Part of our annual conference program each year involves a teaching study led by a seminary professor. This year we have Dr. Elmer Colyer of Dubuque Theological Seminary in Iowa. Colyer gave a provocative presentation this morning on what the Methodist buzzword “connection” should mean for us. He said that the real underlying problem the United Methodist church faces in all of our conflicts is not a lack of discipline, but a lack of connection, because discipline is only effective... Read more
Like many annual conferences of the United Methodist Church, the Virginia Conference is considering a resolution to change the language in the Book of Discipline about homosexuality. In an effort to have a better conversation than convention hall speeches, about 300 of us gathered last night to listen to representatives from each side give speeches and then split up into groups of 8 to share our convictions and stories with each other. Our conversation gave me a lot of hope... Read more
The Virginia Conference of the United Methodist Church will be meeting next weekend in Hampton, Virginia. Among our business is a resolution to recommend omitting the Book of Discipline language around homosexuality. I’ve been dreading the series of angry speeches that will take place in an environment in which it’s impossible for authentic prayerful dialogue to occur. My colleague Tom Berlin has proposed that in lieu of the annual predictable polarizing legislative battle, we try to have some real conversations... Read more
This past Sunday, I preached about the way that Pentecost represents God’s rebellion against his people’s expectations, which I also blogged about earlier in the week. The miraculous sign of speaking in tongues in Acts 2 ends up becoming the evidence of the Holy Spirit’s work among the Gentiles in Acts 10 which ultimately allows for Gentiles to be incorporated into the body of Christ without first becoming Jews in Acts 15. There are three things we see about God’s... Read more
God wants us to be family. That is how I understand the purpose of Jesus’ cross and resurrection and the Holy Spirit’s mission to make us holy. I don’t believe that God is allergic to sin. I don’t believe that God has a “glory” he is obligated to worry about which is somehow at odds with his desire to bring every human being as deeply into his arms as we will allow. God’s glory is his family. I don’t believe... Read more
Yes, I said her. But on Pentecost you can do that. Jesus calls the one who sent him Father. Obviously, Jesus was a dude himself. But the Holy Spirit is at most gender-neutral and at best gender-bending, because the Holy Spirit makes both men and women prophesy, as Peter controversially declares on Pentecost. So God the Spirit can be “he” or “she,” even if you object to putting a “she” on God the Father or God the Son. This genderqueer... Read more
Two women stood before King Solomon in 1 Kings 3:16-28 with one baby, both claiming it was theirs. So Solomon offered to cut it in two. The woman who actually loved the baby was willing to give it up rather than see it die. The other woman had become so embittered by their argument that she didn’t care if the baby lived or died; what mattered to her was to see the other woman get punished so that they would both... Read more
I’ve noticed a gap between what feels right to say about the Bible in the abstract and what actually happens when we read the Bible as part of our daily discipleship. When many Christians talk about the Bible in the abstract, they talk as though it’s a collection of “perfectly clear” but tough to stomach rules that people don’t want to obey so they pull out words like “mystery” to justify their disobedience. It makes me wonder how much time... Read more
For the past several years, I’ve been working with a metaphor that I originally got from Augustine who talked about humanity being trapped in a giant ocean of sin he called the massa damnata. In an allegorical interpretation of Genesis 1, Augustine said that the separation of land and sea symbolized the creation of the body of Christ, an island where humanity could be rescued from the sea of wrath it was trapped in. So I call these two states... Read more
I need your help if you’re willing to listen to 45 minutes of music while you’re at work or at the gym this week. I am going to be collaborating with my favorite Pentecostal preacher Jonathan Martin at the Wild Goose Festival this year. We’re calling it a “rave sermon.” Jonathan will preach while I lay down the beats. The genre is more or less progressive trance with my own weird, not very trend-savvy idiosyncrasies and attention deficit problems. I... Read more
Mercy Not Sacrifice
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