events and the president’s remarks concerning those events. The CEOs who fled the president’s councils have shown a stronger moral fiber than his religious leaders.

Yet across the country, clergy and members of churches, synagogues, and mosques have raised their voices in opposition to the president’s harmful rhetoric.

I know that you want Kessler Park UMC to be one of those faith communities that stands up on behalf of justice, so let me suggest some things that you — and I — can do today.

Let me preface my remarks with an important statement about where we stand vis-a-vis the president. What I am going to say has nothing to do with party politics or policy issues; I recognize that good Christians disagree on all sorts of issues, including immigration, taxes, abortion, and healthcare. I’m not talking about the basic differences between Republicans and Democrats. 

The problem with our current president has less to do with policy issues than with morality, truth, decency, and human dignity. No person of faith can truly deny that this president has violated these norms so consistently and ruthlessly that we no longer expect him to act morally, truthfully, decently, and with dignity. It is clear that this problem will not be solved by a different chief of staff, or a steadying family member, or even opinion polls. The president has clearly signaled that he has no interest in changing or doing things differently.

Thus, Christians must now act to have the president removed from office. It’s as simple as that. The stakes are too high for things to continue as they are. He must be removed by peaceful, nonviolent, democratic, and constitutional means.

Here’s what I recommend all of us do starting today:

1. Call or write your Congressperson and ask them to begin the impeachment process or invoke the 25th Amendment. Do it today. Our representatives need to begin hearing from large groups of people that the president must be removed.
    
2. Consider attending the “In Solidarity” rally with me in Dallas on Saturday evening at 7:30 pm. The rally was originally scheduled to protest the Confederate monuments in Dallas, but now is meant to also stand as a rebuke to what happened in Charlottesville, and resist the president’s defense of white supremacy. The time for debate and conversation about the monuments and statues has passed; at this point, they simply need to come down, for the president has invested new meaning and significance in them, which solely benefits white supremacy.
    
3. Read the Barmen Declaration, written and signed in Germany in 1934 by the brave members of the Confessing Church, which recognized the growing danger of the Nazi movement, and drew its red line in the sand. Dietrich Bonhoeffer helped write this declaration; in fact, pick up anything by Bonhoeffer to read for such a time as this.
    
4. Pray for the president’s removal at 6:45, a.m. and p.m. When you see the clock hit 6:45, spend 5 minutes in prayer, preferably on your knees. Praying in this way will unify us, regardless of where we are when we pray, and it also serves to strengthen and embolden the one who prays. I like to think of prayer as a time when I am given my marching orders, a time of regrouping and empowerment. 
    
5. Use Scripture and theology to protest the president’s words and actions. Permit yourself to use religious imagery and faith symbols in your protests. The rest of the American white church needs to hear what we have to say in their own language.
    
6. Finally, attend a workshop/planning session with me at the church on Sunday night, 6:30 pm in the Chapel. We will work through further steps to take in order to counter the president’s words and actions. 

I recognize that this column is strongly-worded and that some of you may strongly disagree. However, I believe we are long past the point where the words and actions of this president can be legitimately defended by people who follow Jesus Christ. Something must change, or we will encounter worse words and actions tomorrow.