You've Got To Be Kidding
Stories
Object:
Contents
"You've Got to Be Kidding" by C. David McKirachan
"Master at the Craft" by C. David McKirachan
"Do Right or Do Good" by Frank Ramirez
* * * * * * *
You've Got to Be Kidding
by C. David McKirachan
Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7
Every Sunday we pray for our armed forces. We pray that in the midst of hell they not lose themselves, and that they come home whole. There's nothing difficult about that. Even hawks approve of it. Sometimes this Christian thing is hard for them. "Blessed are the peacemakers" and all that. But cheek to jowl with the prayer for our men and women in uniform is a prayer that is difficult. "Lord bless our enemies. Bless those who would do us harm." I know it's not good for the endowment fund, but we're kind of stuck with it. You know, Jesus and all that.
Vengeance is one of the most natural impulses we have. You hurt me or mine, you threaten me or mine, and you are going to pay. This business of treating your enemies like they deserve anything but sugar in their gas tank, an anonymous call to their boss about what they do with their wife, a few boxes of jello in their Jacuzzi. You get the drift. Now everybody knows, these are merciful reactions. Bodily harm is inappropriate. You might get caught. Vengeance is all about inflicting ongoing pain. Jesus just didn't understand.
I've heard some interesting curses. They have little to do with spiritual categories. They have to do with wishing discomfort, anxiety, and pain on those who have intruded on our normality and left us with any of the above. This letter from Jeremiah was received with slaps to the forehead, rolling of eyes, and a withdrawal of support for the capital fund. These nasty barbarians had conquered, killed, and enslaved our nation. Where the heck did this wild-eyed prophet get off telling the chosen people to be nice, to support, and to seek the welfare of these unclean, arrogant Babylonians? You may as well tell Yankee fans to be glad the Red Sox are doing so well. How dare you?
Too often we forget that the love of God is not about some pure, nice world. It is about the hard and painful realities of life. It's not about living apart from the world. It's about living in the world and accepting the gift of this life and all its opportunities. Vengeance cuts off those opportunities. It wastes energy and time. It allows the pain of the past to continue to live and flourish and dominate the present. It makes us victims cemented into patterns of loss and retribution. It is never done and so never allows us to move beyond then to any sort of new day.
Jeremiah spoke God's truth to his people. Evidently they listened to the wild man. They did flourish. May we learn the lesson of the prophet, and the lesson of our Lord. I think they know what they're talking about. Except for the Red Sox thing, that's just unnatural.
Master at the Craft
by C. David McKirachan
2 Timothy 2:8-15
I’ve been doing this ministry thing since... it seems since biblical times. My memories are artifacts that I excavate from the comings and goings of this present day. They could fill a museum. There are many difficult parts about aging. We creak when we stand up after sitting for a while. We run out of energy more quickly than we’d like. We aren’t as good with our thumbs as anyone below the age of 15. Our arms are too short to read things without glasses. But there are good things as well.
One of those is a sense of confidence about the craft of ministry. Forty years of practice really does help. Those of us that have been at it a while have seen situations come and go repeatedly. We’ve confronted shortages and resulting panics, we’ve been confronted by angry, suicidal, addicted, disappointed, grieving, homeless, excluded, sick, dying, betrayed, cynical, arrogant, hopeless, seductive, bipolar, schizophrenic, sociopathic, terrified, nasty, immature people (that being a partial list). And we’ve lived through it all. We’ve designed classes, stewardship campaigns, worship services, mission projects, funerals, weddings, sermons, receptions, roasts, and banners. We’ve moved furniture, recalcitrant people, mountains of books, and the hearts and minds of congregations. And we’ve made it through despair, poverty, death, loss, terror, and being wrong, coming out the other side with some scars and a lot of gratitude.
An incredible amount of learning goes along with all that experience. It is a gift to be here, with all of that to support and inform the now of life. But there is more than that. This job is about more than skill at diplomacy and knowing when to cut and run. It is more than being good at working a room. At the core of our work is a deep consciousness of being owned by that which is so far beyond our philosophy or theology or business sense as to be unknowable except through grace. And the older this old war horse gets, the more I rely on that grace to provide what my skill or experience cannot. I am His. That’s my bottom line. That’s my credential. That’s my ground of being. That’s my ultimate concern.
C. David McKirachan is pastor of the Presbyterian Church at Shrewsbury in central New Jersey. He also teaches at Monmouth University. McKirachan is the author of I Happened Upon a Miracle and A Year of Wonder (Westminster John Knox).
Do Right or Do Good
by Frank Ramirez
Luke 17:11-19
When (Jesus) saw them, he said to them, "Go and show yourselves to the priests." And as they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice.
-- Luke 17:14-15
It's sometimes forgotten that in the story of the healing of ten lepers, the one leper who comes in for special praise because he returned to give thanks, actually disobeyed Jesus, who ordered the group to present themselves to the priests in the temple. Odd as it may sound, there are occasions when it is better to do good instead of doing right.
When Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast in 2005, it was so powerful that it erased for many the memory of other, similar disasters that struck in previous years. But Hurricane Camille, which made landfall near the mouth of the Mississippi River on the night of August 17, 1969, was one of the only three Category 5 storms to strike the United States during the twentieth century.
It is believed the storm struck the Gulf Coast with winds of 190 miles per hour as ten to eleven inches of rain fell in no time, but that is impossible to accurately determine because it was so powerful it destroyed all the measuring equipment.
As a result of that storm 259 people died -- some of them as far inland as the Appalachians Mountains of Virginia, where there was extensive flooding and damage even as the storm slowed traveling over the countryside. In terms of 2013 dollars the storm did nine billion dollars of damage.
It wasn't long before relief workers flooded in from all over the country to help repair damage. Christians worked ecumenically to make sure the people who lost homes and all they owned were helped in as quick a manner as possible.
One of the crews, which included eleven members of the Church of the Brethren, worked under the umbrella of the Mennonite Disaster Services. They were assigned to Pass Christian, Mississippi, one of the poorest communities in one of the poorest states.
The crew was so moved by the conditions of those who had lost everything that they worked through channels to set up a separate project. That's when they ran up against an administrative problem.
It was the policy of the government relief agencies to restore homes to what was officially known as "pre-disaster conditions." This upset the relief workers because many of the homes had been little more than shacks before they'd been destroyed.
It was especially troubling to them that most of the homes didn't even have indoor plumbing. The Christian workers didn't want to just restore the homes. Wasn't it good stewardship, after all, if money was being spent, to improve the homes? But the authorities were very clear. They were told they could not install indoor plumbing if a home had been without before the storm hit.
That's when one of the workers hit on a solution that was not exactly the truth but at least involved telling no lies. He found an old used toilet and some piping among the rubble. After that, whenever the crew arrived at the ruins of a home, they tossed their treasures in a visible location and waited for government inspectors to come by. The inspectors would see the toilet resting among the ruins. The workers said nothing about it. The inspector would then approve, without comment (and without any of the workers volunteering any information about how it got there), the installation of indoor plumbing.
Later, the denominational director of the project found out what they were doing, laughed, and said, "Well, I would rather the government spend my taxes on indoor plumbing than weapons; however, I would prefer that you not do this." However, he didn't ask at other locations if this was still being done, and nobody brought up the subject themselves.
The leper in today's gospel story did not obey the letter of the law -- nor did he strictly obey Jesus! The aid workers may not have technically broken the law, but they certainly stretched it a bit. Sometimes, not often, but every once in a while, it just might be okay to choose to do good, rather than do what is technically right, in order to serve others in the name of Jesus.
Frank Ramirez has served as a pastor for nearly 30 years in Church of the Brethren congregations in Los Angeles, California; Elkhart, Indiana; and Everett, Pennsylvania. A graduate of LaVerne College and Bethany Theological Seminary, Ramirez is the author of numerous books, articles, and short stories. His CSS titles include Partners in Healing, He Took a Towel, The Bee Attitudes, three volumes of Lectionary Worship Aids, and Breakdown on Bethlehem Street.
*****************************************
StoryShare, October 13, 2013, issue.
Copyright 2013 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
"You've Got to Be Kidding" by C. David McKirachan
"Master at the Craft" by C. David McKirachan
"Do Right or Do Good" by Frank Ramirez
* * * * * * *
You've Got to Be Kidding
by C. David McKirachan
Jeremiah 29:1, 4-7
Every Sunday we pray for our armed forces. We pray that in the midst of hell they not lose themselves, and that they come home whole. There's nothing difficult about that. Even hawks approve of it. Sometimes this Christian thing is hard for them. "Blessed are the peacemakers" and all that. But cheek to jowl with the prayer for our men and women in uniform is a prayer that is difficult. "Lord bless our enemies. Bless those who would do us harm." I know it's not good for the endowment fund, but we're kind of stuck with it. You know, Jesus and all that.
Vengeance is one of the most natural impulses we have. You hurt me or mine, you threaten me or mine, and you are going to pay. This business of treating your enemies like they deserve anything but sugar in their gas tank, an anonymous call to their boss about what they do with their wife, a few boxes of jello in their Jacuzzi. You get the drift. Now everybody knows, these are merciful reactions. Bodily harm is inappropriate. You might get caught. Vengeance is all about inflicting ongoing pain. Jesus just didn't understand.
I've heard some interesting curses. They have little to do with spiritual categories. They have to do with wishing discomfort, anxiety, and pain on those who have intruded on our normality and left us with any of the above. This letter from Jeremiah was received with slaps to the forehead, rolling of eyes, and a withdrawal of support for the capital fund. These nasty barbarians had conquered, killed, and enslaved our nation. Where the heck did this wild-eyed prophet get off telling the chosen people to be nice, to support, and to seek the welfare of these unclean, arrogant Babylonians? You may as well tell Yankee fans to be glad the Red Sox are doing so well. How dare you?
Too often we forget that the love of God is not about some pure, nice world. It is about the hard and painful realities of life. It's not about living apart from the world. It's about living in the world and accepting the gift of this life and all its opportunities. Vengeance cuts off those opportunities. It wastes energy and time. It allows the pain of the past to continue to live and flourish and dominate the present. It makes us victims cemented into patterns of loss and retribution. It is never done and so never allows us to move beyond then to any sort of new day.
Jeremiah spoke God's truth to his people. Evidently they listened to the wild man. They did flourish. May we learn the lesson of the prophet, and the lesson of our Lord. I think they know what they're talking about. Except for the Red Sox thing, that's just unnatural.
Master at the Craft
by C. David McKirachan
2 Timothy 2:8-15
I’ve been doing this ministry thing since... it seems since biblical times. My memories are artifacts that I excavate from the comings and goings of this present day. They could fill a museum. There are many difficult parts about aging. We creak when we stand up after sitting for a while. We run out of energy more quickly than we’d like. We aren’t as good with our thumbs as anyone below the age of 15. Our arms are too short to read things without glasses. But there are good things as well.
One of those is a sense of confidence about the craft of ministry. Forty years of practice really does help. Those of us that have been at it a while have seen situations come and go repeatedly. We’ve confronted shortages and resulting panics, we’ve been confronted by angry, suicidal, addicted, disappointed, grieving, homeless, excluded, sick, dying, betrayed, cynical, arrogant, hopeless, seductive, bipolar, schizophrenic, sociopathic, terrified, nasty, immature people (that being a partial list). And we’ve lived through it all. We’ve designed classes, stewardship campaigns, worship services, mission projects, funerals, weddings, sermons, receptions, roasts, and banners. We’ve moved furniture, recalcitrant people, mountains of books, and the hearts and minds of congregations. And we’ve made it through despair, poverty, death, loss, terror, and being wrong, coming out the other side with some scars and a lot of gratitude.
An incredible amount of learning goes along with all that experience. It is a gift to be here, with all of that to support and inform the now of life. But there is more than that. This job is about more than skill at diplomacy and knowing when to cut and run. It is more than being good at working a room. At the core of our work is a deep consciousness of being owned by that which is so far beyond our philosophy or theology or business sense as to be unknowable except through grace. And the older this old war horse gets, the more I rely on that grace to provide what my skill or experience cannot. I am His. That’s my bottom line. That’s my credential. That’s my ground of being. That’s my ultimate concern.
C. David McKirachan is pastor of the Presbyterian Church at Shrewsbury in central New Jersey. He also teaches at Monmouth University. McKirachan is the author of I Happened Upon a Miracle and A Year of Wonder (Westminster John Knox).
Do Right or Do Good
by Frank Ramirez
Luke 17:11-19
When (Jesus) saw them, he said to them, "Go and show yourselves to the priests." And as they went, they were made clean. Then one of them, when he saw that he was healed, turned back, praising God with a loud voice.
-- Luke 17:14-15
It's sometimes forgotten that in the story of the healing of ten lepers, the one leper who comes in for special praise because he returned to give thanks, actually disobeyed Jesus, who ordered the group to present themselves to the priests in the temple. Odd as it may sound, there are occasions when it is better to do good instead of doing right.
When Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast in 2005, it was so powerful that it erased for many the memory of other, similar disasters that struck in previous years. But Hurricane Camille, which made landfall near the mouth of the Mississippi River on the night of August 17, 1969, was one of the only three Category 5 storms to strike the United States during the twentieth century.
It is believed the storm struck the Gulf Coast with winds of 190 miles per hour as ten to eleven inches of rain fell in no time, but that is impossible to accurately determine because it was so powerful it destroyed all the measuring equipment.
As a result of that storm 259 people died -- some of them as far inland as the Appalachians Mountains of Virginia, where there was extensive flooding and damage even as the storm slowed traveling over the countryside. In terms of 2013 dollars the storm did nine billion dollars of damage.
It wasn't long before relief workers flooded in from all over the country to help repair damage. Christians worked ecumenically to make sure the people who lost homes and all they owned were helped in as quick a manner as possible.
One of the crews, which included eleven members of the Church of the Brethren, worked under the umbrella of the Mennonite Disaster Services. They were assigned to Pass Christian, Mississippi, one of the poorest communities in one of the poorest states.
The crew was so moved by the conditions of those who had lost everything that they worked through channels to set up a separate project. That's when they ran up against an administrative problem.
It was the policy of the government relief agencies to restore homes to what was officially known as "pre-disaster conditions." This upset the relief workers because many of the homes had been little more than shacks before they'd been destroyed.
It was especially troubling to them that most of the homes didn't even have indoor plumbing. The Christian workers didn't want to just restore the homes. Wasn't it good stewardship, after all, if money was being spent, to improve the homes? But the authorities were very clear. They were told they could not install indoor plumbing if a home had been without before the storm hit.
That's when one of the workers hit on a solution that was not exactly the truth but at least involved telling no lies. He found an old used toilet and some piping among the rubble. After that, whenever the crew arrived at the ruins of a home, they tossed their treasures in a visible location and waited for government inspectors to come by. The inspectors would see the toilet resting among the ruins. The workers said nothing about it. The inspector would then approve, without comment (and without any of the workers volunteering any information about how it got there), the installation of indoor plumbing.
Later, the denominational director of the project found out what they were doing, laughed, and said, "Well, I would rather the government spend my taxes on indoor plumbing than weapons; however, I would prefer that you not do this." However, he didn't ask at other locations if this was still being done, and nobody brought up the subject themselves.
The leper in today's gospel story did not obey the letter of the law -- nor did he strictly obey Jesus! The aid workers may not have technically broken the law, but they certainly stretched it a bit. Sometimes, not often, but every once in a while, it just might be okay to choose to do good, rather than do what is technically right, in order to serve others in the name of Jesus.
Frank Ramirez has served as a pastor for nearly 30 years in Church of the Brethren congregations in Los Angeles, California; Elkhart, Indiana; and Everett, Pennsylvania. A graduate of LaVerne College and Bethany Theological Seminary, Ramirez is the author of numerous books, articles, and short stories. His CSS titles include Partners in Healing, He Took a Towel, The Bee Attitudes, three volumes of Lectionary Worship Aids, and Breakdown on Bethlehem Street.
*****************************************
StoryShare, October 13, 2013, issue.
Copyright 2013 by CSS Publishing Company, Inc., Lima, Ohio.
All rights reserved. Subscribers to the StoryShare service may print and use this material as it was intended in sermons, in worship and classroom settings, in brief devotions, in radio spots, and as newsletter fillers. No additional permission is required from the publisher for such use by subscribers only. Inquiries should be addressed to permissions@csspub.com or to Permissions, CSS Publishing Company, Inc., 5450 N. Dixie Highway, Lima, Ohio 45807.
