Category Archives: faith

Hidden Baskets, Hidden God

At our house on Holy Saturday, Easter baskets are hidden. With enough activity on Sunday, we do the fun stuff on Easter Eve. This year, Sam’s basket is hiding safely in his clean laundry basket. When he finds it, both the basket and how often he puts away his clean clothes will be revealed.

Faithful to family tradition, I try to make finding the treasure of an Easter basket challenging. Who doesn’t, you might be thinking. But I am not referring to an ordinary level of challenging. I am speaking of a Grandma Florence level of challenging!

I have two distinct memories of desperate searches for my chocolate and real dyed-eggs-filled Easter basket at her tiny house, a house that magically expanded to fit all of the people during the holidays.

Once, my basket was expertly tucked into the large pouch of her walker. This meant my basket had moved around as I wildly hunted for it. Try to accuse grandma of cheating and I assure you it would not have gone well.

And the other one, well, although all childhood memories are suspect, I think this one is spot on. After a very long search, eight-year-old or so me begged my grandma for a single hint. “No hints,” she replied. More searching. Finally, she relented. I was allowed to pick up the landline phone and call my cousin at her house, who was a co-conspirator in the hiding. “One hint, please!” I begged. Eventually, I discovered the basket in her dishwasher, which was never ever used as a dishwasher. In the millions of visits to her house, I didn’t even realize the thing opened.

Who decided to hide Easter baskets? Luckily, we do not do the same at Christmas! It would be fitting if Easter basket hiding could be traced back to the hiding God on Holy Saturday.

God is hidden on this day sandwiched between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. Jesus Christ, who was fully God and fully human, lay in a grave fully dead on this Holy Saturday. Last night in our congregation, a man sang “it is finished” in “Go to Dark Gethsemane” as a door slammed and the finality of Jesus’ life hung in the air, along with the smells of frankincense and myrrh.

It is finished. God has gone into hiding.

Luther described God as a God who went into hiding. For those interested in a theological rabbit hole (you know who you are!) here it is: Luther on the Hidden God, by Steven D. Paulson.

God went into hiding in the Garden of Eden and ever since, God has played hide-and-seek by showing up exactly where we are not looking. Do you think God is found in success and all the good things that happen in our lives. Nope. God is found in the hardship of the cross, in the agony of death, in the sorrow of our lives. Sure, God enjoys the good times, too, but God is more likely to be found where we are not looking.

The women did not go looking for God on the morning we now call Easter Sunday, but God is exactly who they found at the grave. This God is found where we may not seek: in hospital rooms, beside those celebrating Easter alone and far from home, in prisons, in homeless shelters, in Haiti, Gaza, and Ukraine.

God is found where we generally do not seek…which might also be true in Sam’s search for his Easter basket. “No hints.”

Photo by Alan Rodriguez on Unsplash

What is Good?

Today we recall the crucifixion of Jesus and call it Good Friday. What is good in this gruesome story? What is good about a death?

The good is this: There is no simple explanation for the death of God on the cross, but Love.

Here is what I mean. There is no uncomplicating the tangled up, prickly yet tender love of God. The unavoidable fact of Good Friday is that God had a rebellion on God’s hands, a rebellion against grace. God died for the rebels, died so that grace would be the last one standing in the rebellion.

There are many goofy theories around Good Friday which can all be confirmed on the internet. I just re-read the novel “Gilead.” Set in the 1950’s, the pastor noted how 40 years of ministry with a congregation can quickly be undone by one television preacher. And then, there is the internet!

  1. Atonement – This is the notion that Jesus had to die to satisfy God’s anger over our sins. Humanity was so terrible, according to this theory, and God was so mad about it, that the only way to avoid God’s wrath was to put Jesus to death, as though there was a deal between the Father and the Son. This is a trinitarian disaster.
  2. Substitution – This theory suggests Jesus stood in for us on the cross; although we are the sinners, Jesus took the nails for us. This wrathful view of God does not line up with the Gospels for sure, or with the God we meet in most of the Hebrew Scriptures. The God we meet there kept rescuing God’s people.

I suspect television/internet preachers are attracted to these kinds of simple answers to Jesus’ death. It is good, they might suggest, to make sense of the cross.

If only love were so simple.

Bring to mind a person or place or something you deeply love. Or recall a moment when you felt an overwhelming sense of love.

Was it witnessing a gorgeous act of creation – an unforgettable sunset, the Northern Lights, a stunning view of the ocean. Or the birth of a child, the wedding of a granddaughter, the last goodbye to your loved one who was dying. How do you squeeze any of those moments into words? You cannot. The grandeur of love, deep and sweeping love, defies description.

What is good on this Good Friday? The good is the inexplicable love of God for you. The good is Christ, delivering you on the cross from death as the end, who had more mercy for sinners than the world (our world) could handle. The good is God, who met our resistance to grace by embodying it. The good is God, whose love is good and whose grace is good.

Photo by Alicia Quan on Unsplash

Follow Directions

Last week, Marcus taught Sam how to grill hamburgers. One step at a time, he guided Sam through the directions. It reminded me of the famous hamburger helper story in my family. I was the same age as Sam when one day I was asked to make dinner. It was the worst hamburger helper in the history of hamburger helper.

What could be hard about making hamburger helper, you wonder? Fair question. This dish involves only a few easy directions.

Nothing is hard about making hamburger helper, in fact.

What is hard is eating hamburger helper when the cook forgot one important direction: add water.

Directions matter.

The Palm Sunday reading for Sunday is from Mark 11:1-11. The story of Jesus’ procession into Jerusalem is told in each of the four gospels. Matthew’s gospel specifies both a colt and a donkey carrying Jesus. What? I don’t understand, either. Luke’s version leaves out the palms. John’s version is the shortest, barely mentioning the donkey’s colt. (Is that what Matthew meant? Who knows.)

And then there is Mark. Mark is the earliest of the gospels and typically the shortest. But this story is an exception. John’s gospel wins the most abbreviated storytelling award, while Mark slows everything down in Chapter 11.

In painstaking detail, the writer draws our attention to the directions. Jesus gives two of his disciples these (unusual to Mark) detailed instructions:

  1. Go to the village
  2. Find a colt that has never been ridden.
  3. Untie the colt.
  4. “Bring it.” This is hilarious to me. The other gospels finish the sentence, “Bring it to me.” But here in Mark’s gospel, Mark reverts to his hurried writing and doesn’t even finish Jesus’ sentence! I love it.
  5. Explain to anyone around that Jesus needs the colt and will bring it back.

The latter part of Step Five is the thread I’m pulling for the sermon on Sunday.

Aren’t these directions remarkable! For a gospel writer whose most worn-out word is “immediately,” these are thorough instructions.

Digging around in the Scriptures, you find a treasure trove of directions.

  • Eat, drink and be merry.
  • Welcome the stranger.
  • Remember the Sabbath.
  • Love the Lord your God.
  • Love your neighbor as yourself.

And on and on and on. But the directions for the two disciples – how to acquire the colt for Jesus: “bring it.”

Directions matter. The colt made the point that Jesus was a strange sort of royalty. He was a king born in a manger whose baby gifts were essentially burial anointments. This is no ordinary king, proven by the donkey colt who served as lowly transportation. Kings rode regal horses, not donkeys.

The two disciples nailed the directions. They could have been in charge of the hamburger helper and we would have all eaten better that night. Leading up to the procession, had they left out any one of the instructions, the story would be different. Had they not untied the colt, for example, or not explained themselves to bystanders. This may have been a different story.

What does it mean that Mark puts Chapter 11:1-11 into slow motion? What might God stir up in you if you take your time through these verses? (Those are your directions. Oh, and remember your baptism – add water.)

Are You Peculiar Enough?

In his book, “Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know,” Adam Grant encourages readers to “be peculiar.” This idea sticks with me. Peculiar is a way of being completely and entirely your own self. If indeed you are peculiar, you are unlike anyone you have ever met.

Raising an almost teenage daughter, I know peculiar is a hard sell. Peculiar stands out when there are so many more comfortable ways to try to fit in. (How many Stanley water cups exist in a middle or high school? You won’t believe it.)

Peculiar is a synonym for weird, but it is also a synonym for unique. Peculiar is a word insists the Creator has enough creativity to mold each individual person differently, even peculiarly.

Grant’s encouragement is on my mind as we make our way toward Palm Sunday and Holy Week. Jesus models peculiar in the way he parades into Jerusalem, in the way he cares for people who otherwise go unnoticed, in the way he serves his students, in the way God’s gentle love is pronounced in gruesome fashion. It is a peculiar story of peculiar mercy.

Squint your eyes a bit and you might see your own life differently. Are you following this peculiar God’s peculiar ways?

  • Are you living to fit in? Or are you willing to be peculiar with this unique life God created in you?
  • Are you buying what is trending? Or are you using money more peculiarly by buying only what you need?
  • Are you peculiarly aware that this life is a precious gift, that death is not the end, that money does not solve problems, that forgiveness changes people, that God loves a world even as messy as this one?

Please. Be peculiar in word and deed, in what you love and who you follow.

A Parent’s Practice of Holding On & Letting Go: Part Three

In one of my favorite books, “An Altar in the World,” Barbara Brown Taylor points out how difficult it is to get lost. As long as there is a phone within reach, and there usually is, you know exactly where you are.

This is both comforting and…a bummer! Getting lost is a practice that can be traced back to Abraham and Sarah. Taylor suggests God’s only reason for choosing these two not-young people to create a nation was their willingness to enter a wilderness and get lost.

Getting lost can be a spiritual practice. When we cannot rely on Google Maps to guide us, we might be awakened to our need to rely on God to guide us.

This is the last post in this series. You are accompanying me through a season of getting lost. In this season of parenting, I am finding my way through a new wilderness. Earlier this week, we dropped off our oldest to begin basic training for the Army National Guard.

This particular wilderness looks like it does for anyone who has dropped off a kid college, except we have no contact with him until the Army says so. This is the intentional process – an abrupt entrance into the wilderness for him and for his parents.

While I shuffle my own way through the wilderness, so does my son. He is in a new place among new people all because he was willing to get lost. Getting lost is a formative process, and as Taylor describes it, leaving our established paths, we might discover neighbors we never knew we had.

He may come out of this wilderness with friendships and experiences that enrich the rest of his life. The wilderness gives us up to the care of our neighbor. Time in the wilderness better positions us to notice the kindness of strangers, writes Taylor.

In our home, we are short one Lewton, yet we are, all of us, in a wilderness, which I guess is nice. Every variety of transition is a one-way ticket through the wilderness, where the strangers we encounter may be God in disguise.

Have the paths in your life become too established? Or are you, like my family, moving through a wilderness time? If so, notice the strangers. And let God be your guide, as you let go of the map for now.

Photo by ALEXANDRE DINAUT on Unsplash

“Is It Still There?”

Pastors and Deacons everywhere now find ourselves on the other side of Ash Wednesday. Whew! Communities gathered, ashy crosses were marked and now the Lenten season unfolds…

But not before I share two highlights from worship last night. Wiped clean of its ashes, these anecdotes might bring a smile to your face. Both happened during the imposition of the ashes.

First, an older woman who is not new to Ash Wednesday. Drawing the cross on her forehead, I repeated words she has heard dozens of times over the years: “From dust you have come and to dust you shall return.” “I remember,” she replied. “I remember.”

And one more from a little boy. He has not received as many ashy crosses as the woman who will remember. When I traced the cross on his forehead, he turned around and looked at his mom hopefully, “Is it still there?” It was.

Today, it isn’t. If he didn’t wash off the cross with a washcloth, his pillowcase did the trick. The ashes are wiped away yet the cross remains. That’s the gift of Ash Wednesday. We simply trace over a cross drawn at baptism. The cross is still there, now and always. You are indelibly marked as God’s forever. May you remember. May you remember.

Photo by Grant Whitty on Unsplash

A Parent’s Practice of Holding On & Letting Go: Part Two

One 4th of July, I tried to make a red, white and blue dessert. I remember there were strawberries, blueberries, cream and Jello involved. When made correctly the layers resembled an American Flag, each color distinct from the next. When made by me, it was mostly purple. The layers melded together. Instead of resembling an American Flag, the dessert reminded you of Barney.

Parenting is something like this. The ongoing challenge is to keep the layers from melding together; to distinguish one person from the next so that the relationship recognizes each distinct person in it.

On Monday, we will drop off my son at an airport. He will fly from there to basic training, where we will meet him for graduation in 10 weeks. Today, we are living in the waiting period, which is where the layers easily turn to purple.

Here is what I mean.

  • I feel sad, but my sadness should not meld into his feelings. He feels excitement (among other feelings). My feelings are mine and not his.
  • I feel apprehension. What is my son’s future? Despite Isaiah’s prophecy, swords are still lifted up. Spears were not beaten into pruning hooks. War remains a possibility. Yet my own apprehension need not be his. He needs to feel his own way through the uncertainty.
  • I feel loss. He will miss many moments in the next ten weeks. Birthdays, holidays, senior prom, and his own high school graduation. And yet, my role is to support his decision that this is the right next step in his life. My own sense of loss needs to remain my own.

Feelings are such a bugger. They spill out of us and, I’m learning, feelings are created by electrical activity in our brains based not as much on reality as our own human experience. Feelings can make our relationships meld together; when anxiety is high, it is easy to forget where each of us starts and stops.

This requires letting go. I can sort through my feelings and offer to help my son sort through his, but in the end I can only let my son’s feelings be his own. I can recognize my own concerns without trying to make them his. I can love and support him by paying attention and tending to my own feelings.

I find that prayer helps. In prayer, I can commiserate with God, who reminds me that my son is his own person and I am mine. As the conversation unfolds, I hear the reminder that letting go is better than holding on. “Just remember the Barney disaster,” God won’t let me forget. “I remember.” God doesn’t mind eye rolls.

Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

What is Saving Your Life Now?

Barbara Brown Taylor shared this question in her book, “An Altar in the World.” A priest asked her to speak at his church in Alabama. “What do you want me to talk about?” Taylor asked him.

“Come tell us what is saving your life now,” he answered.

His answer was freeing for her. Her assignment was not to pinpoint a message that would be helpful for everyone, which is impossible. Instead, she could articulate how she understood her life at that time.

I once heard an author recall a conversation she had with Sylvia Boorstein, a more seasoned writer. She explained to Boorstein how she felt inadequate as a writer. She was younger and so many writers had more experience, both in life and as writers. Who was she to put words on paper?

Boorstein’s response sticks with me. She advised the new author to write what she knew so far.

Wonder today: “What is saving your life now?” Or, “What do you know so far?”

What might you learn if you slow down enough to stir these questions around in your heart and your mind?

  • What is keeping you going?
  • How does Jesus come alongside you these days?
  • What have you learned so far in your life?

When you reflect on these wonderings, you may be surprised at all that you know! Articulating what you already know offers you a road map for everyday living. Knowing what is saving your life now will help you decide what to do next and what to avoid. Recalling what you know so far will keep you from relearning the same annoying life lessons. Self-reflection keeps you from retaking the same tests over and over again.

But the reflection itself takes time. If you are “too busy” for self-reflection, your own wisdom is left behind. Perhaps you could take 20 minutes to journal your thoughts. Or find one person who will listen to you reflect aloud.

I’ll do the homework first.

  1. Parenting is exhausting. Parenting littles is physically tiring. Parenting olders is mentally tiring, but it’s essential that they know how much you love them even when they do dumb things. I’ve learned that hanging around is key. Be in the kitchen when they’re in the kitchen (which is often). Be in the room without being annoying. (This is hard for me because I like to ask questions.) Don’t ask too many questions.
  2. Yesterday I listened to a podcast that unpacked the importance of relationships. What I heard was how challenging marriage becomes when we expect our spouse to be our primarily emotional and intellectual connection. That one person cannot meet all of our human needs. I now understand, 46 years into life, how essential a friendship can be. Friendship, I learned in this podcast, is an indicator of longevity. And, healthy friendship encourages a healthy marriage because it helps us recognize our spouse is not responsible for meeting all of our needs for connection.

Right now, I know at least two things. And that is enough for now.

Photo by Milan Popovic on Unsplash

A Parent’s Practice of Holding On & Letting Go: Part One

Parents can pack a lot into a life: sign kids up for activities, drive them around to travel sports, desperately squeeze in family dinners, arrange the play dates, teach them how to do this and that. And finally, host the graduation open house.

It happened.

High School graduation is a new milestone in our family. Our first born graduated early in his rush to be an adult. Following his lead, we hosted a very small open house in our living room, enjoyed his favorite foods, walked back in time through the baby books, and marveled at the man in his senior pictures.

An open house is like hitting a pause button, instructing the graduate to wait here for a moment to let it all sink in.

Milestones offer space to reminisce. “Remember that sleepover when you turned six, and I let you invite six little boys because I didn’t know any better?” “Remember your K-5th grade teachers?” “Remember when you tried that sport?” “Wait here while we remember.”

Of course, we can only wait here for so long. We hold onto those old stories like a hot potato knowing eventually we need to let them go, both the stories and the boy.

I’ve learned more than I could imagine in these days since his open house. I now know this is an exhausting milestone! I am weepier and wearier than I expected to be, more uncertain of how long this particular grieving process will take. Whenever we let go of something familiar or significant, this is called grieving. Grieving is the practice of letting go and holding on, it is something parents must do on the regular: letting go of the boy and holding onto God’s promise that God goes with the boy from here.

Meanwhile, God sticks around to hang out with the weepy woman. God has seen this episode before and knows when to hand her a tissue. And therein lies the promise. Throughout our lives, we humans get a great deal of practice letting go, while God does the hanging on.

Photo by Gerhard Reus on Unsplash

Sermons and Reels

Hanging out in front of the tv with my daughter last night, I watched what she likes to watch. Often it’s Mr. Beast on the screen, essentially a slightly awkward game show host who gives away exorbitant amounts of money. Or Hopescope, who tries out products she sees on social media.

Last night, she was watching video clips on Youtube called Youtube Shorts. This version of social media reels are, as the name implies, short, lasting 15-60 seconds. They feature ordinary people providing quick entertainment. One person impressively sang and played the piano. Another explained a video that had gone viral, posing as a news reporter. Someone else painted herself green and pretended to marry Duolingo.

The videos went by quickly, one after another after another. And I noticed this was not relaxing for me! There was no time to enjoy one video before the next one started up; no room to get to know the entertainer or appreciate the person’s talent. Perhaps my attention span is too long for Youtube Shorts? Who knows.

I’ve been pondering attention span since listening to an episode of The Ezra Klein show called “Tired, Distracted, Burned Out? Listen to This.” Parents in my generation were among the first to hand their kids a smartphone and then wonder what the heck just happened! It is now normal for a kid to carry around a smartphone by 6th grade. Like many parents, I quickly learned the content and restrictions, adding screen time and downtime limits. My kids signed a covenant before they could enter their first passcodes. I did my best with what I knew at the time.

And now I know I cannot sit through Youtube Shorts! But my kids sure can. The speed of the clips does not bother them like it bothers me. They adapt more quickly and maybe even process what they are seeing more quickly.

It’s important for parents to note that just because something is different and makes me feel slightly uncomfortable does not necessarily mean it is wrong. It’s not wrong that my kids adapt more quickly. This difference in processing does not mean my kids are doing something wrong because I grew up without the same technology.

It does mean that preachers like me need to wonder what will happen with sermons. Unlike 15-60 second clips, sermons are (among Lutherans) 12-15 minutes long, that’s 720-900 seconds.

My sermons are not entertaining like Youtube Shorts, nor are they meant to be. And the Lutheran church is not known for its entertaining light shows. Never has someone left a Lutheran worship service to say, “That was so entertaining.”

Worship, including preaching, is not intended to be entertainment for the consumer. Instead, it is meant to draw a person into a deeper trust in the God who calls us to share Christ’s love by serving our neighbor. To do that, sermons rely on words. Will words, even profound ones, be enough to engage a generation that processes technology incredibly fast?

It may be the first preacher to ask this question was reacting to the invention of the radio! This is not a new question for the church. For now, Youtube Shorts are not my favorite even though my kids enjoy them. I will keep discerning how to faithfully proclaim the ancient promise of God’s saving love in Christ to a people whose brains may be changing, but whose need of this good news is not.

Photo by S O C I A L . C U T on Unsplash