Month: November 2019

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1957

Every day, Garrison Keillor sends out a new edition of “The Writer’s Almanac.” He always begins each day’s post with a poem. Today’s poem was by Charles Simic and titled “Nineteen Thirty-eight.” Thinking about his poem written about the year of his birth, I recalled a piece I wrote a few years ago on the year I was born. I wrote this in prose, but wondered if it might be crafted into a poem?  Probably not this week… This piece originally appeared in my former blog. 

1957
Jeff Garrison

Ike II

I arrived at the Moore County Hospital, just outside of Pinehurst, on a Wednesday morning in mid-January 1957. The highways we drove home on through the Sandhills were all paved by then, but many of the county roads including the one we lived on were still dirt.   It was a simpler time.  Longleaf pines surrounded the highways and golf courses and small farms raising bright-leaf tobacco dotted the landscape. The Lower Little River was populated by my relatives. We were mostly descendants from Highlanders from Scotland and for us, tobacco was king (and still considered safe).  It sold for 59 cents a pound. Nearly a half million acres were raised in North Carolina, producing over 1700 pounds an acre. You can do the math.

In the same month I arrived, a meeting of African-American pastors led to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.  We’d hear more about them in the next decade as integration was moving into the forefront. Before the year was out, there’d be the incident in Little Rock and the Senate under the leadership of Lyndon Johnson passed the first civil rights legislation since the Reconstruction. We’d also be hearing more about civil rights and Johnston in the years ahead.

Two days after my arrival, three B-52s made the first non-stop around-the-world flights and General Curtis LeMay bragged that we could drop a hydrogen bomb anywhere in the world.  The one place we did drop one that year, accidentally, was New Mexico.  Thankfully, it didn’t detonate which is why no one knew about it. The military were exploding bombs in Nevada but said everything was safe and no one knew differently except for the sheepherders whose flocks began to lose their wool and die off. There were other nuclear accidents in ’57 in the US and UK, but we didn’t know about them. We just trusted that our governments would never do anything to harm us.

Although there were no major wars going on, the world was tense. In October, the first American soldier was killed in Vietnam, a country we’d learn more about. But in ’57, the focus was mostly on the Suez Crisis and the threat of a Soviet nuclear attack. The DEW line was completed in the Arctic.  When proposed, it was to provide a six hours warning before the first Soviet bomb could be dropped on an American city. By the time the work was completed, the margin was cut to three hours as Soviet jets had doubled their speed.  A few months later it became extraneous as the Soviets launched their first intercontinental ballistic missile. Later, they launch Sputnik and we’d spend the next twelve years in a space race. Amidst all this, some yo-yo created the first plastic pink flamingo. The end was near as prophesied by Nevil Shute, On the Beach, a post-nuclear war novel published in 1957.  I’d read it in high school.

To save us from calamity, we placed our faith in Ike, the President, who many thought I resembled as I too had a bald head.Thankfully Ike wasn’t Herod and didn’t waste any time worrying about a newborn impostor as he perfected his golf swing and began his second term as the leader of the free world.

Jack Kerouac published On the Road in 1957, and people were heading out on the road as a new line of fancy cars with high fins and excessive chrome were revealed. The ’57 Chevy became an icon of the era as Ike announced the building of interstates to connect the cities of our nation. Cars ruled!  New York City abandoned its trolley cars in 1957, and shortly afterwards the Brooklyn Dodgers (originally the Trolley Dodgers) announced they were moving to Los Angeles. In other sporting news, the University of North Carolina beat Kansas in the NCAA basketball finals. These teams have remained near the top throughout my life. The Milwaukee Braves led by a young Hank Aaron beat the New York Yankees in the World Series. We’d hear more from Aaron and the Yankees, but Milwaukee faded when the Braves high-tailed it to Atlanta. The Detroit Lions, a team whose demise parallels its city, won their last NFL championship.

Ayn Rand published Atlas Shrugged in 1957. Nearly six decades later, “Who is John Galt?” bumper stickers are occasionally spotted on American highways. In the theaters, The Ten Commandments was the top box office success. For a country that seems so religious yet so consumeristic, the commandment about not coveting appears overlooked and Rand “look out for me” philosophy glorified the sin.  Other commandments were also being broken as “Peyton Place,” which debuted in theaters, reminded us.

Radios in 1957 were playing the music of Elvis, Buddy Holly, Debbie Reynolds, the Everly Brothers, and Sam Cooke.  In Philadelphia, teenagers danced for the first time on American Bandstand as more and more homes acquired televisions.  In England, two chaps named Lennon and McCarthy met and would go on change music as we know it.  Humphrey Bogart died just two days before my arrival, but it was still a good year for Hollywood.  Not only was Moses selling, but so were dogs as children everywhere cried watching Old Yeller.  Another movie released was the Bridge over the River Kwai which motivated whistlers everywhere.  That old British army tune would later be used in a commercial for a household cleanser and inspired one of the beloved parodies of my childhood:

Comet – it makes your teeth turn green.
Comet – it tastes like gasoline.
Comet – it makes you vomit.
So buy some Comet, and vomit, today!

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Looking with Gratitude

 

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
Acts 4:32-35
November 24, 2019

“The story of Jesus doesn’t end with Jesus,” Eugene Peterson writes in Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places. The Christian story continues on in this community and in all communities where people gather to “repent, believe and follow.” Nor does “the supernatural doesn’t stop with Jesus. God’s salvation, which became articulate, visible, and particular in Jesus, continues to be articulate, and particular in the men and women who have been raised to new life in him, the community of the resurrection.”[1]

Ponder the implication of this for a moment. We are a part of a movement that began 20 centuries ago in an obscure part of the world. Christ is still alive, working in his church, whether it’s here on Skidaway Island or in some remote city in China or a hamlet in the savannahs of Africa. Today, the question for us to ponder is this: “what should this community look like?”

In my reading over the past few weeks in preparation for the stewardship campaign, I came across this indictment of the modern church in America:

“One of the reasons churches in North America have trouble guiding people about money is that the church’s economy is built on consumerism. If churches see themselves as suppliers of religious goods and services and their congregants as consumers, then offerings are ‘payments.’”[2]

 

Contrary to what we often think, the church is not to be a supplier of religious goods and services. The church is to be a fellowship that brings people together under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Our offerings are to be signs of our gratitude for what God has done for us. To get a good idea of what the church should look like, let’s go back to the first century and consider the church in Jerusalem at the very beginning. Luke paints an interesting picture of this community who pinned their hoped and placed their faith in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It’s a community of people filled with gratitude. I am reading today’s passage from the Message translation and will put the words on the screens. Read Acts 4:32-35:

 

        I will always be indebted to the congregation in Virginia City, Nevada, a place where I first experienced ministry on my own as a student pastor for a year. The church on the Comstock, at least in the modern era, has always been small. But there was something about the fellowship of that group that made it an attractive place for all kinds of people. The people in the church worked hard together, keeping the church going, which was quite a task in a wooden building built in 1866. But they also worked hard to help one another. And they tried to help others, sending clothes to an orphanage in Mexico and collecting food for a pantry in Carson City.

Every month, this congregation gathered for a dinner party. People from all walks of life came together to enjoy one another’s company. Its appeal was magnetic for there was plenty of laughter at these gatherings.

One of the more colorful townsfolk was a guy named Bob. He could be best described as a skid-row drunk. He lived in a shack outside of town and mostly stayed mostly to himself. But you’d see him several times a day, winding through town, often going down the alleys where he dug through the trash from the bars. He’d eat leftovers, but what he was really after was the dregs of alcohol that remained in the bottles thrown away. Bob would pour these drops into a gallon jar that he toted around with him. Even with its high concentration of alcohol, this was a nasty cocktail none of us would consider drinking.

One evening we had a dinner at the church. As I was walking down the boardwalk, I came upon Bob. I’d been there a few months by this point, so I knew people would be okay with his presence, so I invited him in. He thanked me but wouldn’t come in. I then offered to fix him a plate of food, which he again turned down. One of the women in the church who was walking up the boardwalk, overheard my conversation. She told me that Bob had been invited many times, but would never come in, but suggested we fix him a plate and sit it on the steps. Bob didn’t want to be fussed over, but he would most likely pick up and eat a plate of food if sat out. And that’s what happened. The first plate fixed that evening was for Bob. We covered it with foil and let it at the top of the steps. When we left that evening, the plate was empty.

Virginia City had never been known as a religious place, but that’s okay because our faith isn’t as much about religion as it is about relationships. Our faith manifest itself by being kind and generous and, as we talk about here at SIPC, reflecting the face of Jesus. There was no need for Bob to be uncomfortable inside the church building. We could still provide him a good meal. As a church, we must be willing to meet people where they are at, and not demand that they conform to our ideas or go where we want them to be.

         The congregation Luke describes here near the beginning of the book of Acts wasn’t spectacular. It wouldn’t be considered particularly successful according to modern business practices. The fellowship didn’t include the leading folks of Jerusalem. Everyone was poor and marginalized. They didn’t have any glitzy advertising or even a fancy sign out front. After all, they tried to blend in and not stand out because there were those didn’t appreciate their message. But, despite all this, there was something magnetic about this community. They were generous and gracious. They were willing to help each other and to forgive others for the wrongs they’ve done because they’d experienced forgiveness in Jesus Christ. It was this magnetic appeal that drew folks to the church. Why else would someone risk persecutions and isolation by becoming a Christian?

Let’s look at this passage. What they owned wasn’t important. They knew the truth of the Psalmist who proclaimed, “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it.”[3] Instead of holding tight to possessions they knew belonged to God, they willingly shared with one another. They had set their minds on the glorious resurrection of Jesus and knew that was all that mattered. So, they attempted to do what they could to do for others which meant that no one in the fellowship was needy. Because of what God had done for them, they were filled with gratitude and willing to help others.

        I recently read an article on why we need to make a weekly commitment to attend church. I’ll post this article I my next e-news. It was written by a young widow who describes the church as “the sweetest fellowship this side of heaven.” Her husband died suddenly one night after having been taken to the hospital by an ambulance for shortness of breath. She was left with seven kids. Before leaving the hospital, she called a friend from church. By the time she was home, the friend was there to sit with her. Others came in to grieve, to bring meals, to help clean the house, fix broken appliances and cars, and to minister to and pray for her and her children. The church is not always perfect, she notes. At times, the church can be even cruel. But when we live up to our calling to reflect Jesus’ face to the world, we demonstrate what was described in our passage today. The church can be the sweetest fellowship this side of heaven.[4]

There are two essential traits we need to foster in our lives to help the church grow in this direction: generosity and graciousness. Think about your life and ask yourself, how generous are you? How gracious are you? What can you do to become more generous and gracious?

          Friends, today we receive our estimate of giving offerings for 2020, which is a sign of one half of that last question—how generous we are. We are encouraged to grow in generosity. As Vic Bell suggested last week, we’re to take a step toward being more generous, as we strive to become the church described in Acts. I pray that you will be generous and continue to take steps in this direction. But just as important as generosity is, don’t forget to be graciousness. On your walk with Christ, show grace to one another, just as God has been gracious with us. Realize what God has done and commit yourselves to do what? Say it after me… To be more being generous and gracious.  Amen.

 

©2019

[1] Eugene H. Peterson, Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places: A Conversation in Spiritual Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005), 267.

[2] Doug Pagitt from a lists of stewardship quotes that was in an old file of mine.

[3] Psalm 24:1.

[4] https://www.ibelieve.com/faith/5-reasons-you-need-to-make-church-a-weekly-commitment.html

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Once Upon A River

Bonnie Jo Campbell, Once Upon a River (New York: W.W. Norton, 2011), 348 pages.

 

I enjoyed this novel even though it was hard to get through the opening part which included an incestuous rape of Margo, a teenage girl. I almost put the book down. However, Campbell never glamorized the sex scenes in the book and tells the reader just enough for us to know what happened. The rape sets up a series of events that leads into the story of Margo learning about herself and her own strength while overcoming numerous obstacles. The only thing that appears constant in her life is the river that becomes her home. Margo loves living outside, even when the weather is less than desirable and when she has an option to be in comfort. Reading this book, I was reminded of my own experience after completing the Appalachian Trail. Having spent months outdoors, I was not interested in being inside, either.

 

While the Kalamazoo, which is where the story is based, is an actual river, much of the scenes described in the book are fictional. The first half of the story takes place on a tributary to the Kalamazoo, the “Stark River,” that doesn’t exist.  According to the map, it would be approximately the location of Battle Creek, which flows into the Kalamazoo at the town by the same name.  The Stark River here is populated by a rough but resilience class of people who are barely making it and who struggle when their industrial jobs disappear. Having paddled many such rivers in Michigan, I saw a lot of people living in such a condition. Old trailers and shacks dot the flood plain of the rivers. The book captures this lifestyle. In the book, the Kalamazoo is polluted. Just a year before the book was published, an oil pipeline broke on a tributary that flowed into the Kalamazoo. It was the second worst inland oil spill within the United States and took years to clean up.

 

I enjoyed Campbell’s ability to describe life on the river. While it’s tragic that anyone would have to endure what Margo, the book’s protagonist, had to endure, the reader begins to cheer her on as she struggles to live independently. While she always have to find others to help her, many of whom also take advantage of her vulnerable position, she overcomes the challenges and, by the end of the book, appears to have at least come to understand what’s life is about.

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A Summary (don’t read this if you want to be surprised reading the book):  Margo Crane is fifteen years old. She is being raised by her father, as her mother has run away, leaving the two to fend for themselves. The backdrop for the story, which was set in the 70s, is a metal fabrication factory that is slowly shutting down. Margo’s father has lost his job at the factory and now working in a grocery store to provide a meager existence for him and his daughter. They live on the Stark River, just across from extended family members. The book takes an unpleasant twist early in the story when Margo is raped by her uncle. Her father, when he realizes what happened, takes revenge, shooting out her uncle’s tires. This rift causes problems for Margo as she had been used to playing with her cousins and saw her aunt as a mother-figure.  Margo has taken to the woods and has become quite a good shot with both a shotgun and rifle. She fashions herself as Annie Oakley.  Margo is also out for revenge and shoots her uncle in a place that will curtail his ability to rape anyone else. Unfortunately, it is assumed that Margo’s father shot the uncle and her cousin shoots the father in “self-defense.” Now, like Annie Oakley, she’s truly an orphan and takes off in order to keep the state from taking her into protective custody. Using her grandfather’s boat, she explores the river and finds several different young men with whom to hang out. Sometimes she has consensual sex, but she is also raped. Later, she extracts her revenge, shooting the man who’d raped her in the chest. When his body is found, it is assumed he was shot for a bad drug deal.  Over the next two years, Margo learns more about living on the river and befriends a couple of older men who watch out for her, especially now that she’s pregnant. She also cares for one of the men, “Smoke,” who commits suicide by running his wheel chair into the frozen river in order drown himself in a successful attempt not to be moved to a nursing home. Through these events, Margo finds the will for her and her child to live.

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Looking Out

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
1 Timothy 6:17-19
November 17, 2019

 

 

 

Last week scripture from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount was used to explore how we might “look in” on the role money plays in our lives. Because money and possessions have a power that can lead us astray, we must be careful. Today, I’m using a passage from 1st Timothy that has almost the identical message, but now I want us to look out instead of in. How does our use of money impact our community and others? We need to ask ourselves what good comes from where we spend and give our money? What kind of vision do we have for the church, our community, and world and how might we support such a vision? Read 1 Timothy 6:17-19.

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A group of us watched “It’s a Wonderful Life” this week. The turning point of the movie has George Bailey moan that it would be better if he had never been born. Clarence, the angel sent to save him from despair, then provides a glimpse of what his community would be like without him. It goes back to when he saved his brother’s life when he was ten. In the movie, the adult George is a bit envious of his brother who became a hero in the Pacific War by shooting down kamatzes aimed at a troop ship. If he had not saved his brother, his brother would not have been there to save the ship and it would have sunk with 2000 men aboard. He also learns of the good the Bailey’s Savings and Loan has done in allowing people to own homes. In this vision, he sees the families he’d help live in terrible conditions. In fact, the town isn’t the quaint “Bedford Falls” but a raucous “Pottersville,” named for the owner of the bank. The only escape from the drudgery of the town without George appears to be sex and alcohol.

        George Bailey had no idea he’d touched so many lives. Sometimes the “little things” we do are hard to see and don’t reach fruition until years later. But if we have our priorities right, we can plant such seeds that have the potential to make a difference in the world. That’s the implication from our passage from the Letter to Timothy. Let’s take this text apart and consider what we’re being told.

Paul speaks of those who are rich in this present age or, as another translation has it, those who are rich at this time.[1] By speaking of the present, Paul implies that those who are rich might not always be that way. Wealth comes with uncertainty. A market collapse could wipe us out. And, as we saw last week, nice things can go bad. They can rust or be eaten by moths or stolen by thieves.[2] The riches of our world are transitory. But Paul isn’t just talking about how riches can be lost or lose value in the present.

He suggests that the present won’t last forever. In God’s economy, gold and silver have little value. As Jesus says, we need to remember to store our treasures in heaven.[3]

 

 

        Paul, like Jesus, doesn’t condemn riches in and of themselves. Instead, he points out the dangers or the temptations that come with wealth. Those who are rich must be on guard for two temptations. John Calvin called them “pride and deceitful hope.”[4] The two go together, for pride comes from the hope we place in things which will ultimately fail.

        Let’s explore these two items deeper: Riches can tempt us to act haughty. In other words, we are tempted to have a big ego, or to think more of ourselves than we should. The extreme example of this type of behavior in the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life” is Mr. Potter. He’s a Scrooge-like character that doesn’t experience the joyous conversion of Dicken’s Scrooge. Riches can be a barrier from the humility that’s needed in order to properly see ourselves in God’s kingdom. Augustine, in a sermon during the 4th Century, reflected on this passage saying riches isn’t the problem, it’s the disease which some get from riches which is pride.[5] The vaccine to this disease is generosity.

The second temptation of riches is that we place our trust, not in God, but in our wealth. Paul reminds us, as Jesus did last week, riches are uncertain. All the wealth in the world can’t reverse certain diseases or stop a speeding bus or prevent a plane crash in bad weather, or whatever demise might befall us. Sooner or later, life will end. We must not place our trust in wealth, but in God, who provides us with the ability to create wealth in this life. God wants what is best for us, so we trust God as we move forward into the next life.

But, while we are here, in this life, we are to use our riches in ways that are pleasing to God. Instead of just enjoying our blessings by ourselves, Paul encourages Timothy to teach others to be rich in their generosity. We are to be people who do good works and who are ready to share with others. A generous life is a well-lived life. Back to the movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life,” George Bailey lives such a life as he has helped many people, and in the end when he needs help, people respond. George, who minutes earlier was ready to commit suicide, finds that he is rich beyond measure. Maybe not monetarily rich, but rich in a way that helps him to enjoy a wonder full life.

        In this week’s e-news that I sent out, I linked to an article about a small Lutheran Church in Minnesota. They were down to 20 members and had enough money to carry them for 18 months when a new pastor arrived. He told them his first Sunday, “You’re dead.” Then he asked, “Now what you are going to do?” The members of the church decided if they were to die, they’d do it well, so they began to seek ways to love and care for those around them. They made no demands on those they helped. They offered to do whatever they could to help people in their neighborhood. At first, they only had a few offers. But they kept on and as they continued, they picked up volunteers. Many of these people were not religious, but they liked the idea of church being supportive of the community.[6] And while this church isn’t out of the woods yet, it has grown and is holding its own.

          When we look beyond ourselves, we realize there are three things we can do with money.[7] We can spend it, we can save it, and we can give it away. Neither Paul nor Jesus condemned anyone for spending money on that which was needed or even on the finer things in life. God wants us to enjoy life. We’re not called to beat up on ourselves for enjoying life. Instead, we’re told in Ecclesiastes to enjoy ourselves and to take delight in that for which we’ve toiled.[8] As long as what we’re doing is wholesome, we should enjoy that which we receive from our spending and not feel guilty.

A second thing we can do with money is to save it. This, too, in and of itself, isn’t bad. We’re told in Proverbs that the wise save while the fool devours.[9]  But we must remember the limitations of our nest-eggs. Our savings might make tomorrow or the next decade or our retirement easier, but it doesn’t have the ability to add a single day to our lives. So, while we should save, we shouldn’t worship that which we have saved. Our salvation is in Christ, not in our portfolios.

And finally, we can give it away. Again, over and over in Scripture we’re told how it is more blessed to give than receive and how sharing what we have with others is pleasing to God.[10] If for no other reason, we give because God has given to us.[11] Giving allows that image of God that’s in us shine as we strive to live in a manner that is more god-like.

Spending, saving, and giving. All are good, if done for the right reasons.

         When we look out from ourselves, we should consider how we might make a difference with our money. Whether we can give large amounts or only a small amount, we need to see our giving as an investment in God’s kingdom. But we don’t do it only if we know we can make a difference, we do it because we know that our efforts will be joined with the giving of others and then that will be blessed by God’s Spirit. Giving is an act of faith. It’s like the message we heard from Dean Smith a few weeks ago, about how that annoying jingle of change in our pockets can be saved and when we add them with change from other pockets, we soon have enough to make a difference in the lives of the hungry. When the community comes together like this, we can make a difference in the world.

         Next week is Consecration Sunday. We are asking for you to make an estimate of giving for 2020, to help the church do its budgeting. As you prepare yourself to make this estimate, I ask you to pray throughout the week for God to give you a vision. You can add this prayer to the prayer that you we’ve been asking you to make on behalf of the church. Ask God how you can make a difference in the world? Let us pray:

 

Almighty God, give us a vision of how we might partner with you, and with our brothers and sisters, to make a difference in the world.  Amen.

 

©2019

[1] Contemporary English Bible translation

[2] Matthew 6:19.

[3] Matthew 6:20.

[4] John Calvin, Commentary on 1st Timothy, https://biblehub.com/commentaries/calvin/1_timothy/6.htm

[5] Augustine, Sermon 36.2 as quoted in the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture: New Testament IX (Downers’ Grove, IL: Intervarsity Press, 2000), 224.

[6] http://www.citypages.com/news/peace-lutheran-staved-off-death-by-taking-love-thy-neighbor-to-a-radical-extreme/563648921

[7] This idea comes from Maggie Kulyk with Liz McGeachy, Integrating Money and Meaning: Practivs for a Heart-Centered Life (chicorywealth.com, 2019).  The authors spoke of four things you can do with money, adding “earning” to my list.

[8] Ecclesiastes 3:12-13.

[9] Proverbs 21:20

[10] Acts 20:35 and Hebrews 13:16

[11] Matthew 10:8

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Looking way back: 3 Reviews of History Books

Barbara Tuchman, A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century (New York: Knopf, 1978), 720 pages including notes and index.  Some plates of photos and artwork.

 

The world, or at least Western Europe, seemed to be coming apart in the 1300s. England and France was involved in a 100-year war.  Whenever they took a break in fighting, it was time to attack (crusade) the Muslin invaders who had invaded parts of Europe or Muslin pirates hindering shipping along the African coast. The Black Death kept reappearing. The nobles and noble want-a-be’s wore fashionable shoes, pointed and curly ends, that were condemned by the church. In England, the followers of Wycliffe provided a precursor to the Protestant Reformation (which would be another 2 centuries in the future). During this century, the population of Europe fell, mostly due to plague, but also from war. This had a dramatic impact on the economy.  Without people to work the fields, forest took over farmland. Taxes to finance wars and to keep the nobility in luxury became a burden to everyone, especially to the lower class who paid a much higher rate of taxes than those with affluence. The Roman Catholic Church split. With both an Italian and a French pope, who excommunicated each other, people worried about their salvation (which was seen as coming through the Church) for no one knew which church was the right one.  A lot happened in the 14th Century as Barbara Tuchman skillfully tells in this mammoth work. But, when you think of all that happened, it’s amazed that she can touch on so much of the events in 700 pages.

This was the age of the knights, although these warriors weren’t nearly as noble as we’re led to believe. Knights with their heavy armor, fighting it out on a battlefield, was the ultimate. When the English began to use commoners and arming them with longbows, it was seen by the French (who mostly was on the losing side of battles) as denying the knights their glory. It was also a shift in power, lifting commoners while demoting the power of the nobility. Instead of revising their tactics, the French started using heavier armor to protect them from arrows and made them even less mobile.

The key figure in this book is Sire de Coucy, a man who appeared to be almost as large as his huge fortified castle in Picardy. Coucy seemed to dominate all the great events of the second half of the century. Although he was not the king of France, he held more power and controlled more wealth. He was involved in many of the great battles and, at a time where military judgment was not a defining characteristic of the armies of France, he was one of their successful military leaders. During the last crusade, he was captured by the Turks and died in prison, awaiting ransom. Ransom was a part of war back then, as nobles were “sold” back to the country from which they came. Coucy had a modern vision of war that most of his French contemporaries refused to see.

This book reads well, but there are just too many names and dates and events to keep everything straight. Nonetheless, I enjoyed it and learned a lot about life in the premodern world.

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Edward Dolnick, A Clockwork Universe: Isaac Newton, the Royal Society and the Birth of the Modern World, 2012 (Audible 10 hours and 4 minutes).

 

I am not a math person, but I found myself listening to this book and wishing I could go back and study math once more. But then, Dolrick notes that most great mathematic discoveries are discovered by younger geniuses (especially before 25), so I realized that my math ship has sailed. Nevertheless, I enjoyed this book immensely. The mid-17th Century was a time of change as the world was moving into the modern area. But as exciting of a time it was for a few intellectuals, for most people it was a dreadful age. Filth and disease abound, as cities did not yet have sewers or safe drinking water. London, the location in which much of the book occurs, was ravaged by fire and famine. But there, within the Royal Society of Science, men began to ask questions and ponder new solutions. Some, at least to my mind, were crazy, but this drive to know more about God’s creation (and most of these men were religious) led to breakthroughs in mathematics and science, especially in the understanding of space. Calculus became the language for much of this understanding and the two men most responsible were Isaac Newton and Gottfried Leibniz—a Brit and German. The two appeared to have discovered it independently, but both insisted they were first. In the end, Newton had the best PR, but Leibniz wasn’t forgotten and was resurrected more recently as his binary system predated the development of the computer by three centuries.

This book has a lot in it. We meet many of the great men of the era who pushed math and science beyond the ancient Greek thinkers: Descartes, Kepler, Galileo, and Haley (who, in addition to discovering and predicting a comet’s path was the catalyst behind Newton publishing his thoughts). But the two main characters are Newton and Leibniz, who both admired and were jealous of the other. Their relationship forms a tension that holds the book together.

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John H. Leith, Assembly at Westminster: Reformed Theology in the Making (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1973), 127 pages.

 

I first read the Westminster Confession of Faith as a high school student and have studied much of it throughout my adult life, but I have never read any detailed account of the assembly of “Westminster Divines” who wrote the work. In this short work, the late John Leith provides the background and the setting for the Assembly. The authors of the confession were living on the edge of the modern world, yet they had been raised in the medieval world. The politics of what was going on in England during the Puritan era, as well as what was happening on the continent played a great role in both the writing and influence of this work. After the restoration of the crown in England in 1660, the Confession would no longer play a role in English society, but due to the number of Scottish members of the Assembly, the confession would be adopted in Scotland and become the main confessional document for Presbyterians around the world. In this book, Leith covers the make-up of the Assembly, the political and theological context in which they worked, how they went about their tasks, the nature of confessions, and the key doctrines of the Westminster Confession. He also discusses the limits and fallibility of confessions. This is a good starting point for learning more about Westminster.

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Posted on

Looking In

 

Jeff Garrison
Skidaway Island Presbyterian Church
November 10, 2019
Matthew 6:19-24

 

 

Our morning passage comes from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount. Jesus forces us to consider what we value. Ponder this. What would you grab if your house was on fire? Or, what would you pack if you had to flee, as a refugee or hurricane evacuee and could only take a suitcase? For some of us, our treasures are tangible things. An Arnold Palmer autograph, a trophy, a special putter, or a favorite Hawaiian shirt. For others, our treasures are in bank statements and stock certificates. Granted, most of us like to think we have more noble treasures—our families, our friends. But even with good treasures, a problem arises when they become the most important things in our lives. Then they began to control us and eventually will become our god, with a little g. Such a god will not satisfy our needs. Today, I encourage you to “look in” on what you value. Ask yourself what your life might look like if you spent more time storing treasures in heaven than on earth. Let’s hear what Jesus has to say. Read Matthew 6:19-24.

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The trail, somewhere between northern VA and southern PA.

   When hiking the Appalachian Trail through Pennsylvania, I stopped one night thinking I was going to get to spend an evening by myself. My plan was to get up early and catch some friends who were a day ahead of me. I was in the middle of fixing dinner when a family of four came trudging into the campsite. They were dead tired—they’d set out that day to hike ten or so miles and hadn’t even gotten half that distance. The man asked if I would mind if they camp there, as there was a spring for water nearby and plenty of room. “Not a problem,” I said, even though I wasn’t overly excited about the prospect.

          Continuing with dinner, I kept glancing over at the family. They were quite amusing. It was like watching the backpacking version of a National Lampoon Vacation movie. The father even looked like Chevy Chase. They were obviously new at this and, making it even more humorous, they had not tried out their gear. I’ll give them credit, they had good gear. It was all new and shiny and never out of the package. The family appeared as if they stepped out of an L.L. Bean catalog. With my dirty and torn clothes and well used equipment, I looked a bit like a hobo. After a comedy of errors, they finally were able to pitch their tent. Then it was time to eat.

I could tell the dad was getting flustered. Finally, he came over and asked for my help. He had a top-of-the-line stove, the same one that I had, an MSR multi-fuel stove. This was the preferred backpacking stove for long distance hikers because it burned regular gas. You could fuel up at a gas station. While a good stove, it wasn’t the type of stove most folks had if they were just hiking for a weekend. Next, he had the top of the line cook set that all nestled together and included a windscreen in which you sat the stove. Knowing this, he left behind the simple windscreen that came with the stove. He was trying to put all this together, but there was one problem. The cook set was designed for a Sevier stove, not an MSR one. They didn’t go together. No matter how he tried, it wasn’t going to work. I told him to put away his windscreen and showed him how to set up some rocks upon which he could make a windscreen as he cooked. Soon, they were cooking dinner.

A friend with his possessions on his back. This was back in the 80s, before digital cameras, so I don’t have as many digital photos from which to select.

After they’d finished dinner and while his wife was putting their kids to bed, we talked. He was a physician. He’d hiked a few times with the Boy Scouts and now thought he’d like to get his family into it. He went to a backpacking store to get what he needed. I’m sure the guy selling gear had a nice dinner later that evening on the commission he made. Everything this family had with them, and they had way more than they needed, was first class (even if some of it wasn’t designed to work with other pieces of gear). And the sheer volume of their gear was overwhelming. He confided in me that they were probably going to hike back to their car in the morning instead of continuing down the trail, for there was no way they’d make the distance they’d planned.

Talking with this guy, I realized a couple of things that I jotted down in my journal. First, in the woods, it didn’t matter than he had the money to buy all this fancy gear. It didn’t do him any good. Then I realized that backpacking is a great equalizer. When you have too many treasures, it weighs you down. This guy was carrying nearly eighty pounds on his back, and his wife had another fifty. Each of their kids had a small knapsack. All this stuff was killing them. My pack weight was more like his wife’s and that was only when I was fully loaded with ten days of food, a liter of fuel, and two quarts of water. Thinking about this, I felt a bit of pride.

That me, the traditional photo taken on Mt. Katahdin in Maine at the end of the trail

Then I realized that I, too, was storing up treasures, in the form of memories and bragging rights. Idolatry is a sneaking temptation. I wanted to be able to say that I hiked the whole trail and at that time was roughly halfway to Maine, a goal that was an obsession. Likewise, what the man was doing by getting his family out into the woods was also noble. But ultimately, neither of us was what we’re to be mainly about. Hiking is okay, just as a lot of other things we enjoy are okay, provided they’re put into priority. God must come first. It’s not about what I can do. It’s about what God can do through me.

 

Jesus realized the danger of treasures. He knew “stuff” wouldn’t be able to satisfy us like a relationship with God. When it comes to stuff, be it money, the junk we collect, or accomplishments, it’s never enough. We will always want more. Supposedly John D. Rockefeller was asked how much more money he wanted. “Just a little more,” he said. If we try to satisfy our appetites with our treasures, we’ll always be hungry.

         This passage is about us looking deeply and getting our priorities right. There are three connected proverbial thoughts here, which Jesus uses to encourage his listeners to evaluate their lives and to see where they are placing their trust. First, we’re not to trust worldly treasures for they have a way of disappearing. A fine wardrobe can be destroyed by moths, objects crafted out of metal can rust, and what’s to stop someone from stealing them when we’re not looking. Notice, however, Jesus doesn’t say that having nice things is bad. He just says we can’t trust them to always be there and that the problem with such niceties is that when we place too much trust in them, we risk not trusting God. Ultimately, our treasurers are going to fail us.

         The second proverbial through is about a “healthy eye.” My father just had cataract surgery this week and was telling me on Friday about how bright the colors are now that his eye is healthier. But Jesus isn’t making a pitch for eye surgery. Jesus listeners would have known right away what he was talking about when he mentioned an unhealthy or evil eye. They understood that an evil eye referred to an envious, grudging or miserly spirit, while a good eye connotes a generous and compassionate attitude toward life. One of my professors from seminary, in his commentary on Matthew, says it’s as if Jesus’ says: “Just as a blind person’s life is darkened because of an eye malfunction, so the miser’s life is darkened by his failure to deal generously with others.”[1] Generosity brings light into the world; greed darkens the world.

         The next statement by Jesus concerns serving two masters. A slave would be run ragged if he had to answer to two masters. Likewise, if we try to serve both God and money, we find ourselves with two masters and the latter, money, makes a harsh master. There can never be enough. We need to place our priorities in order. We need to stick with God.

But then again, as I said, Jesus never says that treasures in and of themselves are wrong. He never says that our desire to have treasure is wrong… We’re not Buddhists trying to remove all desire from our lives in search for enlightenment.[2] Instead, Jesus knows we have desires… So, he encourages us to put our desires into the right channels. “Strive to store treasures in heaven.”

It sounds too simple. “Store up your treasures in heaven; don’t worry about things here on earth.” Easier said than done, right? We all worry about having enough for tomorrow—and the day and the year and the decade that follows. We must admit that our prayers for daily bread seem unnecessary when we have a pantry full of food. When we have too much, it’s hard to depend upon God.

But Jesus wants us to trust in God, which is why we’re to store up treasures in heaven. Jesus, in this passage, teaches a good Reformed concept. On earth, we’re to be about doing the Father’s work. And when we do what God calls us to do, we’re storing our treasures in heaven. But when we forget about what God wants us to do and focus only on our wants and desires, we lose our way.

          How might we learn not to store up our treasures here on earth? First, “Enjoy things, but don’t cherish them.” God created this world good and wants us to enjoy life and the blessings provided, but God gets angry when we see such blessings as being ours or being worthy of our worship. Second, “Share things joyfully, not reluctantly.” If it bugs you to share something you have with someone who needs it, you should then know that item has gotten a hold on you. It’s an earthly treasure, an idol. Finally, “Think as a pilgrim, not a settler.” “The world is not my home, I’m just passin’ thru,” the old gospel song goes.[3] Store your treasures at your destination, then your journey will then be easier.

          Look inside yourself and use these thoughts to evaluate what you have: Enjoy, Share, and think like a pilgrim. A pilgrim is like a backpacker. Remember, you don’t want your pack to weigh you down. Amen.

[1] Douglas R. A. Hare, Matthew: Interpretation: A Biblical Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville, KY: JKP, 1993), 72.

[2] Frederick Dale Bruner, The Christbook: Matthew 1-12 (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004), 321.

[3]  Kirk Nowery, The Stewardship of Life (Camarillo, CA: Spire Resources, 2004), 122-123.