(a not very brief Lectionary reflection by Steve Orr ... in parts)
In the previous installments, I told you about sabotage and the labor situation in 1920, and then promised I would relate it to mustard seeds. To do that, I started writing about faith; specifically, "as much faith" as a mustard seed, and the guilt we experience because we don't seem to be able to perform to the standards (moving mountains with such a small amount of faith).
If we're being honest with ourselves, I think we can all agree that we tend to put "mustard seed faith" on the "No Can Do" list. Let's face it. It sounds so surreal! Who goes around moving mountains? And on top of that strangeness, why did Jesus use such an obscure metaphor? Yes, it IS small, but there are smaller things around. Jesus once used a mote (speck of dust) to suggest how picky we can be when searching out the sin in OTHER people's lives. A mote is a lot smaller than a mustard seed. Of course, if you are already feeling guilty about having too little faith, the mote thing doesn't help. Why not use a pebble? They were quite common in Jesus' time and have remained so. We would all recognize a pebble. In fact, if SIZE was all that mattered, Jesus could have chosen any number of small items which have endured right up until today: grain of salt, grain of wheat, speck of dirt, particle of sand, drop of rain.
I don't think anyone would accuse Jesus of being haphazard. It's really no stretch to believe he intentionally selected the mustard seed as the metaphor for effective faith. So what is it about mustard seeds? I think you see where this is going. It CAN'T be just a matter of size. There must be something about the mustard seed, itself; some inherent quality other than its size. Knowing more about them may help clear all this up.
First, Jesus himself tells us (Mark 4:31-32) a mustard seed "is the smallest seed you plant in the ground. Yet when planted it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds of the air can perch in its shade." That is how Jesus illustrated the Kingdom of God. And it can serve as a way we can view faith. When it is very small, we are to plant it; to initially shield it from the harsher elements by placing it in a nurturing environment, an environment designed to facilitate its growth.
The other side of this illustration is that the properly nurtured faith can grow into a very strong faith. Like the resulting mustard PLANT, it will not only grow larger than anything else in the garden of our lives, it can become SO large that others can find shelter, protection, and rest there. This is God at work in a most mighty way.
One more thing you may not know about a mustard seed is its inherent strength. And in this way, we are VERY like the little tyke.
But, what does any of this have to do with sabotage and the 1920 labor scene? Be here next time for the wrap-up where we tie it all together.
In the meantime, if you are in Waco Friday morning, join our little band at Cafe Cappuccino (8:00 a.m., downtown on 6th Street, near the Courthouse) for breakfast and a great time kicking around this week's Lectionary passages.
READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Proper 13 (18) (July 31, 2011)
Genesis 32:22-31 and Psalm 17:1-7, 15
Isaiah 55:1-5 and Psalm 145:8-9, 14-21
Romans 9:1-5
Matthew 14:13-21
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Wednesday, July 20, 2011
Sabotage and Mustard Seeds 2
(a not very brief Lectionary reflection by Steve Orr ... in parts)
Last time, I told you about sabotage and the labor situation in 1920, and then promised I would relate it to mustard seeds. For me to deliver on that promise, we first need to spend some time talking about faith; specifically, "as much faith" (Phillips) as a mustard seed.
If you look up Matthew 17:20, you will find a teaching of Jesus that most of us followers consider very difficult (if not impossible!) to accomplish. Right after Jesus casts out a demon, his followers ask why THEY couldn't cast of the same demon. His answer: "You have so little faith." He then says something that, to many of us, lands like a bomb. "I assure you that if you have as much faith as a grain of mustard seed, you can say to this hill ("mountain" in the NIV), 'Up you get and move over there!' and it will move --- you will find nothing is impossible."
When most people read that passage they immediately conclude it is impossible to have that kind of faith. Plus, they then feel bad about whatever faith they do have; it feels inadequate. Let me suggest that this conclusion derives more from how we interpret this passage than from Jesus' intended message. Here's my reasoning.
First, and this is key, when we read the Bible we must always keep in mind that the overwhelming majority of us are reading a translation; not the original language. I'm not looking to digress into controversy, here. All I want to suggest is that we have a tendency to interpret what we read in the Bible as RULES, as standards, as measures of performance. It's neater that way. The closer the Bible comes to being a list of rules, the tidier it is. And once we've been able to divide those rules into the "I guess I can do that" list and the "Oh, come on! Nobody can do THAT!" list, we give ourselves permission to ignore whatever is on the second list.
That WOULD be tidy except for one problem. We don't ALSO give ourselves permission to stop feeling guilty about it.
What do we do about THAT? ... More of the answer in the next installment.
In the meantime, if you are in Waco Friday morning, join our little band at Cafe Cappuccino (8:00 a.m., downtown on 6th Street, near the Courthouse) for breakfast and a great time kicking around this week's Lectionary passages.
READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Proper 12 (17) (July 24, 2011)
Genesis 29:15-28 and Psalm 105:1-11, 45b or Psalm 128
1 Kings 3:5-12 and Psalm 119:129-136
Romans 8:26-39
Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52
Last time, I told you about sabotage and the labor situation in 1920, and then promised I would relate it to mustard seeds. For me to deliver on that promise, we first need to spend some time talking about faith; specifically, "as much faith" (Phillips) as a mustard seed.
If you look up Matthew 17:20, you will find a teaching of Jesus that most of us followers consider very difficult (if not impossible!) to accomplish. Right after Jesus casts out a demon, his followers ask why THEY couldn't cast of the same demon. His answer: "You have so little faith." He then says something that, to many of us, lands like a bomb. "I assure you that if you have as much faith as a grain of mustard seed, you can say to this hill ("mountain" in the NIV), 'Up you get and move over there!' and it will move --- you will find nothing is impossible."
When most people read that passage they immediately conclude it is impossible to have that kind of faith. Plus, they then feel bad about whatever faith they do have; it feels inadequate. Let me suggest that this conclusion derives more from how we interpret this passage than from Jesus' intended message. Here's my reasoning.
First, and this is key, when we read the Bible we must always keep in mind that the overwhelming majority of us are reading a translation; not the original language. I'm not looking to digress into controversy, here. All I want to suggest is that we have a tendency to interpret what we read in the Bible as RULES, as standards, as measures of performance. It's neater that way. The closer the Bible comes to being a list of rules, the tidier it is. And once we've been able to divide those rules into the "I guess I can do that" list and the "Oh, come on! Nobody can do THAT!" list, we give ourselves permission to ignore whatever is on the second list.
That WOULD be tidy except for one problem. We don't ALSO give ourselves permission to stop feeling guilty about it.
What do we do about THAT? ... More of the answer in the next installment.
In the meantime, if you are in Waco Friday morning, join our little band at Cafe Cappuccino (8:00 a.m., downtown on 6th Street, near the Courthouse) for breakfast and a great time kicking around this week's Lectionary passages.
READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Proper 12 (17) (July 24, 2011)
Genesis 29:15-28 and Psalm 105:1-11, 45b or Psalm 128
1 Kings 3:5-12 and Psalm 119:129-136
Romans 8:26-39
Matthew 13:31-33, 44-52
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Sabotage and Mustard Seeds 1
(a not very brief Lectionary reflection by Steve Orr ... in parts)
The first year of the Roaring Twenties was a pretty good bellwether for the rest of the decade. 1920 was a year filled with all sorts of conflicts, excitements, and problems. World War I had ended a scant 13 months earlier, Prohibition had been in effect for a year, and the Communist Labor Party of America was just four months old. 1920 was the first year women voted in a presidential election (overwhelmingly Republican), and it was a bad year for baseball; the now infamous Chicago 8---players for the Chicago White Sox baseball team---were indicted for taking bribes to throw the 1919 World Series. Sports writers took to calling the team the Chicago Black Sox. They we're later acquitted, but were still banned from organized baseball for life ("Say it ain't so, Joe!"). It was the year Sinclair Lewis published Main Street, and it was a year of particularly strong labor unrest.
Labor unrest was certainly not new in 1920. Workers and owners had been in conflict for centuries. What set this year apart was A. Mitchell Palmer, the Attorney General under President Woodrow Wilson. Palmer wanted, more than anything, to be President. He wanted every American to believe unions were going to destroy our country, and that the only way to stop that destructive force was to elect him President. To this end he waged a relentless campaign against organized labor. Joe McCarthy must have been taking notes because it had all the earmarks of the 1950's Communist witch hunts. Suffice to say there was plenty of nastiness on BOTH sides of this conflict. This was long before civil rights, Miranda, probable cause, etc. Union members were treated badly, and many people at the time believed the behavior of Palmer's federal agents justified the retaliatory use of sabotage by labor supporters.
Sabotage. To most Americans in 1920 sabotage was a fairly new term. It was not very popular; mainly because the only context most had for it was that the Germans had employed sabotage in fighting the allies "over there." Union sabotages, however, while certainly destructive, rarely resulted in harm to people. The term itself seems to come from the French word for wooden shoe: sabot. Legend has it that the first use of sabot-age was among French workers early in the Industrial Revolution. A worker would throw one wooden shoe into the machinery as protest (against poor working conditions, against unemployment caused by machinery replacing humans, etc.). Like the proverbial monkey wrench, this shoe toss would bring the offending machine to a halt. Many an employer spent anxious hours "waiting for the other shoe to drop."
Perhaps you are staring to wonder what any of this has to do with mustard seeds, or, for that matter, with the Lectionary. Well, push on Pilgrim. Answers coming in future installments!
In the meantime, if you are in Waco Friday morning, join our little band at Cafe Cappuccino (8:00 a.m., downtown on 6th Street, near the Courthouse) for breakfast and a great time kicking around this week's Lectionary passages.
READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Proper 11 (16) (July 17, 2011)
Genesis 28:10-19a
Psalm 139:1-12, 23-24 or Isaiah 44:6-8
Psalm 86:11-17
Romans 8:12-25
Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43
The first year of the Roaring Twenties was a pretty good bellwether for the rest of the decade. 1920 was a year filled with all sorts of conflicts, excitements, and problems. World War I had ended a scant 13 months earlier, Prohibition had been in effect for a year, and the Communist Labor Party of America was just four months old. 1920 was the first year women voted in a presidential election (overwhelmingly Republican), and it was a bad year for baseball; the now infamous Chicago 8---players for the Chicago White Sox baseball team---were indicted for taking bribes to throw the 1919 World Series. Sports writers took to calling the team the Chicago Black Sox. They we're later acquitted, but were still banned from organized baseball for life ("Say it ain't so, Joe!"). It was the year Sinclair Lewis published Main Street, and it was a year of particularly strong labor unrest.
Labor unrest was certainly not new in 1920. Workers and owners had been in conflict for centuries. What set this year apart was A. Mitchell Palmer, the Attorney General under President Woodrow Wilson. Palmer wanted, more than anything, to be President. He wanted every American to believe unions were going to destroy our country, and that the only way to stop that destructive force was to elect him President. To this end he waged a relentless campaign against organized labor. Joe McCarthy must have been taking notes because it had all the earmarks of the 1950's Communist witch hunts. Suffice to say there was plenty of nastiness on BOTH sides of this conflict. This was long before civil rights, Miranda, probable cause, etc. Union members were treated badly, and many people at the time believed the behavior of Palmer's federal agents justified the retaliatory use of sabotage by labor supporters.
Sabotage. To most Americans in 1920 sabotage was a fairly new term. It was not very popular; mainly because the only context most had for it was that the Germans had employed sabotage in fighting the allies "over there." Union sabotages, however, while certainly destructive, rarely resulted in harm to people. The term itself seems to come from the French word for wooden shoe: sabot. Legend has it that the first use of sabot-age was among French workers early in the Industrial Revolution. A worker would throw one wooden shoe into the machinery as protest (against poor working conditions, against unemployment caused by machinery replacing humans, etc.). Like the proverbial monkey wrench, this shoe toss would bring the offending machine to a halt. Many an employer spent anxious hours "waiting for the other shoe to drop."
Perhaps you are staring to wonder what any of this has to do with mustard seeds, or, for that matter, with the Lectionary. Well, push on Pilgrim. Answers coming in future installments!
In the meantime, if you are in Waco Friday morning, join our little band at Cafe Cappuccino (8:00 a.m., downtown on 6th Street, near the Courthouse) for breakfast and a great time kicking around this week's Lectionary passages.
READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Proper 11 (16) (July 17, 2011)
Genesis 28:10-19a
Psalm 139:1-12, 23-24 or Isaiah 44:6-8
Psalm 86:11-17
Romans 8:12-25
Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43
Thursday, July 7, 2011
The Perfect Lectionary Reflection
The Perfect Lectionary Reflection
(a brief Lectionary reflection by Steve Orr)
I had the PERFECT Lectionary reflection for this week's passages. Just perfect. But, I can't find it. I wrote the piece several years ago to pair with Isaiah 55:10-11. Now, if I could just locate it, I would have the perfect little story to underscore God's message in the Isaiah passage. But, alas, that is not to be.
Isn't that just the thing? You have the perfect thought, the perfect word, the perfect idea, the perfect story to illustrate something from scripture; the VERY thing that will just make that passage spring to life for the reader; that little boost the scripture needs to settle deep into the heart of the reader where it will take root and produce spiritual fruit a hundredfold or more ... and you just can't quite produce it at the right moment. SO frustrating.
Nothing for it, though. I guess THIS week God's word will have to get by without my support ;-)
"For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it."
--Isaiah 55:10-11
LECTIONARY READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Proper 10 (15) (July 10, 2011)
Genesis 25:19-34
Psalm 119:105-112
Isaiah 55:10-13
Psalm 65:(1-8), 9-13
Romans 8:1-11
Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23
If you are in Waco Friday morning, join our group for breakfast and more of the foregoing at Cafe Cappuccino (8:00 a.m. - downtown on 6th near the Courthouse).
Enjoy!
Steve
(a brief Lectionary reflection by Steve Orr)
I had the PERFECT Lectionary reflection for this week's passages. Just perfect. But, I can't find it. I wrote the piece several years ago to pair with Isaiah 55:10-11. Now, if I could just locate it, I would have the perfect little story to underscore God's message in the Isaiah passage. But, alas, that is not to be.
Isn't that just the thing? You have the perfect thought, the perfect word, the perfect idea, the perfect story to illustrate something from scripture; the VERY thing that will just make that passage spring to life for the reader; that little boost the scripture needs to settle deep into the heart of the reader where it will take root and produce spiritual fruit a hundredfold or more ... and you just can't quite produce it at the right moment. SO frustrating.
Nothing for it, though. I guess THIS week God's word will have to get by without my support ;-)
"For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return there until they have watered the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and succeed in the thing for which I sent it."
--Isaiah 55:10-11
LECTIONARY READINGS FOR THE COMING WEEK
Proper 10 (15) (July 10, 2011)
Genesis 25:19-34
Psalm 119:105-112
Isaiah 55:10-13
Psalm 65:(1-8), 9-13
Romans 8:1-11
Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23
If you are in Waco Friday morning, join our group for breakfast and more of the foregoing at Cafe Cappuccino (8:00 a.m. - downtown on 6th near the Courthouse).
Enjoy!
Steve