Category: Religion

Our Week in Washington D.C.; Or How do I explain to my daughters how important this all is?

“The Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage across the United States Friday in a closely divided ruling that will stand as a milestone in its 226-year history.

The justices ruled 5-4 that states cannot deny gay men and lesbians the same marriage rights enjoyed for thousands of years by opposite-sex couples. Within days if not hours, the decision is expected to trigger same-sex marriages in states that still ban the practice.

“They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law,” Justice Anthony Kennedy said in his 28-page ruling. “The Constitution grants them that right.”

Source: Supreme Court strikes down bans on same-sex marriage

Saving this for posterity because I’ve been in Washington D.C. this week with my wife, our soon-to-be-born baby boy, and my young daughters (age 7 and 5). While we’ve been doing the touristy stuff, we’ve also been in the midst of two major Supreme Court decisions on “Obamacare” and marriage equality.

My girls have gotten to walk past the Supreme Court and stand with us while we took the chants and the applause in after these rulings. I didn’t hide my tears.

What a week. As the Confederate flags come down across Southern states and my own beloved South Carolina after the terrible massacre of innocents in Charleston, we see the rise of something different in our country.

Here’s to new beginnings based on love, reconciliation, and the bridging of divides that those in power have used to try to keep us apart.

Here’s to the future United States and a country that is better for my daughters and son than the one I grew up with.

Amen.

 

“Losing My Religion”

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“If people do that and remain or become evangelical, I’m OK with that.  So long as they don’t hurt and exploit others, especially the poor, the oppressed, and the marginalized.   If they remain or become Catholic, AOK.  If they remain or become Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu, pagan, agnostic, atheist, or anything else, I really don’t care.  I care only that (a) they think about it and (b) they actively love others and do good to others and help others in need. My sense is that this is becoming more of a standard view in this country.   Which is why traditional Christianity is losing people and the non-affiliated are gaining.   Whether it will continue to trend that way or not – heaven knows.”

Source: Losing Religion in America – Christianity in Antiquity (CIA): The Bart Ehrman Blog

I’m not losing my religion (at least I don’t think I am), but that song popped into my head as I read (and agreed with) Prof. Ehrman’s thoughts here.

In the conversations about Pew Research’s report on the erosion of Christianity in the US that I’ve had with friends and family (such as the recorded ones here with Thomas), I’ve encountered a number of different “mansplainings” and explanations for why people in our country are “losing their religion.” As Ehrman points to in his post here, a number of them have to deal with the assumption that those who are leaving mainline or evangelical (which is mainline here in South Carolina) Christianity are doing so because they weren’t necessarily “true” or “real” believers to begin with.

I find that explanation unfair and, quite frankly, disturbing.

On the other side are the explanations from my more progressive or “neo-atheist” friends that point to the foibles of Christianity’s latent and explicit hypocrisy or the Bible’s troublesome ability to interact with modern notions of history or science and declare that “it’s about time” people started waking up to the realization that our fairy tales are bogus and there is no old white man in the sky who is going to either zap us with lightning, hear our prayers, or deliver us from evil.

I find that worldview just as disturbing as the former one.

My faith is weird.

I appreciate science. I love science. Heck, I’ve taught physical science to unruly and amazing 13 and 14 year olds off an on over the last decade of my life. I also love history. Particularly, ancient history and archaeology fascinate me.

Both of those studies, which some would say should degrade or at least invalidate something as quaint and reproachable as faith in fairy tales, challenge my own notion of self and my own well-thought-out beliefs in a way that encourages me to keep on down the path.

Much like Dali, I realize that beings and things are made of energy, not solid mass.

That potential glimpsing of something beyond our own earthly 80 or so years (at least here in 2015 middle class caucasian America) is what draws me to science and what drives my faith.

That extended realization of a split second peek into this universe of energy way beyond what our eyeballs connected to our evolving ape brains via a short cord we call the optic nerve (on mine there is plaque) can ever hope to process is what drives us further out into the cosmic ocean, as Sagan said.

Faith that is based or driven by the need for a moral structure or the need for a guiding hand to be told what to think or do is what is eroding, and will continue to erode, in our country. I have a set of assumptions and guidelines that define my moral and ethical code because of my glimpsings of the universe beyond my diseased optic nerve. That is the basis of my faith. Not the other way around.

We are truly magnificent and amazing creatures, designed by time and weathered by the millennia to survive and thrive on this pale blue dot. But we are also selfish, and capable of great evils. Religion doesn’t save us or secure us from those primal instincts. In many ways, religion is the prime motivator for those evils that we all to easily commit whether intentionally or unintentionally.

We shouldn’t shy away from that reality and speak truth to those who would use religion as a tool to cause oppression of those of different genders, races, sexual persuasions, color spectrum preferences, nationalities, Apple / PC / Android fan-ism, hair color, eye color, allergies, or carbon family basis. Religion is the invitation to participate with the universe in some way that we can never understand. “We know we are approaching the grandest of mysteries,” and that shouldn’t be taken lightly or used as a tool to tell others that they cannot be leaders in our religion or they cannot love another person based on the makeup of sexual anatomy etc.

Our human understandings based on supposedly innerant manuscripts handled countless times by wise and unwise transmitters do not cause us greater communion with the divine if we are seeking to prove our own confused interpretations of the messages being transmitted by the electrochemical computer we call our brains. Otherwise, as Gamaliel warns us across the ages, “if this plan or this undertaking is of human origin, it will fail.”

Thinking Religion: Smuggling Religion

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Thinking Religion: Smuggling Religion | Thinking.FM: Prof. Thomas Whitley and Sam Harrelson attempt to bring some thoughtfulness to the topic of religion again this week with discussions of the Watchmen, Rambo Jesus, Westboro Church, Southern Baptists and Obama, Palmyra, Indiana Jones, and the next reformation.

This Week’s Topics

  • Who watches the Watchmen?
  • Rambo meets Heart of Darkness meets Jesus
  • Hatin’ on Ivory Coast
  • Well, the Bible says…
  • Obama supposedly offends the Southern Baptist Convention
  • Palmyra, India, Israel, and the role of the antiquities black market in politics
  • Mike Huckabee wants to be Indiana Jones
  • Pokers gonna poke
  • A New Reformation

Declining Average Church Attendance and Marketing Implications

RIP, average attendance | Faith and Leadership: “Church attendance was once a key indicator of a virtuous cycle. If the church could get a new person in the pew regularly, offerings would go up, involvement in small groups and missions would climb, and the church would be healthy. If attendance was declining then everything else would eventually decline. The growing lack of dependability on attendance is a sign that the virtuous cycles that have sustained congregations since the end of World War II are collapsing. In order to sustain congregations over the long haul, new cycles need to be developed. Once that begins to happen, new measures can be identified.”

Interesting article that ends with a decisive call to parish leaders to move ahead in attempting to understand the changing nature of church attendance rather than keeping the status quo or firmly placing heads in sand to avoid the uncomfortable conversations that arise as a result.

As Pew Research etc have pointed out, the religious landscape of the United States is decidedly different than it was just 10 years ago, but especially 20-30 years ago when many of the models church leaders use for analysis, budget predictions etc were being formulated.

It’s not all doom and gloom, though. Churches being smart, nimble, and open to hearing the voice of God in the silence, in the whirlwinds, and even in the spreadsheets can mean the difference between keeping a historic sanctuary lit and being able to provide missions monies or having to sell the building to the YMCA.

Religious Slacktivism

Prof. Thomas Whitley and Sam Harrelson attempt to bring some thoughtfulness to the topic of religion again this week with discussions of whether Jesus was a terrorist, the beatification process, Muslim responses to climate change, how to fix Genesis, and why changing your Facebook profile picture makes you feel better.

Source: Thinking Religion Podcast: Religious Slacktivism

 

Our weekly podcast episode on Religion and culture is live. I think it turned out pretty well!

Stop Drinking Bottled Water

Clean, safe drinking water that flows freely out of our faucets is a feat of engineering that humans have been been perfecting for two millennia. It is a cornerstone of civilization. It is what our cities are built upon. And over the years the scientists and hydrologists and technicians who help get water to our houses have also become our environmental stewards, our infrastructural watchdogs, our urban visionaries. Drinking the water these people supply to our homes is the best possible way to protect future access to water worldwide. Companies that package water in a single-use bottle are not concerned with the future. They are not invested in the long-term effects of climate change on an endangered watershed, nor are they working to prepare a megacity for an inevitable natural disaster. What they are interested in is their bottom line: Marketing a “healthy” product to compensate for the fact that people are buying less of their other products that are known to case obesity and diabetes—and selling it for at prices that are 240 to 10,000 times higher than what you pay for tap water.

Source: Stop Drinking Bottled Water

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I’ll add this under my “Theological Eating” umbrella.

A Podcast About Walmart Caskets, Cynic Jesus, and Beards

Prof. Thomas Whitley and Sam Harrelson attempt to bring some thoughtfulness to the topic of religion again this week with discussions of the physicality of resurrections, how to read the Bible in a short period of time while in D.C., pledging allegiance to the Christian Flag, and what Muhammad has to do with the First Amendment.

Source: Thinking Religion: Save Money, Die Better | Thinking.FM

Thomas and I do a podcast every Wednesday that I particularly enjoy. It goes back to our days in seminary together (2008 or so) and although we kept trying to make it a regular thing, it’s only become a standard weekly part of my life in earnest over the past few months.

I wouldn’t think of putting off the recording of an episode now. It’s my weekly chance to nerd out about religion, politics, history, and have a civilized conversation that is “deeper” and more reflective than my usual fare. We certainly don’t always agree (this episode is a good example of that), but we do always end up learning a bit from each other… well, I learn from Thomas mostly.

The other thing that I’m beginning to really appreciate are the show notes. We spend a good deal of time pulling those links together and then curating them down into something that can be reasonably thought of as a standard podcast length show. Every week, we come up with dozens of links, so the selection process before the show has also become a highlight of my week.

It’s become a good show. It’s only getting better. Hope you enjoy.

Is the Original New Testament Lost?

House of Cards is fun, but take a few mins to watch something a little more substantive this weekend (like this):

As you might expect, I argue that even though we have thousands of manuscripts of the New Testament,  we do not have many *early* ones — and hardly any *really* early ones.  That is why we can not (always? ever?) know with absolute certainty what the authors of the New Testament originally said.   That matters for lots of reasons, one of which is that fundamentalist Christians but their faith in the very words of the Bible.  But what if, in some passages, we don’t know what those words were?   Dan, also as expected, argued that we have such extensive evidence for the New Testament — more than for any other book from the ancient world — we can trust that we have what the authors originally wrote.

via My Debate with Dan Wallace: Is the Original NT Lost? – Christianity in Antiquity (CIA): The Bart Ehrman Blog.

Why We Should Care About Archaeological Destruction

This is terrible…

The Islamic State group released a video on Thursday showing militants using sledgehammers to smash ancient artifacts in Iraq’s northern city of Mosul, describing them as idols that must be removed, according to the Associated Press.

The destructions are part of a campaign by Islamic State, who have destroyed a number of shrines — including Muslim holy sites — in order to eliminate what they view as heresy.

via Islamic State Video Shows Militants Destroying Museum Artifacts in Iraq – Dispatch – WSJ.

While the world was watching the Academy Awards ceremony, the people of Mosul were watching a different show. They were horrified to see ISIS members burn the Mosul public library. Among the many thousands of books it housed, more than 8,000 rare old books and manuscripts were burned.

via ISIS Burns 8000 Rare Books and Manuscripts in Mosul – Yahoo! Finance

Let’s not forget that people of many faiths (ancient and modern) have used the defacement or destruction of art or cultural items as a way to “wipe the slate clean” of previous heresies. From Hatsheput to Josiah pulling down the high places in Israel to the burning of books, these tactics are power plays designed to show that the deity or deities are on one’s side in a presumed theo-political battle.

Lost in the fear that ISIS / ISIL / IS is imminently planning to attack the US is the cultural damage this collection of people are doing to museums and sites in Syria (Damascus, Antioch, Palmyra, Dura Europos) and northern Iraq (Mosul / Nineveh).

Specifically for the stories linked above, the modern city of Mosul sites very near Nineveh, the historical capital of the Assyrian Empire, at its height in the 9th-7th centuries BCE. Believe it or not, Assyrian artifacts caused quite a rage in the late 1800’s after Sir Henry Austen Layard’s discovery of Assyrian palaces in the 1850’s.

These artifacts directly impacted the development of the missionary movement as northeastern universities used these impressive pieces of art as proof of God’s providence (as the folks in Jerusalem were saved from Sennacherib’s invasion by God’s hand according to the book of Kings… the folks in the Northern Kingdom of Israel as well as Lachish were less fortunate).

While doing graduate studies at Yale, I somehow lucked into a dream job at the Yale Art Gallery. I was so fascinated by the Assyrian antiquities there and the story of why Yale, Harvard, Amherst, Williams etc were so passionate about securing Assyrian pieces for their own collections in the 1800’s that I wrote a book about it:

This accompanying text to the Yale University Art Gallery’s famed Assyrian reliefs details the 19th-century American frenzy for reliefs taken from Assurnasirpal II’s magnificent palace in Kalhu near the Tigris River. The discovery of the palace by the British in 1845 captured the Victorian public’s imagination, leading to the discovery of other architectural sites and the deciphering of the Assyrian language. Soon, American missionaries sought to procure artifacts for their alma maters, most often coveting reliefs that were religious in content. William Frederic Williams was one such missionary and former Yale faculty member. He, along with Yale Medical School graduate Henry Lobel, secured six slabs from Assurnasirpal’s palace, which were divided up between Yale, Amherst, and Union Seminary in Utica. Harrelson analyzes at length the two reliefs obtained by Yale. He touches on the technical aspects of the materials as well as the reliefs’ religious iconography, situating them within the palace as a whole.

via Asia Has Claims Upon New England by Sam Harrelson, Yale University Art Gallery

Along with the atrocities being done by groups such as IS to other humans, we should care about the destruction of irreplaceable pieces of world history whenever it happens. For those of us with a more jingoist mindset, we should especially care when these cultural pieces are directly tied to our own history and majority religion.

William F. Williams wrote back to his benefactors at Yale from the city of Mosul in the 1850’s that, “Asia has claims upon New England.” Perhaps that has never been more true in the modern context.

Thomas and I will definitely discuss this on the next Thinking Religion, so give that a listen if you’re interested.

I pray for peace.

Theological Eating

At the beginning of the year, I decided to stop eating meat and meat products. I have some experience with this from my days in graduate school (it was more of an economic decision then!), but I was still going into this new year / new eating pattern with the full understanding that it’s very hard to change patterns even if it is 1/1 on the calendar.

Yes, we are humans and we are organic animal beings that are meant to include meat and animals in our diet (and yes, I consider fish, shellfish, etc as part of the animal kingdom).

I want to explain why, as I’ve gotten a good number of questions about my decision. As an aside, the most contentious conversations I’ve had about my “theological eating” has been with more conservative Christians who, at first blush, deny the reality of concepts such as evolution, but are quick to point out that our species became who we are because of meat consumption…but that’s for another post).

I call this whole eating style “theological eating” for me. That’s corny and pretentious and a little ostentatious. But it reminds me of why I’m doing it. Merianna and I (and MH and Laura) are big “animal people” in that we are outnumbered by our animal co-habitators in our home (including a recently acquired tortoise that will outlive me and costs more to maintain than I do every month). I’ve always been very empathetic with animals going back to childhood.

I’ve also been very compelled to examine my own use of resources and materials. I’ve been terrible at the follow through, but I always had a huge amount of guilt when I ordered a Big Mac or a steak at Outback or bought a discounted slab of chicken breasts at Ingles or Bi-Lo. Part of that guilt was because of the animals themselves and my far-removed connection between their probably not-so-great life and death and my own plate. Part of that also has to do with the economic system that we perpetuate by exchanging our dollars for meat “grown” in such a manner. Part of this has to do with the realization of the advertising machine that corporations put into marketing their products to children, adults, and the elderly. Theologically, I can’t be honest with my own faith if I don’t address a very core issue of both the suffering of probably cognizant beings as well as my own participation in an economic system that I don’t support because of a story about a man who lived a long time ago.

I’m also using one small bowl (a bowl I “borrowed” from Wofford College in 2000… promise I’ll return) and one utensil (an awesome titanium spork… yep!) for most of my food intake at home.

This isn’t just about meat, either (but oh boy is it difficult to find good kosher vegan cheese…whew). I’ve also started heavily examining products such as cereals, grains, sugar, water…even beer that I put into my body and pay with my money. I’m extending this to areas such as how I buy tech gadgets (people that know me know that I spend a good deal of time, money, and attention on those), books, music, appliances etc. For the past year, I’ve pretty much worn the same “outfit” (as Merianna calls it) everyday of an awesome black shirt with a pair of slacks and brown shoes. When one cannot be mended anymore, I buy a new one (happened just this week and I had to get a replacement). Thoughtful and deliberate consumption, if you will. I’ll call it “theological eating.”

The unexamined life might not be worth living, but the examined life is not a walk in hippy park, either. I’m not making this lifestyle choice in order to make you feel bad about ordering a #2 at McDonald’s or plopping down $12 for a steak at Applebees, either. This isn’t out of disdain or judgement. We all walk our own path and mine is not for anyone else or better than yours (probably worse).

We live in an amazing period of our species’ existence. It probably won’t continue on some progressive curve upwards, and we should realize and enjoy our fortune of being born in such a time. That involves enjoying the resources around us.

Nevertheless, I feel like I need to be more deliberate about my choices, and that’s why I am hopeful this is the right path for me.

Realizing Our Place in the Universe

“This image, captured with the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, is the largest and sharpest image ever taken of the Andromeda galaxy — otherwise known as M31.This is a cropped version of the full image and has 1.5 billion pixels. You would need more than 600 HD television screens to display the whole image.”

via Sharpest ever view of the Andromeda Galaxy | ESA/Hubble.

I had to download the 4.3 GB file. For science.

Shortest Day of the Year

Emmanuel Baptist Fellowship Christmas Service

The Sun is directly overhead of the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern Hemisphere during the December Solstice.

The December Solstice occurs when the Sun reaches its most southerly declination of -23.5 degrees. In other words, when the North Pole is tilted furthest – 23.5 degrees – away from the Sun.

via TimeAndDate.com

At 6:03 PM EST last night, our geographic location was the furthermost position away from the sun that it will be until next December. I was lucky enough to be singing Christmas carols with my wife, our girls, and members of our faith community at Emmanuel Baptist Fellowship.

Solstice has long been a sacred day for those of us in the northern hemisphere and marks the “extreme of winter” or Donghzi in Chinese. It happens to coincide with major times of festivals in modern and ancient religions on purpose, as we continue to come to grips with our humanity while wrestling with concepts of existence, death, and faith in times of darkness.

Here’s to the lengthening of days and the spreading of candelight to remind us of the angels of our better natures as our mother planet makes yet another orbit around her own parental star. We are a young and curious species, indeed.

On Not Being a That

My friend Stacy with an amazing, and completely self-giving, post…

So I remind myself, I am not a “that.” I am a woman. I am a child of God. I am a friend. I am a sister. I am a caregiver. I am an advocate. I am a daughter. I am a preacher. I am a confidant. I am a dog mom. I am a geek. I am an auntie. I am a teacher. I am an author. I am a disciple. I am a badass. I am a scholar. I am a chaplain. I am an ally. I am a feminist. I am a peacemaker. I am brave, I am resilient, and yes, I am sexy — on my own terms. I am no one’s object. I am so much more. I am me.

via I Am Not a “That” | chaplainjesuslady.

I celebrate the type of religion and Christianity that does not objectify people but instead points them to the wrestling that is found in places such as Romans 7:15-25.

If only we had more clergy willing to make such brave posts and statements.

Thank you, Stacy.

What Does the Future of Church Have in Common with Raising Guinea Pigs?

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One of my driving reasons for starting ministrieslab as a “church” is the realization that what church means is changing quickly. In my mind, ministrieslab enables its members as ministers with the resources needed to engage in the world. That differs from church that sees itself as the center of a Christendom like culture in which the Gospel and Great Commission rule the land and all are members of the big church downtown.

Here’s John Backman reflecting on something similar on Lauri Ann Lumby’s blog:

My wife and I raise guinea pigs. That makes us part of an obscure hobby with maybe 1,000 other folks across the U.S. We meet at shows, often in barns, wearing jeans and sweats sprinkled with animal hair.

A hobby this small has its own dynamic, and it’s much like a family. We attract colorful eccentrics and needy people. We gossip, fight, and disagree about silly things. We may be “related,” but we are very different. We also rally around one another in times of crisis.

And in most cases, we have found a place where we can be fully ourselves. That makes our hobby a sort of living laboratory for how to see and embrace people as they are, warts and all.

In other words, without even thinking about it, we are living into Jesus’ vision of community.

This type of community-as-church is my hope for minstrieslab and one of the main reasons we’re using tools like our Reddit subreddit as a place to facilitate community and encourage people to either participate anonymously or join in.

I’m no Paul for sure, but I look to his example of taking Gospel out of Jerusalem and the Galilee and out into the uncharted more Hellenistic audiences of Turkey, Greece, Italy, and the Mediterranean as inspiration as I head back to finish my MDiv. It wasn’t a completely popular decision among the earliest founders of what would become Christianity as evidenced in the New Testament and extra-biblical sources (especially Galatians). In a modern analogue, there’s a vast sea of cultures that are made vibrant by tools like the web that have a great deal of potential to add to the fabric of Christianity (christianities) in our own era. I want ministrieslab to play a role in these communities much as the same way that organizing forces help guinea pig enthusiasts find their own voices.

ministrieslab looks towards a future of church that is very much like Paul’s own Hellenistic Mediterranean.

More from John Backman that describe some of this…

This would be a massive shift. The Church would no longer be a nexus of power, but rather a facilitator of service. It would stand on the sidelines, the way a head coach does. The game happens on the field; the coach simply gives the players the necessary resources and guidance to play well. It is an important role, but not the central role.

With the Church’s facilitation, people could immerse themselves in the world more fully oriented and better equipped to love all, accept the outcast, be vulnerable, and commit to others in a way that does not end with the first falling out. People living like this could do a world of good. The treasures of the Church would be used in service to humanity. Christendom would inform individuals and cultures rather than trying to control them.

via Where Will the Future Church Meet? Not in Church – Guest Blog | Lauri Ann Lumby.

That’s where I am with ministrieslab. I have no idea where it is with me yet. I can’t wait to find out.

In the meantime, join our community if you’d like.

Back to Seminary

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I’ll be returning to Gardner-Webb’s School of Divinity this fall to finish my Masters of Divinity. Since Harrelson Agency is doing well, it can afford (demand?) that I take a few days for classes while still having a hand in day-to-day operations. I’ll be working on both seminary and the agency as well as ministrieslab moving ahead (more on that in a second).

Gardner-Webb Divinity and I go way back and have more history than I can remember over this past decade. I first started the MDiv program there in 2006 while building the marketing agency as well as teaching undergrad Old Testament as an adjunct there for a little while. In 2009, after the death of my mentor and great teacher Dan Goodman, I received a great opportunity to go back into the classroom at Spartanburg Day School and I knew I had to follow that path.

I’m glad I did. I found my amazing wife at Spartanburg Day and watched her struggle and wrestle with her own call to ministry. She blazed through Gardner-Webb Divinity and impressed me beyond words with her devotion to her call an her passion for authentic ministry. Merianna graduated this year with her MDiv and is now pastor at Emmanuel Baptist Fellowship. I’m so proud of her for too many reasons to list, proud of her congregation, and proud of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of SC for responding to her voice and ministry.

I’m not deciding to do this lightly or with the goal of following a traditional form of ministry. Instead, my ministerial focus will be on a startup church I’m hoping to build in the next few months/years/decades called ministrieslab. We’ll be using Reddit, bitcoin, Twitter, meetups, mobile, our app, and in person fellowship to help enable every member to be a minister and focus on causes like my own Hunger Initiative while still participating in CBF life.

Think authentic missions in the post church-as-cultural-hegemony world that focuses on community. See /r/dogecoin if you need a non-religious example of what transformative community can look like despite the absurdity (almost as absurd as religion). Imagine if Christianity were actually a lifestyle. It’s going to be fun, challenging, nightmarish, and uplifting. I’m sure I’ll be writing more here as I get ministrieslab off the ground.

I view ministrieslab as the culmination of my work in marketing, religion, tech, entrepreneurism, etc and a catalyst for the kind of change I think God wants me to enact in the world. I’ve got enough experience with startups to know what’s ahead and I don’t take it lightly.

I have to thank my amazing wife for pushing me to listen to the still small voice of my call that has been persistent in my life since I was 13. I also have to thank Thomas for being there, always challenging and supporting me. Also, Kheresa Harmon at Gardner Webb Divinity is an amazing counselor along with Jay Kieve and Debbie Haag at CBFofSC.

More on ministrieslab soon. In the meantime, here’s my Pilgrimage Statement that I wrote as part of my (re?) application to Gardner-Webb Divinity explaining the opera in my head…

 

 

Constructs such as fate and purpose do not appeal to me. Instead, because of my education and life experiences, I choose to view the world with a more critical lens. However, incessant gentle prodding from a hand unseen drives me towards an extended realization that to be fully actualized I must throw myself into the fiery and mysterious darkness of Sinai where God’s voice still hovers and beckons humanity to listen.

This pilgrimage has not been easy by any sense of the word and the decision to answer this call does not bring comfort and peace to me. This Damascan Road has been long and arduous and only now are the blisters healing on my eyes. I’ve consistently sought out other paths and avenues for my service, but none have proven satisfactory to the unending whisper that never leaves. Despite the difficulty of the path so far, this is a decision that I have to make because of the persistence of the call.

As I approached college age, I spoke with our Pastor frequently about the ministry and the steps which needed to be taken.  I led our church’s youth group and gained experience in the pulpit both in our church and in surrounding churches in our association.  However, as I entered college, I decided to major in Chemistry and Computer Science and take Religion classes as electives because of my own doubts about my ability to live up to the standards I set for myself and I felt were expected of me. Nonetheless, I quickly discovered the continuing hush whispers summoning me to a life in the ministry would not cease.

It was during an Old Testament summer school class my freshman year that something sneaked up behind me, tapped me on the shoulder and made me realize everything I had missed on the road of life up to that point.  This was exciting, this was real.  That day, I became a Religion major, eventually joined the pre-ministerial society and became an assistant to the Chaplain.

However, my self-doubts were in constant competition with my path. Ultimately, this struggle between doubt and calling came to a critical point during my time at Yale Divinity School and led me to pursue a Masters in Religion and the Arts rather than the MDiv. After teaching for a couple of years, I decided to complete the MDiv at Gardner-Webb in 2007. That process was challenging, enlightening, and completely affirmed my calling. With the death of Prof Goodman in 2009, my own personal theology was challenged to the point where I decided to go back to the classroom as a teacher rather than try to finish the MDiv at that time.

Part of me knew I would eventually return to Gardner-Webb to finish the degree and get my ministry off the ground in a meaningful way for both myself and the Kingdom. It has been a period of soul searching, deep prayer, and conversation with loved ones. However, that still small voice of calling that has been in my life since my childhood is still pushing me down the road to enter pastoral ministry.

I realize now that this crux in my life has provided me with the valuable experience of eight years in the classroom as well as time in the business world creating my own successful marketing agency from scratch. Being a middle school teacher has brought me closer to the various roles of a minister in a way that I would have never been exposed to otherwise. Bootstrapping my own company and having it become profitable has equipped me with tools and skills relating to business that I will bring to my ministry. Those experiences have helped to forge my identity and my theology significantly, and will allow my pastoral ministry to be more enhanced.

To successfully cultivate a theology of ministry in the context of church leadership, it is incredibly important for me that people who have professed faith in Jesus and carry the name Christian understand the depth and ramifications of bearing that self-imposed burden.  In my own personal theology, this is not a simple or easy.  This is beyond difficult and requires both a sense of a developing biblical worldview as well as the ability to always be a lifelong learner.  Professing a faith in Jesus is a deadly serious affair that radically transforms a person and binds them to both the cross and the historical imperative of acting to bring about the Kingdom of God.  In other words, as I grow in my own theology and faith, I am learning and realizing more that calling oneself a Christian is not something to be taken lightly.  Coming to understand the power associated with that self-identification is a gift which church leaders can bestow upon congregants.

Along those lines, understanding that a person has a deep sense of call to a ministry as a vocation and then acting upon that call is an incredibly intensive, personal (yet community-minded) and radical experience.  As I grow in my own faith and come to understand and reconcile my own sense of calling more through the years (a process which I hope never ceases), I am continually realizing that a calling to the ministry is not something that is to be taken lightly or without proper understanding of one’s own limitations, abilities and potential. The backing of my wife, family, and church community at Emmanuel Baptist Fellowship has been so edifying. However, this radical experience has also been challenging and my ministry will seek to honor their support and sacrifices as well as welcoming the kingdom of God into our creation.

The road ahead for my life in the ministry is more challenging than I can ever expect. Comfort and ease are not the objectives of my life as a minister. However, the mysterious darkness which covers the path ahead like a thick fog gestures to me to follow and I cannot ignore that quiet voice which is like a nocturnal lullaby of hope and love. The vocational objectives of my ministry will be shaped by my unending belief that God is calling us all to partake in the richness of the Universe and that we must have eyes to see and ears to hear these soft invitations in a world corrupt with violence and greed. In order to partake in this cosmic communion, we must change as individuals and as a global society. We must consider the lilies of the fields in all that we do.

My objectives as a minister will find their bedrock in the sharing of this opportunity to make real the words of the Sermon on the Mount. As I continue my journey into the metamorphosis of becoming a pastoral minister, I feel my lips being touched with the hot coals and the Seraphim offering the chance for me to have audience with God as I continue down that mysterious path. This choice was not effortless or convenient; however it is the choice that I make so that I may serve my God and my fellow humanity.

Pride of a Husband

As someone who has spent considerable time inside of seminary walls, I know personally how challenging and gut-wrenching the process of discernment to ordination can be for anyone.

I can’t express how proud I am of Merianna in all that she’s accomplished in her time at seminary and in her time as a pastor.

If you need any proof of why “I’m amazed” (to paraphrase McCartney), go listen to her Easter Sermon from today at Emmanuel Baptist Fellowship.

It’s been an amazing experience to be able to share part of those experiences with her and I look forward to where her ministry takes her and our family in the coming years.

People like Merianna and the current crop of strong yet humble leaders coming up in the ranks of the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship make me excited about our future as a group and the impacts that will be made on our communities as God’s Dream continues to be made real.

Great meeting with the CBF of SC office staff again this afternoon. I’m excited to be working on their new website and hope it contributes to our fellowship’s growth in the coming years!

Meant to Struggle

abel

I love the Bible.

I’m a Christian and a person of faith, so that’s (supposedly) a given. However, I really do love what I consider to be this set of inspired texts that has influenced and shaped the development of our species to such an extreme level that it’s simply unimaginable to think what our current world would look like without what we’ve come to think of as the Christian Bible in our presence.

Perhaps if Paul hadn’t come along and literally opened up Christianity to those outside of 1st century Jewish faith while battling those who realized that Jesus and his immediate followers were not looking to establish a new religion outside of what was then considered Judaism, we’d still be worshipping the Roman gods. In some alternate universe perhaps that’s the case.

Regardless, history happened.

Which brings up the notion of history versus the past. I love history. I also love the past. Those are two different statements about two different experiences.

I have no idea what my grandfather had for lunch on April 9, 1964. However, I’m 90% sure that Grandpa Frank had lunch fifty years ago. I believe he had lunch. Did he have lunch? We’ve no idea. There’s no remaining receipts, my grandmother has no evidence, and there’s no way to prove that Grandpa Frank went to Central Drugs for a burger. But I’m pretty sure he did. The facts have not been lost to history, but they have been lost to the past.

History includes documentations. We can point to a certain date and event and show that something happened with certainty. The past are the things that came before us but that doesn’t necessitate them being a part of “history.” No one will really know that I had Bojangles this morning once my Bank of America receipt goes away (hopefully) and my own debit card’s record fades into digital abyss. I had Bojangles but that will be lost to the past in 2064 when my grandson wonders what I had for lunch on this day of April 9.

In the same way, my faith is true. As Kierkegaard pointed out, all faith is irrational and absent of historical veracity. If faith can be rationalized, it’s not faith but historically verifiable. Faith is weird. It’s absent of human constructs. It tugs at hearstrings and wrestles with us until dawn over the river Jabbok. Ultimately, faith renames us and changes us into something we weren’t before. It’s undefinable. That makes it scary and that makes it challenging for the types of preachers, ministers, churches and ideologies that seek to have concrete answers for everything that is questionable. Uncle Walt was right.

Perhaps that’s why I also enjoy reading Bart Ehrman’s writings and listening to his lectures on the Great Courses series via Audible. It’s also why I don’t understand why so many people feel threatened by his writings such as his latest book on the personhood of Jesus (as a character in the New Testament).

Here’s the foil…

I’m politically conservative. I should say, I have always vacillated between the pragmatism of Bill Clinton and the ideology of Ross Perot. I was going into high school during the fascinating election of 1992 and read everything I could including the two books that Perot “wrote” as well as books about Clinton and his famous campaign. In the aftermath of the Clinton administration and the subsequent Bush years, I’ve become more and more convinced that both political parties in our country serve the same master (money for the players of the game) and have little regard for citizens.

As a former member of AmeriCorps who is a self described libertarian who can’t stand the religious right of politics but is anti-abortion yet anti-death penalty while being a small government pragmatist but wants to provide for all children who need healthcare and 3 meals a day… I don’t know where to go.

I’m not blue or red or progressive or … labels fade away. As they should.

I find solace in the person of Jesus. In my mind, that person wasn’t some sort of gnostic demi-god that didn’t struggle on the cross. My Jesus was a person that asked for the cup to be passed, that sweated blood, that cried real tears, that cursed, swore, got angry, spit, and felt abandoned when he looked down from the cross while realizing everything he had worked for was lost. My Jesus is the Jesus that ends with the original version of Mark where there is no nice and clean commissioning and we are challenged to spread the message and participate in the paranoia of the women who found the empty tomb.

Ultimately, my Jesus is the Jesus who was not raised because there was a historically verifiable empty tomb (something no Gospel claims) but claims a risen Jesus based on the experiences that followers have on roads and beaches days, months, and years after his death.

I will not read the Bible as literature like a piece from Shakespeare, nor will I submit to the yoke of biblical reader response (despite my Masters Degree from Yale being in “Religion and Literature). Similarly, I will not read the Bible as a piece of historical documentation of any part of the past as it is something entirely different. Our culture is too monochromatic and doesn’t allow for the multivalency of the Bible, let alone the creation accounts or the stories about the flood (go read your Bible… there are more than one of each).

So let’s actually read our Bibles and not just listen to preachers. Let’s “hear the words that Jesus said” (Johnny Cash) and let’s be troubled by them. We as humans, however great we are, were meant to struggle.

“Can I Handle the Seasons of My Life?”

Last night, I had a crisis.

On the way to celebrate Christmas with my wife’s family in Spartanburg, SC I realized that I had made a major mistake. I pounded the steering wheel and had an adrenaline-spurred moment of animal rage followed by the inevitable realization that the deed had been done and the only thing left to do was figure out how to fix the situation.

My daughters had been with us over the weekend and gone ahead with Merianna to the family party while I stayed back in Columbia and worked for a couple of hours. I had too much to do, left the house in a hurried panic to make the Christmas party, and completely forgot their elf. It was my duty to bring along “Leroy.”

Leroy is a four year old elf that has become part of the family in many ways and has transcended the elf-on-the-shelf cliche-ness into something akin to a family member that flies in for a couple of weeks. I suspect my six year old sees through the “Leroy is a real elf that does mischievous things for a couple of days then flies back home to the North Pole” and keeps the myth going for my three and a half year old. Regardless, Leroy isn’t as much as a creepy judging watcher as someone who has a past, present, and future with her experience of Christmas. It’s like advent on training wheels as Leroy and our family look forward to the twelve days of Christmas time that start tomorrow when we celebrate the presence of God in this world and the “at-handness” of the Kingdom of God.

As a dad, it’s insanely important for me to make sure that my girls cherish this time of the year and realize that Advent and expectation are just as important for our faith and family as the actual Christmas event.

So, I knew what I had to do. I had to drive. Drive a good deal.

I left the Christmas party, we dropped the girls off with their mother and they headed back to Asheville. I left Spartanburg and headed back to Columbia. I arrived in Columbia at 9pm, ran into the house, picked up Leroy from his last mischievousness (making smores with a candle) then headed back to Asheville. I got to their mom’s house at midnight and dropped Leroy off in a passed-out pose on the wood pile outside of her house. He and I felt the same at that point. Then I left to drive back to Columbia and finally crawled into bed at 3am.

During my ten hours on the road, I had a lot of time to think and listen. I’m completely fine with long drives. I loved driving from South Carolina to Connecticut when I was in graduate school and I always loved my late night drives in college. It’s been a few years, but I remembered my old tricks to get me through. A few hours on a current Audible audiobook, then a few minutes of silence, then a few songs that I sing/scream along with while on cruise control.

It was sometime around 2am near Clinton, SC that I realized I was listening to much of the same music that got me through late night drives to Wofford College then to Columbia and back to my hometown of Mullins fifteen years ago. There was Willie and Waylon, Johnny Cash and the Beatles, Beastie Boys and George Strait. Finally, I turned to Fleetwood Mac and John Lennon (the two that got me through late night drives in my old Jeep with headphones attached to my cassette player because there was no stereo and that I had recorded myself on a mixtape).

I thought of late night drives to see girlfriends in the past, or to see my best friend and college roommate. Then I thought even further back to my high school mentor who loved Stevie Nicks in an unhealthy but inspiring manner and how much he both changed my life and inspired me to be a teacher (and how many of his tricks I stole when I was a middle school teacher). I thought of what I thought I would be when I was 15 or 20 and how things have turned out.

And then Landslide came on.

“But time makes you bolder
Children get older I’m getting older too
Yes I’m getting older too, so”

I don’t know how or why my subconscious mind knew that I needed those ten hours away from a computer and work and building a company in complete and forced solitude. I was cut off from Twitter or Google Adwords or a CSS file that I’ve been struggling with and forced to focus on a single and seemingly absurd task of delivering a cloth elf.

It was beautiful and it was a great way to end an incredible year of my life. The best present I could have given myself despite my state of sleep deprivation today.

Thank you, Leroy.

O’Connor’s Prayer Journal

Parker’s Back is still one of my favorite stories, and I’ll definitely be picking this up:

She sensed that the act of creation in both was not her own. “My dear God,” she wrote, “how stupid we people are until You give us something. Even in praying it is You who have to pray in us.” Like the Psalmist who asked God for words to pray, O’Connor believed that words themselves are a gift from God. She wrote, “There is a whole sensible world around me that I should be able to turn to Your praise; but I cannot do it. Yet at some insipid moment when I may possibly be thinking of floor wax or pigeon eggs, the opening of a beautiful prayer may come up from my subconscious and lead me to write something exalted.”

via Inheritance and Invention: Flannery O’Connor’s Prayer Journal : The New Yorker.