Meditation: Psalm Twenty-Three and the Great Lacking

“The Lord is my Shepard. I lack nothing.”

So says the NIV translation. I love this terse translation of the first verse. There’s a ring of defiance in it. A resistance to evil. What powerful words they are when we feel crippled by a deep sense of inadequacy, or what we could call ‘The Great Lacking.’ We experience the Great Lacking when we feel there’s something missing, some mysterious quality or virtue that other people have acquired, and that we lack. It’s when the voice of the enemy diminishes us, or shames us, and we fail to live into the fullness of God’s love and grace.   

In popular culture dogma we’re also taught that there’s nothing we lack, because we’re inherently so special. Yet, the psalmist is more daring than culture’s adulation of self. The psalmist testifies to a God who is the source of our strength. It is because of God’s outpouring of mercy and love that we lack nothing. 

We lack nothing because the source of all goodness and love and power has called us into being from the beginning of time, and guides us, even when we walk through the darkest valleys. God anoints our heads with oil, and our cup overflows in the holy celebration of life in all its purity and sacredness.  

Meditation on Psalm Four: The Roominess of God

Twisted sheets from a night of tormented sleep. Restless nights stewing over problems we can’t control- health problems, financial problems, resentments that burn in our hearts and minds. We lie half awake and half asleep in a highly charged semi-consciousness dream state, haunted by anxiety. We ask ourselves on such nights, ‘What do I need to do?’ And when we can’t figure that out we cry to God, ‘Do something!’

The psalmist, I think, can relate to these nights. He doesn’t mince words, ‘Answer me when I call, O God of my right! You gave me room when I was in distress.’ I like the phrase, ‘You gave me room.’ The realm of God is broad and roomy, not stifling and rigid. A comfortable room with big open windows and a high ceiling, rather than a stuffy attic. God gives us breathing room. God gives us the distance we need when we feel the heat of distress, yet is close enough to hear our anguished prayers. The roominess of God allows the psalmist to say, “When you are disturbed, do not sin. Ponder it on your beds, and be silent.” Don’t fight, don’t fret, don’t fear- just be silent.

The roominess of God creates the space we need for trust, and even creates the trust itself. Left to our own ways, we wrack our brain with frantic thoughts that whirl in a loop. We trust in our own abilities to solve problems, and in spite of our best efforts to protect ourselves, we end up more insecure, fearful, and vulnerable. Yet the psalmist testifies to a God who hears our prayers, and who puts gladness in our hearts when we cannot. It is trust in this God’s care that allows us to sleep in peace. It turns our heated pleas of ‘What should I do?’ into the spacious assurance of gladness, safety, and rest. 

Meditation: Belief, Doubt, and MRI Brain Scans

The elegance of the human brain,
with its billons of cells,
and complex networks.
Its marvelous connections.

Pretty colors glow against
the black backdrop of an MRI scan.
Red is where emotions are located.
Blue is where language is formed.
We even see a ‘God region’ of the brain.
Is there a doubt region?
What color is it?

No matter.
They haven’t yet discovered the colors
that would illuminate the brain
fully alive in revelation.
It would break the machine.

When we touch your nail pierced hands,
we touch our own failure.
But our failure is yours.
It finds home in your pierced hands and side,
and is transformed in broken glory.

Stop trying so hard to believe.
You can't make it happen.
Step out of your stuffy locked room,
and breathe in the fullness of resurrected life.

Jesus our brother in grief

When we slap each other’s back in pleasure
When we flatter one another
When we ‘like’ this or that on Facebook
Or say something clever

We then turn and see you,
On the cross,
And sober up for a moment

You gaze through layers of pretense
You see us as we really are
And by some miracle,
Jesus our brother in grief,
You recognize us as your own

Sermon based on Matthew 14:13-21

Jesus knew the transformative power of a meal.
He knew how intimately connected the link was
between food and fellowship and the kingdom of God.

The joy of God’s presence
came upon the crowds that day
in the sharing of supper together.
Not only did Jesus have compassion
for the crowds and heal their sick,
but he goes beyond expectations and offers the crowds
friendship and hospitality in the form of a feast.

Think of the hundreds of ways
in which we use food in order to connect
with friends and family.
We arrange our lives around food-
whether it’s dinner together as a family,
meeting a coworker for lunch,
or the simple joy of meeting a close friend for supper.
Our bonds with each other are structured
around the meals we eat together.
The smells and tastes and satisfaction
we gain from a great meal
is interwoven with the sense of intimacy we share
with those we love and care about.
Meals strengthen the bonds we share with one another.

And food even helps us connect with strangers.
Think of how the meals we eat
cause us to interact with strangers.
My wife and I sometimes eat at
a little breakfast place in Madison.
And I mean ‘little.’
The building itself is tiny
and throngs of people pack the place on the weekends
and it’s hard to move around.
It’s so small, in fact,
that you have to sit with other diners.
There are no private tables.

I’m not used to this.
I like to have the privacy of my own table,
away from everyone else.
Yet, sitting with other diners forces you to enter into
conversation with people you normally wouldn’t talk to.
It allows you to get to know them.
And the delicious taste of the food is so enjoyable
that it sparks something from within
that opens you up to fellowship
with people you’ve never met before.
So the delight of food opens us to others
in ways that would otherwise be closed.

Our central aspect of worship together
takes place in the form of a meal.
At this table we celebrate
Christ’s real presence in the bread and wine.
The Eucharist is the place of radical hospitality.
In it we are offered a glimpse of the kingdom to come.
We literally taste the transformative power of Christ in bread and wine,
and participate in fellowship with him and each other.
Transformation happens within the context of a meal.

And there are other tables here at church
that are signs of Christ’s hospitality.
After worship on Sundays
I’ve noticed that you serve
doughnuts and coffee in the hallway.
And I like doughnuts.
If you ever want to find me after worship on Sunday,
you need look no further
than the doughnut and coffee table in back.
I find the doughnuts so creamy and so delicious
that I am often tempted to take two,
and sometimes I even try to take a second doughnut,
but my wife stops me,
so I only have one doughnut.

But this is an important ministry at Lake Edge.
By offering food for each other
and for the visitors in your midst,
you show the hospitality of Christ.
My wife and I have gotten to know
some of you better through conversation
over a doughnut and coffee.
And we are grateful for it.
Food opens pockets of space
for fellowship, hospitality and transformation to occur.


One of my favorite movies, Babette’s Feast,
shows how fellowship and a great meal
can transform lives.
The movie is set in the nineteenth century
and tells the story of a French woman, Babette,
who comes into the lives of two sisters
living in a rural community in Denmark.
Babette is a refugee who has fled to Denmark
and works as a servant for the sisters.
The sisters’ father was the founder
of a strict, pious Lutheran sect
and the congregation flourished while he was alive.
But the movie takes place many decades later
when the sisters are old,
the father has died,
and the congregation has dwindled
to a few embittered parishioners.

Babette works for the sisters for fourteen years as a servant,
but she finds out that she has won
10,000 francs in a lottery in France.
But instead of going back to France,
she spends her entire winnings
on a feast for the sisters and the small congregation.

The congregation is bitter and cranky
and they hold many petty grudges and resentments
towards one another.
And being a strict community,
they are suspicious
of the feast that Babette has planned.
They have always eaten rather bland food,
and they think there is something rather sinful
about indulging the appetite
in such a sensuous and exotic meal.
But they decide to go ahead and eat the meal,
but they promise one another
that they will not enjoy it.


Some of the characters in the movie have regrets.
An old general comes back to the village for this feast
and sees for the first time in many years
one of the sisters whom he loved.
One of the most poignant scenes of the movie
shows him getting dressed for dinner
and looking into a mirror.
He is old and melancholy
and dressed pompously in his uniform.
But in the mirror he sees his younger self
in the reflection staring back at him-
a reflection of him when he was a young officer.
He had his arms crossed,
and looked so stubborn and ambitious.
I don’t remember what exactly the actor said,
but his eyes were mournful
as he looked at his younger self.

‘What for?’ he seemed to be saying
as he looked back at that young man.
‘What for?’
He was in deep regret
for the way his life turned out.
The old general had achieved the success
he desired in life,
but at a great cost.
He lost a life with the woman that he loved.

At the dinner Babette serves dish after sumptuous dish-
thin pancakes and caviar,
quail smothered with delicious sauces.
Wine and champaign and chesses and cakes.
The actors’ faces magically light up
after each bite of food.
As the meal progresses,
grudges melt away.
Petty rivalries are dismissed.
Resentments are overcome.
The General stands up
and delivers a moving speech.
He says that “mercy is infinite,”
and declares that “righteousness and bliss shall kiss one another
and the love of Christ will illuminate the world.”
In the feast fellowship happens.
Transformation happens.
The dinner guests come to not even regret the past,
seeing their lives in the larger,
more magnificent framework of God’s grace.

I like to think that this is what Jesus had in mind
in the feeding of the crowds.
He wasn’t just going to cure people of sickness
and send them away.
He was going to transform them
through the power of a meal together.
It was not just a meal,
but a feast that transcended itself,
developing higher and wider
and lower and deeper circles
of friendship and fellowship.
The kingdom of God was happening
in that meal between
Jesus and the disciples and the people.

And the miracle happens today.
The Holy Spirit works in the spaces between the meal-
in fellowship with one another,
in the actual smell and taste of the food,
in laughter and friendship and grace.
All these elements of a meal come together
and transformation happens through them.

So when we offer hospitality to one another
and to the stranger through the sharing of a meal,
remember that it is not just a meal we share.
We are sharing the hospitality, love and presence of Christ.
And as we hunger this Lenten season
for the presence and righteousness of God,
let us recognize the mysterious presence of Christ
among us in our shared meals.
Trust in the One who transforms
our merger scraps of bread and fish
into something much larger
than we could ever hope for or imagine.

lenten devotion

Mark 8:31-38 Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again. 32 He said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. 33 But turning and looking at his disciples, he rebuked Peter and said, "Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things." 34 He called the crowd with his disciples, and said to them, "If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. 35 For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. 36 For what will it profit them to gain the whole world and forfeit their life? 37 Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? 38 Those who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of them the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the angels.

Meditation: This lonely band of outlaws, the disciples, huddled together around Jesus. They were so optimistic about their future ministry and ambitions. They were going to Jerusalem, and (who knows!) maybe change the world. Yet, now they were confronted with this stark, almost fatalistic, message about suffering and the cross- and any message that diverted Jesus from the way of the cross was not only a misunderstanding, but a satanic temptation. Surely the disciples now worried about their own safety, not to mention Jesus' mental stability- A religious fanatic with a death wish.

In our context Jesus' message of the cross has become a spiritual metaphor for inward suffering, or as the means by which we surrender heart and mind to God. Yet, the disciples didn’t have the luxury of considering the cross metaphorically. They weren’t taught by brilliant exegetes- all they had were Jesus' own words. And Jesus himself. Peter was shown that there was to be no pragmatic compromise with the satanic powers in the world. Only a lonely journey to the cross, one frightful step at a time, would transform history. A broken God, who in the humiliation of crucifixion wasn't afforded the dignity by which he could cover the shame in his face with his hands, willed our salvation.

Prayer: Forgive us God, when we treat our callings as career opportunities. Forgive us when we are tempted to forfeit our souls for the sake of approval. This is not what drew us to ministry. But you, O Lord, called us to witness to the power of your cross and resurrection. Teach us anew the cost of discipleship, for our neighbor's sake, and for the sake of the eternal and living beauty of your kingdom come. Amen.

hitchhiking

Feeling a little bored in my Ohio hometown, I decided to hitchhike across the country. So I threw a copy of Jack Kerouac’s On The Road in my backpack along with a few extra clothes, made a Bruce Springsteen playlist on cassette tapes, and left. The freedom of the road was exhilarating. Yet there were days when things got a little tight.

One day in particular I was stranded in the rain on a deserted stretch of I-74 in Illinois. I looked at the drenched fields that surrounded me as I held out my fist and thumb to the passing traffic. I didn’t see any sign of a town or truck stop that would offer shelter from the rain. I thought of home when I packed my bag. At the time of my exuberance, taking Springsteen and Kerouac along with me seemed much more important than packing weather appropriate clothing. I felt the rain soak through my hooded jacket and thought, “You are so screwed, Rick.”

However, I didn’t walk too long before a car passed me slowly and pulled over and stopped. Some people say grace is the unmerited love and favor of God. This is true, but grace is also the broken glory of standing in the rain and seeing a beat up car with its right blinker on, pulled off the side of the road to rescue. I ran up to the car and got in.

It was a lone woman driver, which surprised me since most of the time it was men who picked me up. As she pulled back onto the interstate I thanked her profusely for stopping. “No problem,” she told me. “I hate seeing people stranded in the rain like that.” She said her name was Mary, and asked me where I was going. I told her I was headed to a small town in Nebraska that I used to live in when I was nineteen, and then to Arizona to see my cousin. These things were true, but I was too embarrassed to tell her I had no real destination in mind. The larger truth was I really had no idea where the hell I was going, that I was a lost and desperate young man drifting across the country without any sense of direction in life, searching for something I couldn’t name.

I noticed Mary was wearing sunglasses. I thought this was odd considering it was a rainy day, but I didn’t say anything. We talked for a long time and the conversation turned in many different directions, as conversations with strangers on the road always do. We eventually talked about her husband. She told me he was unstable. That’s when she looked over at me and raised her sunglasses. I saw that her left eye was black and blue and swollen. I was startled. She told me that her husband was in Vietnam and had PTSD. He had nightmares and hit her in bed. I didn’t know what to make of that. I felt the urge to say something that would help her, but I didn’t know what to say, so we talked about other things. Mary told me she was on her way to see her son at college. She asked me if I wanted to come with her. She said she had to drop some things off for him, and it would only take a few minutes. I was in no hurry so we drove to the town where her son lived.

It was an awkward meeting, at least for me. She introduced us and I felt like saying, “Hi, I’m the complete stranger your mother picked up on the side of the road.” But he didn’t show any signs of suspicion. He seemed as kind and generous as his mother.

When we left we got something to eat at a fast food restaurant. Mary tried to look at the menu above the counter but couldn’t see it through her sunglasses, so she lifted them from her eyes for a brief moment and read the sign. There were two employees behind the counter, and when they saw her black eye, they both snuck a quick glance at me.

After we ate, Mary went out of her way to drop me off in a larger town. But before I got out of the car she wrote her phone number on a small scrap of paper. She said, “Now when you get to a safe place tonight I want you to call me and let me know that you’re all right. Please Rick, call me.” She expressed many times during the trip how dangerous it was to hitchhike, and she was genuinely worried for my well being. I grabbed the number and assured her I would call. I thanked her again and said good-bye. It rained off and on as I caught a few more rides that day. I eventually made it to Galesburg where I split a cheap room that evening with a guy who had picked me up. Something was bothering me that night. I don’t remember what it was. I hastily looked through my belongings for Mary’s number, but couldn’t find it. It was written on a tiny piece of paper, but I think if I would’ve looked hard enough, I probably would have found it. But I didn’t feel like looking very hard. The next morning I continued hitchhiking west towards Nebraska. I never found her number.