iHOPE

The Cold Stone Connection

 What does Cold Stone's ice cream and the Bible have in common? Plenty, it turns out.
  Last Wednesday night was the last of our Pioneer Club for the season.  My part in it is to help our kids memorize scripture verses and the books of the Bible.  When one of our kids memorizes all 66 books of the Bible, they get their name on the '66 Club' plaque.  What do they get when they memorize scripture verses?
  Ice Cream.
  Typically there are 7 scripture verses on a page. My deal with them is when they memorize all seven scriptures, I'll take them to Cold Stone's for ice cream.  Its a great way to memorize scripture and have fun together.
  Last Wednesday we had LOTS of fun!  Because it was the last week of the season, the push was on to finish all the verses on the page (some kids are working on their third or fourth page of scriptures). By the end of the night, there were 16 kids who had earned a trip to Cold Stone's!
  It was a great way to end the season and a testament to the great work Jami Lewis and all the people involved with Pioneer Club are doing.

Sabbath Rest: Part 3

  There seems to be two schools of thought about what it means to be 'good' and nowhere are they more distinct than when it comes to observing the Sabbath.

  In Jesus' day, the Sabbath was a BIG thing.  There were laws and codes that pertained to every aspect of what was- and wasn't, permitted on the Sabbath.  One of the reasons Jesus was in such sharp conflict with the religious authorities of the day was because he consistently 'violates' the Sabbath by healing people on that day.

  One school of thought defines being 'good' by all the things you are to avoid. You are 'good' when you don't do anything 'bad'. If you avoided breaking any of the laws and regulations concerning the sabbath, you were 'good.'  That is one school of thought and it is still true today that the child who stays out of trouble and is quiet in class is considered a 'good student.'

  Jesus seemed to have another version of what the Sabbath was all about.  For him, the purpose of 'resting' was not a command to do nothing, but to eliminate the lesser, more urgent things that occupy our days, so that we could attend to the higher work of God. This included mercy, compassion and love.There is never a time to abstain from these things, for these reflect the very heart of God.  In fact the purpose of the sabbath was to reorient ourselves to what was important to God so we could be mindful of those things throughout the rest of the week.

  For Jesus, the sabbath was created to highlight and encourage the things that make us human. Its a day to call us away from  the activities that make us merely 'human doings' and remind us that we are 'human beings.'

 

Sabbath Rest: Part 2

  I've been thinking about the Sabbath and how to 'keep it holy'. In his book, The Dangerous Act of Worship, Mark Labberton describes the purpose of the Sabbath:

Every seven days they (the people of Israel) were to rest.  God's call for Israel to practice sabbath living was given so they would never be more than six days away from laying down the implements and practices of their own productivity in order to acknowledge that human life was set within a limited boundary of time, place and responsibility. The sabbath practice was meant  to be an exercise of human freedom and liberty. 
  Acknowledging these boundaries sets us free to be human. The message is this: prepare for the sabbath; go to sleep and wake up knowing that your life and the world do not belong to you or depend on you; worship God, and remember with his people the One who made you and the world, and called you his own; don't work; don't rely on your provision; then live this out today and every day of the week..."

 In other words, setting aside one day of the week is a way of acknowledging your own limits as a human and declaring your dependence (and freedom) is on God.  The common tendency is to think that if we just worked a little harder or a little smarter or if we just had a little more time, we could accomplish what we want to. The truth is, we could work harder, smarter and have an extra day of the week, but we still won't accomplish what all that we want.

  If we make the command to 'keep the Sabbath holy' nothing more than a list of things we can or can't do, we have missed the point.  That is what the Pharisees did (and you know what Jesus had to say about them!). The point of the Sabbath was to release us from the tyranny of always having to do more so that we can find our rest in what God has already done and prepare for what God is yet to do. If we do that, the sabbath doesn't become the exception to the rest of the week, but a preparation for it.

Sabbath Rest: Part 1

Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.

  (Exodus 20:8)

  How do you keep the Sabbath?  Other than "You shall have no other gods before me", keeping the Sabbath holy may be the most violated of the 10 commandments (and there is a connection).

   In our Bible Study on Thursday, the subject came up again and we compared how we 'kept the Sabbath' when we were growing up. Some of the things we heard were:

• Sunday was a day for family. We couldn't go out and play with friends that day.
• No working on Sunday
• Sunday is for church and religious education.
• No shopping on Sunday.

  Some of us remembered the controversies when stores began to be open and movies theaters were allowed to do business on Sundays. Some of the restrictions were  very confining and no one expressed a desire to go back to the 'good old days' when there were rigid rules and laws that governed what you could- and couldn't, do on Sunday.

  Is the concept of Sabbath outmoded and frumpy?  Is there a way to keep the Sabbath 'holy' without making it 'horrible'?    How do you keep the Sabbath?

"Dangerous Worship": pt. 2

  Mark Labberton's book, The Dangerous Act of Worship has me thinking about worship in new ways. One of the most challenging questions he uses to open  his book is, "Are we putting people to sleep in worship?"

  Usually that question conjures up someone who gets drowsy during a less-than-engaging sermon.  Mark's question goes deeper than that.  Here's how Mark puts it:

The crisis the church currently faces is that our individual and corporate worship do not produce the fruit of justice and righteousness that God seeks...The heart of the battle over worship is this:  our worship practices are separated from our call to justice and worse, foster the self-indulgent tendencies of our culture rather than nurturing the self-sacrificing life of the kingdom of God.  We are asleep. Nothing is more important than for us to wake up and practice the dangerous act of worship, living God's call to justice." (pp.22-23)

  So, is our worship lulling us to sleep by not waking us up to the reality of God's presence and passion for the world?  

"Dangerous Worship"

  One of the most interesting books I've read in 2008 is The Dangerous Act of Worship by Mark Labberton.  Mark is the Pastor at 1st  Presbyterian Church of Berkeley, a beacon for what a church can and should be for decades.  After reading this book, it is easy to see why.

  There has been a lot of conversation and controversy in the church over the last 30 years about whether the worship style should be Contemporary or Traditional. We have had some of the same conversations around New Hope.  It is a good question to wrestle with, but Labberton reminds us the the most important question is not the style of worship but the purpose of worship. 

  Here's a quote:

Somehow the God we name, the music we sing, the prayers we offer, and the Scripture we hear read and preached, has to call us deeper into God's heart and deeper into the world for which Christ died. (p.35)

  I'm convinced worship can be Contemporary, Traditional, Emergent, Blended or any number of different labels- and still be worship.  The real question of our worship is whether or not it helps to shape and form our lives so that we are better able to be God's people the rest of the week.

  More to come in the future, but all thoughts concerning worship are welcome.

 

Lomagundi Clinic

  The Internet is an amazing thing. It allows people to transcend distance and time zones.

  The latest example is what some folks in our Presbytery did to promote a new partnership in Zimbabwe. Much as we have done in the Murewa district (in northeast Zimbabwe), several churches are trying to do in the western part of the country around Chenyoi. 

  How do you get the word out in a way that people can quickly and easily see and hear?  How do you let the people of that region speak for themselves?  The answer is below.

  Julia Henderson is part of the Brighton congregation and she has done some tremendous things over the years to connect with the people and their needs in Zimbabwe. She currently chairs a committee I serve on called, the "Partnership of Zimbabwe and Denver Presbyteries" (PZDP).  The last time she was in Zimbabwe, she brought her video camera.  When she got home, a neighbor edited into a short video presentation.  In order to get it out to the most people in the least amount of time, they used YouTube. I love the creativity that constantly seeks to find ways to get the message out. More than that, I love the indomitable spirit of our brothers and sisters in Zimbabwe who find ways to 'do more' when others want to give up.

  Because it is 13 minutes long, it had to be broken into two segments. Click on the links below to see what is going on in the Lomagundi Clinic.

Zimbabwe Clinic: Part 1

Zimbabwe Clinic: Part 2

Correction: We Are NOT #1

  I need to make a correction about a statistic I mentioned in the sermon (2/3). I recounted a conversation with Leslie about suicide rates in Douglas County and I misquoted her. I said that Douglas County had the highest suicide rate in the country.  In fact, it does not.  What I should have said was that the suicide rate in Douglas County was above the national average.
  The mistake was mine. I mixed up that statistic with a couple others and ended up giving out false information and I wanted to correct it for a couple of reasons:

1. Its good news that we don't lead the nation in suicide rates
2. It is a serious enough of a problem that we are still above the national average and I don't need  to sensationalize with inflated numbers.
3. The stats were wrong.

For more information about suicide prevention in Colorado you can follow this link:Colorado Suicide Report