Perspectives: Underwear Collection

 

The Next Person

West Virginia is the home of the Summit Bachtel Reserve, a Boy Scout adventure center.  This year is was the home of the National Scout Jamboree.  At the event, the scouts volunteered to assembled flood buckets.  Russell Smart, a national program chairman for BSA was quoted in an article in United Methodist News:

“The last thing I tell them is, ‘Okay, when you put the lid on the bucket, the next person who picks up that bucket is not going to be having a good day,’ ” Smart said. “ ‘And you’re never going to know who is going to open that bucket. You’re not even going to know when it’s going to be opened. You’re not even going to know where it’s going to be opened, but the person that opens that bucket — the first thing they’re going to see is who made it happen. … So you won’t know them, but they’re going to know you. And they’re going to say a thank you, that you were there for them on the day they needed you.’ … That’s why we call it service and impact.”

We don't always get to see the impact of what we do, but we can imagine "the next person" - the one who is facing a home filled with flood damage, opening a flood bucket.  We can imagine "the next person" who has a meal because we have provided food, or a place to sleep because we have contributed to a shelter. We can imagine the abused family who has a moment of safety in a abused women's shelter, or the recovering addict who can stay clean another day, or the lonely widow who has a friend at church - "the next person."

 

Perspectives: Helping

This is Steve on the beach.  We were walking along the water that evening, and we saw a family with one member taking their picture.  My husband, being the person he is, went up to them, and offered to take the picture so that everyone could be in it.

Where can you offer a helping hand today?

Perspectives: Have you been served?

Have you ever noticed that during communion, the pastor who is leading cannot serve him/herself. Someone else has to do it. It would be easy to reach for a piece of bread, dip it in the juice, and eat it, but the pastor never does that. Someone who is helping, hands him/her the bread, holds the cup, and says the reassuring words of remembrance - This is the body of Christ, broken for you. This is the blood of Christ, shed for you.

Whoever we are, we need someone to serve us. It is the way church is created. Church and grace are not solitary pursuits. 

I saw a bumper sticker the other day that said, "Nature is my church." Don't get me wrong, I find God in nature all the time, and nature - God's creation - can be a wonderful place to encounter God. But it isn't community and it isn't church.

Church is the place where we can serve. Church is the place where we can be served. Both of these must happen. 

It's hard, isn't it, to be served. But it's necessary.

Perspectives: To Serve

This is a picture of the little bag that holds the silverware at Chili's. I couldn't help but take a picture of it. "We were put here to serve."  True about silverware. 

True also about us.

We were put here to serve. Who do we serve? 

Put the question another way. Can we equate love with service? I think we can, if we remember Jesus washing the disciple's feet. Service is love.

Love God. Love each other. Serve God. Serve each other.

How can we be of service to each other? If this is our calling, perhaps it is a question we should ask ourselves each day. Who am I to serve today? May God show us all the way. And the one (or more) to serve today.

Passing the basin

In our Bible study, we're reading the book John: The Gospel of Light by Adam Hamilton.  This morning, I am reading chapter 4 in which Hamilton discusses the Final Discourse.

Hamilton is good at creating pictures in my mind with his words.  I can visualize the scene he sets.  This morning I'm thinking (as let by Hamilton) about the Last Supper, especially the moments when the disciples entered the room.  He tells us that there would probably have been a basin and pitcher by the door so that those who entered could wash their feet. Why didn't they?

He suggests that they had been with Jesus long enough to know that if they stopped to wash their own feet, the action of a servant would have been to wash everyone's feet.  Perhaps none of them wanted to do that, so they ignored the basin.

Do we do that?  Do we know what following Christ means - that it means service and humility?  That it means washing one another's feet, but instead, we pass the opportunity by, hoping someone else will do it instead?

Jesus showed them the way by picking up the towel himself.  There are those in my life who do the same - who pick up the towel, when I walk by it.  I see Christ in them, and yet a I fail to demonstrate Christ to others, hoping someone else will do it.

Expectation

Having written yesterday's post about volunteer vs servant, I think we need to face a problem that I
think the church often has:  low expectations.  As church leaders, what are our expectations of members?  Of volunteers or servants (whatever you call them)?

Do we ask people to serve on a committee and tell them, "You won't have to do much - the committee only meets once a year."?

Do we say, "Nobody will volunteer to do this" when the problem really is that we haven't asked anyone?

Do we not want to bother someone with a task because we think it will be too much or that it will be an imposition?

Believe me, I hate to ask people to take on a task in the church (or anywhere else).  Having said that, I think we need to ask people to serve.  I think we need to expect that they will serve - not out of guilt or duty, but because they have found that service is when they are closest to God.  And if they haven't yet discovered that, then we need to make sure they have the opportunity to find out - it's part of "making disciples."

Servant or Volunteer?

I'm still reading Mike Slaughter's Renegade Gospel.  He says this:

...we come to Jesus offering ourselves as volunteers rather than as servants.  ... Volunteers serve out of convenience of their calendars, controlling when, where and how they participate. ... Volunteers follow Jesus up to a point - the point of interference with their lifestyle.

I get what he is saying, but I don't completely agree with it.  Do you?

Slaughter doesn't call people volunteers in his church - he calls them servants.  I agree that we are to be servants of God - available and obedient to God's call, regardless of the inconvenience.  I don't believe (and maybe Slaughter doesn't either) that we are servants of our church.  God has placed particular calls on my life, and that includes the work I do in my job, in my family, in my community and in my church.  They are all calls from God, and there are times when one will have priority over another.  God calls me to know how to do that - and that is part of the service I am called to do.

I can't always say "yes" at church, because sometimes it's not the highest priority.  Another part of my service is higher.  Sometimes I have to say "no" to a family event because I have to do something for work.  Sometimes I need to take time off from work for a family responsibility.  Sometimes I miss church, work and family time to go on an Emmaus walk, and for that weekend, God has called me to place that at the highest priority for my time.

I asked a pastor once, "Why don't you like the Walk to Emmaus?"  His answer was that it pulls people out of worship.  I'm not convinced that this was actually his reason, but still - God calls us to many ministries, and calls us to prioritize them (with God's guidance).  That doesn't make me a flighty "volunteer."  It makes me a servant "volunteer."

Prayer as Service

There was a gentleman who belonged to my church named Jim Ray.  Jim's gift was service to others, and that is the way he lived his life.  I've written about him before.

He came to mind today because I read this in my study bible, referencing Luke 18 and the story of the persistent widow:  "To grasp the way in which the widow is a model of prayer, it is important to realize how this parable expands the idea of prayer to include the whole life of believers in their crying out in the midst of and their protesting against injustice."

Jim's life, lived in service, was in some ways a  cry out against injustice.  Isn't that what service is, sometimes?  In a discussion at church about what prayer is, I mentioned that Jim's service was an example of prayer. Everyone looked at me as if I wasn't making sense, and maybe I wasn't, but I still see a connection between what you do and what you pray.  Service is a kind of prayer.  It is communicating with God.  It is responding to God's love with love and obedience -- to God and to other people.  It is a kind of prayer.

Think about how you pray beyond the expected way you pray.

Help

 

The word for today is help.

 

The picture for today doesn't really portray my thoughts about the word "help," but I thought a cross was appropriate.

 

This morning I dropped a plastic cup of ice on the hallway floor.  It was an annoyance.  As I was cleaning it up, a retired Conference staff member came by.  She said, "Oh, let me do that."  She's a lovely lady who is almost 85 years old.  There was no way I was going to let her clean up the ice -- in fact, I was worried that she might step on an ice cube and fall down.  Even so, later, as I thought about the word "help," I was reminded of her, and of the two other staff members (younger ones) who came out and provided the needed help.

 

Help is pitching in, sacrificing one's time and serving.  Mary understood (the retired staff person) -- not only that, but helping is part of her make-up. 

 

Servanthood may be the way we were created to be.  We ignore it, we set it aside, but perhaps service is part of our make-up, too.

Mary's Song

My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Svior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.  Luke 1:46b-49

The verses above are from the Magnificat, Mary's song after agreeing to serve as the mother of the Christ. 

What does it mean to have a soul that magnifies the Lord?  I have a ruler in my desk drawer that will isolate and magnify a line of text on a spreadsheet.  It helps me to keep my place as I read numbers; it makes them bigger and easier to see; and it keeps me from looking at the wrong lines.  I wonder if magnifying the Lord is similar -- to magnify the Lord would be to make him more visible to those around us -- to make it hard to miss him.  It would mean that someone could see God through us.  Do we magnify the Lord?

And the next line -- her spirit rejoices in God her Savior.  She serves with joy.  She isn't grouchy or morose about it.  She could have been -- her life was now in danger, her reputation would be shot.  Nothing will be the same again, and yet she rejoices.  Do we rejoice in our service?

Mary sees what she is doing as a gift of grace from God, one that she doesn't deserve.  She doesn't believe he has chosen her because of her worthiness, but instead, in spite of her unworthiness.  Do we sometimes believe we deserve God's favor?  Do we see opportunities to serve God as gifts of grace?

It's a beautiful song,and it holds much for us to consider.

In Anticipation of the Day

Bishop Grove was telling a story in memory of Catholic Bishop who died.  The two men attended worship / communion services at which the other was leading.  When Bishop Grove approached the Catholic Bishop for communion, with his arms crossed (a symbol of a request for a blessing), the Catholic bishop pulled his arms down and said, "I want to serve you, in anticipation of the day."

In anticipation of the day...

What do we do in anticipation of the day?  Do we forgive those who hurt us in anticipation of the day when grace will overflow?  Do we love our enemies in anticipation of the day when love will reign?  Do we feed the hungry in anticipation of the day when no one will be hungry? Do we teach children the Word of God in anticipation of the day when every knee will bow?  Do we pray  in anticipation of the day when we will know God?  Do we worship in anticipation of the day when we will stand in front of God?  Do we share in communion in antiicpation of the day when we will all be gathered around the table?

Do we serve our Lord in anticipation of the day?

Does our service bring us and others a foretaste of the day to come?

Does our service bring that day closer?

Servant, serve, stewardship

A question from my Certified Lay Ministry curriculum --

Look up scriptures that use the words serve, servant and stewardship.  Share one passage, and talk about the relationship between service and leadership.  Note that the word ministry means service.  As a group, explore the difference between this type of leadership and other understandings of leadership in our culture.

A few scripture examples:

• Luke 1:38:  Then Mary said, “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”  Then the angel departed from her.
• John 12:26:  Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there will my servant be also.  Whoever serves me, the Father will honor.
• 1 Timothy 4:6:  If you put these instructions before the brothers and sisters, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, nourishing the words of faith and of the sound teaching that you have followed.
• 2 Timothy 2:24-26:  And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kindly to everyone, an apt teacher, patient, correcting opponents with gentleness.  God may perhaps grant that they will that they will repent and come to know the truth, and that they may escape from the snare of the devil, having been held captive by him to do his will.
• Mark 10:42-45:  So Jesus called them and said to them, “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them.  But it is not so among you; but whoever wishes to becomes great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all.  For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
• 1 Peter 4:8-10:  Above all, maintain constant love for one another, for love covers a multitude of sins.  Be hospitable to one another without complaining.  Like good stewards of the manifold grace of God, serve on another with whatever gift each of you has received.  Whoever speaks must do so as one speaking the very words of God; whoever serves must do so with the strength that God supplies, so that God may be glorified in all things through Jesus Christ. To him belong the glory and the power forever and ever.  Amen.

Knowing that the questions requests a choice of one scripture and the use of it to discuss the relationship between service and leadership, I instead chose two.  Mark 10:42-45 defines how Jesus viewed leadership.   To be a leader is to be a servant.  We are to follow in the example of Christ, who leads us in all things, but does so by being a servant.  When love comes into the equation, our love of others and of God means that we place the needs of others above our own, that we do not seek glory or privilege for ourselves, but we seek to love and serve others, even to the cross.  Peter 4:8-10 speaks to the link between stewardship, service and leadership.  We become disciples of Christ, learning from him a way of life, and then we become stewards of what we have been given, using our gifts to change the world.  I like the phrase, “good stewards of the manifold grace of God.”  We use what we have been given so that others will come to know the grace of God.  We use what we have been given in service to others so that God will be glorified, not ourselves.   

That is probably the biggest difference between servant leadership and secular leadership.  Leadership in our culture means glory, fame, success, authority, and power.  Servant leadership for Christ is counter to all of those values.

Shout

In Jack's prayer today, he said something like "Shout loudly with our actions." That phrase struck with me. We had just finished singing, "Shout to the Lord, all the earth, let us sing, Power and majesty, praise to the King..."

We think about praising God ... of singing our praises of God. Do we think, though, of praising God through our actions? Do we remember that our actions shout loudly?

There is a church in our area selling white lawn crosses to demonstrate that they are Christians. Is there another way to do that? Can our actions shout that we are Christians?

I was working on our Emmaus newsletter this evening, and thinking about Jack's prayer. I added the following as an article in the newsletter:

Shout…with the way you live your life
Show your praise to the Lord

Christian action doesn’t usually happen by accident – make a plan, and make it happen. How can you shout with the way you live your life of your thanksgiving?

• Does your local food and clothing pantry need donations?
• Is someone in your area serving a thanksgiving meal for those who won’t eat otherwise? Can you help?
• Does one of your neighbors need a visit? And how do you define “neighbor”?
• Is there someone you can pray for? Is there someone who needs a card? Is there someone who needs a smile or a hug? Is there someone who needs encouragement and affirmation?

Shout to the Lord with your life. As always, he will inhabit our praise.

Service

I'm packing my bags, preparing to fly to Memphis tomorrow for a national meeting. I'm tired; I'm ready to go to bed. I THINK I'm finished packing, although I keep thinking of things.

I'm sure I've packed too much. I always pack too much. Why is that?

So, for this evening, a very short, little story. I was reminded of it by reading Lectionary Leanings on RevGalBlogPals. The blog post author was discussing the gospel reading about the "me first" clamor of James and John. She was reminded of the Servant Song, which was interesting to me, because I chose hymns today for Laity Sunday, and I looked at that one.

"Brother, sister, let me serve you
Let me be as Christ to you
Pray that I may have the grace
To let you be my servant too"

A few weeks ago, I was listening to an Emmaus talk about Christian Action. The speaker told a story of how she loved the youth of her church. Each year, she goes with them as a Youth Leader to Ichthus. Her "thing" -- one of the ways she serves -- is that when they return to the tent, she gives the youth foot rubs.

She then told us that she didn't think she really had an example of her own Christian Action to share.

How amazing. How humble. How is it that she didn't recognize her own service when she saw it.