Friday, February 27, 2009

Preaching Materials for March 8th, 2009

R U M O R S # 542
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2009-03-01

March 1, 2009

LOOK BEFORE YOU LEAP
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

IMPORTANT: I really appreciate your notes, and Rumors is the richer for them. To protect me from viruses, please be sure that you put something on the "subject" line that lets me know that you are legit. For instance, the word "Rumors" works. And please give us your name and where you’re from. Folks like to know. Even if you written to me 874 times, please tell me your name and where you are from. I will have forgotten.
I’m a “senior,” so I have an excuse. Thanks.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
The Story – the cost of the covenant
Rumors – ashamed of Jesus
Soft Edges – room for rebels
Bloopers – a rose bowel
We Get Letters – hough nough brown cough?
Mirabile Dictu! – the power of termites
Bottom of the Barrel – terminal coolness
Scripture Story as Reader’s Theatre – Mark 8:31-38
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rib Tickler – This from Fred Braileyof Orangeville, Ontario.
When my daughter, Kelli, said her bedtime prayers, she would bless every family member, every friend, and every animal (current and past).
For several weeks, after we had finished the nightly prayer, Kelli would say, 'All girls.'
This soon became part of her nightly routine. My curiosity got the best of me. “Kelli, why do you always add the part about ‘all girls?'”
“Because the minister always finishes his prayers by saying 'All Men!’”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you may hear in church this coming Sunday,

The Story – Mark 8:31-38 (Mark 9:2-9) (from the Revised Common Lectionary)

Jim says:
I’m torn. The Abraham/Sarah story matters, because there’s a “covenant”
theme that runs through all the readings for this Lent. And the Peter and Jesus story matters, because it sets up the events of Passion Week and Easter. (But if you didn’t read the preamble last week, verses 27-30, then I would certainly add them to the reading this week.)
I think I want to deal with both stories, to illustrate the notion that signing on to a covenant can have unexpected and unpredictable consequences. Abraham almost ended up sacrificing his son Isaac, terminating the line of descendants before it started. Peter did eventually end up on his own cross – crucified, according to legend, upside down.
Did any of us have any idea what we were getting into, when we said our marriage vows? When we had children? When we grew older? Once you commit yourself –- imagine sky-diving, say, or whitewater rafting –- you can’t back out. Like Peter and Abraham, once we accept the covenant with God, we cannot stop the world and ask to get off.
So my third text might be an excerpt from the traditional marriage ceremony: “for better or for worse... till death do us part...”

Ralph says:
I was tempted to go for the Genesis story of Abe and Sarah, but the story of Jesus’ confrontation with Peter it seems to me is more relevant to the Lenten season. It really confronts the common notion that to be a Christian all you need to do is be nice and go to church once in awhile when there’s nothing better to do on a Sunday morning.
There’s a “back story” behind the Jesus story in the Gospels. It’s the story of Peter who has a bad case of “foot-in-mouth” disease. But I think he’s a person we can identify with more easily just for that reason.
All of us shoot ourselves in the foot over and over, and sometimes we even take aim. Like Peter.
But I think Jesus would have felt a more profound love for Peter whose heart was in the right place, even when his head wasn’t.
Peter may have messed up all over the place and repeatedly, but I think he was never “ashamed” of Jesus and his teachings. Peter didn’t have all the right moves, but there was no doubt whose side he was on.

Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 – the covenant theme runs all through this Lenten season. Maybe Jim was right – this is the story we should be focusing on. But the covenant theme runs through the gospel reading as well, so perhaps it’s both stories.
The thing about the covenant with Abraham – he and Sarah had to wear it for their whole lives. Because one of the problems with covenants is there’s high emotion and lively spirituality when we make that covenant, but it’s hard to live it, day by day by day. That’s why so many marriages don’t last beyond the first year or two.
I have a friend who is a caregiver. In her career as a nurse she cared deeply about all the people she looked after. When she retired, she looked after her aging parents day after month after year. It’s the kind of unglamorous living out of the covenant that is far harder and far more heroic than the kind of brave acts we honor.
God says to Abraham, “Walk before me and be blameless.” To do that over a lifetime is probably the toughest assignment in the world.
Psalm 22:23-31 – – paraphrased by Jim Taylor
A friend walked with not one but three AIDS victims down, as Shakespeare put it, "to dusty death."
23 Behold a saint!
Few could do what she does:
she goes down to the hospice, every day,
24 where people waste away with AIDS.
She does not hide her face behind a mask, nor her hands inside rubber gloves.
When they cry in misery, she cradles them in her arms.
25 We shake our heads in awe at such selfless service.
26 She feeds them, spoonful by spoonful.
They watch with sunken burning eyes;
they turn their skin-tight skulls and kiss her cheek.
27 Their own families turn away from them;
long after their sons and brothers, their daughters and sisters, have died, those families will remember her devotion.
28 In her they see God's kind of love;
love that has no limits and sets no conditions.
29 God's love does not distinguish between the froth on the top and the dregs on the bottom;
it makes no distinctions between the lords and the lepers of our society.
30 Years from now, people will speak of her visits in hushed voices;
they will hold her high as an example to follow.
31 Because of her, they will know God better.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com

Romans 4:13-25 – This is Paul’s convoluted assurance that in the end, faithfulness – not lock-step observance of all the rules – but faithfulness to the covenant of love and hope will have it’s reward.
But I wonder if that’s relevant. Because, of the people I know who have been most faithfully living the gospel, reward is the last thing on their minds.
Certainly that’s my experience. In those assorted and infrequent moments when I’ve been faithful to the gospel of love, I realize I have also been enjoying myself quite thoroughly. Well, no, that’s not entirely true. There have also been some moments of faithfulness that have been pure hell.
But in the moments themselves, we’re not thinking about any of that stuff. In those moments when we are living faithfully, we are totally focused on whatever it is we are doing or experiencing.
Faithfulness is its own reward. In those moments of faithfulness, the last thing on our minds is some celestial bookkeeper who will reckon this to us as righteousness.
In other words, Paul was right but irrelevant.
Suggestion. If children are part of your worship during the first part of the service, read them “A Very Hard Thing to Do” (based on Mark 8:31-34) from “The Lectionary Story Bible, Year B,” page 82. Then later in the service, use the “Reader’s Theatre” version of the same story. By the time the sermon comes along, the adults who have heard both, might have some idea of what the homily is about.
There are children’s stories for every Sunday of the lectionary cycle in “The Lectionary Story Bible,” by yours truly. The marvellous illustrations are by Margaret Kyle. There’s at least one story for each Sunday. Usually two, and occasionally three. Click the main Wood Lake Publications website at www.woodlakebooks.com, or click on the following address which takes you directly to the “Lectionary Story Bible.”
http://tinyurl.com/2lonod

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rumors – “Once in the dear, dead days beyond recall,” (if you are 70+ you may recognize those words) when I worked for money, I used to spend a lot of my life sitting in airplanes.
“You must meet interesting people on your travels,” my friends often said to me.
“Well, I do,” was my reply. “But not on airplanes. I hardly ever talk to people on airplanes.”
“Why?” they want to know. They’ve experienced “some neat conversations on airplanes.”
“Because inevitably the conversation gets around to ‘what do you do for a living?’ And I tell them I’m a writer, and they ask, ‘what do you write?’ and I tell them. Then I have to deal with their embarrassment because they don’t know what to say or do with ‘religious’ people. Or they turn out to be one of those ‘born again’ types.”
I remember a conversation with Rhonda (not her real name), a friend in our church who works in a bank. She talked about inadvertently mentioning that she went to church. “Everybody looked at me as if I had some weird tropical disease,” Rhonda whined.
“Are you ashamed of going to church?” I asked piously.
“No, but I don’t know how to explain why I go.”
Exactly.
I don’t know how to explain to people on airplanes why I believe what I believe. I can talk about my faith quite easily at church events. I have no problem using “God language,” the liberal Christian version of “Jesus talk.” In sermons or Bible study groups or writing here in Rumors, it comes quite naturally and easily.
So why can’t I do it on airplanes? Why can’t Rhonda do it at the bank? Is Jesus talking about us when he says, “those who are ashamed of me and my words.”
There are, I think, two problems here.
There’s a linguistic problem. There is a dialect we use in the pulpit and study groups and other “religious” occasions that we don’t use in ordinary conversations, even with other churchy types. Many of my friends are clergy and they speak to each other quite differently than they speak in the pulpit. It’s a different dialect.
Bev and I went to the Philippines as missionaries way back, when we were still in our 20’s. We spent huge hunks of time learning Cebuano, the local language. Now I’m wondering if learning a “God language” appropriate to banks and airplanes may take as much effort.
Until we can do that, let’s be honest. Jesus is right. Rhonda and I are ashamed of him.
God help us!

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Room for Rebels
A few more reflections after our trip to Honduras.
Outside our room, a colony of ants marched endlessly up and down a tree trunk. As long as there was daylight, one column marched up the tree to the upper branches, and carefully cut little circles out of the tenderest leaves, and carried those circles back down the tree and across the grounds to their ant hill.
“They have their own compost piles down there,” another tourist assured me. “Ants are smart. They figured out the benefits of organic waste recycling long before we did.”
I realized I don’t know much about ants.
I’ve heard about them in moral fables, of course. Who hasn’t been told about the Ant and the Grasshopper. The grasshopper lazed away the summer days, and perished when winter came. The ant stored supplies for winter, and survived.
The moral always said something like, “Look to the Ant, thou Sluggard...”
But I remember another maxim too: “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.”
I suspect that describes ant life quite well.
Ant hills and termite mounds are marvels of engineering. But as far as I know, ants have never painted a wall in bright colors, just for the sake of doing something beautiful, never composed an ant symphony, never prepared a gourmet meal...
When the leaf-cutting and transporting is done for the day, do they get together in the afternoon for tea parties, or for potluck suppers? Do they go bowling, or watch a sunset in awe?
Somehow, I doubt if they have much of a social life. They rarely pause as they pass each other on the tree trunk to exchange gossip. They certainly never stage a walkout or strike – even though they are probably the ultimate model for labor unions.
People who study these things sometimes suggest that there’s no such thing as an individual ant. The living entity is the colony itself.
But perhaps even in ant colony, some free will is permissible. I was pleased to see that even ants have occasional “wrong-way Corrigans.” Once in a while, I’d see a few ants heading back down the tree without a leaf. I suppose they could have been supervisors or union stewards, but I like to think that ant colonies may have slackers, just like human societies.
And I saw one ant carrying a piece of leaf back up the tree, against the stream. Others bumped into him – or her – and almost got him turned around, but then he would turn and stubbornly continue taking that piece of leaf back up to the top of the tree.
I have no idea what he hoped to do when he got it up there. I doubt if ant technology includes Crazy Glue capable of sticking the piece back into the damaged leaf.
Was he the first lonely proponent of an environmental movement?
Whatever, I was glad to see that even an ant colony has room for an occasional rebel.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – April Dailey of Ford City, Pennsylvania wants to know, “Does studying the Bible cause indigestion?”
She writes: “As our youth group prepared to compete in our Synod's Bible Bowl, I asked parents if their teens were meeting at our church or at the site of the local competition in which we were to have a team.
“One parent's response: ‘My daughter will be meeting you at the Bible Bowel on Sunday’.”
April – this reminds me of a newspaper misspelling a few years ago. It referred to a football contest as the “Rose Bowel.”

Francois Theron of Willow Park, South Africa, writes: “In a town nearby I spotted a sign next to a scrap yard. "Body Parts Sold Here."

Jim Taylor writes: “The hymn announced in the bulletin was Daniel Shutte's ‘Here I am Lord’ but it got typed as ‘Here, I'm Lord’."

If you’ve spotted any good bloopers in your church bulletin or newsletter, or anywhere else for that matter, please send them to me. ralphmilton@woodlake.com

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Wish I’d Said That! – The essence of immorality is the tendency to make an exception of myself.
Jane Addams via Jim Taylor

God loves everyone, but probably prefers "fruits of the spirit" over "religious nuts!"
source unknown"No pessimist ever discovered the secrets of the stars, or sailed to an unchartered land, or opened a new heaven to the human spirit." Helen Keller
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

We Get Letters – Andy Loveman of Los Angeles writes: “Did you know that ‘Rumors’ makes an instant, fun, weekly Bible Study? No preparation. Just add people.
“I print out several copies of Rumors and chop them up. As we begin, I have four individuals each read the Rib Tickler, Mirabile Dictu, Bottom of the Barrel and Bloopers. Laughter is a good way to start a Bible Study. It relaxes people and sets an open and inclusive mood for the more serious discussion.
“Then I have two or more people read us the scripture from Reader’s Theatre. I follow this by reading the version in “The Lectionary Story Bible.” I usually read this myself because I often interject a phrase or two.
“Finally, I have two others read Jim’s and Ralph’s comments. Then I let ‘er rip. I’ve been doing this for about four months now, and have yet to have a dull or boring session. We close with someone reading Jim’s Psalm paraphrase.
I go away from each gathering feeling pumped and full of ideas for Sunday’s sermon.”

The little poem about the pronunciation of “ough” from David Gilchrist last week got a world-wide response. And a lot of it. Whew! Hang on. This could take awhile.

Melanie from Woonona Australia writes: the other one (the sixth way to pronounce “ough”) is as in trough But Ann Raith in Scotland says: “Your sixth “ough” word is sough (sow, as in pig) meaning to make a sighing sound, as with the wind. Mike Glover of Yorkshire, England writes: “The sixth pronunciation of 'ough' is as in 'thought'.”
Mike adds: “A rough-coated, dough-faced, thoughtful ploughman strode through the streets of Scarborough; after falling into a slough, he coughed and hiccoughed.
(This sentence contains every pronunciation of "ough", which can be pronounced in nine different ways.)
Jim Taylor, who’s maternal ancestry is from the old sod, wonders: “Maybe ‘lough’ the Irish form of the Scottish ‘loch’ as in Lomond.
Jim adds: “There's also an English city called Slough, which I think they pronounce as "slow" (seems appropriate, since Vauxhall cars were made there). But prairie types should also remember "slough" pronounced "slew".
Susan Fiore AOJN wonders: “Would it be “sough”? (Pronounced "suh" or "suhf".) And how about adding these two lines to the poem:
And when the boy said he was through
He heaved a heavy, heavy sough.

Nancy Thorne of Bristol, England was “interested to read the bit you put in this week’s ‘magazine’ re some of the daft pronunciation we have in the English language. I actually put the following in this month’s church magazine.”

Hough Nough?
English spelling seems illogical at times. Here are a few oddities, courtesy of a “Readers Digest” book dated 1967 which someone gave me many years ago.
I wonder what would help my cough;
A cup of coughey should,
At least it wouldn't bump me ough,
And it might do me gould.

Today, away from me you fly,
Though, yesterday, to me you flew,
So now I am disposed to cry,
Though heretofore I never crew.

If you say 'Boot,'
Then why not foot?
And on your feet,
You should wear beet.
Margaret Fishback

The wind was rough
And cold and blough;
She kept her hands inside her mough.
It chilled her through,
Her nose turned blough,
And still the squall the faster flough.
And yet although,
There was no snough,
The weather was a cruel fough.
It made her cough,
(Please do not scough);
She coughed until her hat blew ough.
Bennett Cerf

An eccentric chap named Turner took to signing his name Phtholognyrrh. This was his explanation:
Phth, as in phthisic, is pronounced T
olo, as in colonel, is pronounced UR
gn, as in gnat is pronounced N
yrrh, as in myrrh, is pronounced ER

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “the power of termites!”) This from Margaret Wood.
The putative origin of these revised aphorisms is from primary school children. While some of them may have originated there, this is a list that’s been around the internet for years and growing each time it comes around.
It’s good fun. There area few new ones (to me at least). And some interesting insights. So here it is again.
* Don't change horses – until they stop running.
* Strike while the – wasp is close.
* Never underestimate the power of – termites.
* Don't bite the hand that – looks dirty.
* No news is – impossible
* A miss is as good as a – Mr.
* If you lie down with dogs, you'll – stink in the morning..
* The pen is mightier than the – pigs.
* An idle mind is – the best way to relax
* Where there's smoke there's – pollution.
* Happy the bride who – gets all the presents.
* A penny saved is – not much.
* Two's company, three's – the Musketeers.
* Don't put off till tomorrow what – you put on to go to bed.
* Laugh and the whole world laughs with you. Cry and – you have toblow your nose.
* If at first you don't succeed – get new batteries.
* You get out of something only what you – see in the picture on the box
* When the blind lead the blind – get out of the way.
* A bird in the hand – is going to poop on you.
* Better late than – pregnant
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Bottom of the Barrel – Glenn Witmer sends this item from “The Washington Post's Style Invitational which asked readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition.”
Some of these have been around before, but most are new. Or perhaps I’ve forgotten. Doesn’t matter. One of the blessings of age is that you can enjoy items like this over and over.
* Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.
* Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period.
*. Giraffiti (n): Vandalism spray-painted very, very high.
* Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
* Inoculatte (v): To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.
* Hipatitis (n): Terminal coolness.
* Osteopornosis (n): A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)
* Karmageddon (n): it’s like, when everybody is sending off all these, like, really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer.
* Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.
* Glibido (v): All talk and no action.
* Dopeler effect (n): The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.
* Arachnoleptic fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.* Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.
* Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a grub in the fruit you're eating.

Note: Please send a “get well” card to my spell-checker. I had to send it in for treatment of an anxiety attack and hernia repair, after the last two items.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Scripture Story as Reader’s Theatre – Mark 8:31-38

Reader I: Wow! The writer of Mark’s Gospel doesn’t mess around.
Reader II: Neither did Jesus, from the sound of the passage we’re supposed to read today.
I: I feel sorry for poor Peter. He tries so hard, and he get’s stomped on.
II: Wasn’t it last week, when we were reading the story about the transfiguration? Jesus and Peter and a couple of others are up there on the mountain. It’s all fog and mist and Jesus in white garments, and they see Moses and Elijah. It just blows Peters mind, and so he blabs the first thing he can think of about building some huts or houses up there on the mountain.
I: And Jesus stomps on him.
II: Jesus stomps on him, right. And in the passage we have to read this week, he tries to save Jesus’ life – and guess what. Jesus yells at him. It’s a wonder Peter stuck with it. If it had been me, I’d have gone back home to see if I could get my old job back.
I: So let’s read it. This is from Mark’s gospel. The 8th chapter.
(SLIGHT PAUSE)
II: Then Jesus began to teach his disciples 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.
II Jesus said all this quite openly. And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.
I: But turning and looking at his disciples, Jesus rebuked Peter.
II: "Get behind me, Satan! For you are setting your mind not on divine things but on human things."
I: Then Jesus called to the crowd that was with his disciples.
II: "If any of you want to become my followers, you must deny yourself and take up your cross and follow me. For those of you who want to save your life will lose it, and those of you who lose your life for my sake, and for the sake of the gospel, will save it. After all, what will it profit you to gain the whole world and forfeit your life? Indeed, what can you give in return for your life?
I: Then Jesus looked at his disciples and the crowd that gathered. He spoke sadly and softly.
II: “Those of you who are ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of you the Son of Man will also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Information and Stuff – (Read this section only if you want to know about subscribing, unsubscribing or quoting stuff from Rumors.) It would be nice if you could give Rumors a plug in your bulletin or newsletter. Please invite your friends (and even your enemies) to subscribe. There's no charge: RUMORS is free and it comes to your e-mail box every Sunday morning. Just send your friends the instructions to subscribe [below], and include an invitation to join the list ... perhaps something like this: “There’s a lively and fun newsletter called RUMORS which is available at no cost on the net. It’s for ‘Christians with a sense of humor’.” Please add the instructions to subscribe [below]. If you have a friend you think would enjoy Rumors, and you’d rather not give them the subscribing instructions below, send me an e-mail at ralphmilton@woodlake.com and give me the e-mail address of your friend. If you are using something from Rumors in your sermon, give credit only as appropriate, without stopping the sermon dead in its tracks. I am delighted when Rumors is useful in the life and work of the church. As long as it is within your congregation or parish, you don’t need permission. You are welcome to use the stuff in church bulletins or newsletters. Please say where it came from, and please invite people to subscribe to RUMORS. An appropriate credit line would be; “From Ralph Milton's RUMORS, a free Internet ‘e-zine’ for Christians with a sense of humor." ... and please be sure to include these instructions to subscribe to RUMORS: To Subscribe:* Send an e-mail to: rumors-subscribe@joinhands.com
* Don't put anything else in that e-mail
To Unsubscribe:
* Send an e-mail to: rumors-unsubscribe@joinhands.com
* Don’t put anything else in that e-mail* If you are changing e-mail addresses, and your old address will no longer be in service, you do not need to unsubscribe. The sending computer will try a few times, and then give up..~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*Please Write – If you respond, react, think about, freak-out, or otherwise have things happen in your head as a result of reading the above, please send a note to: ralphmilton@woodlake.com
Who knows, I might quote you in a future issue of RUMORS.All material is copyright © Ralph Milton.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Preaching Materials for March 1, 2008

R U M O R S #542
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2009-02-22

February 22, 2009

THE RAINBOW COVENANT

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites” list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I post each issue of Rumors on that blog so that you can access it any time. And if an issue of Rumors goes missing, you can go and find it there.
Thanks.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The Story – the gift of a rainbow
Rumors – very simple
Soft Edges – bothered by bikinis
Good Stuff – beatitudes for the elderly
Bloopers – singing under water
We Get Letters – pronouncing and spelling
Special – a cure for February blahs
Scripture Story as Reader’s Theatre – Noah and the rainbow
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rib Tickler – The Immaculate Perception
A little girl asked her mother, “Mom, where’d I come from?”
“God sent you,” said mom.
“Where did you come from?”
“God sent me.”
“How about Grandpa and Grandma?”
“God sent them.”
“Gee,” said the little girl. “There hasn’t been a normal birth in this family for 150 years!”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you may hear in church this coming Sunday, March 1, which is the first Sunday in Lent.

Genesis 9:8-17 – The story this Sunday is in the Hebrew Scriptures – the last scene in the Noah story. The largest part of the Noah story happens in Year A, but I think this part of it is the most significant because it speaks of God’s covenant with us.

Ralph says:
I’m almost (but not quite) glad the lectionary folks hived this part of the story off the main body of the legend. Once you get past the cute part – the animals two by two trotting obediently into the ark – the story really becomes quite horrifying. Take a look at what’s floating in the water beside the ark. The legend reflects a very primitive concept of a God willing to commit genocide as punishment for sins.
And after the rainbow covenant, Noah gets pickled and winds up cursing Canaan, thus providing a proof text that was used for years to justify racism and slavery. Not just in the American south but all over the Christian world.
So I would simply summarize the rest of the story of Noah, then describe this beautiful scene of God’s promise of covenant love, not just with Noah & Co., but with all creation. “Every living creature.” (One way of doing this is to use the Reader’s Theatre version of the story below.)
That covenant and that rainbow are under threat. The rainbow happens when sunlight is refracted through droplets of water. But this, I am told, doesn’t happen when the air is polluted. In other words, if we don’t exercise our stewardship of the earth, the rainbow may disappear and another kind of global destruction will occur.
If there’s an ark under construction somewhere, we’ll be on the outside pleading to get in.

Jim says –
The story of Noah may be fact, or it may be legend. When we treat it as fact (along with creation in 4004 BC) we do a disservice to science. When we write it off as legend, when we dismiss it as an imaginary story based on ignorance, we do ourselves a disservice.
Because sometimes the ancients got it right!
As I look through this passage, I see eight references to “every living creature,” “all flesh,” and “the earth.” Eight times, God says that the covenant is not just with humans, or with a particular group of humans, least of all with a particular individual.
Given this emphasis, how could we distort that universal message into a “God ’n’ me” theology?
So I would tell the story of creation. Not the biblical version. But how everything started as an immeasurable point. How every atom of the universe emerged from that one instant. The simple first atoms combined into more complex elements, into organic molecules, into life – but we still carry within us the stuff of that first instant, however it happened. So does every other creature, every plant, every planet, every galaxy. In every atom of our bodies, we are all related. We are all kin.
The other wisdom of the ancients that we frequently overlook is that God is not locked into the past. God can and does change. In the Flood, God tried something and decided it didn’t work. But God does not undo something that has been done. God builds on the past, to shape a new future.
And so I would ask: are we trying to bring back the past? Or build a new future?

Psalm 25:1-10 – paraphrased by Jim Taylor
Abraham bargained with God to try to save the people of Sodom. Moses talked God out of destroying the Israelites, by persuading God that the Egyptians would consider God a failure if the Israelites died in the desert. Obviously, it's okay to argue with God. Like a skilled negotiator or a lawyer, we must be ready to use all the tactics available to us.
1 To you, Lord, I plead my case.
2 I trust you, God; don't let me down.
You won't let me make a fool of myself.
Lord, don't let others lord it over me.
3 You wouldn't humiliate your loyal helpers, would you?
Save your heavy hand for those who don't care about you.
4 I want to be your friend, Lord.
I want to do things your way.
5 So take my hand, and lead me through life's potholes and pitfalls.
You are the only one who can save me;
You are what I have been looking for, all my life.
6 Don't do it just for my sake.
Do it for your own reputation as a loving God.
7 Don't count my past mistakes against me.
Be true to yourself – you are a loving God,
So show me love, O Lord.
8 Lord, because you are perfect, you can take pity on less perfect people;
9 You can train the fumble-footed to follow your footsteps.
10 Your ways all lead to love and faithfulness,
And those who keep faith with you will not forget it.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com

1 Peter 3:18-22 – Verse 21 is the key. The writer of this passage (probably not Peter) says that the Noah story “prefigures” baptism, which wasn’t practiced in main stream Judaism. Which is a bit hard to understand because the eight who escaped in the ark never got their feet wet and everybody else drowned.
I’ve never quite grasped the thinking of passages like this that tell me somehow my sins were paid for in advance by Jesus’ suffering and death. But rather than argue that one again – we’ve danced around that mulberry bush too many times here in Rumors – I’ll just leave it be and move on to the next reading.
Mark 1:9-15
1 Peter 3:21 also explains why the Mark passage about Jesus’ baptism is in this same pot, even though I have trouble getting my mind around the “prefigure” thing.
I like Mark’s gospel. He doesn’t mess around. He rattles off the story quickly and succinctly. Mark assumes that we know the story – that we’ve heard and loved and believed the truth inside the story – so that all he needs to do is remind us.
I wish that were still true. Those of us who struggle to communicate the story of God’s good news make that mistake over and over again – assuming the folks know the story. A few do, of course, and they tend to be the folks who comment on our writing or preaching or whatever.
The rest of the folks slide out of church or put down the book, and quietly move away, ashamed to admit they have no idea what the whole thing is about. The most frequent reason given for not attending Bible study is, “I don’t know anything about the Bible.” Go figure.
So while I like Mark’s gospel, it presents us with a problem when we use it communicating with contemporary adults. If we read passages like this to them, and don’t fill in the blanks of the story for them, they go away confused.
And when people go away confused, the often stay away.

One way to make sure the adults hear the story is to tell it to the kids. The rainbow covenant story is in “The Lectionary Story Bible, Year B,” page 76. But if you want to tell the whole Noah story, it’s in Year A, page 124.
There’s a children’s version of the baptism story, based on Mark, in Year B, page 78.
For more info about these books, click the main Wood Lake Publications website at www.woodlakebooks.com, or click on the following address which takes you directly to the “Lectionary Story Bible.”
http://tinyurl.com/2lonod

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rumors – I’ve just completed the last bit of work on ‘The Lectionary Story Bible.” It was the comprehensive index that will be in Year C, telling you where to find any passage in the three-volume set. Margaret Kyle is finishing the last bits of art work and the folks at Wood Lake are doing all the million and one technical things to get the material to the printer in time for release this summer.
It’s been quite a journey. It’s easily the biggest and toughest writing project I have undertaken and probably the largest collection of children’s Bible stories in captivity. Certainly it’s the only comprehensive collection that reflects an open, inclusive theology, an unconditionally loving God, and the joyful power of the gospel. I had to work really hard sometimes, to squeeze that bit of juice out of the text.
In the process I’ve really grown to love the stories – especially the grand legends of Genesis and Exodus, and especially the parables of Jesus. One of my favorites is the Noah story.
When that story first appeared in “The Family Story Bible,” the work that gave rise to “The Lectionary Story Bible,” it drew some interesting feedback. Some people thought I wasn’t explicit enough in holding up “Bible truths.” One fellow labeled the book “pornographic” because the picture Margaret did for the rainbow scene showed a child doing a summersault that showed a bit of buttock.
My response? Piffle.
I’ve had many letters and other responses to the “Family Story Bible” and the “The Lectionary Story Bible,” which was developed along the same model. Almost all have been enthusiastic and positive.
But among the most gratifying responses have been a those relating to the Noah story, and specifically to the fact that I held up the rainbow covenant as the key and the point to the whole story. Many felt that element of the story had been short-changed by all the romantic emphasis of the animals being loaded into the ark.
The Noah legend speaks strongly to the ecological crisis facing the world. Sin has its own built-in punishment and our sin of abuse against our pale blue planet has within it the punishment of human pain and ecological destruction on a scale we can hardly imagine.
And the ark we are commissioned to build is not made of acacia wood and not designed to save the good and destroy the bad. The ark we are called to build will be designed around a way of being that is good, wholesome and simple.
Very simple.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Bothered by Bikinis
Spending a week on a beach in the tropics is hard on the eyeballs – at least for a male.
Most of the women wore bikinis, even if they shouldn’t. Some of them had much more flesh than a bikini should cover.
A few women didn’t bother wearing the whole bikini. That was even harder on the eyeballs.
The men with them, however, wore mostly baggy shorts that hung down to their knees. Most of the men had rather unappealing beer bellies spilling over the waistband of their shorts.
I found myself wondering who determines these fashions.
Initially, I thought that this difference in treatment of bodies reflected a patriarchal bias. Certainly, Honduras remains a strongly patriarchal culture. But the people wearing the beachwear at this resort were not Hondurans. Most came from Canada, some from the U.S.
The few European men typically wore Speedo briefs. The European women were more likely to sunbathe topless.
I don’t think there’s a fashion police who dictate what men and women should wear on the beach. Certainly no one issued instructions that the women must wear skimpy bikinis and men must wear baggy shorts. But any culture develops unconscious concepts of what’s appropriate and what’s not.
Clearly, the North American collective unconscious believes that women’s bodies should be displayed, and men’s should not. Women play beach volleyball in bikinis; men don’t. At formal occasions, like the Oscars, women’s bodies are exposed as much as possible; men’s bodies are covered from necktie to socks.
That might imply that fashion choices are determined by males.
Many men will immediately protest that women have the upper hand. They get into the lifeboats first when a ship sinks. They have doors opened for them. They generally receive lighter sentences from juries.
Indeed, there are organizations that insist that men consistently get shafted in divorce settlements, custody battles, spousal abuse cases, etc.
I don’t buy that rationale. I think it’s more likely that the special privileges accorded to women – mostly a leftover from Victorian times – were intended to reinforce the notion of women as helpless creatures who needed male help to open doors and balance cheque books.
If women were in charge, would they design an economic system that pays them roughly two-thirds as much as men for the same job? (In macho Honduras, women get paid about one-third as much as men.)
In a world run by women, would nations pay out $18 billion in holiday bonuses to Wall Street bankers, while slashing $5 billion from funding for prevention of AIDS, TB, and malaria?
Or spend a trillion dollars a year on arms, when one per cent of that could provide clean water and sanitation for every family on earth?
For sure, no woman would have invented mammography. If men had their testicles examined by clamping them in a vice...
Even beaches might be different. I’m guessing, of course, but if women ran things, I suspect they might prefer segregated beaches, where women would wear nothing at all.
But I also suspect that even on segregated beaches, many men would hesitate to expose their shortcomings to public scrutiny.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Good Stuff – Jim Spinks sends this poem. The author is unknown, unfortunately, but the poet had a deep sense of what it’s like being elderly.
Blessed are they who understand
My faltering steps and shaking hands.
Blessed, who know my ears today
Must strain to catch the words they say.
Blessed are they who look away
When tea is spilled on the cloth that day.
Blessed are they with a cheery smile
Who stopped to chat for a little while.
Blessed are they who never say:
‘You've told that story twice today.’
Blessed are they who make it known
That I'm loved, respected and not alone.
And blessed are they who ease the days
Of my journey home, in loving ways.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – Jim Taylor forwarded this from Alan Yoshioka. It was on the Archdiocese of Toronto website announcing a St Patrick's Day Mass. "Liturgical music by the Irish Coral Society."
Maybe the service was to be held under water. (Is it possible to sing under water?)

Kenneth Smith tells us that he saw an announcement from a church in Lubbock, Texas announcing a "Fiends and Me Tea."
Says Ken, “I was just excited thinking maybe I could attend after all.”

David Gilchrist read a report about a church camp. “It says that the windows need putty because they are losing their pains.”
Says David: “The more pain we lose the better!”

Ellen Lee of Calgary, Alberta saw this quotation from Proverbs 3:13-14 on the front of a bulletin.
“Happy are those who find Wisdom, and those who get understanding; for her income is better than silver and her revenue is better than god.”
Ellen, I doubt God is much interested in revenue anyway.

Darlene Emery of Nanaimo, BC, “laughed at some of the menu bloopers in last weeks Rumours, and was reminded of a cafeteria whiteboard that announced the soup of the day as ‘Cream of Vegetarian’. At least I hope it was a blooper!”

If you’ve spotted any good bloopers in your church bulletin or newsletter, or anywhere else for that matter, please send them to me. ralphmilton@woodlake.com

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Wish I’d Said That! – Jesus Christ – the one who couldn't live without you.
sign in front of a church via Margaret Wood

Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.
Dale Carnegie via Jim Taylor

Men are from earth. Women are from earth. Deal with it. source unknown

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

We Get Letters – Jim Taylor writes: “The words attributed to DeGeneres are almost a direct quote from Brian Gee's ‘Unlock Your Bible’.”
“Nothing. There was absolutely nothing. Nothing to see, nothing to hear, nothing to feel.
“Then God brought some light into the situation, and at least you could see that there was nothing.”

David Gilchrist writes: “Harking back to Jan/ 4/09, I just ran across this lovely bit from a New Zealand lady:
Underneath the mistletoe bough
Stands a boy with a hacking cough
His mother gives him lumps of dough
Until he says he's had enough
David, that “ough” can be pronounced six ways in English, “through” being one of them, though for the life of me, I can’t think of what the sixth one is. English being a dialect of Frisian (that should raise a few hackles!), my ancestral language, those words would all have been pronounced with a fricative –“ach” in German or more likely, “och” in Scotts. The pronunciation changed but the spelling didn’t.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Special – a prescription for the February Blahs
February, even though it has the fewest number of days, is the longest month of the year. At least in my neck of the woods. (What does a “neck” look like in the woods?)
So on pure impulse, I decided to run this piece instead of “Mirabile Dictu” and “Bottom of the Barrel.” It’s an antidote for the February funk.
Instructions for the use of what follows go like this: Gather a group of friends. The more the merrier. Share some good food. And maybe a glass of something. Then give them the little quiz that follows.
After that, spend no more than half an hour bellyaching about the economy or the government or “people these days” then move on to saying something good and kind about each person in the room.
After that, do whatever comes naturally.
But do it quickly. Lent begins on March 1, and you are not allowed to laugh during Lent.

The three greatest literary influences on the English language were probably the King James Bible (1611), Shakespeare’s plays (1564-1616), and The Book of Common Prayer (1549). Hundreds of phrases and expressions from those sources are part of our current language. Here are just a few of them.
Have you and your friends and see if you can figure out which expression came from which of those three sources. The right answers are below.
* with bated breath
* my brother’s keeper
* a good old age
* an eye for an eye
* the apple of his eye
* a man after his own heart
* read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest
* a still, small voice
* earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust
* all our yesterdays
* the root of the matter
* what the dickens
* the skin of my teeth
* wilt thou have this woman to be thy wedded wife?
* out of the mouth of babes
* beggars all description
* at their wit’s end
* can the leopard change his spots?
* a tower of strength
* as good luck would have it
* eat sour grapes
* the salt of the earth
* a foregone conclusion
* the straight and narrow
* cold comfort
* in sheep’s clothing
* if the blind lead the blind
* the signs of the times
* to kick against the pricks
* renounce the devil and all his works
* salad days
* all things to all men
* to the manner born
* it’s Greek to me
* in the twinkling of an eye
* hoist with his own petard
* at one fell swoop
* suffer fools gladly
* make a virtue of necessity
* thorn in the flesh
* money is the root of all evil
* play fast and loose
* brevity is the soul of wit
* fight the good fight
* love is blind
* the patience of Job

The Answers
The Bible:
my brother’s keeper (Gen. 4)
a good old age (Gen. 15)
an eye for an eye (Exod. 21)
the apple of his eye (Deut. 32)
a man after his own heart (1 Sam. 13)
a still, small voice (2 Kgs. 19)
the root of the matter (Job 19)
the skin of my teeth (Job 19)
out of the mouth of babes (Ps. 8)
at their wit’s end (Ps. 107)
can the leopard change his spots? (Jer. 13)
eat sour grapes (Ezek. 24)
the salt of the earth (Matt. 5)
the straight and narrow (Matt. 7)
in sheep’s clothing (Matt. 7)
if the blind lead the blind (Matt. 15)
the signs of the times (Matt. 16)
to kick against the pricks (Acts 9)
all things to all men (1 Cor. 9)
in the twinkling of an eye (1 Cor. 15)
suffer fools gladly (2 Cor. 11)
thorn in the flesh (2 Cor. 12)
money is the root of all evil (1 Tim. 6)
fight the good fight (1 Tim. 6)
the patience of Job (James 5)

The Book of Common Prayer:
read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest (Collect, 2nd Sunday in Advent)
renounce the devil and all his works (Public Baptism)
wilt thou have this woman to thy wedded wife? (Solemnization of Matrimony)
earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust (The Burial of the Dead)

Shakespeare’s plays:
play fast and loose (Antony and Cleopatra, IV.xii)
a tower of strength (Richard III, V.iii)
make a virtue of necessity (Pericles, I.iii)
cold comfort (King John, V.vii)
at one fell swoop (Macbeth, IV.iii)
what the dickens (The Merry Wives of Windsor, III.ii)
to the manner born (Hamlet, I.iv)
brevity is the soul of wit (Hamlet, II.ii)
beggars all description (Antony and Cleopatra, II.ii)
a foregone conclusion (Othello, III.iii)
hoist with his own petard (Hamlet, III.iv)
all our yesterdays (Macbeth, V.v)
with bated breath (Merchant of Venice, I.iii)
love is blind (Merchant of Venice, II.vi)
it’s Greek to me (Julius Caesar, I.ii)
as good luck would have it (The Merry Wives of Windsor, III.v)
salad days (Antony and Cleopatra, I.v)

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Scripture Story as Reader’s Theatre – based on Genesis 9:8-1

Reader I: Oh, goody! Today we get to do the story of Noah and the ark. (SINGS) “Noah, Noah, brother Noah built the ark!” (OR ANY OTHER NOAH SONG YOU KNOW)
Reader II: Yeah! But I often wondered why Noah didn’t just bring one mosquito on board. And one housefly.
I: Well, it’s a legend after all. It’s not history. It’s just a grand old fun story.
II: Whoops!
I: What’s the matter?
II: This passage starts at chapter nine. The part about the ark is all over. Noah and his family are back on dry land.
I: Do we miss all the fun part of the story?
II: Yeah, we also miss the yucky part. The part where God wipes out everybody and everything else.
I: OO, yeah. Can you imagine what must have been floating on the water beside that ark? Yeeech!
II: So this is the part about the rainbow. How the rainbow becomes a symbol.
I: God makes a covenant.
II: What’s a covenant?
I: It’s kind of like a bargain. Like and agreement. Except more. More like when two people get married and they promise to love and honor and protect. That’s a covenant.
I: OK. So let’s read the story.
(SLIGHT PAUSE)
II: Then God spoke to Noah and to his children with him.
I: "As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark.”
II: And God said:
I: I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth."
II: And God said:
I: "This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations. I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth."
II: And God said to Noah:
I: "This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Information and Stuff – (Read this section only if you want to know about subscribing, unsubscribing or quoting stuff from Rumors.) It would be nice if you could give Rumors a plug in your bulletin or newsletter. Please invite your friends (and even your enemies) to subscribe. There's no charge: RUMORS is free and it comes to your e-mail box every Sunday morning. Just send your friends the instructions to subscribe [below], and include an invitation to join the list ... perhaps something like this: “There’s a lively and fun newsletter called RUMORS which is available at no cost on the net. It’s for ‘Christians with a sense of humor’.” Please add the instructions to subscribe [below]. If you have a friend you think would enjoy Rumors, and you’d rather not give them the subscribing instructions below, send me an e-mail at ralphmilton@woodlake.com and give me the e-mail address of your friend. If you are using something from Rumors in your sermon, give credit only as appropriate, without stopping the sermon dead in its tracks. I am delighted when Rumors is useful in the life and work of the church. As long as it is within your congregation or parish, you don’t need permission. You are welcome to use the stuff in church bulletins or newsletters. Please say where it came from, and please invite people to subscribe to RUMORS. An appropriate credit line would be; “From Ralph Milton's RUMORS, a free Internet ‘e-zine’ for Christians with a sense of humor." ... and please be sure to include these instructions to subscribe to RUMORS: To Subscribe:* Send an e-mail to: rumors-subscribe@joinhands.com
* Don't put anything else in that e-mail
To Unsubscribe:
* Send an e-mail to: rumors-unsubscribe@joinhands.com
* Don’t put anything else in that e-mail* If you are changing e-mail addresses, and your old address will no longer be in service, you do not need to unsubscribe. The sending computer will try a few times, and then give up..~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*Please Write – If you respond, react, think about, freak-out, or otherwise have things happen in your head as a result of reading the above, please send a note to: ralphmilton@woodlake.com
Who knows, I might quote you in a future issue of RUMORS.All material is copyright © Ralph Milton.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Friday, February 13, 2009

Preaching Materials for February 22nd, 2008

R U M O R S # 541
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2009-02-15

February 15, 2009

RETURNING TO THE SOURCE
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites” list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I post each issue of Rumors on that blog so that you can access it any time. And if an issue of Rumors goes missing, you can go and find it there.
Thanks.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The Story – returning to the source
Rumors – Transfiguration Mountain
Soft Edges – insect bites
Bloopers – let there be light
We Get Letters – making mistakes
Mirabile Dictu! – soup of the dog
Bottom of the Barrel – comparing sons
Scripture Story as Reader’s Theatre – Elijah and Jesus returning to the source
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rib Tickler – This from Bob Buchanan.
A Sunday school teacher asked her class, "What was Jesus' Mother's name?" "Mary," said the child who always had the right answer. "And what was Jesus' father's name?" "Verge." “Verge?” said the confused teacher. "Where did you get that?" "Well, you know they are always talking about The Verge 'n' Mary."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you may hear in church this coming Sunday, February 22nd, which is Transfiguration Sunday.

The Story (from the Revised Common Lectionary) for this week seems to be two stories. 2 Kings 2:1-12 and Mark 9:2-9. The story of Elijah being raised up to heaven and the story of Jesus’ on the mountain seem to be so connected.

Ralph says:
We probably need to be reminded again that the Hebrews (which includes Jesus and his disciples) didn’t normally make statements about what they believed. “I believe Elijah was God’s chosen prophet,” or “I believe Jesus was the Messiah.” They told stories to communicate their beliefs.
Actually, propositional theology – talking about concepts and ideas in the abstract – has always been something of an educated-class venture. It seems to me that common folk in all cultures do their theology through story – the stories of what happened to whom. “God must have been looking after me because I survived that accident.”
And so I’d tell these two stories for what they are – legends that allow us to see how ancient peoples thought about their prophets – not history telling us what happened. And perhaps we can find some of our own stories that tell what we really believe about God’s activity in our lives.
To me, the two stories are about Elijah and Jesus returning to the source. Going home (Elijah) – visiting home (Jesus). Drinking at the well. Leaning on the breast – perhaps even feeding at the breast – of a loving God.

Jim says,
On Transfiguration Sunday, I would have to deal with the Transfiguration; Elijah’s ascent into heaven on a whirlwind is a bit of background that helps to validate his presence on the mountain with Moses and Jesus.
I would want to ask what it means to be transfigured. Is an Ugly Duckling transfigured if it grows into a lovely swan? Is an alcoholic transfigured by giving up the bottle? Are you and I transfigured when we fall in love?
I would suggest that transfiguration doesn’t mean glowing in the dark, but seeing others (and ourselves) in a new way. The three disciples were changed by seeing Jesus in a new way. We are changed when we see a girl/boy we’ve taken for granted, with the eyes of love. The world is changed when we begin to view other religions, other races, other genders, with caring and compassion.
It’s pointless to ask how Jesus’ transfiguration took place – we’ll never know. But we can ask how our own transfiguration will take place – and _that_ transfiguration we can monitor, day by day.
And then, perhaps, we too will seem to glow.

Psalm 50:1-6 – paraphrased by Jim Taylor
1 As an alarm drags us out of deep slumber,
2 so God rouses us from our lethargy.
3 God does not sneak into our consciousness on soft-soled slippers.
God enters like a roaring lion,
a tornado rampaging across the prairie,
a parent who has already warned us three times.
4 God rattles our excuses.
Feeble rationalizations cannot defend us.
5 At baptism, at confirmation, at communion, we make promises.
God comes to judge how well we live up to our commitments.
6 How can we challenge God's verdict?
We know how often we have failed.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com

2 Corinthians 4:3-6 – I wonder if it’s possible that Paul was thinking of the story of Elijah’s raising and of Jesus’ transfiguration when he writes about God “blinding” the eyes of unbelievers so they can’t know the truth inside those stories.
Certainly there are many who dismiss such stories as pious legends, even though I don’t believe that it’s God who keeps them from knowing what the stories are really about. And there is certainly no use in arguing with such people on the basis of logic or historical fact.
Faith, truth, beauty, hope, joy – are the essence of experience. They cannot be analyzed or explained. They can and should be examined, however, because darkness and cruelty and sham can lurk inside them.
Here’s a bright idea to consider.
Andrew O’Doyle of Capetown, South Africa, writes: “The folks in my congregation would be mightily offended should I read them your children’s version of scripture. So the first scripture reading is from your Story Bible and it’s listed in the bulletin as, “The Scripture for Children.” But of course, the adults hear it too. Several adults have admitted that hearing the children’s version first has enabled them to understand the ‘adult’ version so much better when I read it later in the service. And it bothers none of them to hear the same scripture twice.”
“Jesus on the Mountaintop” is a children’s version of Mark’s transfiguration account. It’s in “The Lectionary Story Bible, Year B,” page 74.
There are children’s stories for every Sunday in the Revised Common Lectionary, in “The Lectionary Story Bible,” by yours truly. The marvellous illustrations are by Margaret Kyle. There’s at least one story for each Sunday, usually two, and occasionally three. Click the main Wood Lake Publications website at www.woodlakebooks.com, or click on the following address which takes you directly to the “Lectionary Story Bible.”
http://tinyurl.com/2lonod

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rumors – We were riding on a bus though the Galilee.
Don, our leader, had just pointed out an interesting feature of Mount Tabor which, according to tradition, is the Mount of the Transfiguration. We had just come down from that mountain, and the hot afternoon made the mountain shimmer.
We were not tourists. We were a bus load of students studying biblical archaeology – mostly priests of the Roman Catholic Church and a few seminarians. And three laypeople. A professor of communications. Myself.
And Sister Jennifer, a nun who had sparkle in her eyes, laugh lines around her mouth and the fire of a lively faith in her soul.
We had read the scriptures and talked about the transfiguration all the way from our camp on the Sea of Galilee.
One of the priests in our group said a Mass in the church at the top of the mountain, and preached a homily on the Transfiguration. Then we walked through the light mist and tried to imagine what might have happened there, two-thousand years ago.
“Look out the window!” Don said to our group as our bus rumbled away from the mountain. He pointed to Mount Tabor shining in the afternoon sun. “Did you notice that the mountain is shaped like a woman’s breast?”
It was. Very clearly.
I found Don’s comment deeply moving. “That brings it together for me,” I said. “Jesus returns to his mother God for comfort and nourishment.”
The comment was troublesome to most on the bus – deeply offensive to a few. And the conversation quickly came to an embarrassed halt. There was an unnatural silence. The priests, but especially the seminarians, stared out the windows.
Sr. Jennifer took my arm as we got off the bus. “Yes!” she whispered in my ear. “Yes! Yes!”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Insect Bites
Scientists investigate all kinds of things that the rest of us rarely think about until we experience it personally. Like pain, for instance.
Long ago, a magazine I edited devoted a whole issue to the subject of pain. One of the medical experts stated flatly, “There is no such thing as a pain thermometer.”
“The only way to find out how much pain a person is feeling,” said that author, “is to ask them.”
Pain is relative. Some people can go through major surgery and come out with minimal after-effects; others find the same experience utterly debilitating.
Nevertheless, our human minds keep trying to quantify the unquantifiable. When I was rushed to the emergency ward of a Halifax hospital a few years back with a totally blocked-up prostate gland, the triage nurse asked me, “How much does it hurt?”
“A lot,” I said bravely (at least, I tried to sound brave).
She wasn’t impressed. “Rank it on a scale of one to ten,” she instructed, “with one being like getting a thorn in your thumb, and ten being the worst pain you’ve ever known.”
A few people have built their careers around finding ways to measure pain.
For example, an American chemist, Wilbur Scoville, developed a scale to measure how hot chili peppers can get. India, it seems, has a pepper called Naga Jolokia, which is about 200 times hotter than a jalapeno pepper, and about ten times hotter than a habanero.
My mouth hurts thinking about it.
Since I have just come back from two weeks in Honduras, a Central American country with an abundance of stinging and biting insects, I found myself interested in the “pain index” developed by an entomologist, Dr. Justin Q. Schmidt, for different kinds of insect stings. His imaginative analogies would do credit to a wine writer:
* 1.0 Sweat bee: Light, ephemeral, almost fruity. A tiny spark has singed a single hair on your arm.
* 1.2 Fire ant: Sharp, sudden, mildly alarming. Like walking across a shag carpet & reaching for the light switch.
* 1.8 Bullhorn acacia ant: A rare, piercing, elevated sort of pain. Someone has fired a staple into your cheek.
* 2.0 Bald-faced hornet: Rich, hearty, slightly crunchy. Similar to getting your hand mashed in a revolving door.
* 2.0 Yellow jacket wasp: Hot and smoky, almost irreverent. Imagine W.C. Fields extinguishing a cigar on your tongue.
* 2.4 Honey bee: Like a match head that flips off and burns on your skin.
* 3.0 Harvester ant: Bold and unrelenting. Somebody using a drill to excavate your ingrown toenail.
* 3.0 Paper wasp: Caustic & burning. Distinctly bitter aftertaste. Like spilling hydrochloric acid on a paper cut.
* 4.0 Pepsis wasp: Blinding, fierce, shockingly electric. A running hair drier has been dropped into your bubble bath.
* 4.0+ Bullet ant: Pure, intense, brilliant pain. Like walking over flaming charcoal with a 3-inch nail in your heel.
There, now, doesn’t that make you feel better about your own relatively minor aches and pains?

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – I don’t know if this is a blooper or a quote or a letter or what, but it’s too good to miss. It’s from Ellen DeGeneres via (who else?) Evelyn McLachlan.
“In the beginning there was nothing. God said, 'Let there be light!' And there was light. There was still nothing, but you could see it a whole lot better.

From the file:
* The person who typed the stencil for the church bulletin couldn't quite get all the word "Father" on one line, so decided to put the whole word on the next one, forgetting to erase the "Fat" already typed on the previous line. (Does that make sense?) So the Lord's Prayer read, "Our Fat Father..."
* The service will close with "Little Drops of Water." One of the men in the choir will start quietly and the rest of the congregation will join in.

If you’ve spotted any good bloopers in your church bulletin or newsletter, or anywhere else for that matter, please send them to me. ralphmilton@woodlake.com

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Wish I’d Said That! – Whatever hits the fan...will not be evenly distributed.
source unknown via Jim Spinks

What would you attempt to do if you knew you would not fail?
Robert Schuller via Evelyn McLachlan

If it weren't for stress, I'd have no energy at all. source unknown, via Jim Spinks

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

We Get Letters – I make mistakes. And I made one last week by running the joke about the psychiatrist and the proctologist. Thanks to Clayton Buck of Calgary, Alberta, for calling to my attention the fact that people who are struggling with psychiatric problems would find this hurtful.
I ran the item thinking it was a delightful bit of wordplay. Which it was. But my definition of a “dirty joke” is one that has a victim, and in this case there were victims.
So I am sorry! I apologize for the hurt I caused.

Kay Lynn Perry of Bloomington, Illinois, writes: “I was putting my 6-year-old to bed, and asked him to pray.
After hearing yet another repetition of his selfish little formula (God, help me to have a good time . . .), I thought it was time to push him to a broader understanding of prayer. After his "amen," I said, "But you didn't pray for me. Would you pray for mommy?"
He looked at me bewildered, as though the thought had never crossed his mind. He thought and thought, and finally prayed: "God, please help mom . . ." another torturous pause, while he racked his brain for something he could say to God about me, then inspiration: "and stuff. Amen."
Well, at least he's more likely to get a "yes" on that one than his request for another snow day with no school.

AAAGGGGGHHHH! Those horrible, hateful, horrendous homonyms again!
Vern Ratzlaff writes: “I don't know whether this is a blooper or a deep insight, but in this Sunday's edition of Rumours . . . 'the story of Naaman was, I am sure, chosen to compliment this gospel account.' I find fascinating the possibility of the common scriptures' story deferring in politeness to the New Testament reading and granting accolades – a wondrous development in hermeneutical good graces.”

Dave Schiffer enjoyed the “let us spray” joke in last week’s Rumors, which reminded him of an age old limerick in similar vein.
The indolent vicar of Bray
His roses allowed to decay,
His wife, more alert
Bought a powerful squirt
And said to her spouse, "Let us spray".

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “soup of the dog!”) It’s not just bulletin typists that make interesting mistakes. Ditto those who type menus. For instance:
* Soup of the dog* Served on a warm nun* Kindly beans* Dark meat of chicken – two things and two legs* Pork with geek and garlic* Kids’ menu (served to chicken under 12)* Curried lamp and rice* Scared breast of chicken* Cork chops
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Bottom of the Barrel – Four Catholic ladies are having coffee together, discussing how important their children are.
The first one tells her friends, “My son is a Priest. When he walks into a room, everyone calls him ‘Father.’”
The second Catholic woman chirps, “Well, my son is a Bishop. Whenever he walks into a room, people say, ‘Your Grace.’”
The third Catholic woman says smugly, “Well, not to put you down, but my son is a Cardinal. Whenever he walks into a room, people say ‘Your Eminence.’”
The fourth Catholic woman has a kind of beatific smile. She sips her coffee and says nothing for what seems like ages. Then in a very quiet voice: “My son is a gorgeous, 6’ 2,” hard-muscled, body builder. Whenever he walks into a room, women say, ‘My God!!!’”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Scripture Story as Reader’s Theatre – Because the Hebrew and Christian readings are so linked, I’ve used them both this Sunday.

Reader I: It feels like tiny little people with cold feet running up and down my backbone.
Reader II: What does?
I: Those two scripture readings for today. The story of Elijah rising up into the sky, and the story of Jesus on the mountain talking to Elijah and Moses.
II: They are a bit weird. It’s hard to believe that this kind of thing really happens.
I: Maybe that’s why they’re important.
II: Because they are weird?
I: Yeah. Weird stories like this are usually trying to tell us something important. Like the Hebrew scripture reading from the book of Kings. I think it’s a really old legend from way back in the mists of time, and it’s trying to tell us that Elijah was more than just a very good prophet. He was God’s favorite prophet because he didn’t have to die in order to get up to heaven. God raised Elijah up into the sky as is. Body, mind, spirit. The works.
II: So let’s read the ancient legend of Elijah and his side-kick Elisha. It’s in Second Kings.

I: Now when the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. Elijah spoke to Elisha.
II: "Stay here; for the Lord has sent me as far as Bethel."
I: "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you."
II: So Elijah and Elisha went down to Bethel. The company of prophets who were in Bethel came out to Elisha, and spoke to him.
I:” Do you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?"
II: "Yes, I know; keep silent."
I: Then Elijah spoke to him.
II "Elisha, stay here; for the Lord has sent me to Jericho."
I: "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you."
II: And so they came to Jericho. The company of prophets who were at Jericho drew near to Elisha, and spoke to him.
I: "Do you know that today the Lord will take your master away from you?"
II: "Yes, I know; be silent."
I: Then Elijah spoke to him.
"Stay here; for the Lord has sent me to the Jordan."
II: "As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you."
I: And so the two of them went on. Fifty men of the company of prophets also went, and stood at some distance from them, as they both were standing by the Jordan. Then Elijah took his mantle and rolled it up, and struck the water; the water was parted to the one side and to the other, until the two of them crossed on dry ground. When they had crossed, Elijah spoke to Elisha.
II: "Tell me what I may do for you, before I am taken from you."
I: "Please let me inherit a double share of your spirit."
II: "You have asked a hard thing; yet, if you see me as I am being taken from you, it will be granted you; if not, it will not."
I: As they continued walking and talking, a chariot of fire and horses of fire separated the two of them, and Elijah ascended in a whirlwind into heaven. Elisha kept watching and crying out.
II: "Father, father! The chariots of Israel and its horsemen!"
I: But when Elisha could no longer see him, he grasped his own clothes and tore them in two pieces.
(SLIGHT PAUSE)
II: What was that about the “chariots of Israel and its horsemen?”
I: I have no idea. But legends are like that. The story gets passed down from one generation to the next, and often we lose some of the meaning in the process.
II: The New Testament reading is like that too. Jesus is seen talking to people who have been dead for centuries – there’s the whole business of the clothes that shine like neon lights – and Peter making the silly suggestion about building three huts or booths.
I: Well, lets stop talking about it and read it. This is from the Gospel of Mark.
(SLIGHT PAUSE)
II: Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his clothes became dazzling white, such as no one on earth could bleach them.
I: And there appeared to them Elijah with Moses, who were talking with Jesus.
II: Then Peter spoke to Jesus.
I: "Rabbi, it is good for us to be here. Let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah."
II: Peter did not know what to say, because he and the other disciples were terrified. Then a cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud there came a voice.
I: "This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!"
II: Suddenly when they looked around, they saw no one with them any more, but only Jesus.
I: As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them to tell no one about what they had seen, until after the Son of Man had risen from the dead.


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Information and Stuff – (Read this section only if you want to know about subscribing, unsubscribing or quoting stuff from Rumors.) It would be nice if you could give Rumors a plug in your bulletin or newsletter. Please invite your friends (and even your enemies) to subscribe. There's no charge: RUMORS is free and it comes to your e-mail box every Sunday morning. Just send your friends the instructions to subscribe [below], and include an invitation to join the list ... perhaps something like this: “There’s a lively and fun newsletter called RUMORS which is available at no cost on the net. It’s for ‘Christians with a sense of humor’.” Please add the instructions to subscribe [below]. If you have a friend you think would enjoy Rumors, and you’d rather not give them the subscribing instructions below, send me an e-mail at ralphmilton@woodlake.com and give me the e-mail address of your friend. If you are using something from Rumors in your sermon, give credit only as appropriate, without stopping the sermon dead in its tracks. I am delighted when Rumors is useful in the life and work of the church. As long as it is within your congregation or parish, you don’t need permission. You are welcome to use the stuff in church bulletins or newsletters. Please say where it came from, and please invite people to subscribe to RUMORS. An appropriate credit line would be; “From Ralph Milton's RUMORS, a free Internet ‘e-zine’ for Christians with a sense of humor." ... and please be sure to include these instructions to subscribe to RUMORS: To Subscribe:* Send an e-mail to: rumors-subscribe@joinhands.com
* Don't put anything else in that e-mail
To Unsubscribe:
* Send an e-mail to: rumors-unsubscribe@joinhands.com
* Don’t put anything else in that e-mail* If you are changing e-mail addresses, and your old address will no longer be in service, you do not need to unsubscribe. The sending computer will try a few times, and then give up..~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*Please Write – If you respond, react, think about, freak-out, or otherwise have things happen in your head as a result of reading the above, please send a note to: ralphmilton@woodlake.com
Who knows, I might quote you in a future issue of RUMORS.All material is copyright © Ralph Milton.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Preaching Materials for February 15, 2009

R U M O R S #540
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2009-02-08

February 8th, 2009

A SMALL VOICE

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites” list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I post each issue of Rumors on that blog so that you can access it any time. And if an issue of Rumors goes missing, you can go and find it there.
Thanks.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

The Story – from the bottom of the social ladder
Rumors – that muddy creek soaked off his armor.
Soft Edges – religious reformations
Bloopers – a sample of the sermon
We Get Letters – hell in the hallway
Mirabile Dictu! – celebrate
Bottom of the Barrel – the psychiatrist and the proctologist
Scripture Story as Reader’s Theatre – the general and the slave girl
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rib Tickler – This from Wayne Seybert, Longmont, Colorado.
A family of skunks was trapped in a thicket, surrounded by a pack of hungry wolves that were edging even closer.
“Come, children,” said mama skunk. “Let’s put our heads together so we can deal with this situation.” The children skunks all gathered in a neat circle, their heads together.
Mama smiled at her children. Then she bowed her head and said, “Let us spray.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you may hear in church this coming Sunday, which is the sixth’s Sunday after the Epiphany.
The Story (from the Revised Common Lectionary) – 2 Kings 5:1-14

Jim says…
I cannot resist the story of Naaman. Except that it’s not just the story of Naaman, the Syrian general. It’s also the story of Naaman’s unnamed wife, who felt confident enough of herself in a ruthlessly patriarchal culture to advise her husband. And of the wife’s unnamed Israeli slave girl, who dared suggest a means of healing Naaman’s leprosy.
And of Elisha’s servant, who went out in fear and trembling to take Elisha’s message to a very powerful man who was getting increasingly frustrated at the buck-passing going on. And of the unnamed slave who braved Naaman’s temper tantrum, urging him to follow Elisha’s second-hand advice.
Lois Wilson told two of those stories – the slave girl, and the servant who braved Naaman’s anger – in her book “Stories Seldom Told” (Northstone, 1997).
If I had the time, I would gather half a dozen people and work with them through the week to explore the story and develop their roles. Then on Sunday, I would have each of them tell their part of the story through the eyes of their character.
And at the end, I would invite Naaman himself to recognize that more than his skin got healed when he dipped himself seven times in the Jordan. As the almighty general heard those stories, as he realized how many people had taken risks for his sake, he might discover that his eyes had been opened too.

Ralph says…
There are many themes running through the stories of the Bible. One of them could be called, "the least expected." Bev (to whom I am married) pointed out to me that the unnamed Israelite slave girl in this story was certainly "the least expected." Foreign, female, slave and young. You couldn't get any lower on the status ladder.
I am convinced that God has a sense of humor. Army commanders and Kings generally have a fairly high opinion of themselves. Naaman and his king were no exception. So when a Hebrew slave girl made a suggestion through Naaman's wife (also unnamed), the Commander had to swallow pretty hard. One of the gifts the leprosy gave to Naaman was at least a touch of humility. Or was it desperation that forced him to pay attention to her suggestion?
Then Naaman had to take a deep breath and go to a country full of foreigners who had a weird language, ate strange food and were generally considered inferior. When he got there, Naaman was really ticked off when the prophet didn't even come out of the house and perform some spectacular pyrotechnics. The prophet sent a note. "Take a bath in the Jordan." I can understand Naaman's feelings. I would have felt slighted too. Maybe I have the same problem as Naaman.
Foreign slave girls, rude prophets, muddy creeks – God uses the least expected people and the most ordinary things to bring healing. Healing of the body sometimes, yes, but especially healing of the soul.
It seems to me this ancient story speaks to us of healing – what it is, how it is done, and the healing all of us need.

Check out “Rumors” below which is the story told from the point of view of the Hebrew slave girl. And the Reader’s Theatre version of the scripture reading right after the “Bottom of the Barrel.”

Psalm 30 – paraphrased by Jim Taylor
The greatest liberation for many women is to discover that they are not intrinsically inferior to the men in the lives.
1 My God, O my God, what a gift you have given me!
2 I thought I was born a loser;
you have given me self-esteem.
3 I let others speak for me; I let others think for me.
I felt I was nothing.
You have given me life.
4 I am not a faulty copy of anyone else, God.
I am me. Thank you.
5, 7 Once I thought God despised me.
But I have felt God's gentle hands lift me into the light.
8 I cried silently in the night, afraid to be heard.
I stifled my own suffering.
I thought I didn't matter.
9 I could have died – but I was afraid no one would notice.
10 "Can anyone hear me?" I cried. "Does anyone care?"
11 And you heard me, God.
You turned my rainclouds into rainbows;
you stirred spices into the watery soup of my life.
12 I am done with self-abasement.
I will delight in me and in you forever.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com

1 Corinthians 9:24-27 – I am writing this in Tucson, Arizona from the home of our son Mark. Last Sunday, the Arizona Cardinals and the Pittsburg Steelers faced off in the Super Bowl – easily the biggest religious* assembly in North America! All “glory, laud and honor” went to the winners. The Cardinals went home feeling noble but deeply disappointed. As Paul says in this reading, it was winner take all.
Which seems unjust.
So often the decisions of our courts of law, based largely on an adversarial system, seem to reach simplistic decisions which ignore the complexity and shared responsibility involved.* Yes, that’s exactly what I meant.

Mark 1:40-45 – The story of Naaman was, I am sure, chosen to compliment this gospel account of Jesus healing a leper. But it seems to me there’s far more meat on the Hebrew story than on this one. Mark, typically, gives us just the bare bones.
Who was this leper, and why couldn’t he keep his mouth shut when Jesus expressly asked him to?
It’s quite understandable, of course. Leprosy (more correctly Hansen’s Disease) was the most dreaded disease of the time. There were a bunch of assorted skin diseases that were called leprosy in those days. And those who had it were kicked out of town and out of people’s lives and lived in miserable little clusters on whatever tidbits of food and kindness they could beg. Probably more of them died from starvation, exposure and heart break than from the disease.
If someone cured your leprosy, you got your life back. So when the guy discovered he was cured, he went shouting and yelling and singing and rejoicing and totally out of control.
Who could blame him?

For children see “The Lectionary Story Bible, Year B,” page 63 where you will find a re-telling of the 2 Kings reading, and page 65 where you will find a children’s version of the reading from Mark.
There are children’s stories for every Sunday in the Revised Common Lectionary, in “The Lectionary Story Bible,” by yours truly. The marvellous illustrations are by Margaret Kyle. There’s at least one story for each Sunday, usually two, and occasionally three. Click the main Wood Lake Publications website at www.woodlakebooks.com, or click on the following address which takes you directly to the “Lectionary Story Bible.”
http://tinyurl.com/2lonod

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Rumors – The story of Naaman
"...that muddy creek soaked off his armor."
from “Is This Your Idea of a Good Time, God?”
Wood Lake Books 1995

It was dark as pitch. Miriam lay on her mat, listening to her mistress toss back and forth in her bed in the next room.
"Miriam!"
"I'm coming, ma'am."
Miriam had been expecting the call. She had been called every night for months now. Her mistress would fall into a fitful sleep, then wake a few hours later, tense, tired and frightened.
Even the smoky oil lamp seemed bright to Miriam's eyes as she emerged from the darkness of her little cell. "May I rub your back ma'am?" she asked.
"Yes, Miriam. Gently!" Ghazal's voice was tired. Miriam could hardly hear it, but it didn't matter. She had done this every night. Her strong, young hands moved firmly, gently along the knotted muscles in Ghazal's neck and shoulders.
Ghazal's shoulders sagged, relaxed just a little from the burden of fear. "It doesn't count for anything, Miriam. Not a thing."
"Ma'am?"
"Money. Status. Power. It doesn't get you anything in the end. They'll throw us away, like so much garbage. In the end, that's what will happen."
"Oh, ma'am. Surely not. Your husband is the Commander of the Army. He serves the king."
"Exactly!" Now there was anger in Ghazal's voice. "He serves the king! Naaman is commander of the army. The second most powerful man in this stupid country. And this man has leprosy! He has stinking, dirty leprosy! You know what they do with people who have leprosy, Miriam. As soon as it gets a bit worse, as soon as he can't cover that spot anymore, as soon as the wounds get ugly, they'll throw him onto the garbage heap. And me with him! Wives are attached to their husbands, so I go too. They'll send us out to live in the caves with the other lepers."
Ghazal fury dissolved into tears – great screaming sobs that shook her whole body. Miriam's fingers continued their quiet ministry to Ghazal's aching shoulders, and the sobs moved into tears of quiet exhaustion.
"Oh Miriam, what would I do without you?" Ghazal reached back over her shoulder and took Miriam's hand. "Sit down, my child."
"How old are you, Miriam?"
"I don't know ma'am. I have been your slave for six winters since the warriors brought me here from Israel. I was very small then."
"You are old and wise beyond your years, Miriam. You are a girl-child, a slave, a Jew, and I couldn't survive all this without you. In your quiet way, you are wise. You seem to understand, and you seem to care about me. How can you possibly care about me, Miriam, when you are my slave and I have the power of life and death over you?"
The older woman looked deep into the dark, sad eyes of the girl. "Perhaps you are wise because you have suffered," said Ghazal. "You were ripped away from your home, your family. You have nothing left, except wisdom. Do we all have to suffer before we can be wise, Miriam?"
Ghazal began to cry again. "I've never suffered anything, Miriam, until now. I was a pampered child. I had wealth and power, or at least as much power as a woman can ever have. I never had to think or do anything for myself, Miriam. Nothing. I've never even had any children, so I don't even know what that is like.
"And now this thing with Naaman's leprosy. My whole world is coming apart, Miriam. They'll send Naaman away soon, when his leprosy spreads. They'll send him off, and then what's going to happen to me? I'll have to go and live in the caves with him? I can't survive in the caves with him. I can't live with him here, Miriam. He's so angry and afraid. He's always been proud and distant. Always the tough, aristocratic male. Now he's in pain and he pushes me away. You know, I haven't been in his bed for months?"
Miriam nodded. Of course she knew. Miriam was a woman in a child's body. She stood up and went behind Ghazal's chair. Again, she massaged the burden from the knotted, hurting neck and shoulders.
"Ma'am!" Miriam said hesitantly.
Ghazal looked up at her.
"I'm sorry ma'am. I was going to say something but it is not my place to make suggestions."
"Oh Miriam. If you have something to suggest that might help, please say it."
"There is a prophet in my home place. He is a prophet of the God of Israel."
"What are you saying, Miriam? Are you saying he can cure leprosy?"
"I'm not sure, ma'am. I've heard it said."
"Do you think there's any chance, Miriam? Do you think there's any chance?"
"A great commander of the army would not accept the word of a Jewish slave girl."
"No, he wouldn't. Naaman is far too proud for that." Ghazal sat for awhile, the urgency, the desperation building inside her. "But he must. Leprosy doesn't respect commanders of the army. Naaman's just has to get off his high horse and listen, even to the word of a Jewish slave girl."
For the first time in months, Ghazal stood up straight. She took the oil lamp, tucked her night dress firmly around her, and walked toward the door leading to Naaman's bedroom.
Miriam went back to her mat. She was very tired. Through the small window of her cell she could see the first light of dawn.
...
It was light outside one morning when Miriam woke with a start. She had slept right through the night. She had not heard Ghazal stir, had not massaged Ghazal's shoulders, hadn't listened to Ghazal talk. Had Ghazal called and had she not heard?
Miriam rushed to Ghazal's bed. It was empty. It hadn't been slept in. For what seemed like an eternity, Miriam stood there at the bedside, wondering what had happened. What did the empty bed mean? Had Naaman come back? Her body rigid with fear, Miriam waited.
It was late in the morning when Ghazal finally came through the door. She was still in her nightgown. Her face was soft and she was smiling.
"Oh Miriam. He's back. The leprosy is gone, Miriam. He did go to the Jordan River and he's cured." The older woman took the girl in her arms. "Thank you Miriam."
There was a long silence, as the two women sat in each other's embrace. Finally Ghazal spoke again.
"We talked all night, Miriam. We really talked to each other. Among other things, of course." Miriam blushed and Ghazal chuckled.
"There's something that's been healed besides Naaman's leprosy, Miriam. I'm not sure what to call it, but it feels like a miracle. It was the Commander of the Army who went to Israel. But it was a man named Naaman who came back. He's a real man now, not just a swollen ego in a soldier suit.
"Naaman says that Jordan River of yours is just a muddy creek, Miriam. But maybe it soaked off his armor. Naaman says he did a lot of thinking along the way. I guess – I guess that God of yours knew that leprosy wasn't Naaman's main problem."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Religious Reformations
A friend and I had an animated discussion a while ago. His argument was simple: if all religions are the same at heart, why does it matter which one you belong to?
As my friend Ralph Milton has occasionally commented, “I don’t think God cares about our petty arguments over who’s got the right theology.”
Notice – Ralph is not saying that God doesn’t care about us, or about what we believe; simply that God finds our endless nit-picking over doctrinal details a waste of energy.
Was the Virgin Mary really a virgin? Can one man’s death erase all the sins ever committed by humanity? Does a tasteless wafer turn into human flesh?
It’s true that all religions have, at their root, two primary concerns – our relationships with each other, and our relationship with the world around us.
Yes, I know, the primary relationship is supposed to be with our deity-of-choice. But I contend that we first experience that deity through our relationships with each other and with the world.
Over time, the nature of the deity that we discover through those relationships becomes codified. That code – that system of thinking about the deity – eventually becomes a religion.
That’s why you cannot simply switch from Christianity to Buddhism or Hinduism or any other religion. You also have to accept a lot of baggage – that religious culture’s attempt to explain the experience of the divine, to build a rational framework that will, hopefully, keep wild speculation under control.
Over time, that framework grows. Ever-more elaborate explanations get added to the previous explanations, until religions develop a tottering superstructure that invites skepticism.
That is why every reformation, regardless of the religion, always starts by cutting back some of that superstructure, trying to recapture the original roots of the experience of the divine.
I can’t think of any reformation that started by adding a whole bunch of new terms and conditions to the existing belief structure.
I suspect that 100 years from now, historians will look back and conclude that several religions have been going through a reformation right now.
Christianity, Hinduism, and Islam are all developing two contrary streams. On the one hand, there’s a rise of fundamentalism. On the other, there’s a radical liberalism.
Both apply a new lens to historic scriptures – one literally, one figuratively.
In Christianity, this reformation may have started with Latin America’s “Liberation Theology.” Or perhaps with feminism, which forced its advocates to read between the Bible’s patriarchal lines.
This reformation might even have started with the abolition of slavery – thus deliberately rejecting a status endorsed by most of the Bible.
The mere fact that reformations keep happening refutes a common prejudice that religion is a form of brainwashing – a conviction, as one acquaintance charged, that “My god can beat up your god.”
Reformations happen because a growing number of people become convinced that what they believe DOES matter.
So they set out to change their church, their faith, and themselves.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – David Coffman of Walhalla, South Carolina writes: “Last Sunday we installed our church council following the sermon. There in the bulletin, it stated, ‘Council Instillation.’ So we had a special prayer as the congregation grabbed a hand of a neighbor and we prayed for the power of the Holy Spirit to be ‘instilled’ in them.

April Dailey, who is a Pittsburg Stealers* fan, says young Jacob was given a multiple choice question. “Who is called the author of the first five books of the Bible? Moses, Abraham, Isaac, Daniel?”
Young Jacob’s answer: "It was Moses, because Abraham Lincoln wasn't around when the Bible was written!”
* Please note correct spelling. In view of the Super Bowl last Sunday, “grand larcenists” would be more correct.

Sandy Cross of Brandywine, Maryland typed an announcement for a choir rehearsal, that went like this. “Choir Rehearsal is at 7 p.m. We will begin sinning the Easter Cantata at 7:30 this week. Please join us.”
Unfortunately, Sandy noticed in time to make the correction.

Patricia Ling Magdamo writes: “My pastor friend put sanitary hot air hand dryers in the rest rooms at his church but after two weeks, he took them out. I asked him why.
“They work fine,” he said, “but someone put a sign on them that said, ‘For a sample of this week's sermon, push the button’."

If you’ve spotted any good bloopers in your church bulletin or newsletter, or anywhere else for that matter, please send them to me. ralphmilton@woodlake.com

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Wish I’d Said That! – Try Jesus! If you don't like him, the devil will always take you back!!
source unknown, via Stephanie McClellan

Church is a Gift from God. Assembly Required.
from a church sign in Orillia Ontario via Jim Spinks

Laughter is the shortest distance between two people.
Victor Borge via Velia Watts

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

We Get Letters – Douglas Lawson, Heather Nesbitt, David Gilchrist, Linda McMullan and several others sent notes about last weeks sign post: “This is a chu__ch. What is missing?” They point out that it should have read: “This is a ch__ __ch. What's missing? Answer: U R.”

Priscilla Gifford sent our cold beer and ice-cream diet to her friend, Jeff Grove who checked all the facts of that amazing calculation and found them wanting.
Priscilla, tell Jeff that facts are not relevant in cases like this. You’ve got to be a believer! If you firmly believe you will get thinner with this diet, you will believe you actually are getting thinner. The trick is to stay away from things like scales and mirrors.

Robert Moore writes: “A friend liked to quote the old saying, ‘When one door closes, another one opens.’ After she suffered a health setback, she went through months of unemployment. and someone else added, "but it's hell in the hallway."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “celebrate!”)
There was a Pope who was greatly loved by all of his followers, a man who led with gentleness, faith and wisdom. His passing was grieved by the entire world, Catholic or not.
As the Pope approached the gates of heaven it was Saint Peter who greeted him in a firm embrace.
“Welcome your holiness, your dedication and unselfishness in serving humanity during your life has earned you great stature in heaven. You may pass through the gates without delay and are granted free access to all parts of heaven.
“You are also granted an open door policy and may at your own discretion meet with any heavenly leader, including the God, without prior appointment.
“Is there anything which your holiness desires?”
“Well yes,” the Pope replied, “I have often pondered some of the mysteries which have puzzled and confounded theologians through the ages. Are there perhaps any transcripts which recorded the actual conversations between God and the prophets of old? I would love to see what was actually said.”
Saint Peter immediately ushered the Pope to the heavenly library and explained how to retrieve the various documents. The Pope was thrilled and settled down to review the history of humanity’s relationship with God.
Two years later a scream of anguish pierced the stacks of the library. Immediately several of the saints and angels game running to the Pope’s side to learn the cause of his dismay.
There they found the Pope pointing to a single word on a parchment, repeating over and over, “There’s an ‘R.’ There’s an ‘R’ ...”
The word was “celebrate.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Bottom of the Barrel – John Severson writes: “This one is just for you – unless you're brave enough to send it along! HA!”
John, my daddy told me never to accept a dare. But then, I didn’t always do everything my daddy said.

The Psychiatrist and the Proctologist
Two doctors, a psychiatrist and a proctologist, opened an office together in a small town.
They put up a sign reading, "Dr. Smith & Dr. Jones: Hysterias & Posteriors."
The town council was not happy with the sign so the doctors changed it to, "Schizoids & Hemorrhoids."
This was not acceptable either. In an effort to satisfy the council, the doctors changed the sign to, "Catatonics & High Colonics."
No good. Next, they tried, "Manic Depressives & Anal Retentives."
Thumbs down again. Then came, "Minds & Behinds."
Unacceptable, again! So they tried, "Analysis & Anal Cysts."
Not a chance. So "Nuts & Butts?"
No way. How about "Freaks & Cheeks?"
Still, no go. Maybe "Loons & Moons?"
Forget it.
Almost ready to admit defeat, the doctors finally came up with, "Dr. Smith & Dr. Jones: Odds & Ends."

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Scripture Story as Reader’s Theatre – 2 Kings 5:1-14
Reader I: It’s a great story! I love it!
Reader II: C’mon! It’s another one of those dusty Old Testament stories about things that probably never happened.
I: I don’t care. It’s a great story.
II: What’s so great about it?
I: Well, it’s got a great army general. Secretary of Defense. Medals all over his chest. Scrambled eggs on his hat and shoulders. And there’s his spoiled and beautiful wife and her slave girl. To say nothing of a scared-stiff king and a religious guy who is supposed to be able to cure sickness. And this general has a really ugly disease and has to get rid of it or he’ll lose his job and probably his life. What more do you want in a story?
II: OK already! Let’s read the story.
I: Second Kings. Chapter five. You start.
(slight pause)
II: Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man and in high favor with his master, because by him the Lord had given victory to Aram. The man, though a mighty warrior, suffered from leprosy.
I: Now the Arameans on one of their raids had taken a young girl captive from the land of Israel, and she served Naaman's wife. She spoke to her mistress.
II: "If only my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy."
I: So Naaman went in and told his lord just what the girl from the land of Israel had said. And the king said…
II: "Go then, and I will send along a letter to the king of Israel."
I: So Naaman went, taking with him ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold, and ten sets of garments. He brought the letter to the king of Israel. This is what the letter said.
II: "When this letter reaches you, know that I have sent to you my servant Naaman, that you may cure him of his leprosy."
I: When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes.
II: "Am I God, to give death or life, that this man sends word to me to cure someone of his leprosy? Just look and see how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me."
I: But when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he sent a message to the king.
II: "Why have you torn your clothes? Let him come to me, that he may learn that there is a prophet in Israel."
I: So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and halted at the entrance of Elisha's house. Elisha sent a messenger to Naaman.
II: "Go, wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall be clean."
I: But Naaman became angry.
II: "I thought that for me he would surely come out, and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, and would wave his hand over the spot, and cure the leprosy! Are not the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them, and be clean?"
I: Naaman turned and went away in a rage. But his servants approached him.
II: "Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? How much more, when all he said to you was, 'Wash, and be clean'?"
I: So Namaan went down and immersed himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the word of the man of God. His flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Information and Stuff – (Read this section only if you want to know about subscribing, unsubscribing or quoting stuff from Rumors.) It would be nice if you could give Rumors a plug in your bulletin or newsletter. Please invite your friends (and even your enemies) to subscribe. There's no charge: RUMORS is free and it comes to your e-mail box every Sunday morning. Just send your friends the instructions to subscribe [below], and include an invitation to join the list ... perhaps something like this: “There’s a lively and fun newsletter called RUMORS which is available at no cost on the net. It’s for ‘Christians with a sense of humor’.” Please add the instructions to subscribe [below]. If you have a friend you think would enjoy Rumors, and you’d rather not give them the subscribing instructions below, send me an e-mail at ralphmilton@woodlake.com and give me the e-mail address of your friend. If you are using something from Rumors in your sermon, give credit only as appropriate, without stopping the sermon dead in its tracks. I am delighted when Rumors is useful in the life and work of the church. As long as it is within your congregation or parish, you don’t need permission. You are welcome to use the stuff in church bulletins or newsletters. Please say where it came from, and please invite people to subscribe to RUMORS. An appropriate credit line would be; “From Ralph Milton's RUMORS, a free Internet ‘e-zine’ for Christians with a sense of humor." ... and please be sure to include these instructions to subscribe to RUMORS: To Subscribe:* Send an e-mail to: rumors-subscribe@joinhands.com
* Don't put anything else in that e-mail
To Unsubscribe:
* Send an e-mail to: rumors-unsubscribe@joinhands.com
* Don’t put anything else in that e-mail* If you are changing e-mail addresses, and your old address will no longer be in service, you do not need to unsubscribe. The sending computer will try a few times, and then give up..~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*Please Write – If you respond, react, think about, freak-out, or otherwise have things happen in your head as a result of reading the above, please send a note to: ralphmilton@woodlake.com
Who knows, I might quote you in a future issue of RUMORS.All material is copyright © Ralph Milton.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*