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A thought from Howard Schultz

I wonder if these poignent words spoken by Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks, aren't perhaps equally important and relevant to the life of the church today?

"I would not return to the role of ceo dwelling on our storied history. Instinctively I understood that we had to return to our roots, but if that heritage was not linked to a willingness to reinvent and innovate, then we would fail." Onward p.56 

A thought on Presbyterian Worship

In the reformed tradition there were three main lines of thought regarding music in the church.

At the time of the reformation Martin Luther was an advocate for the use of hymns, authoring several himself including the well known "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God." Meanwhile in the Swiss town of Zurich, Ulrich Zwingli, an accomplished musician himself, sought successfully to have all music removed from the worship service. And over in Geneva,  John Calvin held steadfastly to the belief that only the Psalms could be sung in worship and these were to be unaccompanied.

In my tradition, Presbyterian, it was the position of John Calvin that carried the day and the Presbyterian church became a Psalm singing church. It wasn't until 1751 that the Synod of New York rejected a challenge against hymnody and hymns began to become a more integral part in Presbyterian worship in the United States. Not so in Scotland and Ireland where it took until the mid-1800's for hymns to be accepted with the Church of Scotland formally adopting hymns in 1861.

Today Presbyterian churches can be found singing all sorts of songs, metrical Psalms, four part harmony hymns, chant, folk, praise music, rock music... all have made their way in as part of the ever evolving tradition of worshiping God.

 

 

A thought from Leslie Newbigin

This may be a thought for pastor's but it's one that every congregational member needs to hear as well...

"The task of ministry is to lead the congregation as a whole in a mission to the community as a whole, to claim its whole public life, as well as the personal lives of all its people, for God's rule. It means equipping all the members of a congregation to understand and fulfill their several roles in this mission through their faithfulness in their daily work. It means training and equipping them to be active followers of Jesus in  his assault on the principalities and powers which he has disarmed on his cross. And it means sustaining them in the cost of that warfare."
-Bishop Leslie Newbigin

"The Things I Take for Granted"

As I walked over to Subway today to buy my lunch I received a text from my wife who was an hour away driving the speedboat on the lake with the kids riding in the tube behind the boat. Just last week we upgraded my wife's phone from the outdated Motorola Razor to an iPhone. She loves her new phone.

I've come to take the technology of the iPhone for granted, I would feel lost without the texting and the internet access it provides me with. This past Monday, when I was in a place where I couldn't access the cellular data network I found myself a little annoyed and perhaps even anxious that I was unable to connect to the world in my usual way and I felt a clear sense of relief when I was finally able to access "my data" once again.

Monday, while it is a day off for me, it is not a time to be offline, being offline is reserved for very special occasions when I make a conscious choice to do that. It has been suggested that within a generation or two we are going to have to teach people what it means to be "offline" because their new "natural environment" will be online all the time.

Anyway, my wife's text got me thinking about all I take for granted... Just today I took for granted clean water, indoor plumbing, a dependable electric grid, having $10 in my pocket to buy lunch, having a car to drive and the resources to maintain it, air conditioning, online access, books to read, a copy of the bible in my spoken language, lighting, and cellular phone and data service. These are the things that jumped to my mind when I started thinking about all I have taken for granted.

The truth is that all of you who are reading this probably all, or almost all, of these things for granted as well, but for most of the world these are not things that can be taken for granted. About 1 in 8 people don't have access to clean water, 1 in 3 people lack access to proper sanitation, more people in the world own cell phones than have access to a toilet!

We know the statistics, let's try and be mindful of how greatly blessed we are and not just take things for granted. Lets use that blessing to bless others, let's take our gratitude and allow it to be transformed into generosity!

A Further Thought on Church Music

James White in his book, 'A Brief History of Christian Worship,' writes, "By the end of the twelfth century, composers were writing for three or four voices and polyphony had become a distinct alternative to plainsong. This demanded competent musicians, not ordinary lay folk."

While the plainsong of Gregorian chant has been making a comeback in many circles. There has also been a movement toward songs with a basic melodic structure born out of folk and rock and roll music, the music of the people, the music of the culture reclaimed and reworked for the kingdom of God.

To some this movement has felt like a rejection or a neglect of the great hymnody of the church, but this is really far from the case. If we were to look at the big picture of church history, going back to the time of Jesus or even before that to the time of the Psalm writers we would find that there has been no "standard" for church music and that the songbook of the church is wide and varied and changes radically over time.

The primary purpose of music in the church is to provide God's people with an opportunity to sing with one voice their songs of praise and cries of lament to their God. Style is only relevant in that the songs should be intelligible (in the language of the people) and accessible to the culture in which the local church worships. There is nothing "spiritual" about the style of music or the way it is presented (choir, band, soloist etc).   

A thought on being famous

Last night as I was laying in bed I started thinking about what it means to be famous. Webster states that being famous is being "widely known" or "honored for achievement." I've known lots of famous people in my time.

My dad played golf for Ireland and achieved a level of fame, now largely forgotten, in the world of amateur golf. Many of our family friends growing up were famous. Robin Thompson captained the British Lions Rugby tour to South Africa in 1955 and was one of the nicest men you could ever meet. Jack Kyle another famous rugby player occassionally stopped by our home when I was a kid. The best man at my parents wedding, Barry Crymbal, was the first orthopedic surgeon in Ireland to perform a hip replacement. Lord Lowry was a close family friend and Chief Justice for Northern Ireland before becoming one of the Lord's of Appeal in the British justice system. I took my first golf lesson with Norman Drew, our club pro but also a former member of the British Ryder Cup team.

When I married, I married into fame as my father-in-law was a former NFL player with the MN Vikings and have had the opportunity to meet many former players.

As a kid I thought it was cool to meet famous people, but now that I'm an adult I have no interest in meeting someone simply because they are well known. I no longer want an autograph just to say I've met them. All these famous people I've met are no different from anyone else in this world, its just that they've excelled at something that has brought them into the public eye. Now, I do enjoy talking with people who are experts in their field because they are experts, not because they are famous. 

At the end of the day, when my girls are watching the Olympics and they tell me they want to be famous, I remind them that it is character and integrity that matter most and if they apply themselves and work hard they will succeed in life. After all how many of the famous people I mentioned have you ever heard of?

Just a thought on our thinking

"Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things." Phil. 4:8

Sarah Palin writes notes on her hand... Who cares, it doesn't matter.

Lindsey Vonn appears in Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition... Who cares

Angelina Jolie heads to Haiti... Big deal... there are thousands of aid workers there already.

As our news reporting has become ever increasingly consumer driven have we lost our ability to discern what is really important? I fear so, I fear we are being entertained into complacency with just enough real life distraction so we can truly buy the lie and not engage the world as we should.

A Thought From Albert Einstein

I have this quote posted in my office as a reminder of how important it is to dream, to imagine, to envision the world as God would have it and then to work to find ways to share that dream and make it part of a new reality.

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand."
- Albert Einstein

A Thought From Erwin McManus...

"While not many churches perform their services in Latin today, our language, style, music and methods are pretty much Latin to the unchurched population."

    Erwin McManus, An Untoppable Force, p.81

The Monkey and The Fish

Dave Gibbons uses this parable as the title for his book, "The Monkey and the Fish," and that's where I first came across it.

I shared it with our leadership team last night and solicited their responses as to the ways in which we, as a church, act like the monkey, and what we could do if we really wanted to help the fish. If you haven't read the parable before here it is...

A typhoon stranded a monkey on an island.
In a protected place on the shore, while waiting for the raging waters to recede, he spotted a fish swimming against the current. It seemed to the monkey that the fish was struggling and needed assistance.

Being of kind heart, the monkey resolved to help the fish. A tree leaned precariously over the spot where the fish seemed to be struggling. At considerable risk to himself, the monkey moved far out on a limb, reached down, and snatched the fish from the waters. Scurrying back to the safety of his shelter, he carefully laid the fish on dry ground. For a few moments, the fish showed excitement but soon settled into a peaceful rest.

I wonder how many fish the church has allowed to settle "into a peaceful rest" because we tried to force them to adapt to our environment only to find they couldn't breath the air we had there?

Three Rules To Convince Yourself Winter's Not So Bad!

Here in Minnesota we have a way of coping with the weather that I will have to learn again for I have indeed forgotten...

It was -13F this morning but the weather guy on the radio said, "at least there's no wind."
Rule number 1: Always celebrate when there is no wind.
Even if it is still cold enough for your fingers and toes to drop off with only a short exposure to the elements! It has now warmed up to -1F but the wind has picked up to 5mph bringing a windchill of -12F, oh well, we claimed this rule while we could!

Yesterday morning I woke up to temperatures of -20F and was told by a native Minnesotan, "Ah, but the sun is shining!"
Rule number 2: If the sun is shining then the cold can't be as bad as you think
Really, then why was no one out in bathing suits and bikinis, why did the hairs in my nose freeze when I tried to breath, why do my lips go numb after a minute or two?

One of the phrases the native Minnesotan loves to state is that we have four season here. You may ask which four? Well, they would be the same four that people all over the world have, winter, spring, summer and autumn.
Rule Number 3: Convince yourself that the four seasons are special in Minnesota.
They are indeed special as November sees an average snowfall of 6.1 inches and April an average snowfall of 2.9 inches. This winter form of precipitation would lead me to believe that winter is a five to six month season, not many places can claim this! Only June, July and August have never recorded snow. 

Perhaps there are other rules that I'm unaware of or have forgotten, if so please remind me, I need to relearn them and be fully assimilated back into the culture!

Sentimental Fool

I'm a sentimental fool this time of year, my heart finds itself ripped in a multitude of directions.

I think of Christmas past and the guests gathered around our table, mum, dad, Clare, David, Granny and Grandpa C, Granny and Grandpa K, Barry Crymbal, "Granny" Mackey and others that on ocassion reached 16 in number. They were great Christmas's in the past and when I think of them this time of year tears well up in my eyes. The memories of the conversations, the food, the wine, the Christmas pudding alight with Brandy flames glowing blue in the dark. The relatioships, I always sat betwen my two grannies, that was my spot. They are gone now, my grannies, as is Mackey, Crymbal and Granpda C.

I think of Christmas present, mum, dad, David and his family and Grandpa K will sit around the family table. Clare will be with her husbands family in England and I will be with my wife's family with Jenny and our three girls. I'll raise a glass to absent friends and, as the words stick in my throat, my eyes will fill with tears as I remember. My life will be filled with joy this Christmas as I watch my kids open their gifts with the same joy and excitement that my dad watched me open mine when I was younger. My parents are now the grandparents, I am the parent and my children are the ones who get giddy over Christmas morning. My eyes fill with tears.

I think of Christmas future and the passing of the generations. I think of the changing seasons and the passing years and imagine how Christmas will be different in the future... I don't know yet, but when I find out I'm sure I'll shed a tear.    

Merry Christmas

A thought on the weather

Now that we're back in the winter wonderland of Minnesota I find myself fascinated with the weather. When I left Belfast for the Twin Cities 17 years ago I gave up a mild winter for much colder one, losing some 24 degrees of temperature, but I gained daylight, about one and a half hours at the time of the winter solstice, very nice.

When I left the Twin Cities for Virginia I gained some 20 degrees in temperature and added about 40 minutes of daylight to my shortest day of the year. When I returned to Minnesota I gave that up again. 

Of the places I've lived the best place to enjoy the shortest day of the year is... Gainesville, VA.

Shortest day stats:
Belfast: sunrise 8:46, sunset 4:00, mean temp 40
Twin Cities: sunrise 7:47, sunset 4:33, mean temp 16
Gainesville: sunrise 7:24, sunset 4:52, mean temp 35

The world at rest

It was in the high teens with a windchill in the single digits when I headed out the door this morning for my run.

The ponds were frozen, no water was moving on their surface, all was still and quiet. 

The fields lay fallow and frozen. Having completed their work for the year, they have yielded their harvest and now enjoy a season of Sabbath rest. Not yet covered with snow the remains of their labor could still be seen protruding from the plowed soil.

I was struck by the peacefulness of it all.

I have been so conditioned to think about what's next that it was a challenge to soak up the moment and not jump ahead to the spring thaw and the next planting season.

Winter is the time in which the land rests, a necessary rest if it is to continue to produce a harvest year after year. It is a visible reminder that we need regular seasons of rest in our lives if we wish to be truly productive. It might seem counter intuitive, but its true.

Satan, Santa and Saint Nicholas

I mentioned this a couple of years ago but I find it fascinating how a cultural depiction of Satan has been blended with the ideals of St. Nicholas to form our modern Santa Claus. The book that this is taken from is not a fundamentalists attempt to debunk Santa but rather its a serious scholarly work from Cornell University Press.

"The Devil comes from the north, domain of darkness and punishing cold. Curious connections exist between Satan and Santa Claus (Saint Nicholas). The Devil lives in the far north and drives reindeer; he wears a suit of red fur; he goes down chimneys in the guise of Black Jack or the Black Man covered in soot; as Black Peter he carries a large sack into which he pops sins or sinners (including naughty children); he stick or cane to thrash the guilty (now he merely brings candy canes); he flies through the air with the help of strange animals; food and wine are left out for him as a bribe to secure his favors. The Devil's nickname (!) "Old Nick" derives directly from Saint Nicholas. Nicholas was often associated with fertility cults, hence with fruits, nuts, and fruitcake, his characteristic gifts.This odd connection indicates how freely associative folklore becomes and how tangential to the essential point. The permutations of the folklore Devil are almost limitless; for the most part they do little to penetrate the problem of evil"

Taken from The Prince of Darkness by Jeffrey Burton Russell

This is not written to take the fun out of Christmas, there are many other "pagan" stories that have morphed over the years to form part of our popular culture. It is, I think, just an interesting observation

Some Thoughts on a Worship Service

I just returned from our community's "ecumenical" thanksgiving service. It was an interesting experience for me. The service ran smoothly, the combined choir sang beautifully, the officiants all looked very official in their white robes (with the exception of the Presbyterian who wore a black robe). It was a thoroughly traditional service, although the prayer of confession and assurance of pardon were missing.

I spent the service sitting in the pews with the congregation, not coming within 100 feet of a microphone. Following the service several members of our congregation mentioned that they had hoped I would be participating in the service. I assured them that I was a participant, I just wasn't wearing robes and standing up front.

As I looked around the congregation I realized that at 41 I was one of the youngest people there and I began to ask myself why? I wondered if it was people's busy schedules that kept them away and then realized that we all set priorities and make to those things we deem important, so this was clearly not important to the 40 and younger crowd. But why would this not be an important event to my age group and younger?

I think the answer can be found in the emphasis on diversity that is placed on the younger generations. We don't see the disunity that requires a service of this kind. We don't care if you are Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Lutheran, Evangelical Free, CMA, Roman Catholic, Anglican, UCC or whatever other label you attach. Indeed every worship service is in some way "ecumenical" as people from different walks of life come together to worship God under one roof.

I think my generation and younger are much less interested in the formal "ecumenism" of a worship service like this than they are in the ongoing relationships among people. It is no big deal for me or my children to be involved with more than one faith community at a time.

As I sat in my pew I was also struck by the groups that were missing, we had Catholics, Presbyterians, Methodists, UCC and ELCA. But we didn't have any Evangelical Free, CMA, Baptist, Pentecostal or Independent congregations represented. Why was that? Were they not invited to the table, were they not interested in sitting at the table (actually we never did gather round the table because our ecumenism can not extend to sharing communion, but that's another issue).

I mentioned that the service was thoroughly traditional, I wonder what it might have been like if we had invited the folks from Eaglebrook, the local mega-church, to lead the singing with their guitars and drums? Would this be acceptable to those in attendance if it drew a greater part of our community to worship together?

Growing up in Northern Ireland I've attended all sorts of ecumenical gatherings. The most powerful being the one at the Kings Hall following the Enniskillen bombing, were several thousand young people gathered for cross community worship to state that we are one in Christ. If the purpose of the service this evening was to offer a traditional worship for those who would like to celebrate Thanksgiving in this way then it was a success, absolutely fantastic. However if there is another purpose for it then I don't think I understood what it was and I don't think it was achieved.

Personally, I enjoyed it for what it was and it was great to see several members of our congregation participating in this community event.

Just a thought from Bono

"Freedom began with Christmas."
Bono, in concert 10/01/09

Lifelong Learners

I had a conversation yesterday with a ninety year old who was talking about his desire to read up on a new theory of leadership. A lifelong learner!

I know too many people who have largely given up on learning, they have reached a point of comfort in their lives and no longer strive to embrace the changing world around them. They refuse to accept that the way the world is today may be as good or better than the past and they strive to hold on to what once was and want everyone to embrace their idealistic picture of how things should be. By way of personal confession I still have a hard time with professional Rugby Union, I miss the amateur days when I was a boy and our club, Instonians, had several Irish international guys playing on the team. It's still a great game (far better than Rugby League) but I'll still say that its not the game it once was. 

If we are serious about being lifelong learners then we will develop an understanding of the changes in our world and culture and be better equipped to embrace those changes as we see why they are occurring. 

I only hope that if I make it to ninety that I'm able to live as fully in the present as the gentleman I spoke with yesterday is.

A Thought On Life Prompted by My Office

I'm looking around my office at my walls filled with books... everything from the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament (never too far from my grasp) to The Truth About Poop (sitting on my fun shelf along with my egg laying chicken and jelly bean pooping cow!). There are commentaries, systematic theologies, sermons, history books, biographies, poetry, sociology, psychology, business, economics, marketing. Lots of books almost all of which I have read.

Then there are the pictures in my office, my wife, my kids, my university, Fisherwick Church, a Kirsten Berry print, our 1995 Kenya mission team and a portrait of John McKean. John was my dad's great uncle and former moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland. I never knew him but his image is always before me as it sits beside my monitor. I often wonder what he would make of ministry in the 21st century?

All sorts of people, dead and alive, authors, friends, family, people who have shaped and influenced my life in so many ways. It's quite astonishing to see all the ways so many people have molded and shaped me over the years. John Donne was right, "no man is an island..."

No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manner of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.

 

A thought on Hospitality

I've been thinking about hospitality and culture and how different cultures display hospitality in different ways.

Growing up in Ireland one of the major symbols of hospitality was the drink. If a guest arrived, either announced or unannounced, at your home you would offer them a drink. In extending this gift of hospitality the guest would then accept the offer of a drink as a sign of accepting the gift of your hospitality. It would be rude to refuse the drink for in the refusal of the drink is a rejection of the hosts gift of hospitality.

When my mum comes to visit among the first things she says is, "Let's put the kettle on." In saying this she is really saying, let's enjoy the gift of hospitality, the gift of being together, the gift of relationship. It's not simply about a cup of tea, its far more important than that.

It's been 17 years since I moved to the United States where it seems to be OK to refuse the offer of a drink, perhaps its done out of politeness or not wanting to trouble the host. Yet there is still a part of me that feels rejected when the offer a drink is refused or if I'm not offered a drink when visiting the home of someone else.

In other cultures it is a meal that is offered. The one thing that is clear to me is that hospitality and the cultural dance that surrounds it is always centered on relationships with others. May we dance this dance well so our lives may be enriched through our interaction with others.