"Maintaining the Sacred" by John Fitzgerald
"Being a Fool, Professionally" by C. David McKirachan
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Maintaining the Sacred
by John Fitzgerald
John 2:13-22
We can't help but feel sorry about misfortune that befell Uzzah of scripture. You do remember Uzzah? Just to refresh your memory, we are told in I Chronicles 13:9-11 that God's Wrath struck this man dead on account of his inadvertent touching the Ark of Covenant.
To the modern mind it seems strange that anyone would pay with their life by accidentally coming into contact with a holy object. Yet to ancient Israel it seemed perfectly reasonable for God in smiting someone who violated the Lord's holiness.
Perhaps why we do not understand the fate that undertook Uzzah is because of our complete removal from anything that speaks to the sacred. Hebrew people knew a God who could be a consuming fire filled with awe, wonder, power, and glory. Our sense of awe and wonder is reserved for science and technology.
No doubt we have made tremendous strides in the realm of modern medicine, communication, and technical achievements. Thanks to progress in these realms our lifestyle has improved one hundred fold when compared with pioneer ancestors. However, our fascination and reverence is focused now almost exclusively upon these fields.
In biblical times people knew a God who transcended any new discoveries made possible by scientific breakthrough. The Lord portrayed in scripture created heaven and earth. All glory and honor is due to the Holy One who gives life to everything in our universe.
Contrasting with the perspective of God's Word is is our current secular mind-set which acknowledges only that which can be conceived by the human mind. There is nothing considered holy or sacred in the culture of 21st Century America. We have watered everything down to the same common denominator with no vision of God's rule and reign in our world. Divine rule and reign can be witnessed in the commonplace. For instance, soon we shall be celebrating the new season of spring. What a great time all of us shall have in witnessing green grass, birds chirping, and more sunlight. Do we give credit to God for bringing back the renewal of warmth and growing things? The power and wonder of a Living Lord who gives birth to new life of every form often is far from our hearts. A better attitude to adopt is suggested in a poem by Cecil Alexander:
All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great an small,
All things wise and wonderful:
The Lord God made them all.
Each little flower that opens,
Each little bird that sings,
He made their glowing colors,
He made their tiny wings.
He gave us eyes to see them,
And lips that we might tell
How great is God Almighty,
Who has made all things well.
The Lent season is time to think anew about God's holiness and renounce a corrupt culture. Our scripture reading from John's Gospel took placed during a holy season for Jews. People of faith gathered in Jerusalem for Passover and remembered God's sacred witness in their life. In the midst of this sacred event Jesus saw God's Temple being transformed into a place of secular business.
The act of trampling upon a sacred place incited our Lord into an angry outburst of driving money changes out with a whip from God's House. The disciples of Jesus realized this action fulfilled what scripture predicted, "zeal for the Lord's house will consume me."
The Bible is teaching us here about sacred places and holy seasons. America today needs a new understanding of reverence and entering into the divine presence. Hopefully, we shall never be zapped like poor old Uzzah because of our disobedience. But our country will be much better off when there is a healthy dose of respect for God's glory.
John Fitzgerald lives in Leesburg, Ohio, with his wife Carolyn and has served as pastor at the Leesburg Friends Meeting for the past 27 years. Cornfield Cathedral (Fairway Press, 2013) is the second book authored by Pastor Fitzgerald. John has earned a Master's of Ministry Degree from the Earlham School of Religion in Richmond, Indiana.
Being a Fool, Professionally
by C. David McKirachan
1 Corinthians 1:18-25
I’ve heard my whole life that we have to take care of number one if we’re going to be anything. When I informed my brother in law that I was entering seminary he encouraged me with the sage words, “If you can’t do, teach. If you can’t teach, preach.” A teacher asked me why I hadn’t become a lawyer. “You shouldn’t have limited yourself to being a pastor.” And then throughout my ministry people have tut-tutted about the risky things I recommended that the church get into, like being inclusive, being peace makers, siding with the poor and the homeless, advocating for education in prisons. “You can’t expect to keep a church going if you get involved with all these crazy movements. You need to cultivate some big givers, some power brokers if you want your church to be significant in the community. What you’re doing is just plain foolish.”
My brother was known to attract trouble, or maybe he just went to the center of the conflicts in our society, race, war, poverty. His sense of the pastorate was to represent Christ and take his good news where it was most needed. He hung around with radicals like Martin Luther King Jr. So I guess I was using him as a model. Big brothers are good for that. He laughed a lot. I think he had a lot of joy because he felt at home being a fool. He used to tell me we had good company there.
Christ was a fool. You could even say God was a fool. On a number of occasions the big boss violated the basic rules of money and power. And Jesus was pretty consistent with his dad. Apple don’t fall far.
If we’re going to follow suit, I don’t think we have much choice about this kind of foolishness. Our big brothers and sisters in the faith are downright consistent in that category. Old and New Testament are full of people who went out on the worst limbs you can imagine and many times fell in very predictable ways. Just look at Paul. He was a prosperous leader. He had his trip together. And then he caught this Christianity thing like a bad case of the flue. It was all downhill from there.
When you come to think about it, it’s kind of our business to be fools. Take a look at the vows we take. Consider the person we follow and call Lord. Some Lord. Paul was downright nuts about it. He dug himself in and preached it to the world. No negotiation points, no exit strategies.
When you come to think about it my brother in law had a point. “Stumbling blocks and folly?” Not much of a strategy. A strange bunch we are.
Unless you like the company.
C. David McKirachan is pastor of the Presbyterian Church at Shrewsbury in central New Jersey. He also teaches at Monmouth University. Two of his books, I Happened Upon a Miracle and A Year of Wonder, have been published by Westminster John Knox Press. McKirachan was raised in a pastor's home and he is the brother of a pastor, and he has discovered his name indicates that he has druid roots. Storytelling seems to be a congenital disorder. He lives with his 21-year-old son Ben and his dog Sam.
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StoryShare, March 8, 2015, issue.
Copyright 2015 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
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