Brandon's Blog

Why I Serve (in 912 Words)

A few weeks back, I was asked to put together some thoughts on serving from a faith perspective for some sort of Bible study guide.  Unfortunately, I got the request in the form of an e-mail sent to an address that I rarely check, so I barely made the deadline (which I think was yesterday).  It was supposed to be 700-900 words, so if I had a chance to put some more time and editing into it, I may have been able to be a bit more concise and make the ideas flow together more smoothly. 

So if you asked me to write out a "devotional" on how I feel about the way my faith informs my desire to serve, and you gave me a 24 hour deadline, this is how it might turn out.

The Kiss of Betrayal

I've always been fascinated by this Caravaggio painting of Judas' betrayal of Jesus.  Caravaggio painted himself into the picture as the man holding the lantern.  Is he with the soldiers?  Or just a curious onlooker?

But maybe a more obvious thing we see in the painting, other than the kiss of betrayal, is the disciple fleeing behind Jesus, dumbfounded and stunned at what is happening.  Though it's only a side profile of this shocked Christ-follower, his countenance stands out in stark contrast with that of Jesus, who has only a pained look of someone enduring inevitable sorrow, fully expected.  No surprise there on Jesus' face.  And almost as if he knows that it's only the beginning of a very long, agonizing road ahead.  (Gospel accounts)

Interestingly enough, the original painting was discovered in a Jesuit convent here in Dublin just 18 years ago. 

Maundy Thursday

Today, on this Maundy Thursday, we remember the words of Jesus with the mandate to love sacrificially and humbly, in the same spirit of servanthood with which God became flesh.

The word Maundy is derived through Middle English, and Old French mandé, from the Latin mandatum, the first word of the phrase "Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos" ("A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you"), the statement by Jesus in the Gospel of John (13:34) by which Jesus explained to the Apostles the significance of his action of washing their feet. (wiki)

Praise to you Friendship Giver,
for showing what love is,
for coming to our table and bringing us supper,
with the kiss of death hanging darkly over you.
As you tenderly wash each travelling foot,
in the lastness of it all,
in the job of love to be poured out, come what may,
praise to you.

(Tess Ward, The Celtic Wheel of the Year)

A Prayer of Simplicity

Last night, I had the privilege of leading some worship for a house group that meets twice a month, lead by our friends Dave and Emily.  The group is reading through Richard Foster's book Celebration of Discipline and last night we discussed the discipline of simplicity.  As I pondered the chapter on simplicity and thought about how to go about guiding the group in worship, I put the following liturgy together.  I hope it will bless you in the midst of the complexity and noise that might be in your life.

More Thoughts from Dr. Luke

Just a few thoughts from my study time this morning, looking at Luke 7.36-50.

The dignity with which Jesus views this woman is ironic, given her humble, “undignified” posture before him and given the way that Simon the Pharisee views the woman.  It’s a powerful picture of the principal that Jesus teaches in his little parable of the forgiven debts. 

While, on one level, it can be said that Simon’s “debt” is ultimately the same as the woman’s and that his self-righteousness blinds him from seeing it, I think there’s also something else going on here.  There are reputations involved. 

Simon is a respectable Pharisee, whom everyone looks up to due to his high position in Jewish society.  The woman is looked down on, due to public knowledge of her lifestyle as “sinful.”  So from the vantage point of that social value system or economy, the distance that the woman’s reputation has to travel to gain respectability is far greater than that of Simon.

HOWEVER, in forgiving the woman’s “debt,” Jesus also removes her from that social economy of respectability and reputation and places her in a different economy altogether.  An economy based not on the currency of reputation, respectability and outward religiosity, but rather on faith, forgiveness, and relationship with Himself – a system known in other parts of Jesus’ teaching as the Kingdom of God.

Translation Silliness, Prayer Meditation, and Hearing the Voice

Let’s face it.  When it comes to Bible translations, evangelicals can just get silly.  From the “King James only” fundies to the more moderate “translation vs. paraphrase” debate , we really just want something to point to and say, “This translation is God’s BEST!”  Usually, in the U.S., I’ve heard that from the NAS fans who think that the Bible can be translated word-for-word.  Anyone who knows anything about how linguistics work knows this is impossible.

After my “respectable” evangelical education at a Bible college (which sounds ever so intimidating), I began to realize what actually goes into translation.  I know now that there’s no such thing as “God’s best” English translation. 

Missional Posters Set to Music

Thoughts from Dr. Luke

This morning, I was struck all over again by the supernatural quality of the love that Christ-followers are called to embody.  Here's the text.  And here are some of my thoughts . . .

Jesus' teaching here comes to focus on a supernatural, divinely reflective, others-centered love that flies in the face of conventional human logic. (And in such a time as this, an important question to ask might be: How might American Christians promote this kind of love in such a way that it influences American foreign policy?)  This supernatural, Kingdom-style love that turns conventional love upside down is exceedingly generous, giving, and others-centred. However, for Christ-followers who embody this love, it doesn't make them pushovers. Rather, it carries the potential to absorb the inertia of selfishness and greed and to transform them. 

Shedding the Sanctimony

A few nights ago, we met in a home with some Christ-followers who gather twice a month.  It was mostly a crowd of spiritually passionate, enthusiastic young people, though there were also a few "older" folk who seemed just as fervent.  One of the girls got up during the sharing time to act out the parable of “the Pharisee and the tax collector” that Jesus gave in Luke 18.  I was very impressed with the lack of inhibition with which this young woman acted out the parable.  In the end, she didn’t give a real clear three-point explanation of the story or anything like that, except to make the confession, “Sometimes I’m that Pharisee.” 

I’ve spent a lot of time critiquing today’s church and wrestling with the question, “Where have we gone wrong?!”  In the midst of that struggle, I’ve been able to point out ways that modern day Christians are making the same mistakes that Jesus pointed out in the Pharisees of his day.  Superfluous man-made religious rules.  False hierarchies of sin.  Self-righteousness.  Approval addiction.  And the list goes on. 

But sometimes God uses a young woman named Orla with an obvious theatre/drama disposition to remind me that all too often . . . . I’m that Pharisee.  The parable isn’t so much a commentary on the religious establishment as it is on human nature and our persistent propensity for hypocrisy. 

Sorry . . . . MY persistent propensity for hypocrisy. 

So, somehow, a necessary element of my spiritual transformation must be to confront that tendency.  And if I ever think I'm getting pretty good at it, well then I guess the cycle just starts all over again now, doesn't it. 

Thoughts on Weird Christians and Such

At the gym yesterday evening, I was just thinking about how we as Christ-followers engage people in the world around us who may not be followers of The Way.  This is roughly how it went, about half way through my jog on the treadmill.  (You may even be able to get a clue about how long I was on the treadmill by reading this.  Not long, as you'll see.)

I’m wondering if, when people in our society reject Christ or Christianity, they may not actually be rejecting Christ or His ways.  They may just be rejecting the weirdness that sometimes comes with the Christendom package or the obnoxious, antiquated traditions that seem more to do with religiosity than with The Way of Jesus.  As a result, we may actually be asking them to convert to a quirky sub-culture that seems very foreign to them more than we are asking them to become a follower of Jesus.

I’m wondering if we need to use far less words and do far more demonstrating of the supernatural life that we’ve been given.  At least then, if people reject The Way of Jesus, they’ll have a better understanding of what exactly it is they’re saying “no” to.  We’ve filled the streets and the cable TV signals with preaching, we’ve filled hotels with Bibles, billboards with quotes from the Bible in 400 year-old English, and we’ve filled the radio waves with “Christian” music (particularly in the States – everywhere else in the world, “Christian music” means “weird American sub-culture music.”)

The result has been something similar to making a small boy read the Major League Baseball rule book and then quizzing him on it – when actually, we should have taken him to watch the Mariners kick the snot out of the Yankees at Safeco Field during the American League Championship, gradually explaining the rules to him in the process.  Now look what we’ve done.  The kid hates baseball and would rather memorize HTML code or play Killer Sudoku.  Poor little guy.  (NOTE: This analogy works with just about any sport.  Except cricket.  Take a kid to a 5-day-long cricket match and he’ll still be scarred for life.)

Often, it seems, we as Christians only have a wall of propositional or didactic noise to offer, when actually, we’re called to be the aroma of the Bread of Life.  That aroma comes from the character of Christ being formed in us, not from our clever defensive arguments for the existence of God.  It comes from the supernatural love that we have to offer in relationships with people, not from our judgements towards non-followers for being non-followers as if they should know better.  It comes from representing all of the qualities of God’s Kingdom – justice, truth, care for creation, peace, life, etc. – not just for the three values of America’s Christian right. 

I wonder if maybe the amount of talking that Christians have done in the last century is grossly disproportionate to the impact that we’ve had on society overall.  I wonder if Jesus was serious when he said, “People will know you’re my disciples because of the way you love.” 

I wonder if this blog post has far too many words by now and is close to being guilty of hypocrisy . . . .