R U M O R S # 474
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-11-04
November 4, 2007
RELATIONSHIP, NOT OWNERSHIP
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites” list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I will 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.
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Next Week’s Readings – a real squirmer
Rumors – relationship, not ownership
Soft Edges – nuclear weapons, part II
Good Stuff – up to par
Bloopers – eat and get gas
We Get Letters – hope on back order
Mirabile Dictu! – about those angels
Bottom of the Barrel – blame it on Carl
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – He had been used to playing golf in the withering summer heat of Arizona. When he died and went to hell, the heat of the place didn’t impress him.
“Got any golf courses around here?” he asked the devil.
“Of course. Beautiful golf courses. Lots of ‘em!”
“So where do I find the clubs and the balls?” asked the man.
“Haven’t got any,” replied the devil. “That’s the hell of it.”
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, November 11th, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary. This Sunday is Remembrance Day in Canada and Veterans’ Day in the USA.
Haggai 1:15b-2:9 – This reading, the only one from Haggai in the RCL, is all about a building program. Haggai is jabbing the ribs of the governor and the high priest and telling them to get a move on. Get the temple built – make sure it is better than the last one – because once that’s done, God’s reign will come to earth and everything will be wonderful.
Seems to me I’ve heard that song sung in various congregations where they worked their backsides to the bone trying to get a building built and paid for. Once that was done, the reign of God didn’t come. In fact, the congregation fell asleep. It seems that the most active congregations are the ones most in debt. Except that their activity is all about raising money and not much about mission. Hmmmm!
Psalm 145:1-5, 17-21 – Sorry! Jim does not have a paraphrase of this part of Psalm 145.
2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17 – Here’s a question of editorial ethics. If you read straight through from verse one to verse 17, you get a very different impression of what Paul is talking about, than if you skip verses 6-12. If we don’t like the theology of those intervening verses (and I don’t), should we read the others?
The reality is that every one of us individually, and every denomination and every congregation cherry picks the passages of scripture that support their theology. “Everybody is doing it!” is not a defense. So let’s just plead guilty and be honest with ourselves about what we are doing.
With that in mind, I would be inclined to focus on the second part of the reading which can be a strong encouragement when we feel somewhat overwhelmed by what we face as Christians and what our denominations and congregations are facing. It’s tough territory, but God is walking with us.
Luke 20:27-38 – This passage is a real squirmer. It deals with levirate marriage, which we would dismiss out of hand because it turns the woman into a baby machine, and nothing more. If a husband died before his wife conceived a child (and that happened a lot, especially when the guys were continually going off to war), the husband’s brother had to take her in and conceive an heir for the dead brother. It served to protect the window who would otherwise starve to death.
The Sadducees did not believe in life after death, and their question isn’t really a question – it’s a trap to demonstrate how ridiculous such a doctrine really was.
Jesus basically tells them it’s a stupid question. That’s not what the resurrection is about.
It could be that valid comments on this passage can only be made by women – preferably older women – who remember what life was like for them when they were more obviously regarded as the property of either their father or their husband.
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful. Go to the website at:
www.woodlakebooks.com
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Rumors – There’s more to that business of levirate marriage. If the surviving brother discovered that the widow was pregnant by someone other than himself or the dead husband, he was expected to kill her. It wasn’t a question of sexual morality, it was a matter of ruined property.
When the prophet Nathan confronts King David about his affair with Bathsheba, David is accused of theft, not adultery.
And David may well have had Uriah, Bathsheba’s husband, murdered because otherwise Uriah would have been honor bound to kill both David and Bathsheba.
Now if you think the practice of honor killing has died out, or that it is only practiced in a few backward societies, google “honor killing.” I got 205,000 hits. While the practice may be more formalized or legitimized in some countries, the fundamental concept is alive and well and living in our “civilized” countries.
That’s because women are still viewed as a man’s possession in our collective unconscious. To a lesser extent, men are also seen by women as a possession. Check out the number of romantic songs where the word “my” and “mine” are used.
Granted, those two words can imply a relationship more than a possession. When I use the phrase “my God,” I surely don’t mean that I own God. And when I speak of Bev as “my wife” and she speaks of me as “my husband” we surely don’t mean that we own each other. Or do we?
It gets fuzzy in our world where our laws and our professed values don’t exactly match the reality of our lives. During the years when I was involved in the men’s movement, I found myself in conversation with men who had violently attacked their wives, either physically or verbally. When, in the long conversations, we finally got down to the real issues, it most often boiled down to property. She belonged to him, but she didn’t act as if she belonged to him. Furthermore, his violence was justified because she belonged to him.
There is no easy, quick or simple solution. I am sure there is no single solution, but I am convinced we need to raise up the issue – we need to raise it repeatedly. And we need to confess the misogyny that is still latent even in our most liberated male psyches.
Jesus tells the Sadducees that “who owns who” is not a valid question and in the reign of God, it is not an issue.
Relationship, yes. Ownership, no.
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Nuclear Weapons, Part II
It seems I need to offer some explanation about last week’s column. Quite a few readers thought I seriously advocated making nuclear weapons more widely available.
Indeed, one high school student in Sheldon High School – wherever that is – asked for permission to quote my column for her paper on “The nuclear weapon makes the United States lead to social advantages.”
I’m guessing that her English classes don’t include satire.
And from other responses, it seems quite a few of you have never heard of, let alone read, Jonathan Swift’s essay, A Modest Proposal, published in 1729.
Swift wrote it about the desperate plight of the Irish people, impoverished by English landlords, English trade policies, and English marketing. They were so poor, Swift suggested, that the only way they could drag themselves out of their abyss of poverty would be to sell their infants to the prosperous English upper classes. For food.
A one-year-old child, Swift proposed, had not yet suffered enough from poverty and malnutrition to become stringy and inedible. Such a child could be as tasty on the dinner table as a young suckling pig.
Swift wasn’t really advocating cannibalism. Rather, he expected that the very concept of cannibalism would be so repugnant that readers might actually do something about the fate of Irish peasants.
Similarly, I wasn’t recommending handing out nuclear weapons like candy at a Santa Claus parade. I was hoping that people would find my argument so ridiculous, so unrealistic, that they might also question conventional wisdom about gun use and gun ownership.
Especially the NRA’s version of conventional wisdom.
It seems to me that if it makes sense to allow people to own guns for self protection, then it should make equal sense to allow more powerful weapons – with nuclear weapons as the extreme example.
The reverse argument is equally simple – if it’s stupid to allow nuclear weapons into the hands of any fool, then it’s just as stupid to allow guns into the hands of any fool.
Fortunately for my damaged ego, a few people did catch the point.
For example, Padre Dave on AOL wrote, “Amen, brother, Amen! I've held this quite logical approach to the matter of ‘arms control’ for some time. I'm glad to see someone else has finally seen the light! I imagine the NRA will offer you a huge grant to help propagate this idiocy, I mean, ideology across the globe.
“Why must the cowards in power arbitrarily draw the line at hand guns and assault rifles? It is enshrined in the US Constitution that I have the inalienable right to ‘keep and bear ARMS!’ The founding fathers wisely did not use the word ‘guns’ and even went so far as to set no defining limit on ‘arms’ knowing full well the dramatic advances in destructive power and efficiency that we would one day have at our disposal.
“Thanks so much for a most encouraging column. I'll pray for the wildfire spread and adoption of your policy across the world, hastening the glorious day of Armageddon! Hellalujah!”
I’d like to think that his last word was intentionally misspelled.
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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Good Stuff – Dave Towers sends this. It’s a piece about a stewardship program called PAR (Pre-Authorized Remittances) as a way of giving to the church. Dave got it from his dad, Jack Towers, who was famous in western Canada for his work in stewardship, and for his penchant for puns. Here’s what Dave presented to the folks in his church. I’m sure both he and his dad would be delighted if you used it in yours.
When I think of PAR, the first thing that comes to mind has little to do with church finances, and a lot to do with a smooth swing, and connecting just right with a golf ball.
The term PAR just reinforces that line of thought. So, it is with great difficulty that I pull my thoughts from the golf course to talk about PAR in the church.
When you select the PAR method of giving, it is a key way to help the church IRON out the finances that allow it to TEE-UP and DRIVE its programs and services, and of COURSE help avoid a BACKSPIN into the HOLE.
Let me PUTT it to you this way. I don’t want to CLUB anyone over the HEAD with this APPROACH, I just want to take a SHOT at saying, that anyway you SLICE it, I think you will find it a FAIRWAY, FORE you to contribute.
It’s not ROUGH at all, just a simple monthly bank deduction.
For all those who are on the BALL and WOOD like to FOLLOW-THROUGH with this, PAR forms (like a scorecard) are available today, just a short CHIP SHOT away, at the back of the sanctuary.
For others who are on the FRINGE, and who are just LINING UP their thoughts on PAR, please LINK-UP with the treasurer, or FLAG anyone on the stewardship team at coffee after the service. We WOOD be happy to ADDRESS your concerns regarding any HAZARDS or TRAPS you think may exist.
Of COURSE, our congregation will WIN, and the Mission and Service fund WOOD too. That fund is our best SHOT at CHIPPING IN for the work of the church.
SHANKS for you attention to this little PITCH.
I hope I wasn’t OUT OF BOUNDS with the subtle HOOK in the message.
Now let’s SWING into something else.
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From the folks who make Rumors possible – An exciting publication from Wood Lake! Marcus Borg and Tim Scorer have teamed up to present a 10 week study session called, “Experiencing the Bible Again for the First Time.
Here’s a study that engages both the heart and the mind – probing the scriptures to find strength, joy and empowerment. Marcus Borg, the biblical scholar and Tim Scorer, the educator, make the study of scripture both fun and exciting.
Check it out at the Wood Lake web site. Click on this address, or copy it into the address line on your web browser.
http://www.woodlakebooks.com/product_detail.taf?site_uid1=14958&hallway_uid1=14961&catalog_uid1=1797&u_currency_id=127
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – Margaret Wood of Wick, Scotland, writes: “The Kirk here is in the process of joining two churches together. They call it a ‘linking’ process. We received a newsletter from one of the churches announcing ‘A service of Liking.’ I think I like that better anyway.”
A person who does not want to be identified noted in some minutes about planning for Christmas season: “Put big tree in sanctuary up right after church on Dec. 2. Try to get younger, more active people to help with the supervision of those who have done it for years.”
“Chain-saw needs getting ready for Family Tree-Cutting Saturday. Men’s Prayer Group will eat that day, and get gas.”
Well, this one’s on me. Lyle Phillips of Langley, BC, points out that “in the latest edition of Rumors you state: ‘make the study of scripture both fun and exiting.’ I think many people would find it exciting to make the study of scripture exiting.”
Meanwhile, Dave Woods writes: “This sounds as if they get the same result as I do when I make an appeal at the end of the sermon. I get a good response – everyone gets up and leaves.”
A few have wondered about my reference to “Christmas shoplifting.” That one, alas, was on purpose.
Jayne Whyte of Fort Qu'Appelle, Saskatchewan reports that when the lector was reading 2 Timothy 4:6 she stumbled on the word "libation" so that we heard, "I am being poured out like liberation; and my time of departure has come."
Which had Jane thinking, “Oh, that liberation would pour out for all people, all creatures, and all creation.”
Jim Taylor found it in the “Globe and Mail.” Seems one of the Toronto politicians urged his fellow councilors to “corral all of these sacred cows and put them under the microscope.”
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
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Wish I’d Said That! – Definition: A camel is a horse put together by a committee.
source unknown, via Margaret Wood
When we work as hard in peacetime to make this world decent to live in as in wartime we work to kill, the world will be decent and the causes for which men (sic) fight will be gone.
Agnes Keith via Bob Warrick
Heck is the place they send people who don't believe in Gosh!
source unknown, via Frank Chubb
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We Get Letters – Dave Towers writes: “Story (legend?) has it that several years ago, a church in Edmonton had ‘Jesus Saves’ on their sign. Some local prankster(s) propped their own sign below it: ‘Gretzky scores on the rebound’.”
Non-Canadians or non-hockey fans need to know that Wayne Gretzky is a Canadian demigod. He was perhaps the greatest hockey player ever. The city of Edmonton went into mourning when he was traded to Los Angeles.
Kent Chown of Montreal writes: “My congregation recently ordered Advent bulletin covers – you know, the ones with ‘Hope’, ‘Peace,’ ‘Joy’ and ‘Love.’ Unfortunately, ‘hope’ is on back-order.
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “about those angels!”) This delightful list from Peggy Neufeld in Ponoka, Alberta.
* I only know the names of two angels. Hark and Harold. Gregory, 5
* Everybody's got it all wrong. Angels don't wear halos anymore. I forget why, but scientists are working on it. Olive, 9
* It's not easy to become an angel! First, you die. Then you go to heaven, and then there's still the flight training to go through. And then you got to agree to wear those angel clothes. Matthew, 9
* Angels work for God and watch over kids when God has to go do something else. Mitchell, 7
* My guardian angel helps me with math, but he's not much good for science. Henry, 8
* Angels talk all the way while they're flying you up to heaven. The main subject is where you went wrong before you got dead. Daniel, 9
* When an angel gets mad, he takes a deep breath and counts to ten. And when he lets out his breath, somewhere there's a tornado. Reagan, 10
* Angels have a lot to do and they keep very busy. If you lose a tooth, an angel comes in through your window and leaves money under your pillow. Then when it gets cold, angels go north for the winter. Sara, 6
* Angels live in cloud houses made by God and his son, who's a very good carpenter. Jared, 8
* All angels are girls because they gotta wear dresses and boys didn't go for it. Antonio, 9
* My angel is my grandma who died last year. She got a big head start on helping me while she was still down here on earth. Kate Lynn, 9
* Some of the angels are in charge of helping heal sick animals and pets. And if they don't make the animals get better, they help the child get over it. Vicki, 8
* What I don't get about angels is why, when someone is in love, they shoot arrows at them. Sarah, 7
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Bottom of the Barrel – Carl Boyle is responsible. Not me. I’m jus a humble cipher, hunched over my little keyboard, doing what must be done. So blame Carl.
A noted biologist, who had been studying little green frogs in a swamp, was stumped. The frog population, despite efforts at predator control, was declining at an alarming rate. A chemist at a nearby college came up with a solution: The frogs, due to a chemical change in the swamp water, simply couldn't stay coupled long enough to reproduce successfully. The chemist then brewed up a new adhesive to assist the frogs' togetherness, which included one part sodium. It seems the little green frogs needed some monosodium glue to mate.
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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:
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* 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, October 31, 2007
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Preaching materials for November 4th, 2007
R U M O R S #473
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-10-28
October 28, 2007
MORE THAN HISTORY
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites” list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I will 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.
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Next Week’s Readings – a slight case of the willies
Rumors – write the vision
Soft Edges – a modest proposal
Bloopers – forgive us our trash baskets
We Get Letters – Chopin at the bit
Mirabile Dictu! – scrawl of the wild
Bottom of the Barrel – the Pope, Billy Graham and Oral Roberts
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – After reading Jim’s column below, I couldn’t resist this one. This epitaph was on a tombstone in San Diego, California, according to a newspaper printed in 1860.
Here lies the body of Jeemes Humbrick
who was accidentally shot on the
bank of the Pacus River by a young man.
He was accidentally shot with one
of the large Colt’s revolvers with
no stopper for the cock to rest on,
it was one of the old-fashioned kind
brass mounted. And of such is the
Kingdom of heaven.
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, November 4th, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary. This Sunday is also All Saints Sunday.
Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4 – Habakkuk, an obscure prophet, writes about the gut-churning problem of why the wicked do so well and why God is silent “when the wicked swallow those more righteous than they” (1:13). Habakkuk gets the answer that is still the answer we hear today. God will deal with the wicked in God’s own time. In the meanwhile, “the righteous live by their faith” (2:4).
As a professional scribbler, verse 2:3 has long had a special message. That message is also there for anyone who writes a sermon – whether in their head or on a piece of paper.
“Write the vision,” says Habakkuk. “Make it plain upon tablets.” That’s translated as “put it up on billboards,” in the Modern Language version, “so that people driving by can read it.”
The reality of the modern church is that we only have one crack at communicating with the folks who have some connection with our churches. That’s Sunday morning, and while they are not running or driving by, they have enough stuff flitting through their consciousness, that they might as well be driving by in a car.
Psalm 119:137-144 – paraphrased by Jim Taylor
In any race, only one person can come first. We all like to win – but failure is the more universal human experience.
137 It is hard to serve you, God.
I cannot live up to your level of perfection.
138 Your standards are too high for me.
141a I am only a frail and fallible human.
139 I do my best – but often I feel like an outcast, an oddball;
Few of my fellow humans recognize what I hope to measure up to.
140 I'm not asking for lower standards;
I know you are right.
Generations and generations have proved your rightness.
141b I cannot ignore their insights.
142 For you do not waver with the winds;
Popularity polls have no impact upon you.
Your values are eternal.
143 Although troubles swirl around me like autumn leaves,
your wisdom still shows me the way.
144 Your example is as dependable as a lighthouse in the darkness –
I can safely set my course by it.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to http://www.woodlakebooks.com/
2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12 – Check out the stuff between verses 4 & 11. I can see why the lectionary folk would want to leave that out, but it does show that it’s not just the far right wing of the church that uses proof-texts. We too cherry-pick those passages which support our point of view. I don’t have a problem with that. It’s just that those who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
In those first four verses the writer clearly points to love as the operative principle of the church. The hallmark of the church is the way in which we love each other. But another hallmark of the church is its love and care for those who are outside of its fellowship, and in that context, verses 5-10 give me the willies.
Luke 19:1-10 – It’s interesting how often the two words, “preaching” and “healing” are in the same sentence. It connects a care for souls with a care for bodies. It means the gospel of love is for our whole beings – from ingrown toenails up to dandruff on our scalp.
But that also applies to those who don’t like us. I don’t think we have the option of giving them the Trudeau Salute (a gesture involving the middle finger, the modern equivalent of shaking the dust off your shoes) and simply walking away. We do have power over demons (mental illness) and we can cure disease (v.1) but we lack the political will to do that.
Our current political regime in Canada, showing the largest budget surplus in history, has opted to cut taxes. Not a word about the homeless folks who live in our dark alleys and sleep in doorways.
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful. Go to http://www.woodlakebooks.com/ .
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Rumors – A conversation with Bev a week ago sparked a thought I’d like to toss out for your reaction. It came as a result of a study group at our church, led by our pastor, Karen Medland.
In the group they had been looking at Luke’s Christmas stories, and wondering what implications that would have for a Christmas Eve service. What would they do with those stories they no longer see as historical? What about the text of traditional Christmas carols?
What kind of a service might meet the needs of the folks who come to hear the old, old stories? What would meet the needs of the people in that study group who are also there and needing to worship? Bev and I found ourselves talking about the pastoral implications of this discussion.
Karen loaned Bev a book by Walter Brueggemann (Cadence of Home – Preaching among Exiles). I had been reading Karen Armstrong’s “The Bible” which I was finding somewhat dull – the first chapter at least it is a rehash of Biblical History 101. But one sentence leapt out at me. Referring to the Genesis legends, she wrote: “These are not history. They are more than history.”
That’s a useful concept. Bishop Spong, in his writings, seems to be mostly negative – he starts with all the stuff he can no longer believe. Spong’s method seems like the radical treatment for some kinds of leukemia. You destroy the entire immune system to kill the cancer, then build it up again. Many patients do not survive that process.
Or to use another analogy – you don’t remodel or redecorate the home, you tear it down and build from the ground up. Except, where do you live in the meantime? You may never find your way back.
Marcus Borg is more positive. He wants to build on the tradition. “No!” I heard him say to a Lutheran pastor on one occasion. “You don’t go in there and tell them that Mary was not a virgin. You use that story and build on it, to see what’s inside. Why was that idea important to the early church?”
Walter Brueggemann suggests that the church is in a modern experience of exile. We often feel like a “motherless child, abandoned, vulnerable, orphaned.” He points to the increasing number of folks doing genealogy as evidence of a search for roots. If we simply tell people the biblical stories are not historical, we maroon them even more on a small island in a sea of uncertainty and change. And they will go searching elsewhere.
I think the biblical stories can come to our rescue. Used gently, creatively, with delight and a touch of humor, they can feed all of us. But the stories must not be allowed to stand on their own, or they will just become an entertaining yarn. There must be intelligent reflection on those stories.
Those ancient tales and old carols, told with skill and passion, can take us into an experience of a God of hope who comes to us as a child – in every child. A perceptive reflection on those tales and carols can help us translate our experience into our lives.
For the diverse group of folk who come to our churches during the Christmas season, I think we can do no better than the biblical myths (though we would not use that word) which speak in so many different ways to our various needs. We can add a few gentle comments about these being “more than history.” We can invite people to look inside the story and simply set aside their doubts about historical accuracy and gynecological details. “What is inside the story that moves you?” “What is in those stories that speaks to you today?”
But to do, as Spong has been accused of doing, to play demolition derby with the tradition, however well that may be founded in biblical research or theology, would do violence to our call into a pastoral ministry.
Habakkuk calls us to “write the vision.” It’s the vision we need to communicate, and that can only come through story, through song, through drama, through poetry. Through those things that connect with our dreams, our fears, our hopes.
A sermon must speak to the mind, but first it must speak to that inner longing for a truth that cannot be expressed in ordinary language. Worship must speak to the whole person – the inner child and the thoughtful adult.
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
A Modest Proposal (with tongue firmly in cheek)
North Korea claims it already has nuclear weapons. Iran may have them. Israel probably does, but won’t admit it. India and Pakistan certainly do.
The original five members of the nuclear club – The United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia, and China – have defended its exclusivity as vigorously as any all-male club in London resisting the admission of women. Currently, 189 states have signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferating Treaty to limit any further spread of nuclear weapons.
But why?
Restricting nuclear technology to an elite group of nations makes as much sense as gun registration. It presumes that unarmed individuals will be safer if no one but criminals possess guns.
With apologies to Jonathan Swift, I offer a modest proposal.
Surely the solution – and I admit that I’m indebted to the National Rifle Association for this insight – is to arm everyone. No idiot would pull a gun while robbing a convenience store if he knows that he will immediately perish in a hail of bullets. When every passenger in an airplane carries a loaded sidearm, hijackers lose their advantage.
The same holds true for nuclear weapons. Restricting nuclear weapons to a small minority of nations automatically gives them bullying power over unarmed nations. Instead of restricting nuclear weapons, we should expand their availability.
The benefits of such a policy go far beyond mere national security considerations. This is also a matter of principle. It is, I submit, a basic human right to own and if necessary to use a nuclear weapon.
Nuclear weapons will be the great social equalizer. Size will no longer matter. One nation can no longer dominate another simply because it has a larger population, greater resources, or a more prosperous economy.
When the alternative is annihilation, antagonists will be forced to negotiate their differences peacefully.
An open market for nuclear weapons will enable arms manufacturers to offer more products. Competition will increase efficiency and force prices down, making nuclear weapons more affordable for poor nations.
As arms producers increase their profits, stock markets will soar. Pension plans will benefit. Seniors will enjoy a quality of living in retirement that they could not have imagined in more restrictive times.
There will be other social benefits, too. Societies will no longer function in a climate of fear. They can operate with the confidence that they can instantly retaliate against any aggressive acts.
Exclusivity will be replaced by inclusivity. Instead of a nuclear “us” versus a non-nuclear “them,” everyone can be equally lethal to everyone else.
Of course, those who choose to remain non-nuclear, whether by innate orientation or acquired ideology, will have to recognize that their lifestyle choice involves a certain sacrifice – just as gays, lesbians, dark-skinned peoples and Muslim women do currently.
Obviously, some implications of my modest proposal still need exploration. But I submit that even in its formative stages, it offers great potential for hastening the second coming of Christ, to reign unchallenged by any human presence.
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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$Grandparenting – been having lots of fun with the new book, “The Spirituality of Grandparenting.” The media folks have been buzzing around. The local paper even published an item about an event that was cancelled.
Bev and I are signing books at an event in Revelstoke this weekend, and next weekend we’ll be in Kananaskis for the Western Women’s Conference – which I must hasten to explain – is not a gathering of women dressed in cowboy boots and coiffed like Dolly Parton. Linnea Good is doing the music, and she doesn’t look or sound at all like Dolly Parton.
Meanwhile, if you would like to do your Christmas shoplifting early, you could try your local bookstore, or order from http://www.woodlakebooks.com/ .
Pssssssttt!! If you are in a bookstore, and you see the book there, even if you don’t buy it, when nobody is looking, re-arrange the shelf so the whole cover shows. That will sell more books to help support me in my dotage.
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – Pastor Bette Johnson Sohm of Pine Plains (no state or province named) writes: “Our Sunday School was practicing the song ‘Jesus, Lord of Promises’ to sing in church this past Sunday. It starts: ‘Jesus, Lord of promises, I believe in you.’
A grandmother reported to me that her four-year-old grandson, practicing at home, was heard to sing ‘Jesus sort of promises: I'll be leaving you’.”
Peggy Neufeld of Ponoka, Alberta, sent a note about the four-year-old who prayed, “And forgive us our trash baskets as we forgive those who put trash in our baskets.”
Peggy, I hope the adults didn’t try to correct the child. She/he got it right! How many folks know what a “trespass” is? Anything like an overpass on the highway?
From the file, this hopeful note: There will be no home-groan talent playing musical numbers during the banquet.
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
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Wish I’d Said That! – To appreciate nonsense requires a serious interest in life.
Gelett Burgess via Evelyn McLachlan
If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, 'thank you,' that would suffice.
Meister Eckhart via Bette Johnson Sohm
Loyalty to a petrified opinion never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul.
Mark Twain via Mary in Oman
Laughter has no age. It belongs to all generations, especially when it's shared. That's the secret of crossing the generation gap.
Bob Talbert via Velia Watts
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We Get Letters –Evelyn McLachlan has a serious addiction to puns, but now it appears as if the disease is running rampant through her congregation. She writes, “I had made a request to Bob, the choir director about singing the first few bars of the Hallelujah Chorus as a response to one of the lines in a Call to Worship.
His first response was, "I think we can Handel that. Carole (co-choir director), will you Bach me up? Catherine (organist), do you think we could go for Baroque with this?"
My response was "That's good. I was Chopin at the bit to do this. I'm really quite Jazzed about it."
Not to be outdone, Bob Anderson responded with, “Well, how do you really feel about Sunday Chopin? I could make a few notes on my Liszt. I think we should stick to the bass-ics. Maybe tenor eleven things alto-gether. It would be no treble at all. And maybe keep it to just the staff. Or we could conduct a survey. You could help us with the fine tuning on that. But who would ad-minister it? The results could be instrumental to our success – the key to our future happiness. Naturally, we will have to stay sharp. Everyone will have to pitch in, know the score, and take a stand. And I ain't just whistling Dixie ! Hummmmmmmmm . . . . Time to give it a rest.”
“I responded by waving a white flag and bowing to his punny prowess.
“I'm sorry if I have caused you pain from groaning but I wanted other people to have to put up with what I have to put up with!”
Evelyn. Fun stuff, but I don’t for a moment believe that you are “sorry” for having done this.
Susan Fiore, AOJN (that stands for “Anglican Order of Julian of Norwich, which is very close to my heart) is laughing at herself – a very healthy thing to do.
Susan responds to my comments about the Pharisee and the tax collector. “Some time ago I realized that when I hear that story, my initial thought is, ‘Thank you, God, that I'm not like that Pharisee who thinks he's not like that tax collector.’ The next thought is invariably, ‘Thank you, God, that I'm not like someone who thinks she's not like that Pharisee who thinks he's not . . .’ well, you see how this can become an endless spiral of self-righteousness!”
Susan, there’s a book – or at least a sermon – in your comment. “Spirals of Self-righteousness.”
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “The scrawl of the wild!”)
* Nietzche is piesche but Satre is smartre.
* Jesus saves. Moses invests.
* Death is nature’s way of telling you to slow down.
* Help a nun kick her habit.
* My mother made me a homosexual. Immediately below this: If I get her the wool, will she make me one too?
* Old soldiers never die. Just young ones.
* God is dead – Nietzsche. Under this in another hand: Nietzsche is dead – God.
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Bottom of the Barrel – Here’s one from the prolific Evelyn McLachlan.
The Pope, Billy Graham, and Oral Roberts were in a three-way plane crash over the Pacific Ocean. They all died and went to heaven together.
"Oh, this is terrible," exclaims St. Peter. "I know you guys think we summoned you here, but this is just one of those coincidences that happen. Since we weren't expecting you, your quarters just aren't ready. We can't take you in and we can't send you back.
Then St. Peter got an idea. He picked up the phone. "Lucifer, this is St. Peter. I’ve got these three guys up here. They're ours, but we weren't expecting them, and we gotta fix the place up for 'em. I was hoping you could put them up for a while. It'll only be a few of days. What d'ya say?"
Reluctantly, the Devil agreed. However, two days later St. Peter got a call.
"Pete, this is Lucifer. Hey, you gotta come get these guys. This Pope fellow is forgiving everybody, the Graham guy is saving everybody, and that Roberts has raised enough money to buy air conditioning."
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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.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-10-28
October 28, 2007
MORE THAN HISTORY
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites” list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I will 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.
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Next Week’s Readings – a slight case of the willies
Rumors – write the vision
Soft Edges – a modest proposal
Bloopers – forgive us our trash baskets
We Get Letters – Chopin at the bit
Mirabile Dictu! – scrawl of the wild
Bottom of the Barrel – the Pope, Billy Graham and Oral Roberts
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – After reading Jim’s column below, I couldn’t resist this one. This epitaph was on a tombstone in San Diego, California, according to a newspaper printed in 1860.
Here lies the body of Jeemes Humbrick
who was accidentally shot on the
bank of the Pacus River by a young man.
He was accidentally shot with one
of the large Colt’s revolvers with
no stopper for the cock to rest on,
it was one of the old-fashioned kind
brass mounted. And of such is the
Kingdom of heaven.
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, November 4th, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary. This Sunday is also All Saints Sunday.
Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4 – Habakkuk, an obscure prophet, writes about the gut-churning problem of why the wicked do so well and why God is silent “when the wicked swallow those more righteous than they” (1:13). Habakkuk gets the answer that is still the answer we hear today. God will deal with the wicked in God’s own time. In the meanwhile, “the righteous live by their faith” (2:4).
As a professional scribbler, verse 2:3 has long had a special message. That message is also there for anyone who writes a sermon – whether in their head or on a piece of paper.
“Write the vision,” says Habakkuk. “Make it plain upon tablets.” That’s translated as “put it up on billboards,” in the Modern Language version, “so that people driving by can read it.”
The reality of the modern church is that we only have one crack at communicating with the folks who have some connection with our churches. That’s Sunday morning, and while they are not running or driving by, they have enough stuff flitting through their consciousness, that they might as well be driving by in a car.
Psalm 119:137-144 – paraphrased by Jim Taylor
In any race, only one person can come first. We all like to win – but failure is the more universal human experience.
137 It is hard to serve you, God.
I cannot live up to your level of perfection.
138 Your standards are too high for me.
141a I am only a frail and fallible human.
139 I do my best – but often I feel like an outcast, an oddball;
Few of my fellow humans recognize what I hope to measure up to.
140 I'm not asking for lower standards;
I know you are right.
Generations and generations have proved your rightness.
141b I cannot ignore their insights.
142 For you do not waver with the winds;
Popularity polls have no impact upon you.
Your values are eternal.
143 Although troubles swirl around me like autumn leaves,
your wisdom still shows me the way.
144 Your example is as dependable as a lighthouse in the darkness –
I can safely set my course by it.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to http://www.woodlakebooks.com/
2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12 – Check out the stuff between verses 4 & 11. I can see why the lectionary folk would want to leave that out, but it does show that it’s not just the far right wing of the church that uses proof-texts. We too cherry-pick those passages which support our point of view. I don’t have a problem with that. It’s just that those who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
In those first four verses the writer clearly points to love as the operative principle of the church. The hallmark of the church is the way in which we love each other. But another hallmark of the church is its love and care for those who are outside of its fellowship, and in that context, verses 5-10 give me the willies.
Luke 19:1-10 – It’s interesting how often the two words, “preaching” and “healing” are in the same sentence. It connects a care for souls with a care for bodies. It means the gospel of love is for our whole beings – from ingrown toenails up to dandruff on our scalp.
But that also applies to those who don’t like us. I don’t think we have the option of giving them the Trudeau Salute (a gesture involving the middle finger, the modern equivalent of shaking the dust off your shoes) and simply walking away. We do have power over demons (mental illness) and we can cure disease (v.1) but we lack the political will to do that.
Our current political regime in Canada, showing the largest budget surplus in history, has opted to cut taxes. Not a word about the homeless folks who live in our dark alleys and sleep in doorways.
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful. Go to http://www.woodlakebooks.com/ .
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Rumors – A conversation with Bev a week ago sparked a thought I’d like to toss out for your reaction. It came as a result of a study group at our church, led by our pastor, Karen Medland.
In the group they had been looking at Luke’s Christmas stories, and wondering what implications that would have for a Christmas Eve service. What would they do with those stories they no longer see as historical? What about the text of traditional Christmas carols?
What kind of a service might meet the needs of the folks who come to hear the old, old stories? What would meet the needs of the people in that study group who are also there and needing to worship? Bev and I found ourselves talking about the pastoral implications of this discussion.
Karen loaned Bev a book by Walter Brueggemann (Cadence of Home – Preaching among Exiles). I had been reading Karen Armstrong’s “The Bible” which I was finding somewhat dull – the first chapter at least it is a rehash of Biblical History 101. But one sentence leapt out at me. Referring to the Genesis legends, she wrote: “These are not history. They are more than history.”
That’s a useful concept. Bishop Spong, in his writings, seems to be mostly negative – he starts with all the stuff he can no longer believe. Spong’s method seems like the radical treatment for some kinds of leukemia. You destroy the entire immune system to kill the cancer, then build it up again. Many patients do not survive that process.
Or to use another analogy – you don’t remodel or redecorate the home, you tear it down and build from the ground up. Except, where do you live in the meantime? You may never find your way back.
Marcus Borg is more positive. He wants to build on the tradition. “No!” I heard him say to a Lutheran pastor on one occasion. “You don’t go in there and tell them that Mary was not a virgin. You use that story and build on it, to see what’s inside. Why was that idea important to the early church?”
Walter Brueggemann suggests that the church is in a modern experience of exile. We often feel like a “motherless child, abandoned, vulnerable, orphaned.” He points to the increasing number of folks doing genealogy as evidence of a search for roots. If we simply tell people the biblical stories are not historical, we maroon them even more on a small island in a sea of uncertainty and change. And they will go searching elsewhere.
I think the biblical stories can come to our rescue. Used gently, creatively, with delight and a touch of humor, they can feed all of us. But the stories must not be allowed to stand on their own, or they will just become an entertaining yarn. There must be intelligent reflection on those stories.
Those ancient tales and old carols, told with skill and passion, can take us into an experience of a God of hope who comes to us as a child – in every child. A perceptive reflection on those tales and carols can help us translate our experience into our lives.
For the diverse group of folk who come to our churches during the Christmas season, I think we can do no better than the biblical myths (though we would not use that word) which speak in so many different ways to our various needs. We can add a few gentle comments about these being “more than history.” We can invite people to look inside the story and simply set aside their doubts about historical accuracy and gynecological details. “What is inside the story that moves you?” “What is in those stories that speaks to you today?”
But to do, as Spong has been accused of doing, to play demolition derby with the tradition, however well that may be founded in biblical research or theology, would do violence to our call into a pastoral ministry.
Habakkuk calls us to “write the vision.” It’s the vision we need to communicate, and that can only come through story, through song, through drama, through poetry. Through those things that connect with our dreams, our fears, our hopes.
A sermon must speak to the mind, but first it must speak to that inner longing for a truth that cannot be expressed in ordinary language. Worship must speak to the whole person – the inner child and the thoughtful adult.
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
A Modest Proposal (with tongue firmly in cheek)
North Korea claims it already has nuclear weapons. Iran may have them. Israel probably does, but won’t admit it. India and Pakistan certainly do.
The original five members of the nuclear club – The United States, the United Kingdom, France, Russia, and China – have defended its exclusivity as vigorously as any all-male club in London resisting the admission of women. Currently, 189 states have signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferating Treaty to limit any further spread of nuclear weapons.
But why?
Restricting nuclear technology to an elite group of nations makes as much sense as gun registration. It presumes that unarmed individuals will be safer if no one but criminals possess guns.
With apologies to Jonathan Swift, I offer a modest proposal.
Surely the solution – and I admit that I’m indebted to the National Rifle Association for this insight – is to arm everyone. No idiot would pull a gun while robbing a convenience store if he knows that he will immediately perish in a hail of bullets. When every passenger in an airplane carries a loaded sidearm, hijackers lose their advantage.
The same holds true for nuclear weapons. Restricting nuclear weapons to a small minority of nations automatically gives them bullying power over unarmed nations. Instead of restricting nuclear weapons, we should expand their availability.
The benefits of such a policy go far beyond mere national security considerations. This is also a matter of principle. It is, I submit, a basic human right to own and if necessary to use a nuclear weapon.
Nuclear weapons will be the great social equalizer. Size will no longer matter. One nation can no longer dominate another simply because it has a larger population, greater resources, or a more prosperous economy.
When the alternative is annihilation, antagonists will be forced to negotiate their differences peacefully.
An open market for nuclear weapons will enable arms manufacturers to offer more products. Competition will increase efficiency and force prices down, making nuclear weapons more affordable for poor nations.
As arms producers increase their profits, stock markets will soar. Pension plans will benefit. Seniors will enjoy a quality of living in retirement that they could not have imagined in more restrictive times.
There will be other social benefits, too. Societies will no longer function in a climate of fear. They can operate with the confidence that they can instantly retaliate against any aggressive acts.
Exclusivity will be replaced by inclusivity. Instead of a nuclear “us” versus a non-nuclear “them,” everyone can be equally lethal to everyone else.
Of course, those who choose to remain non-nuclear, whether by innate orientation or acquired ideology, will have to recognize that their lifestyle choice involves a certain sacrifice – just as gays, lesbians, dark-skinned peoples and Muslim women do currently.
Obviously, some implications of my modest proposal still need exploration. But I submit that even in its formative stages, it offers great potential for hastening the second coming of Christ, to reign unchallenged by any human presence.
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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$Grandparenting – been having lots of fun with the new book, “The Spirituality of Grandparenting.” The media folks have been buzzing around. The local paper even published an item about an event that was cancelled.
Bev and I are signing books at an event in Revelstoke this weekend, and next weekend we’ll be in Kananaskis for the Western Women’s Conference – which I must hasten to explain – is not a gathering of women dressed in cowboy boots and coiffed like Dolly Parton. Linnea Good is doing the music, and she doesn’t look or sound at all like Dolly Parton.
Meanwhile, if you would like to do your Christmas shoplifting early, you could try your local bookstore, or order from http://www.woodlakebooks.com/ .
Pssssssttt!! If you are in a bookstore, and you see the book there, even if you don’t buy it, when nobody is looking, re-arrange the shelf so the whole cover shows. That will sell more books to help support me in my dotage.
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – Pastor Bette Johnson Sohm of Pine Plains (no state or province named) writes: “Our Sunday School was practicing the song ‘Jesus, Lord of Promises’ to sing in church this past Sunday. It starts: ‘Jesus, Lord of promises, I believe in you.’
A grandmother reported to me that her four-year-old grandson, practicing at home, was heard to sing ‘Jesus sort of promises: I'll be leaving you’.”
Peggy Neufeld of Ponoka, Alberta, sent a note about the four-year-old who prayed, “And forgive us our trash baskets as we forgive those who put trash in our baskets.”
Peggy, I hope the adults didn’t try to correct the child. She/he got it right! How many folks know what a “trespass” is? Anything like an overpass on the highway?
From the file, this hopeful note: There will be no home-groan talent playing musical numbers during the banquet.
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
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Wish I’d Said That! – To appreciate nonsense requires a serious interest in life.
Gelett Burgess via Evelyn McLachlan
If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, 'thank you,' that would suffice.
Meister Eckhart via Bette Johnson Sohm
Loyalty to a petrified opinion never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul.
Mark Twain via Mary in Oman
Laughter has no age. It belongs to all generations, especially when it's shared. That's the secret of crossing the generation gap.
Bob Talbert via Velia Watts
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We Get Letters –Evelyn McLachlan has a serious addiction to puns, but now it appears as if the disease is running rampant through her congregation. She writes, “I had made a request to Bob, the choir director about singing the first few bars of the Hallelujah Chorus as a response to one of the lines in a Call to Worship.
His first response was, "I think we can Handel that. Carole (co-choir director), will you Bach me up? Catherine (organist), do you think we could go for Baroque with this?"
My response was "That's good. I was Chopin at the bit to do this. I'm really quite Jazzed about it."
Not to be outdone, Bob Anderson responded with, “Well, how do you really feel about Sunday Chopin? I could make a few notes on my Liszt. I think we should stick to the bass-ics. Maybe tenor eleven things alto-gether. It would be no treble at all. And maybe keep it to just the staff. Or we could conduct a survey. You could help us with the fine tuning on that. But who would ad-minister it? The results could be instrumental to our success – the key to our future happiness. Naturally, we will have to stay sharp. Everyone will have to pitch in, know the score, and take a stand. And I ain't just whistling Dixie ! Hummmmmmmmm . . . . Time to give it a rest.”
“I responded by waving a white flag and bowing to his punny prowess.
“I'm sorry if I have caused you pain from groaning but I wanted other people to have to put up with what I have to put up with!”
Evelyn. Fun stuff, but I don’t for a moment believe that you are “sorry” for having done this.
Susan Fiore, AOJN (that stands for “Anglican Order of Julian of Norwich, which is very close to my heart) is laughing at herself – a very healthy thing to do.
Susan responds to my comments about the Pharisee and the tax collector. “Some time ago I realized that when I hear that story, my initial thought is, ‘Thank you, God, that I'm not like that Pharisee who thinks he's not like that tax collector.’ The next thought is invariably, ‘Thank you, God, that I'm not like someone who thinks she's not like that Pharisee who thinks he's not . . .’ well, you see how this can become an endless spiral of self-righteousness!”
Susan, there’s a book – or at least a sermon – in your comment. “Spirals of Self-righteousness.”
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “The scrawl of the wild!”)
* Nietzche is piesche but Satre is smartre.
* Jesus saves. Moses invests.
* Death is nature’s way of telling you to slow down.
* Help a nun kick her habit.
* My mother made me a homosexual. Immediately below this: If I get her the wool, will she make me one too?
* Old soldiers never die. Just young ones.
* God is dead – Nietzsche. Under this in another hand: Nietzsche is dead – God.
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Bottom of the Barrel – Here’s one from the prolific Evelyn McLachlan.
The Pope, Billy Graham, and Oral Roberts were in a three-way plane crash over the Pacific Ocean. They all died and went to heaven together.
"Oh, this is terrible," exclaims St. Peter. "I know you guys think we summoned you here, but this is just one of those coincidences that happen. Since we weren't expecting you, your quarters just aren't ready. We can't take you in and we can't send you back.
Then St. Peter got an idea. He picked up the phone. "Lucifer, this is St. Peter. I’ve got these three guys up here. They're ours, but we weren't expecting them, and we gotta fix the place up for 'em. I was hoping you could put them up for a while. It'll only be a few of days. What d'ya say?"
Reluctantly, the Devil agreed. However, two days later St. Peter got a call.
"Pete, this is Lucifer. Hey, you gotta come get these guys. This Pope fellow is forgiving everybody, the Graham guy is saving everybody, and that Roberts has raised enough money to buy air conditioning."
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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, October 17, 2007
October 21, 2007, with preaching materials for October 28th
R U M O R S #472
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-10-21
October 21, 2007
A BUM RAP
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I will 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.
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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. Thanks.
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Next Week’s Readings – the warm smile of God
Rumors – don’t get too self-righteous
Soft Edges – attributes worth avoiding
Good Stuff – barbers don’t exist
Bloopers – much appreciated
We Get Letters – was it only Henry?
Mirabile Dictu! – ordaining men
Bottom of the Barrel – a black cat in dark room
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – This from Robert Moore.
A pastor in a large city church announced that he had been elected bishop and would be leaving the church. But he assured the congregation that his successor would be a very good pastor for the congregation.
An older member lamented that no one could be as good as he had been. He assured her that she would be very pleased with her new pastor.
She became agitated and said, "But you don't understand. I've been here many years and I've seen many pastors and each one has been worse than the one before."
Robert, on a semi-serious note, what that woman said is probably true. It has been well demonstrated that as we age, we edit our memories, and usually toward the good side. So the pastors we remember tend to get better and better as the years go by. Which is a bit tough on alive and current pastors.
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, October 28th, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary.
Joel 2:23-32 – Poor little Joel only gets one crack in the regular Sunday readings of the lectionary, but I always enjoy him when he comes by. In my particular printing of the NRSV there’s a delightful typo in verse 28. Instead of “your old men shall dream dreams,” my book says, “your old men shall dream reams.”
Being now certifiably old and very much a dreamer, I’ve come to see that little error as a gift.
But I don’t know what to do with this passage. It was written for the people of Israel after a plague of grasshoppers which ate everything. The people were literally starving. So how can we, who are experiencing an unprecedented standard of living, possibly understand that? I doubt there will be anyone in most of our congregations who has ever known what desperate need or real starvation is really like. I know I’ve never had such an experience.
Which is not to say that such desperation is absent from our world. Does it mean that this promise of hope is there for people in some parts of Africa but not for us?
Psalm 65:1-13 paraphrased by Jim Taylor – Remembering to Give Thanks
1 We can't put it off any longer, God.
2 We come crawling to you, because we have all fallen short of your expectations.
3 We have all missed the mark.
But you have not held our failures against us.
5 We stumbled, and you picked us up;
we were sinking, and you helped us swim.
4 You treat us with honor and respect.
You make us welcome.
It is more than we dare ask, more than we could ever expect.
6 We have no right to such kindness.
You are the creator of the world.
You push mountains into ranges;
you calm the raging oceans;
7 you spin the earth on its axis.
Before you, we are as insignificant as ants, parading our puny armies.
8 If you stamp your feet, we will be squashed.
9 We boast of our science and technology,
but by ourselves we cannot make even one seed sprout;
we cannot shape a single raindrop.
10 We destroy, but only you bring life.
11 Through the cycle of the seasons, with reckless generosity, you share the wealth of the earth.
12 As tiny drops of dew gather into rushing streams,
so our small thoughts gather into a torrent of gratitude.
13 The whole world celebrates your goodness.
Like dolphins dancing through the waves,
like antelope leaping through long grass,
the earth jumps in a shout of joy.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com
2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18 – I saw a lapel button once that said, “I don’t get mad. I get even.” It didn’t particularly warm me to the person wearing it. In some of his letters, Paul doesn’t talk revenge, but he does get a bit heavy-handed.
Not here. Paul is feeling his age a bit, and he feels his life slipping away. “I’ve done what I could,” he seems to be saying, and he’s sure that God will give him his reward. If he ever had thoughts of getting even with the folks who showed their backs when he was in trouble (and it would be very surprising if he hadn’t entertained such thoughts), he’s finished with that. So there are blessings that come with getting older.
Or at least that’s my experience. One blessing is that there are not nearly as many things you think are important. But for the convictions that are at the centre of your life, you are ready to go to the wall.
Luke 18:9-14 – There’s a problem word in this passage. “Justified.” In normal English, it has to do with making an idea or an action reasonable. Self-justification is a long-standing human pastime.
But here the writer of Luke uses the word in the sense of being “made right with God,” or “accepted by God.”
It was the Pharisee who was having a go at the self-justification game. He’s listing all his virtues – all his noble actions – and almost demanding a spot at the heavenly banquet table.
The tax collector has nothing to offer. All he can do is beg for mercy. And it’s that humility that brings to him the warm smile of God.
But don’t kick the tax collector too hard. See below.
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful.
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Rumors – Remember old Tevya in “Fiddler on the Roof?” As he walked along, talking to himself or talking to God he would say, “On the one hand,” and “on the other hand.”
That’s how I feel about the latest rash of apologies we have been involved in as a church and as a nation. It has become very common for official apologies to be made to those we’ve abused or misused in the past.
On the one hand, I think that’s a good idea. It helps us understand that the wounds inflicted by our forebears have not yet healed, and in some cases, we are living on the benefits of those wounds.
On the other hand, I get a bit squirmy. These apologies sometimes sound as self-serving as the Pharisee’s prayer in this week’s gospel reading. Is there not an element of self-righteousness if I apologize for the errors committed by someone else – someone now long gone who cannot repent and apologize on their own?
Are we not saying, “We have reached a level of enlightenment you didn’t have. Out of our morally superior position we are apologizing to for you. You didn’t know better, but we do.”
And doesn’t the apology of our churches seem a little thin when we realize it is only a small core of the leadership that is really apologizing – that most of the folks in the denomination are not even whispering, much less shouting, “Amen?”
We come down hard on that Pharisee because from our vantage point, we can see what he is doing. But he is living by the righteousness code of the Judaism of his day. He is doing what he was taught – what he thought God wanted.
According to that code, he had every right to feel superior to the tax collector. He knew he had followed the law and that it was the meticulous following of the law that made him right with God. He was honestly doing what he felt – what the “church” had taught him – was right. I think he got a bum rap.
Jesus comes along and proclaims that it is not works but faith that justifies us. But it was only the small circle of followers around Jesus who believed that then, and only a small part of the early church that really believed that. A works-based theology of righteousness came through into Christianity, untouched from first century Judaism.
Luther was still fighting that battle, and we still struggle against it today. In our churches, the folks who serve on most of the committees, or who volunteer the most and who give the most money, get the most honor and attention. We talk a theology of grace from the pulpit, but we live a theology of works in our church culture.
So let’s not get too self-righteous when we read this story. We have found the Pharisee and he is us.
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Attributes Worth Avoiding
Last week I suggested that the bond between humans and dogs might serve as an example for the bond that God wants with humans.
“Not that dogs are perfect,” I ended.
Even in their imperfections, though, dogs can remind us of some human qualities we might benefit from avoiding.
Jesus condensed a multitude of biblical instructions to two – to love God “with all your heart, and soul, and mind, and strength,” and “to love your neighbour as yourself.”
Dogs, as I suggested last week, offer a model for the first of those commands. They don’t do as well on the second.
For example, most dogs would rather poop on a neighbour’s lawn than on their own.
But don’t we do the same? Some of our garbage goes out in trucks, to a distant landfill site; some goes down sewer pipes. Either way, we too prefer to soil someone else’s territory.
Phoebe will roll in anything that is dead, decaying, or disgusting. Whenever I see her lying on her back, legs in the air, wriggling ecstatically, I know I will find something malodorous underneath her.
Just like her, some humans wallow in things I find offensive. Like pornography, for example. Judging by the spam e-mails that flood my inbox, there must be lots of people who welcome this stuff, or the spammers wouldn’t bother sending it.
If Phoebe doesn’t roll in it, she eats it. The other night, she woke us with the sounds of vomiting. She threw up an entire peach. Including the pit.
I’m told that all members of the Labrador Retriever family act like eating machines.
Obesity is now a major health risk in North America. The main road in almost any town today is a promenade of fast-food joints. We know that a diet of greasy hamburgers, french fries, and sugary cola is not good for us. But we keep A&W, Burger King, McDonald’s, Wendy’s and their ilk in business anyway.
Travel writer Paul Theroux wrote a devastating critique of the Chinese addiction to eating rare and endangered species. The rarer it is, the greater the delicacy. When the last living example of some rare species slithers down a Chinese throat, Theroux suggested, the diner will look surprised and say, “But it tasted so good!”
Phoebe greets all humans with joy. She defers to those she considers her superiors. But she shows no compassion at all towards lesser creatures like field mice and chipmunks.
She’s as prejudiced as some of us.
Perhaps we can’t expect dogs to practice the Golden Rule, “to treat others as you would want them to treat you.” But dogs might encourage us to take seriously the alternate version found in a least six other world religions. Confucius, in his Analects, put it, “Do not do to others what you would not want them to do to you.”
When we find dog behavior objectionable, we might examine ourselves, to see if we’re doing anything similar.
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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Good Stuff – This from Dave Towers who got it from Allan Shaw. It’s been attributed to Robin Williams, no less, but I don’t think so. It’s been around longer than Williams.
A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and his beard trimmed. The barber began to work. They talked about so many things and various subjects.
When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said: "I don't believe that God exists."
"Why do you say that?" asked the customer.
"Well, you just have to go out in the street to realize that God doesn't exist. If God exists, would there be so many sick people? Would there be abandoned children? If God existed, there would be neither suffering nor pain. I can't imagine loving a God who would allow all of these things."
The customer thought for a moment, but didn't respond. The barber finished his job and the customer left. Out on the street, the customer saw a man with long, stringy, dirty hair and an untrimmed beard. He looked dirty and un-kept.
The customer rushed back into the shop. "You know what? Barbers don't exist."
"How can you say that?" asked the surprised barber. "I am here, and I am a barber. And I just worked on you!"
"Barbers don't exist because if they did, there would be no people with dirty long hair and untrimmed beards, like that man outside."
"Ah, but barbers do exist! What happens is, people do not come to me."
"Exactly!" said the customer. "That's the point! God, too, does exist! But people don’t go to God – they don’t look for God. That's why there's so much pain and suffering in the world."
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Rained Out – The big book launch for “The Spirituality of Grandparenting” that was to happen last Tuesday, was rained out. The sun came out at noon but by then the media people had all gone somewhere else. They’re not a patient lot.
I’m looking forward to the Western Women’s Conference which is November 2-4 at the Delta Kananaskis Lodge. Bev will be there too signing books with me. She didn’t write the book but she most certainly was a full partner in the grandparenting that gave rise to it.
So we look forward to seeing some of you there.
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff
* The bishop will preach here next Sunday and his wife will open our annual garden fête on the following Sunday. On both occasions I hope to be away on holiday.
* The vicar wishes it to be known that since the flock is quite scattered in many parts of the city, it will be sometime before he can visit them all. This will no doubt be appreciated by them.
* On our dedication Sunday, the procession in the churchyard will take place in the afternoon. If it rains in the afternoon, the procession will be held in the morning.
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
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Wish I’d Said That –We are still family by God, and that is something no one can take away.
Carl Chamberlain
What’s the good of accomplishing anything if you have no altar on which to place it.
Fred Craddock via Allan Saunders
If only we could stop trying to be happy, we could have a good time.
Edith Wharton
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We Get Letters – Surely he wasn’t the only one that noticed, but as of this moment (Wednesday morning) he’s the only one to write. Henry Passenger pointed out that I ran almost identical articles in Mirabile Dictu the last two weeks.
I’ve been searching my brain for a good excuse. I think I’ve found it. Henry, I ran the same stuff twice because I didn’t think people would get it with just one go-round.
Larry Claus writes: “Our priest, Father Wayne, went to a local nursing home for a communion service. At the end of the service, our priest noted a new resident sitting at the back crying. He recognized them as tears of joy.
"Oh Father" she said in a Dutch accent" imagine Catholics and Protestants worshipping and taking communion together. Isn't it wonderful. And thank you for serving real wine. Jesus should never be watered down!"
Elwyn Hunt of New Zealand writes: “You wrote in last weeks ‘Rumours’ – ‘Remember the old philosopher's puzzle? If a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it, does it make a sound?’ I just want to add another interpretation of the same saying. ‘If a man speaks in the forest and there is no woman to hear him, is he still wrong?’"
Marie Zettler of Westmeath, Ontario writes: “This story was sent by my niece who works at a northern nursing station.
One funeral here was especially long, all in Cree. The minister talked on and on. Finally the procession made it to the graveside. The coffin was lowered into the grave but the preacher kept preaching. Finally he paused.
The whispered voice of a grave digger carried loud and clear through the silence: "Quick! Start throwing the dirt in before he starts preaching again!"
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “Ordaining Men!”)
Ten Reasons Why Men Should Not Be Ordained
1. Their physical build indicates that men are more suited to tasks such as picking turnips or dehorning cattle. It would indeed be “unnatural” for them to do other forms of work. How can we argue with the intended order that is instituted and enforced by nature?
2. For men who have children, their duties as ministers might detract from their responsibilities as parents. Instead of teaching their children important life skills like how to make a wiener-roasting stick, they would be off at some committee meeting or preparing a sermon. Thus these unfortunate children of ordained men would almost certainly receive less attention from their male parent. Some couples might even go so far as to put their children into secular daycare centers to permit the man to fulfill his duties as a minister.
3. According to the Genesis account, men were created before women, presumably as a prototype. It is thus obvious that men represent an experiment, rather than the crowning achievement of creation.
4. Men are overly prone to violence. They are responsible for the vast majority of crime in our country, especially violent crime. Thus they would be poor role models, as well as being dangerously unstable in positions of leadership.
5. In the New Testament account, the person who betrayed Jesus was a man. Thus his lack of faith and ensuing punishment stands as a symbol of the subordinate position that all men should take. The story also illustrates the natural tendency of all men to be either unwilling or unable to take a stand. From the Garden of Gethsemane to football locker rooms, men still have this habit of buckling under the weight of the lowest common denominator. It is expected that even ordained men would still embarrass themselves with their natural tendency toward a pack mentality.
6. Jesus didn’t ordain men. He didn’t ordain any women either, but two wrongs don’t make a right.
7. If men got ordained, then they wouldn’t be satisfied with that; they’d want more and more power. Next thing most of the Conference leaders would be men and then where would we be? No. The line must be drawn clearly now before it’s too late.
8. Many, if not most men who seek to be ordained, have been influenced by the radical “men’s movement” (or “masculist movement”). How can they be good leaders if their loyalties are divided between leading a church and championing the masculist drive for men’s rights? The tract writers haven’t pronounced on it yet, but the masculist movement is probably profoundly un-Christian.
9. To be an ordained pastor is to nurture and strengthen a whole congregation. But these are not traditional male roles. Rather, throughout the history of Christianity, women have been considered to be not only more skilled than men at nurturing, but also more fervently attracted to it. Women, the myth goes, are fulfilled and completed only by their service to others. This makes them the obvious choice for ordination. But if men try to fit into this nurturing role, our young people might grow up with Role Confusion Syndrome, which could lead to such terrible traumas as the Questioning Tradition Syndrome.
10. Men can still be involved in Church activities, without having to be ordained. They can still take up the offering, shovel the sidewalk, and maybe even lead the singing on Fathers’ Day. In other words, by confining themselves to such traditional male roles, they can still be vitally important in the life of the Church. Why should they feel left out?
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Bottom of the Barrel – You may need to think about this one for a bit.
A philosopher and a theologian were having an argument about the value of their respective disciplines.
Said the theologian, “A philosopher is just like a blind man, in a dark room looking for a cat that isn’t there.”
“Yes,” said the philosopher. “And the theologian would find it!”
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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.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-10-21
October 21, 2007
A BUM RAP
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I will 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.
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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. Thanks.
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Next Week’s Readings – the warm smile of God
Rumors – don’t get too self-righteous
Soft Edges – attributes worth avoiding
Good Stuff – barbers don’t exist
Bloopers – much appreciated
We Get Letters – was it only Henry?
Mirabile Dictu! – ordaining men
Bottom of the Barrel – a black cat in dark room
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – This from Robert Moore.
A pastor in a large city church announced that he had been elected bishop and would be leaving the church. But he assured the congregation that his successor would be a very good pastor for the congregation.
An older member lamented that no one could be as good as he had been. He assured her that she would be very pleased with her new pastor.
She became agitated and said, "But you don't understand. I've been here many years and I've seen many pastors and each one has been worse than the one before."
Robert, on a semi-serious note, what that woman said is probably true. It has been well demonstrated that as we age, we edit our memories, and usually toward the good side. So the pastors we remember tend to get better and better as the years go by. Which is a bit tough on alive and current pastors.
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, October 28th, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary.
Joel 2:23-32 – Poor little Joel only gets one crack in the regular Sunday readings of the lectionary, but I always enjoy him when he comes by. In my particular printing of the NRSV there’s a delightful typo in verse 28. Instead of “your old men shall dream dreams,” my book says, “your old men shall dream reams.”
Being now certifiably old and very much a dreamer, I’ve come to see that little error as a gift.
But I don’t know what to do with this passage. It was written for the people of Israel after a plague of grasshoppers which ate everything. The people were literally starving. So how can we, who are experiencing an unprecedented standard of living, possibly understand that? I doubt there will be anyone in most of our congregations who has ever known what desperate need or real starvation is really like. I know I’ve never had such an experience.
Which is not to say that such desperation is absent from our world. Does it mean that this promise of hope is there for people in some parts of Africa but not for us?
Psalm 65:1-13 paraphrased by Jim Taylor – Remembering to Give Thanks
1 We can't put it off any longer, God.
2 We come crawling to you, because we have all fallen short of your expectations.
3 We have all missed the mark.
But you have not held our failures against us.
5 We stumbled, and you picked us up;
we were sinking, and you helped us swim.
4 You treat us with honor and respect.
You make us welcome.
It is more than we dare ask, more than we could ever expect.
6 We have no right to such kindness.
You are the creator of the world.
You push mountains into ranges;
you calm the raging oceans;
7 you spin the earth on its axis.
Before you, we are as insignificant as ants, parading our puny armies.
8 If you stamp your feet, we will be squashed.
9 We boast of our science and technology,
but by ourselves we cannot make even one seed sprout;
we cannot shape a single raindrop.
10 We destroy, but only you bring life.
11 Through the cycle of the seasons, with reckless generosity, you share the wealth of the earth.
12 As tiny drops of dew gather into rushing streams,
so our small thoughts gather into a torrent of gratitude.
13 The whole world celebrates your goodness.
Like dolphins dancing through the waves,
like antelope leaping through long grass,
the earth jumps in a shout of joy.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com
2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18 – I saw a lapel button once that said, “I don’t get mad. I get even.” It didn’t particularly warm me to the person wearing it. In some of his letters, Paul doesn’t talk revenge, but he does get a bit heavy-handed.
Not here. Paul is feeling his age a bit, and he feels his life slipping away. “I’ve done what I could,” he seems to be saying, and he’s sure that God will give him his reward. If he ever had thoughts of getting even with the folks who showed their backs when he was in trouble (and it would be very surprising if he hadn’t entertained such thoughts), he’s finished with that. So there are blessings that come with getting older.
Or at least that’s my experience. One blessing is that there are not nearly as many things you think are important. But for the convictions that are at the centre of your life, you are ready to go to the wall.
Luke 18:9-14 – There’s a problem word in this passage. “Justified.” In normal English, it has to do with making an idea or an action reasonable. Self-justification is a long-standing human pastime.
But here the writer of Luke uses the word in the sense of being “made right with God,” or “accepted by God.”
It was the Pharisee who was having a go at the self-justification game. He’s listing all his virtues – all his noble actions – and almost demanding a spot at the heavenly banquet table.
The tax collector has nothing to offer. All he can do is beg for mercy. And it’s that humility that brings to him the warm smile of God.
But don’t kick the tax collector too hard. See below.
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful.
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Rumors – Remember old Tevya in “Fiddler on the Roof?” As he walked along, talking to himself or talking to God he would say, “On the one hand,” and “on the other hand.”
That’s how I feel about the latest rash of apologies we have been involved in as a church and as a nation. It has become very common for official apologies to be made to those we’ve abused or misused in the past.
On the one hand, I think that’s a good idea. It helps us understand that the wounds inflicted by our forebears have not yet healed, and in some cases, we are living on the benefits of those wounds.
On the other hand, I get a bit squirmy. These apologies sometimes sound as self-serving as the Pharisee’s prayer in this week’s gospel reading. Is there not an element of self-righteousness if I apologize for the errors committed by someone else – someone now long gone who cannot repent and apologize on their own?
Are we not saying, “We have reached a level of enlightenment you didn’t have. Out of our morally superior position we are apologizing to for you. You didn’t know better, but we do.”
And doesn’t the apology of our churches seem a little thin when we realize it is only a small core of the leadership that is really apologizing – that most of the folks in the denomination are not even whispering, much less shouting, “Amen?”
We come down hard on that Pharisee because from our vantage point, we can see what he is doing. But he is living by the righteousness code of the Judaism of his day. He is doing what he was taught – what he thought God wanted.
According to that code, he had every right to feel superior to the tax collector. He knew he had followed the law and that it was the meticulous following of the law that made him right with God. He was honestly doing what he felt – what the “church” had taught him – was right. I think he got a bum rap.
Jesus comes along and proclaims that it is not works but faith that justifies us. But it was only the small circle of followers around Jesus who believed that then, and only a small part of the early church that really believed that. A works-based theology of righteousness came through into Christianity, untouched from first century Judaism.
Luther was still fighting that battle, and we still struggle against it today. In our churches, the folks who serve on most of the committees, or who volunteer the most and who give the most money, get the most honor and attention. We talk a theology of grace from the pulpit, but we live a theology of works in our church culture.
So let’s not get too self-righteous when we read this story. We have found the Pharisee and he is us.
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Attributes Worth Avoiding
Last week I suggested that the bond between humans and dogs might serve as an example for the bond that God wants with humans.
“Not that dogs are perfect,” I ended.
Even in their imperfections, though, dogs can remind us of some human qualities we might benefit from avoiding.
Jesus condensed a multitude of biblical instructions to two – to love God “with all your heart, and soul, and mind, and strength,” and “to love your neighbour as yourself.”
Dogs, as I suggested last week, offer a model for the first of those commands. They don’t do as well on the second.
For example, most dogs would rather poop on a neighbour’s lawn than on their own.
But don’t we do the same? Some of our garbage goes out in trucks, to a distant landfill site; some goes down sewer pipes. Either way, we too prefer to soil someone else’s territory.
Phoebe will roll in anything that is dead, decaying, or disgusting. Whenever I see her lying on her back, legs in the air, wriggling ecstatically, I know I will find something malodorous underneath her.
Just like her, some humans wallow in things I find offensive. Like pornography, for example. Judging by the spam e-mails that flood my inbox, there must be lots of people who welcome this stuff, or the spammers wouldn’t bother sending it.
If Phoebe doesn’t roll in it, she eats it. The other night, she woke us with the sounds of vomiting. She threw up an entire peach. Including the pit.
I’m told that all members of the Labrador Retriever family act like eating machines.
Obesity is now a major health risk in North America. The main road in almost any town today is a promenade of fast-food joints. We know that a diet of greasy hamburgers, french fries, and sugary cola is not good for us. But we keep A&W, Burger King, McDonald’s, Wendy’s and their ilk in business anyway.
Travel writer Paul Theroux wrote a devastating critique of the Chinese addiction to eating rare and endangered species. The rarer it is, the greater the delicacy. When the last living example of some rare species slithers down a Chinese throat, Theroux suggested, the diner will look surprised and say, “But it tasted so good!”
Phoebe greets all humans with joy. She defers to those she considers her superiors. But she shows no compassion at all towards lesser creatures like field mice and chipmunks.
She’s as prejudiced as some of us.
Perhaps we can’t expect dogs to practice the Golden Rule, “to treat others as you would want them to treat you.” But dogs might encourage us to take seriously the alternate version found in a least six other world religions. Confucius, in his Analects, put it, “Do not do to others what you would not want them to do to you.”
When we find dog behavior objectionable, we might examine ourselves, to see if we’re doing anything similar.
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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Good Stuff – This from Dave Towers who got it from Allan Shaw. It’s been attributed to Robin Williams, no less, but I don’t think so. It’s been around longer than Williams.
A man went to a barbershop to have his hair cut and his beard trimmed. The barber began to work. They talked about so many things and various subjects.
When they eventually touched on the subject of God, the barber said: "I don't believe that God exists."
"Why do you say that?" asked the customer.
"Well, you just have to go out in the street to realize that God doesn't exist. If God exists, would there be so many sick people? Would there be abandoned children? If God existed, there would be neither suffering nor pain. I can't imagine loving a God who would allow all of these things."
The customer thought for a moment, but didn't respond. The barber finished his job and the customer left. Out on the street, the customer saw a man with long, stringy, dirty hair and an untrimmed beard. He looked dirty and un-kept.
The customer rushed back into the shop. "You know what? Barbers don't exist."
"How can you say that?" asked the surprised barber. "I am here, and I am a barber. And I just worked on you!"
"Barbers don't exist because if they did, there would be no people with dirty long hair and untrimmed beards, like that man outside."
"Ah, but barbers do exist! What happens is, people do not come to me."
"Exactly!" said the customer. "That's the point! God, too, does exist! But people don’t go to God – they don’t look for God. That's why there's so much pain and suffering in the world."
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Rained Out – The big book launch for “The Spirituality of Grandparenting” that was to happen last Tuesday, was rained out. The sun came out at noon but by then the media people had all gone somewhere else. They’re not a patient lot.
I’m looking forward to the Western Women’s Conference which is November 2-4 at the Delta Kananaskis Lodge. Bev will be there too signing books with me. She didn’t write the book but she most certainly was a full partner in the grandparenting that gave rise to it.
So we look forward to seeing some of you there.
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff
* The bishop will preach here next Sunday and his wife will open our annual garden fête on the following Sunday. On both occasions I hope to be away on holiday.
* The vicar wishes it to be known that since the flock is quite scattered in many parts of the city, it will be sometime before he can visit them all. This will no doubt be appreciated by them.
* On our dedication Sunday, the procession in the churchyard will take place in the afternoon. If it rains in the afternoon, the procession will be held in the morning.
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
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Wish I’d Said That –We are still family by God, and that is something no one can take away.
Carl Chamberlain
What’s the good of accomplishing anything if you have no altar on which to place it.
Fred Craddock via Allan Saunders
If only we could stop trying to be happy, we could have a good time.
Edith Wharton
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We Get Letters – Surely he wasn’t the only one that noticed, but as of this moment (Wednesday morning) he’s the only one to write. Henry Passenger pointed out that I ran almost identical articles in Mirabile Dictu the last two weeks.
I’ve been searching my brain for a good excuse. I think I’ve found it. Henry, I ran the same stuff twice because I didn’t think people would get it with just one go-round.
Larry Claus writes: “Our priest, Father Wayne, went to a local nursing home for a communion service. At the end of the service, our priest noted a new resident sitting at the back crying. He recognized them as tears of joy.
"Oh Father" she said in a Dutch accent" imagine Catholics and Protestants worshipping and taking communion together. Isn't it wonderful. And thank you for serving real wine. Jesus should never be watered down!"
Elwyn Hunt of New Zealand writes: “You wrote in last weeks ‘Rumours’ – ‘Remember the old philosopher's puzzle? If a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it, does it make a sound?’ I just want to add another interpretation of the same saying. ‘If a man speaks in the forest and there is no woman to hear him, is he still wrong?’"
Marie Zettler of Westmeath, Ontario writes: “This story was sent by my niece who works at a northern nursing station.
One funeral here was especially long, all in Cree. The minister talked on and on. Finally the procession made it to the graveside. The coffin was lowered into the grave but the preacher kept preaching. Finally he paused.
The whispered voice of a grave digger carried loud and clear through the silence: "Quick! Start throwing the dirt in before he starts preaching again!"
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “Ordaining Men!”)
Ten Reasons Why Men Should Not Be Ordained
1. Their physical build indicates that men are more suited to tasks such as picking turnips or dehorning cattle. It would indeed be “unnatural” for them to do other forms of work. How can we argue with the intended order that is instituted and enforced by nature?
2. For men who have children, their duties as ministers might detract from their responsibilities as parents. Instead of teaching their children important life skills like how to make a wiener-roasting stick, they would be off at some committee meeting or preparing a sermon. Thus these unfortunate children of ordained men would almost certainly receive less attention from their male parent. Some couples might even go so far as to put their children into secular daycare centers to permit the man to fulfill his duties as a minister.
3. According to the Genesis account, men were created before women, presumably as a prototype. It is thus obvious that men represent an experiment, rather than the crowning achievement of creation.
4. Men are overly prone to violence. They are responsible for the vast majority of crime in our country, especially violent crime. Thus they would be poor role models, as well as being dangerously unstable in positions of leadership.
5. In the New Testament account, the person who betrayed Jesus was a man. Thus his lack of faith and ensuing punishment stands as a symbol of the subordinate position that all men should take. The story also illustrates the natural tendency of all men to be either unwilling or unable to take a stand. From the Garden of Gethsemane to football locker rooms, men still have this habit of buckling under the weight of the lowest common denominator. It is expected that even ordained men would still embarrass themselves with their natural tendency toward a pack mentality.
6. Jesus didn’t ordain men. He didn’t ordain any women either, but two wrongs don’t make a right.
7. If men got ordained, then they wouldn’t be satisfied with that; they’d want more and more power. Next thing most of the Conference leaders would be men and then where would we be? No. The line must be drawn clearly now before it’s too late.
8. Many, if not most men who seek to be ordained, have been influenced by the radical “men’s movement” (or “masculist movement”). How can they be good leaders if their loyalties are divided between leading a church and championing the masculist drive for men’s rights? The tract writers haven’t pronounced on it yet, but the masculist movement is probably profoundly un-Christian.
9. To be an ordained pastor is to nurture and strengthen a whole congregation. But these are not traditional male roles. Rather, throughout the history of Christianity, women have been considered to be not only more skilled than men at nurturing, but also more fervently attracted to it. Women, the myth goes, are fulfilled and completed only by their service to others. This makes them the obvious choice for ordination. But if men try to fit into this nurturing role, our young people might grow up with Role Confusion Syndrome, which could lead to such terrible traumas as the Questioning Tradition Syndrome.
10. Men can still be involved in Church activities, without having to be ordained. They can still take up the offering, shovel the sidewalk, and maybe even lead the singing on Fathers’ Day. In other words, by confining themselves to such traditional male roles, they can still be vitally important in the life of the Church. Why should they feel left out?
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Bottom of the Barrel – You may need to think about this one for a bit.
A philosopher and a theologian were having an argument about the value of their respective disciplines.
Said the theologian, “A philosopher is just like a blind man, in a dark room looking for a cat that isn’t there.”
“Yes,” said the philosopher. “And the theologian would find it!”
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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, October 10, 2007
Sermon Helps for Sunday, October 21, 2007
R U M O R S #471
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-10-14
October 14, 2007
WRITTEN ON YOUR HEART
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I will 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.
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Next Week’s Readings – not what Jeremiah had in mind
Rumors – written on my heart
Soft Edges – going to the dogs
Good Stuff – thanksgiving suggestions
Celebrations – a big book bash on Tuesday
Bloopers – the ushers may eat you
Mirabile Dictu! – give me a light
Bottom of the Barrel – an old broom
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – It was time for the Pastor to move on to another parish. She told her congregation of her intent to do so, and an emotional worship service was had by all.
Afterwards the Pastor was greeted by a man who, in no uncertain terms, told her how much she would be missed.
“Now, don’t worry,” said the pastor. “You’ll probably get a nice young seminarian, full of good ideas and energy. After all, ‘A new broom sweeps clean!’ right?”
“Yes, Pastor,” said the man. “But an old broom knows where all the dirt is!”
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary.
Jeremiah 31:27-34 – Obviously, this is where the expression “sour grapes” comes from. Well, maybe not. There is an Ǽsop fable about a disgruntled wolf. “I’m sure those grapes are sour.”
Verse 30 hurts. We adopted twins who suffer from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. They inherited that curse from their birth mother who probably inherited it from her mother, who may have been dehumanized by my land-grabbing ancestors. One of the twins died because of that sin.
And verses 31-34 should be a bit upsetting to those of us who earn our bread by communicating the gospel – writing, preaching, counseling, etc. Jeremiah says we will be obsolete. Unnecessary.
And that is happening. The “gospel” most people in Western European society live by is absorbed through popular culture, the media, and occasionally a little bit from the church. They have a “law within them” – maybe I should make that inclusive – we have a law within us that governs our lives and prescribes our ethics.
I don’t think that’s what Jeremiah had in mind.
Psalm 119:97-104 – Jim does not have a paraphrase of this portion of Psalm 119.
2 Timothy 3:14-4:5 – I love that phrase, “itching ears (4:3).” Itching ears can be a symptom of wax buildup which inhibits hearing. At least, that’s what happens in my ears. Is that why sound is so often over-amplified – folks can no longer hear the subtle sounds? The “sound of silence?” The “still, small voice?” And so we accumulate for ourselves “teachers to suit our own desires.”
The phrase that is most often proof-text is “All scripture is inspired by God.” But this was a personal letter to Timothy. Paul had no idea he was writing holy writ. The scripture referred to is what we, somewhat patronizingly, call the “Old Testament.” There were no Christian scriptures at that point in history.
For me, the most useful sentence is right at the top. “Continue in what you have learned and firmly believe, (v.14)” which could be interpreted to mean, “don’t never change your mind about nothin’.” But for me it’s saying, get a good handle on the core of your faith. And build on that.
Luke 18:1-8 – Until fairly recently, many people interpreted scriptures allegorically. Especially Jesus’ parables.
So in this passage the allegorical reading would have been to say the widow stands for us and the judge stands for God. Whoops! Does that mean that God has no fear of God, and that God is unjust?
And it is not the merit of the widow’s prayer that convinces the judge, it is her bloody-minded persistence. The judge just wants to get her off his back. It doesn’t matter what we pray for, as long as we keep at it. Eventually we’ll wear God down.
Then there’s that enigmatic last sentence. Half a dozen commentators have a dozen readings on it. So how about this as a paraphrase. “When the Son returns, will your persistent prayers show that you have enduring relationships with God? Or will you have given up and joined a fundamentalist snake handling sect?”
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful.
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Rumors – I can’t do better than to share what I wrote in response to those scriptures in Aha!!! magazine, almost ten years ago.
“What kind of a pen does God use to write on your heart?”
It was an angry, pain-filled question during a Bible study session. A literal response to a metaphor is almost always cynical or cruel.
But what is Jeremiah trying to get across? I’m not sure, but here are some stories.
Our choir is singing at a senior citizen’s home. The people there are all in their final years. Our singing, and the words of our minister, don’t seem to penetrate the shade of years pulled across their minds.
Then we sing, “Jesus loves me, this I know,” and a small light goes on in several ancient faces. In a tiny, cracked voice, and old lady sings with us. The song is written on her heart and the weight of years cannot erase it.
My nephew has died. There is pain in his death that is more than the pain of his dying so young. Family quarrels have surfaced in the tension around the bedside. An Anglican priest comes in. He is my nephew’s pastor and his long-time friend. The priest is one of the mourners.
I brace myself, wondering if the priest will say something “helpful.” He stands at the bedside, and from the depth of somewhere he speaks an ancient lamentation. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken us?” He needs no book. The words are written on his heart.
I am at a memorial service for my son who ended his lonely life of suffering the devastation of fetal alcohol syndrome. I am confused. I am angry at his birth mother whose drinking shut down his nervous system, and made it impossible for him to give or receive affection. Why should a child grow to be a man and never know that he is loved?
We play a song that was my son’s favorite. “The Rose.” It is about the love which he never understood or felt. What did he sense when he heard that line, “….and you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong…”?
The song’s gift to me is the final verse.
“Just remember in the winter,
far beneath the bitter snows,
likes a seed, that with the sun’s love,
in the spring becomes a rose.”
And so, when the minister tells us with passion and hope that “nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of Christ Jesus,” I know that my son now knows that love – the love of Christ Jesus and his earthly father’s love, which he never knew before.
I know that, because the knowledge of resurrection, of Easter hope, is written on my heart.
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Going to the Dogs
We have a new dog in our household.
Our last dog, Phoebe the Irish Setter, died in August 2006. We grieved her passing, and our loss, for most of a year.
In late July, friend and neighbour Mick Wentworth asked, “Are you still looking for a dog? I have a two-year-old Chesapeake Bay Retriever who needs a home.”
Her previous owner had committed suicide; the dog was alone with his body for several days. “It’s either you, or the pound,” said Mick.
“Does she have a name?” we asked.
Mick grinned sheepishly: “Phoebe,” he said.
After that, we could hardly NOT take her. So Phoebe II came home with us.
No one would ever call a Chesapeake beautiful. Even the breeder’s manuals, which portray their favourite breed in the best possible terms, comment that “The Chessie has been valued for talents rather than appearance.”
With her short curly coat and barrel chest, Phoebe resembles a Brillo pad on legs.
But she has a marvellous temperament. She greets everyone with exuberant friendliness. She takes snacks without imperilling our fingers. She’s gentle with our three-year-old granddaughter Katharine. And she is absurdly devoted to us.
It’s too bad that the ancient Hebrews didn’t have dogs as pets. Nomadic herders probably couldn’t afford the luxury of household pets. Dogs were carrion-eaters at best, predators at worst. So most biblical references to dogs are negative.
In one episode, Jesus referred to Gentiles as “dogs.” He did not intend it as a compliment.
But it seems to me that many of the qualities that God expects of humans are the same qualities we expect of our dogs.
Obedience: we are to learn God’s will, and do it. “Thy will be done,” we pray.
But obedience is more than just doing one’s duty. Employees can obey orders, but hate what they’re doing. A well-trained dog wants to do what we want. A dog gets pleasure from obeying.
“The law of the Lord is perfect,” says Psalm 19, “more to be desired than gold, sweeter than honey...”
Devotion: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might,” says the Hebrew Shema.
That’s a pretty good description of Phoebe’s attitude to us. She adores us. It shows in every wag of her tail, every shine in her eyes. Could God ask for more?
Above all, faithfulness: “You shall have no other gods ahead of me,” decrees the first Commandment.
A multitude of stories describe the fidelity of dogs to their humans. Possibly the ultimate example was Greyfriars Bobby, who kept vigil at his master’s grave for 14 years.
A dog doesn’t spend its life looking for new masters. A dog knows to whom it belongs.
Biblical writers could have saved so many words, if they had just told us to relate to God the way our household dogs relate to us.
Not that dogs are perfect. But that’s a subject for next week’s column.
(Ralph’s note: Jim has authored a fine book in the Spirituality series, “The Spirituality of Pets.” There’s a lot in there about Phoebe I. Go to the Wood Lake Publications web site (www.woodlakebooks.com) and click on “Jim Taylor’s Edges” right near the top of the page.)
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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Good Stuff – This from Fred and Joyce Abma. It’s a bit late for the Canadian Thanksgiving, but thanksgiving should not be limited to one day a year. And Americans can put it in their file for Thanksgiving which they celebrate on November 22nd. In most of Canada, fall has fell by then and it’s already winter.
This is from a sermon by Joel Lohr, of Woodriver, Illinois.
A few thanksgiving suggestions:* Be thankful that you don’t already have everything you want. If you did, what would there be to look forward to?
* Be thankful when you don’t know something. This gives you the opportunity to learn.
* Be thankful for the difficult times. During those times you grow.
* Be thankful for your limitations. They give you opportunities for improvement.
* Be thankful for each new challenge. It will build strength and character.
* Be thankful for your mistakes. They will teach you valuable lessons.
* Be thankful when you’re tired and weary. It means you’ve made a difference.
It’s easy to be thankful for the good things. But, a life of true fulfillment can come to those who are also thankful for the setbacks. As hard as it may be, find a way to be thankful for your troubles, and they can become your blessings.
As we look around us at the land of plenty that we live in, it is my prayer that we will see through new eyes each day, the ways that God has blessed us.
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COME AND HELP US CELEBRATE – Any of you folks living in the central Okanagan (well anywhere, actually, if you don’t mind the drive) are invited to a book launching bash that’s happening this Tuesday, October 16th, between 10 am and 2 pm.
And the book, of course, is “The Spirituality of Grandparenting.” I’ve written a dozen or more books, but this is one that I’ve particularly enjoyed and which turned out to be a full-color, beautifully designed coffee table book with lots of marvelous photos.
Wood Lake Books is staging the event at the McMillan Pumpkin Patch at 3690 Berard Rd, (not Bernard!) Kelowna. Their phone number is 250-863-6081 and their e-mail is rcmcmillan@shaw.ca. Phone or e-mail if you need directions. There’ll be apricots and pumpkins and hay rides and hay mazes, lots of good fun and an autographed copies of the book.
Bring along your grandkids if they’re either too young or too old for school. Should be fun.
The sad thing is, you won’t meet our grandkids, Zoë and Jake. They’ll be in school. But Bev and I will be delighted to see you.
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – Evelyn McLachlan says a non-church goer is called a Seventh-Day Absentist.
Evelyn, shouldn’t that be a “First Day Absentist?”
From the file:
* Ushers may eat the late arrivals.
* Volunteers are needed to spit up food.
* We are gathering to unite this man and this woman in holy macaroni.
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
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Wish I’d Said That! – By the time we are wise enough to watch our step, we’re too old to go anywhere.
Billy CrystalWhen the student is ready, the teacher appears. Buddhist Proverb
Love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.
Author Unknown via Velia Watts
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “Give me a light!”)
The Bible in a Nutshell, from Dennis Languay of Saint-Lambert, Quebec, who found it on the net.
This has been ascribed to school children, but those of you who are experts in textual criticism will recognize many familiar phrases from previous circulating e-mails. Doesn’t matter. It’s fun to read.
In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness, and some gas. The Bible says, "The Lord thy God is one," but I think God must be a lot older than that. Anyway, God said, "Give me a light!" and someone did. Then God made the world.
God split the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren't embarrassed because mirrors hadn't been invented yet. Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden of Eden. Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn't have cars.
Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he was Abel. Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be like a million or something.
One of the next important people was Noah, who was a good guy, but one of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a large boat and put his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they said they would have to take a rain check.
After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than his brother, Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat.
Another important Bible guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh's people. These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable. God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti. Then He gave them His Top Ten Commandments. These include don't lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor's stuff. Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother.
One of Moses' best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to use spies. Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town.
After Joshua came David. He got to be king by killing a giant with a slingshot. He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher says he was wise, but that doesn't sound very wise to me. After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets. One of these was Jonah, who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed up on the shore. There were also some minor league prophets, but I guess we don't have to worry about them.
After the Old Testament came the New Testament. Jesus is the star of the New Testament. He was born in Bethlehem in a barn. (I wish I had been born in a barn, too, because my mom is always saying to me, "Close the door! Were you born in a barn?" It would be nice to say, "As a matter of fact, I was.")
During His life, Jesus had many arguments with sinners like the Pharisees and the Republicans. Jesus also had twelve opossums. The worst one was Judas Asparagus. Judas was so evil that they named a terrible vegetable after him.
Jesus was a great man. He healed many leopards and even preached to some Germans on the Mount. But the Republicans and all those guys put Jesus on trial before Pontius the Pilot. Pilot didn't stick up for Jesus. He just washed his hands instead.
Anyways, Jesus died for our sins, then came back to life again. He went up to Heaven but will be back at the end of the Aluminum. His return is foretold in the book of Revolution.
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Bottom of the Barrel – This from John Severson who says it’s “an oldie-but-goody.” It’s almost in the category of a folk tale, because there are many different versions of the story. It’s been in Rumors before, but it’s deserves another go.
A priest from Ireland was assigned to a Texas diocese. One morning, Father O'Malley rose from his bed. It was a fine spring day in his new Texas mission parish. He walked to the window of his bedroom to get a deep breath of the beautiful day outside.
He then noticed there was a jackass lying dead in the middle of his front lawn. He promptly called the local police station.
“Good morning, this is Sergeant Jones,” said the voice on the phone. “How might I help you?'
“And the best of the day te yerself,” said the priest. “This is Father O'Malley at St. Brigid's. There's a jackass lying dead in me front lawn. Would ye be so kind as to send a couple o’yer lads to take care of the matter.”
Sergeant Jones, considering himself to be quite a wit, replied with a smirk, “Well now Father, it was always my impression that you people took care of last rites!”
“Aye, 'tis certainly true,” said Father O’Malley after a long pause. “But we are also obliged to notify the next of kin!”
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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.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-10-14
October 14, 2007
WRITTEN ON YOUR HEART
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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Please put this “blog” address on your “favorites list. http://ralphmiltonsrumors.blogspot.com/
I will 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.
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Next Week’s Readings – not what Jeremiah had in mind
Rumors – written on my heart
Soft Edges – going to the dogs
Good Stuff – thanksgiving suggestions
Celebrations – a big book bash on Tuesday
Bloopers – the ushers may eat you
Mirabile Dictu! – give me a light
Bottom of the Barrel – an old broom
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – It was time for the Pastor to move on to another parish. She told her congregation of her intent to do so, and an emotional worship service was had by all.
Afterwards the Pastor was greeted by a man who, in no uncertain terms, told her how much she would be missed.
“Now, don’t worry,” said the pastor. “You’ll probably get a nice young seminarian, full of good ideas and energy. After all, ‘A new broom sweeps clean!’ right?”
“Yes, Pastor,” said the man. “But an old broom knows where all the dirt is!”
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary.
Jeremiah 31:27-34 – Obviously, this is where the expression “sour grapes” comes from. Well, maybe not. There is an Ǽsop fable about a disgruntled wolf. “I’m sure those grapes are sour.”
Verse 30 hurts. We adopted twins who suffer from Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. They inherited that curse from their birth mother who probably inherited it from her mother, who may have been dehumanized by my land-grabbing ancestors. One of the twins died because of that sin.
And verses 31-34 should be a bit upsetting to those of us who earn our bread by communicating the gospel – writing, preaching, counseling, etc. Jeremiah says we will be obsolete. Unnecessary.
And that is happening. The “gospel” most people in Western European society live by is absorbed through popular culture, the media, and occasionally a little bit from the church. They have a “law within them” – maybe I should make that inclusive – we have a law within us that governs our lives and prescribes our ethics.
I don’t think that’s what Jeremiah had in mind.
Psalm 119:97-104 – Jim does not have a paraphrase of this portion of Psalm 119.
2 Timothy 3:14-4:5 – I love that phrase, “itching ears (4:3).” Itching ears can be a symptom of wax buildup which inhibits hearing. At least, that’s what happens in my ears. Is that why sound is so often over-amplified – folks can no longer hear the subtle sounds? The “sound of silence?” The “still, small voice?” And so we accumulate for ourselves “teachers to suit our own desires.”
The phrase that is most often proof-text is “All scripture is inspired by God.” But this was a personal letter to Timothy. Paul had no idea he was writing holy writ. The scripture referred to is what we, somewhat patronizingly, call the “Old Testament.” There were no Christian scriptures at that point in history.
For me, the most useful sentence is right at the top. “Continue in what you have learned and firmly believe, (v.14)” which could be interpreted to mean, “don’t never change your mind about nothin’.” But for me it’s saying, get a good handle on the core of your faith. And build on that.
Luke 18:1-8 – Until fairly recently, many people interpreted scriptures allegorically. Especially Jesus’ parables.
So in this passage the allegorical reading would have been to say the widow stands for us and the judge stands for God. Whoops! Does that mean that God has no fear of God, and that God is unjust?
And it is not the merit of the widow’s prayer that convinces the judge, it is her bloody-minded persistence. The judge just wants to get her off his back. It doesn’t matter what we pray for, as long as we keep at it. Eventually we’ll wear God down.
Then there’s that enigmatic last sentence. Half a dozen commentators have a dozen readings on it. So how about this as a paraphrase. “When the Son returns, will your persistent prayers show that you have enduring relationships with God? Or will you have given up and joined a fundamentalist snake handling sect?”
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful.
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Rumors – I can’t do better than to share what I wrote in response to those scriptures in Aha!!! magazine, almost ten years ago.
“What kind of a pen does God use to write on your heart?”
It was an angry, pain-filled question during a Bible study session. A literal response to a metaphor is almost always cynical or cruel.
But what is Jeremiah trying to get across? I’m not sure, but here are some stories.
Our choir is singing at a senior citizen’s home. The people there are all in their final years. Our singing, and the words of our minister, don’t seem to penetrate the shade of years pulled across their minds.
Then we sing, “Jesus loves me, this I know,” and a small light goes on in several ancient faces. In a tiny, cracked voice, and old lady sings with us. The song is written on her heart and the weight of years cannot erase it.
My nephew has died. There is pain in his death that is more than the pain of his dying so young. Family quarrels have surfaced in the tension around the bedside. An Anglican priest comes in. He is my nephew’s pastor and his long-time friend. The priest is one of the mourners.
I brace myself, wondering if the priest will say something “helpful.” He stands at the bedside, and from the depth of somewhere he speaks an ancient lamentation. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken us?” He needs no book. The words are written on his heart.
I am at a memorial service for my son who ended his lonely life of suffering the devastation of fetal alcohol syndrome. I am confused. I am angry at his birth mother whose drinking shut down his nervous system, and made it impossible for him to give or receive affection. Why should a child grow to be a man and never know that he is loved?
We play a song that was my son’s favorite. “The Rose.” It is about the love which he never understood or felt. What did he sense when he heard that line, “….and you think that love is only for the lucky and the strong…”?
The song’s gift to me is the final verse.
“Just remember in the winter,
far beneath the bitter snows,
likes a seed, that with the sun’s love,
in the spring becomes a rose.”
And so, when the minister tells us with passion and hope that “nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of Christ Jesus,” I know that my son now knows that love – the love of Christ Jesus and his earthly father’s love, which he never knew before.
I know that, because the knowledge of resurrection, of Easter hope, is written on my heart.
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Going to the Dogs
We have a new dog in our household.
Our last dog, Phoebe the Irish Setter, died in August 2006. We grieved her passing, and our loss, for most of a year.
In late July, friend and neighbour Mick Wentworth asked, “Are you still looking for a dog? I have a two-year-old Chesapeake Bay Retriever who needs a home.”
Her previous owner had committed suicide; the dog was alone with his body for several days. “It’s either you, or the pound,” said Mick.
“Does she have a name?” we asked.
Mick grinned sheepishly: “Phoebe,” he said.
After that, we could hardly NOT take her. So Phoebe II came home with us.
No one would ever call a Chesapeake beautiful. Even the breeder’s manuals, which portray their favourite breed in the best possible terms, comment that “The Chessie has been valued for talents rather than appearance.”
With her short curly coat and barrel chest, Phoebe resembles a Brillo pad on legs.
But she has a marvellous temperament. She greets everyone with exuberant friendliness. She takes snacks without imperilling our fingers. She’s gentle with our three-year-old granddaughter Katharine. And she is absurdly devoted to us.
It’s too bad that the ancient Hebrews didn’t have dogs as pets. Nomadic herders probably couldn’t afford the luxury of household pets. Dogs were carrion-eaters at best, predators at worst. So most biblical references to dogs are negative.
In one episode, Jesus referred to Gentiles as “dogs.” He did not intend it as a compliment.
But it seems to me that many of the qualities that God expects of humans are the same qualities we expect of our dogs.
Obedience: we are to learn God’s will, and do it. “Thy will be done,” we pray.
But obedience is more than just doing one’s duty. Employees can obey orders, but hate what they’re doing. A well-trained dog wants to do what we want. A dog gets pleasure from obeying.
“The law of the Lord is perfect,” says Psalm 19, “more to be desired than gold, sweeter than honey...”
Devotion: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might,” says the Hebrew Shema.
That’s a pretty good description of Phoebe’s attitude to us. She adores us. It shows in every wag of her tail, every shine in her eyes. Could God ask for more?
Above all, faithfulness: “You shall have no other gods ahead of me,” decrees the first Commandment.
A multitude of stories describe the fidelity of dogs to their humans. Possibly the ultimate example was Greyfriars Bobby, who kept vigil at his master’s grave for 14 years.
A dog doesn’t spend its life looking for new masters. A dog knows to whom it belongs.
Biblical writers could have saved so many words, if they had just told us to relate to God the way our household dogs relate to us.
Not that dogs are perfect. But that’s a subject for next week’s column.
(Ralph’s note: Jim has authored a fine book in the Spirituality series, “The Spirituality of Pets.” There’s a lot in there about Phoebe I. Go to the Wood Lake Publications web site (www.woodlakebooks.com) and click on “Jim Taylor’s Edges” right near the top of the page.)
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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Good Stuff – This from Fred and Joyce Abma. It’s a bit late for the Canadian Thanksgiving, but thanksgiving should not be limited to one day a year. And Americans can put it in their file for Thanksgiving which they celebrate on November 22nd. In most of Canada, fall has fell by then and it’s already winter.
This is from a sermon by Joel Lohr, of Woodriver, Illinois.
A few thanksgiving suggestions:* Be thankful that you don’t already have everything you want. If you did, what would there be to look forward to?
* Be thankful when you don’t know something. This gives you the opportunity to learn.
* Be thankful for the difficult times. During those times you grow.
* Be thankful for your limitations. They give you opportunities for improvement.
* Be thankful for each new challenge. It will build strength and character.
* Be thankful for your mistakes. They will teach you valuable lessons.
* Be thankful when you’re tired and weary. It means you’ve made a difference.
It’s easy to be thankful for the good things. But, a life of true fulfillment can come to those who are also thankful for the setbacks. As hard as it may be, find a way to be thankful for your troubles, and they can become your blessings.
As we look around us at the land of plenty that we live in, it is my prayer that we will see through new eyes each day, the ways that God has blessed us.
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COME AND HELP US CELEBRATE – Any of you folks living in the central Okanagan (well anywhere, actually, if you don’t mind the drive) are invited to a book launching bash that’s happening this Tuesday, October 16th, between 10 am and 2 pm.
And the book, of course, is “The Spirituality of Grandparenting.” I’ve written a dozen or more books, but this is one that I’ve particularly enjoyed and which turned out to be a full-color, beautifully designed coffee table book with lots of marvelous photos.
Wood Lake Books is staging the event at the McMillan Pumpkin Patch at 3690 Berard Rd, (not Bernard!) Kelowna. Their phone number is 250-863-6081 and their e-mail is rcmcmillan@shaw.ca. Phone or e-mail if you need directions. There’ll be apricots and pumpkins and hay rides and hay mazes, lots of good fun and an autographed copies of the book.
Bring along your grandkids if they’re either too young or too old for school. Should be fun.
The sad thing is, you won’t meet our grandkids, Zoë and Jake. They’ll be in school. But Bev and I will be delighted to see you.
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – Evelyn McLachlan says a non-church goer is called a Seventh-Day Absentist.
Evelyn, shouldn’t that be a “First Day Absentist?”
From the file:
* Ushers may eat the late arrivals.
* Volunteers are needed to spit up food.
* We are gathering to unite this man and this woman in holy macaroni.
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
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Wish I’d Said That! – By the time we are wise enough to watch our step, we’re too old to go anywhere.
Billy CrystalWhen the student is ready, the teacher appears. Buddhist Proverb
Love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.
Author Unknown via Velia Watts
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “Give me a light!”)
The Bible in a Nutshell, from Dennis Languay of Saint-Lambert, Quebec, who found it on the net.
This has been ascribed to school children, but those of you who are experts in textual criticism will recognize many familiar phrases from previous circulating e-mails. Doesn’t matter. It’s fun to read.
In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness, and some gas. The Bible says, "The Lord thy God is one," but I think God must be a lot older than that. Anyway, God said, "Give me a light!" and someone did. Then God made the world.
God split the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren't embarrassed because mirrors hadn't been invented yet. Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden of Eden. Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn't have cars.
Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he was Abel. Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be like a million or something.
One of the next important people was Noah, who was a good guy, but one of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a large boat and put his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they said they would have to take a rain check.
After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than his brother, Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat.
Another important Bible guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh's people. These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable. God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti. Then He gave them His Top Ten Commandments. These include don't lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor's stuff. Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother.
One of Moses' best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to use spies. Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town.
After Joshua came David. He got to be king by killing a giant with a slingshot. He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher says he was wise, but that doesn't sound very wise to me. After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets. One of these was Jonah, who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed up on the shore. There were also some minor league prophets, but I guess we don't have to worry about them.
After the Old Testament came the New Testament. Jesus is the star of the New Testament. He was born in Bethlehem in a barn. (I wish I had been born in a barn, too, because my mom is always saying to me, "Close the door! Were you born in a barn?" It would be nice to say, "As a matter of fact, I was.")
During His life, Jesus had many arguments with sinners like the Pharisees and the Republicans. Jesus also had twelve opossums. The worst one was Judas Asparagus. Judas was so evil that they named a terrible vegetable after him.
Jesus was a great man. He healed many leopards and even preached to some Germans on the Mount. But the Republicans and all those guys put Jesus on trial before Pontius the Pilot. Pilot didn't stick up for Jesus. He just washed his hands instead.
Anyways, Jesus died for our sins, then came back to life again. He went up to Heaven but will be back at the end of the Aluminum. His return is foretold in the book of Revolution.
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Bottom of the Barrel – This from John Severson who says it’s “an oldie-but-goody.” It’s almost in the category of a folk tale, because there are many different versions of the story. It’s been in Rumors before, but it’s deserves another go.
A priest from Ireland was assigned to a Texas diocese. One morning, Father O'Malley rose from his bed. It was a fine spring day in his new Texas mission parish. He walked to the window of his bedroom to get a deep breath of the beautiful day outside.
He then noticed there was a jackass lying dead in the middle of his front lawn. He promptly called the local police station.
“Good morning, this is Sergeant Jones,” said the voice on the phone. “How might I help you?'
“And the best of the day te yerself,” said the priest. “This is Father O'Malley at St. Brigid's. There's a jackass lying dead in me front lawn. Would ye be so kind as to send a couple o’yer lads to take care of the matter.”
Sergeant Jones, considering himself to be quite a wit, replied with a smirk, “Well now Father, it was always my impression that you people took care of last rites!”
“Aye, 'tis certainly true,” said Father O’Malley after a long pause. “But we are also obliged to notify the next of kin!”
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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.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Saturday, October 6, 2007
Sermon Helps for Preachers with a sense of Humor!
R U M O R S # 470
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-10-07
October 7, 2007
THE SAMARITAN NOTICED
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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COME AND HELP US CELEBRATE – Any of you folks living in the central Okanagan (well anywhere, actually, if you don’t mind the drive) are invited to a book launching bash that’s happening on Tuesday, October 16th, between 10 am and 2 pm.
And the book, of course, is “The Spirituality of Grandparenting.” I’ve written a dozen or more books, but this is one that I’ve particularly enjoyed and which turned out to be a full-color, beautifully designed coffee table book with lots of marvelous photos.
Wood Lake Books is staging the event at the McMillan Pumpkin Patch at 3690 Berard Rd, Kelowna. Their phone number is 250-863-6081 and their e-mail is rcmcmillan@shaw.ca. Phone or e-mail if you need directions. There’ll be apricots and pumpkins and hay rides and hay mazes, lots of good fun and an autographed copies of the book.
Bring along your grandkids if they’re either too young or too old for school. Should be fun.
The sad thing is, you won’t meet our grandkids, Zoë and Jake. They’ll be in school.
Click on this Wood Lake Publishing web address (www.woodlakebooks.com) for this and many other delightful and useful resources. Select “Search by Title, Author," at the top left column of the site.
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Next Week’s Readings – the least expected
Rumors – the Samaritan noticed
Soft Edges – Marie-Lynn’s triumph
Good Stuff – the cost of a miracle
Come Celebrate – launching the grandparent book
Bloopers – dead friends
We Get Letters – litaurgo-theological
Mirabile Dictu! – God split the Adam
Bottom of the Barrel – wearing a hat
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – This from Irene Carter of Calgary, Alberta.
“Einstein climbs to the top of Mt. Sinai to get close enough to talk to God. Looking up, he asks, ‘God, what does a million years mean to you?’
‘A minute.” says the voice from God.
‘And what does a million dollars mean to you?’
“A penny,’ says the voice of God.
‘Well, God, can I have a penny?’
‘In a minute’."
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, October 14th, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary.
Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7 – Jim Taylor once described a friend as “utterly insane, in the best sense of the word.” Visionaries, prophets, poets are often a bit loosely attached to the reality we experience – which is why they see things we tend to miss. And what they tell us is often counter-intuitive.
Two weeks ago in the RCL lectionary we heard how Jeremiah bought a field – this at a time when any realistic financial consultant would advise strongly against it. But Jeremiah was enacting a parable of hope.
And he’s still at it in this passage. The Babylonians have dragged the people into exile. They are, quite literally, slaves again. And it wasn’t much fun. Jeremiah should have been sending them encrypted e-mails telling them how sabotage the Babylonians – how to fight for their freedom.
But Jeremiah tells them to live their lives as fully as possible within the system that’s there. In other words, “Get a life.” Did they take his advice? Hard to say. But when they eventually got back home, they had an enriched sense of who they were and what God was calling them to be.
Psalm 66:1-11 – paraphrased by Jim Taylor
(Note: Jim’s paraphrase is for verses 1-7.)
A song of immigrants and settlers and refugees, of anyone recovering from a serious illness or debility.
1 On the other side of the mountains, a new world spreads before us.
2 The rocky ridges give way to spreading grasslands;
the shadows of our past to endless sunshine.
4 The far horizon shimmers in holy celebration.
In sacred silence we stand, speechless before the rebirth of possibility.
3 You tested us terribly, God.
At times, we thought we would die, adrift, alone.
5 You scorched us on the deserts;
you froze us on the glaciers.
We could not help ourselves.
6 But you gave us shade against the sun, and fire against the cold.
With your help, we survived every obstacle.
7 Through our trials you taught us that you alone are almighty, and not we ourselves.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com
2 Timothy 2:8-15 – “Avoid wrangling over words,” says the writer in verse 14. Us churchy types have a really bad habit of wrangling over words. We’ve all had discussions that degenerated into silly arguments because two people were using one word (or several words) in different ways. The worst part of those kinds of discussions is that they have implicit within them, the notion that the Christian life is about getting your theology right. And the pride that pushes us to persuade the other person over to our point of view, because that will demonstrate the rightness of our own beliefs and opinions.
Does God weep or laugh over such encounters? I have no idea, of course, but I do know that such encounters – such discussions – are only fruitful when there is genuine dialogue. And that involves listening to the other person – not to refute their position or their ideas – but to understand them.
Luke 17:11-19 – Mythologist Joseph Campbell speaks of a category of myth (i.e. a story that carries meaning) under the heading of “the least expected.”
The entire Bible, both the Hebrew and the Christian scriptures, fall under that category. Which brings to mind a bit of slightly anti-Semitic doggerel
How odd
Of God
To choose
The Jews.
That was by William Norman Ewer. (There’s an almost equally well known reply written by Cecil Browne: "But not so odd/As those who choose/A Jewish God/But spurn the Jews.")
The continuing storyline in the Hebrew Scriptures is about a God who has chosen one of the smallest, least powerful and most obscure nations. The least expected. King David, their greatest king, started life as a shepherd, which was pretty near the bottom of the social ladder.
And the storyline of the Christian scriptures is about an obscure carpenter from a hick-town called Nazareth, born under questionable circumstances, who turns out to be God’s chosen one.
It’s a theme that occurs over and over again. In this passage, it is the Samaritan, the foreigner who comes back to thank Jesus – the one least expected.
Again and again this is demonstrated in the life and teachings of Jesus. “The first shall be last and the last shall be first.”
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful.
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Rumors – I’m writing this on a Monday morning. I’ve just been across the street to check on a neighbor who has significant health problems – most of them age related. “I was looking out the back window,” he said. “It’s such a beautiful morning. There were some quail feeding on the lawn. I really love the soft browns and muted blacks in the feathers on their backs.”
Remember the old philosopher’s puzzle? If a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it, does it make a sound? Does sound exist apart from the hearing of it?
We talk of beauty and goodness and health and holiness, but I wonder. Do they exist if we do not notice? God has created all this wonder, but is it wonder if we humans do not notice that it is wonderful. Is it possible that the Samaritan leper’s gift to Jesus was that he noticed the wonder of his own healing – a sense of awe that Jesus described as faith?
Neither Bev nor I have green thumbs, but there are roses that bloom in our back yard in spite of our best efforts. Even this late in autumn the odd “last rose of summer” survives the cold nights and is covered with dew in the mornings. A few days ago Bev pointed out one blossom, opening in all its freshness, with subtle shades of red and pink and yellow.
Who but God could create such beauty? Or maybe God doesn’t create beauty at all. Maybe that rose was not beautiful at all until Bev noticed it. We often talk of being called to co-create the world with God, and that concept incorporates a whole lot of stuff. But surely, part of the meaning of that concept is that we are called to make the world beautiful by noticing the beauty.
What does it mean to be a person of faith? Too often we are told to accept a certain theological formula or creed or practice. But the story of the leper has me wondering. According to standard brand Jewish theology of the day, the Samaritan had it all wrong. But Jesus doesn’t check out his theological credentials. He simply says, “Your faith has made you well.”
Perhaps it was the despised Samaritan who noticed the beauty and wonder of his own healing – who was awake to the holiness of what had happened. Maybe that was the miracle Jesus had in mind when he said, “Your faith has made you well.”
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Marie-Lynn’s Triumph
When a hurricane destroys a city, when a mudslide buries a village, when a forest fire torches houses and wildlife, we tend to attribute it to an “Act of God.”
Based on insurance policies, you’d think God only does harmful things.
But there is another side.
You may have heard Marie-Lynn Hammond’s albums – or perhaps heard her singing on Stuart McLean’s Vinyl Cafe program on CBC. A co-founder of Stringband, Marie-Lynn has since gone solo. Critics have called her “one of Canada’s best singer-songwriters” – even if she’s not as famous as Sarah McLachlan.
Marie-Lynn is also an enthusiastic equestrian. On August 26, 2006, Marie-Lynn’s usually quiet horse suddenly and inexplicably began to buck – most likely because of a wasp sting. Marie-Lynn was thrown. She sustained five broken ribs, a fractured neck vertebra, and multiple breaks to her right collar-bone. Though she wore a helmet, she suffered a concussion, bleeding in the brain, and damage to a cranial nerve.
She has no memory of the accident. “My memories end just before my horse began to buck,” she says, “and resume about 30 minutes later as I was being loaded into the ambulance.”
Initially, she lost the sight of her right eye. Over the last year, and after endless rounds of therapy, most of that sight has returned, but with serious double-vision problems.
On August 26 – exactly one year after her accident – she went to another horse show. “I felt a need to revisit the scene,” she rationalized.
A friend found her a very gentle horse to ride.
“Originally I was simply going to enter a fun class, that didn’t demand any real riding skills,” Marie-Lynn told her friends, “but that class got cancelled. So I decided what the heck, I would enter English Pleasure (you are judged on how responsive and relaxed the horse and rider are at walk, trot and canter). The judge was informed of my situation, and told me if I felt unsteady or unsafe, I could simply come into the centre of the ring and sit out the remainder of the class.
“We won the class! When I heard them call my number, I was stunned, and then thrilled, and then I began to get all teary, as did many of my friends watching, some of whom had witnessed the accident. And then they began to cheer and holler, and I realized in the most viscerally happy way how far I'd come in a year.”
The judge assured Marie-Lynn that her disability had not influenced his choice: “He told me and others that I had won the class fair and square; he had not made any allowances for me.
“Red ribbons are not something I'm used to getting, so this one is especially precious.”
Whenever I read Marie-Lynn’s letters, I choke up. I get so used to hearing bad news that good news sneaks under my defences.
I think of Marie-Lynn’s triumph should be called an Act of God too.
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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Good Stuff – This from Kausie White:
Six-year-old Tess went to her bedroom and pulled a glass jelly jar from its hiding place in the closet.
She poured the change out on the floor and counted it carefully. Three times.
Carefully placing the coins back in the jar and twisting on the cap, Tess slipped out the back door and made her way six blocks to the drug store.
She waited patiently for the pharmacist to give her some attention. But the pharmacist was busy talking to a well-dressed man.
Finally he spoke to her. “And what do you want?”
“I want to talk to you about my brother,” Tess answered “He's really, really sick, and I want to buy a miracle.”
“What did you say?” asked the pharmacist.
'His name is Andrew and he has something bad growing inside his head and my Daddy says only a miracle can save him now. So how much does a miracle cost?”
“We don't sell miracles here, little girl. I'm sorry but I can't help you,” the pharmacist said, softening a little
“I have the money to pay for it.”
The well dressed man who had been talking with the pharmacist stooped down to Tess’ eye level. “What kind of a miracle does your brother need?”
“I don't know,” Tess replied with her eyes welling up in tears. “I just know he's really sick and Mommy says he needs an operation. But my Daddy can't pay for it, so I want to use my money.”
“How much do you have?” asked the man.
“One dollar and eleven cents,” Tess said in a tiny voice. “It's all the money I have, but I can get some more if I need to.”
“Well, what a coincidence,” smiled the man. “A dollar and eleven cents – the exact price of a miracle for little brothers.”
He took her money from Tess. “Take me to where you live. I want to see your brother and meet your parents. Let's see if I have the miracle you need.”
That well dressed man was Dr. Carlton Armstrong, a neurosurgeon. The operation was completed free of charge and it wasn't long until Andrew was home again and doing well.
“That surgery,” her Mom whispered. “was a real miracle. I wonder how much it would have cost?”
Tess smiled. She knew. One dollar and eleven cents – plus the faith of a child.
A miracle is not the suspension of natural law, but the operation of a higher law.
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – From the file:
* Sufficient unto the day is the evil eye thereof.
* Take my life and let it be, constipated Lord to thee.
* Thank you, dead friends.
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
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Wish I’d Said That! – If a person tries to fail and succeeds, which did they do?
author unknown via Velia Watts
Jesus listened and observed first, and then to those who needed healing, he gave healing, to those who were frozen against God's new thing, he gave the warmth of love and the fire of passion, and to those who were beaten down by an oppressive world, he gave encouragement and freedom.
Tom Ehrich via Mary of Bahrain
Velia Watts of Edmonton, Alberta, found these one liners on the web:
* In a Jam? God Preserve Us!
* Forget Big Brother, Speak to Our Father.
* The Ultimate F-Word is Forgiveness.
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We Get Letters – Evelyn McLachlan admits this is bad. “Which is why I had to send it to you!” she writes. Now I need to figure out if that was an insult or a compliment.
Did you see the recent story in the Jewish Chronicle about the theft of egg-enriched dough from a north London warehouse?
Unfortunately, the theft happened just before Shabbos and it forced many local bakeries to bake their challas with plain, white flour. A leading rabbi was quoted as saying, "I'm appalled by the rise in white challa crimes."
Chris McMullen sends a note offering a definition of that puzzling term we identified last week. He writes: “I assume that ‘litaurgo-theological’ words are those which have no identifiable meaning unless sung to the accompaniment of a guitar. Here are some examples: ‘Kumbaya’; ‘you are a part of the fa-mi-lee’, and, especially, ‘borning cry’.
Sharyl Peterson of Grand Junction, Colorado relates another incident in the category of sartorial slip-ups. Sharyl has a friend who “served a church that had an overactive heating system in winter, and no air-conditioning during the summer. So, she had developed a habit, while people were going through the line after worship, of unfastening the front of her alb, so she would be cooler.
“One summer day was unusually hot, and she decided that she would just wear underwear underneath her alb, rather than her usual "full kit" (underwear, dress, jacket).
“As folks were going through the line, she automatically reached up and ripped open the Velcro tabs holding her alb closed, letting it hang open – and didn't realize the full impact of what she'd done until the next man standing in line with his hand out froze, gaped at her, and turned bright red. At which point, she did, too!
“I'm not sure exactly what she did, but knowing her, I am guessing she laughed and handled it as gracefully.”
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “God split the Adam!”)
This from Peggy Neufeldt, who says these came from some “junior church students.”
However, the whole thing bears the marks of significant adult editing, including phrases from other items that have been circulating on the internet. But what the heck? They’re fun.
* In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness, and some gas. The Bible says, "The Lord thy God is one," but I think He must be a lot older than that. Anyway, God said, "Give me a light!" and someone did. Then God made the world.
* He split the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren't embarrassed because mirrors hadn't been invented yet. Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden of Eden. Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn't have cars.
* Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he was Abel. Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be like a million or something.
* One of the next important people was Noah, who was a good guy, but one of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a large boat and put his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they said they would have to take a rain check.
* After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than his brother, Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat.
* Another important Bible guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh's people. These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable. God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti. Then He gave them His Top Ten Commandments. These include don't lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor's stuff. Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother.
* One of Moses' best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to use spies. Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town.
* After Joshua came David. He got to be king by killing a giant with a slingshot. He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher says he was wise, but that doesn't sound very wise to me. After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets. One of these was Jonah, who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed up on the shore. There were also some minor league prophets, but I guess we don't have to worry about them.
* After the Old Testament came the New Testament. Jesus is the star of the New Testament. He was born in Bethlehem in a barn. (I wish I had been born in a barn, too, because my mom is always saying to me, "Close the door! Were you born in a barn" It would be nice to say, "As a matter of fact, I was.") During His life, Jesus had many arguments with sinners like the Pharisees and the Republicans. Jesus also had twelve opossums. The worst one was Judas Asparagus. Judas was so evil that they named a terrible vegetable after him.
* Jesus was a great man. He healed many leopards and even preached to some Germans on the Mount. But the Republicans and all those guys put Jesus on trial before Pontius the Pilot. Pilot didn't stick up for Jesus. He just washed his hands instead.
* Anyways, Jesus died for our sins, then came back to life again. He went up to Heaven but will be back at the end of the Aluminum. His return is foretold in the book of Revolution.
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Bottom of the Barrel – One day a mother and her eight-year-old daughter were walking along the beach, just at the water’s edge. Suddenly, a gigantic wave splashed up on the beach, and swept the little girl out to sea.
“Oh, God,” lamented the mother, turning her face toward heaven and shaking her fist. “This was my only baby. I can’t have more children. She is the love and joy of my life. I have cherished every day that she’s been with me. Give her back to me, and I’ll be in church every day for the rest of my life!!!!”
Suddenly, another gigantic wave flashed up and deposited the girl back on the sand. The mother looked up to heaven and said, “She was wearing a hat!!!!”
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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.~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Ralph Milton’s E-zine for people of faith with a sense of humor
2007-10-07
October 7, 2007
THE SAMARITAN NOTICED
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Motto:
"A merry heart doeth good, like a medicine, but a broken spirit drieth the bones." (Proverbs 17:22 KJV)
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COME AND HELP US CELEBRATE – Any of you folks living in the central Okanagan (well anywhere, actually, if you don’t mind the drive) are invited to a book launching bash that’s happening on Tuesday, October 16th, between 10 am and 2 pm.
And the book, of course, is “The Spirituality of Grandparenting.” I’ve written a dozen or more books, but this is one that I’ve particularly enjoyed and which turned out to be a full-color, beautifully designed coffee table book with lots of marvelous photos.
Wood Lake Books is staging the event at the McMillan Pumpkin Patch at 3690 Berard Rd, Kelowna. Their phone number is 250-863-6081 and their e-mail is rcmcmillan@shaw.ca. Phone or e-mail if you need directions. There’ll be apricots and pumpkins and hay rides and hay mazes, lots of good fun and an autographed copies of the book.
Bring along your grandkids if they’re either too young or too old for school. Should be fun.
The sad thing is, you won’t meet our grandkids, Zoë and Jake. They’ll be in school.
Click on this Wood Lake Publishing web address (www.woodlakebooks.com) for this and many other delightful and useful resources. Select “Search by Title, Author," at the top left column of the site.
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Next Week’s Readings – the least expected
Rumors – the Samaritan noticed
Soft Edges – Marie-Lynn’s triumph
Good Stuff – the cost of a miracle
Come Celebrate – launching the grandparent book
Bloopers – dead friends
We Get Letters – litaurgo-theological
Mirabile Dictu! – God split the Adam
Bottom of the Barrel – wearing a hat
Stuff – (read this only if you would like to subscribe, unsubscribe or are wondering about permissions. That sort of boring stuff.)
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Rib Tickler – This from Irene Carter of Calgary, Alberta.
“Einstein climbs to the top of Mt. Sinai to get close enough to talk to God. Looking up, he asks, ‘God, what does a million years mean to you?’
‘A minute.” says the voice from God.
‘And what does a million dollars mean to you?’
“A penny,’ says the voice of God.
‘Well, God, can I have a penny?’
‘In a minute’."
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Next Week’s Readings – These are the readings you will probably hear in church this coming Sunday, October 14th, if you are using the Revised Common Lectionary.
Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7 – Jim Taylor once described a friend as “utterly insane, in the best sense of the word.” Visionaries, prophets, poets are often a bit loosely attached to the reality we experience – which is why they see things we tend to miss. And what they tell us is often counter-intuitive.
Two weeks ago in the RCL lectionary we heard how Jeremiah bought a field – this at a time when any realistic financial consultant would advise strongly against it. But Jeremiah was enacting a parable of hope.
And he’s still at it in this passage. The Babylonians have dragged the people into exile. They are, quite literally, slaves again. And it wasn’t much fun. Jeremiah should have been sending them encrypted e-mails telling them how sabotage the Babylonians – how to fight for their freedom.
But Jeremiah tells them to live their lives as fully as possible within the system that’s there. In other words, “Get a life.” Did they take his advice? Hard to say. But when they eventually got back home, they had an enriched sense of who they were and what God was calling them to be.
Psalm 66:1-11 – paraphrased by Jim Taylor
(Note: Jim’s paraphrase is for verses 1-7.)
A song of immigrants and settlers and refugees, of anyone recovering from a serious illness or debility.
1 On the other side of the mountains, a new world spreads before us.
2 The rocky ridges give way to spreading grasslands;
the shadows of our past to endless sunshine.
4 The far horizon shimmers in holy celebration.
In sacred silence we stand, speechless before the rebirth of possibility.
3 You tested us terribly, God.
At times, we thought we would die, adrift, alone.
5 You scorched us on the deserts;
you froze us on the glaciers.
We could not help ourselves.
6 But you gave us shade against the sun, and fire against the cold.
With your help, we survived every obstacle.
7 Through our trials you taught us that you alone are almighty, and not we ourselves.
From: Everyday Psalms
Wood Lake Books.
For details, go to www.woodlakebooks.com
2 Timothy 2:8-15 – “Avoid wrangling over words,” says the writer in verse 14. Us churchy types have a really bad habit of wrangling over words. We’ve all had discussions that degenerated into silly arguments because two people were using one word (or several words) in different ways. The worst part of those kinds of discussions is that they have implicit within them, the notion that the Christian life is about getting your theology right. And the pride that pushes us to persuade the other person over to our point of view, because that will demonstrate the rightness of our own beliefs and opinions.
Does God weep or laugh over such encounters? I have no idea, of course, but I do know that such encounters – such discussions – are only fruitful when there is genuine dialogue. And that involves listening to the other person – not to refute their position or their ideas – but to understand them.
Luke 17:11-19 – Mythologist Joseph Campbell speaks of a category of myth (i.e. a story that carries meaning) under the heading of “the least expected.”
The entire Bible, both the Hebrew and the Christian scriptures, fall under that category. Which brings to mind a bit of slightly anti-Semitic doggerel
How odd
Of God
To choose
The Jews.
That was by William Norman Ewer. (There’s an almost equally well known reply written by Cecil Browne: "But not so odd/As those who choose/A Jewish God/But spurn the Jews.")
The continuing storyline in the Hebrew Scriptures is about a God who has chosen one of the smallest, least powerful and most obscure nations. The least expected. King David, their greatest king, started life as a shepherd, which was pretty near the bottom of the social ladder.
And the storyline of the Christian scriptures is about an obscure carpenter from a hick-town called Nazareth, born under questionable circumstances, who turns out to be God’s chosen one.
It’s a theme that occurs over and over again. In this passage, it is the Samaritan, the foreigner who comes back to thank Jesus – the one least expected.
Again and again this is demonstrated in the life and teachings of Jesus. “The first shall be last and the last shall be first.”
There’s a bundle of great resources on the Wood Lake Books website, including “Seasons of the Spirit” curriculum – which has material for all ages in the church. A few moments poking around on that site could be very fruitful.
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Rumors – I’m writing this on a Monday morning. I’ve just been across the street to check on a neighbor who has significant health problems – most of them age related. “I was looking out the back window,” he said. “It’s such a beautiful morning. There were some quail feeding on the lawn. I really love the soft browns and muted blacks in the feathers on their backs.”
Remember the old philosopher’s puzzle? If a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it, does it make a sound? Does sound exist apart from the hearing of it?
We talk of beauty and goodness and health and holiness, but I wonder. Do they exist if we do not notice? God has created all this wonder, but is it wonder if we humans do not notice that it is wonderful. Is it possible that the Samaritan leper’s gift to Jesus was that he noticed the wonder of his own healing – a sense of awe that Jesus described as faith?
Neither Bev nor I have green thumbs, but there are roses that bloom in our back yard in spite of our best efforts. Even this late in autumn the odd “last rose of summer” survives the cold nights and is covered with dew in the mornings. A few days ago Bev pointed out one blossom, opening in all its freshness, with subtle shades of red and pink and yellow.
Who but God could create such beauty? Or maybe God doesn’t create beauty at all. Maybe that rose was not beautiful at all until Bev noticed it. We often talk of being called to co-create the world with God, and that concept incorporates a whole lot of stuff. But surely, part of the meaning of that concept is that we are called to make the world beautiful by noticing the beauty.
What does it mean to be a person of faith? Too often we are told to accept a certain theological formula or creed or practice. But the story of the leper has me wondering. According to standard brand Jewish theology of the day, the Samaritan had it all wrong. But Jesus doesn’t check out his theological credentials. He simply says, “Your faith has made you well.”
Perhaps it was the despised Samaritan who noticed the beauty and wonder of his own healing – who was awake to the holiness of what had happened. Maybe that was the miracle Jesus had in mind when he said, “Your faith has made you well.”
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Soft Edges – by Jim Taylor
Marie-Lynn’s Triumph
When a hurricane destroys a city, when a mudslide buries a village, when a forest fire torches houses and wildlife, we tend to attribute it to an “Act of God.”
Based on insurance policies, you’d think God only does harmful things.
But there is another side.
You may have heard Marie-Lynn Hammond’s albums – or perhaps heard her singing on Stuart McLean’s Vinyl Cafe program on CBC. A co-founder of Stringband, Marie-Lynn has since gone solo. Critics have called her “one of Canada’s best singer-songwriters” – even if she’s not as famous as Sarah McLachlan.
Marie-Lynn is also an enthusiastic equestrian. On August 26, 2006, Marie-Lynn’s usually quiet horse suddenly and inexplicably began to buck – most likely because of a wasp sting. Marie-Lynn was thrown. She sustained five broken ribs, a fractured neck vertebra, and multiple breaks to her right collar-bone. Though she wore a helmet, she suffered a concussion, bleeding in the brain, and damage to a cranial nerve.
She has no memory of the accident. “My memories end just before my horse began to buck,” she says, “and resume about 30 minutes later as I was being loaded into the ambulance.”
Initially, she lost the sight of her right eye. Over the last year, and after endless rounds of therapy, most of that sight has returned, but with serious double-vision problems.
On August 26 – exactly one year after her accident – she went to another horse show. “I felt a need to revisit the scene,” she rationalized.
A friend found her a very gentle horse to ride.
“Originally I was simply going to enter a fun class, that didn’t demand any real riding skills,” Marie-Lynn told her friends, “but that class got cancelled. So I decided what the heck, I would enter English Pleasure (you are judged on how responsive and relaxed the horse and rider are at walk, trot and canter). The judge was informed of my situation, and told me if I felt unsteady or unsafe, I could simply come into the centre of the ring and sit out the remainder of the class.
“We won the class! When I heard them call my number, I was stunned, and then thrilled, and then I began to get all teary, as did many of my friends watching, some of whom had witnessed the accident. And then they began to cheer and holler, and I realized in the most viscerally happy way how far I'd come in a year.”
The judge assured Marie-Lynn that her disability had not influenced his choice: “He told me and others that I had won the class fair and square; he had not made any allowances for me.
“Red ribbons are not something I'm used to getting, so this one is especially precious.”
Whenever I read Marie-Lynn’s letters, I choke up. I get so used to hearing bad news that good news sneaks under my defences.
I think of Marie-Lynn’s triumph should be called an Act of God too.
If you have comments or questions about Jim’s column, write to him directly at jimt@quixotic.ca. Jim also does another weekly column called “Sharp Edges” which is published in our daily newspaper. It has a stronger political-social justice content. If you’d like to receive Sharp Edges, send Jim a note at the address above. Or go to Jim’s web page at: http://edges.canadahomepage.net/index.php . Click on Sharp Edges or Soft Edges or whatever else you might like to read.
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Good Stuff – This from Kausie White:
Six-year-old Tess went to her bedroom and pulled a glass jelly jar from its hiding place in the closet.
She poured the change out on the floor and counted it carefully. Three times.
Carefully placing the coins back in the jar and twisting on the cap, Tess slipped out the back door and made her way six blocks to the drug store.
She waited patiently for the pharmacist to give her some attention. But the pharmacist was busy talking to a well-dressed man.
Finally he spoke to her. “And what do you want?”
“I want to talk to you about my brother,” Tess answered “He's really, really sick, and I want to buy a miracle.”
“What did you say?” asked the pharmacist.
'His name is Andrew and he has something bad growing inside his head and my Daddy says only a miracle can save him now. So how much does a miracle cost?”
“We don't sell miracles here, little girl. I'm sorry but I can't help you,” the pharmacist said, softening a little
“I have the money to pay for it.”
The well dressed man who had been talking with the pharmacist stooped down to Tess’ eye level. “What kind of a miracle does your brother need?”
“I don't know,” Tess replied with her eyes welling up in tears. “I just know he's really sick and Mommy says he needs an operation. But my Daddy can't pay for it, so I want to use my money.”
“How much do you have?” asked the man.
“One dollar and eleven cents,” Tess said in a tiny voice. “It's all the money I have, but I can get some more if I need to.”
“Well, what a coincidence,” smiled the man. “A dollar and eleven cents – the exact price of a miracle for little brothers.”
He took her money from Tess. “Take me to where you live. I want to see your brother and meet your parents. Let's see if I have the miracle you need.”
That well dressed man was Dr. Carlton Armstrong, a neurosurgeon. The operation was completed free of charge and it wasn't long until Andrew was home again and doing well.
“That surgery,” her Mom whispered. “was a real miracle. I wonder how much it would have cost?”
Tess smiled. She knew. One dollar and eleven cents – plus the faith of a child.
A miracle is not the suspension of natural law, but the operation of a higher law.
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Bloopers, Boggles, Typos and Stuff – From the file:
* Sufficient unto the day is the evil eye thereof.
* Take my life and let it be, constipated Lord to thee.
* Thank you, dead friends.
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
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Wish I’d Said That! – If a person tries to fail and succeeds, which did they do?
author unknown via Velia Watts
Jesus listened and observed first, and then to those who needed healing, he gave healing, to those who were frozen against God's new thing, he gave the warmth of love and the fire of passion, and to those who were beaten down by an oppressive world, he gave encouragement and freedom.
Tom Ehrich via Mary of Bahrain
Velia Watts of Edmonton, Alberta, found these one liners on the web:
* In a Jam? God Preserve Us!
* Forget Big Brother, Speak to Our Father.
* The Ultimate F-Word is Forgiveness.
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We Get Letters – Evelyn McLachlan admits this is bad. “Which is why I had to send it to you!” she writes. Now I need to figure out if that was an insult or a compliment.
Did you see the recent story in the Jewish Chronicle about the theft of egg-enriched dough from a north London warehouse?
Unfortunately, the theft happened just before Shabbos and it forced many local bakeries to bake their challas with plain, white flour. A leading rabbi was quoted as saying, "I'm appalled by the rise in white challa crimes."
Chris McMullen sends a note offering a definition of that puzzling term we identified last week. He writes: “I assume that ‘litaurgo-theological’ words are those which have no identifiable meaning unless sung to the accompaniment of a guitar. Here are some examples: ‘Kumbaya’; ‘you are a part of the fa-mi-lee’, and, especially, ‘borning cry’.
Sharyl Peterson of Grand Junction, Colorado relates another incident in the category of sartorial slip-ups. Sharyl has a friend who “served a church that had an overactive heating system in winter, and no air-conditioning during the summer. So, she had developed a habit, while people were going through the line after worship, of unfastening the front of her alb, so she would be cooler.
“One summer day was unusually hot, and she decided that she would just wear underwear underneath her alb, rather than her usual "full kit" (underwear, dress, jacket).
“As folks were going through the line, she automatically reached up and ripped open the Velcro tabs holding her alb closed, letting it hang open – and didn't realize the full impact of what she'd done until the next man standing in line with his hand out froze, gaped at her, and turned bright red. At which point, she did, too!
“I'm not sure exactly what she did, but knowing her, I am guessing she laughed and handled it as gracefully.”
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Mirabile Dictu! – (Latin for “God split the Adam!”)
This from Peggy Neufeldt, who says these came from some “junior church students.”
However, the whole thing bears the marks of significant adult editing, including phrases from other items that have been circulating on the internet. But what the heck? They’re fun.
* In the beginning, which occurred near the start, there was nothing but God, darkness, and some gas. The Bible says, "The Lord thy God is one," but I think He must be a lot older than that. Anyway, God said, "Give me a light!" and someone did. Then God made the world.
* He split the Adam and made Eve. Adam and Eve were naked, but they weren't embarrassed because mirrors hadn't been invented yet. Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating one bad apple, so they were driven from the Garden of Eden. Not sure what they were driven in though, because they didn't have cars.
* Adam and Eve had a son, Cain, who hated his brother as long as he was Abel. Pretty soon all of the early people died off, except for Methuselah, who lived to be like a million or something.
* One of the next important people was Noah, who was a good guy, but one of his kids was kind of a Ham. Noah built a large boat and put his family and some animals on it. He asked some other people to join him, but they said they would have to take a rain check.
* After Noah came Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob was more famous than his brother, Esau, because Esau sold Jacob his birthmark in exchange for some pot roast. Jacob had a son named Joseph who wore a really loud sports coat.
* Another important Bible guy is Moses, whose real name was Charlton Heston. Moses led the Israel Lights out of Egypt and away from the evil Pharaoh after God sent ten plagues on Pharaoh's people. These plagues included frogs, mice, lice, bowels, and no cable. God fed the Israel Lights every day with manicotti. Then He gave them His Top Ten Commandments. These include don't lie, cheat, smoke, dance, or covet your neighbor's stuff. Oh, yeah, I just thought of one more: Humor thy father and thy mother.
* One of Moses' best helpers was Joshua who was the first Bible guy to use spies. Joshua fought the battle of Geritol and the fence fell over on the town.
* After Joshua came David. He got to be king by killing a giant with a slingshot. He had a son named Solomon who had about 300 wives and 500 porcupines. My teacher says he was wise, but that doesn't sound very wise to me. After Solomon there were a bunch of major league prophets. One of these was Jonah, who was swallowed by a big whale and then barfed up on the shore. There were also some minor league prophets, but I guess we don't have to worry about them.
* After the Old Testament came the New Testament. Jesus is the star of the New Testament. He was born in Bethlehem in a barn. (I wish I had been born in a barn, too, because my mom is always saying to me, "Close the door! Were you born in a barn" It would be nice to say, "As a matter of fact, I was.") During His life, Jesus had many arguments with sinners like the Pharisees and the Republicans. Jesus also had twelve opossums. The worst one was Judas Asparagus. Judas was so evil that they named a terrible vegetable after him.
* Jesus was a great man. He healed many leopards and even preached to some Germans on the Mount. But the Republicans and all those guys put Jesus on trial before Pontius the Pilot. Pilot didn't stick up for Jesus. He just washed his hands instead.
* Anyways, Jesus died for our sins, then came back to life again. He went up to Heaven but will be back at the end of the Aluminum. His return is foretold in the book of Revolution.
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Bottom of the Barrel – One day a mother and her eight-year-old daughter were walking along the beach, just at the water’s edge. Suddenly, a gigantic wave splashed up on the beach, and swept the little girl out to sea.
“Oh, God,” lamented the mother, turning her face toward heaven and shaking her fist. “This was my only baby. I can’t have more children. She is the love and joy of my life. I have cherished every day that she’s been with me. Give her back to me, and I’ll be in church every day for the rest of my life!!!!”
Suddenly, another gigantic wave flashed up and deposited the girl back on the sand. The mother looked up to heaven and said, “She was wearing a hat!!!!”
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