Life at Jeff Street

Goatwalkin'

2012-02-15T07:18:00.000-08:00

Our church coffee house, the Urban Goatwalker, celebrated 20 years of ministry last Saturday. This video are some very few of the many amazing highlights of last Saturday's celebration.

The Goatwalker is an open mic coffee house in downtown Louisville that has been open the second Saturday of each month without fail for 20 years now. The Goatwalker is open to all, but was intended as a place of refuge, dignity and celebration especially for our more marginalized brothers and sisters. The idea was that it would be a place where the homeless, the mentally ill and others who are often actively NOT wanted, ARE wanted. They are invited in, cherished, treated as honored guests, and, along with anyone else, can freely order coffee, lemonade, home made brownies, cookies or other treats.

All our visitors are also invited, if they so choose, to take the stage and perform a song, a poem, tell a story and otherwise share something meaningful to them. And share, we do. The most powerful songs, poems, dancing and other performances come from our visitors and every performer is cheered and hurrah-ed for the treasures they share.

The Goatwalker team didn't want this to be a pity/charity place, where "WE do-gooders" do something for THOSE "poor, pitifuls," but where we are all on equal footing, able to order food and drinks, able to share, able to help, able to perform. And mostly, that is what happens.

God's kingdom come, God's will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

While this might sometimes lead to some strange and edgy moments, it is mostly divine, just divine. I hope the video could give you a taste of that.

* As an aside, while this was designed to be a safe place to share together primarily for our marginalized brothers and sisters, it has become a safe place for many others. Our church's children, for instance, from pretty early ages, begin to want to get up and sing, or tell a joke, or even to take a chance on learning a new instrument - a guitar, a ukulele, a banjo, dulcimer, mandolin, fiddle, cello, drums... - and share at the Urban Goatwalker. As a result, we have an amazingly talented and compassionate set of children, youth and, now, young adults in our midst. They also are frequently our waiters and waitresses and other helpers.

My son and his elder band-mate buddy both were born roughly the same time as the Goatwalker and have grown up in that context. I very much attribute their compassionate and passionate song-writing and music-playing largely to exposure to the Urban Goatwalker and the witness of our more marginalized friends, along with the adults in church who have freely shared music and ideas with them over the years.

The whole idea of sharing freely has some amazing and sometimes unexpected side effects.

Happy Twentieth Birthday, GW!

2012-02-13T10:32:00.001-08:00

Goatwalker Candle, a photo by paynehollow on Flickr.

Our church just celebrated the 20th anniversary of an open mic coffee house we hold for everyone, but especially our homeless, mentally ill and otherwise marginalized friends. Yesterday’s sermon celebrated that ministry, and for that reason and simply because it was such a very good and topical sermon, I’m posting it here in its entirety…

Because we are so far removed from Jesus’ culture, we often miss the real impact of the stories that we read. We read scriptures in a personalistic way, and don’t see the political or the social implications. And thus we see Jesus as such a nice guy that we wonder how anyone could kill him?!

The temptation is to read this morning’s story in the same way. It’s a lovely story, really. Jesus is moved with compassion for this poor leper, and he reaches out, touches him, and heals him. Then sends him on his merry way to visit the priests, in keeping with the Jewish laws.

Except that what we don’t realize is that this story is NOT about gentle Jesus meek and mild healing a leper, this story is about angry Jesus – while some of the ancient texts say moved by pity, or compassion, others say, moved by anger (orgistheis), and that is certainly in keeping with the anger that he shows a little later on in the passage. This story is about angry Jesus taking on the oppressive systems of his day, deliberately breaking the laws of his day.

In Jesus’ day, the primary paradigm that shaped his Jewish social world was: Be holy as God is holy. That was the rule of the day, the lens through which the Jews interpreted their world.

Hundreds of years before, when the Jewish people had been hauled off to Babylon, they were faced with the crisis of being assimilated, sucked up, into a foreign culture. You remember the story of Daniel, who refused to eat the diet of the empire, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, who refused to bow down to the statue of King Nebuchadnezzar, the Psalmist who sat down by the waters of Babylon weeping, refusing to sing for captors. “How can I sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land,” he cried.

It was a full blown crisis for the people of Israel. Not only had they been forcibly removed from their homes, they were now, bit by bit and day by day, being asked to give up who they were. And it was out of that experience that the Jewish people began to interpret the Torah, in a way that stressed, above all, God’s holiness, God’s set-apartness, thus their holiness, their set-apartness as God’s people. It was during that time that the sections of the law which emphasized separation and purity became dominant. This emphasis was so severe, in fact, that you may recall that it was during that time that Ezra instructed the Jews to put away (divorce, abandon) their foreign wives and children.

Hundreds of years later, Jesus’ society, which was now facing the threat of being assimilated into Roman culture, was structured according to that interpretation. The purity system or the politics of holiness, as it is now called, was one of the ways that the Jewish people coped. It kept them separate from everyone else. But it also kept them separate from one another by establishing a spectrum of people ranging from the pure to varying degrees of purity to people on the margin to the radically impure (Borg). People were determined to be pure or impure according to some extent on birth. The priests and Levites, who were hereditary classes, came first, followed by Israelites, followed by converts, and on down the line.

But one’s degree of purity or impurity also depended on behavior. Those who lived according to the purity codes were seen as pure. And there were, in fact, at least two renewal movements in Jesus’ day in which people sought to become even purer. The Essenes, who believed that the only way to be pure was to remove themselves from the culture, and who lived in the desert, and the Pharisees, who tried to maintain strict codes of purity within the culture. Those who didn’t or couldn’t maintain these purity codes were seen as outcasts. And of course, the outcasts included occupational groups such as tax collectors and shepherds.

One’s degree of purity or impurity also depended on physical wholeness. The people who were not whole, the maimed, the chronically ill, lepers, eunuchs, etc., were impure.

Also, one’s degree of purity or impurity was associated with economic class. While it was certainly possible for a rich person to be impure and a poor person to be pure, it was generally believed that rich people were rich because they had been blessed by God and that poor people were poor, or that sick people were sick, etc., because they had not lived rightly, and were thus not blessed by God. (Which is why Jesus’ statement that God makes the sun to shine and the rain to fall on the just and the unjust is so remarkable.)

And, it was almost impossible for a poor person to observe the rigid purity laws.

Purity and impurity were also associated with the contrast between male and female. Generally speaking, men in their natural state were thought to be more pure than women. And, of course, purity and impurity was also attached to whether one was a Jew or a Gentile.

The purity system had become the political system, and it worked for those who were in power. It kept them rich. For example, farmers were required to tithe part of their yearly crop to the priests and the Levites. If they did not, then their food would be considered unclean, and no one would buy it. Another example, before a leper could be proclaimed clean, he or she would have to bring in a rather hefty amount of offerings to the priest, who could then do the necessary healing rituals. So the concept of holiness had become the politics of holiness, and in fact, the economics of holiness. The powers were highly invested in keeping the status quo, and the best way to do that was to keep everybody in their place.

Okay, that was Jesus’ culture. And we need to know and understand that in order to truly understand the gospels. For example, Jesus’ story about the good Samaritan, with which we’re all so familiar, was an attack on the holiness code. The Levite and the priest passed the man by not because they were particularly apathetic or hateful, but because they were not, according to the holiness code, allowed to touch a dead person, and they couldn’t tell if the man, who is described as ‘half-dead,’ was dead or not. The Samaritan, who is radically impure, comes by, acts out of compassion, not purity, but compassion, and is praised for his actions.

And Jesus was not just attacking the holiness code in this story, he was teaching a whole new one, to be compassionate as God is compassionate (Luke 6:36). He even uses the same formula. Remember, the paradigm of the day was, Be holy as God is holy. But Jesus comes teaching, Be compassionate as God is compassionate. And he doesn’t just teach it, he does it.

Cont’d…

Happy Twentieth Birthday, GW!

2012-02-13T10:31:00.001-08:00

Urban Goatwalker Trombone Dudes, a photo by paynehollow on Flickr.

“If you choose, you can make me clean,” says the leper, and you can imagine that his heart is in his mouth.

“If you choose, you can make me clean,” says the leper, and what he’s asking Jesus to do is something that the priests have refused to do, what he’s asking Jesus to do is to declare him clean in the Levitical sense. What he’s asking Jesus to do is to restore him to his family, to restore him to his livelihood, to restore him to his community, to restore to him his dignity and his life.

“If you choose, you can declare me clean,” and his heart is pounding so hard that he knows that Jesus can hear it, and the blood is rushing to his head, and Jesus is looking at him, knowing how hard his heart is pounding, knowing how desperate he is to be restored, knowing how vile and how corrupt this system of purity has become, knowing, according to Ched Myers, who says that that’s the only way that Jesus’ anger makes sense here, that he’s been to the priests already, and that they’ve denied him his bill of health, his access to his family, to home, to livelihood, to everyone and everything that a person would want to live for, and as Jesus stands there looking at him, he is moved with anger at the systems that have cast this man out like so much garbage, Jesus is moved with anger, and he reaches out, and he knows as he reaches out that he is, by Jewish law, not allowed to touch the man, that in touching the man, he will be viewed as unclean, too, and he knows as he reaches out, that if he proclaims this man clean, that he will be overstepping his bounds, usurping the carefully guarded authority of the priests, who according to the Torah are the only ones who can declare a leper clean, even if the priest is an imbecile, the teachings say, it must be the priest that declares the leper clean, and Jesus, moved with anger, reaches out his hand and touches the man, and says to him, “I do choose. Be made clean!”

And immediately the man is made clean. At Jesus’ touch, at Jesus’ word, the man is proclaimed and made clean. But Jesus is still angry. In fact, Mark says that he snorts with indignation. Jesus is still angry at the systems that have oppressed this man for so long, and he says to man, “See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, show them what I’ve done, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, as a witness against them. They would not touch you, they would not proclaim you whole, they would not give you back your life. You go and tell them, you go and show them what I’ve done.”

Saul Alinsky, who is one of the most famous community organizers of all times, says in his book, Rules for Radicals, that the job of the organizer is to maneuver and bait the establishment so that it will publicly attack him as a ‘dangerous enemy.’ The word ‘enemy’ is sufficient to put the organizer on the side of the people, to identify him with the ‘Have-Nots…’

And then Jesus, because he himself was considered to be unclean after touching the man, and more importantly, because in taking a stab at the authorities of his day he had put himself in danger, could not go into a town openly, but had to stay out in the country, where people came to him, where the Have-Nots came to him from every quarter.

Jesus knew what he was getting into. “If you choose,” said the leper with his heart in his mouth, “if you choose…” and Jesus did choose. He chose, not just to heal the leper, which he could have done at a safe distance, as he did in the story in Luke, but to confront head on the purity laws, and thus, the keepers of the purity laws, the priests. He’s already confronted the scribes, and now he’s confronting the priests.

Twenty years ago a group of folks who had grown up under a different, but in some ways, similar, holiness code, and that’s the Southern Baptist holiness code, that can be summed up, perhaps, with this little rhyme:

Don’t smoke or drink or chew, or
hang with those who do…

…they had a vision of a place where people from all walks of life could come together on equal ground. They didn’t want another place where the haves would serve the have nots, no, they wanted a place where everyone would be served equally, and so they decided that everything would be free for everybody. They didn’t want a place where those with talent would perform for those without talent. No, they wanted a place where everyone could have a chance to shine, and so they decided to do an open mic.

They also decided to clap like crazy whenever anybody did anything, or maybe they didn’t decide it, but they sure did it, and people who never in a million years would have thought that they’d ever read a poem or sing a song found themselves up there on stage being treasured, being listened to, being loved.

They had this vision, and they made it work, and now it’s worked for 20 years. 20 years of faithfulness, 20 years of radical inclusivity, 20 years of making coffee and washing dishes, 20 years of waiting tables, 20 years of listening and performing, 20 years of pulling down the walls.

I remember our very first Urban Goatwalker Coffeehouse. Robert and I sat with a couple who was homeless, and the woman rubbed the tablecloth between her fingers and looked at the candle on the table and looked around the room and said, with reverence in her voice, this is really nice.

After all these years, I still feel the reverence of this place where people come together on equal ground, and find healing.

“If you choose, you can heal me,” says the man.

“If you choose,” says this broken, needy, desperate, heart in its mouth world, “you can heal me.” And you warm up the coffeepot and you pull out the tablecloths and you put on our aprons, and you do choose.

Thanks be to God.

Christmas Day Music at Jeff St

2012-01-01T16:59:00.001-08:00

Retreat Snippets

2011-11-02T07:00:00.000-07:00

Taking Up Your Cross

2011-09-14T08:16:00.001-07:00

Jesse's Baptism, a photo by paynehollow on Flickr.

This morning’s story is a rather odd one [Exodus 4 - God's attempt to kill Moses! and Moses' son's subsequent circumcision/foreskin sacrifice!!]. As we look at it, we might find it helpful to remember what John Dominic Crossan says about the Bible. He says that the Bible is a dialogue about what God is like. On the one hand,you have a picture of a God who is violent and retributive, in other words, a God who punishes those who are bad and rewards those who are good.

On the other hand, you have a picture of a God who is non-violent and distributive, in other words, a God who loves everybody, not just the good people, not just the people of Israel, but all the nations, of a God who gives equally to all, who created the earth and its bounty for everyone, who throws a great big feast to which all of the nations come streaming to taste of God’s goodness and mercy. Both of these pictures of God run through the Old and the New Testaments. It’s not that, as we used to say, there’s a God of the Old Testament, and a God of the New Testament. Both of these pictures of God run throughout.

There’s a tension between the two views of who God is, because it can’t be both ways. There are, of course, a lot of people putting a lot of time into developing theologies that explain how God can be both violent and non-violent, but God can’t be both: one precludes the other.

As Christians, of course, the clearest picture that we have of God is through the person of Jesus Christ, and Jesus shows us the God who, in his words, causes the rain to fall and the sun to shine on the just and the unjust, not the retributive God, but the God who loves everybody equally, the God who is like the father who forgives the prodigal son before he can even say, I’m sorry, the God who is like the employer who pays the workers who show up at the end of the day the same wages as the ones who’ve spent the whole day working their fingers to the bone.

So the Bible, says Crossan, is a dialogue between two visions of what God is like. This morning’s odd story falls on the side, obviously, of the violent God, as will some of the other stories that we look at over the next few weeks as we continue on through Exodus. And this particular story has always struck me as so very bizarre that I’ve chosen to ignore it. You’ll not be surprised when I tell you that it’s not one of the lectionary passages, which means that a whole ton of other preachers also ignore it.

But in the book, Freedom Journeys, Rabbis Arthur Waskow and Phyliss Berman have wrested a meaning from it that I want to share with you. But first let me mention the more traditional meaning, which is that circumcision is so important to God that God is ready to kill Moses because either he or his son, or maybe he and his son are not circumcised. The pronouns here are not clear, though it’s usually translated that Zipporah takes the foreskin of their son and throws it at Moses’ feet. It’s not clear whose foreskin it is, or whose feet it gets thrown at, Moses’ or God’s.

It kind of just seems to be stuck in there. It doesn’t flow well with the rest of the story. Moses is God’s chosen, on his way to free the people of Israel.

You’d think that God wouldn’t want to kill him. You’d think that God might have mentioned something about circumcision back there at the burning bush, and by the way, circumcise your son, or yourself, which ever, while you’re at it, before you head off to Egypt. Maybe that’s the missing part of the story. Maybe God did tell Moses to do this, and Moses resisted, you can’t blame him, and now God is angry at him. At any rate, the most traditional meaning of this story is that it’s a story that underlines the importance of circumcision as a Jewish rite. These stories were written down during the Jewish exile in Babylon, so it would have served as a reminder to the Jews who were being tempted to take on the ways of the Babylonian empire, who were under great pressure to assimilate, to just fit in, to remain faithful to their traditions.

But these rabbis that I mentioned have wrested out another meaning, as well, and that is that once Moses faced death at the hand of God, that he was never scared of anything again. I mean, if God tries to kill you, and you live through that, then really, who are you going be afraid of?

Seeing Moses’ pale, gaunt face imbued with terror, trudging hopeless on the path to death, God knew he had to slay this terror-stricken Moses, had to kill the terror that was already emptying out Moses’ life, making him impotent to face Pharaoh and free the slaves.

Facing a God on the brink of killing him was Moses’ cure. Facing immediate death, he knew a Power more powerful than Pharoah. His terror burned away, and he became the Moses about whom it is written, ‘Never again did there arise among the Israelites a prophet like Moses who knew YHWH intimately, face-to-face’ (Deut. 34:10).

Okay, just to be clear about this. I don’t believe that God tried to kill Moses.It’s one of the threads of thinking about who God is. That’s okay, I guess, except that it might leave you wondering whether or not God will try to kill you anytime soon. And I always remember the story about the woman, who during prayer, heard God’s voice say, “My child, why do people always think me so cruel?”

BUT, I do like the meaning that the rabbis have wrested from this ancient story. And obviously something happened in-between the time that Moses first talked to God, full of hesitation and excuses, but what about this, and what about hat, not me, Lord, and the time that he powerfully confronted Pharaoh. It may have been as simple as the fact that by the time he confronted Pharoah, he had his brother Aaron with him.

There’s great power in numbers, right? He wasn’t going it alone anymore. At any rate, somewhere along the way, he became one of those seemingly fearless ones, like Gandhi, like Martin Luther King, Jr., like Archbishop Oscar Romero, like Sojourner Truth, like Nelson Mandela, like Jesus. And when I say “fearless,” I don’t mean that they didn’t feel or express fear. “Abba,” Jesus prayed on the night of his arrest, “if you are willing, take this cup from me.” I mean that they didn’t let fear guide their actions, they didn’t let fear rule their lives.

And isn’t that what Jesus was after when he invited his disciples to take up the cross? He took the symbol that was most feared by the people, most adroitly used by the Roman Empire, who would crucify hundreds of people at a time right out there at the crossroads for everyone to see, leave them up for days as a way of keeping their subjects in line. It was a very effective tool.

So Jesus took the symbol that most invoked fear and dared his followers to beat them to the punch. Take it on, pick it up, carry it around. Show them that they can no longer control you. Show them that you will not be controlled by fear.

If any want to follow me, he said, deny yourself, take up the cross, and follow.

Baptism, which we will be celebrating this afternoon, is also a symbol of dying to oneself, dying to one’s fear, dying to one’s hatreds, dying to one’s selfishness, dying to one’s old way of living. We die as we go under the water and are raised to new life in Christ. New life in Christ, ruled no longer by fear, but by love. Ruled by love…

Jesse, you’ve been following Jesus for some time now, and we’ve all seen that. We want you to know that your church family is well-pleased with you. For you have chosen a life, not ruled by fear, but by love. You have chosen a life that matters, that counts, not just for your own happiness, but for the joy of others. As you stir the waters of baptism today, we remember our own baptisms, and we pledge to walk alongside you on this journey toward the cross.

Amazing Grace

2011-08-27T12:21:00.000-07:00

Eyes Wide Open

2011-06-30T14:03:00.000-07:00

The Trabue family playing our first song together as a group, I believe... Eyes Wide Open, by the Vespers. Some of the lyrics...

1. Went to see Grandpa in September
When his days left here were few
He sat me down at his bedside
Told me things that I should do

2. Please respect this crown of wisdom,
He said, pointing to his gray head
I leaned in and listened closely
As my dear grandfather said

CHORUS:
Live your life with eyes wide open
Bide your time with palms toward heaven
People come in circles and squares
Some are hearts but they're quite rare

3. He told me stories of his childhood
Of mistakes that he had made
Told me, Don't you make the same ones
Because love is not a game.

CHORUS:
Grandpa died with eyes wide open
Grandpa died with palms toward heaven
People come in circles and squares
Some are hearts but they're quite rare
Grandpa was one of these hearts
Take a look at what you are...

Earth Day 2011

2011-05-22T16:13:00.000-07:00

Happy Earth Day from Jeff St Baptist Community!

We Are Free

2011-05-09T07:41:00.001-07:00

Jeff St Easter, a photo by paynehollow on Flickr.

On the evening of that first day of the week, when the disciples were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” After he said this, he showed them his hands and side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.

Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone’s sins, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”

~John 20

It’s interesting to me that out of all the things that the Risen Christ might have said, maybe did say to his cowering in fear disciples, that out of all the blessings, out of all the charges that he could have given, that the one that the author of John reports is about forgiving and retaining sins.

If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.

I’ve always wondered what he meant by that. And I’ve shied away from ever really preaching about it because on the surface it kind of sounds like the Risen Christ was giving the church the power to forgive or to not forgive sin, to decide who is in and who is out, who is clean and who is unclean, etc. And I, for one, have not been very happy with the church’s record in that regard.

I grew up believing that God didn’t forgive you until you said a special little “please forgive me of all my sins, Jesus” prayer, which meant that the large majority of the non-Southern Baptist world, having not said that particular prayer, was left unforgiven. I’m exaggerating about that a little bit, but not much.

But what I’ve realized along the way is that this statement isn’t about the church’s power to forgive sin or to not forgive sin. It’s about Christ’s power to forgive sin, and about the church’s power through Christ to proclaim the forgiving love of God, and to live as forgiving and forgiven people.

Martin Niemoeller talks about Easter as the “unexpected act of the living God, which interrupts and runs counter to the uniform rise and fall of the world’s rhythm.” Talk about running counter to the uniform rise and fall of the world’s rhythm — some of us experienced that this week, didn’t we, when our world was cheering over the death of Bin Ladan, and we were saddened, or if not saddened, concerned, or if not concerned, at least ambivalent over the violent death of, yes, we can say it, one of God’s children.

I attended part of a conference at Louisville Presbyterian Seminary on Monday morning, and there was a part of the worship service where people were voicing prayers aloud, and as I was struggling to find words to express a prayer about our response to the death of Bin Laden, someone else simply prayed, “God, give us the courage to forgive our enemies.” It was perfect, and I was grateful to be in a setting where people were seeking to love, seeking to not gloat, to not rejoice in the demise of another, however dastardly that other was. I was grateful to be in a community where the uniform rise and fall of the world’s rhythm was interrupted by a great jolt of forgiveness.

Of course, it’s easier to gloat, to not forgive. But thankfully, Craig Barnes reminds us that “we are not on our own for this. Jesus gave us the Holy Spirit before he called us to forgive. The work of the Spirit is to bind us into the work of Jesus Christ. What this means is that we disciples are not called to produce forgiveness. We’re called to be the priest pronouncing that which has been produced on the cross...”

Jesus’ charge to the disciples was to carry on the work that he had started. I am thinking of the woman caught in adultery. The crowd was ready to stone her, but Jesus said, “Let the one among you who has never sinned cast the first stone.” I am thinking of the story of when Martha came out of the kitchen madder than a wet hen because Mary hadn’t been lifting a finger to help cook, and Jesus defended Mary. “Mary has chosen that right thing,” he said. And later, when Judas jumped all over Mary for wasting an expensive bottle of perfume to annoint Jesus, and once again Jesus defended her.

It seems to me that one of the things that Jesus did consistently through the Gospel of John was to give people the benefit of the doubt, to take what others saw as “sin,” as “shortcoming,” as “uncleanliness,” and to reinterpret it.

In the story of the woman caught in adultery, he didn’t downplay the seriousness of the woman’s sin, but he did put it into context for everyone there: “Let the one who is without sin cast the first stone.” Yeah, okay, she sinned, but really who hasn’t? And in the stories of Mary, with Martha, and with Judas, he reinterpreted Mary’s actions, which were seen as negative by others in both cases, Mary should have been working in the kitchen, fulfilling her role as a woman, right, and Mary shouldn’t have wasted so much money on one lavish act of love, right, he reinterpreted her actions, and pronounced them good, pronounced her good. “Wherever the gospel is preached, she will be remembered.”

And it strikes me that while the forgiveness that we usually talk about is, I will forgive you for what you have specifically done to me, that it’s broader than that. It’s an approach to the world, it’s a lavishness, a liberality, an automatic giving of the benefit of the doubt. It’s a willingness and not just a willingness, but a habit of going deeper, of looking beyond and beneath, of seeing people, not just in light of what they’ve done, of how they’ve screwed up, but through the eyes of someone who truly loves them...

If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.

If we look at people through a stingy, judgmental lens, we are retaining their sins, accentuating their failures, perpetuating their sense of shortcoming. But if we look at people through a lens of grace and tenderness and love, then, poof, it’s no longer their shortcomings that are foremost in our minds, and maybe, just maybe not in their minds, at least for awhile, either.

What is that verse in 1st Peter? “Love covers a multitude of sins.”

Of course, we can proclaim forgiveness, live in a spirit of forgiveness and grace and still not seem to make much a difference in the lives of those around us. But we can be assured that the one place that it will make a difference is in our lives.

In his book about South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Process, Bishop Desmond Tutu tells the following story: A recent issue of the journal ‘Spirituality and Health’ had on its front cover a picture of three U.S. ex-servicemen standing in front of the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, D.C. One asks, “Have you forgiven those who held you prisoner of war?” “I will never forgive them,” replies the other. His mate says: “Then it seem they still have you in prison, don’t they?”

Bishop Tutu says that forgiving does not mean forgetting and it does not mean condoning. It does not mean minimizing what happened or not taking it seriously. And I would add that it does not mean going back to an abusive partner or putting yourself in a situation where you will be used or taken advantage of. What it does mean is, says Tutu, is “drawing out the sting in the memory that threatens to poison our entire existence.”

Eugene Peterson, in his paraphrase of scripture, The Message, interprets it like this:

"If you forgive someone's sins, they're gone for good. If you don't forgive sins, what are you going to do with them?"

Craig Barnes, again, says, “If we do not forgive those who hurt us, the only alternative is to retain the sins. To retain means to hold, and to hold onto hurt is to lock ourselves into the identity of victim. In the words of Lewis Smedes, ‘When you forgive you set a prisoner free. And then you discover that the prisoner was you.’"

On Easter, Karen mentioned the movie that some of us had gone to see the day before, “Of Gods and Men,” about nine Catholic priests who chose to remain at their monastery in Algeria even though they knew that their lives were in danger due to a rebel-led insurrection against the government. In one of the most on the edge of your seat scenes, the rebels, who had previously executed a number of foreigners in the same town, force their way into the monastery to demand medical care and supplies.

Brother Christian, the leader of the priests, refuses to send the elderly doctor with them, saying that he is too feeble to make the journey and that they can come to the clinic instead. He also refuses to give them medicine, saying that their supplies are low, and that the villagers need them. The rebel leader says, “You have no choice.” And Brother Christian, knowing that he could be shot to death any minute, replies, “Yes. I do.”

The people of the Risen Christ know that we always have a choice. Not in what happens to us, but in how we respond. We can choose to love, we can choose to walk the second mile, we can choose to turn the other cheek, we can choose to forgive, we can choose to live powerfully as the people of the Risen Christ, defined only by love, controlled only by love.

We have a choice. We are free.

=====
Excerpts from yesterday's sermon by Pastor Cindy

Happy Easter!

2011-04-24T19:57:00.001-07:00

Easter blessings from the tribe at Jeff St Baptist Community...

Not many years their rounds shall roll
Each moment brings it nigh
And all your glories stand revealed
To our admiring eye
You wheels of nature speed your course,
You mortal powers decay
Fast as you bring the night of death
You bring eternal day

~from "Florence," by Crooked Still

Confrontation Monday!

2011-04-18T12:16:00.000-07:00

On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple courts and began driving out those who were buying and selling there.

He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves*, and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. And as he taught them, he said, “Is it not written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations’? But you have made it ‘a den of robbers.’”

The chief priests and the teachers of the law heard this and began looking for a way to kill him, for they feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed at his teaching.

*Doves - the offering specifically mentioned by Jesus - were the offering required to be paid by the poor folk, who'd often bring in their own doves, only to find out they were not "pure" enough for a sacrifice and thus, the poor were forced to pay more - that they couldn't afford - in order to be in God's Temple. Thus, the "den of robbers" charge, especially insofar as they were ripping off especially the poor, who could least afford it.

It is this action that was at least one of the final straws for the religious authorities that drove them to plan Jesus' execution by the state.

Labyrinth

2011-03-15T18:57:00.001-07:00

Labyrinth a photo by paynehollow on Flickr.

A journey begins
pebbles in my walking shoes
labyrinth leads home

~Kate Sanders

I Love Mountains

2011-02-12T08:12:00.001-08:00

I Love Mountains
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

More Muir quotes and more artwork...

Pollution, defilement, squalor are words that never would have been created had man lived conformably to Nature. Birds, insects, bears die as cleanly and are disposed of as beautifully as flies. The woods are full of dead and dying trees, yet needed for their beauty to complete the beauty of the living...

Oh, these vast, calm, measureless mountain days, inciting at once to work and rest! Days in whose light everything seems equally divine, opening a thousand windows to show us God. Nevermore, however weary, should one faint by the way who gains the blessings of one mountain day; whatever his fate, long life, short life, stormy or calm, he is rich forever.

The battle we have fought, and are still fighting for the forests is a part of the eternal conflict between right and wrong, and we cannot expect to see the end of it. ... So we must count on watching and striving for these trees, and should always be glad to find anything so surely good and noble to strive for.

Save The Mountains

2011-02-12T08:10:00.001-08:00

Save The Mountains
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

More Muir quotes, and more artwork...

There is a love of wild nature in everybody an ancient mother-love ever showing itself whether recognized or no, and however covered by cares and duties.

How hard to realize that every camp of men or beast has this glorious starry firmament for a roof! In such places standing alone on the mountain-top it is easy to realize that whatever special nests we make - leaves and moss like the marmots and birds, or tents or piled stone - we all dwell in a house of one room - the world with the firmament for its roof - and are sailing the celestial spaces without leaving any track.

Only by going alone in silence, without baggage, can one truly get into the heart of the wilderness....

It has been said that trees are imperfect men, and seem to bemoan their imprisonment rooted in the ground. But they never seem so to me. I never saw a discontented tree. They grip the ground as though they liked it, and though fast rooted they travel about as far as we do. They go wandering forth in all directions with every wind, going and coming like ourselves, traveling with us around the sun two million miles a day, and through space heaven knows how fast and far!...

Our crude civilization engenders a multitude of wants, and law-givers are ever at their wit's end devising. The hall and the theater and the church have been invented, and compulsory education. Why not add compulsory recreation? Our forefathers forged chains of duty and habit, which bind us notwithstanding our boasted freedom, and we ourselves in desperation add link to link, groaning and making medicinal laws for relief. Yet few think of pure rest or of the healing power of Nature.
One is constantly reminded of the infinite lavishness and fertility of Nature -- inexhaustible abundance amid what seems enormous waste.

And yet when we look into any of her operations that lie within reach of our minds, we learn that no particle of her material is wasted or worn out. It is eternally flowing from use to use, beauty to yet higher beauty; and we soon cease to lament waste and death, and rather rejoice and exult in the imperishable, unspendable wealth of the universe, and faithfully watch and wait the reappearance of everything that melts and fades and dies about us, feeling sure that its next appearance will be better and more beautiful than the last.

I Love the Appalachians

2011-02-12T08:07:00.001-08:00

Love Appalachians
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

More Muir quotes and more artwork...

In God's wildness lies the hope of the world - the great fresh unblighted, unredeemed wilderness. The galling harness of civilization drops off, and wounds heal ere we are aware...

So extraordinary is Nature with her choicest treasures, spending plant beauty as she spends sunshine, pouring it forth into land and sea, garden and desert. And so the beauty of lilies falls on angels and men, bears and squirrels, wolves and sheep, birds and bees....

Most people are on the world, not in it. - have no conscious sympathy or relationship to anything about them - undiffused, separate, and rigidly alone like marbles of polished stone, touching but separate.

I used to envy the father of our race, dwelling as he did in contact with the new-made fields and plants of Eden; but I do so no more, because I have discovered that I also live in "creation's dawn." The morning stars still sing together, and the world, not yet half made, becomes more beautiful every day.

Love the Mountains Day

2011-02-12T08:04:00.001-08:00

Miriam Heart Mountains
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Every year, the last few years, we have found ourselves in our state's capital on Valentine's Day, expressing our love for the mountains and our opposition to their destruction. Kentucky author Wendell Berry - God bless him!) - has, in fact, camped out at the governor's office this weekend in protest.

Unfortunately, our Democrat governor has placed himself on the side of (in the pocket of) coal companies and is suing the EPA for daring to actually do its job and "P" the "E!"

The story about opposition to Mountaintop Removal can be found here

And so, I ask any readers who are so inclined to think of our wonderful mountains and valleys this weekend. Think of the gall it takes to believe it is acceptable to blow off the top of hundreds of mountains for the sake of cheap energy. Artificially and unjustly cheap energy. Pray for the opposition, if you are a praying sort. Write letters, if you are a letter-writing sort. Change your lifestyles so that it is less dependent upon cheap fossil fuels, if you are a bold sort.

Thanks. I'll leave you with some quotes on creation from John Muir...

The wrongs done to trees, wrongs of every sort, are done in the darkness of ignorance and unbelief, for when the light comes, the heart of the people is always right.

Fresh beauty opens one's eyes wherever it is really seen, but the very abundance and completeness of the common beauty that besets our steps prevents its being absorbed and appreciated. It is a good thing, therefore, to make short excursions now and then to the bottom of the sea among dulse and coral, or up among the clouds on mountain-tops, or in balloons, or even to creep like worms into dark holes and caverns underground, not only to learn something of what is going on in those out-of-the-way places, but to see better what the sun sees on our return to common everyday beauty.

Another glorious day, the air as delicious to the lungs as nectar to the tongue...

Brought into right relationships with the wilderness, man would see that his appropriation of Earth's resources beyond his personal needs would only bring imbalance and begat ultimate loss and poverty by all.

Any fool can destroy trees [and, I would add, Mountains - dt]. They cannot run away; and if they could, they would still be destroyed - chased and hunted down as long as fun or a dollar could be got out of their bark hides. Branching horns, or magnificent bole backbones. Few that fell trees plant them; nor would planting avail much towards getting back anything like the noble primeval forests...

Who publishes the sheet-music of the winds or the music of water written in river-lines?

Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life...

These temple-destroyers, devotees of ravaging commercialism, seem to have a perfect contempt for Nature, and instead of lifting their eyes to the God of the mountains, lift them to the Almighty Dollar. Dam Hetch Hetchy! As well dam for water-tanks the people's cathedrals and churches, for no holier temple has ever been consecrated by the heart of man.

How infinitely superior to our physical senses are those of the mind! The spiritual eye sees not only rivers of water but of air. It sees the crystals of the rock in rapid sympathetic motion, giving enthusiastic obedience to the sun's rays, then sinking back to rest in the night. The whole world is in motion to the center. So also sounds. We hear only woodpeckers and squirrels and the rush of turbulent streams. But imagination gives us the sweet music of tiniest insect wings, enables us to hear, all around the world, the vibration of every needle, the waving of every bole and branch, the sound of stars in circulation like particles in the blood...

Come to the woods, for here is rest. There is no repose like that of the green deep woods. Here grow the wallflower and the violet. The squirrel will come and sit upon your knee, the logcock will wake you in the morning. Sleep in forgetfulness of all ill. Of all the upness accessible to mortals, there is no upness comparable to the mountains.

No synonym for God is so perfect as Beauty. Whether as seen carving the lines of the mountains with glaciers, or gathering matter into stars, or planning the movements of water, or gardening - still all is Beauty!

God never made an ugly landscape. All that the sun shines on is beautiful, so long as it is wild...

Keep close to Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.

You can read more wonderful Muir excerpts here.

Intro to the Sermon on the Mount

2011-01-04T10:22:00.001-08:00

Lower Signpost
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

About once a year or so, our Youth Minister, Roger, presents a telling of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. He has committed the sermon to memory and tells it, much as it must have sounded hearing Jesus tell it. It's a wonderful, powerful way to consider the teachings of Jesus.

This year, Roger prepared an introduction to the Sermon, to give us some context. This, too, I thought was very cool, and so I present it here for your consideration.

Palestine in the time of Jesus was difficult. Galilee, Samaria, Judea and the rest of the eastern Mediterranean region was under the occupation of the Roman Empire. Luke’s birth narrative begins with, “In the days of Caesar Augustus…” and Caesar Augustus was the first full-blown emperor of Rome. Rome had been a republic until Julius Caesar seized control and began the transition away from more democratic principles toward empire. His nephew, Octavius, inherited his power, took the name Caesar Augustus, and consolidated Rome’s position as an empire. Not only did Caesar Augustus consolidate political power, but he began to consolidate religious power as well. The expectation was for the conquered lands to worship the divine Caesar as a god.

This proved to be a problem for the Jews. Whereas most of the Mediterranean world already believed in many gods and had little difficulty assimilating Caesar in as another god to be worshipped, it was not the same for the Jews. The Jews believed there was but one true God, the creator and master of the universe. “Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.”

There was no way they could worship God and worship Caesar. Fortunately, because this was their religion when Rome took control, they weren’t forced to sacrifice at the altars to Caesar Augustus, but they were expected to capitulate to the political and social expectations of the empire.

But even this was too much for the Jews. “How can we, the chosen people of God, live in this unacceptable situation? Why are we again under the rule of the pagan gentiles? Didn’t we have our own rulers and our own temple? What has gone wrong?”

There were four significant points of view on this question in the days of Jesus. The zealots wanted to rise up like the Maccabees and violently drive Rome from the Promised Land. “It’s our land and we’ll kill the Romans and their lackeys to keep it.”

The Sadducees and Herodians urged the people to go along to get along with the rule of the empire. “If we rise up we’ll be destroyed. We must work together.” The Sadducees and Herodians had a credibility problem with the people, though, because as collaborators with Rome they became rich oppressors themselves.

The Pharisees viewed Roman rule as punishment from God for the people’s sin. “If we would only purify ourselves and truly become God’s holy people, then God will send his Messiah to lead us to victory against God’s enemies.” They were pretty serious about this, too, developing over 600 specific rules to make sure they were pure in the sight of God. This approach left little room for error and as a result the Pharisees tended to be a tad judgmental and intolerant toward those who didn’t follow their rules just so.

The Esseenes said, “All y’all are crazy and don’t get it” and they withdrew from society into the wilderness and refused to trouble themselves with earthly concerns and conflicts.

And in the region of Galilee from the town of Nazareth, Jesus, a carpenter turned rabbi, began a ministry of healing and of signs and wonders that the people had not seen before. And he had a message that put him at odds with everyone.

The zealots liked the way he exposed the hypocrisy of the Sadducees and the Pharisees, but he also said, “Do not take revenge against the evil doer” and “Love your enemies, too, like God does.”

The Sadducees liked Jesus’ words of blessing to the poor people of the land, but when he enjoined them to stand up to those who backhand you and turn the other check to make them treat you like an equal or to stand naked before the judge and expose the economic injustice of the system or to turn the tables on Roman law by refusing to give a Roman soldier back his backpack after he has forced you to carry it for a mile – why, that just rocks the boat too much!

The Pharisees liked many of the themes of Jesus’ teaching – almsgiving, praying, and fasting, these were good, measurable acts of righteous in their eyes – but then he sums up the law with “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you,” and their 600 plus rules seem a bit silly and extreme.

The Esseenes could relate to the times Jesus withdrew to the mountains in solitude to pray, but then he always came back to the people and invited them to participate in the kingdom of God right now. And this participation was not based on how zealous or rich or pious or mystical one was. “It’s not even about calling me Lord,” Jesus said, “or prophesying, or casting out demons or performing miracles. That’s not how you know me and that’s not how you participate in the realm of God.” Instead it was based on recognizing the traps that pull us to sin and avoiding them. It was based on embracing God, not as the master of the universe, but as our Abba, our Daddy, and on carrying on the family business of reconciliation and love. It wasn’t about selfish prestige, or monetary gain, or being afraid and worrying about getting it right. It was based on simply treating others the way we’d like to be treated in return.

The Sermon on the Mount is the longest sermon of Jesus in the Gospels. Listen for these themes. Listen to how his message was heard by the zealots and the Sadducees, the Pharisees and the Esseenes. Listen to how his message was heard by his disciples and by the people of the land. And then listen to how his message sounds to you as you try to live your life with integrity in the empire today.

The Sermon on the Mount

Signals of Oddity: Reclaiming Christmas

2010-12-21T15:16:00.001-08:00

Old Crow
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Every year, Jeff Street celebrates the Birth of the Christ by means of our Reclaiming Christmas Project, in which we encourage others to NOT give to us (since we have so much already) but to give to various relief projects.

This year, the Reclaiming Christmas Project will pay for three very important projects:

1. Medical assistance to the poor in Nicaragua
2. Emergency aid to poor refugees in Morocco
3. Buying into clean energy at our own church

The Cravin'
with apologies to Poe

Once upon a Christmas season, while I shopped without reason
Over many quaint and curious trinkets and toys from the store,
While I coasted down the aisles, that went on for miles and miles,
Til my socks of argyle, were slipping towards the floor.
’Tis the season,' I muttered, `fa la la la las galore -
Only this, and nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I recall it was very nearly fall
And each of the shopping malls put up their finest Halloween decor
But not that holiday alone, for by September twenty-one
The freaking Christmas decorations did appear all over the stores!
The snowmen, reindeer, elves and Santas made their way into the stores
It seems they stay there evermore.

Presently my soul grew weaker; and my spirits they grew bleaker,
`Ma’am,' said I, `or Sir, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was shopping, and I saw you over there mopping,
And I wonder why you’re dropping, all these hints for us to buy more?
It’s not even November! Do all the distinguished members of the board
Want us to buy forevermore?

Deep into that dark soul staring, long I stood there wondering, glaring,
At the Blue Vested Customer Service Representative from the store
But the silence was unbroken, and that teen, he gave no token,
And the only word there spoken were the grunted words, ` I was just mopping the floor'
This he grunted, like a football punted back the words, `the…the floor!'
Merely this and nothing more.

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if shill or devil! -
Whither the tempter sent you to lure me to this wretched store?
Tell me that I speak treason, not to want the Christmas season
By the greedy corporations – To turn tricks for this whore!
Is there - is there deeper meaning? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the employee, `Dude, I was just mopping the floor.'

Now the manager, slowly running towards the noise so stunning
and upsetting to the blessed shoppers busily treading through his store
For he could not help but hearing that a customer was sneering
At the Christmas decorations so glaringly beautiful upon their doors
Jesus is the reason for the seasonal increase in profits they adore
They kicked me out, forevermore.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Jeff St 2010 Retreat

2010-11-08T07:26:00.001-08:00

Jeff St 2010 Retreat
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Photo slideshow can be found here, I think.

Many thanks to Christy, Dina and all who helped organize this wonderful weekend!

2010 Jeff St Retreat, Kids' Stop Motion Fun

2010-11-08T07:12:00.000-08:00

Uninhibited!

2010-10-19T17:35:00.001-07:00

Passion Flower
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Donna and Cindy shared the "word of the day" at church last Sunday - uninhibited. They did so by singing Apples in June, accompanied by our own Blair on cello! They all did a great job...

Signals of Oddity: Muddling Through

2010-10-15T05:50:00.001-07:00

Karen Preaching
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Excerpts from a recent sermon by our dear sister, Karen...

...My professor and friend Roberta Bondi says: when it comes to prayer, the most important thing is to show up. But it's not as easy as it might sound, is it? Many of us would much prefer to have a shiny, cleaned-up version of our selves to present to God (and other church types).

The challenge then, is indeed, to show up as we are, to try to be as real as we can, as honest as we can be about who we are and be those true selves before God, however, whoever, we understand God to be – being as honest as we can there, too. There's a whole lot of ambiguity therein, requiring all manner of muddling, I think.

One thing I love about this church is that it is a place that gives us permission to show up and muddle through together with brothers and sisters, which is what we are doing this morning.

I chose the Prodigal Son as our gospel reading today, because it was already on my mind...

You know what prodigal really means, right? It means “excessive, lavish, extravagant”. And we attach this adjective with derision to the lost son. But the most prodigal character in this story is not that younger brother, you know, but, rather, the father.

If the son breaks the norms of society in acting prodigally, the father shatters those norms by his own prodigal behavior: his extravagant forgiveness, his lavish love, his excessive grace.. His son who has shamed him and the entire family should be dead to him. His honor, that commodity which was all-important socially, had been offended.

But the father who should have been nursing his wounded pride, was, instead, waiting and watching for the return of his son – like a Mama who cannot forget her baby... So when his boy finally did show up on the horizon, though he was still a long way off, Jesus says, this father spotted his son – even with that cataract in his left eye he knew his boy's walk, and, abandoning all pretense of dignity, he ran, yes ran (which dignified men did NOT do) he ran like a crazy old woman, kicking up enough dust to get his pristine white jellaba dirty, he RAN to meet his son and wrapped him in his arms.

By the time we get to the end of the story, we are not surprised to find that the Father's lavish, extravagant, embarassingly motherly prodigal love extends to his other son as well – the one who feels no need for grace, who doesn't realize that he needs forgiveness in his life, who doesn't realize how much is broken and unwell in his soul or in his family because he has worked so blastedly hard to keep things together on the farm that, by God, things better be in order or there'll be hell to pay in the morning. We see that the father does not condemn the older son for his hardness of heart any more than he condemned the younger one for his wantonness.

Rather, the father invites them both into the joy of relationship with him as his beloved children, bound together by a healing, “wholing” flow of grace.

The sparse language of the two sons in the parable makes the words they say telling. The younger son believes he is not worthy to be a son, and so will ask to simply be a servant/a slave – doulos (same word in Greek).

The older son spitefully reminds his father that he has worked like a slave for him all these years which ought to be worth something. But the father makes it plain to both of them that he does not want slaves, worthy or unworthy of their keep. He wants his own beloved children, just as they are, to show up, to come back to him, to join him in the circle of love and joy that is their true birthright as family...

To choose sonship, daughtership, our heritage of belovedness, is to let ourselves be caught up in the flow of God's prodigal love, to go with the flow, and trust it to keep flowing. And in the life of Jesus, we are invited to trust that the flow of grace will indeed keep on saving us from ourselves, that nothing will stop it – not even bony death.

For God is not some remote man upstairs who might quietly slip away and abandon us, but the Mother/Father who doesn't just promise to show up if we'll show up, but runs to meet us at every turn. In life, in death, and beyond death. Our loving God pours out forgiveness and grace upon our every breath, our every atom of being. God washes us with saving grace, and promises to hold us in love for eternity.

Moroccan Choir at Jeff St

2010-09-05T06:30:00.000-07:00

Our dear friend, Karen, brought a wonderful choir from Morocco for a recent visit at Jeff St. Much good music and high times were enjoyed by all...

A Prayer for Peace

2010-08-09T08:46:00.001-07:00

With the uproar about the Islamic Center being built in NYC, and with the remembrance of Peace Sunday and the horrors of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I offer a small prayer for peace...

The song is "Jerusalem," written by Steve Earle and sung here by Donna and Dan, with Jordan accompanying us on mandolin.

I woke up this mornin' and none of the news was good
And death machines were rumblin' 'cross the ground where Jesus stood
And the man on my TV told me that it had always been that way
And there was nothin' anyone could do or say

And I almost listened to him
Yeah, I almost lost my mind
Then I regained my senses again
And looked into my heart to find

That I believe that one fine day all the children of Abraham
Will lay down their swords forever in Jerusalem

Well maybe I'm only dreamin' and maybe I'm just a fool
But I don't remember learnin' how to hate in Sunday school
But somewhere along the way I strayed and I never looked back again
But I still find some comfort now and then

Then the storm comes rumblin' in
And I can't lay me down
And the drums are drummin' again
And I can't stand the sound

But I believe there'll come a day when the lion and the lamb
Will lie down in peace together in Jerusalem

And there'll be no barricades then
There'll be no wire or walls
And we can wash all this blood from our hands
And all this hatred from our souls

And I believe that on that day all the children of Abraham
Will lay down their swords forever in Jerusalem

Signals of Oddity: Sabbath Economics

2010-07-27T07:19:00.001-07:00

Barefoot Rick
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

I'm going to post an excerpt from the sermon by our dear friend, Rick, who preached the last two weeks at Jeff St on the topic of the Sabbath. (That's Rick in the photo, barefoot and ready to preach!) The Bible passages he refers to are the story of Joseph the dreamer - found in Genesis 47 - and the story of the provision of manna to the people of Israel - found in Exodus 16.

This is just a very brief excerpt from a larger and wonderfully challenging sermon...

...In one of the great ironies of literature, Joseph is praised for resisting the designs of his boss’s wife, while his role as the inadvertent catalyst for the eventual enslavement of his own people is ignored.

Of course, Joseph probably couldn’t have known what his program [gathering together huge amounts of grain, centralized in Egypt - dt] would lead to. But future generations in Israel reflected on their long nightmare in Egypt and filled their literature with warnings about concentrated economic power.

Of course, the Hebrews finally escaped from Egypt. The Exodus from enslavement was the great liberating event of their history. And in the lore that developed about their deliverance, Hebrew storytellers emphasized some intriguing imagery that signified a different way. Manna in the wilderness.

The tale of the manna is much more than a miracle story. It envisions an economic alternative! It’s the symbolic charter for what we call “Sabbath economics.”

*Work in the place where you are.
*Take just enough for your family’s needs.
*Depend on the abundant provision of creation.
*Hoarding and excess result in rottenness.

The dream of Joseph envisions more and more.
The vision of the manna says enough is enough.
The dream of Joseph is take all you can.
The vision of the manna is share what you have.
Accumulate or cooperate.
One dream uproots - and turns into a nightmare for others.
The other dream plants - and prioritizes the needs of others.
The symbol of the manna is the visionary charter of an unseen conspiracy, the seed of change, quietly operating just below the surface.

The manna imagery even takes root in Israel’s national covenant as they develop the Sabbath economics consistent with their faith a God who liberated them from empire.

*Their gleaning laws allowed the poor to gather food off the land. (Deut. 24: 19-22)
*They outlawed interest rates that might lead people into spirals of debt servitude. (Ex. 22: 25)
*They set aside Sabbatical years to protect the land and to free the poor from debt. (Ex. 23: 10-11).
*Even the Sabbath has a humanitarian function (Ex. 23: 12).
*They envisioned periodic years of Jubilee to challenge accumulation of wealth, by redistributing land to level out patterns of concentrated ownership (Lev. 25: 10, 13, 28).

Some Jews even rejected monarchy itself, because it grafted political authority onto economic power. It was too much like Egypt’s system of an all-controlling center, enriched by an impoverished periphery...

So what do these ancient stories mean for us?

Of course, the same competing visions grow in the soil of our history as well. In our society, wealth has been redistributed upward for 30 years, toward greater concentration at the top, and increasing dependence at the bottom. Our nation has the largest gap between rich and poor in its history. The top 1% of Americans now possess 40% of the nation's total wealth.

We’ve been through the worst economic crisis since the Depression — an era also characterized by excess and scandal on Wall Street. Our largest banks are under investigation for complex financial maneuvers that profited from misleading their investors.

We’re now accustomed to terms like hedge funds, derivatives, debt swaps, and mortgage-backed securities — which symbolize the flagrant unchecked greed of an unfettered oligarchy, speculatively gambling with the nation’s wealth for the enrichment of a few, profiting even from the nation’s housing meltdown.

The other side of this coin is millions of homes in foreclosure…

Today, the reintegration of commercial and investment banking has yielded mega-banks so gigantic that their collapse threatens the entire financial system. And most of us are carrying their credit cards — our money, our homes, our welfare all tied up with their power.

We can scarcely imagine an alternative.

Now considered “too big to fail,” the mega-banks appropriate even more of the nation’s wealth unto themselves, gobbling up tax-funded bailouts while awarding themselves multimillion-dollar bonuses. And the recent financial regulation bill may not change as much as we’d hope.

So we’re faced with the age-old choice:

The dream of Joseph or the vision of the manna.
More and more, or enough is enough.
Take all you can, or share what you have.
Accumulate or cooperate.

The danger is more than economic. Justice Louis Brandeis was right when he said: "We can have democracy in this country, or we can have great wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we can't have both.”

With millions spent on lobbyists, the mega-banks aren’t just “too big to fail,” but too well-connected to fail.

It’s a dream come true.

The trouble is, while modern-day Josephs dream of profit piled upon profit, we can’t seem to do without a system we now depend on.

For three months, we’ve watched as the BP oil spill has exceeded 100 million gallons, leaving 11 workers dead, unparalleled damage to an ocean ecosystem, fragile wetlands polluted, pelicans and sea turtles coated with petroleum, fish suffocating in underwater plumes of oil.

It’s the terrible price of a crude addiction we cannot shake...

The official history of our era is the story of the powerful — bank bailouts, financial flows, military campaigns, election returns… But do not be deceived. There’s another story.

There’s something going on underground.

It’s the quiet revolution of mustard seeds. The conspiracy of the seemingly insignificant...
It’s the story of countless unnamed midwives to a history flowing forward in a simple basket of reeds.
It’s the story of Shiphrah and Puah, Moses and Amos, St Francis and Dorothy Day, Gandhi and Wilberforce, Sandino and Mandela, Cesar Chavez and Rosa Parks.

What’s happened at Vacation Bible School this week (the kids collecting money and things for the needy) doesn’t seem like much. The gardens we’ve planted in our back yards seem so small. The Tuesday Farmer’s market you’ve worked so hard on is tiny.

But in a concentrated agro-industrial system, these mustard seed realities are nothing less than a new vision germinating in the midst of the old.
Yes, three corporations control the world’s grain trade.
Yes, Monsanto controls three-fifths of the world’s seed production.

But the dream that envisions a local, sustainable food economy can reconnect more and more of us with the source of our food and the rhythms of the earth. This is the odd vision of Sabbath economics, the peculiar practice of the manna alternative.

======

Thanks, Rick!

Signals of Oddity: Sabbath, 1

2010-07-20T07:14:00.001-07:00

Bouncing Rick
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

We begin our year long look at our "Signals of Oddity" - those practices we have that make us peculiar - with our dear brother Rick leading us at a look at the notion of Sabbath...

Terri reminded us last week of Flannery O’Connor’s famous quip, “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you odd.” I love that oddity is the theme for our sabbatical period.

This year, we're considering our “Signals of Oddity: Worship as a Counter-Cultural Practice.” The idea is to study how worship functions as an alternative to the dominant culture. It says that one of our church’s challenges is to preserve our radical edge, our salty flavor, our oddity, our peculiarity.

Now on one level, a quick glance around the room suggests that peculiarity should not be a challenge for us! We are indeed an odd bunch. And the idea of Sabbath is pretty odd and countercultural too.

So what are we doing here? Really. Here we are, this odd collection of people — male and female; black and white; gay and straight; single and coupled; older and younger; homeless and housed; people with psychological and physical challenges; students and professionals, employed and unemployed, believers and seekers…

The welcoming diversity of this church, in itself, is a blessed oddity. One reason we’re here is the people we’ve come to love.

And there’s something pretty special about being with people with whom we can share our joys and concerns, knowing there’s a place where we belong. In this individualistic society, that’s pretty odd too. But to clarify why Sabbath signals a blessed oddity, I want to go back to the beginning – all the way back to Genesis 1 and 2, where Sabbath is first established. Because the Hebrews were saying something that’s remarkably relevant to our time.

So turn to Genesis 1, the first of two creation stories in the opening chapters of Genesis. They come from oral traditions of two different regions of Israel in two different centuries. They even use different names for God (1:1—God/Elohim—and 2:4b—Lord God/YHWH Elohim). They’re different stories. So we can’t read them as science or historical reporting of actual events. That would misunderstand the nature of this literature. These stories present a worldview—symbolically.

The first story uses old Babylonian imagery by starting with a formless watery void, and portrays the whole drama of creation as a triumph of order.

1:2—“The earth was formless and empty; darkness was over the surface of the deep; and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.”

The chapter shows God simply speaking Order into existence. It’s one of the most carefully designed literary units in the Bible, with a structure crafted to reinforce its message—that we’re part of this marvelously complex patterned structure, an abundant, harmonious order. It’s amazing how the text’s form serves its function. Notice:

1) There are seven days—each paragraph set apart with repeated refrains in a richly patterned prose. You can see the order on the page.

And each paragraph has three repeated refrains, giving a symmetrical pattern to the whole structure:
*Each paragraph begins with, “And God said.”
*Each repeats: “And God saw that it was good.”
*And each day ends with the refrain, “And there was evening and there was morning, (another) day.”

The intentional sense of Order is impossible to miss.

2) But there’s another layer below the surface, adding a deeper complexity of more profound patterns. The structure includes two 3-day sets —the first set (days 1-3) introduces created contexts, and the second set (days 4-6) introduces the inhabitants of these settings.

For example, 2 and 5 are parallel to each other. The sea creatures and the birds created on the 5th day fill the sea and the heavens created on the 2nd. And the land animals created on the 6th day inhabit the dry land set aside on the 3rd. It’s an amazing symmetry!

3) And it gets more complex. At a deeper level, each paragraph contains structured pairs of opposites—darkness/light, heaven/earth, male/female.

It’s an intricate, multi-layered creation unfolding its richness as each interconnected level reveals deeper structures, carefully designed order — so many patterns in each layer that we can’t help but marvel at the intricate complexity of this literary creation, even as we do when we observe the perfect pattern of a snowflake, the colors of a prism, the interconnectedness of a forest ecosystem.

Textually, the chapter’s refrains, parallels, and pairs speak to us on a level beyond words of something that’s beautiful in its symmetry, and dependable in its complex patterns. The passage itself reflects the order of the natural world. Its form evokes its message: We live in a stable, ordered, abundant world that reflects the goodness of a loving God.

Now, just as we’re marveling at the design of this amazing literary creation, something breaks the pattern! In most Bibles, you can see it on the page. Your eye is drawn to something new and different inserted into this carefully patterned prose—verse 27.

So God created humans in God’s own image,
in the image of God, God created them;
male and female God created them.

The creation of humanity is the appearance of something entirely new, so special that it can only be expressed as poetry in the midst of prose.

Here, the written form contains the message about the Hebrew view of humanity: In this marvelously ordered creation, humans are God’s poetry. YOU ARE GOD’S POETRY!

The God who speaks in beautifully structured prose in the created order, switches to poetry in the creation of humanity.

Look at the faces of the people around you. Each one divine poetry. Creation’s lyric verse.Each one an ode to the divine consciousness, reflecting the mind of a Master Poet. Here, the text says “very good.”

Then, after all the action, all the ordered patterning, the parallel structuring, the now familiar routine, the next paragraph doesn’t follow form.

The seventh day doesn’t have the same refrains as all the other days.

It throws out the pattern. It’s got a different rhythm. No structure. The routine is dropped.

That’s Sabbath. So the passage isn’t about creation, it’s about our lives.

Our need for a break in the routine. We stop. We rest. We ponder the patterns of which we are a part. And we worship.

Continued...

Signals of Oddity: Sabbath, 2

2010-07-20T07:04:00.001-07:00

Mountain Sunset
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Continued...

So, in chapter 1, divine consciousness speaks creation into existence, replacing a formless watery void with sublime Order. We learn that the world is good. Humans are good—the climax of God’s handiwork, the image of divine reality, the only creatures with God-like qualities—reasoning, creative, relational, responsible beings—God’s poetry in a world of beautifully crafted prose.

And the poetry that is humankind finds its voice when it breaks from routine, takes moments to ponder, to wonder in awe, to perceive what is good.

Now, the 2nd story... The Torah’s editors were compiling a collection of religious lore that would unite the north and south, and they knew that southerners had their own creation story. It’s pretty different. It begins with dry desert. A human is created first, not last, and not from a spoken word but out of dirt, before anything else is created. Then come plants, then animals, and birds, and then a woman (poetry again!).

And even though this more ancient story was different, they wisely included this one too. Remember, they weren’t writing a science text or a history text.

Factual consistency is a modern concern belonging to our scientific age, which is why we argue about literalism in these texts and thereby miss their point (and their power).

So why the second story? I think these editors wanted to guard against any self-satisfied conceit the first story might create. Its exalted view of human nature needed some balance. So the second story shows a God scooping up some dirt to form a human. Here, the first human is molded out of mud.

Now there’s an interesting wordplay in this story, at chapter 2, v. 7.
In Hebrew it says, the Lord God formed man (“adam”) out of dirt from the ground (adamah). Adam is made from adamah. Humanity is of the earth. In other words, we are “earth creatures.” That’s how “Adam” should be translated.

The point that comes from the balance between the two stories is that we are indeed unique and god-like—the very image of God—but we are also dust, tied to the earth, terrestrial not heavenly beings, finite, and subject to limits.

THIS IS ANOTHER REASON WE NEED SABBATH. We have forgotten. Sabbath is not only time to take a break, to ponder the beauty of creation and the majesty of a creator, to take stock of our purpose. It also helps us remember our finitude, our earthiness, our limits. In short, Sabbath is the time we set aside to remember that God is God and we are not. And this basic stance of humility is odd, peculiar, weird.

It’s about limits—a word humans have never liked. The rest of this story shows humans rebelling against limits, trying to escape their finitude, trying to build defenses against the fragility that is part of the human condition. We’re OK with the “image of God” part of our nature, but not so keen on the finitude and limits side of things.

Reinhold Niebuhr summarizes our human dilemma well when he says: “We are mortal. That is our fate. We pretend not to be mortal. That is our sin.” So humans eat the fruit of the tree we think will make us divine. God responds in chapter 3 (22-24), they are trying to become divine…

So they’re expelled from the garden. Unwilling to accept mortal limits, their quest for security gets them insecurity. And it gets worse. Soon they’re scheming to “build a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves.” Babel. We build empires, towers, marvels. And we congratulate ourselves for our achievements. It never ends. We never stop. We work and work and work. No time for Sabbath.

The Hebrew writers knew the pattern and imagined a divine response that reflected their warning (11: 6): “This is only the beginning of what they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.”

In other words, one of the great dangers of the human condition is our tendency to build fortresses of security and power we think will shield us from our limits, satisfy some inner quest, protect us from our mortal frailty and the existential uncertainty that’s always in the back of our minds. Ultimately, these efforts only lead to confusion, insecurity, and dissatisfaction.

So the thrust of the story is that we are finite. Mortal.Tied to the earth. And we’ll find our deepest fulfillment only when we cease the endless striving, accept that we’re not ultimate, and reconnect to what’s real.

And this is the purpose of Sabbath. It critiques a society that believes bank accounts and insurance policies make us secure; it challenges a society that accepts technology as the new reality in which we live and move and have our being. In the world we’ve created, the relentless pace of technological advance seduces us.

The natural environment seems almost secondary. The environment we dwell in is technological —computers and text messages; fully digitized economic, transportation and communication systems; whole mountaintops removed to air condition our homes; whole ocean ecosystems fouled so we can drive to corporate stores to buy industrially-produced food raised from genetically-modified seeds.

In this techno-Babel environment, it’s truly countercultural to acknowledge that we’re not God, that humans are not the source and end of all value, that human creation is not the only creation, that there’s something greater than us. Sabbath gets us in touch with who we are.

The truth is, we really need times of worship to get in touch with “the beyond in the midst of our lives.” Sabbath is when we set aside the routine to nourish an inner life.

The more we’re surrounded by technology, the more pressed for time on an anxious treadmill of work and consumption and bills, the more alientated, the more essential it is to break from our distracted busyness to make reflection and worship a part of our lives...

Signals of Oddity: Sabbath, 3

2010-07-20T06:55:00.001-07:00

Signals of Oddity 10
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

In our context, it’s odd to acknowledge that there’s more to life than work, making money, building security, consuming, being busy, achieving tasks. Sabbath sets that aside for a time. And Jeff Street is one church where it’s OK to say that Sabbath is about much more than church.

Wendell Berry says it beautifully in his collection of poems entitled, Sabbaths.

I go among trees and sit still. After days of labor,
All my stirring becomes quiet mute in my consternations,
around me like circles on water. I hear my song at last,
My tasks lie in their places and I sing it. As we sing,
where I left them, asleep like cattle... the day turns, the trees move.

These beautiful phrases catch the essence of Sabbath:
My tasks lie in their places.
My stirring becomes quiet.
Mute in my consternations, I hear my song at last and I sing it.

Intentional time like this, free of distractions, really can condition us to notice the color purple on a summer day, to hear the song of the lark, to feel the breeze on the skin, to breathe in the honeysuckle on a warm summer evening, to notice in the eyes of the neighbor a kindred spirit. And to relish each of these as gifts of love and goodness. In a culture that’s all about busyness and achievement and cynical hardheartedness, Sabbath rest is countercultural because it locates value elsewhere and opens us to genuine gratitude.

But we really do have to tune out the static. Turn off the TV and the computer. Give stuff away. Simplify. Stop talking. Reinsert ourselves into natural settings and communal settings that remind us who we are. Reconnect with our finitude, our limits.

Years ago I was in Guatemala on a Witness for Peace delegation in a community of returned refugees who had established a new community –- building houses, planting crops, tending animals, raising kids… One afternoon, while people were bringing food from the gardens to cook, feeding cattle, hanging clothes out to dry, this powerful tropical storm came up. And everything stopped. Here’s what I wrote about it in my journal:

7/11/97—Much of the afternoon was spent waiting through a powerful rainstorm. Here, when it rains like this, daily work simply comes to a halt. People wait. Nature takes over. The earth replenishes itself. The cycles integral to the life of creation are part of daily human existence and there’s no attempt to go on as if creation was something separate. Here, existence conforms to the rhythms of life. I think of modern culture, an intentionally fostered alienation from what is real. When it’s hot, we turn on the AC, when it rains, we can still get in the car, or continue our office work. When it’s dark, we turn on the lights and prolong the day.

Here, each casa is glows briefly with evening candlelight before an early bed time. People eat for today because leftovers can’t be refrigerated. They coexist with the animals that share their space and provide their sustenance. They know how to gather from what the land provides—mangoes and bananas or maize and frijoles. Here, in this rainstorm, creation took over for a while, a reminder of the rhythms into which our lives fit despite our denials and our alienation, our pretensions to separateness.

Huddled together under the roof of the tienda, we’re awed by the power of the rain, the strength of the wind, the grandeur of the thunder and lightning. Little rivers form from all directions, filling the stream with rushing water. Talk gives way to the sound of relentless rain and wind. We sit together, silenced, enveloped, connected, aware, sensing the presence of what is. For a moment there is no past, no future, just now.

Three volcanoes dominate the horizon, arising like phantom silhouettes in the darkening night sky. That night, we sit again, witness to the primeval sight of earth re-creating itself. Picaya rumbles. The mountain erupts with bright flashes of orange. The clouds and ash above take on a soft red glow. A faintly visible flow of lava appears and disappears along the eastern edge of the volcano—a primordial beauty occurring before our eyes.

In the distance, flashes of heat lightning brighten the purple sky. The ground shakes. The orange glow visible again. The earth is alive. These moments are mystical, full of power and energy, exotic, utterly fundamental; inspiring wonder—a beauty that touches the deepest places.

But the pain of this community dwells even deeper. Orange flashes of gunfire from weapons provided by my government, long ago drove them from ancestral lands. Churning memories ready to erupt at any moment, phantom silhouettes looming on a dark emotional horizon.

The children are sick. Babies have pneumonia and diarrhea. Kids have pink-eye and rashes. Latrines are filthy and unsanitary. Chickens and turkeys wander through kitchens searching for scraps— flies gathering on their feces, the same flies exploring the food on our plates. The dogs are starving. Mucous oozes from the eyes of the children.

The government, conforming to IMF requirements, has cut funds for health care … I go to the river to bathe. I need cleansing…

So, this creation narrative suggests that creation is unfinished business. Another reason we need Sabbath: It’s odd for those who have all they need to acknowledge that all human beings have inherent worth and dignity—and therefore, that something is required of us. Sabbath helps us connect with community and the responsibility community calls us to. In our context, this is countercultural.

Something important happens to us at Sabbath rest. As Thomas Kelly says,

“God plucks the world out of our hearts, loosening the chains of attachment, and God hurls the world into our hearts, where we and God together, carry it in infinitely tender love.”

Genesis reminds us that we share responsibility for creation, and that as social beings, we share responsibility for one another. For the child who is sick, whose dog is starving, whose entertainment is the flash of a volcano but whose nightmare is the flash of an American-made gun. In Sabbath time, we reaffirm the inherent worth and essential equality of every human being created “in the image of God.” And we find ourselves saying, “Creation isn’t finished. It has been good to rest. It has been good to reconnect with what is real. Now, we have work to do.” That’s why we’re here.

So that’s the truth. It will make you odd. And it will make you free.

Signals of Oddity, 1

2010-07-13T06:31:00.000-07:00

We have begun a New Thing at Jeff Street this week. Two new things, actually.

Our pastor, Cindy has just left for Sabbatical - a time of rest, reflection, recuperation, rejuvenation and restoration. She will be gone for three months and rejoining us in October. As part of our service Sunday, we sent her on her way with our blessings.

Cindy will be considering "Listening In On the Outside" as she takes her break and she plans to be intentional about listening to those voices on the margins that we often don't hear, including spending time with "outsider" artists, transgendered persons and Christians in China, amongst others. Cindy, we will miss you and pray for you to have a wonderful time of Sabbath. May the peace and power of God be with you.

Also this last Sunday, we began what will be a year long consideration of our Signals of Oddity - those practices of church in general (and Jeff Street in particular) that make us Odd, and to celebrate, explore and embrace that very real oddness.

The notion of being an odd people, a peculiar people, a people called out to be different... this is a theme found throughout the Bible and, at our best moments, we still find it today.

For instance, one common odd practice amongst nearly all churches is the practice of Giving. In a world where we are tempted to - even told to - consume much stuff for ourselves and to horde much stuff for ourselves - people of faith the world over, each and every week, take up offerings and often those offerings are going to help those in need. We freely and gladly give so that others may have and this is too often an Unusuality, but a good and blessed Unusuality. So, we shall explore this Oddity and celebrate it.

Other Signals of Oddity will include our practice of Communion (of sharing the bread and the cup together), the sharing of our joys and concerns, the practice of Sabbath... These and other practices we will be considering more carefully and thoughtfully over this next year. We'll be sure to post our progress here as the year passes.

Yesterday, as we celebrated and blessed Cindy to send her on her way, and as we consider the whole notion of our Peculiarity, we spent some beautiful time recounting some of the Stories of Oddity that have been part of our history at Jeff St.

We share many of those stories here below and in the next two posts.

Peace.

Signals of Oddity, 2

2010-07-13T06:30:00.001-07:00

Signals of Oddity, 3

2010-07-13T06:29:00.001-07:00

Cap'n Mellow

2010-07-06T07:33:00.001-07:00

Cap'n Mellow
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Cap'n Mellow (age unknown, identity unknown) is our masked caped crusader for Truth, Justice and a Groovy Jazz Riff. The Good Captain (Seen here in his epic battle against the Men in Suits) is a peace-lovin', hipster doofus with flaming fingers chillin' on his Guitar of Smmmoootthhh Lovin'.

Can you dig it?

The Naboth Option

2010-06-29T07:12:00.001-07:00

Mountain Sunset
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

A recent sermon from our pastor, Cindy. The biblical passage read was from 1 Kings 21, the story of Naboth. As a reminder: Evil King Ahab wanted Naboth’s vineyard. Ahab thought it would make a pleasant garden. So he told Naboth he wanted to buy it. But in Israel, one’s land was what one passed down to one’s children. It was their safety net, how they insured they could survive. So Naboth tells the king, No.

Ahab whines about being snubbed. Queen Jezebel says, “don’t worry, I’ll fix it,” and she ultimately kills off Naboth, so that Ahab can have the land.

Nice couple, the Ahabs…

I’ve heard more than one person point out that while BP is certainly responsible for the oil spill in the Gulf, that all of us are implicated to a point, all of us, that is, who use gas, or plastic, which is, of course, all of us. Of course, I don’t like to hear that. I’d rather just blame BP. I mean, really, it’s not my fault.

And yet, some of our fellow church members, years ago, were so aware of their connectedness to this earth, so concerned for how their consumption effects the earth’s dwindling resources that they went out and sold their second cars, began living in smaller circles, made drastic changes in their daily habits in order to consume less.
We are tempted to think it’s so big and complicated and impossible to change that “why bother?” But we know, not only that we are responsible, but that we can do something about it. We know that our consumption or lack thereof matters.

Well, back to the story of Naboth’s vineyard. I’m wondering, how many of you have heard this story before? Even if you haven’t, it is such a common story that I am thinking that it rang a bell somewhere in your head when you heard it read.

Because even if you haven’t heard it before, you’ve heard it before: The Staniford Field Airport wants to expand, and the City of Louisville is, of course, all for it. You can’t be a first class city with a teeny weeny airport, right? So they condemn a whole neighborhood, Highland Park, full of sweet little houses and white picket fences and webs of relationships and shared experiences and memories, but it’s alright, don’t worry, they say, as they offer the people money enough to move into a new house in a different neighborhood. You’ll be recompensed. As if money could buy webs of relationships and shared experiences and memories.

You’ve heard it before: Shelby Park, one of the poorest neighborhoods in the city, has one thing going for it, and that’s the park itself, with a swimming pool and a library. Both the pool and the library are always full of kids, low-income minority kids, mostly. But the city decides that they have to close some libraries, and they say that Shelby Park doesn’t produce enough business, quantified by the number of books that are being checked out. It doesn’t matter that the library is always full of kids, they’re not checking out enough books.

But don’t worry, they say, we will build you another library, and we’ll even put the name ‘Shelby Park’ in the title. Sure, it’s too far to walk to, it’s in a whole other neighborhood, but you can ride the bus, right, all you little kids? All these years later, they still call it the “Highland/Shelby Park Branch.” As if.

Well, a few years later, the Board of Education decides to take the park itself, to build a school there. But don’t worry, they say. We’ll let the neighborhood use the gym from time to time. This plan was foiled, by the way, by some good organizing of a broad diversity of neighbors, but even more by someone’s brilliant idea to tie the campaign to save the park into the fact that it is an Olmsted Park, designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, who also designed Central Park in New York City. Hoity toity. Had it not been an Olmsted Park, it would now be a school instead. But don’t worry, they would have let the neighborhood kids use the gym. Once a week, once a month, a couple times of year, maybe.

A few more years go by, this time the city has its eye on the last gem that this impoverished little neighborhood holds, their swimming pool. We can’t afford so many swimming pools, they say, targeting, of course, the ones that are in low-income neighborhoods. Don’t worry, they say, after we tear down the pool, we’ll build you a splash park. Woo hoo. And they did, and it’s lovely, but you can’t swim in it.
You’ve heard the story before. Israel takes more and more land from the Palestinians, puts up walls separating the people from their places of work, from their vineyards, from their families.

After my trip there, I told you how the three adults in this one Palestinian family, who lives in Jerusalem, used to get to be able to get to work in ten minutes. Now it takes them, collectively, five hours. I told you how our Palestinian guide, Nabil, who had been with us for one week already, and was once we arrived in Jerusalem only thirty minutes away from his home, from his wife and two little daughters who lived in Bethlehem, could not go home to spend the night because he knew that he might not get back out, or that it might take so long to get through the checkpoints that he wouldn’t be back in time.

I told you, didn’t I, about the huge apartheid wall, keeping the Palestinians in, or out, keeping the Palestinians DOWN. Did I tell you about the story that the iman told us over supper one night about the old Palestinian man who lived in Jerusalem, and went off somewhere one day, and when he came home that night, his house had been torn down?

You’ve heard the story before. And it would be just another story, this story of Ahab and Naboth, except that in THIS story, we see something that gives us pause.

This is a story, you see, that does not just remind us how things are in this world. We don’t need to be reminded of how things are. For every story I just told you, you could tell me another one just like it. Right? Clarksdale Housing Projects, Central America…

But in this story we see something different. Because this story presents us with another possibility, with another option. This story presents us with the Naboth Option.

Naboth chooses to serve God no matter what the cost. He pledges his allegiance, not to the flag, not to the state, not to the empire, not to culture, not to the almighty dollar, but to God. So in simply hearing this story, our eyes are opened: we see that faithfulness is a possibility. Fidelity is a possibility. King Ahab assumes that everything is a purchasable commodity but Naboth refuses to be bought. Naboth operates as a free agent, bound only by the laws of God.

And even though he ends up dead, we know in our heart of hearts that we would rather be dead Naboth, who was able to live freely and according to his own conscience, who was able to stand up to the most powerful man in all the land, than live Ahab, who seems to have had no conscience, as evidenced by his inability to even stand up to his own wife. As followers of Jesus Christ, we have been introduced to a life of abundance, to a life of self-giving love, to a life of connectedness and community, and while none of us are itching to die, we’re beginning to understand that the only life worth living is a free one.

And before I’ll be a slave I’ll lay down in my grave, says Naboth, in essence. I will obey the God who led us out of slavery, who introduced new ways of being and living in this world, who introduced new laws allowing for equitable distribution. I will be faithful to the traditions of my people, and to my yet unborn children who will someday care for this little vineyard. And before I’ll be a slave I’ll lay down in my grave…

And we are strengthened by his declaration, strengthened by his story, and we know what we, given the same option, would hope to choose. The Naboth Option. The LORD is MY shepherd, not the King, not the empire, not the culture, not my boss, not even my mother or my father, but the LORD…

Racy Bible Stories

2010-06-07T14:43:00.001-07:00

Fowlers Toad
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

I missed the sermon a week ago, and it sounds like a good one. It was from our beloved Jay, proving once and for all that men CAN preach.

The biblical passage (Genesis 38) is a strange one, at least to modern ears. It involves "good" prostitution, seed spilling and justice for the oppressed. Preach on, Jay...

For those of you who, after hearing the passage and reading the title of my sermon, are concerned that it is going to be X-rated, rest assured that it will not be inappropriate, PG-13 at most.

I recently read the book How to Read Literature like a Professor, by Thomas C. Foster. The chapter titles are very witty, and include When in Doubt, It’s from Shakespeare… and the following chapter, …Or the Bible. Other examples include It’s All Political, If She Comes up It’s Baptism, and He’s Blind for a Reason You Know.

The title of Chapter 16 is It’s All about Sex… and in this chapter Foster argues that before D.H. Lawrence, one could not write openly about sex and therefore sex was always hidden in the text whenever the author wanted to write about it, which he claims was often the case.

In the very next chapter, which is titled …Except for Sex, he argues that if the author actually writes about sex that it is really about something else entirely. I am inclined to agree with Foster’s argument and say that Genesis 38 is not really about sex.

If I were preaching a sermon from this text anywhere other than Jeff Street I would preach from Tamar’s perspective. I would talk about how Tamar, as a marginalized woman in a precarious situation, took matters into her own hands. I would expound upon her subversive acts and how her actions resulted in justice and renewed hope for her survival. But alas, I am preaching at Jeff Street, and I believe that we do a good job when it comes to being subversive, working for justice, and reaching out in love to those on the margins of society.

So, rather than preach from Tamar’s perspective, I am going to ask that we focus our attention today on Judah...

The season of Easter recently ended and I was originally to preach during Easter but our latest flood postponed my preaching this sermon until today. It is during Easter that we talk about and think upon resurrection and rebirth, and rightly so. But I believe that God has always been in the business of rebirth and I hope to show how the Old Testament story of Judah and Tamar is a wonderful example of rebirth and new life.

In the first verses of this passage we learn that Judah marries a Canaanite, Shua’s daughter, and they have three sons; Er, Onan, and Shelah. When Er is old enough, Judah arranges a marriage for him to a woman named Tamar. We are informed that Er is wicked and God takes his life before he and Tamar can produce children. Judah then tells his second son Onan to “go into your brother’s wife and perform the duty of a brother-in-law.”

This levirate marriage, as it is called, requires that the brother of a deceased man who has died without producing children is to marry his brother’s widow. The firstborn of the marriage is to be the dead brother’s child and heir and thereby would continue the brother’s line and name.

Securing an heir and continuing the brother’s line and name was not the only purpose of the levirate marriage. As Susan Niditch writes, “The law must have also saved young childless widows from economic deprivation and from a sort of social wilderness, no longer under her father, but having no husband or son to secure her place in the patriarchal clan.”

Throughout the Old Testament we find God commanding the Hebrew people to help and care for the stranger, the other, the ones who have no power to care for themselves. This is one of the laws that God has in place to ensure that care is given to the widow. This is one of God’s laws that help to ensure justice.

Onan takes Tamar as his wife but has no desire to share his inheritance with what would be his dead brother’s son, so when he has sex with her he practices the primitive birth control coitus interruptus, thereby formally fulfilling his duty but ensuring that Tamar does not become pregnant.

This displeases God and so God also takes Onan’s life. I want to take a minute to address the instances in this passage that state that God took both Er’s and Onan’s lives. We understand God to be one who is life giving rather than one of death. It is important to understand that the narrator is not trying to teach us about the nature of God, but rather about human responsibility.

Since God’s hand was seen in nearly everything by the original audience, they would have easily accepted this reasoning for the deaths of Er and Onan. An example of this is when you hear someone respond to a tragedy by saying that “It’s just God’s will,” which for the record, I believe is bad theology. What is important here is to understand that the statements of God taking these two lives are not commentary about God, and to draw any conclusions about death as God’s will would be a mistake. Rather, these statements should be understood as elements of the story that help to illustrate the importance of doing God’s will, which always includes justice.

Now, back to Judah…his next move should have been to give Tamar to Shelah. But having lost two sons already, perhaps he is wondering if Tamar is the problem. So, rather than risk the life of his third son, he sends Tamar back to her father’s house and tells her that when Shelah is old enough to marry he will send for her. We know, from our knowledge of the ending of the story, that Judah has no intention of keeping his word. Tamar is Judah’s responsibility and he acts irresponsibly.

By sending Tamar back to her father’s house, Judah has practically sealed her fate. She now has no inheritance rights and is not free to remarry, as she is technically engaged to Shelah. Her future welfare is in jeopardy.

We are not told how long Tamar has been back at her father’s house when we learn that Judah’s wife has died and the required time of mourning has passed. Whatever the length of time, it has been long enough for Shelah to grow old enough to be married. Tamar realizes that Judah is not going to allow her to marry Shelah, so she does the only thing she knows to do; she outwits her father-in-law.

She takes off her widow’s clothing, disguises herself, and sits at the gate or entrance of Enaim where she knows Judah will pass on his way to shear his sheep. As planned Judah sees her and comes to her and asks to have sex with her. She asks him what he will pay her and he replies that he will send her a kid (goat).

She must have been laughing to herself, knowing that she was going to have his kid, but not a goat. (The pun is there even in the Hebrew and actually there are many other word plays in this narrative). She demands collateral, and anxious to fulfill his desires, Judah agrees to give her his “signet, cord, and staff.” The signet and cord were his seal or signature and his staff would have been individualized. These were items of identification, his driver’s license and credit card, so to speak. The next time someone asks you for two forms of ID, think Tamar and Judah.

After receiving his two forms of ID she has sex with Judah and conceives. She then proceeds to put back on her widow’s clothing and heads back to her father’s house. Judah sends his friend Hirah back to Enaim with a kid (goat) to pay the prostitute. The townspeople tell Hirah that he is mistaken, that there has been no prostitute in Enaim.

When Hirah comes back still in possession of the kid, Judah states that he has upheld his end of the deal, that he has kept his promise. He tells Hirah not say anything else, lest he become a laughing stock. Little does Judah know that Enaim is not Vegas and that what happens in Enaim does not necessarily stay in Enaim. I would also point out that Judah considers it important that he has kept his promise in paying the prostitute but seems to have no concern that he has no intention of keeping his promise to his daughter-in-law.

Once Tamar starts to show, word gets back to Judah that his daughter-in-law is pregnant. When he learns this he is outraged. Tamar, being engaged to Shelah, is prohibited by law to marry or have sex with anyone else. It is obvious that she is guilty of adultery, which is punishable by death. Judah immediately calls for her to be brought out and burned to death, despite the fact that the usual means of death for adultery was stoning and that burning was saved for severe cases that included adultery by daughters of priests.

Judah was so angry and his indignation was so strong that he pronounced her sentence without giving her a trial or even a chance to speak.

As Tamar is being brought out to be burned to death, she plays her trump card. She sends word to Judah that whoever owns these things is the father of my baby, and she pulls out his signet, cord, and staff. When Judah recognizes these things as his own, he immediately states that Tamar is more righteous than he is because he refused to give her to Shelah as he promised and as was his duty.

The story ends with a joyous resolution to Tamar’s crisis; she gives birth to twins. Their birth is an unusual one in which the baby who initially reaches his hand out, withdraws it and his brother actually comes out first. They are then given the significant names Perez, which means breakout or bursting forth and Zerah, which means rising sun or a dawning.

So what is it that we have to learn from Judah? Before answering this question it is important to note that the narrator places no moral judgment upon Judah for his having sex with a supposed prostitute which was in actuality his daughter-in-law.

The narrator makes it clear that what Judah has done wrong is to not keep his promise and fulfill his duty of giving Tamar to his youngest son Shelah. Judah’s daughter-in-law is his responsibility and by not acting responsibly he places both Tamar and the community in jeopardy. As Walter Brueggemann puts it, Judah’s sin is of looking after private interest at the expense of the community...

But all this changes after Tamar exposes Judah as the culprit and he admits his guilt in not giving her to Shelah. His confession leads to change. In verse 24 he is condemning Tamar to death, employing conventional understanding of morality and righteousness. In verse 25 he is presented with evidence of his guilt. And then in verse 26 he declares that Tamar is more righteous than he is; which employs a new and radical understanding of righteousness. At least a new understanding for him, but I would dare not say new to God...

As I mentioned earlier, I believe that we at Jeff Street, both individually and collectively, do a good job caring for the marginalized and working for justice, and doing these things through acts of subversion when need be. But if we are completely honest, we would have to admit that sometimes we find ourselves in Judah’s sandals, and are guilty of looking after our own interests at the expense of others.

Maybe we keep quiet when we hear another person being demeaned because of their color, or sexual orientation, or religion, or size, or any other reason, because we are afraid of what others may think about us. Maybe we degrade someone else because they do not act kindly or justly; failing to see them as the child of God that they are. Finding it much easier to criticize and put down someone rather than to pray and work towards a change in their lives.

Maybe we, like Judah, do the right thing the first time, and maybe even the second and third times, but then at some point out of fear or unwillingness to take another risk fail to do the right thing again. Be sure that God’s love for us is NEVER dependent upon our doing the right thing, but often another person’s well-being is.

So let us continue to follow Tamar’s example of bravery, subversion, and demanding justice for ourselves and others. But if we find ourselves to be like Judah and jeopardize the well-being of others, either by what we do or by what we fail to do, may we freely admit when we are wrong and may it serve as an impetus for change in our lives, as it was for Judah.

Ellie's Baptism

2010-05-25T08:26:00.001-07:00

Ellie's Baptism
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

The eunuch asked Philip, "Tell me, please, who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else?"

Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus.

As they traveled along the road, they came to some water and the eunuch said, "Look, here is water. Why shouldn't I be baptized?"

And he gave orders to stop the chariot. Then both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water and Philip baptized him.

When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord suddenly took Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him again, but went on his way rejoicing.

~Acts 8

Miriam's Baptism

2010-05-25T08:23:00.001-07:00

Miriam's Baptism
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority... having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.

When you were dead in your sins... God made you alive with Christ!

God forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; God took it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, God made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. These are a shadow of the things that were to come; the reality, however, is found in Christ.

~Colossians 2

Music From this Weekend

2010-05-12T08:38:00.000-07:00

Dead Raising Church, Part 1

2010-04-29T10:20:00.001-07:00

estr 078
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Our sermon from last week, by our own amazing Pastor Cindy...

Mary Burgess and Mabel Mitchell, two of the saints that I met when I first came to Jeff Street, spent every Wednesday morning for I don’t how many years working in the Clothes Closet that we had when we were in the other building. They would sort and bag and fold and hang, and sort and bag and fold and hang.

And there’s no telling how many people benefited from their faithful ministry, how many kids were able to go to school wearing something new, or at least different, how many men were able to find jobs because now they had a clean shirt and tie, or a pair of pants that fit.

Cheryl Bone, one of the saints of Jeff Street that we are privileged to have in our midst now, spends five mornings a week down at the Golden Arrow, which sounds like a nightclub, but is instead a ministry that provides clothes and diapers and bottles and formula and all kinds of other stuff for expectant and new mothers.

Like Mary and Mabel before her, Cheryl sorts and bags and folds and hangs, and there’s no telling how many people benefit from Cheryl’s faithful ministry.

Tabitha, in Aramaic, or Dorcas, in Greek, lived in a time, I would venture to say, before Clothes Closets. Some of us, by the way, think that BC means “before Christ,” but those of us who are thrift store aficionados know that it really means, “before Clothes Closets.” Or maybe not.

At any rate, she was indispensable to her community. She made clothes for them, which is something that most of us just take for granted, being clothed. But when you don’t have clothes that keep you warm, or clothes that fit, then you know just how important a woman like Dorcas could be to a community.

And that’s evidenced by the description here in the story of how the women are showing Peter every piece of clothing that Dorcas ever made, each one with a story behind it, each one with Dorcas’ loving care and kindness stitched into it.

This story is one of the post-Easter lectionary passages not because it happens in the weeks directly following the resurrection, but because it’s about resurrection. Dorcas is raised from the dead. Now the more pragmatic ones among us will instantly move to questions like, how could that have happened? Maybe she was not dead at all. But if we want to be faithful to the story, we have to start out with her as dead. And I know that some of you are already thinking about the Monty Python parrot skit…

Dorcas, like the parrot, was as dead as a doornail. And that she was raised from that, well, that should surprise not a one of us, metaphorically speaking, anyway. We’ve all seen people who were dead and raised to life.

Once I was visiting our beloved brother Larry Burke at University Hospital. He was in intensive care, and I noticed in the room across the way, that someone had died, and that they had covered him or her with a sheet. I found it strange that they’d left the door open, but then they didn’t really have solid doors on this intensive care unit, and as I was thinking about all of this, suddenly the man sat up, and I almost had a heart attack.

When the nurse came in, I said, “I thought that man that was covered up with a sheet was dead.” She said, “Oh, he does that all the time.”

Robert and I were in Malaysia once for about three hours, and we spent about thirty minutes of it standing on a corner with a slew of other people who were watching a man do mumbo jumbo over another man who was presumbly dead and lying under a sheet. He was, according to the English speaking man who sidled up to us, going to raise the man back to life. “He is raised from the dead every night,” he said, with great humor.

We didn’t have time to see the actual event, but judging from the crowd, I’ll bet that it was pretty exciting.

In this story, though, it’s not through the act of one person that Dorcas is raised, it is through the power of the gathered community, who, out of their love for Dorcas, do the only thing they know to do on her behalf and call in Peter. Dorcas couldn’t raise herself. She could not call for Peter. But the gathered community could. And, says Stephen Jones, they were unafraid to wade into each others’ lives in transforming ways. And so they did.

They were unafraid to wade into each others’ lives in transforming ways. That phrase reminds me of something that happened just this week. The Coordinating Council approached Diane Moten recently with the offer, having seen her abundant gifts for ministry, to ordain her. We suggested that she pull together some folks from the church to help her discern whether or not she wants to pursue this, and she did, and we met on Thursday night.

This time of discernment, which sometimes ends with a decision to continue with the process of ordination and sometimes does not, is always a holy time. At the end of this particular time, Diane, being Diane, went around the little circle, and told each of us why she had chosen us to be a part of her discernment process.

I was a little surprised by what she said when she got to Andy. She said, “Andy, sometimes you just make me so mad.” She’d been saying all this nice stuff to the rest of us, and she said, “Andy, sometimes you just make me so mad. You remember that day at church, and I had to just walk away from you and go outside because I was so mad at you?” Andy nodded, yes, he did remember that. “But you and I were able to work it out, right? And the reason I wanted you here tonight is because you always push and challenge me, and because you always have a different perspective from mine, and because you make me a better person.” That’s not word for word, but it the gist of it.

Andy and Diane are unafraid to wade into each others’ lives in transforming ways.

And the widows are not afraid to wade into Dorcas’ life, either, and they call for Peter...

Dead Raising Church, Part 2

2010-04-29T10:16:00.001-07:00

estr 104
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

The rest of the sermon...

Katie Huey, at her excellent website, tells us that “Joseph Harvard suggests that the story ‘challenges our assumption that we are left to our own devices to fix our predicaments – or, more to the point, that our predicaments are not fixable at all.’ He says that we live in a ‘Humpty Dumpty’ world in which we are convinced that things can not be put back together again, but the book of Acts tells a different story, about people who were empowered to 'turn the world upside down.'”

And the so widows call for Peter, and Peter comes in, and wades through the widows, through their stories and their tears, and then goes in to where Dorcas is, and raises her from the dead, and presents her to them alive.

I love that! He presents them to her alive. Have you ever met someone who used to be dead, and I’m not talking physically dead, I’m talking spiritually or emotionally dead, someone without a spark of anything in their eyes, and then later you meet them again, and you see that something has happened to them, that they’ve been made alive? Or maybe you see them as they’re being made alive.

I remember there was this man who used to come to our Hospitality Program. He was there every morning for years, and he never said a word to anybody. He just sat there, long beard, long fingernails, dirty face and hair, just sat there and drank his coffee. We’d say hi to him, “Hi, Doyle,” every morning, and he’d just sit there.

Then one morning, and this was after he’d been coming for years, he said, “Hi.” You coulda knocked me over with a feather. He eventually warmed up to the point that he taught me how to play spades one morning, if you can believe that. I saw that man with my own two eyes go from dead to alive.

William Willimon tells the story of a church that he once pastored in rural Georgia. On his first visit to the church, he found a large chain and padlock on the front door. It had been put there by the Sheriff the week before when the church members got mad at a board meeting and started ripping up the carpet and dragging out the pews that they had given in memory of their mothers. (Hopefully that won’t happen at our business meeting today.) The Sheriff said that he’d keep the lock on the door until the new preacher could come in and settle everything down.

Willimon says that that rather typified his whole time at the so-called church, what with the arguments, the pettiness, the fights in the parking lot. He spent a long, hard year there, and on his last day, as he drove away, he muttered, “You call yourselves a church!”

A couple of years later, he ran into a young man who told him that he was pastoring the same church. Willimon’s heart went out to him. “Remarkable bunch of people,” the young man said. “Yes, remarkable,” replied Willimon.

“Their ministry to the community has been a wonder,” he continued. “That little church is now supporting, in one way or another, more than a dozen of the troubled families around the church. The free day care center is going great. Not too many interracial congregations like them in North Georgia.”

Willimon could hardly believe it. “What happened?” he asked.

“I don’t know. One Sunday, things just sort of came together. It wasn’t anything in particular. It’s just that, when the service was done, and we were on our way out, we knew that Jesus loved us and had plans for us. Things fairly much took off after that.”

Willimon says, “I tell you what I think happened. I think that church got intruded upon. I think someone greater than I knocked the lock off that door, kicked it open and offered them peace, the Holy Spirit, mission and forgiveness. And now, they are called ‘church.’”

Church, how sweet it is to be called church, church, with the power of the Risen Christ behind us. Church, with the courage to wade into each others’ lives and into this world in transforming ways. Church, with the power to love people into a whole other space, to grace people into new life.

Church, locks knocked off, doors kicked open, life-giving, dead-raising church. Church, God-blessed, Christ-peaced, Spirit-blown church. That’s Peter and Dorcas and her widowed friends, that’s Mabel Mitchell and Mary Burgess and Larry Burke, that’s you and me, folks. Church, life-giving church. Church, dead-raising church.

Sermon by Pastor Cindy

Easter...

2010-04-09T12:06:00.001-07:00

estr 129
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

He is risen!

Easter...

2010-04-09T12:05:00.001-07:00

estr 134
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

There are also many other things that Jesus did, but if these were to be described individually, I do not think the whole world would contain the books that would be written.

Easter...

2010-04-09T12:03:00.001-07:00

estr 066
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

After this, Jesus revealed himself again to his disciples at the Sea of Tiberias. He revealed himself in this way.

Together were Simon Peter, Thomas called Didymus, Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, Zebedee's sons, and two others of his disciples.

Simon Peter said to them, "I am going fishing." They said to him, "We also will come with you." So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

When it was already dawn, Jesus was standing on the shore; but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus.

Jesus said to them, "Children, have you caught anything to eat?"

They answered him, "No."

So he said to them, "Cast the net over the right side of the boat and you will find something." So they cast it, and were not able to pull it in because of the number of fish.

So the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, "It is the Lord."

When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he tucked in his garment, for he was lightly clad, and jumped into the sea.

The other disciples came in the boat, for they were not far from shore, only about a hundred yards, dragging the net with the fish.

When they climbed out on shore, they saw a charcoal fire with fish on it and bread.

Jesus said to them, "Bring some of the fish you just caught."

So Simon Peter went over and dragged the net ashore full of one hundred fifty-three large fish. Even though there were so many, the net was not torn.

Jesus said to them, "Come, have breakfast."

Easter...

2010-04-09T11:53:00.001-07:00

estr 119
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

A little later the bystanders came over and said to Peter, "Surely you too are one of them; even your speech gives you away."

At that he began to curse and to swear, "I do not know the man." And immediately a cock crowed.

Then Peter remembered the word that Jesus had spoken: "Before the cock crows you will deny me three times." He went out and began to weep bitterly...

=======

When it was morning, all the chief priests and the elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him to death.

They bound him, led him away, and handed him over to Pilate, the governor.

Now Jesus stood before the governor, and he questioned him, "Are you the king of the Jews?" Jesus said, "You say so."

And when he was accused by the chief priests and elders, he made no answer.

Then Pilate said to him, "Do you not hear how many things they are testifying against you?"

But he did not answer him one word, so that the governor was greatly amazed...

=======

Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus inside the praetorium and gathered the whole cohort around him.

They stripped off his clothes and threw a scarlet military cloak about him.

Weaving a crown out of thorns, they placed it on his head, and a reed in his right hand. And kneeling before him, they mocked him, saying, "Hail, King of the Jews!"

They spat upon him and took the reed and kept striking him on the head.

And when they had mocked him, they stripped him of the cloak, dressed him in his own clothes, and led him off to crucify him...

...And they placed over his head the written charge against him: This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.

Two revolutionaries were crucified with him, one on his right and the other on his left...

...Jesus cried out again in a loud voice, and gave up his spirit.

And behold, the veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth quaked, rocks were split, tombs were opened, and the bodies of many saints who had fallen asleep were raised.

And coming forth from their tombs after his resurrection, they entered the holy city and appeared to many.

The centurion and the men with him who were keeping watch over Jesus feared greatly when they saw the earthquake and all that was happening, and they said, "Truly, this was the Son of God!"

Easter...

2010-04-09T11:40:00.001-07:00

Snow Thistle
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple area and began driving out those who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves, and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts.

And as he taught them, he said, "Is it not written: `My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations'? But you have made it `a den of robbers.'"

The chief priests and the teachers of the law heard this and began looking for a way to kill him, for they feared him, because the whole crowd was amazed at his teaching...

======

...When John came to you in the way of righteousness, you did not believe him; but tax collectors and prostitutes did. Yet even when you saw that, you did not later change your minds and believe him.

"Hear another parable. There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a hedge around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a tower. Then he leased it to tenants and went on a journey.

When vintage time drew near, he sent his servants to the tenants to obtain his produce.

But the tenants seized the servants and one they beat, another they killed, and a third they stoned.

Again he sent other servants, more numerous than the first ones, but they treated them in the same way.

Finally, he sent his son to them, thinking, 'They will respect my son.'

But when the tenants saw the son, they said to one another, 'This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and acquire his inheritance.'

They seized him, threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.

What will the owner of the vineyard do to those tenants when he comes?"

They answered him, "He will put those wretched men to a wretched death and lease his vineyard to other tenants who will give him the produce at the proper times."

Jesus said to them, "Did you never read in the scriptures: 'The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; by the Lord has this been done, and it is wonderful in our eyes'?

Therefore, I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that will produce its fruit...

When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard his parables, they knew that he was speaking about them.

And although they were attempting to arrest him, they feared the crowds, for they regarded him as a prophet...

=======

The chief priests and the entire Sanhedrin kept trying to obtain false testimony against Jesus in order to put him to death, but they found none, though many false witnesses came forward. Finally two came forward who stated, "This man said, 'I can destroy the temple of God and within three days rebuild it.'"

The high priest rose and addressed him, "Have you no answer? What are these men testifying against you?"

But Jesus was silent. Then the high priest said to him, "I order you to tell us under oath before the living God whether you are the Messiah, the Son of God."

Jesus said to him in reply, "You have said so. But I tell you: From now on you will see 'the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Power' and 'coming on the clouds of heaven.'"

Then the high priest tore his robes and said, "He has blasphemed! What further need have we of witnesses? You have now heard the blasphemy; what is your opinion?" They said in reply, "He deserves to die!"

Word on the Street

2010-03-17T11:00:00.001-07:00

White Turtle Shell
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Another "Word on the Street" - thoughts from Adam, who is working with our homeless friends this year...

We are the people who live on the streets of Louisville.

In an informal survey, we were asked about where we sleep at night. This is what we said:

Many of us are blessed to be given free or inexpensive housing by different organizations and churches in the area. The problem is, the waiting list for most of this kind of housing is often discouragingly long…

Another option for many of us is to stay at shelters like the Salvation Army or Wayside Mission. The problem is, these aren’t permanent places. If you are disabled or ill, you may get to stay longer, but one way or the other, they’ll put you back on the street.

A number of us can stay the night with different relatives—at least when it’s cold. But many of us would rather risk the streets than go near our families homes because we are embarrassed about our circumstances and some of us feel like we have no place with “regular people” anymore.

There are those of us who can stay with friends sometimes; not often, but its something. A dusty couch in a basement or even lying on a living room floor is a lot better than sleeping outside and afraid…

Some of us sleep in camps nestled out of sight in the woods or huddled underneath a bridge. We usually camp in groups, almost never alone. And if we aren’t propped up on anything else, those of us who are lucky find those square wooden pallets you can get at construction sights to put our tents or sleeping bags on so we don’t have to sleep in the mud. Sometimes we even build plastic domes over our blankets to shelter us and our campfires from the weather. The problem is, sometimes these domes burn down, blow down, collapse under the weight of snow, or the police come and destroy them.

A few of us have tried making backdoor deals with homeowners to let us sleep in their tool sheds or basements in exchange for doing work around the house and yard. This always seems like a win, win situation in the beginning. The problem is, the list of tasks homeowners ask us to do keeps growing and growing. We know that if we ever say “no,” they can kick us to the curb at a moments notice or even report us to the police out of spite.

Others of us sleep on benches, in dumpsters, on roof tops, in vending machine gazebo’s, churches, abandoned buildings, parks, and even cars.

If anyone has any better ideas, please let us know…

Prize-Winning Weekend!

2010-02-27T19:09:00.000-08:00

Wow! What a weekend this is shaping up to be. And it's only Saturday!

First off, we received word that Donna's Sunday School class (she teaches the elementary kids at church and has been for years) came in SECOND PLACE in a video contest sponsored by the Kentucky Waterways Alliance (KWA). Children (2nd to 6th grades) were invited create a video about Why We Should Love Our Waterways. They spent the last few Sundays brainstorming and then creating this video below, titled Every Drop.

For their wonderful efforts, they received Second Place in the contest! Woohoo! Way to go, Miriam, Lydia, Ellie, Laura and Katherine!! The winning three videos were played at an Environmental Film Festival today in Louisville and we just couldn't be prouder.

Then, we found out just this morning that a short video about homelessness - featuring my Donna's voice-over, speaking on behalf of the social service ministry where she works (Volunteers of America of Kentucky) - has won a First Place award in a separate video contest. You can see that video, A Place to Call Home, here:

I just couldn't be prouder of my Donna and all the hard work that VOA does in working with and for the down and out. You'd be hard-pressed to find two harder-working and more deserving non-profit organizations than VOA and KWA. Check them out.

All Are Welcome

2010-02-02T14:49:00.001-08:00

Walker Jesse Sarah Blair
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

by Marty Haugen, one of the hymns we sing regularly at Jeff Street...

1. Let us build a house where love can dwell
And all can safely live,
A place where saints and children tell
How hearts learn to forgive.
Built of hopes and dreams and visions,
Rock of faith and vault of grace;
Here the love of Christ shall end divisions;
All are welcome, all are welcome,
All are welcome in this place.

2. Let us build a house where prophets speak,
And words are strong and true,
Where all God's children dare to seek To dream God's reign anew.
Here the cross shall stand as witness
And a symbol of God's grace;
Here as one we claim the faith of Jesus:
All are welcome, all are welcome,
All are welcome in this place.

3. Let us build a house where love is found
In water, wine and wheat:
A banquet hall on holy ground, Where peace and justice meet.
Here the love of God, through Jesus, Is revealed in time and space;
As we share in Christ the feast that frees us:
All are welcome, all are welcome,
All are welcome in this place.

Word on the Street

2010-01-11T06:17:00.001-08:00

Barbwire Pole
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

To paraphrase their own words, here are a few anecdotes from some of our sisters and brother on the street:

* When you live on the streets, you might have to stay in the closet—and I don’t mean the kind where you hang coats. If you thought it wasn’t safe to be me in your neighborhood, imagine being me in mine…

* When I went into prison, they had just come out with the very first Atari video game system—you know the one with one button on the control where you play paddle-ball? When I got out, I saw these machines you can put 1,000 songs onto—1,000 songs of music in something no bigger than a pack of dental floss. I don’t know where I am anymore…

* When you live on the streets, you know where to collect cans and which day-labor businesses are still hiring. You know when the social worker is gonna have hours at which shelter, you know who you can trust to watch your bag for a few minutes if you need to step out for a minute…and you might know how ride box car train without a ticket or how to start a fire with just trash…

* When I was in Alabama last year, I used to get my coffee and this gas station on the corner. The woman in there talked to me, used to ask me about my life. She and her husband gave me this coat, this one right here, and told me to come on back for Christmas if I wanted…I wonder if they meant it? Wonder if I could still make it down there if I left today?

* When you live on the streets, you know you can’t stop working just cause your back hurts so much you can hardly see what your doing through your tears; you know you can’t loose what little work you have. You also know you’ll last about 10 minutes in the mall before the security officer asks you to leave; what you might not know is how they can always tell you don’t belong there, even when your cloths look like everybody else’s….When you live on the streets, you know where you are wanted and where you’re not…

* When I get off these streets I’m gonna get a recording studio in my house, I’m gonna get one of those keyboards with a mixer and a bunch a instruments and make as much as noise as I can…I’m gonna bang around the house with pots and pans and make a god-aweful racket…that’ll be my house.

By Adam, who has been working with and amongst our homeless friends this year and who has blessed us on Sunday mornings the last few months with his "Word on the Street" reflections.

A Prayer of Off-Guard Joy

2010-01-06T10:25:00.001-08:00

Mother and child
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

I saw you today, God.

As an elderly lady walked through my
Urban neighborhood
She tripped and fell
Spilling the contents of her purse.

From nowhere, a thug appeared -
Hoodie hiding his face
Prison tattoos scarring his knuckles
Pants sagging nearly to his knees

He quickly reached down and grabbed her purse and...

...and gently assisted her to her feet, returning her purse and
Tenderly wiping the dust from her clothes and
Tending to her as if she were his own grandmother
As if she were the Daughter of God
As if he were the Son of God.

Thank you God, for
Sudden moments of off-guard joy and
Gentle rebukes from
Unknown and intimidating saints.

Amen.

Poor Young Ruler

2009-12-15T10:40:00.001-08:00

Golgotha Fun Park
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Excerpts from a recent sermon by our pastor, Cindy...

You get the feeling from reading the Gospel of Mark that the man was very earnest. He really wanted to know what it would mean to turn his life around, to live differently, to be a part of Jesus’ movement. He wasn’t trying to test Jesus or to trick Jesus. He came to Jesus with a real question, with a real need. But Jesus, in typical Jesus-fashion, didn’t try to coax him along. Jesus just laid down the truth, and it was too much for him. “Go and sell everything you have and give the money to the poor, and you’ll have treasures in heaven, and then come, and follow me.”

Once when Clarence Jordan and his wife, Florence, and a few others were trying to get Koinonia Farms off the ground, that was an interracial community down in south Georgia in the 1940s, this rich woman came to him. She was very rich, and she wanted to give all her money to the community, and then to come and be a part of it. He told her that they’d love to have her, but that she needed to give all of her money to someone else. They couldn’t afford, you see, having the burden of all that money along with the person who ‘used to’ own it.

The woman went away sad. She was ready to part with her money, you see, but only to a point. Which means, of course, that she wasn’t really ready to part with her money.

But Clarence knew that it would be hard to live in community with someone who had donated that much money. No matter how hard they tried, they never could have been on level ground with one another.

Maybe that’s what Jesus had in mind with the rich young ruler. You want to be a part of my movement, of my little ragtag, outcast community? Then come empty-handed, come and learn to depend on God and on one another just like we do, come and learn to depend on the mercies of strangers.

The man went away sad because he knew, he knew that Jesus was right. But he just couldn’t give up his stuff. And so it was his stuff that would keep him from being able to fully embrace his brothers and sisters, to fully live into God’s realm.

And, says Ched Myers, that’s what’s this story is all about: God’s realm. He says that while the Gospel of Mark never definitively tells us what God’s realm, or Kingdom is, there is one point at which Mark tells us very clearly what it is not. And it’s found here, in this story... Not with their wealth intact.

In Jesus’ day, as in ours, people owned stuff at the expense of others. You couldn’t be wealthy without directly or indirectly exploiting others. Some of us watched the movie, “Flow,” on Thursday night. It’s about the water crisis around the world, and it was pretty sobering. I had never so clearly realized how my water consumption effects people in so many other places. I’ve given up bottled water as a result, and if you ever see me drinking it, you can remind me of this pledge.

I already knew, you see, that plastic bottles were bad for the environment. What I didn’t realize is how these water companies, huge companies like Nestle, for example, go in to other countries and other states here in the US, and deplete the water supply for everyone else. They say that if they own the land, they own the water, too. So down in Zephyrhills, Florida, where they have one of these huge bottling plants, houses are being swallowed up by sinkholes, they’re there one day, and then, whooom, gone into the ground as the water supply dries up below. But they say that they own the land, and that they own the water.

Of course, my giving up bottled water doesn’t amount to much. But it’s s little something that brings me into a more honest relationship with those kids in developing countries who are dying for lack of water, those little Bolivian children, of whom, one out of ten die before age 5 due to lack of clean water. It’s not much, my giving up bottled water. But I realized that it’s part of my own salvation, a little bit of leveling in which I can be a participant.

Jesus was asking the rich young ruler to come and be on level ground with his little dispossessed community. But he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t do it.

Jesus looked at him with love, Mark tells us, nevertheless, looked at him with love, and that’s my favorite part about this otherwise difficult story. One of the authors of Texts for Preaching says,

“Seeing him clear through, Jesus does not rebuke or discipline him, but loves him. It is more than admiration or respect or sentimentality. It is the gut-wrenching concern one has for a loved one about to take his own life. All that is important in a moment like that is to get the gun out of his hands and help him discover a reason to live. ‘You lack one thing; go, sell what you own, and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.’ Wholehearted discipleship cannot take place until the ties to the man’s possessions are broken, ties so intense and so enslaving that he can only hang his head and walk away grieving.”

It seems to me that Jesus didn’t really care so much about whether the man was good or not, I mean, he’d been good all his life, kept all the commandments. What Jesus wanted him to be was alive, What Jesus wanted him to learn is that you’ve got to lose your life in order to gain it.

Myers says that when he said, “Go, and sell everything that you have,” that the word that he used for ‘go’ was the same word he used when he healed people. ‘Get up,’ he pleaded. ‘Get up. Be healed. Live...’

Jesus couldn’t save the rich young ruler... But he can save us. Will we let him? And what will that salvation look like for you today? This week? This year?

A Light in the Window

2009-12-03T18:04:00.001-08:00

A Light in the Window
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

A writing from Roger, in preparation for Advent...

You need a new moon and its darkness blanketed around you to make it to the Ohio River and to freedom. You need a clear, cold, dark night so you can follow the stars. You see, a runaway slave in 1857 knows to follow the drinking gourd. A runaway slave knows to look for that big dipper in the sky that points the way north to the Ohio River, to the Jordan River and the Promised Land of freedom beyond its stormy waters.

But as you make your way from station to station along Kentucky’s Underground Railroad you worry about that river. Sure, it means freedom if you can cross it, but how will you cross it? The river is wide. The river is cold. The river is deep.

You hear of a place, just downstream from Maysville, Kentucky, where the river’s not as deep. It’s dangerous, though. The slave catchers know of it, too, and patrol the borderland along the shores. The dreams of freedom for many runaways are dashed on there on the southern bank of the Ohio River.

But on the northern shore is the town of Ripley. A local pastor, John Rankin, and his sons are all abolitionists and have had more than one close call with the slave catchers. It’s against the law to help runaway slaves. The law says slaves are property and must be returned to their masters.

The Rankin family and the other few abolitionists in the area do not believe a person can be considered the property of someone else. The Rankin home is on the hill high above Ripley and can be seen from the Kentucky shore. When it is too dangerous for a runaway slave to try a crossing, the windows of the Rankin house are dark. But if it is likely you might get past the slave catcher patrols, Mrs. Rankin will place a single candle in the window.

And on that cold, dark night, when you finally make your way to the Ohio River, that border between slave states and free states, you can see Ripley across the water and you can see the Rankin house and you can see the candle in the window beckoning you to freedom and safety, to liberty and a new life.

As you approach the water’s edge, you hear the slave catcher’s hounds baying. They’ve caught your scent. The patrol is on your trail. Your fear rises from the pit of your stomach and threatens to overwhelm you. To have come all that way only to be caught and beaten and sent back into slavery.

You are desperate to escape. But it’s a dark night and you can’t see if anyone is there to help you make the crossing. As you frantically search the waters for a sign of hope, you hear a call, almost a whisper. You respond and a small boat with oars like angel’s wings emerges from the darkness. It’s one of the Rankin boys and John Parker, a freedman who owns his own house at the river’s edge in Ripley. They’ve come to carry you across the waters of the Ohio River like they’ve done for so many so many times before.

But for you…what words can describe it? Hope and relief and dreams and longings of freedom and liberty, of safety and a new life swirl through your heart as you climb the hill. And as you rise over the crest of the hill, you see it – the light in the window – beckoning to you, calling you home.

And as you approach the threshold, you begin to sing…
“I looked over Jordan, and what did I see Comin’ for to carry me home?
A band of angels comin’ after me, Comin’ for to carry me home…”

This Advent, may we be a band of angels for one another as we help each other along the long and dark and weary road – moving away from those things that bind and enslave us and moving toward liberty and freedom and safety. And as travelers, may we find comfort and strength from the light in the window calling us onward, calling us home.

Wow, Roger. Amen.

2009 Jeff Street Retreat Slideshow

2009-11-24T06:11:00.000-08:00

With music provided by the adult choir singing Truly, I Believe, a South African song that Andy introduced to us and which was a big hit.

I believe in Jesus, the Savior of the people, I believe in God, the almighty Lord Creator, I believe, I do believe, truly I believe!

Amen.

2009 Jeff Street Retreat

2009-11-23T08:24:00.000-08:00

Jeff Street held our annual church retreat this weekend. The weather was perfect, the friends were all there - including John, Miranda and sweet little Brandon all the way from Colorado! AND Greg, Terri, Will and Anna all the way from North Carolina!! - the music and games and hikes were all great and a grand time was had by all.

More photos and whatnot still to come...

Sermon Excerpts

2009-11-20T14:15:00.001-08:00

Cindy
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Over the years since we started this blog, one thing we have done on a regular basis is offer up sermon excerpts here. I thought it might be helpful to create a compendium of these and so. Some of these individual links are to excerpts that run more than one post, so you may have to look a bit further for the rest of the story...

Outsider Art, by Cindy W
Yewt Sunday, by Sarah and Riley
Earth Sunday 2009, by Chie
For Freedom!, by Cindy W
Mindful Living, by Cindy G
Listening as Prayer, by Michelle
Earth Day 2008, by Donna
Fear's the Way You Die, by Roger
A Promise, by Cindy W
Baptism by Flood, by Karen
Radical Breaks, by Cindy W
Hospitality as Resistance, by Cindy W
Tower of Babel, by Rick
Reformation Sunday, by Michael
Life is a Cabaret, by Kevin
Story from Clarence Jordan, by Roger
Standing Up, by Michelle
Hospitality to Strangers, by Michael
Non-Violence and Revelation, by Michael
Be Ye Angry, by Michael
Practice Resurrection, by David D
Confrontation Monday, by Cindy W
Shuffling In, by Cindy W
MLK, Jr, by Cindy W
Voice in the Wilderness, by Karen
Dear Francisca, by Cindy W
Jacob, Have I Loved, by Cindy W
Allah Al-Ghaffur, by Karen
Sub-Version, by Cindy W
God as Woman, by Janel
A Story to Struggle With, by Cindy W
Hagar's Story, by Cindy G
Part of a Larger Sermon, by Cindy W
Render Unto God, by Cindy W
Two Types of Religion, by Michael
Talkin' 'bout a Revolution, by Sammie
Light of the World, by Cindy W

Word on the Street

2009-11-09T08:18:00.001-08:00

Frozen Oak Leaf
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

We've been blessed already this year by our Seminary intern, Adam. Adam has been working with our homeless friends at Jeff Street's daily Hospitality Program, which provides a warm, welcoming and safe place for our homeless friends to visit during the week.

Whereas in most places, the homeless are not welcome and encouraged to leave as soon as possible, in our Hospitality Program, they can come and sit as long as they want, use the phone, get some coffee, read the paper, etc. In short, they can, at least for a while, make themselves at home.

Adam has been kind enough to share with us a few times this year his "Word on the Street," reflections on his ministry with the least of these. For this, we are very grateful, Adam...

This Word on the Street is a little different from previous ones because The Word on the Street is that a regular attender of our Hospitality Programs and a recent member of our congregation died this past week.

Richard had been living on the streets for years, 13 of which he was receiving dialysis treatments three times a week that kept him alive.

The precarious nature of his health had begun to shape Richard’s perspective very keenly lately. At the age of 58, he had begun to look back and assess his life, his relationships, and his standing with Almighty God. Some of those from our very congregation were honored with the opportunity to be included as conversation partners in Richard’s final process of reflection.

Now in retrospect, it almost seems like he knew what was coming—he seems to have been methodically going about reaching closure on the loose ends of his life. His joining us here at Jeff Street in the past few weeks was one small part of how Richard was reaching out to God from this side of death. What we didn’t know was that God was also reaching out to him from the other side, arms open wide in welcome.

So this week, let’s rejoice in the life of our brother, Richard, and be grateful that he chose to extend to us the privilege of sharing in some of his last and most sacred days. More than once he commented that the worship and the people at Jeff Street were “different than other churches” that he’d been to, and that he felt at home in that difference.

Let’s also be grateful for the work that God does through the Hospitality Ministries here, without which we might perhaps have missed out on knowing Richard and walking with him for a while, here at the end of his journey.

AMEN.

Hooray!!!

2009-10-14T17:28:00.001-07:00

Goatwalker Snippets

2009-10-11T05:33:00.001-07:00

Tongues o' Fire

2009-09-29T10:06:00.001-07:00

1994ish Ashley Jordan
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

In the last few months, we've been sharing testimonies we've called "Tongues O' Fire" in which we recall someone in our lives who has brought God to us in a very real way. This past Sunday, we heard from Adam, who is an intern this semester at Jeff St. He gave a powerful and delightful honoring of his big sister...

My big sister Carlye taught me that if I act up too much she WILL physically sit on top of me until I calm down and apologize…

My big sister Carlye taught me that if I bite her, or hang a freshly caught fish in a ziplock bag on our maroon refrigerator with magnets, she WILL physically sit on top of me until I understand why that’s gross…

My big sister Carlye taught me that even when no one who drives by the top of our driveway wants to stop at my lemonade stand, or my used toy stand, or my Charlie Chaplin impersonation stand, that I still always have a niche market in big sisters who can never get enough lemonade, rusty matchbox cars, and Charlie Chaplin…

My big sister Carlye taught me that your strength comes from how you love yourself, how your family loves you, and how God loves you; it does NOT matter what the kids at school say or whether or not you have many friends…

My big sister Carlye taught me that you can still listen to bad music; you just sing a different word, like “ice-cream” when mom and dad would tell you to turn it off…

My big sister Carlye taught me that Christians can be real, cool, fun, smart, and engage in all the things everybody else is concerned with around them…Christians DON’T live in enclosed habitats like the animals at the Zoo…

My sister Carlye taught me that women CAN be ministers and that even when a quarter of our home-church leaves when she gets hired, God uses even that kind of occasion to weave good, humbling, and beautiful things…

My sister Carlye taught me that even after seven years of ministry, even when your own friends make you pay in blood for challenging their customs, you still press on and don’t let it stop you…

My sister Carlye is teaching me how to be a parent, how to love little people, and to realize that parenthood is one of those things that gets its own category, FAR beyond that of “full-time job”…

My sister Carlye is teaching me that it is actually OK to change, or grow, and that this doesn’t mean you are betraying the family values but you are honoring them with your own contributions…

My sister Carlye and I are learning together that even when a spouse runs off, when grandparents die, when friends and family move far away, when circumstances arise that you cannot control or see coming ahead of time, and even when postpartum depression makes you question whether your life will ever be what you always imagined it would, that you can rise up like a phoenix from the ashes in resurrection…

My sister Carlye and I are learning together that God never runs out of life to give out or good ideas for new changes of plans…that God is a Tinker who likes to stitch together broken bits of junk and make us into works of art that breath…
======
Thanks, Adam!

Kiddin' Around

2009-09-23T19:18:00.001-07:00

Outsider Art

2009-09-15T14:57:00.001-07:00

Spiderweb 2
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Pastor Cindy had a sermon a few weeks ago where she was talking about artwork, specifically a type of art called, "Outsider Art." This is an excerpt...

As I said, the label for what “Outsider Art” actually is is fluid, but this is the definition I’ve heard that I like the best:

“I have come to use the phrase Outsider Art to refer to the creative work of artists who are self-taught and/or those who, for a variety of reasons, are what I consider fortunately impervious to being taught how to make art. It now includes all of the following: The naive, the innocent, the self-taught, the visionary, the intuitive, the eccentric; the schizophrenic, the developmentally disabled, the psychotic, the obsessive, the compulsive.”

That’s a pretty cool definition, isn’t it? It really struck a chord with me, and of course, the reason that it struck a chord with me is that it describes, not just Mr. Finn and Mark Anthony Mulligan and Larry Smothers and some other artists I know, it describes our church: the naïve, the innocent, the self-taught, the visionary, the intuitive, the eccentric, the schizophrenic, the developmentally disabled, the psychotic, the obsessive, the compulsive.

A Mutt. The Wretched Refuse. A Funny Looking People.

That’s not all of us, of course, not all the time. But it’s who we are at our best, a little bit of this, a little bit of that, a diverse bundle of humanity. It’s who we are at our best. So I’ve got a new label for us.

We are an Outsider Church.

When we were kicked out of our building by the Long Run Baptist Association 19 years ago for calling a woman pastor, that would be me, the most crucial decision that we made was to stay in our rough and tumble neighborhood. Looking around now, it’s not so rough and tumble. But it was then, and I am convinced that it was that decision that has pushed us more than anything else into any radical thing that we’ve ever done...

...You and I, because we are an Outsider Church, because we have been in relationship with the cast-out, the funny looking, the dispossessed, the mentally ill, the poor, we have a different slant on things, and it’s crucial that we don’t lose it. It’s crucial that we don’t lose it.

Which means, as our neighborhood changes around us, that we are going have to do something different, something new in order to continue to live in relationship with the marginalized. We’ve always had the luxury of never having to go look for human need. These other churches come down here on Sunday mornings to do the Welcome Table, to feed meals to homeless men and women because they know that it’s not just important for the homeless, but that it’s important for them.

We’ve never had to go that far. It’s been a precious gift, our proximity to the poor. But we’re not across the street from a housing project anymore, and we are going to need to do something different. To maybe come down to the Hospitality Program one morning a month to sit with Diane and to learn the names of some our homeless guests. To figure out who is actually living in our new neighborhood, and if they might need us, if we might need them.

To come down to the Goatwalker Coffeehouse, not just to enjoy the music, but to intentionally build a relationship with one of the homeless guests. To maybe take on one of the Welcome Table meals ourselves once a quarter. To trip over each other on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights as we rush to welcome the stranger, the odder the better.

Or... what? What other ideas do we have? It’s not just the poor who are marginalized, of course. Immigrants, transgendered persons, gays and lesbians, mentally ill persons, addicts.

There’s a whole slew of people who we need to learn from, who we need to foster relationships with. It’s always been a gift, a luxury that people like "Louise" would just walk through the door and delight us and frustrate us for months with her request every week during joys and concerns for a new bra. But she didn’t just give us fodder for funny stories, she unmasked us. "Louise" constantly reminded us that our system isn’t working. Her life, her crappy, sad, heartbreak of a life howled like a cry through every smug pretense our life afforded.

“You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you odd,” said Flannery O’Connor.

"Louise" wasn’t just odd herself, she made us odd, thank God, and what a wonderful gift that is, to be odd, and to be unmasked, and to be an Outsider Church...

...As we enter into this new year, may we be looking for ways to retain our saltiness, our flavor, our identity as an Outsider Church. May we irritate the crap out of the Powers that Be, may we heal the brokenhearted, may we season this city with mercy and justice and grace, may we ever preserve our oddness, following the One who calls us to be salt for the earth.

Amen.

Songs from Jeff Street

2009-08-19T22:29:00.000-07:00

Yewt Sunday!

2009-08-10T06:21:00.001-07:00

Yewt Sunday

2009-08-09T20:20:00.001-07:00

MTR Riley Sarah
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

The Youth of our church led the service today. Many of them have recently returned from Summer Camp at Unidiversity, which is a program we've been participating in for about 16 years now. Our very own Sarah and Riley co-wrote the sermon - here it is!

So, how many of you guys have seen High School Musical? For those of you who haven’t seen it, the basic plot is that the hot shot basketball star, Troy, spends most of his year practicing for the championship. That is, until he meets Gabriella, and they unintentionally try out for the upcoming spring musical.

He then decides that he doesn’t want to be just the basketball star anymore, he wants to sing. Like all other generic Disney movies, Troy finally realizes that he can’t keep being who his Dad wants him to be; he needs to go where his heart and voice leads him.

On a note that doesn’t include Disney Channel Movies, recently several of the youth of our church attended Unidiversity, which is described as discipleship training for teens. Starting at the beginning of the week we were guided to find our true identities and instructed on how to not give in to conformity and to show our individuality. It was made very clear that we were all formed in God’s image, to be as we are.

Ten minutes after we arrived in Longwood, Virginia we were shown a video of two of the administrators greeting some of the fellow churches with a red carpet, microphone, and camera, pretending that they were interviewers and the students were movie stars. They asked questions such as “Who are you wearing, what are you here for, etc.” We were also instructed to write three facts about ourselves on a card, along with our name and church. At this point we were disappointed in the fact that this was what the week had in store for us. During the video, Riley even turned to me and said “There better be a point to this.” And there surely was.

The next morning our preacher for the week, Erin, introduced the theme. She entered the stage inquiring “Who has my identity? Do you?” After a while of searching for an answer, to no avail, she found a suitcase she referred to as her identity. She then proceeded to take out all the things in the suitcase which she used to define herself. The things she pulled out included magazines, make up, a flat screen TV, a couple of DVD’s, and other assorted miscellaneous items. When the suitcase was completely empty, she asked everyone in the audience “Who are you without all the accessories?
Who are you beyond the image?”

At the end of that service, we received a paper that had a list of ways that people have come to define themselves. This list included “you are what you eat”, “you are what you wear”, “you are a city/country kid”, “you are your parents’ child”, “you are a teenager”, “you are what you have” and “you are what you do”. We were given this sheet with the instructions to find a quiet spot to think about it. I thought this was a good way to get us thinking about ourselves. I realized that a lot of how we define ourselves is based off of other objects, people, interests, and beliefs.

We then realized how many of the people at Unidiversity defined themselves by their choice in electives, seminars, and cliques. We began to see the way most teenagers think of it all on the small scale of Undiversity: the jocks are in the athletic electives, the preppy girls are in photography, the dorks are in the cooking electives, and the skater boys are in the music electives. In addition to this, after about the first day many people had formed into their own groups. A couple people from each church would mingle together, and they stuck with each other for the rest of the week to form their own cliques.

About a year ago, I read a book called The Secret Life of Devon Delaney. To sum it up, there is a girl, Devon Delaney, who is basically an outcast. So, to deal with this she conforms to fit in and, although unsuccessful, she lies to her cousin, Lexi, about how she’s in with the popular crew (one of which she had a crush on.) So, you could have imagined her horror when her cousin transferred to her school. Within a day, Lexi was hanging out with the popular crew and within a month she was dating Devon’s crush, Jared. This is one example of lying to make yourself feel better about your true social status, which, particularly in school, is a big part of who you are. In the end, she ends up confessing to Lexi that she lied, after she can no longer hide the fact. She informs her cousin of who she really is, and how she doesn’t quite fit in. And you know what? Lexi likes her anyways, and is glad she finally told the truth about her identity.

Because of the week we spent at Unidiversity we now think about how we respond when we’re asked who we are. Instead of saying our name, city, age, and interests, we think more about what we’re passionate about, how we spend our spare time, and what makes us happy. Hopefully, Unidiversity has taught us to love each other more fully as people of God and to think about the people around us, the relationships we share with them, and how both sides are affected by the relationship.

Riley and I are both shamefully big Facebookers, as some of you might have seen, and one of the most popular applications seems to be taking the quizzes, and spending as much time in Walgreen’s as we do, we’ve noticed a common link between the Facebook quizzes and the ones you find in magazines for adolescents. In the quizzes you are asked four to eight questions about things varying from what your favorite color is to what the first letter of your name is to what you would do if your best friend liked your crush. When the quiz is finished, they label you with things like “loyal friend”, “jock”, “passionate kisser”, or even“75% black”. They then include a blurb about what a person with this title does.

People seem to really like these quizzes, probably because they define you, so you don’t have to find ways to define yourself. Sometimes, that’s a lot easier than being who you are, especially with the conformity issues at most schools. It’s hard for many people to grasp that all we can really do is be who we are and just hope that we can find people that love us anyway.

In the book of Romans, it states

So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you; take your everyday, ordinary life – your sleeping, eating, going to work, walking around life – and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don’t be so well adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking, instead fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily, recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well formed maturity in you. (From The Message version)

At the end of the later Tuesday service, we were told to rip up the cards on which we had written the three facts to define ourselves, and we were given new, fresh cards to represent a clean slate. Unidiversity helped us to find, like Troy, that because we were in fact created in God’s image, it’s less important to be who society wants you to be than who you are, because who you are is exactly who God wants you to be.

Solar Panel Dedication: Thanks!

2009-06-19T11:52:00.001-07:00

Solar Panel Dedication: Thanks!
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

On Sunday, May 17th - which is when we celebrate Earth Day at Jeff Street - this year we had an added bonus and matter of praise: We have had Solar Panels installed!

The Project was made possible with a donation from ASHRAE (the American Society of Heating Refrigeration and Air-conditioning Engineers) to purchase the panels and installation donated by Earthwell Energy Management, Inc.

ASHRAE is paying for the materials as a part of their 2009 sustainable footprint project. They hope to help offset their environmental impact caused by having their conference in Louisville in June. Ken Peet, chair of the Sustainability Subcommittee and President of local LSE Engineering, Inc. says with the help of KIPL (Kentucky Interfaith Power & Light), "we selected the church due to its existing efforts to save energy."

[ KIPL is a local organization that looks at ways we, as communities of faith, can encourage living responsibly on God's creation. Jeff Street is a proud member of KIPL.]

We can't thank our friends at KIPL, ASHRAE and Earthwell enough for this fantastic gift. It is a gift that will only keep on giving. Thank you.

Tongues o' Fire

2009-06-02T09:56:00.001-07:00

Tongues of Fire
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

In a great big burst of creativity and power and shared language, in the midst of a teaming mass of praying, laughing, waiting, wondering people, in languages that no one of them could ever have spoken, in awe, individually and collectively, to each believer in a very personal way and to all of them together, this is how the church began…Happy Birthday, followers of Jesus, Happy Birthday, Body of Christ!

Peter, always quick with a word, seized the opportunity:

This is what was spoken through the prophet Joel: ‘In the last days it will be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young people shall see visions, and your old people shall dream dreams. Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy.

There are images abundant in this morning’s scripture passage. But this morning I am thinking of those tongues of fire, and how they rested over the head each of the believers.

I think it’s fascinating and fitting that Luke describes them as “tongues” of fire. Not just flames, but tongues, God’s expression of self, God’s words comes into and through the believers, then and now. They become God’s voice, we become God’s tongue, God’s voice, God’s expression of self.

As followers of Jesus, of course, we believe that Christ was God’s expression of self. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word became flesh. God expressed Godself through Christ. That’s why we’re here this morning, that’s why we call ourselves Christ-followers. Christ is the clearest picture that we’ve been able to find of God so far, God’s most precious expression of self.

Sure, we get that. But whoever would have thought that God would be so pleased with that expression-attempt that God would just keep on at it. They were patriots, rebels, prostitutes, destitute, thoughtful, impetuous, lovable, disagreeable, faithful, and doubtful, is Ken Sehested’s description, disciples who had not believed themselves capable of tying their own sandals without Jesus, is Barbara Brown Taylor’s.

And God chose them as expression, as voice, as hands and feet and heart. As lovers and resisters and builders of God’s New Order.

Bill Wylie Kellerman says, The story in Acts 2 begins presumably in the upper room and ends in the streets of Jerusalem…The disciples take resurrection to the streets. They go public.

One day they can’t even tie their own sandals, and the next they are going public, taking resurrection to the streets.

To the authorities it must appear as political madness, an acute and hopefully isolated case of sanctified anarchism. Some people say that they have had too much to drink. Granted this refers in part to the inspired and ecstatic utterances, but I wager even more so to their reckless courage. After what’s been done to Jesus, you’d have to be either crazy or drunk to be shouting his name in the streets and pointing accusing fingers at the executioners.

Heretofore the disciples have beheld Christ; now they experience the concrete and practical freedom of the resurrection. No political authority any place or any time can shut that down.

They become God’s word, God’s expression, God’s fearless voice of confrontation, of gospel-good news, of second chances galore, of the alternative Way of living in this world, not alone, not insular, not for self, but for God, for one another, for all.
=======
Sermon excerpts from Pastor Cindy's magnificent Pentecost Sunday sermon. And dig the really cool "tongues of fire" mobiles she did as artwork!! What a multi-talented pastor we're blessed with!

Earth Day 2009

2009-05-19T03:55:00.001-07:00

String Band
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Part of the service consisted of Michelle reading a powerful, wonderful essay her daughter, Chie, wrote. Chie is one of our graduating high school seniors this year, of whom we are all well-pleased...

Light streams into my room creating warm spots on my quilt. The panels of sunshine, cast by the south-facing window, fall like so many parallelograms. On a cold winter day it's comforting to feel that live energy, transmitted over unfathomable distance, sink into my skin.

A few miles away, a woman enjoys the same luxury. Yet for her, sunbeams aren't a mere source of trivial pleasure. That same energy is working; powering her lights, dishwasher, water heater, and refrigerator. People may scoff at her investment: prominent glossy black solar panels mounted on the roof of her modest home. How much effect can one person's actions have on the wider world? What they don’t know is that in one year she will have prevented 15 tons of carbon dioxide from entering our atmosphere.

The woman chooses this lifestyle because she understands that humankind is walking the edge of an environmental precipice. With every ounce of pollution, every razed forest, every extinct species, we borrow against ourselves. She's choosing to confront the terrifying question that has haunted humans since the day they first began altering their surroundings:

Can humankind live sustainably, or will we inevitably destroy the earth and ourselves?

After centuries of ignorance and waste, the choice has been made for us: we must adapt or die. We must repudiate denial as a false comfort and embrace the uncertainty of new ideas. The future is daunting, but I believe with all my heart that there is yet a chance for redemption. Fortunately there are luminaries such as this woman, leading those who will listen, living the question—stretching it to its limits, and challenging us all to do the same.

I credit my mother for bringing this question into my life. Walking into our kitchen, it’s easy to spot the little signs of our family’s personal environmental crusade. On any given day, drip-drying dishes spread on towels cover nearly every inch of limited counter space. Stretched above the sink is a recycled line clipped with drying sandwich bags. The water beads, resembling sparkling swarovski crystal, reflect light from energy-efficient fluorescent light bulbs. It’s a labor of love to hand-wash each plate, cup, utensil or “disposable” bag for reuse.

Our reward is in the knowing that among four people we use one box per year. In the corner of the counter against the wall is our compost bucket, a reused container that held wall spackle in a former life. During the winter months, it becomes an object of controversy as my siblings and I squabble over who will make the cold journey to the backyard compost pile.

Growing up composting food scraps, I never fully appreciated the beauty of the natural cycle enacted each year. The ritual begins in the spring when we prepare the ground by spreading seasoned compost on our barren organic vegetable garden. We do it with faith, knowing that the nutrients will visit us again later in the year when we harvest glowing cantaloupe, watermelon, squash, zucchini, and heirloom red tomatoes.

Besides composting, and conserving water and energy, I am from a family of avid recyclers. However, over the years I’ve come to the realization that the answer to trash problems isn’t recycling more—it’s consuming less. Consuming less, ironic though it may seem, is the most difficult commitment of all.

I’m sure our seemingly innate need to acquire more and more possessions is rooted somewhere deep in our survival instincts. The question I find myself asking nearly every day is: how can I conquer this urge in my own life? In some ways the quest for simplicity is much easier for me because my family makes just enough to get by. However, I worry about the future and how a successful career and more money might transform me as a person. Would I settle into a comfortable suburban life and easily forget the dying rainforests of South America?

It’s one of the questions I’m living out, and yet my perennial optimism has endowed me with a certain unshakable feeling that comfort and success need not be at odds with conservation and sustainability. This is my paradigm, based on the fundamental belief that the earth is not something that should be owned, owned in the sense that someone can ravage, destroy, or use it up as they please. The Native Americans, the ultimate example of peoples who lived sustainably with the land, have an ancient proverb that forms the basis of my beliefs:

We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow if from our children.

As I leave my childhood behind me, I am aware that it is my generation’s task to take on the responsibility of living out this question of sustainability. I want to be able to look into the eyes of my children without guilt; knowing that I’ve given them what is rightfully theirs in better condition than when it was handed to me.

So each morning when the sun filters in through my windows, I am filled with fresh hope and the knowledge that the tools are already here to engineer the earth’s salvation. It’s in hearts of green builders like the woman with the solar house, hardworking families who are doing what they can, and passionate leaders who will dare to overturn centuries’ worth of negligent environmental precedents. I know the work won’t be over in my lifetime, so I’ll continue to live out my answer in the best way I know how.

Earth Day Kid's Choir and Mighty Kazoo Band

2009-05-19T03:32:00.001-07:00

Rainbow Lent

2009-04-17T07:32:00.001-07:00

Rainbow Lent
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

This Lenten and Easter season, we are celebrating in colors at Jeff Street. Each week, we worshiped in living color (as seen below) and this Easter Day, we celebrated with a type dye rainbow swirl of rejoicing. Christ is risen!

Where man sees but withered leaves, God sees sweet flowers growing.

~Albert Laighton

Awake, thou wintry earth -
Fling off thy sadness!
Fair vernal flowers, laugh forth
Your ancient gladness!

~Thomas Blackburn, "An Easter Hymn"

See the land, her Easter keeping,
Rises as her Maker rose.
Seeds, so long in darkness sleeping,
Burst at last from winter snows.
Earth with heaven above rejoices...

~Charles Kingsley

'Twas Easter-Sunday. The full-blossomed trees
Filled all the air with fragrance and with joy.

~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "Spanish Student"

I think of the garden after the rain;
And hope to my heart comes singing,
At morn the cherry-blooms will be white,
And the Easter bells be ringing!

~Edna Dean Proctor, "Easter Bells"

Happy Easter

2009-04-13T03:46:00.000-07:00

Green Lent

2009-04-10T07:44:00.001-07:00

Green Lent 3
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

My dear friend, Sue, introduced me to the concept of reading wedding and obituary listings just for the joy of seeing what might be seen. One of the things that I really look forward to when I do this are weird/interesting name combinations (like, what if they hyphenated their names when they got married?).

I have noticed names like the Muell-Skinner wedding, the Hardy-Harr wedding, and I'm forgetting others.

Here's another example, I had a friend growing up whose sister's name was Pam. Pam Burger. And it got worse: She married a guy named King (Pam Burger-King?).

Anyway, I like to watch for fun name groupings.

Once a few years back, our wonderful bicycling buddy, Jackie Green appeared in a news story about the problems with having too many cars prowling around, the pollution, the dangers, etc.

In the news story, they were quoting our environmentalist friend Jackie to represent one side of the story and they found a fella who worked for government who talked about why we ought to be expanding our roads to allow for more and more cars. This guy's last name was - wait for it - Carr.

And so you had Green vs Carr in a story about about just that.

I loved the irony.

This Easter, I think it is quite easy for us to find God in the color Green. It is all about us. It is what gives us life in a very fundamental way. We eat Green, we live in a Green and Blue world, we breathe deep green cleansing breaths when we find ourselves outside in this Holy Creation. Thanks be to God.

And the wrens have returned and they're nesting
In the hollow of that oak where his heart once had been
And he lifts up his arms in a blessing for being born again
And the streams are all swollen with winter
Winter unfrozen and free to run away now
And I'm amazed when I remember
Who it was that built this house
And with the rocks I cry out

Be praised for all Your tenderness by these works of Your hands
Suns that rise and rains that fall to bless and bring to life Your land
Look down upon this winter wheat and be glad that You have made
Blue for the sky and the color green that fills these fields with praise

~The Color Green, Rich Mullins

Blue Lent

2009-04-01T06:52:00.001-07:00

Blue Lent 1
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

This Lenten season, we are celebrating in colors at Jeff Street. Each week, we'll worship in living color and this week's was blue, which reminded me of the poem by our own Kate, about the blue heron and the poverty all about us...

Between These Worlds
Kate Sanders

The fog has lifted off the lake.
Only a thin mist still swirls
along the surface of the water.
The sun lights the red and yellow leaves.

In Clarksdale,
shots ring out over the early morning traffic.

At the edge of the lake,
a blue heron crouches, lifts his wings,
then beating, beating, steadily moves
his great blue body across the water
to a sunny rock.

In Clarksdale,
shots ring out over the early morning traffic
and a two year old is struck by a bullet
while sitting in his stroller.

I sit here by a crackling fire
Somehow caught between these worlds.

The great blue heron shakes the damp mist
off his feathers and stoops low, lower,
and leaps into the air.

He flies northeast
over trees and fields and interstates
until high above the city
he circles, searching.
He settles slowly, like a single feather,
into the heart of Clarksdale
onto the edge of a housing project rooftop.
He stands there, wings outstretched,
above a mother who sits crying
holding her wounded boy.

Purple Lent

2009-03-24T11:23:00.001-07:00

Purple Lent 2
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

This Lenten season, we are celebrating in colors at Jeff Street. Each week, we'll worship in living color and this week's was purple, or violet, if you prefer. Some quotes, then, on finding God (or not) in purple.

I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't notice it.... People think pleasing God is all God care about. But any fool living in the world can see it always trying to please us back.

~Alice Walker

Larry-Boy: Drop the asparagus!
Fib: Why don't you come and make me, little purple man?
Larry-Boy: If that's the way it's gotta be...

Who do they call when Bumblyburg's in trouble?
Who's got the suit with super-suction ears?
There's no need to panick, 'cause this guy's manic,
And you know that he'll save the day!
You need a hand, he's right there on the double
Hey, hey, he's on the way
Purple and yellow! He's one super fellow!

~Assorted quotes from Veggie Tales regarding the Purple and Yellow Avenger: Larry Boy

Come to the woods, for here is rest. There is no repose like that of the green, deep woods. Here grow the wallflower and the violet. The squirrel will come and sit upon your knee, the logcock will wake you in the morning.

~John Muir

Red Lent

2009-03-17T06:58:00.001-07:00

Red Lent 3
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

This Lenten season, we are celebrating in colors at Jeff Street. Each week, we'll worship in living color and this week's was red. Here, then, is an excerpt from a song by Steven DeGeorge, in which he mentions a red bicycle...

He’d walk on into church like he owned the place,
and they wouldn’t see much more than the dirt upon his face.
And then a man would come and ask politely if he could show him to
the exits
but He’d walk right past and take the podium.

He’d say, “Blessed are the poor mechanics blessed are the miners’
families and
blessed are you who help the least of these.
And woe to you whose wealth is blinding; for you the kingdom will
be like driving through the eye of a needle in a white-washed SUV,”

…and they’d get mad. They’d get angry.
But I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.

Well just outside of Morgantown it threw a rod, the truck broke
down,
and He sent His friends ahead and they hitchhiked.
They found a room and just like He said there was a Schwinn and it
was red, and
they brought it to Him and He rode triumphant in.

Hosanna man, lay your flannel down. He’s ridin’ in, put your shirt on
the ground.
Hosanna man, lay your flannel down. He’s ridin’ in, put your shirt on
the ground.

Orange Lent

2009-03-11T08:59:00.001-07:00

Orange Lent 2
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

"Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves."

~John Muir

(I'm thinking the sun and autumn leaves must surely be orange at times, yes?)

"I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze."

~William Wordsworth

(IOkay, so the "golden daffodils" are probably yellow. Sue me.)

Yellow Lent

2009-03-03T07:03:00.001-08:00

Yellow Lent 1
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

This Lenten season, we are celebrating in colors at Jeff Street. Each week, we'll worship in living color and this week's was yellow. Sue offered a wonderful thoughtful moment of how she has found God in the smell of lemons, in the blooming of yellow flowers in a golden spring.

Along those lines, I offer this little poem...

GoldFinch

I've seen him twice now,
this American Goldfinch.
Not a rare bird, perhaps,
But certainly near extinction in this
urban jungle yard of mine.
His bright yellow feathers warm me
with a hope that my garden,
my yard,
my city
can be reclaimed
and that nature can once again be
welcome here.

-dt

Some blessings...

2009-02-05T08:08:00.001-08:00

Amos and Martin
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

A Blessing for our Sons

Kate Sanders

May you be blessed in your exuberance
confirmed in your creative day dreams
Feel peace in your spirit while never
letting that spirit be trampled

May you find a way to channel your
wonderful wildness
into a moving ahead of the world

Above all, may you always know
that you are loved

Loved by your family
Love by your church community
Love by your God

Amen.

A Blessing for President Obama

Be blessed with humility, honesty,
integrity and humor.
Be blessed with time to care for
and be with your family.
Be blessed with an ability to stay
close to your roots, to stay
grounded and willing to listen
to the poor and needy.
Be blessed with the desire to
give opportunity to those who
haven't had it.

Amen.

Jeff Street Moments...

2008-12-31T07:14:00.001-08:00

Easter Confetti
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Another Jeff Street Book excerpt, a story from our Minister to the Homeless, Diane.

Every service at Jeff Street is unusual; you can almost always count on that. Whether it’s a Sunday morning service, Wednesday night prayer meeting, our Urban Goatwalker night, or some other meeting or service happening, you can expect the unexpected. But some moments are especially odd. We call these “Jeff Street Moments.”

It’s the moments like when, during our Prayer Requests time, we get prayer requests for bras or a pack of smokes. It’s the moments like when a worship service is interrupted by one of our regulars who began Happy Hour early.

Jeff Street Moments.

And what’s interesting is that these especially out-of-control moments of grace (or not) seem to always happen whenever we have visitors – family or friends or maybe just a first time visitor – and we are sure that they must be a bit taken by surprise (or outrage or fear, depending…) by these weird moments of church history.
Like the time when, for a sermon illustration, Robert Owens stripped down to his boxer shorts!!

Honestly, it made perfect sense in the context of the sermon, illustrating Jesus’ sermon where He said, “if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well…,” and it was all about demonstrating how Jesus taught how to flip corrupt systems on their head with subversive non-violent behavior, you know?

Really! It made great wacky sense in context!

Anyway, after this object lesson, Robert gathered his clothes and his dignity and was walking back out of the sanctuary to get changed and just at that moment, some first-time visitors walked in late for the service and took one look at Robert wearing his boxers and a smile and Robert, not knowing what else to do as they stood there – eyes bulging and mouths wide open – said, “Good morning! Welcome to Jeff Street!”

They turned around and left.

But that’s not the Jeff-Street-Moment-catching-visitors-by-surprise I wanted to talk about. I told you that story to tell you this one…
We started holding Earth Day services back in the early 1990s. We always hold these services outside, weather permitting, and at one of these first ones, we perhaps went a bit overboard.

Towards the end of the service, we were holding hands, barefoot in the grass, dancing around in a circle around a tree singing with gusto, “Inch by inch, row by row, please bless these seeds I sow. Please keep them safe below 'til the rain comes tumbling down…” like a bunch of hippie tree worshipers.

Of course, it was this Sunday that we had two Southern Baptist Summer Missionaries show up for the first time. And on top of the paganish-feeling service (or at least I’m sure it felt that way to these more traditional young Baptist ladies), there was a part of the service where we talked about our lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender friends, and that had to send them right over the edge.

As it turned out, they stayed on as Summer Missionaries with us, but they were constantly appalled and dismayed and generally miserable at our services. They never got used to the regular Jeff Street stuff, much less those especially odd Jeff Street Moments.

I heard later on that one of these young ladies eventually came out of the closet and embraced her lesbian nature as a gift from God.

I can’t help but wonder and hope that maybe, just maybe, her Jeff Street moments – so uncomfortable and awkward at the time – helped her accept herself, helped her in her walk with God and search for family and community. I don’t know. Maybe not.

I just know that it’s what those skewed moments do for us at Jeff Street. We find that we learn a little more about ourselves, and sometimes a bit about God in those awful, holy moments.

Awkward, uncomfortable, outrageous, distasteful, and maybe, just maybe, filled with God’s grace.

Listen!

2008-12-08T14:59:00.001-08:00

Red barn
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

A story from our Jeff Street book of stories. This is one of my favorites, from our pastor, Cindy...

So, one time this fella was evicted from church for bad behavior. We don’t recall what exactly he was doing now, but he was on the inebriated side of things and was causing a disruption during a Wednesday night mealtime (our Wednesday night prayer meetings are preceded by a dinner where all are welcome, and many often come).

Usually, when this sort of thing happens (and it does happen at times), Diane or Kate or Cindy or one of us (and more often than not, it’s one of our fearless women) will deal with it. Escort someone out, call the cops if necessary. One way or the other, we deal with it.

This time, Cindy escorted him to the door on a cold night, insisting that he had to leave. He argued his way out of the room and argued at the door, and eventually Cindy opened the door, got him outside, and closed the door.

Still, he remained on the other side of the door, yelling at Cindy but Cindy was insistent. She stood her ground on the inside of the door repeating, “No, you just need to go on. Go on. I’ll have to call the police. Go away.”

And the fella just stood right there on the other side of the door, yelling.

Cindy eventually opened the door to tell him to his face he needed to go on, at which point she could hear that he’d been yelling, “My coat’s stuck in the door!”

We don’t always know the reasons for people’s behaviors, and sometimes we never will. But sometimes – sometimes, we just have to listen at least a little.

Bread for the Journey

2008-11-17T08:27:00.001-08:00

Bread for the Journey
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Hello. As those who've read here for a while know, earlier this year, the good folk at Jeff Street Baptist Community at Liberty (my beloved church) published a book of writings, stories, poems, etc from our members. We had a big release party this summer, dedicated the book to our dear pastor and had books available for those who wished to purchase one.

I have now finally gotten around to setting up the account so that you can order these Jeff Street books online! We actually published two books. The first is Bread for the Journey: Stories and Whatnot from Jeff Street. This is our book of stories and, well, whatnot.

The second book is Steve P. Holcombe, the Converted Gambler: His Life and Work. This book was written by Alexander Gross and published by the Courier Journal Press in 1880. It is the fascinating story of the fella who founded the Union Gospel Mission, the church from which Jeff Street sprang.

Both of these books are available online at our Jeff Street "store." When we received permission to republish the Steve Holcombe book, we had to promise to only charge the actual publishing costs. So, if you go to order that story, you will see that it is cheaper (free! if you choose to download it!) and that is why.

All profits from the Jeff Street book go directly to the work of the church. If you are interested in either book, please check them out.

Throughout Jeff Street’s history, we’ve never been a large church - mostly averaging fewer than 100 in attendance on any given Sunday.
We’ve never been a rich church, being made up of the homeless, the mentally ill, the working poor, and – moreso in these last 20 years – teachers, mental health workers, social workers, labor and justice organizers, and those working in environmental fields: sort of the seamy side of the working class.

What we have been is there. We’ve consistently been there, on the frontlines of Louisville’s poverty issues, homeless concerns, and justice and peace issues. What a blessed history to remember!

What a future yet to tell!

2008 Jeff Street Retreat

2008-11-03T21:07:00.000-08:00

Mother Ann Lee Hydroelectric Station

2008-10-29T10:13:00.001-07:00

Mother Ann Lee Hydroelectric Station
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

From a story by James Bruggers in the October 28th edition of Louisville's Courier Journal...

PLEASANT HILL, Ky. -- From a small, unassuming plant at Lock and Dam No. 7, not far from historic Shaker Village, the Kentucky River gushes across the propellers of a hydroelectric generator that will soon provide enough electricity for 2,000 homes.

The plant, located under the limestone cliffs of the river as it moves through Mercer County, was built to generate electricity in 1927 for Kentucky Utilities, but became run down and was retired in 1999.

Today, the newly named Mother Ann Lee generating station is one of four new hydropower facilities working or planned in Kentucky -- part of what some see as a step toward meeting the challenges of global warming and an increasing demand for energy security.

"We are at the beginning of a renewable energy revolution," said the plant's co-owner, [Jeff Street's own] David Brown Kinloch, a Louisville engineer. "There will be others that follow."

The plant emits no climate-warming pollution, and has been certified as having little environmental impact on the Kentucky River and its aquatic life. It sells its electricity to the Salt River Electric Cooperative, and renewable energy credits to LG&E and Kentucky Utilities.

Even in coal-dominated Kentucky, renewable energy is getting more attention as federal and state tax incentives add up, and the federal government moves closer to capping carbon dioxide emissions and making coal power more costly.

While other states have abundant wind or sunshine, making them good candidates for wind and solar power, Kentucky has substantial and consistent rainfall, and a lot of rivers. Many of the rivers are already dammed for navigation, flood control or recreation, giving the state a potentially rich hydroelectric resource.

Brown Kinloch, who has worked as an energy analyst for past Kentucky attorneys general, said there are potentially dozens more places in Kentucky where existing dams could use water power to generate electricity safely and cleanly.

In addition to the four under way, Brown Kinloch recently conducted a survey showing 20 other potential hydro projects at existing dams that have received preliminary permits from the Army Corps of Engineers or the Kentucky River Authority. Fifteen others also show potential to produce electricity, he said...

Taken together -- 2 megawatts here, 10 megawatts there -- Kentucky has enough lock-and-dam structures or flood-control dams that could be retrofitted to generate as much as 887 megawatts of electricity, according to Brown Kinloch's survey.

That would be, for example, 137 megawatts more than the proposed new unit at E.On U.S's Trimble County plant. And added up, the new hydro potential could power as many as 877,000 homes.

Brown Kinloch's contract with E.On forbids him from disclosing financial details about the Mother Ann Lee plant, and nobody has done an analysis of how much it would cost to retrofit all the dams he surveyed.

But Brown Kinloch estimates the costs of developing the 887 megawatts of hydropower could range from $1.7 billion to $4.4 billion. By comparison, The Courier-Journal reported in July that the new 750 megawatt Trimble unit will cost $1.2 billion...

Brown Kinloch and his partners have done the renovations for the Mother Ann Lee themselves -- and the work often was grueling because access is only by boat or by a 20-minute walk through the woods.

For example, they used a boat, a crane, and ropes to swing a 2,300-pound circuit breaker onto a hillside ledge. When completed, the plant will be able to be run remotely by computer.

During a recent tour of the plant, Brown Kinloch showed how one of the plant's three 20,000-pound rotors, turning 150 times a minute, runs so smoothly that he could balance a nickel on its edge.

"They call that the nickel test," he said, beaming with the pride of a parent.

Some of the work on the Mother Ann Lee is being paid for by some Kentucky Utilities and LG&E customers, through a voluntary "green energy" program.

As part of the program, residential and business customers can pay extra in monthly increments of $5 and $13 to support renewable energy and offset their "carbon footprints" -- and a portion of that goes to the Mother Ann Lee plant.

So far, 1,180 customers have signed up, said Chris Whelan of E.On U.S., the utilities' corporate parent.

Playin' Ball at the Farm

2008-10-26T21:27:00.001-07:00

Molly Batting
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

I would live all my life
in nonchalance and insouciance,
Were it not for making a living,
which is rather a nouciance.

~Ogden Nash

Playin' Ball at the Farm

2008-10-26T21:18:00.001-07:00

Paul Pitching
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Men do not quit playing because they grow old; they grow old because they quit playing.

~Oliver Wendell Holmes

Playin' Ball at the Farm

2008-10-26T21:16:00.001-07:00

Amos At Bat 1
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

I never did say that you can't be a nice guy and win. I said that if I was playing third base and my mother rounded third with the winning run, I'd trip her up.

~Leo Durocher

Playin' Ball at the Farm

2008-10-26T21:15:00.001-07:00

Kevin A tBat
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

We are never more fully alive, more completely ourselves, or more deeply engrossed in anything than when we are playing.

~Charles Schaefer

Playin' Ball at the Farm

2008-10-26T21:10:00.001-07:00

Dave Catching
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Some people crave baseball - I find this unfathomable but I can easily understand why a person could get excited about playing a bassoon.

~Frank Zappa

For Freedom!

2008-10-12T17:43:00.001-07:00

MTR Rally
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

An excerpt from an excellent sermon by Pastor Cindy...

The story that I heard when [William Lloyd Garrison] first caught my eye was about how he attended a very important meeting of abolitionists in London. His ship was delayed, and when he got there a few days late, he was disappointed to hear that the delegates to the meeting had already voted that women, among them Lucretia Mott, could not be seated on the floor and that they would not entertain another motion regarding this.

Back in the US, Garrison had worked closely with a number of women abolitionists, and he was adamant in his support for human rights, human rights. “He would not sit at a convention that dishonored his colleagues, but would bear silent testimony against it from the gallery.”

And so he went and sat up in the balcony with the women and some of his male friends. Everyone noticed him, and bit by bit, some of the other delegates joined him. It caused quite a stir. He dominated the meeting without saying a word. Became quite popular, in fact. And it was the it was the beginning of something huge. You see, Elizabeth Cady Stanton was there with her brand new husband, who was opposed to Garrison’s stance. But Garrison’s silent protest lit something in Elizabeth Cady Stanton that would not be silenced.

As his biography, All on Fire, puts it, she had been garrisonized...

...And now we turn to the Apostle Paul, who, like Garrison, believed in human freedom. There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male or female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.

The last several chapters of Acts make for great narrative. Most of what we know today about ships and sailing during Paul’s time is due to the author of Act’s detailed acccount of Paul’s journey to Rome.

As we heard last week, Paul was arrested and imprisoned. Upon hearing of a plot to kill him, the Romans sent him to Caesarea, where he was imprisoned for possibly two years. When his case was finally heard, he appealed to Rome, where he was sent. After a storm at sea, hunger, shipwreck, a visit with the natives on the island of Malta, Paul eventually does make it to Rome, and that’s where our story ends.

[The last two verses of Acts read:

And he stayed two full years [imprisoned] in his own rented quarters and was welcoming all who came to him, preaching the kingdom of God and teaching concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with all openness, unhindered. ]

So the author of Acts either didn’t know what happened to him, or purposefully chose to end the story with Paul imprisoned, and yet free. I tend to think that it’s the latter, because after all, as Frank Stagg said, that’s what the whole book’s about, right? For freedom, Paul says to the Galatians, for freedom Christ has set us free.

Cuando el Pobre

2008-09-09T10:09:00.001-07:00

Goatwalker, by Larry
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

One of the lovely hymns we sing sometimes at Jeff Street - Cuando el Pobre, - "When the Poor Ones." Beautiful.

When a poor one who has nothing shares with strangers,
When the thirsty water give unto us all,
When the crippled in their weakness strengthen others,
Then we know that God still goes that road with us.

When at last all those who suffer find their comfort,
When they hope though even hope seems hopelessness,
When we love though hate at times seems all around us,
Then we know that God still goes that road with us.

When our joy fills up our cup to overflowing,
When our lips can speak no words other than true,
When we know that love for simple things is better,
Then we know that God still goes that road with us.

When our homes are filled with goodness in abundance,
When we learn how to make peace instead of war,
When each stranger that we meet is called a neighbor
Then we know that God still goes that road with us.

Embracing Mindful Living

2008-08-07T15:39:00.001-07:00

Rabbit
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Cindy G preached a great sermon last Sunday while Pastor Cindy was on vacation. Here is a marvelous, powerful excerpt. She was preaching on the Acts story of the miraculous release of Peter from prison.

A few weekends ago on the evening of a full moon, we were up at Patoka Lake and went night-sky stargazing. The bright lunar landscape commanded most of our attention, but as we turned to go back inside, we noticed a small point of light that hung beyond the tall firs, and decided to explore further with a small telescope.

What to our naked eyes first appeared to be an ordinary star was the massive planet Jupiter, with a band of swirling gases around her and four moons in orbit. Sometimes, when I’m watching clouds during the middle of the day, I think in awe about the whole other worlds and galaxies that are happening beyond my vision, spinning without us noticing…

I wonder if much of the time I’m missing out on so much of God’s activity in the world and in my life because I am just not attuned to seeing it…

We live in a culture that trains us well for mindless living. For example, we don’t have to think about where our food or clothes or other products come from. If I want, I can open the fridge, take out a can of soda, and drink it without ever thinking about the laborers in Ghana who mined the aluminum ore for the can, or the sea merchants who shipped the ore to the US factories, or the farmers in Central America who grew the corn to make the syrup to sweeten my soda, or the Appalachian Mountains that were demolished to extract the coal that gives me the electricity to run my refrigerator that keeps my soda cold. In fact, the culture that we live in counts on the fact that we won’t be mindful of our consumption and of all the people that are affected by our mindless consumption.

American culture creates masters at thoughtless living.

Mindlessness is the stance of the Empire. Don’t pay attention to what’s going on. Don’t stop and think, don’t question authority, don’t wonder why the social order is the way it is.

Don’t contemplate how things could be different!

Fill all the silences, stay busy, work longer hours, BUY MORE STUFF!
We become so accustomed to life as we know it that we have a hard time envisioning a world apart from the Empire.

When even Peter, one of the most zealous of the disciples, requires an angel to poke him awake and when even THEN he still doesn’t get what miraculous movement God is doing right in plain view, how much more do WE have to work to stay awake and live in a posture of openness?

It was difficult for Peter to be attentive to what God was doing because he was chained down by the Roman Empire. Peter had seen miracles, performed miracles himself, and again and again been witness to God’s power of deliverance. Yet the Powers that held him captive had the power to shadow his hope and belief in God’s miraculous work in the world…

If mindlessness is the way of the Empire, Mindfulness is the way of Shalom, of the Realm of God. The powers of the world would rather we stay asleep. How can we be awake to God’s presence?

…If we take the time to pay better attention, and if we block out some of the noise of the Empire, I think we are more likely to be surprised by God every day. Perhaps we’d be stunned in disbelief at the many moments we are invited to co-create with God. Perhaps we’d reel in incredulity at the many ways we are invited to embrace freedom from this world, from earthly restraints, from the evil powers of the Empire that seeks to imprison us. And we would instead become attuned to the Spirit, we’d expect miracles, we’d believe in the possibility of God’s deliverance.

Perhaps if we lived in mindfulness, we’d fin d more occasions for holy amazement, shock at God’s movement…

[Kathleen Norris quotes a modern Benedictine who says] “the classic sign of our acceptance of God’s mystery is welcoming and making room for” the stranger, the other, the surprising, the unlooked for, and the unwanted. It means learning to read the world better, that we may better know our place in it.

May we all be granted these gifts:
The hospitality of the desert Benedictines,
The mindfulness of the Buddhist monk,
The attentive eye of a nature writer,
And the imperfect belief of the disciples of the emerging church.

Amen.

Listening as Prayer

2008-08-01T11:13:00.001-07:00

Fawn
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

A sermon excerpt from Michelle L, who served as a pastor at a youth camp this summer...

At camp we began the week by listening to nature, and listening for God in nature and in ourselves. And we talked about how the act of listening is a form of prayer.

I often feel closest to God as I am walking through the woods, listening to the birds, or watching the clouds float by on a crisp, blue day. The other day at the farm, I walked with our dog, Iglook, out to the pond very early one morning. I sat on the bench and listened.

I heard about eight different bird calls. I heard the twang of bullfrogs in the cattails, and the plop of little toads hopping into the pond as Iglook’s curious snout sniffed a little too close to them. In the distance I heard a rooster crowing, repeatedly, though the sun had been up quite a while.

I listened harder, and I heard the breeze rustling the leaves. I listened farther, and heard the white noise of the interstate. That was the farthest sound I could hear.

Then I heard the mystery sound of the morning. It was a knocking sound -- too uneven to be a woodpecker. Just coming two at a time, then four, then three knocks. I craned my neck, sure I could get a glimpse of who or what was swinging that small hammer. I couldn’t see a thing, but the knocking continued. I imagined a child building a fort in the woods, or a bear trying to knock a bee’s nest out of a tree with a creekstone.

Okay, we don’t have any bears, but my imagination got the best of me.

I finally walked back to the house, amazed that such a symphony plays constantly only a two-minute walk from my back door, and yet I am usually completely unaware of it. Listening as prayer. Listening as a way to become aware of all that is around and in us...

BENEDICTION:
Go forth in peace, be led out in joy. Let the mountains and the hills before you break forth into singing. Let the trees and fields clap their hands. Join the celebration of life in the whole creation.

Amen.

Cindypalooza!

2008-07-14T12:20:00.001-07:00

Cindypalooza!!

2008-07-13T00:23:00.001-07:00

Cindypalooza Mosaic
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

NOT ONLY was this the weekend that our church had the Jeff Street book release celebration, it was also the weekend we had a Surprise Celebration for our beloved pastor, Cindy!

We surprised her at the book party which was only a book release party superficially. The main celebration was to honor Cindy's years of service at Jeff Street, and what a celebration it was! There was music, skits, silly songs, book readings, friends from out of town, fellowship and at least a little intrigue.

Cindy has ministered at Jeff Street for going on 25 years and what a joy and privilege it has been to have her leading our community. Cindy is an incredibly gifted and Godly preacher and we have had blessing upon blessing flow over us by her delightful presence.

In addition to the party Friday night (which was covered by the newspaper here), we had a picnic today (Saturday) and will continue to rejoice in and honor our sister, Cindy, in our church service tomorrow.

And a grand time has been had, and will be had, by all.

Thanks, Cindy, for all you are and do. We thank our God upon every remembrance of you.

We love you!

Bread for the Journey

2008-07-12T07:45:00.001-07:00

Bread for the Journey
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

It's official! Jeff Street has a brand spanking new book of stories, poetry and miscellanea covering mostly our last 25 years of ministry. This, from a church that is also celebrating our (roughly) 125th anniversary of ministry in downtown Louisville, a ministry that has always been amongst the marginalized and down-trodden.

Another excerpt from the book (last one for a while, I promise):

Throughout Jeff Street’s history, we’ve never been a large church - mostly averaging fewer than 100 in attendance on any given Sunday.
We’ve never been a rich church, being made up of the homeless, the mentally ill, the working poor, and – moreso in these last 20 years – teachers, mental health workers, social workers, labor and justice organizers, and those working in environmental fields: sort of the seamy side of the working class.

What we have been is there. We’ve consistently been there, on the frontlines of Louisville’s poverty issues, homeless concerns, and justice and peace issues. What a blessed history to remember!

What a future yet to tell!

JEFF STREET BOOK RELEASE PARTY!!!

2008-07-08T08:10:00.001-07:00

Paul
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

For the last six or so months, our church, Jeff Street, has been working on a book of stories, poems, songs and essays from church members and friends. We have finally wrapped that project up and are having a book release party this weekend.

There are some 33 writing contributors, as well as artwork from three other contributors (all of this in a church with only about 70-90 members) who have contributed 66 stories, essays and poetry (same as the number of books in the Bible, hmmm...). The participants are from every age range, and from every part of our church.

The book is called, Bread for the Journey: Stories and Whatnot from Jeff Street and we self-published it through lulu.com, which has been a great experience for us. At this point, I've just printed out enough for Jeff Street folk and friends who wanted it, but we may eventually make it public if others are interested.

The book cover is still secret at this point, but I'll put it up online after the party this weekend.

Congratulations, Jeff Street!

Summer Study Series

2008-06-30T08:29:00.001-07:00

Summer Study Series
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

I realize that most folk who frequent this blog do not live near my Louisville home. But some of you do.

It is for you I post this announcement.

My church, Jeff Street Baptist, is doing a Bible study on Homosexuality and Christianity, led by our own prophet, genius and all around good guy, Dr. Rick Axtell.

Rick is a professor of ethics at a Kentucky university and is an excellent teacher and the study is open to all who are interested in the topic - even if you disagree with my church's position (we are open and affirming of our lesbian and gay brothers and sisters).

A good time shall be had by all, with thanks to Rick and Lisa for preparing for and presenting this study.

The Important Thing...

2008-06-08T13:54:00.001-07:00

Sweet Yellow Clover
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Here lately at church, we've had different people offering their thoughts on "The Important Thing..." What's important to them in their lives? Today's answer came from our own Kate Sanders, who wrote...

The important thing about writing is to put the pen on the paper. I realize this at 10:02 pm the night before, after having two weeks to think of what the important thing is.

I have always resisted answering questions where I have to pick only one correct answer. I hate multiple-choice questions. I am always second guessing the obvious choice or thinking of reasons that the others could also be true. I much prefer an essay question where I can just say what I know. So THE important thing has had me stymied for two weeks.

And yet when I finally put the pen on the paper, I write, “The important thing about writing is to put the pen on the paper.” And it is absolutely true. In every writing class I have had, I think, my instructor has said, “Just write.” If you worry about exactly what is going to come out, you will never get started. And if you edit yourself as you go, you’ll never get to the end. You have to write first then come back and edit after you have actually gotten something down on paper. This is the method that has always worked best for me—when I follow it.

I think that, as with writing, there are so many things where you just have to begin. Any kind of discipline, whether it be running, dieting, reading everyday, cleaning the house, a spiritual discipline—whatever it may be—you just have to begin. You don’t have to know where it is going—have every detail planned out—you just have to begin. And usually that is the most difficult part.

I feel like I waste so much of my life waiting for the conditions to be “just so” to begin. I get so caught up I the unending daily tasks that sometimes I feel I rarely give attention to those things that really make me feel whole—playing music, writing, spending focused time with my kids.

I wrote—one of the few times I have actually put the pen on the paper lately—I began what may become a song or may remain another slip of paper to keep in my writing folder.

The Things You Think You Have to

Sometimes I wake and find myself
Getting caught up in the wheels
My life’s running on, I’m just getting through it
With no room to really feel

My life is slipping through my fingers
Like so much running water
I’ve not taken time to read with my son
Or play with my baby daughter

I’ve got to begin to hold on tight
To what I mean to do
Lord, save my from the sinking blue
Of the things you think you have to

So I guess the important thing for me is to begin. Not to wait “till I get through this week” or “feel less tired” or “the weather’s not so hot” or whatever—don’t let the daily routines of life keep you from what is life giving to you. I am writing You, but of course I am meaning Me also. I worry that I will just waste my life getting through each day and never really live in the present moment.

So, the important thing is to begin—to begin to really live.

Earth Day 2008 Sermon

2008-05-27T06:30:00.001-07:00

Mountaintop Removal
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Excerpts from a sermon by Donna on our Earth Day service this year.

Well, I’m wondering how many of you are ready for a break from school, let me see your hands. Me too! I’m going to be quoting today
from some men for whom I have a great deal of respect and the first one is my dad, William Seth Helton, who went to be with God last June - and who apparently by the end of his senior year in high school was rather tired of school.

My mom let me have his yearbook after he died and there were little snippets about him in the yearbook that didn’t surprise me. His senior weakness was listed as quietness and in another spot it said “If silence is golden, William Helton is rich” and in another place “William Helton likes farming, always says work won’t do no harming…”

My dad loved walking in the woods behind our house and the mountains and being in nature in general. He was at home there. One of the ways I’ve chosen to honor his life is to try to work to protect the Appalachian mountains and to familiarize myself more with the critters that he loved and revered.

So in June of 2006, our family was driving to the Cowan Creek Mountain Music Camp in Whitesburg, KY for a family vacation and Dan who can spot a hawk two miles up in the sky it seems while driving was going on and on with Sarah about how sometimes endangered animals aren’t exotic ones living halfway across the globe, sometimes they are right here in our own state and right under our own feet.

He was waxing on and on about the Cerulean warbler, a bird with which I was completely unfamiliar but which is or at least used to be prevalent in Eastern Kentucky and about taking responsibility for the earth’s creatures. It was pretty late and we decided to drive through the Hardees in Hazard and get something to eat since we would be really late getting to Whitesburg and sitting in the drive-thru we heard
something shrieking.

We found a little bitty kitten in the parking lot, emaciated and alone, and Sarah was quick to point out that sometimes endangered animals are not exotic, but are right here in our own state and right under our feet and how we are responsible for them. And that is how we acquired one of our cats, Duke. Duke of Hazard…

While we were in Whitesburg, we met some incredible Kentucky musicians and had the opportunity to take classes with them. But we began to hear snippets about their lives that were disturbing. We heard from Randy, the banjo teacher who can play a banjo made out of a fruitcake tin made for him by his neighbor, has spent $5,000 just trying to have clean water.

We heard from Roy – a guitar teacher who gave Jordan the handy hint that girls love guitar players – couldn’t shut his front door after a
coal company blasted the top off a mountain near him. When he invited the coal company to come to his house, the coal company rep said that it must be the humidity that caused the door not to close.

On Wednesday of that week we decided to… go on a mountaintop removal tour with Kentuckians for the
Commonwealth and we were stunned to see what was happening to the landscape in this part of our state not so far away.

We have heard since about others who have been witness to constant dust, flooding, mudslides, cracked foundations in their houses, polluted wells, 500 injuries caused by coal trucks, other health issues, and boulders called flyrock landing in their yards and family cemeteries.

Most disturbing is the story of Jeremy Davidson, a three year boy in
Virginia, who was sleeping soundly at 2:30 in the morning when some flyrock, a boulder the size of a microwave, came crashing onto his bed.

The first mountaintop removal operation began in 1970 and in 1972, a coal impoundment dam collapsed at Buffalo Creek resulting in over 100 fatalities and in October of 2000 the bottom of a coal waste pond near the town of Inez KY collapsed pouring 250 million gallons of slurry or sludge, 25 times the amount of oil spilled in the Exxon Valdez disaster into an underground mine shaft , flooding two creeks causing the water systems in ten counties serving 27,000 people to be shut down.

And it is easy to point fingers at and tsk tsk about coal companies, but when you go to ilovemountains.org, you can find your own connection to mountaintop removal. I am a customer of LG&E, which purchases coal from a coal company that does MTR in communities like Rawl, West Virginia, where resident Donetta Blankenship says her water runs out of the pipe like tomato soup, thick with orange sediment.

Corporate greed, corrupt politics, and an insatiable appetite (our own) for supposedly cheap energy have resulted in the planned destruction of a national treasure with the highest level of biodiversity in the country. Over 470 mountains and over 420 miles of Kentucky’s headwater streams have been permanently destroyed and over 60,000 acres of valley fills currently exist…

So let me wrap up and get to the altar call here. What am I asking of
you today?

I am asking that you do one or more but even better all of the
following:

Stroll in the woods as often as you can...

Get excited about woodchucks and bluejays and tree toads.

Look for the endangered species maybe right under your feet and learn something new about them that you didn’t know before.

Go to ilovemountains.org or just google mountaintop removal and read and read and read. Look carefully at the pictures of decimated mountains and learn of the impact on those living nearby and consider the impact on those of us who are downstream.

Put February 14, 2009, on your calendar right now (I Love the Mountains Day rally).

Write your legislators.

Join Kentuckians for the Commonwealth.

Go on a mountaintop removal tour.

Read your LG&E bill carefully and reduce your usage.

Recall Jeremiah's biblical warning:

Destruction upon destruction is cried,
For the whole land is plundered...
For My people are foolish,
They have not known Me.
They are silly children,
And they have no understanding.

I beheld the mountains, and indeed they trembled,
And all the hills moved back and forth.
I beheld, and indeed there was no one,
And all the birds of the heavens had fled.
I beheld, and indeed the fruitful land was a wilderness...

For I have heard a voice as of a woman in labor,
The anguish as of her who brings forth her first child,
The voice of the daughter of Zion bewailing herself;
She spreads her hands, saying,

‘ Woe is me now, for my soul is weary
Because of murderers!’

And as you go, recall John Muir's blessing:

Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves...

Keep close to Nature's heart...and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.

Amen.

Bread for the Journey teaser

2008-05-16T13:46:00.001-07:00

Bread for the Journey teaser
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Sorry there's been nothing posted here lately, but it's for good reason. For the last six months or so, we've been collectively working on a Jeff Street book of stories, poetry and essays. The book is in its final stages and will be sent off to be published soon.

The title is (barring in final changes...) Bread for the Journey: Stories and Whatnot from Jeff Street and the release date is slated for mid-July.

Look for more info about the book coming soon!

In the meantime, here is an excerpt from one of the essays, which is itself, an excerpt from one of Cindy's sermons...

Do you how sometimes in the spring and sometimes in the fall, there will be those days when everything is just so sharp, when the sky is as blue as blue can be and when you look at the trees you can see each little leaf, not just one big blob, but each little leaf, and the shadows, even the shadows are crisp and sharp and so well-delineated?

Well, that’s how it is around here a lot of the time. In the light of this community, we can often see things that clearly – like how very rich we are, not because of what we own, but because of one another, because of the grace and fidelity and abundance of second chances that we find in this place...

We are the light of the world, to these precious little ones, to one another, and to the principalities and powers of darkness. May we shine like crazy, and in our shining, may the world begin to see things clearly.

Bluebird in Flight

2008-04-09T05:29:00.001-07:00

Bluebird in Flight
Originally uploaded by paynehollow

Spring is rising on the wing at the community farm. The birds are singing, the trees are greening, the ground awakening and all of heaven is bursting loose. Hallelujah!

I only went out for a walk and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.

~John Muir