According to a news article on http://www.nj.com/, the last time a hurricane actually made landfall in New Jersey was in 1944 -- and at that point, the naming system for storms wasn't even in place. It's obviously well before my time. It's something well even before my parent's time. As I've watched the news and followed Hurricane Irene, I'm reminded of just how powerful Mother Nature can be.
Many are without power, and many will come home after being evacuated to find a plethora of damage on their property. What I'm grateful, for, is how far we've come in terms of learning how to be prepared for storms.
Former Fox news talkshow host and radio personality Glen Beck called the storm Irene a blessing. He said: "If you’ve waited, this hurricane is a blessing. It is a blessing. It is God reminding you – as was the earthquake last week – it’s God reminding you you’re not in control. Things can happen. Be prepared and be someone who can help others so when disaster strikes, God forbid, you’re not panicking."
When I first read what Beck said, I was immediately thrown back to when Pat Robertson said the earthquake in Haiti was God's way of bringing judgment to that people. And at first, I was sort of angry. I was thinking of all the people on the East Coast being evacuated from their homes and thinking, "Geeze, Beck, go see the Wizard and get a heart, would ya?" (Queen of Insults, I know). Then I thought about it some more and I realized I actually partially agree with Beck. But not entirely.
I don't see Hurricane Irene as a "blessing from God." I see her as a reminder that God is in control, yes, and I see her as a reminder that weather is not always 100% predictable and we ought to mirror our preparation as the ants and not as the grasshopper. Irene is not a blessing; but blessing can come out of her. I think that's an incredibly important distinction. I agree with Beck insofaras hopefully these natural diasters remind us to be prepared so we're ready when -- I doubt anymore it's 'if' -- disaster comes.
Blessing can come through something as frightening and devastating as a natural disaster. Hopefully it reminds us how grateful we ought to be for our loved ones and and how temporary the material stuff on this earth is. Anything man-made can, inevitably, be destroyed. Even the things deemed "indestructible" have a weakness at the end of days. But God's creation manages to get through it all and God gives us the strength we need to carry on. Hopefully the blessing through the storm is that we do learn how to be prepared for disasters because I know this is the first time in my memory at least -- and I'm 26 years old -- that the East Coast that far north has had to really think about disaster preparation. Hopefully we keep learning and keep getting better about facing natural disasters with faith instead of just fear (not saying the fear won't be there, but I'm hopeful it's accompanied by prayer and faith).
At any rate, I'm still watching Irene. As of this morning, she was leaning into New York. So many places are underwater, and I'm still praying for my family in New Jersey because even when the storm passes, the residual effects -- power outages, floods, etc. -- will still be there. Here's hoping we've learned a thing or two since Katrina and are better prepared in the days of clean up ahead.
Yours in Christ,
Pastor Becki
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Redeeming Facebook's Name
http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/08/17/rushkoff.flash.mobs/index.html?hpt=hp_c1
I've said it before: I'm not really a fan of social media. I use social media like Facebook because I can keep in touch with people this way. But I also think social media, while it makes the world smaller and keeping in touch easier, has done a great deal to add to the array of things compromising our ability to function face to face in the world.
I mean, seriously: You can even order a pizza online these days.
I've been reading and watching the new regarding the question of whether or not government should have more ability to regulate social media. Is social media promoting anararchy?
Probably not. Anarchy is perhaps too strong a word. Maybe it's promoting the idea that it's easy to put groups together for a common experience. Whether that experience is positive or negative is an end which is determined by the action of the users. I don't believe social media is flawed; I believe humanity is flawed. And granted positivity and negativity are adjectives that become interchangeable depending on which side of the line you're standing. People using social media to get together to form a mob would probably say their reasons are legit. Some parts of society would agree. The victims and parts of society at large would disagree.
At this point, I'm not interested in trying to determine whether or not right and wrong really matter. The fact that some will say that an event is positive while another group describes the same event as negative is really neither here nor there; it's just the way it is. I'm not even really interested in whether or not we can play the blame game where some say, "I blame parents" others say, "I blame social media" and others say, "If you're going to blame anyone, blame the government."
Here's what I say: at some point, whose fault it is ceases to be important. Whether you think social media is evil, necessary or otherwise, the fact is that it's there and it's up to us to decide how we use it. As churches, we strive to use social media to promote our churches and stay in touch with our congregation. As people, we use social media for largely the same purpose. It's good to stay in touch and it's good to have a means to invite a large number of people to your birthday party at the same time. I used my Facebook account to invite all of my friends to attend my ordination and not only did it save me money on invitations, but it reached a group of people I don't even actually have addresses for. A lot of people came to my ordination because they heard about it through Facebook.
In the interest of putting my cards on the table, I think the government regulating social media is dangerous because in the world where privacy and terrorism co-exist (to some degree), it's hard to know where to draw the line. I take security seriously, but I also take my privacy seriously.
Then again, we might ask, "Well, if you're putting it on the internet, you're not really concerned about privacy, are you?"
Yes, actually, I am. I put stuff out there for a specific group of people. Not government officials trying to check if I'm into something that the government might classify as treasonous (I'm not, by the way, in case you were wondering).
Alas, I digress.
You use a peeler or a knife to peel an apple. You wouldn't use a hammer to peel an apple. Social media is a tool, and like any other tool, it's up to people who use it to deterine how it's used. I hope that when people ask why social media is letting people find new ways to run rampant in the streets, we respond by figuring out what programs are missing to help nurture the young people that make decisions to do something violent. As a church, what can we do to offer programs that help nurture young people (because that seems to be the demographic of the people not only using social media, but also the demographic of people engaging in the violence) so that they have a positive outlet to plug their energy into? Move beyond the question of funding, and let's start figuring out better ways to serve the people with energy, intelligence, imagination, and love.
Wishing You Peace,
Pastor Becki
I've said it before: I'm not really a fan of social media. I use social media like Facebook because I can keep in touch with people this way. But I also think social media, while it makes the world smaller and keeping in touch easier, has done a great deal to add to the array of things compromising our ability to function face to face in the world.
I mean, seriously: You can even order a pizza online these days.
I've been reading and watching the new regarding the question of whether or not government should have more ability to regulate social media. Is social media promoting anararchy?
Probably not. Anarchy is perhaps too strong a word. Maybe it's promoting the idea that it's easy to put groups together for a common experience. Whether that experience is positive or negative is an end which is determined by the action of the users. I don't believe social media is flawed; I believe humanity is flawed. And granted positivity and negativity are adjectives that become interchangeable depending on which side of the line you're standing. People using social media to get together to form a mob would probably say their reasons are legit. Some parts of society would agree. The victims and parts of society at large would disagree.
At this point, I'm not interested in trying to determine whether or not right and wrong really matter. The fact that some will say that an event is positive while another group describes the same event as negative is really neither here nor there; it's just the way it is. I'm not even really interested in whether or not we can play the blame game where some say, "I blame parents" others say, "I blame social media" and others say, "If you're going to blame anyone, blame the government."
Here's what I say: at some point, whose fault it is ceases to be important. Whether you think social media is evil, necessary or otherwise, the fact is that it's there and it's up to us to decide how we use it. As churches, we strive to use social media to promote our churches and stay in touch with our congregation. As people, we use social media for largely the same purpose. It's good to stay in touch and it's good to have a means to invite a large number of people to your birthday party at the same time. I used my Facebook account to invite all of my friends to attend my ordination and not only did it save me money on invitations, but it reached a group of people I don't even actually have addresses for. A lot of people came to my ordination because they heard about it through Facebook.
In the interest of putting my cards on the table, I think the government regulating social media is dangerous because in the world where privacy and terrorism co-exist (to some degree), it's hard to know where to draw the line. I take security seriously, but I also take my privacy seriously.
Then again, we might ask, "Well, if you're putting it on the internet, you're not really concerned about privacy, are you?"
Yes, actually, I am. I put stuff out there for a specific group of people. Not government officials trying to check if I'm into something that the government might classify as treasonous (I'm not, by the way, in case you were wondering).
Alas, I digress.
You use a peeler or a knife to peel an apple. You wouldn't use a hammer to peel an apple. Social media is a tool, and like any other tool, it's up to people who use it to deterine how it's used. I hope that when people ask why social media is letting people find new ways to run rampant in the streets, we respond by figuring out what programs are missing to help nurture the young people that make decisions to do something violent. As a church, what can we do to offer programs that help nurture young people (because that seems to be the demographic of the people not only using social media, but also the demographic of people engaging in the violence) so that they have a positive outlet to plug their energy into? Move beyond the question of funding, and let's start figuring out better ways to serve the people with energy, intelligence, imagination, and love.
Wishing You Peace,
Pastor Becki
Saturday, August 6, 2011
Trust vs. Faith
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1ILPl5FQaM
Trust is hard.
Just ask Mowgi.
In preparation for my sermon this week, I've been spending some time this week thinking about the relationship between faith and trust. It's hard to have trust if you don't have faith. Likewise, I don't think you can have faith unless you first have a sense of trust. If we trust in someone, we have faith in him. If we have faith in someone, we trust them. Seems like the words are interchangeable.
Mostly.
But not entirely.
Take Luke 16, for example. A business owner tells his accountant that he's bad at his job and going to lose said job. The accountant works out a plan to get himself on people "Good Guy" list by cutting their debt that they owe the master. The idea is that when the master gets him out of the job, the accountant will have made friends. In other words, he figures out a way to "take care of himself" in a way that the business owner actually praises him.
And then Luke says this: 10 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. 11 So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? 12 And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own?"
Trust is a process. Trust is something you earn. Trust is something you work up to. Trust is something easily broken.
Faith, to me, involves a process, but the kind of faith that Christ talks about isn't a process in and of itself. Faith is, according to Hebrews, confidence in what we hope for and assurance of what we do not see. Faith doesn't need to prove itself. Faith is what we have inherently. It takes cultivation to deepen our faith (I like the word deepen rather than strengthen, by the way), but God doesn't earn our faith and we don't earn God's faith. We trust in God because we have faith in who God is; we don't have faith in God because we trust Him.
Trust is hard. Most of us can point to experiences in our lives that have involved a burning of some sort. I have several that come to the top of my head almost immediately. Trust is tough. And once trust between two people has been broken, it's often very difficult to rebuild that trust. Trust is a process.
Faith isn't really easier, even though it's inherent. I remember people telling me that faith makes things possible, not easy. I have those times when this seems silly: why can't faith make things easy, too? Why stop at simply possible?
To quote Tom Hanks in "League of their Own": "It's supposed to be hard. If it was easy, everyone could do it."
I think God wants everyone to have faith. I think God wants everyone to be able to, without reservation, put our hope and trust in our Creator. God says in Ezekiel 18, "Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign LORD. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?" So why is it so hard to have faith? Why is it so hard to have trust? Why, when we step out of the boat and onto the water, do we take a few steps and then sink? (Matthew 14).
Simply put: we sink because we're human. Seriously. I'm not just being coy. We sink because we're human. We sink because we have doubts. We sink because even those with what we might call the "deepest" faith struggle with their identities in God. The important part, though, is that we keep getting out of the boat. My favorite part of the story of Peter walking on the water in the storm with Christ is that at least Peter got out of the boat. What about those other disciples watching who just sat in the boat? What do you think they were thinking when they saw Peter take those steps? Do you think they even noticed, or were they so focused on the fact that the storm was battering their boat so badly that they were in danger of sinking?
Jesus rebukes Peter for not having enough faith to stay on the waves, but I don't think Jesus means it in anger or in disappointment. I think he means it to be a teaching moment. Our faith is what gives us the ability to walk on the water. Our fear -- our human nature -- is what makes us sink.
I've been listening to a lot of music by the band "Brand New" this week, and I discovered from their album, "God and the Devil Raging Inside of Me" the song "Jesus Christ." The song is, for lack of a better word, a prayer. At one point in the song, the singer says, "At the gates does Thomas ask to see my hands" and another line that I like is, "I'm scared that I'll get scared and I swear I'll try and nail you back up." We all doubt. We all have reservations, even when we think our faith is deeper than it's ever been. It's okay to be honest with ourselves (and with God) that we've had thoughts of turning and running instead of trust in God. I think God expects that. I think God understands that. I also think that God waits for us with his open arms, waiting to welcome back all of us prodigals into His embrace.
Faith and trust are hard. Trust is something we earn and learn to do. Faith is something we already have that we learn to acknowledge and see God working through. One is a process itself. The other calls for a process.
Getting out of the boat isn't easy. It's scary. Maybe even terrifying. But you get out of the boat to get on the water because it's on the water that we encounter Jesus. And Jesus waits for us on those waves in the midst of the storm. We can take those steps; we can walk on the water with Jesus, but only if we get out of the boat first. My hope and prayer for you this week is that you are able to discern how God is calling you through the storms in your lives, whatever your storm might be. I hope you are able to trust God, recognizing that faith makes trust possible.
Not easy. Possible.
Yours in Christ,
Pastor Becki
PS: incidentally, if you're looking for a great read on Matthew 14, I recommend John Ortbergs, "If you want to walk on water, you have to get out of the boat." It's a great book for an adult study and an easy read on how we identify what our boat is and how we learn to step out of it to the water where Jesus is.
Trust is hard.
Just ask Mowgi.
In preparation for my sermon this week, I've been spending some time this week thinking about the relationship between faith and trust. It's hard to have trust if you don't have faith. Likewise, I don't think you can have faith unless you first have a sense of trust. If we trust in someone, we have faith in him. If we have faith in someone, we trust them. Seems like the words are interchangeable.
Mostly.
But not entirely.
Take Luke 16, for example. A business owner tells his accountant that he's bad at his job and going to lose said job. The accountant works out a plan to get himself on people "Good Guy" list by cutting their debt that they owe the master. The idea is that when the master gets him out of the job, the accountant will have made friends. In other words, he figures out a way to "take care of himself" in a way that the business owner actually praises him.
And then Luke says this: 10 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. 11 So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? 12 And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own?"
Trust is a process. Trust is something you earn. Trust is something you work up to. Trust is something easily broken.
Faith, to me, involves a process, but the kind of faith that Christ talks about isn't a process in and of itself. Faith is, according to Hebrews, confidence in what we hope for and assurance of what we do not see. Faith doesn't need to prove itself. Faith is what we have inherently. It takes cultivation to deepen our faith (I like the word deepen rather than strengthen, by the way), but God doesn't earn our faith and we don't earn God's faith. We trust in God because we have faith in who God is; we don't have faith in God because we trust Him.
Trust is hard. Most of us can point to experiences in our lives that have involved a burning of some sort. I have several that come to the top of my head almost immediately. Trust is tough. And once trust between two people has been broken, it's often very difficult to rebuild that trust. Trust is a process.
Faith isn't really easier, even though it's inherent. I remember people telling me that faith makes things possible, not easy. I have those times when this seems silly: why can't faith make things easy, too? Why stop at simply possible?
To quote Tom Hanks in "League of their Own": "It's supposed to be hard. If it was easy, everyone could do it."
I think God wants everyone to have faith. I think God wants everyone to be able to, without reservation, put our hope and trust in our Creator. God says in Ezekiel 18, "Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign LORD. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?" So why is it so hard to have faith? Why is it so hard to have trust? Why, when we step out of the boat and onto the water, do we take a few steps and then sink? (Matthew 14).
Simply put: we sink because we're human. Seriously. I'm not just being coy. We sink because we're human. We sink because we have doubts. We sink because even those with what we might call the "deepest" faith struggle with their identities in God. The important part, though, is that we keep getting out of the boat. My favorite part of the story of Peter walking on the water in the storm with Christ is that at least Peter got out of the boat. What about those other disciples watching who just sat in the boat? What do you think they were thinking when they saw Peter take those steps? Do you think they even noticed, or were they so focused on the fact that the storm was battering their boat so badly that they were in danger of sinking?
Jesus rebukes Peter for not having enough faith to stay on the waves, but I don't think Jesus means it in anger or in disappointment. I think he means it to be a teaching moment. Our faith is what gives us the ability to walk on the water. Our fear -- our human nature -- is what makes us sink.
I've been listening to a lot of music by the band "Brand New" this week, and I discovered from their album, "God and the Devil Raging Inside of Me" the song "Jesus Christ." The song is, for lack of a better word, a prayer. At one point in the song, the singer says, "At the gates does Thomas ask to see my hands" and another line that I like is, "I'm scared that I'll get scared and I swear I'll try and nail you back up." We all doubt. We all have reservations, even when we think our faith is deeper than it's ever been. It's okay to be honest with ourselves (and with God) that we've had thoughts of turning and running instead of trust in God. I think God expects that. I think God understands that. I also think that God waits for us with his open arms, waiting to welcome back all of us prodigals into His embrace.
Faith and trust are hard. Trust is something we earn and learn to do. Faith is something we already have that we learn to acknowledge and see God working through. One is a process itself. The other calls for a process.
Getting out of the boat isn't easy. It's scary. Maybe even terrifying. But you get out of the boat to get on the water because it's on the water that we encounter Jesus. And Jesus waits for us on those waves in the midst of the storm. We can take those steps; we can walk on the water with Jesus, but only if we get out of the boat first. My hope and prayer for you this week is that you are able to discern how God is calling you through the storms in your lives, whatever your storm might be. I hope you are able to trust God, recognizing that faith makes trust possible.
Not easy. Possible.
Yours in Christ,
Pastor Becki
PS: incidentally, if you're looking for a great read on Matthew 14, I recommend John Ortbergs, "If you want to walk on water, you have to get out of the boat." It's a great book for an adult study and an easy read on how we identify what our boat is and how we learn to step out of it to the water where Jesus is.
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