The Boycott is ON!

A few weeks ago, I received the following email:

PLEASE remove us from you7 e-list as we do not plan to ever eat there again. We do NOT agree with your stand on gay marriage and will NOT support your establishment again Sorry as you were are favorite place to eat in RL

My first reaction was fairly joyful.  Knowing these particular folks and how much I dislike their political and religious views, I was happy to learn that they wouldn't be coming into my restaurant anymore.  Not that they were all that regular to begin with.  I'm guessing we maybe saw them once or twice a year, but that's probably a stretch.  But each time they came in, my stomach would get tight and I had to swallow my true feelings of them in order to follow through on my overriding desire and responsibility to be hospitable, after all that's the business I'm in.  Needless to say, I never once confronted them about how much I disagreed with their views on so many topics.  Perhaps I should have.

My mind started racing with all the things I could say in response.  I shared my ideas with my wife knowing that it was probably wise not to fire off a quick response.  Ultimately, I considered that no response was probably the smart play.  But no response also meant little to no satisfaction.

Then again a few days ago, I received another email:

We can no longer support your place so please remove us from you ex. group and e-mails. Having felt you were the best place in town to eat this dose make us sad to say the least. However we can NOT give our money to those that approve in supporting gay marriages which is against the LAW of God. Try reading I Cor. 6:8 and following, Rom 1, Lev.11:22 and 18: 22 & 23. We are very sorry about this but we feel VERY strongly about this so will be eating elsewhere.

Clearly, they were expecting a response.  Here was my reply:

I’ve been wrestling with whether or not to respond to you and what would be an appropriate way to counter your claim as to why you’re choosing to discontinue dining at Bridge Creek.  I’ve actually had more than a bit of fun coming up with a whole host of clever comebacks.  These witticisms were grounded in the wide range of emotions that your declaration brought out of me: sadness, joy, anger and frustration, to name but a few.  Ultimately I came to realize that sharing any of them with you would have accomplished little beyond momentary satisfaction.

Your most recent email suggested that I “try reading” and “following” a few selected verses from the Bible.  I have read and continue to read the Bible and if there’s anything I hope to follow, it’s Jesus.  I am, however, not willing to read any one verse of the Bible without considering the entirety of the biblical witness.  And it’s when I challenge myself to follow Jesus, that I’m most convinced my understanding of sexuality and human relationship reflects God’s promised future.  As much as I would wish it otherwise, I also know hardly anything I could say to you, or list of verses I would suggest you read, would have any chance of changing your mind.

Your ‘decision’ to stop patronizing our restaurant saddens me as well.  It’s not sad because we will miss having you dine with us.  I’m sad for you.  Not only are you going to miss out on “the best place to eat in town” and “your favorite restaurant,” you’re not going to be able to experience the hospitality that we love to shower upon all of our guests, regardless of their political or religious convictions.  I believe if we had taken efforts to make sure our customers opinions matched our own, we wouldn’t have stayed in business for very long.  I’m sad for you because the world is going to become a very small place in a very big hurry now that you’re taking this step.  I can only imagine that it's must be frightening to be closing yourselves off from so much of this world that God has created.

Finally, I will pray for you.  I trust that God will strengthen and care for us in the days ahead, keeping our hearts wide open to see others as they are.

This whole episode has given me more than enough to occupy my mind and I'll most likely be posting some more thoughts here as I process it through.  I'd be curious to know your thoughts too.

What could the Bible do?

by Peter Christ P.A. Christ

There are days, and they grow seemingly more frequent, when the challenge of doing what I do* is totally derailed. While the source of such derailments can be varied, most common among them sits one very curious culprit, the Bible. If this fact offends you, perhaps this posting is not for you (though I think you should read on anyway). If you’re nodding your head in agreement, be careful as you proceed because I’ll most likely offend you at some point along the way. The idea that the Bible can do anything at all is a bit preposterous from the outset but what the bible could do is exactly what I want to explore in this posting.

The Bible, after all, is just a book. It’s a collection of historical writings, thousands of years old, filled with contradictions, antiquated customs and admonitions, overflowing with stories of a time and place that couldn’t feel more disconnected from us here today. Still, the Bible remains one of the most re-printed and re-distributed texts of today, far surpassing the collected works of J.K. Rowling, C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien (note to self: change byline to “P.A. Christ”). The Bible serves a lot of functions, unfortunately more often than not as ammunition in a battle, as justification in times of oppression, as a set of blinders in the midst of unsettled and unwanted realities. Yes, the Bible can do lots of things but I want to suggest that it could do one very important set of things. In a world that seems increasingly fragmented and in a time that seems vastly more chaotic than ever before, the Bible could help us face all this disconnection by connecting us to God, to each other and to ourselves.

Put plainly, you should read the bible because it could connect you…

to God!

The Bible is about God. Try to think of something less tangible that we are more desperate to have be tangible. If God is real, if God truly matters, if God should have any place at all in our lives then why wouldn’t we want to be able to see, hear or feel God? The Bible is something very real. We get to hold it in our hands, scroll through its verses on the screen, let its images fill our minds. More importantly, as we listen to the narrative contained within, we discover accounts of people who have seen, first-hand, a God that’s active in this world. As God’s presence shaped their stories, so too God can shape our stories. Perhaps the most important story contained in the bible is the one about Jesus. This is a story about how God has already made the intangible tangible. To know the story of Jesus is to know the story of God. No, the book isn’t God. But, it points to where God is and if we don’t pick it up, we’re making it a whole lot harder on ourselves to reach out and be touched.

to others!

The Bible is about relationships. Of course God wants a relationship with you but that can only be fully realized in the relationships we have with each other. Our families, our friends, our co-workers, the UPS driver, the kid in the drive-thru window, the person processing your mortgage application, it’s through these relationships that God is able to create, with us, the kind of world where we can thrive. Making meaning of the Bible is only possible when we work on it together. I can’t make sense of it if you don’t help me and I won’t trust how you make sense of it if you don’t include me in your deliberations. If we don’t read the Bible, it’s also harder to make a counter argument when others start to make claims that seem contrary to the sense we’re trying to make of this world. When we read the bible we also become connected to a rich and deep history of others doing the same. Their struggles, their questions, their reactions, all give us more ways to be drawn into the story ourselves. Reading the Bible draws us together in the midst of a world that seems to want to push us apart.

to you!

Finally, the Bible is about you. Let’s be honest, you really need some help and so do I. Reading the stories of the Bible helps us to make sense of our own stories and there’s more than enough that just doesn’t make sense. When we compare our experiences of joy and sadness and certainty and doubt with those chronicled in the Bible, we gain glimpses of the truth and the value and the relevance of our lives. These glimpses help build our imagination for the possible. There are many who think the Bible is some sort of rule book or even a play book on how to live life. I think that really sells it short. Much more than providing us with easy answers, the Bible provides an opportunity to ask better questions. As a result, we’re encouraged to experiment, to try and to fail and then to try again. Each time we take a step forward we have the chance to learn something about ourselves and every new learning moment builds on the last. Sometimes even, the failures build the strongest foundations for the future. If you’re anything like me, you feel pulled in countless directions. Home and family, school and work, friends and play, all have us going every which way. The Bible might just be where it all comes together, the one story that makes the most sense, the place you get to find the real you.

If you’ve gotten this far and you’re still not offended, then I promise I’ll try harder next time. If you did get offended but kept on reading, thanks for sticking with me. Hopefully, even for just this moment, I’ve exposed you to the possible. Yes the Bible can do lots of things, but only if you pick it up is it possible that the Bible could do the most important things of all.

*What do I do? Well to quote from some essay I wrote on my “sense of call:" helping others experience a connection with God.

The Word on the Street

I happened upon a strange sight last night. A group of ten or so 16-25 year-olds were sitting in a circle having a bible study. That's not the strange part. Let it be known, I'm pro-bible study and I'm especially impressed with the ages of the group that was gathered. If anything, that's exactly the age demographic that seems least likely to invest any time gathered in community with an open bible in front of them. Note that it was Saturday night, which seems to underline the uniqueness of this particular bible study of young adults. They could have been at the movies, or bowling or even at watching the Twins win their 5th in a row at Target Field but instead, they're studying the bible. But that's still not the strange part.

The strange part is not who was studying the bible or when they were studying the bible. The strange part was where they were studying the bible. They were seated right on the sidewalk in downtown Minneapolis, just outside the doors of Dream Girls, a night club that features female strippers and table dancers. Even stranger was that the Twins game had just gotten over and there were crowds of people filing past, first the velvet ropes of the entryway to the strip club, then the cross-legged bible studiers. I'm guessing that the circle of young folks was very intentional about the when and the where of their bible study. Perhaps it was some form of non-violent protest or maybe they had just gotten kicked out of the pizza place on the corner and needed a place to continue their study. I didn't stop and ask but maybe I should have. Honestly, the whole thing made me feel uncomfortable and a little sad.

"Your Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path." Psalm 119

I need to ask my kids what they thought of the whole scene. I wonder what they found to be more weird, people lining up to watch naked people dance or people sitting in the middle of a sidewalk reading the bible. The culture that was present last night probably thought the bible study was the more "unusual" of the two. I would probably be on that side too. It's not that I think the Word should be kept in particular places. The Word can speak to much more than we tend to allow it space for. The strangeness of the sidewalk bible-study suggests to me how some prefer to "use" the bible in contrast to culture rather than have the Word speak directly to culture.

The Word will shine its light onto many things; good, bad and, from time to time, strange.

Violating My Expectations

The second week of my second year at Luther Seminary has just begun. I'm just now settling back into the rhythm of a life dominated by reading and writing. I'd like to use this blog more effectively this year in processing what I am learning. We'll see if that happens.

One of my most anticipated classes this semester is "Foundations of Biblical Preaching" with one of my preaching idols David Lose. The course is co-taught with Karoline Lewis and both have recently become internet sensations with their commentaries on WorkingPreacher.org.

Over the past few years, I've come to love being in the pulpit. That's not completely true. What I think I really love is the preparation for being in the pulpit. Yes, delivering a good sermon is enjoyable but the real pleasure happens in the preparation.

One of the assigned texts for my preaching class is The Witness of Preaching by Thomas G. Long, professor of preaching at the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. In the discussing the biblical witness of preaching, Long encourages us to wrestle with the challenges of our life and then bring those challenges to the texts.

"The text must be allowed to surprise us, even violate our expectations." - Thomas G. Long

I appreciate the reminder that the Gospel is, to it's core, a radical, catalytic story. We need to let the story do the work, not the other way around. If we're faithful to the process, we might just be surprised by what we find.

My Ancestral Saga?

Is it possible to claim the Exodus story as an “ancestral saga” of my own? If I think about it honestly, I’d have to say that I’ve thought of the Exodus narrative as somehow removed from my own history. This is not to say that I didn’t accept the relevance of the story but it just seemed like someone else’s story. Exploring the wealth of commentary on the Exodus story has reminded me of a history that I do claim as my own. Just three and four generations ago, my own ancestors left behind trials, crossed the waters and settled in a hoped-for Promised Land. Subsequent generations have struggled to validate the heroic efforts of those who came before with a steadfast determination to make a better life for each coming generation. Never absent, at least has it seemed to me, was an unfailing faith in God. Surely, my ancestors were conscious of the Exodus story and perhaps they felt a kindred link to the wandering Israel. If I believe in the same God that delivered my own ancestors, then perhaps I can also claim the same freedom given to Israel.

A New Foothold

The scriptures that purport to be central to our understanding of God are peppered with inconsistencies and seeming contradictions. This is especially true when confronted with an expression of law that seems to convict more than it sets free. Yet, Paul Hanson argues in Canon & Authority, these contradictions are “clues to the restless nature of a divine word” (p.127). Nestled within this restlessness I see an ember of hope. My frustration with biblical interpretation that expresses the will of God only in absolutes has become an ever-increasing source of tension in my life. Perhaps by exploring the evolving nature of scripture, I can breathe onto that ember and allow the Word to re-envision some much sought-after relevance. At the very least, I see gaining a foothold in arguments that I’ve grown weary of debating on ground heretofore claimed solely by the absolutists.