A few days after the birth of Jesus, Mary and Joseph took the baby to the temple, as was the custom, to have him consecrated to the Lord. After offering their traditional sacrifices, they encountered Simeon, a man who was “righteous and devout” and who was “waiting for the consolation of Israel.”
As Simeon was moved by the Spirit, he took the child in his arms and praised God, saying, “For your eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all people, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.”
Joseph and Mary marveled at the mysterious blessing. But Simeon continued, “This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many will be revealed. And a sword that will pierce your own soul too.”
Although the birth of Jesus is celebrated with peace, joy, hope, and love, this matter of following Jesus is risky business. It requires loyal commitment, frequent forgiveness, and stubborn faithfulness.
You have followed the star of Christmas to find Jesus in the manger. Now that a New Year has begun, will you follow him further?
Friday, December 30, 2011
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Dare to March to a Different Drummer
The holidays typically usher in a shopping frenzy and frantic pre-occupation with gift giving, but again this year both will likely be tempered by a recurrent wave of market anxiety. As I reflect on how we celebrate Christmas in this challenging economic context, I am focused on the juxtaposition of two seemingly unrelated Bible texts. The first summarizes the journey of the Magi who traveled from the East in search of the mysterious child of promise: When they saw the star, they were overjoyed. On coming to the house, they saw the child with his mother Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasures and presented him with gifts of gold and of incense and of myrrh (Matthew 2:10-11 NIV).
The second text, which I readily confess does not typically invoke Yuletide emotion, is Romans 12:2, a passage that boldly challenges believers to live out our faith with subversive authenticity: Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will (NIV).
Treasures construed to be the contemporary equivalent of gold, incense, and myrrh are not the only gifts you can present in honor of Jesus. As you finalize your Christmas shopping, perhaps you might consider offering something that costs you a little more of your self, a contribution from your own stratum of talent or giftedness.
Do you recall the legend behind the musical story of “The Little Drummer Boy,” the song about a boy who gave of his meager talent by playing the drum for the Christ child? Introduced in the U.S. in the 1950’s, this memorable holiday carol made popular by Bing Crosby, was actually based on a Czech tune, “Carol of the Drum,” composed by Katherine K. Davis in 1941 and later recorded by the famed Von Trapp Family Singers in Austria. The more familiar “drummer boy” version details the fictional but meaningful tale of a young boy who approached the manger with nothing to offer but his drum. However, as the boy began to play his drum, his unique gift brought a smile to the face of the infant.
Throughout this holiday season a variety of colorful and thematic decorations will adorn many of our church campuses, iconic symbols such as a Christmas tree, an Advent wreath, or a manger crèche. Peculiar in the décor of the church I serve is a drum tree which is constructed annually in our church atrium. Vick Vickery, our recently retired Scoutmaster, assembles this drum tree each year out of 34 percussion instruments from different eras in history. Included in this display are replicas of the rope drum used in the Revolutionary War and the Civil War. Historically, these instruments were crucial for conveying instructions and maintaining morale, for in the days prior to advanced telecommunication, soldiers were trained to listen carefully for strategic commands encoded in the resounding beat of the drummer.
Now, stacked and configured in the form of a Christmas tree, our drum tree serves as a Christmas reminder that God calls us to march to the beat of a different drummer, receiving our formative cues and motivation from the teachings and lifestyle of Jesus. While the default values of our culture may prompt us to spend irresponsibly, to consume disproportionately, and to hurry frantically, our faith calls us to march to the rhythm and cadence of a different percussionist, to be cheerful in giving, gracious in receiving, and intentional in living.
During this festive season of the year, you and I are invited to invest our best gifts, tangible and intangible, in ways that express our allegiance and alignment with the One born in Bethlehem.
The second text, which I readily confess does not typically invoke Yuletide emotion, is Romans 12:2, a passage that boldly challenges believers to live out our faith with subversive authenticity: Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will (NIV).
Treasures construed to be the contemporary equivalent of gold, incense, and myrrh are not the only gifts you can present in honor of Jesus. As you finalize your Christmas shopping, perhaps you might consider offering something that costs you a little more of your self, a contribution from your own stratum of talent or giftedness.
Do you recall the legend behind the musical story of “The Little Drummer Boy,” the song about a boy who gave of his meager talent by playing the drum for the Christ child? Introduced in the U.S. in the 1950’s, this memorable holiday carol made popular by Bing Crosby, was actually based on a Czech tune, “Carol of the Drum,” composed by Katherine K. Davis in 1941 and later recorded by the famed Von Trapp Family Singers in Austria. The more familiar “drummer boy” version details the fictional but meaningful tale of a young boy who approached the manger with nothing to offer but his drum. However, as the boy began to play his drum, his unique gift brought a smile to the face of the infant.
Throughout this holiday season a variety of colorful and thematic decorations will adorn many of our church campuses, iconic symbols such as a Christmas tree, an Advent wreath, or a manger crèche. Peculiar in the décor of the church I serve is a drum tree which is constructed annually in our church atrium. Vick Vickery, our recently retired Scoutmaster, assembles this drum tree each year out of 34 percussion instruments from different eras in history. Included in this display are replicas of the rope drum used in the Revolutionary War and the Civil War. Historically, these instruments were crucial for conveying instructions and maintaining morale, for in the days prior to advanced telecommunication, soldiers were trained to listen carefully for strategic commands encoded in the resounding beat of the drummer.
Now, stacked and configured in the form of a Christmas tree, our drum tree serves as a Christmas reminder that God calls us to march to the beat of a different drummer, receiving our formative cues and motivation from the teachings and lifestyle of Jesus. While the default values of our culture may prompt us to spend irresponsibly, to consume disproportionately, and to hurry frantically, our faith calls us to march to the rhythm and cadence of a different percussionist, to be cheerful in giving, gracious in receiving, and intentional in living.
During this festive season of the year, you and I are invited to invest our best gifts, tangible and intangible, in ways that express our allegiance and alignment with the One born in Bethlehem.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
A Christmas Prayer for Our City
December 15, 2011
Good and gracious God, during the Advent of this holiday season we give you thanks for the privilege of living in one of the most scenic and resourceful communities in the world.
During this historic week as our military campaign in Iraq comes to a close, we continue to pray for the stability in the Middle East, even as we continue to pray for all the men and women who serve in our nation’s military, especially those deployed in other campaigns. We pray for them to perform their humanitarian mission with effectiveness and precision, and return home safely and soon.
Tonight, we pray for all of our local, state, and national leaders that they will rise to a new level of bipartisan cooperation and that they will have moral courage commensurate to the challenges of our day.
And on this evening, we pray for our great city, for our mayor, our council representatives, and for our fellow citizens.
We are grateful for many exciting and emerging opportunities and possibilities that can potentially make our city more vibrant, more beautiful, and more family-friendly.
We especially pray for those members of our community who are unemployed, those who are facing health hurdles, and those who are striving to make ends meet. May the joy of this season create hope, motivation, and opportunity for a better quality of life for all.
Now, as we come to the close of 2011, and as we look forward to a great year in 2012, may our dreams be big, may our dialogue be civil, may our strategies be effective, and may our resolve be firm.
Just as the lights of Christmas illuminate our town during this season, so may your love and grace provide light for our lives all year long. For we offer our prayer in the name of the one who came to be our Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace. Amen.
(Barry Howard serves as senior minister at the First Baptist Church in Pensacola, Florida. This prayer was offered at the December City Council Meeting.)
Good and gracious God, during the Advent of this holiday season we give you thanks for the privilege of living in one of the most scenic and resourceful communities in the world.
During this historic week as our military campaign in Iraq comes to a close, we continue to pray for the stability in the Middle East, even as we continue to pray for all the men and women who serve in our nation’s military, especially those deployed in other campaigns. We pray for them to perform their humanitarian mission with effectiveness and precision, and return home safely and soon.
Tonight, we pray for all of our local, state, and national leaders that they will rise to a new level of bipartisan cooperation and that they will have moral courage commensurate to the challenges of our day.
And on this evening, we pray for our great city, for our mayor, our council representatives, and for our fellow citizens.
We are grateful for many exciting and emerging opportunities and possibilities that can potentially make our city more vibrant, more beautiful, and more family-friendly.
We especially pray for those members of our community who are unemployed, those who are facing health hurdles, and those who are striving to make ends meet. May the joy of this season create hope, motivation, and opportunity for a better quality of life for all.
Now, as we come to the close of 2011, and as we look forward to a great year in 2012, may our dreams be big, may our dialogue be civil, may our strategies be effective, and may our resolve be firm.
Just as the lights of Christmas illuminate our town during this season, so may your love and grace provide light for our lives all year long. For we offer our prayer in the name of the one who came to be our Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, and Prince of Peace. Amen.
(Barry Howard serves as senior minister at the First Baptist Church in Pensacola, Florida. This prayer was offered at the December City Council Meeting.)
Friday, December 16, 2011
Rekindling Hope
by Barry Howard
Advent is a time to reclaim the hope we have in Christ. Our hope in Christ reminds us that through the ever-changing circumstances and seemingly insurmountable challenges of life, “with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26).
As our nation emerges ever-so-gradually from a recession, economic uncertainty has become a global concern, with many European countries either re-organizing or teetering on the brink of financial collapse.
As we prepare for a crucial election year, the rhetoric of the campaigns already sounds more indicative of superficial political posturing than substantive problem-solving.
A general cultural malaise that is saturated with complaint and almost devoid of optimism seems to be contagiously infectious, not just around the nation, but around the world. And to make matters worse, that sense of hopeless discontent has infiltrated the church. If the community that has been called to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth (Matthew 5:13), the very bastion of hope, forfeits hope for hopelessness, we may find ourselves rushing toward an apocalyptic future.
Real hope is neither blind nor naïve. Real hope motivates us to rise above despair and deal with challenging circumstances proactively, constructively, and collaboratively.
A few years ago I read of a rather profound exchange between two clergy who were working together during a season filled with monumental changes. In 1960, John Claypool began his tenure as pastor at the Crescent Hill Baptist Church in Louisville. Shortly after his arrival, Claypool became friends with a Jewish rabbi who was forty years his senior. Their friendship grew deeper as they worked together in the civil rights movement. After a tense and unproductive meeting one day, Claypool looked at his Jewish friend and said, “I think it is hopeless. This problem is so deep, so many-faceted, there is simply no way out of it.”
The rabbi asked Claypool to stay a few minutes after the meeting and said, “Humanely speaking, despair is presumptuous. It is saying something about the future we have no right to say because we have not been there yet and do not know enough. Think of the times you have been surprised in the past as you looked at a certain situation and deemed it hopeless. Then, lo and behold, forces that you did not even realize existed broke in and changed everything. We do not know enough to embrace the absolutism of despair. If God can create the things that are from the things that are not and even make dead things come back to life, who are we to set limits on what that kind of potency may yet do?”
Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. Isaiah 40:28-31
Like the stoking of warm embers to re-awaken the flame, hope can be rekindled by stoking the fire in our bones that propels us “to act justly and love mercy and walk humbly with our God” (Micah 6:8) in all of the seasons of life.
Advent is a season to rekindle our hope and to renew our strength, a hope inspired by God’s perspective and strength that motivates us toward God’s plan, realized on earth as it is in heaven.
(Barry Howard serves as senior minister at the First Baptist Church of Pensacola, Florida.)
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