Going Back Down the Mountain

          As I sit in the airport once again ready to return home, I am now better equipped to enter the whirlwind of packing up all my worldly belongings and moving to our new house in Virginia Beach next weekend. I am better equipped to learn from and lead the congregation I serve. I am better equipped to feed myself and others with God's Word through the preaching moment. 

          Why? Because I have taken the time to sit at the feet of some of the greatest preachers of our time. Because I have set aside time to be nurtured by family. Because I carved out time to take a deep breath, slow down my frantic pace, and rediscover my center once again. 

          After all, that's why I come to these conferences.  That's why I miss moments like Alex losing his first tooth and Christian trying out for soccer. That's why I make the sacrifice. To be the best pastor, mom, wife I can be, I need to retreat at times and renew my passion for who I am and what I'm called to do. 

          Jesus needed some time away to reconnect with God and his purpose. It's a healthy rhythm we all need. I am grateful for a congregation that understands and supports this need. I am grateful to a husband willing to "hold down the fort" while I'm gone. I am grateful to a God who is always faithful to meet me where I am and give me what I need to do what God asks me to do. Deep breath. Time to go back down the mountain. 

Preaching That Works

          Adam Hamilton, pastor of Church of the Resurrection, gave a lecture that was by far the most practical and helpful of the week. He called it, "Preaching That Works" and gave several suggestions on how to improve our preaching. I resonated with almost all of them. Just in case they are helpful to anyone else, here's what I learned from Adam Hamilton (which I'm sure can be found in some of the many books he's written but it was easier to learn these in a one hour lecture than in reading a book.)

          Kierkegaard the philosopher said we should preach with fear and trembling, but that shouldn't paralyze us. If God can speak through Balaam's ass, God can speak through you and me. The Spirit works despite those Sundays we feel completely inadequate or unprepared. Preaching is about giving it our all, our best, and then leaving the rest to God. When we don't spend enough time in prayer, we can often feel the difference in our preaching. We know how to write a sermon, but it's not about our work or our word in the end so we rely on prayer and the Holy Spirit.

          The sermon we live is the most important one of all. Be authentic. Be vulnerable. Be honest about your struggles and fears. Don't use preaching for self-therapy but also don't act like you are any better than anyone else. After all, we wouldn't need the gospel if we were perfect.

          Be clear about your MVP: mission, vision, and plan. Make sure the church is clear about its MVP and then allow the preaching moment to reinforce the direction the church is going in. Have a one or two year preaching plan. Hamilton takes one week a year away to plan out the next year's worth of sermons with input from the congregation. What are you trying to accomplish through your preaching? Be clear about your goals and create a long term plan.

          Every sermon should have 3 aims: the head, the heart, the hands. We should be biblically informed, spiritually transformed, and serving God in the world. Make sure they learn at least one thing through every sermon. Make sure they feel inspired, motivated, uplifted. Make sure they are challenged to do something specific as a result of the message, living it out in their own lives.

          Keep in mind the 5 categories of sermons. 1. Fishing sermons geared toward seekers. 2. Discipleship sermons helping people go deeper in their faith. 3. Pastoral Care sermons to care for and nurture people. 4. Equipping and Sending sermons to encourage people to share God's love with others. 5. Strengthening the Church sermons that focus more on the church itself. Try to keep a good balance of all five of these different kinds of sermon series throughout the year.

          Preaching on difficult subjects: be faithful to each side. Carefully articulate each side of an issue and respect those who differ. Share your perspective with humility and love. Begin with, "This is where I am today on this topic." or "I may be wrong but..." Keep in balance the prophetic and the pastoral when preaching on controversial issues.

          My hope is that people leave more authentically human than when they came.

          Preaching can begin with a text and apply it to life today. Another way is to start with a life question and then apply the biblical witness to it. Both are effective ways to preach, although Jesus seemed to lean toward the latter in his preaching and many in our culture today do also.

          Understand where people are on the discipleship pyramid. If Christ is at the top of the pyramid and is our aim in the Christian life, about 10% of the congregation has almost reached it. These are the saints, the ones who are the closest to living like Jesus. The next 20% are the leaders. They are always at the church, giving of their time, talent, and treasure, and are invested in the church. The next tier down makes up 30% of the people, people who are trying but still struggle. They come to worship most of the time but might not be involved in anything else. The bottom of the pyramid makes up 40% of the congregation, the people that come three or four times a year or when it's convenient. We have to preach to all four levels, but mostly to the 40%. We can't assume they know scripture or the context or history of biblical stories. We must preach with a heavy teaching component so many can get caught up in their biblical background knowledge. Don't just preach to the top one or two tiers of Christians. Make your preaching accessible to all. 

          Capitalize on special holidays like Mother's and Father's Day with a special sermon, give away, or personal invitation to a special activity during or after church.

          Illustrations and stories are your bread and butter. It's the stories that make the sermon. Spend time looking for powerful and compelling illustrations for the message. Your own family, people in the congregation, and every day life are great places to look. Be on the look out constantly for great stories/examples.

          Give aways are an effective way of reinforcing the sermon and helping people put it into action. A magnet, memory card, coin, rock, or shower tag are all ways that people can take something tangible with them to remember the point of the sermon and to encourage them to live the message. These give aways become a reminder of the message so it stays with them longer.

          Of course there are no magic answers or formulas to great sermons, but I found all of these tips and suggestions to be helpful as I look forward to my next preaching opportunity. There is always room to grow and improve upon one's gifts. I'm thankful for these tidbits of wisdom as I continually and intentional seek to grow in my preaching abilities.

Going Where No Preacher Has Gone Before

          OK, maybe it's an exaggeration to say "no preacher." But suffice it to say that very few preachers choose to preach on difficult texts and difficult topics. On Wednesday, the motif running through all 6 of the lectures and classes I attended was the encouragement to preach on those scriptures and themes that so many are afraid to speak about.

          Luke Powery, my Princeton Seminary classmate and now pastor at Duke Divinity School, highlighted the role of the wilderness and reclaimed the role of grief and groaning in preaching. Beginning with John the Baptist in Luke 3, Powery reminded us the word of God came to an unlikely person in an unlikely place. We avoid the difficult, anxiety infested wilderness yet that is all too often where the word of God can be found. Those words in the wilderness are powerful for they offer a "haunting echo of hope." We must seek out and preach from the wilderness in order to help our congregation find a way through it. Powery continued asking us if our Gospel groaned. Is there room for tears, and pain, and heartache in our preaching? Recovering the power of lament, Rachel weeping for her children, Jeremiah groaning for his people, the Spirit praying sighs too deep for words, scripture is full of lament. A Gospel who doesn't groan has not guts and no God. Preachers proclaim a wounded word. The Spirit is immersed in the messiness of life. You've got to go through the groans to get to the glory. Tears are rooted in hope. Hope comes despite grief but not without it. Don't underestimate the tears of grief. It's not popular, but it's what people are going through. It's the whole gospel.

          Walter Bruggeman, professor emeritus at Columbia Theological Seminary, reminded us that the Bible, especially the Old Testament, is both a wonder and a vexation. God is not a God of certitude but rather a God of fidelity. A God of certitude is predictable, has no gray areas, no forgiveness, no need to listen to others, crushes all views but their own, seeks status quo. A God of fidelity has the freedom to respond to human existence, sometimes in surprising and unpredictable ways. God expresses anger, jealousy, violence, as well as forgiveness and grace. Preachers are called to preach a biblical God of fidelity in a world who wants a God of certitude.

          Anna Carter Florence, professor of preaching at Columbia Theological Seminary, told us we need to tell the hard stories and it starts with us. Using Judges 19, the story of the unnamed concubine who was thrown out by her owner to a bunch of thugs who raped her all night and left her dead at the doorstep of the house, only to be taken by her owner and cut up and sent to the twelve tribes of Israel, is a true text of terror. And yet it is in our Bible, it is part of our Holy Scripture. It is also part of our congregation's lives, whether through domestic violence or human sex trafficking. Acknowledge and tell the hard stories because only then will we see ourselves in them and work to create a different ending to that story in the world today. Carter Florence in a subsequent lecture used the first three chapter of Ruth to encourage us to: 1. Cling like Ruth to the text even when others tell you to turn back to what is more comfortable. 2. Glean like Ruth in the fields of the text, as laborious and slow and difficult as it is at times. 3. Uncover like Ruth which is why we do all this gleaning. To tell the truth because something needs to be uncovered. Uncover racism, immigration injustice, hate crimes. Time to recognize each other as family and take care of one another. These are the gifts and the challenges of preaching.

          John Philip Newell, poet, peace activist, and leader of Iona community in Scotland,  invited us to learn from the Eastern faith traditions and to see God's wisdom and image in all people. In a world suspicious and afraid of faiths other than their own, in a world where we create divisions of us vs. them, Newell challenged us to appreciate and learn from the gifts Eastern traditions bring. Specifically, the East emphasizes the "withinness" of God, how the divine is in all of us. Jesus said, "I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you." (John 14:20) We must "strip Jesus of Western garb" and open ourselves to the beauty and the divine found in Eastern faith traditions. When was the last time we preached a sermon highlighting the gifts of Hinduism or Buddhism and how they shed light on our own Christian faith?

          Each of these four speakers challenged me to keep pushing the envelope, keep making myself uncomfortable, keep preaching the ENTIRE bible and not just the pretty or convenient or socially acceptable parts. Conferences like these jolt me out of my complacency and routine in sermon preparation and motivate me to commit once again to preaching the oftentimes uncomfortable Word of God. As the Star Trek introduction put it, "To go where no one has gone before." Or at least very, very few.

Swirling Nuggets of Wisdom

          On my last trip to Chuck E Cheese I had the honor of accompanying my newly turned six year old into the ticket blaster machine. After putting on safety glasses, my son and I stepped into this capsule. In a matter of one minute we were bombarded with flying tickets swirling around us and had to grab as many as we could as onlookers stopped to watch this frantic scenario. It was stressful to have so many valuable tickets coming at me and helplessly trying to capture as many as possible. 

          The Festival of Homiletics is like trying to grab as many valuable nuggets as possible swirling around me in a finite amount of time. It's both rewarding and stressful to try to capture all these pieces of wisdom, truth, and advice for the preaching moment. And then there is the challenge of sharing these various nuggets with those who have not had this experience. 

          Tuesday was a twelve hour day of lectures and worship, each one teaching and enriching my personal, pastoral, and preaching life. What a rich and overwhelming diet to feast upon! Here are some nuggets I was able to catch as they were swirling by:

          We feasted upon the first miracle of Jesus at Cana and how even God needed a mom to encourage him at age 30 to fulfill his purpose in this world. Preachers are like parents, offering courage and hope to a congregation hesitant to fulfill their purpose in the world. Mothers and preachers know what their children and congregation are capable of and so nudge and push them saying, "You can do this!" We remind them who God calls them to be and give them the support and courage to be it. 

          Your people will make you into the pastor they need you to be. 

          We preach from our scars but not our wounds.

          Before we can know the Good News about a text, we need to be clear what the bad news is, what is the text convicting me of. Dig deep and be vulnerable and honest. 

          In prophetic preaching, we must first expose and then envision. Exposing without envisioning leaves us in despair. Envisioning without exposing leaves us with no motivation to change. For example, we must first expose our racist society before we can envision the sacred work of reconciliation we are called to do as God's people.

          At some point the community context cries out to be addressed from the pulpit. We cannot ignore the world around us. We cannot ignore the evil in the world. Preaching must address pertinent issues like racism in the face of Ferguson, New York, and Baltimore.

          We were told through Nehemiah 8:1-12 to Lawyer up when we approach the pulpit. Scripture gets people upset and the temptation is to soften it. But if we are not getting run out of town then we probably aren't preaching Jesus. God's Word puts us all on trial. Preach God's uncomfortable Word, not what people want to hear.

          And in the evening, just to put our ego in check, we heard, "Consider your call. Not many of you are wise or powerful or of noble birth, but God chose what is foolish to shame the wise. God chose what is low and despised, so that no one might boast. God chose you."

          My husband told me to enjoy my vacation this week. After a long twelve hour day and 7 1/2 pages of single spaced notes, it is anything but a vacation. Rather it's an intense learning, growing, challenging, nourishing experience to mold me into a more faithful messenger of God's Word. Speak Lord, for your servant is listening.  

But What If...

     1800 people are gathering in Denver, Colorado for the Festival of Homiletics, a preaching conference for pastor geeks like me. At the opening worship service, I was introduced to a Lutheran, blue grass, 19 page bulletin liturgical style of worship. With clergy collars, banjo, gluten free crackers, and standing up/sitting down more times than a fitness class, pastors (among others) gathered to praise God together. 

The opening worship service was head lined by Rev. Nadia Bolz-Weber, a local celebrity known for her tattoos, tell-it-like-it-is preaching style, and New York Times best selling memoir. Even in a ten minute sermon, she did not disappoint. Using the Mark 9:30-37 passage about welcoming children, she put the passage in context by reminding us the role of children in that day. And let's just say it had nothing to do with Norman Rockwell and Ann Geddes. Children were seen as replacement adults: dirty, inconvenient, unwanted, snot nosed, not potty trained, and treated more like mongrel dogs. The disciples were arguing about who was the greatest, "like a bunch of insecure junior high boys talking smack." Jesus responds to these petty arguments by taking this dirty, messy, unwanted child and telling them they need to welcome this child as they welcome Jesus.

Bolz-Weber continued, "This could have been a lesson on radical hospitality, whatever the hell that means." But upon reflecting that a bunch of tired stressed preachers who have travelled all day were the ones listening, the message that Jesus was giving us one more thing to do just didn't seem right. But what if... What if instead of seeing ourselves as the disciples, we saw ourselves as the child: feeling misunderstood, unwanted, messy, inadequate. What if we are the dirty ones that never feel good enough.  What if the disciples were not only given the message to welcome the child, but to see themselves as a child welcomed by God. What if we as pastors saw ourselves the same way.

Pastors too feel small, scared, with no ability to make themselves worthy, like the children of Jesus' day. But what if...God welcomes that part of us just as much as the competent, faithful part of ourselves. What if we didn't have to hide our pettiness, our insecurities, our short comings, our messiness, because we knew we were accepted, welcomed, and loved by a God who enfolds that which is filthy and helpless into God's forgiveness and grace.

Then pastors could be honest and vulnerable, standing among the congregation instead of above them. Then preaching could be just as much Good News to the preacher as the congregation. Then we might step out from the curtain of competence that hides our insecurities. Then we might really experience words like grace, unconditional love, surrender.

What if we were all just dirty, unwanted, messy, inadequate children. And what if God welcomes and loves us anyway. 

Taking a Deep Breath

     As a child, I loved swimming in my friend's pool. We would often race each other the length of the pool under water. After I had gone about half way, I would have to come up for air. I quickly exhaled and then took the deepest breath I could before becoming submerged once again to finish the race. That's what these next four hours are: a deep breath before I go under water once again.

     After being submerged in the waters of moving to Virginia Beach, learning new routines, getting to know a new congregation, having half our stuff still packed and sitting in the rental garage, searching for a house to buy, trying to sell the Charlotte house, a small flood in the rental house, celebrating three birthdays, hosting my entire family during Holy Week, and two trips back to Charlotte, it's time to come up for a deep breath.  A time to relax even if I am on a full flight on the way to Denver to attend the national preaching conference, Festival of Homiletics. Since I'm too cheap to pay for wi-fi, I find myself in an odd predicament. I can't multi-task. I can hardly single task. Trapped in a small seat for several hours, I am forced to "Be still and know that God is God." God has me where God wants me.

     Deep breath. Ruach means breath. It also means spirit. As I take a deep breath, I also breathe in the Spirit. I need a mini-Pentecost. A fresh experience of the Holy Spirit. Life has become too hectic and I sometimes lose perspective. I lose my temper with the kids (and my husband) too quickly. I get too overwhelmed with fixing up the new house so we can move in Memorial Day weekend. I feel like I'm behind the curve with so much more to learn at the new church. I lose my sense of peace. Ironically I also just started teaching a class based on Marjorie Thompson's book Soul Feast, all about the spiritual disciplines. Not a coincidence that I'm teaching this book when I myself need to focus on the spiritual disciplines more than ever before. Not a coincidence. Rather a God incident. 

     Deep breath. In the class last week, we talk about breath prayers, a one sentence prayer that is thought of or whispered while breathing in and out. Two people had brought up my favorite scripture for breath prayer before I had the chance to introduce it. "Be still and know that I am God." With every breath I take off one word from the end of the sentence. "Be still and know that I am. Be still and know that I. Be still and know that. Be still and know. Be still and. Be still. Be." By the time I get to "Be" God has stilled my swirling thoughts and frantic lifestyle. I am centered once again.

     Deep breath. Pentecost is coming, in the church calendar year, in our denomination, in our churches, in our lives. Breathe in the Spirit. Allow it to still you or to energize you. Let the Spirit move with the the oxygen into your blood stream and become a part of you. Feel the presence of God and center yourself on the Source of your being. I need that. I forget how much I need that until moments like these when God traps me and stills me and speaks to me.

     Deep breath. As I soar 30,000 feet over the earth, the view above the clouds is serene. It gives me a completely different perspective as the problems of the earth seem so small above the clouds. This week will give me a different perspective also. This wonderful week will bring inspiration, challenge, and growth as I sit at the feet of some of the great preachers of our time. A time to renew and recharge, like my cell phone currently plugged into the charger between the plane seats. I look forward to sharing whatever God whispers in my ear this week. In the meantime...deep...breath.