a reflection by the Rev. Nancy Christensen
Southeastern Synod Director for Evangelical Mission
I remember about ten years ago or so, there were books and journals and all kinds of attention on talk shows about gratitude, and it felt to me like the latest-and-greatest self-help craze. I confess that I didn’t pay much attention. While I didn’t object to the sentiment of being grateful at all, I didn’t buy the books, or jump in to the daily list-making that people around me were doing with such gusto.
So, as tends to be my pattern – ten years later, when no one is talking about it anymore, I’m just now getting around to thinking about what it really means to be grateful.
Henri Nouwen talks about gratitude as a spiritual discipline that involves a conscious choice. He says we can choose to be grateful even in the midst of hurt, and painful loss. In a book called, With Burning Hearts: A Meditation on the Eucharistic Life, Nouwen says,
"The question is whether our losses lead to resentment or to gratitude. Resentment is a real option. Many choose it. When we are hit with one loss after another, it is very easy to become disillusioned, angry, bitter, and increasingly resentful. The older we become, or the harder our circumstances, the greater is the temptation to say: 'Life has cheated me. There is no future for me, nothing to hope for. The only thing to do is to defend the little I have left, so that I won't lose it all.' "
In the midst of loss, sometimes, gratitude can be a catalyst for change in us. Seeing what’s good in our experience can help us shift our focus and move us beyond our resentment or our disappointment.
As I anticipate this week of Thanksgiving with family and friends, I also think that gratitude goes beyond being thankful for the temporary things, or about pushing away the negative stuff. When my feelings of gratitude are conditional on things, like my possessions, or my job, or my relationships, then my patterns of behavior don’t change. I may be thankful for a time, but then I almost always go right back to thinking and feeling in the same old ways. But when I root my gratitude in something permanent, it becomes a permanent part of me. So, instead of saying, “I am grateful for…” eventually I just say, “I am grateful.”
It’s an attitude for life, and for living – it’s a way of being. And, the permanent basis for my gratitude must ultimately be my faith in a God of abundance, who continuously creates, and re-creates – who blesses my life over and over – and who transforms even the negative circumstances, and the losses I face into opportunities for something new to emerge.
So, I think that right now it’s more important than ever to dig deep, and to live gratefully. We look for the blessings, and we don’t hold back from sharing them with one another. We also don’t apologize for challenging our brothers and sisters to be grateful, too, and to be generous in such a difficult moment in our history – because we KNOW that we are part of something greater than this moment, or these circumstances. We are confident in that permanent thing that never fails us, and that always brings us to new life.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Sunrises and Sunsets
by Assistant to the Bishop Darrel Peterson
I have always been fascinated by sunrises and sunsets, with a preference for sunrises, in that I tend to be a morning person. What a beautiful sight to see that golden disk edge onto the horizon in the cool of the morning! In my Colorado years, I traveled Eastward on the East side of Denver to get to my church. I enjoyed celebrating many sunrises as the days began. In my present call to ministry, I am often on the way early on Sunday mornings. The roads are clear and the sun comes up in all its magnificence.
Traveling transatlantic by air provides another sunrise opportunity. I will always remember seeing the sun come up over Africa as we crossed the skeleton coast of Namibia. Being at the beach on the Atlantic coast at various resorts has afforded me many peaceful and joyful moments.
This is not to denigrate sunsets. The clouds from the daytime are often situated to accentuate the colors at sunset. Key West and the gulf coast of Florida celebrate their sunsets. People gather to watch and take yet another sunset picture. I recently did a wedding on the beach North of Naples. The sunset was spectacular, and the photographer made the most of it. Again, my Colorado experiences afforded my enjoying the sun setting in so many different ways over the angular mountains to the West.
Sunrises and sunsets are symbols for our beginnings and endings. As the sun rises, we are reminded of new beginnings. In our Christian theology, we can celebrate God’s grace that is new each morning and God’s forgiveness that provides for yet another fresh start. We often hesitate as things change. Old patterns and habits persist. But with each new day, we can be reminded how important it is to have persistent newness. New beginnings come whether we are ready or not.
Politicians talk of sunset provisions. By such laws they allow programs and decisions to expire. In the church we often have problems with sunset thinking. We have a hopeful theology of dying and death. But we are wont to resist the end of organizations and traditions. This past summer, I was privileged to visit some of the New Testament sites such as Ephesus and Laodicea. There were ruins, to be sure, but there were no evangelism committees or congregation councils. The actual ministry in those places has long since ceased. The active ministry of those places now exists in the lives and ministries of us who read the New Testament.
We have many churches whose existence is being threatened by community change, division of the parishioners, the absence of the next generation, and the devastating economy. We need to be reminded we are called to be disciples, not perpetuators of institutions. Some of our churches need to say “mission completed” and to celebrate the sunset of ministry of past days.
We desperately need to see the sun coming up on new opportunities for mission. We don’t need to spend our efforts and resources on purifying our religious comfort levels and our galvanized prejudices. We have far too many people coming to church to get their opinions and lifestyles blessed. We need to hear God’s word with the clean slate of the morning sun, and we need to each day receive God’s grace and forgiveness. And we need to allow many of the day’s activities to end with the setting of the sun.
I have always been fascinated by sunrises and sunsets, with a preference for sunrises, in that I tend to be a morning person. What a beautiful sight to see that golden disk edge onto the horizon in the cool of the morning! In my Colorado years, I traveled Eastward on the East side of Denver to get to my church. I enjoyed celebrating many sunrises as the days began. In my present call to ministry, I am often on the way early on Sunday mornings. The roads are clear and the sun comes up in all its magnificence.
Traveling transatlantic by air provides another sunrise opportunity. I will always remember seeing the sun come up over Africa as we crossed the skeleton coast of Namibia. Being at the beach on the Atlantic coast at various resorts has afforded me many peaceful and joyful moments.
This is not to denigrate sunsets. The clouds from the daytime are often situated to accentuate the colors at sunset. Key West and the gulf coast of Florida celebrate their sunsets. People gather to watch and take yet another sunset picture. I recently did a wedding on the beach North of Naples. The sunset was spectacular, and the photographer made the most of it. Again, my Colorado experiences afforded my enjoying the sun setting in so many different ways over the angular mountains to the West.
Sunrises and sunsets are symbols for our beginnings and endings. As the sun rises, we are reminded of new beginnings. In our Christian theology, we can celebrate God’s grace that is new each morning and God’s forgiveness that provides for yet another fresh start. We often hesitate as things change. Old patterns and habits persist. But with each new day, we can be reminded how important it is to have persistent newness. New beginnings come whether we are ready or not.
Politicians talk of sunset provisions. By such laws they allow programs and decisions to expire. In the church we often have problems with sunset thinking. We have a hopeful theology of dying and death. But we are wont to resist the end of organizations and traditions. This past summer, I was privileged to visit some of the New Testament sites such as Ephesus and Laodicea. There were ruins, to be sure, but there were no evangelism committees or congregation councils. The actual ministry in those places has long since ceased. The active ministry of those places now exists in the lives and ministries of us who read the New Testament.
We have many churches whose existence is being threatened by community change, division of the parishioners, the absence of the next generation, and the devastating economy. We need to be reminded we are called to be disciples, not perpetuators of institutions. Some of our churches need to say “mission completed” and to celebrate the sunset of ministry of past days.
We desperately need to see the sun coming up on new opportunities for mission. We don’t need to spend our efforts and resources on purifying our religious comfort levels and our galvanized prejudices. We have far too many people coming to church to get their opinions and lifestyles blessed. We need to hear God’s word with the clean slate of the morning sun, and we need to each day receive God’s grace and forgiveness. And we need to allow many of the day’s activities to end with the setting of the sun.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
How cheap are you?
by the Rev. Dr. Delmer Chilton
In the November 2, 2010 edition of the Christian Century magazine it was reported that, "Three marketing researchers have concluded that the less religious one is, the more commercial brand names matter. . . .For people who aren't religious, visible markers of commercial brands, such as logos on a laptop or shirt pocket, function as a means of self-expression and an assertion of self-worth comparable to the symbolic expression of faith." (p.9)
Gee, by that measure I must be one of the most religious people on the planet. All my brands are "off-off-brands." I well remember the hot and muggy June day I moved into an apartment at Lutheran Southern Seminary in Columbia, SC. One of our current cluster deans (you know who you are) offered me a beer after helping me lug furniture for several hours. I hate to look a gift horse in the mouth, but it was awful. The beer's only redeeming factor was it was really cold. My new friend looked at my face and laughed and said, "One thing I learned in the military. Buy the cheapest beer in town and learn to like it." Sounded like a good idea to me.
I never really thought of my parsimony as being religiously related; I just thought I was raised poor and my Scots heritage dictated a certain amount of cheapness as a natural born right. My father was still wearing suits in the 1970s that he bought in the 1940s but as he repeatedly told my mother, "It's a good suit and it still fits. What's the problem?" Dad died in 2003; I wish I could have told him before he died that his frugality was a sign of his faithfulness, a fact that would have surprised his Methodist minister who always suspected Daddy of being less than completely orthodox, and not without reason.
The statistics on this are indeed interesting but I am not certain that the researchers' conclusions are as, well, as conclusive, as they seem to think. That is, they focus on why the non-religious seek brand names; I am more interested in why the religious eschew them.
It all depends on how you define the norm and the resultant measureable deviation (I knew that sociology degree would come in handy sometime.) If the norm is disinterest in brand names, then you propose answers as to why people want them. But, if wanting brand names is the human norm, then the question is "Why are there people who don't?"
I think the human norm is to seek validation of our existence. We look for things that make us feel important and secure in the world. As Luther said in the Large Catechism: "A 'god' is the term for that to which we are to look for all good and in which we are to find refuge in all need....Anything on which your heart relies and depends, I say, that is really your God." (Book of Concord, Kolb and Wengert Edition, p. 386)
Those of us who are baptized into Christ have been "marked with the cross of Christ forever" (ELW, p. 231, LBW, p. 124) and have no need of other visible marks of distinction or "self-expression." Because of our Baptism, we know who we are and whose we are and we are free to live simply and generously as beloved children of a gracious God.
Delmer Chilton
In the November 2, 2010 edition of the Christian Century magazine it was reported that, "Three marketing researchers have concluded that the less religious one is, the more commercial brand names matter. . . .For people who aren't religious, visible markers of commercial brands, such as logos on a laptop or shirt pocket, function as a means of self-expression and an assertion of self-worth comparable to the symbolic expression of faith." (p.9)
Gee, by that measure I must be one of the most religious people on the planet. All my brands are "off-off-brands." I well remember the hot and muggy June day I moved into an apartment at Lutheran Southern Seminary in Columbia, SC. One of our current cluster deans (you know who you are) offered me a beer after helping me lug furniture for several hours. I hate to look a gift horse in the mouth, but it was awful. The beer's only redeeming factor was it was really cold. My new friend looked at my face and laughed and said, "One thing I learned in the military. Buy the cheapest beer in town and learn to like it." Sounded like a good idea to me.
I never really thought of my parsimony as being religiously related; I just thought I was raised poor and my Scots heritage dictated a certain amount of cheapness as a natural born right. My father was still wearing suits in the 1970s that he bought in the 1940s but as he repeatedly told my mother, "It's a good suit and it still fits. What's the problem?" Dad died in 2003; I wish I could have told him before he died that his frugality was a sign of his faithfulness, a fact that would have surprised his Methodist minister who always suspected Daddy of being less than completely orthodox, and not without reason.
The statistics on this are indeed interesting but I am not certain that the researchers' conclusions are as, well, as conclusive, as they seem to think. That is, they focus on why the non-religious seek brand names; I am more interested in why the religious eschew them.
It all depends on how you define the norm and the resultant measureable deviation (I knew that sociology degree would come in handy sometime.) If the norm is disinterest in brand names, then you propose answers as to why people want them. But, if wanting brand names is the human norm, then the question is "Why are there people who don't?"
I think the human norm is to seek validation of our existence. We look for things that make us feel important and secure in the world. As Luther said in the Large Catechism: "A 'god' is the term for that to which we are to look for all good and in which we are to find refuge in all need....Anything on which your heart relies and depends, I say, that is really your God." (Book of Concord, Kolb and Wengert Edition, p. 386)
Those of us who are baptized into Christ have been "marked with the cross of Christ forever" (ELW, p. 231, LBW, p. 124) and have no need of other visible marks of distinction or "self-expression." Because of our Baptism, we know who we are and whose we are and we are free to live simply and generously as beloved children of a gracious God.
Delmer Chilton
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