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No doubt many of our faithful are asking some theological questions as we witness the aftermath of the terrible earthquakes that have hit Japan this past week.†Where is God in all this?†How can a loving God let something like this happen?
A reporter once asked writer and holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel how, after the Holocaust, he could still believe in God.†Wiesel answered, "After the Holocaust, what else is there to believe in?"†Faith in God is that power which keeps us going when all other powers have been rendered powerless by the destructive forces of nature and the evil inclinations of humankind. It is the voice that pronounces the word "nevertheless" over all our trials.
* * *
This week's lectionary passages cluster around the biblical idea of faith. Probably the greatest passage of faith in the Bible is that wonderful passage in Hebrews 11. In a hard time of disillusionment and difficulty when apostasy was a serious problem for the struggling church, the author of Hebrews pens a written oratorio of faith. It begins: "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." This is followed, of course, by that great roll call of faith: Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, and on and on it goes. We could add our own roll call today, couldn't we? It's a list of people who dared to plod and go on against all sorts of difficulties: Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa, Archbishop Bernardin, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King -- and that little man in the house around the corner who lovingly attended his wife with Alzheimer's for years, and when she died took care in the same loving way of her sister. You might think of people in your own roll call of faith.
* * *
Writing for the National Journal in 2008, Ashley Johnson noted that "it's the broken promises that people often remember. In 1992, Clinton promised 'the most ethical administration' in history. His predecessor, George H.W. Bush, famously vowed 'No new taxes' in the run-up to the 1988 election, and then raised taxes while in office. Going back further, Franklin D. Roosevelt reneged on his 1932 campaign pledges to maintain a balanced budget and to cut government operations by 25%. Herbert Hoover ran in 1928 with the slogan 'Vote for prosperity' and predicted 'a final triumph over poverty'; the next year, the nation plunged into the Great Depression. 'Public cynicism is a real response to the gap between promises and performance,' said Stephen Wayne, a professor of government at Georgetown University. 'Promises have gotten larger and more extensive. And from the point of view of the public, the achievements haven't been there.' "
We learn from Abraham's experience that God always keeps God's promises; therefore we can live by faith and not the cynicism that professor Wayne speaks of.
* * *
How is faith different from belief?
Belief requires nothing from us but intellectual assent.†When we affirm that an assertion is in fact the case that affirmation happens in our brains but nowhere else.
Faith requires action. To have faith is to do something.
I can, for instance, believe that you can push me across Niagara Falls on a tightrope in a wheelbarrow without doing anything to test or prove that belief.†Faith is getting in the wheelbarrow.
The proof of Abram's faith is found in Genesis 12:4.†Three words: "So Abram went."
* * *
Martin Luther has been quoted as saying: "It should be noted that there are two ways of believing. One way is to believe about God, as I do when I believe that what is said of God is true; just as I do when I believe what is said about the Turk, the devil, or hell. This faith is knowledge or observation rather than faith. The other way is to believe in God, as I do when I not only believe that what is said about Him is true, but put my trust in Him, surrender myself to Him, and make bold to deal with Him, believing without doubt that he will be to me and do to me just was what is said of Him."
* * *
What Is Your Word Worth?
In Huntingburg, Indiana, where my grandparents lived, there were only two car dealerships in the 1940s. One sold Fords, and the other sold Chevys.†During World War II it was nearly impossible to buy a new car, so when the war ended lots of customers (who had waited for several years) were ready to buy a car -- and my grandfather, Howard Clark, was one of them. That year the average price of a car was $1,400.
The story my grandmother told was that Howard went to the Ford dealer and priced a car, but said that after waiting so long he felt that he owed it to himself to check out the Chevys before he made up his mind.†"But," he told the Ford dealer, "if I buy a Ford I'll buy it from you."
Howard went to the Chevy dealer and after looking around decided he was going to buy the Ford -- but the Chevy dealer stopped him as he was leaving and told him, "My brother owns a Ford dealership in Jasper.†I can save you a hundred bucks on your price here in Huntingburg."
Grandma said that Howard didn't even miss a beat: "I gave him my word -- and my word is worth a whole lot more than a hundred bucks."
-- Dean Feldmeyer
* * *
Where Do You Go for Help?
In 1902 nine motor clubs met in Chicago to form the American Automobile Association. In 1903 AAA began its work campaigning on motorists' behalf for better and safer roadways by supporting federal legislation to establish the US Department of Transportation. In 1905 the first AAA map was produced and depicted roads on Staten Island, New York.†In 1915 AAA's "Men on Motorcycles" provided the first emergency road service.
Today, AAA is a federation of more than 50 affiliated clubs with some 1,100 offices in the United States and Canada serving more than 51 million members.†AAA annually distributes more than 90 million maps and 17 million TripTik customized routings.†And today, the American Automobile Association operates a network of 13,500 contract towing facilities that annually respond to more than 30 million roadside assistance calls.
Yet we can still say, with the Psalmist:†"My help is in the name of the Lord..."
* * *
Jim and I were canoeing in the boundary waters of Ontario with eight teenage boys, and we were lost.†The portage trail was supposed to be right about here but after passing up and down along the bank a dozen times we could not find it. Finally, there was nothing to do but get out of the canoes and walk along the shore looking for footprints where other canoeists had passed before.
After a while I heard Jim whistle and followed the sound.†When I found him, he was smiling and pointing to a tree.†On it was a piece of gum wrapper stuck to the tree with a wad of well-chewed gum.†Written on the wrapper was: "Trail here." We couldn't see the trail, but we walked another 20 feet or so and the underbrush cleared and there was the trail as plain as day.
The note directed us to the trail -- but we had to keep walking even when we couldn't see it.†"It depends on faith," says Paul to the Romans (4:16).
-- Dean Feldmeyer
* * *
One of the books that keeps me going is Tim Madigan's little book I'm Proud of You (Gotham Books, 2006). In 1995 Madigan was a reporter for the Fort Worth Star-Telegraph. He was given the assignment of interviewing the children's television icon Fred Rogers of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.
Even though Tim's writing career was flourishing, the rest of his life was in shambles. He was having trouble in almost every area of his life: spirituality, marriage, and personal relationships. His health was causing him a great deal of difficulty. He had never had a good relationship with his father and had never heard his father say he was proud of him.
So Madigan interviewed Mr. Rogers. In that conversation Fred Rogers began to ask Tim about his life. Over a period of months they kept in contact. Tim opened up his heart and let Rogers in. It was a remarkable relationship -- not one-way at all. Mr. Rogers would call or email Tim and find out how he was doing. After every conversation or email Mr. Rogers would always write "I'm proud of you."
That became the title of the book that Tim writes about his healing relationship with Mr. Rogers. He tells how his life slowly began to come together and how he was a different person. When someone has faith in us, it really has the capacity to change our lives.
* * *
There was a mother and her little son who stood looking at the huge marble statue of Christ that stands overlooking the city of Rio de Janeiro. As they looked, a low cloud cover driven by the wind blocked the view of Jesus. The statue, which had stood in contrast against the blue, blue sky, was hidden in the darkness of the clouds.
The little boy tugged at his mother's hand, "Look, Mommy, look! He was there when the clouds came. Will he be there when they go away?"
The mother looked up and the clouds and said to her son, "Yes, oh yes, of course, darling. He will be there when the clouds move away."
* * *
Several years ago David Herbert Donald published a book about Abraham Lincoln (Lincoln, Simon & Schuster, 1995). In that book he said: "Lincoln's belief that the 'Almighty has His own purposes' sustained him during a life of constant striving that might otherwise have crushed him. It helped rescue him from self-righteousness, allowed him to be forbearing when others made mistakes, and encouraged in him the realistic caution that served him and his country so well during its gravest crises."
* * *
The late Baptist minister Luther Jo Thompson told about a visitor to a small community who was so impressed by the radiant happiness of the woman that came to clean his hotel room. He asked her why she seemed so cheerful. She said it was because she was a Christian. The visitor asked her, "Do all the people around here enjoy their religion like you?"
She replied, "Them that has it does. That's the way you know they got it."
* * *
On one of my favorite poems are these lines by Patrick Overton, which come from his book The Learning Tree:
When we talk to the edge of all
the light we have
and take that step into the darkness
Of the unknown,
we must believe that one of two things
will happen --
There will be something solid for us
to stand on,
Or, we will be taught how to fly.
* * *
Many of us have been moved by the Oscar-winning film The King's Speech. Some time ago a British documentary of World War II was released. The man who struggled to conquer his stuttering, King George VI, spoke to his people when England was on the verge of experiencing one of her greatest military tragedies. This is what the king told his people: "I said to the man who stood at the gate of shadows, 'Give me a light that I may tread faithfully out into the dark unknown.' A voice replied, 'In order to find victory in the darkness, go in courage; and then put your hand in the hand of God. That will be better than having light and safer than knowing the way.' "
A reporter once asked writer and holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel how, after the Holocaust, he could still believe in God.†Wiesel answered, "After the Holocaust, what else is there to believe in?"†Faith in God is that power which keeps us going when all other powers have been rendered powerless by the destructive forces of nature and the evil inclinations of humankind. It is the voice that pronounces the word "nevertheless" over all our trials.
* * *
This week's lectionary passages cluster around the biblical idea of faith. Probably the greatest passage of faith in the Bible is that wonderful passage in Hebrews 11. In a hard time of disillusionment and difficulty when apostasy was a serious problem for the struggling church, the author of Hebrews pens a written oratorio of faith. It begins: "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." This is followed, of course, by that great roll call of faith: Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, and on and on it goes. We could add our own roll call today, couldn't we? It's a list of people who dared to plod and go on against all sorts of difficulties: Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa, Archbishop Bernardin, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Martin Luther King -- and that little man in the house around the corner who lovingly attended his wife with Alzheimer's for years, and when she died took care in the same loving way of her sister. You might think of people in your own roll call of faith.
* * *
Writing for the National Journal in 2008, Ashley Johnson noted that "it's the broken promises that people often remember. In 1992, Clinton promised 'the most ethical administration' in history. His predecessor, George H.W. Bush, famously vowed 'No new taxes' in the run-up to the 1988 election, and then raised taxes while in office. Going back further, Franklin D. Roosevelt reneged on his 1932 campaign pledges to maintain a balanced budget and to cut government operations by 25%. Herbert Hoover ran in 1928 with the slogan 'Vote for prosperity' and predicted 'a final triumph over poverty'; the next year, the nation plunged into the Great Depression. 'Public cynicism is a real response to the gap between promises and performance,' said Stephen Wayne, a professor of government at Georgetown University. 'Promises have gotten larger and more extensive. And from the point of view of the public, the achievements haven't been there.' "
We learn from Abraham's experience that God always keeps God's promises; therefore we can live by faith and not the cynicism that professor Wayne speaks of.
* * *
How is faith different from belief?
Belief requires nothing from us but intellectual assent.†When we affirm that an assertion is in fact the case that affirmation happens in our brains but nowhere else.
Faith requires action. To have faith is to do something.
I can, for instance, believe that you can push me across Niagara Falls on a tightrope in a wheelbarrow without doing anything to test or prove that belief.†Faith is getting in the wheelbarrow.
The proof of Abram's faith is found in Genesis 12:4.†Three words: "So Abram went."
* * *
Martin Luther has been quoted as saying: "It should be noted that there are two ways of believing. One way is to believe about God, as I do when I believe that what is said of God is true; just as I do when I believe what is said about the Turk, the devil, or hell. This faith is knowledge or observation rather than faith. The other way is to believe in God, as I do when I not only believe that what is said about Him is true, but put my trust in Him, surrender myself to Him, and make bold to deal with Him, believing without doubt that he will be to me and do to me just was what is said of Him."
* * *
What Is Your Word Worth?
In Huntingburg, Indiana, where my grandparents lived, there were only two car dealerships in the 1940s. One sold Fords, and the other sold Chevys.†During World War II it was nearly impossible to buy a new car, so when the war ended lots of customers (who had waited for several years) were ready to buy a car -- and my grandfather, Howard Clark, was one of them. That year the average price of a car was $1,400.
The story my grandmother told was that Howard went to the Ford dealer and priced a car, but said that after waiting so long he felt that he owed it to himself to check out the Chevys before he made up his mind.†"But," he told the Ford dealer, "if I buy a Ford I'll buy it from you."
Howard went to the Chevy dealer and after looking around decided he was going to buy the Ford -- but the Chevy dealer stopped him as he was leaving and told him, "My brother owns a Ford dealership in Jasper.†I can save you a hundred bucks on your price here in Huntingburg."
Grandma said that Howard didn't even miss a beat: "I gave him my word -- and my word is worth a whole lot more than a hundred bucks."
-- Dean Feldmeyer
* * *
Where Do You Go for Help?
In 1902 nine motor clubs met in Chicago to form the American Automobile Association. In 1903 AAA began its work campaigning on motorists' behalf for better and safer roadways by supporting federal legislation to establish the US Department of Transportation. In 1905 the first AAA map was produced and depicted roads on Staten Island, New York.†In 1915 AAA's "Men on Motorcycles" provided the first emergency road service.
Today, AAA is a federation of more than 50 affiliated clubs with some 1,100 offices in the United States and Canada serving more than 51 million members.†AAA annually distributes more than 90 million maps and 17 million TripTik customized routings.†And today, the American Automobile Association operates a network of 13,500 contract towing facilities that annually respond to more than 30 million roadside assistance calls.
Yet we can still say, with the Psalmist:†"My help is in the name of the Lord..."
* * *
Jim and I were canoeing in the boundary waters of Ontario with eight teenage boys, and we were lost.†The portage trail was supposed to be right about here but after passing up and down along the bank a dozen times we could not find it. Finally, there was nothing to do but get out of the canoes and walk along the shore looking for footprints where other canoeists had passed before.
After a while I heard Jim whistle and followed the sound.†When I found him, he was smiling and pointing to a tree.†On it was a piece of gum wrapper stuck to the tree with a wad of well-chewed gum.†Written on the wrapper was: "Trail here." We couldn't see the trail, but we walked another 20 feet or so and the underbrush cleared and there was the trail as plain as day.
The note directed us to the trail -- but we had to keep walking even when we couldn't see it.†"It depends on faith," says Paul to the Romans (4:16).
-- Dean Feldmeyer
* * *
One of the books that keeps me going is Tim Madigan's little book I'm Proud of You (Gotham Books, 2006). In 1995 Madigan was a reporter for the Fort Worth Star-Telegraph. He was given the assignment of interviewing the children's television icon Fred Rogers of Mister Rogers' Neighborhood.
Even though Tim's writing career was flourishing, the rest of his life was in shambles. He was having trouble in almost every area of his life: spirituality, marriage, and personal relationships. His health was causing him a great deal of difficulty. He had never had a good relationship with his father and had never heard his father say he was proud of him.
So Madigan interviewed Mr. Rogers. In that conversation Fred Rogers began to ask Tim about his life. Over a period of months they kept in contact. Tim opened up his heart and let Rogers in. It was a remarkable relationship -- not one-way at all. Mr. Rogers would call or email Tim and find out how he was doing. After every conversation or email Mr. Rogers would always write "I'm proud of you."
That became the title of the book that Tim writes about his healing relationship with Mr. Rogers. He tells how his life slowly began to come together and how he was a different person. When someone has faith in us, it really has the capacity to change our lives.
* * *
There was a mother and her little son who stood looking at the huge marble statue of Christ that stands overlooking the city of Rio de Janeiro. As they looked, a low cloud cover driven by the wind blocked the view of Jesus. The statue, which had stood in contrast against the blue, blue sky, was hidden in the darkness of the clouds.
The little boy tugged at his mother's hand, "Look, Mommy, look! He was there when the clouds came. Will he be there when they go away?"
The mother looked up and the clouds and said to her son, "Yes, oh yes, of course, darling. He will be there when the clouds move away."
* * *
Several years ago David Herbert Donald published a book about Abraham Lincoln (Lincoln, Simon & Schuster, 1995). In that book he said: "Lincoln's belief that the 'Almighty has His own purposes' sustained him during a life of constant striving that might otherwise have crushed him. It helped rescue him from self-righteousness, allowed him to be forbearing when others made mistakes, and encouraged in him the realistic caution that served him and his country so well during its gravest crises."
* * *
The late Baptist minister Luther Jo Thompson told about a visitor to a small community who was so impressed by the radiant happiness of the woman that came to clean his hotel room. He asked her why she seemed so cheerful. She said it was because she was a Christian. The visitor asked her, "Do all the people around here enjoy their religion like you?"
She replied, "Them that has it does. That's the way you know they got it."
* * *
On one of my favorite poems are these lines by Patrick Overton, which come from his book The Learning Tree:
When we talk to the edge of all
the light we have
and take that step into the darkness
Of the unknown,
we must believe that one of two things
will happen --
There will be something solid for us
to stand on,
Or, we will be taught how to fly.
* * *
Many of us have been moved by the Oscar-winning film The King's Speech. Some time ago a British documentary of World War II was released. The man who struggled to conquer his stuttering, King George VI, spoke to his people when England was on the verge of experiencing one of her greatest military tragedies. This is what the king told his people: "I said to the man who stood at the gate of shadows, 'Give me a light that I may tread faithfully out into the dark unknown.' A voice replied, 'In order to find victory in the darkness, go in courage; and then put your hand in the hand of God. That will be better than having light and safer than knowing the way.' "
