Do We Ever Run Out of Barricades?

Today, I arrived late to the Transition Team Meeting for the Christian Church in IL & WI after driving through three construction zones. As a way of demonstrating web features that we may use to help connect our new Regional Minister & President to folks across the region, I've added this post. We are meeting with Rev. Dr. Teresa Dulyea-Parker today as she begins her new ministry with the 160 congregations that make up CCIW. Our prayer is that you may get to know her and be ready to partner in ministry with her!

Here is my proof of why I was late this morning:



Disclaimer: Do not do this at home!

Intolerance Shall Not be Tolerated

I am saddened by the ignorance fueled intolerance a number of people of "faith" continue to hold onto whenever Islam makes an American headline. Without any doubt, fanatic Muslims are among the world's most dangerous groups which include fanatic Christian and Jewish groups. Anytime one's own set of beliefs and values become the only true way to God, danger lurks around every turn. For, whenever fanatical beliefs rear their ugly heads, domination, elimination and extermination are sure to follow for those who find themselves outside of those beliefs.

The current controversy, of course, is over the building location of an Islamic Community Center near the site of the former World Trade Center. First, make sure you have the facts here. The proposed structure is not a mosque, although why that would make any difference is beyond me, but instead a community center where Muslims may go to practice peace in the community. And yet, too many uninformed Americans are ready to condemn the location without any respect for the purpose of the project. Christ must weep whenever his followers are witnessed participating in the very hatred of division, segregation, stratification, and demonization he came to conquer as the son of man!

Nine years ago, we witnessed a horrendous act of fear and cowardice as hopeless men savaged neighbors, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, mothers and fathers early on a Tuesday morning in September. Yes, I remember that morning clearly. I was finishing a presentation for a local homeless shelter at the Forsyth Rotary Breakfast when I learned of the first tower being hit. The day was surreal and yet unfortunately all too real. And I remember the racial profiling of Muslims that followed and continues yet today.

Fear continues to attract the human psyche and inform our sensibilities and too often our actions. And yet, as a person of faith, a disciple of Christ, I follow the Lord who said to his closest followers, be not afraid. I choose to believe that God's love made known to us through Jesus really is wide enough, tall enough, long enough, thick enough, deep enough, and full enough for everyone. So, I choose not to tolerate intolerance! Stop buying the fear that intolerance sells you,
the fear that they are going to get you,
the fear of scarcity proclaiming a limit on God's love and grace,
the fear within you coaxing your belief in your own unworthiness!

Choose love over hate, abundance over scarcity, tolerance over intolerance and we may just yet know peace in our world.

This link shares the National Council of Churches' Statement on the proposed Community Center:
National Council of Churches News

Simple Goals of Abundance

I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.

John 10:10

A couple decades ago this week I was gathering all the required stuff for a young man's dorm room and preparing myself for the great adventure of higher learning on the beautiful campus of Culver-Stockton College in Canton, MO. My goals were simple. I would earn my bachelors degree in Business Administration with a Computer Science emphasis so that I could make a fortune and lift my family out of the cycle of being working class poor. I was one of the first members of my family to leave my hometown for college and eventually the first to get a degree. All of my family members had the potential for success in college. I was simply fortunate to receive great scholarships and government grants. My first goal was to make money. My next goal was to find a partner for life, well actually the whole "for life" concept may not have been an early part of the goal, looking back.

Many of our brightest young adults are about to pack up their coordinating dorm room accessories and make the move from being a child at home, under the guidance of their omnipresent parents, to being a college student away from the values and security of home, where they will have ample opportunity to explore their once recognizable boundaries. And, many will have the same simple goals I had when I carried my little used refrigerator in to James Shannon Hall.

We preach to our children that they must get an education, they must graduate from high school, they must attend a college or university and they must earn at least a bachelor's degree so that they may obtain gainful employment. I believe in the power of education. I agree that education should never be an option. And, I have to pause when I contemplate the basic reason most folks employ in their argument for the importance of a high quality education, to make money of course. Have I mentioned that my first goal was discarded during my first semester of accounting?

Many have learned the same lessons that I have learned over the decades since I left The Hill of C-SC. We have learned that living an abundant life is not all about how much stuff you are able to stuff into your life. We have learned that an abundant life is one that lives without the fear of scarcity that our financial systems are based upon and use to manipulate consumers. We have learned that the abundant life that Jesus told his followers he had come to bring is not a pie in the sky dream about the hereafter, but rather the design God has for all of creation right here and right now.

In John's gospel, Jesus tells us that his way of living provides access to an abundant life. I'm not advocating a pietistic view of discipleship as the way to abundant living (ie. praying a certain way to achieve abundance). I'm not suggesting that legalistic literalism is the way to abundant living either (ie. taking a teaching of scripture out of historical context and slamming ourselves or someone else over the head with it). What I am suggesting is that as the one who taught forgiveness, who shared all his resources and invited others to share theirs as well, who welcomed those cast out from societal acceptance, who served others in humilty, and who came as Lord over all lords, Jesus paved the way for having an abundant life. He provided all the data for our GPS to abundant life.

When we fall for the old trickery of scarcity, we fool ourselves into building bigger barns for our wealth, we fool ourselves into a narcissistic worldview that claims that we are truly the most important people on the planet, we fool ourselves into learning for personal financial gain. An abundant life really is possible for everyone, and it is not all about how much money we have. One of the easiest ways to begin living the abundant life is to give something away - share what you have with others. What would our world be like if every entering college student had this simple goal: to make a difference for the common good? How would our world be different if all the efforts of our youngest and brightest were focused on improving the common good instead of one's bottom line? Would we all not have a truly abundant life?

Oh, as for the second simple goal I had when I arrived on campus, that one has been a complete success!
Peace & Joy!