Sons of Thunder (Sunday’s Sermon Today- Gospel of Luke)

Posted on January 22, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

So, you want to be like Jesus… Seems easy enough, right?

Love. Serve. Give.

Strike that. This being like Jesus thing might read easily enough, but being like Jesus is tough. It costs us something because of what we give up to follow. But sometimes, we think we’re following when we’re really not. We’re caught up in too much other stuff. Just like the first disciples.

But if they could follow Jesus, then maybe we can, too. It’s just that we have so many people we like and want to be like.

In 1991, there was a Gatorade ad campaign featuring Michael Jordan, the hotshot University of North Carolina grad and Chicago Bull who had just won his first (of six) NBA championships. The campaign was “Be Like Mike,” capitalizing on the desire of nearly every basketball player of any age to be like Mike. They drank the Gatorade, bought the Air Jordans, pumped their shoes up, shot ball after ball after ball in the gym.

How do I know that, you ask? Because I was one of them.

I had the posters, watched the games, treasured the magazine articles, soaking up every word Jordan said. I tried to follow him in an age that was pre-Facebook, pre-Twitter.

But even notwithstanding my lack of size (and jumping ability), I wasn’t interested in following through with the regimen I discovered Jordan pursued relentlessly. I wouldn’t make the sacrifices to only eat the healthy stuff he ate, to lift weights the way he did, to run the countless hours and miles he ran. I was willing, in the words of Kyle Idleman, to be a fan but not a follower. I was unwilling to be a disciple of Michael Jordan.

But Jordan is a freak of nature, one-of-a-kind. And Jesus is both fully God and fully man, one-of-a-kind… who proposed that we could and should follow him. Is that even possible? Is that even a reality?

It would not seem to be if we didn’t have the examples of those disciples who came before, both those we’ve known and those we read about in the Biblical record.

For our discussion, discipleship begins one day that must’ve seen normal, just like any other. Jesus is doing his thing, preaching to whoever will listen. This sunny day, he preaches at the Lake of Gennesaret to people who are crowding around him – a crowd so big that he commandeers a nearby fisherman’s boat. A fisherman minding his own business named Simon. And he directs Simon, who moments before was probably repairing nets and resting up from a night of fishing, to go off the shore so that he can be heard by more of the people (Lk 5:1-3).

Jesus preached- no big deal, right? He did that all of the time. But on this day, Jesus goes from run-of-the-mill revivalist with charismatic wordplay to someone with an entourage. First, he proves his power by telling the fishermen how to make a great catch and where to toss their nets – he tells them how to do their job.  Second, Simon recognizes that he’s  seen something spectacular, confessing “Go away from me Lord, I am a sinful man!” (He takes it from miraculous to holy in that split second.) Third, Simon’s experience is understood by the other fishermen, James and John the sons of Zebedee who Jesus will nickname “Sons of Thunder” for their brashness. Fourth, Jesus presents the challenge: “Don’t be afraid; from now on you will fish for people” (5:10). And fifth, these new disciples leave their nets and follow him.

Jesus just went from solo act to leader of the band. Jesus, freshly baptized and tempted, tried and true, is now going to devote his time not only to the masses but also establishing the disciples as the force by which the church-to-be will be established. They’re going to “fish for people” but how do they do that? What do they do once they give up their old lives and go on the road – again, the image of a band following their lead vocalist on a tour bus.

This is no aimless drifting. This is the absolute intentionality of Jesus – again, driven by the Holy Spirit, by the will of God and a movement of obedience. The disciples are caught up in it- how well they understand is open to to interpretation- and they learn at the feet of Jesus. He closes many of his lessons with the phrase “Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear.”

Whoever is ready to listen may understand. Whoever will follow will listen. Whoever will listen will have their heart opened.

Sounds sort of like Yoda, doesn’t it? Like the Kung Fu, Zen-like, so backward-it-must-be-forward kind of truth that could take our whole lives to figure out, understand, internalize, … and live out. Ah, the life of a disciple.

In fact, a disciple is one who becomes covered in the dust kicked up by their teacher, their Master’s, feet because they are walking so close behind him. But in the case of Jesus, it’s not just dust – they receive the gift of power and authority “to drive out all demons and cure diseases,” as they are also instructed to proclaim the kingdom of God and heal the sick (Luke 9:1-2). Jesus gives them the ability and the responsibility to handle spiritual matters and health issues, to share the good news that God’s kingdom is here and not yet.

These men took nothing – food or possessions- so that they were fully reliant on the hospitality of others. Jesus tells them to leave the town and shake the dust off their feet if the people there don’t welcome them – remember how disciples became covered in their Master’s dust? Their mission is so laser-focused that they aren’t even supposed to be bothered by an unbelieving, disinterested town’s dust.

Their mission is to care for people’s souls and to fix their bodies, to battle the forces of sin and spiritual brokenness. To share the good news of the kingdom of God like the angels, and the shepherds, to make more disciples.

Of course, just like today, not everyone is ready to follow Jesus, to count the cost of discipleship as worthwhile (Luke 9:57-52). In one vignette, a man says he’ll follow Jesus but Jesus tells him that there’s no security in following Jesus and that’s the last we hear of the man.  Another says he’ll follow Jesus after he buries his father and Jesus dismisses him; a third says he’ll follow after he says goodbye to his family and he gets sent away, too. Like B.A. Baracas, Jesus won’t suffer no fools. But he also isn’t interested in people whose hearts aren’t completely in it.

Jesus knows we are into security (how much is in our 401k? how do we set ourselves up to succeed tomorrow? how well are we taken care of?), that our ties and our relationships often keep us from following Jesus, and that our expectations of what our lives should be like keeps us from seeing what God wants our lives to be. And so he tells those who can’t move past those things that they might as well not worry about being disciples. And then we don’t hear from them again.

Not everyone makes the cut.

Not everyone wants what Jesus offers.

Not everyone is willing to make the sacrifice.

And Jesus doesn’t force it on anyone either.

But Jesus does demand absolute commitment, exceptional devotion. Jesus tells the crowds who come to him that “anyone who comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters- yes, even their own life- such a person cannot be my disciple. And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:25-27). Brutal, right? Not exactly the thing we’d expect from the guy we thought would help us understand love better, who seems to be always considered kind… and compassionate.

It would be a much easier sell to explain Jesus’ “love God, love others” and edit out all of the parts that seem hard. Thomas Jefferson is famous for having edited out all of the parts of the Bible that he didn’t like or agree with. Jesus talks about the cross before he even gets there, but he knows his listeners would understand about the ways that the cross was an ignoble, terrible way to die. And they wouldn’t have been hyper-interested in carrying a cross, just for kicks. But Jesus said… “take up your cross to be my disciple”?

Seriously, Jesus isn’t all lollipops and cotton candy. He’s more of a salty than sweet guy: “Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is fit neither for the soil nor the manure pile; it is thrown out” (Luke 14:34-5). He’s intent on helping his disciples, on helping us understand that we’re either for Jesus or we’re against him.

That Jesus doesn’t say “pray for whatever you want and it will automatically be yours.”

That Jesus doesn’t say “oh, go do your own thing and I’ll just wave the cross of forgiveness over you.”

That Jesus doesn’t say “oh, pick and choose which parts you like about what I’m saying and dispose of the rest.”

That loving God and following Jesus is an all-or-nothing venture.

We either get to being about loving and serving and forgiving and following absolutely or we don’t. A half-baked, half-painted, half-completed discipleship isn’t worth anything to Jesus.

In his book The Cost of Discipleship, Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes that the salvation of Jesus discussed without the cross is only cheap grace, grace that doesn’t understand how much God loves or how much Jesus gave up by dying on the cross. “Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate… [Real] grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: ‘Ye were bought at a price’, and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us. Costly grace is the Incarnation of God.”

If we’re going to be disciples, if we’re going to follow Jesus, then we must move away from a life of sin, repent(!), and take up our cross. Sure, we’re forgiven before we even know we need to be forgiven, thanks be to God Jesus died on the cross! Sure, it’s freely given for all who would believe. But that forgiveness, that grace, asks our repentance, our actual remorse, and our actually living out what it means to love God and love others on a real-life basis.

Being a disciple is hard work. Harder than coughing out a prayer over a meal, harder than flipping through our Bibles once a month, harder than dropping whatever is left over in our wallets into  the offering plate. Being a disciple requires sacrifice, requires the willingness to follow.

The Message’s translation of Mark 8:34-38 is a modernized reminder of what the cost of discipleship looks like, what Jesus is calling us to, what it means to actually follow Jesus. Here, he says,

“Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat; I am. Don’t run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I’ll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to saving yourself, your true self. What good would it do to get everything you want and lose you, the real you? What could you ever trade your soul for?

“If any of you are embarrassed over me and the way I’m leading you when you get around your fickle and unfocused friends, know that you’ll be an even greater embarrassment to the Son of Man when he arrives in all the splendor of God, his Father, with an army of the holy angels.”

We’ve been warned, challenged, encouraged, inspired, and commanded.

But I want to stop here for a second and say this: discipleship doesn’t mean perfection; discipleship means devotion and followthrough.

There’s a story I heard lately about a woman and her husband who had just bought a brand new car. They got home from the car dealership, freshly off of the lot, and he sat down on the steps to their house. She went into the garage and returned with a sledgehammer. “Do you want to do it? Or me?” she asked him. “Go ahead,” he said, holding out his hand in permission. As a neighbor watched, she took the sledgehammer and brought into the body of the car above the wheel well. The pristine car now had a dent the size of a fist in it. She turned back to the garage and returned the sledgehammer to its spot.

“Why did she do that?” the neighbor asked, incredulously.

With a mixture of understanding (and pain!) the husband replied, “Now we can just drive it-  we don’t have to worry about it’s first ding.”

That’s our expectation. We are dinged up. We do sin. But we’ve been forgiven and we’re called to follow the one who forgave us, by living the life of a disciple.

We must decide if we’re willing to take up our cross and follow, if we’re willing to sacrifice to be more like Jesus, if we really want to be all in with Jesus.

The way we’ll know for sure? When we can recognize that the dust of Jesus’ feet is all over us, in the way others recognize our lifestyle as being like Jesus, in the way we live and in the way we love.

Let those who have ears, let them hear.

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On Martin Luther King Day: Find Your Voice (A Mustard Seed Musing)

Posted on January 19, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

I’ll probably never change the world,
not like The Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King,
I’ll probably never end an era, or bring an issue to the world.
They’ll probably never name a day after me,
or announce that I won the Nobel Peace Prize.
I’ll probably never meet the President,
Discuss politics with world leaders,
Liberate a people, preach to thousands,
Organize millions,
Or bring healing to the masses.

But I have a dream,
I believe in the kingdom come,
In the here and the not yet;
I believe in the power of prayer joined with action,
That my voice matters and that my life means something.
I believe your voice and your life matter, too,
And that I can show you in the way I listen and
In the way I serve you.
I believe we can use our influence for good or ill,
And that there are people we can free right here, right now.
I believe that Martin Luther King was dreaming the dream,
And that one day, all voices will be heard, and peace will come,
And the glory of the Lord will fill the earth.

So today, I urge you,
Find your voice.

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American Sniper: The Costs of War (Movie Review)

Posted on January 17, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

War films have been a staple of American cinema for years. Director Clint Eastwood has even starred in a few of those films himself… but his directorial look at war has a different vantage point (Gran Turino, Flags of Our Fathers). American Sniper is another one of those movies about war but also not about war. We see the conflict in Iraq through first person vantage points, complete with the tension and terror, but we also see the impact of that war at home (The Hurt Locker, Zero Dark Thirty ). It’s a different view than we normally get from the news, and one that asks us to consider how the lives of those who protect our freedom are forever changed by the costs of war.

After watching footage of terrorist attacks on TV in the late 1990s, brash Texan Chris Kyle (Bradley Cooper) enters the Navy Seals, and stoically pursues training as a sniper. His call to duty is immediate, absolute, and all-consuming, even as he enters into a life-long love affair with Taya Renae (Sienna Miller), who serves as his anchor to the real world. The attacks on the U.S. steer him to Iraq for the first of four tours just hours after his wedding to Taya, and their relationship (and Kyle’s work) consume the bulk of the film.

The trailer lays out Kyle’s first kill: the mother and son duo who attempt to take out an American convoy with an IED. He’s shaken (“this isn’t what I thought it would be like”) yet he understands that it’s us-or-them. He is a sheepdog in his father’s categorization of people (sheep, wolves, or sheepdogs) and he holds it up as his duty to protect others, to watch over them. Ironically, the first person he kills is a child who is moved to action by the direction of his parents (probably his father given the paternalistic culture); Kyle’s life is directed by the intense value placed on protection and honor instilled in his childhood by his father and it will cause him to experience both ultimate success and failure. But his value system, instilled in hunting and life, will place a value on helping others that conflicts with his desire to raise a family with Taya- that’s the power of Eastwood’s depiction of the “real” conflict.

Some of the film is practically unwatchable for me. I’ve been drawn to stories of war that struggle with it like Zero and Fury, but as a doctor later implies to Kyle, there are things you can’t unsee. Whether it’s who he kills or who he watches die around him, from Iraqi citizens to his own comrades, the weight of death burdens Kyle, snowballing into an impossible weight of unresolved pain, anger, and sadness. This is PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder)- the real beast that soldiers return with that no one can “see.” Given the images still rolling before my eyes from watching the film, it’s almost unbearable to consider what these men and women have experienced, and continue to relive, as they return home. And this is the collective debt we owe as a country and as a society, to consider how we can support them, how we can help them, how we should minister to the families of our soldiers.

Sure, Eastwood took a true story and pulled the right levers to make us see, to ask us to consider. But his direction, and Cooper’s portrayal, are excellent, and emotionally enthralling. Which makes the tragedy even deeper, the lasting impression stronger. War IS hell (I’d argue so is working the streets as a police officer or a fireman) but what about the demons those soldiers bring home? What about the cost of taking another’s life, or watching a friend die? Is July 4th or Memorial Day really enough?

Do we owe our soldiers something more?

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Remembering Grandma (Celebration of Her Life 1.14.15)

Posted on January 15, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

How do you talk about someone like Grandma? How can you fairly tell her story? In my experience, the best way to tell a story is to start at the beginning.

Annette Weatherford Turner was born on October 4, 1921, ninety-three years ago. She had a front row seat to Prohibition, the Great Depression, World War II, Vietnam, and a host of other major upheavals in the world that many of us will only read about in a history book. She’d tell you those stories if you took a moment to stop and listen – even though she was a quiet lady who spent most of her time watching you!

She married the love of her life, Harry AKA Pop, in 1945. The two of them had survived World War II together- communicating via letters and notes that kept them connected in the midst of the war. She took care of the home they built, planting flower gardens on the property- especially roses. Like the woman in Proverbs 31, she also took to working with thread, and her work as a seamstress would later be used to make pajamas from feed sacks or bridesmaids dresses from pale green organdy, just one of the ways she shared her blessings with others. But Annette’s marriage to Harry was just another chapter in the story, because before too long, she became “Mama.”

Harriette Evans was born to Annette and Harry in 1950 and “Mama” became the role and life’s work that she threw herself into. “Mama” learned to drive so she could take her daughter to school rather than have her ride the bus. Harry would tell Harriette how to get places and then she would direct her Mama on the route, even getting out of the car to give directions on parking! (For the record, Mrs. Evans still gives lots of driving directions).

One of Harriette’s Christmas memories is of a church pageant: “I vividly remember Mama and Daddy as Mary and Joseph in the LUMC Christmas pageant. I thought she was more beautiful than Mary could ever have been. It was as if she had a magical glow about her.” The fact that her parents were part of the pageant had a lasting impact on her view of them – and of church.

Mama was steadfast in installing the values of right and wrong and the importance of honesty in her daughter, and the trust they had bonded them together. Mama became Harriette’s advisor, confidant, and friend- even when she took on a new name: “Grandma.”

As Grandma, Annette Turner first had Jonathan, and then Joanne. She spoiled them from the time they were little on up, with vegetable soup, string and butter beans, head rubs, and the most lavish Christmases. Her sweetness was only matched by the twinkle in her eye, and the quick retort to one of her grandchildren’s teasing remarks.

Jonathan remembers “coming home from traveling abroad in 1998 and teasing Grandma about never being on a plane. She informed me that she most certainly had – that a neighbor used to charge them a dollar to go up in the crop duster. That made me realize she wasn’t just the lady that cooked my ham biscuits but someone that had also led an interesting life. I tried to get her to talk about her life; some of my fondest adult memories with her are of her telling stories from her childhood and young adult life.”

Joanne remembers how Grandma and Pop were always there – like her mom and dad are there for her/our kids. How it always seemed like Grandma was winning games, even though she wouldn’t brag about it! And how she must have been the best mom in the world, because of how she taught Harriette to be a mom, too.

Over time, Grandma also inherited two “in-law” grandchildren. First, she met me – and I tell people she was the first Evans to give me her blessing, even over my wife! Then, she met Ashley, who says she leaned over and gave her a hug and immediately treated her like one of her own.

As we grew in our own marriages, the grandchildren realized what a testament to love Grandma was, both to us and in her relationship with Pop. Jonathan remembers the day that Pop died, that Grandma admitted she didn’t know what she would do. It’s a feeling that people here today can relate to. I always thought of her as one of the most courageous people I knew personally, because after losing Pop, she found joy everyday in us and in life for fifteen more years! Yes, she celebrated fifteen more sets of birthdays, outlived her first great grand dog, and received another name: “Great Gran.”

Sure,”Great Gran” loved to play bridge with her friends- and beat them-  but she warmed to playing Chinese Checkers, proving her mind to be sharp and quick, beating her great grandchildren over and over again.

We’ve shared several laughs about our family trips to the beach in the summer, four generations of family packed into one house for a week. Great Gran loved to be around you guys, Adam, Carter, Laurel and Andrew, and she took great pride in who you are and what you are becoming. I do know we all gave her fits sometimes. I remember walking into the room one day, and the kids are running around like crazy. I spoke to her and she didn’t respond- I thought something was wrong. I bent down and put my hand on her arm, and she said, “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you.” And then conspiratorially… “I took my hearing aids out.” And then she winked.

Those great grandkids took to her like bees to honey! With hugs and stories and jokes and game playing. She loved to see them and they loved to see her. She was willing to do whatever craziness they asked about, whether playing pretend or learning how to use an iPad. She wasn’t afraid! We are thankful that they got to know her, and that she was able to show them love these last seven years. And we’re thankful that they love her.

The night of the day she died, we were saying prayers, and the boys both mentioned Great Gran and asked God to “watch over her.” But I was struck by the innocence of Andrew’s three-year-old prayer, and the wisdom of it, that passes my understanding and is deeper than my sadness. “God,” he said, “help Great Gran grow.”

You know what? He’s right.

From Annette to Great Gran, her names might’ve changed but who she was stayed the same. As we celebrate her life, I am reminded that for all of the things we called her, she was really “Blessed Child of God.” Her love for her church, and her passion for the mission work of the United Methodist Women, gave her great joy. She loved to tell us about what her church was doing, who she had seen at church, and especially about the way that the children were involved. She was always growing! She was the seed planted by her parents and God who grew to be a mighty, sturdy tree.

Grandma was the tree that withstood time and storms and loss and stayed firm. She was the one who believed, and who hoped, and who knew. In our Scripture today, I Corinthians 15 hinges on this verse: “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.” It’s the truth I know Grandma believed.

That Jesus Christ did die on the cross and he did rise again.

That all of those who had and have believed in faith in his resurrection, that they will all rise, too.

I miss Grandma today. I wish she would have heard me share these stories about her. But I know what she believed, and I know where she is. She fought the good fight, she finished the race, she kept the faith.

Now she’s beating Moses at bridge, and Peter at Chinese Checkers.

Dancing with Pop.

Sitting in the sun.

Soaking in the glory of God in a pain-free, arthritis-free, unfiltered heaven.

Celebrating a faithful life, well-lived.

—–

So how do we honor Grandma? How can we represent Great Gran?

By making someone else’s favorite food and then giving it to them;

By listening to stories, even ones that don’t make sense;

By laughing with joy with someone else;

By sharing your stories so that others can learn too;

By welcoming in those new to your family and community like they’re your long-lost missing piece;

By serving at church, by being in church so that others can grow too;

By being fully present for others. By being steady, steady like a rock.

By carrying on, with joy and wisdom, and recognizing that every day brings something good, something new, something blessed.

By always growing. Amen.

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Obey Your Thirst (Sunday’s Sermon – Luke 4:1-13)

Posted on January 14, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

So I won’t be preaching this Sunday – our Lay Leader, Gus Hulcher, will be leading our Laity Sunday service, but here are a few reflections on this week’s scripture from our Gospel of Luke series. 

One of the coolest things I’ve ever learned about this passage comes from the first sentence, not even that: it’s incredible what is packed into the beginning of this passage:

“Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness…”

Jesus is filled up with the Holy Spirit and straight, or forthwith (as they say on Blue Bloods), he’s driven by the Holy Spirit into isolation/temptation. Before he was dealing with trouble, Jesus was filled with the right kind of thing- the good stuff as it were – the power and presence of God. So that there was no room for anything else – like evil or poor decisions – in Jesus.

Not only is Jesus full of the Holy Spirit but the driving force behind his next adventure, his temptation itself, is that the Holy Spirit puts him there. The Holy Spirit sets him up to be tested, to be prepared, to be made ready for what is to come. This readiness couldn’t or wouldn’t happen in front of a bunch of other witnesses or other people involved but would happen while Jesus was forced to deal with his situation on his own.

That’s all in the first salvo of this story.

Sure, Jesus will be tested: first with hunger and instant gratification, then with glory or authority, and finally, with comfort or security.

Jesus rebuts each piece of temptation with Scripture. He knows whose he is and who he is. Jesus knows his history and his strength, and he refused to be badgered by the devil himself. (Of course, the devil left until a “more opportune time” – one has to assume that Jesus didn’t think this was ‘over.’)

So, when we’re tempted:

-Are we prepared, filled by the Holy Spirit and surrounded by the presence of God?

-Are we being tested and prepared, or are the temptations things we’ve fallen into because we don’t know the Scripture, aren’t pursuing the will of God, and generally move about willfully rather than faithfully?

-When we do face temptation or trouble, where do we go? Is it to Scripture and the community of faith and prayer, or what do we rely on for comfort and support?

I pray that this new year will find us closer to God in prayer and in community, and that we will grow us people who stand against temptation because we are filled with the Spirit!

 

 

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Selma: It’s Still A Struggle (Movie Review)

Posted on January 13, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

The quiet chatter of four small girls seconds before the church explodes in flames.

Matthew 6:26 whispered in a prison cell to remind Martin Luther King that God had a plan for him.

The charging shadow of a state trooper on horseback bringing his whip down on a fleeing protester.

The savage beating of a preacher from Boston.

The tortured expressions of King sitting in the shadows as Mahalia Jackson sings the gospel to him.

These are the enduring images for me of Ava DuVernay’s Selma, a film that should certainly stir up conversations about freedom, power, and race relations in a world still reeling from Ferguson and Staten Island, and other locales around the world. While some found 42 to be watered down and others found 12 Years A Slave too brutal to watch, Selma strikes a blend of realism and emotional chords to make us recognize the danger, the tragedies, and the sacrifice of those who have fought the fight- who fight the fight.

David Oyelowo, who seems to have risen out of nowhere but who actually appears in The Butler, Interstellar, Lincoln, and Jack Reacher, is a rising star as he presents MLK. His portrayal of the tortured leader, sure of his role in the fight for civil rights but struggling with how it will work in the end, is the powerful catalyst that keeps us engaged in the quieter moments of the film. It helps that Carmen Ejogo emits quiet strength as Coretta Scott King, the yin to MLK’s Yang, the woman keeping him anchored to his family and yet pushing quietly behind the scenes toward real change.

From a plot perspective, the film runs from the acceptance of the Nobel Peace Prize to the speech at the capitol in Birmingham, AL, with stops along the way in Washington, D.C., with President Johnson (Tom Wilkinson), and in conversations outside of the King inner circle with the likes of George Wallace (Tim Roth) and J. Edgar Hoover (Dylan Baker). It chronicles the political roadblocks King faced as he balanced the pressures from the black leadership to fight and the white leadership to desist (or at least, slow), and the actual, physical confrontations that his protesters had with police at places like the Edmund Pettus Bridge.

While some films settle for glamorizing the physical confrontations, and others just talk about the conflict, Selma ties the chords together in a way that they’re not just juxtaposed, but they are both/and. After the death of one of the young men who has come to love King’s work and marched with him, Paul Webb’s script has Oyelowo deliver a speech that threatened to move me to tears. [For the record, I felt the explosion of the church coming – and that almost caused me to be sick in the middle of the theater. It was that powerful.]

“Who murdered Jimmie Lee Jackson? Every white lawman who abuses the law to terrorize. Every white politician who feeds on prejudice and hatred. Every white preacher who preaches the bible and stays silent before his white congregation. Every Negro man and woman who stands by without joining this fight as their brothers and sisters are brutalized, humiliated, and ripped from this Earth.”

Here, DuVernay and Webb are clear to show the actual conflict with both blacks and whites of the day, but the emphasis (which is mine) sticks with me as a white preacher who seeks to follow Jesus Christ. As the pastor from Boston says, “When Rev. King called us as pastors to do something, I just had to come.” It’s a reminder that if we say we’re about justice, we have to speak to justice but we also have to do something. Micah 6:8 “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” It’s what MLK called for, it’s what he did, and it’s what he inspired others to do as well. We can’t just be inspired though, we have to move – because this isn’t over.

But Selma also presents us with options for moving, and varying degrees of success for those options. We have Oyelowo’s King and we have Nigel Hatch’s Malcolm X, and several members of both ‘sides’ of the black response. But, as I survey the landscape of responses to injustice and violence, I find myself often closer to King and yet in the middle. And the film presents me with that voice as well, through Stephan James’ John Lewis, as someone who must come to appreciate King’s ways but recognizes that violence will simply bring more violence. Again, in art and life, we are often presented with either/or, and DuVernay and Webb present us with both/and. We should be moved, but the decisions we make about how to move are left to us.

I recognize that King was first a preacher, first a man with the quiet dream to teach and raise a family, who was pushed out of that safe envelope by the recognition of his call. I see his call and his dream tied together in his understanding of God’s will for his life, whether it’s kneeling on the bridge to pray, or standing in the midst of the racist Birmingham system and proclaiming, “Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;  he is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored; he hath loosed the fateful lightning of his terrible swift sword; his truth is marching on.”

The truth marches on, but what will we do about it?

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We’re Not In Control (A Mustard Seed Musing)

Posted on January 12, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

My new year started out with a funeral, when I attended the service for a friend’s mother. Then, the news broke that longtime ESPN Sportscenter anchor Stuart Scott had died of cancer, a man who basically was my news anchor in college and beyond. Death seems to be everywhere.

After the service, I sat with two friends and reflected about life over lunch. We talked about how we try to artificially create a sense of security for ourselves, how 9/11 broke through our nationalistic sense of invincibility, and how the end result is a constant news cycle of fear. Fear of ebola, fear of the flu, fear of terrorist attacks. Fear is everywhere.

It can be almost overwhelming. The sense of our own mortality and the fear percolating around us can threaten to drag us under, suffocating us and incapacitating us.

But the truth is, there is life everywhere, too. Instead of four weddings and a funeral, the second week of 2015 has been filled with four births and a funeral. Three of my friends are now fathers (one had twins!) and to see those beautiful children, with a world of promise and hope in front of them, is a reminder that the good news of Christmas (that God is here) still rings true, that there’s a time for everything … and that it’s outside of our control.

We can impact our lives; don’t get me wrong, we’re supposed to be responsible for our own actions. We can kick the habits of smoking or drinking to the curb and increase our health; we can use medicine and scientific advancement to increase the chances of pregnancy; we can embrace a healthier lifestyle to impact our potential lifespan. Goals and changes are important to our development as human beings!

But the truth is, every second, every minute, every hour is allotted to us by God. Not to be trite, but the whole world is in his hands. The entirety of our lives is known by God, from the way we came into the world to the way that we’ll go out. And each moment, every breath, is a gift. Rather than worry about what we can’t control, better to take each moment and live in the power of the resurrection, to recognize in the words of Johnny Cash, that even in death, “ain’t no grave gonna hold me down.”

Jesus came as a little baby, and grew to be the man who would die on the cross, that we might “have life, and have it abundantly” (John 10:10). Whether it’s the reminders of justice and peace in Selma or the power of forgiveness in Unbroken, the things we can control lie within our context, our spirits, our hearts. The things we can’t control? We need to give God all of that – and let him worry about it!

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Taken 3: Spoofing Liam Neeson (Movie Review)

Posted on January 10, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

Sometimes, you just need to know when to quit. Especially when it comes to movie sequels.

Spiderman 3. Rush Hour 2. Any Matrix movie after the first one.

But after the disappointment that was the too-focused-on-Famke Janssen and Maggie Grace sequel to the stunning surprise that was the first Taken movie, one could be forgiven for hoping that Luc Besson and Neeson would get the third (and final?) act of the trilogy back on track. Inject Academy Award winner Forest Whitaker, well-travelled villain Dougray Scott, and creepy Sam Spruell into the mix, and it had to be better, right?

I have to stop right there: Taken 3 is only better if you take it as a spoof of Liam Neeson action films.

There are the moments when our hero Bryan Mills runs by stacks of automatic weapons to burst into rooms and growl, firing off his one magazine’s worth of ammunition from a handgun. Or the times when Maggie Grace’s Kim grimaces, stares, and grimaces with the same expressions for discovering she’s pregnant, discovering her mother has been killed, and realizing her father has to save her from bad guys again. Or the escaping-from-an-explosive-car trick, the how-did-he-know-that-trapdoor-was there plot hole, or the way Mills proposes that his daughter’s safety is his number one goal while putting her in danger repeatedly.

This just isn’t a good film. It’s not even bad enough to be as laughable as one might hope.

Sure, we want to admire Mills’ dedication to protecting his family, or the way he avenges his ex-wife’s murder. But when he water boards a pretty worthless character, it made me more squeamish than victorious, and when he killed a character who (from the film’s moral code) got what he deserved, it felt hollow. The justice of the first film, when his innocent Kim was kidnapped and he vowed to get her back, has been displaced by an overarching bloodlust for death and revenge. And it’s just not that fun.

So, go see Unbroken. Heck, I’ve seen it twice and the second time was still better than seeing Taken 3 once. And I stayed awake for Unbroken both times.

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Unbroken: A Second Look (Movie Review)

Posted on January 8, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

A month after seeing Unbroken for the first time, I went back with a group of folks from church to see what new insights I might glean from director Angelina Jolie’s cinematic translation of Laura Hillenbrand’s bestseller Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. I found myself moved again by this powerful true story of Louie Zamperini’s stubborn perseverance and forgiveness, and felt compelled to again propose that everyone should see this flick – regardless of what critics or your neighbors might have said. (For an actual review, click here.)

The bulk of the arguments I hear or read fall into two camps. They either state that Jolie failed to tell the ‘whole’ story, or the Christian one, because she encapsulates the impact of Billy Graham on Zamperini’s PTSD and alcoholism, or they complain that Zamperini seems ‘too’ good amidst a world of war movie cliches. To the first, I will gently point out after reading the book, interviewing Zamperini’s daughter, and  reading several other interviews with principal players, that the film is what Louie himself wanted. I will also discuss the points of how Jolie artfully includes those Christian elements, momentarily.

To the second complaint, I must ask, do these critics not know that it’s a true story, researched by Hillenbrand and others, compiled, printed, and sold as a bestselling work of non-fiction? If Zamperini is better than expected in war movie situations, is it not more a question of why we as a society are so flummoxed by a POW who is willing to forgive? Maybe it has more to do with our expectations of society today, that heroes aren’t able to ride on white horses, that sooner or later, Zamperini will bend to fight the Bird’s fire with fire…

To the theological points I find stunningly wrapped inside the war film:

1) Louie Zamperini sits through a sermon that foreshadows ‘surviving the dark’ of his POW years, in a critical, cinematic, creative licensing way that specifically points to the fact that Jesus Christ (not some mamby-pamby higher power) is the Lord of both the day and the night.

2) Jolie intentionally inserts Zamperini’s discussion of prayer with Phil (Domhnall Gleason), asking about whether God talks back comes midstream to his mother’s prayers for him as a boy (St. Augustine would be proud!) and his own heavenward prayer in the raft that “if you help me survive this, I’ll dedicate my life to you.” The fruition of those thoughts doesn’t appear fleshed out in the movie, but is the final third of the Hillenbrand book “made for the screen?” I hardly think so, and yet we’re invited to check it out by the closing screen shots.

3) When Zamperini takes punch after punch from (I believe) one hundred and fifty-one prisoners, Jolie makes sure that we see that the other prisoner (the one the Bird beats to initiate this) is visibly juxtaposed. This is substitutionary atonement, Louie as Christ, captured perfectly.

4) When Zamperini is lifting the beam, the shadow cast from his body, slowly panned over, is specifically a cross in shape; while the other prisoners look on, prayerfully encouraging him to not give up, he is again doing what they cannot do – defeating the Bird not by fighting back physically but by refusing to give up. (The shadow of the bomber overhead also appears at times to play with the shadow of a cross…)

5) Where else is forgiveness that much of a factor? I’m an unapologetic fan of To End All Wars and The Power of One (the first is the non-fiction account of some POWs in another internment camp, the second is a fictional look at South Africa). Sure, Catch a Fire tried… but it seems that Jolie has set this whole forgiveness thing (which seems to be in great demand, no?) in the context of a sermon that a young boy preaches and then must live out.

I’m not saying it’s a great film. But in addition to other movies that I think challenge our lives in the here and now with issues from the past (I’m looking at you Selma, and you, American Sniper), Unbroken is a film that asks us to look at those who serve our country with honor, and to consider if a little forgiveness between you and me might change the world. Because if Louie can forgive the Bird… then you and I have plenty we should be able to forgive…

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Something In The Water (Sunday’s Sermon Today- Luke 3)

Posted on January 7, 2015 by Jacob Sahms

In our scripture today from Luke 3, Jesus’ cousin John gets his marching orders before Jesus begins his public ministry. It says that the word of God called John from what he was doing – his private life – to instead go through the region around the Jordan preaching that people should be baptized through repentance for the forgiveness of their sins.

John knew that the people could be forgiven but that they needed to show repentance. They needed to admit that they were in the wrong and that they need to be made right. They needed to recognize there were parts of their lives that were out of their control and out of order, that they needed help. They needed to recognize that there was a power greater than themselves, and that they were not living life on their own.

None of those things is easy, are they? You’re wrong, you’re not in control, your desires aren’t all that matter. Those are hard truths – but that is the message John was preaching. And the message is still true.

We want to minimize things to “mistakes,” when too often, we do exactly what we want to do even though we know we shouldn’t. That’s sin.

We want to be the boss of our own lives, whether it’s physically, emotionally, financially, etc. when we’re supposed to be turning the keys over to God.

John understands that about human nature – that’s why he’s ‘preparing the way,’ laying it all out there. But he also knows God’s nature, that God desires people to repent and turn to God.

That forgiveness is possible.

So, John is outside of society, living out in the wilderness, preaching that people should repent (turn their lives around), be baptized, and receive forgiveness. And people are coming and coming and coming to hear him.

The people that hear John preach tell other people who go to hear him. And it’s not the candy-coated “name it and claim it” prosperity gospel where everything is going to be groovy and God wants you to be “happy!” It’s tough love- hard truths – real, God-centered redemption.

Which John says is just the beginning – not the end – because it’s not enough to repent and turnaround, to be forgiven. No, John says that his listeners need to exhibit fruit and actually be different.

So the people ask what different looks like? Isn’t that the question that we always ask, sort of skeptically, about folks who make a change in their lives?

I wonder what would have happened if Charles Dickens had written the story of Ebenezer Scrooge after that Christmas morning with a different type of ending. What if Scrooge woke up on Christmas morning and said, “whew, Thank God, I’m alive,” and then went back to exorbitant fees and wage garnishments? What if he chalked the appearance of the four ghosts to indigestion or anxiety or something other than actual visions from heaven?

Wouldn’t it change the whole story? Wouldn’t knowing the purpose of the ghosts (or lack thereof) change what we think about Scrooge and Dickens’ A Christmas Carol?

Of course it would! There would be no real story to tell – because it’s one of repentance and forgiveness that is made real because there is change. We expect Scrooge to shake it off – or for the effects to wear off – because we know that happens with us.

But Scrooge changes his ways to “prove” or show his repentance. He must follow through, both so that we can see how the story changed but so that his person, his character, can exhibit new life!

New life. Do we know what that looks like? Do we recognize what change looks like?

We can see a person lose weight, end a destructive relationship, give up an addiction. Those are all hard work – drastic even. But what does a new life look like?

John says, “Anyone who has two shirts should share with the one who has none, and anyone who has food should do the same. And to tax collectors, “Don’t collect any more than you are required to.” And to soldiers, “Don’t extort money and don’t accuse people falsely—be content with your pay.”

Stuff. Power. Money. If John had targeted their politics, he’d have hit the Mount Rushmore of the Don’t-Mess-With-It-List.

How many shirts do you have?

How many of you have more than enough food?

How many of you have ever twisted a rule to financially benefit yourself, or spoken unkindly, even wrongly, against your neighbor?

How many of you are unhappy with what you get paid?

How many of you mistreat someone else because of the bad day you’re having?

John is taking his grubby, gruff, grumpy, Grinch-like finger and poking us in the chest until the skin breaks, the bones get sore, and our bleeding, pulsing heart is exposed to the world. And while he’s poking, he asks again and again, “Do you get it? Do you know God? Do you love God? Will you be different?”

Thank God that Jesus showed up at the Jordan, and got baptized next. If Jesus hadn’t come, we would still be living in a world that understood judgment and repentance but had very little room for grace.

If Jesus hadn’t come, we’d still need to be seeking the Johns of the world in the wilderness, to make our sacrifices and hope we’d be forgiven of our sins.

Thanks be to God, Jesus did come, and offer forgiveness for all who would believe. Because he was God’s one and only son, he could do that. Thankfully, God acknowledged or recognized Jesus in the moment of his baptism, as the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove. And a voice came from heaven: “You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.” Thankfully, Jesus knew where he was from – and whose he was.

That sense of purpose, that clarity of history, that’s what allowed Jesus to enter his temptation in the wilderness (next week), to minister and teach for three years, and stay focused on to the cross. I wonder what would happen if we had that sense of purpose, that understanding of who we are? I wonder if we could just grasp a little of God’s greater purpose and plan for us…

The other night, we were driving through downtown Richmond and my wife encouraged me to drive by the Christmas tree outside of the James Center. It’s where I proposed fifteen years ago (fifteen years!) and where our family’s origin began in a metaphorical sense. As we slow-rolled by, because it was too cold to get out, she turned to our boys, and told them that was where their daddy had proposed. (For the record, they asked a few questions and went back to their electronic devices.)

A few days passed, and I was again driving the boys around at night. Suddenly, a voice called out from the backseat, “Look, that’s where Daddy married Mommy!” Of course, it wasn’t actually where I proposed but my three year old knew part of the story, and he understood how special it was. Even if it was incomplete, he knew part of the story – and he wanted to be part of it.

I think we have that childlike understanding of God, even the wisest, deepest, most spiritual one of us. I find myself in awe of the story, and the way that God works, but I know that John’s message to the people gathered in the wilderness is still true.

“This isn’t about you. It’s for you, but it’s not about you.

“You’re blessed so you can be a blessing.

“Get your head out of the sand and get involved.

“God forgives you, you idiot!”

Wait, maybe that last one is just how I read it sometimes. Maybe that’s what I need it to say to me, because sometimes I fail to fully grasp God’s grace, and sometimes, I feel like I fail to exhibit the after effects of my own repentance. But the truth is, that God’s grace just keeps coming. That Jesus’ death doesn’t wear off. That while I might need to repent again, I don’t have to worry that God stopped loving me somehow.

That baptism is something we do but that grace is something God has done.

Rev. Rob Colwell shared the story of a woman who called the West Virginia Department of Transportation. The woman complained “about the location of a particular deer crossing sign. She demanded that the state remove that sign because the deer kept crossing at the spot where the sign was placed and they were being struck by coal trucks coming down off the mountain. Now, no offense to West Virginians because sometimes I wonder if we too view the sacraments in a similar fashion. Of course we intelligent Virginians all know that the deer were not crossing the road because the sign was erected, but the sign was erected because someone observed where the deer were crossing.” Baptism, he said, was where we celebrate the work God as already done, not the place God shows up because of what we do.

It’s why I think baptism is such a powerful image for our lives of faith. Water makes up most of our bodies – it’s necessary; water is what we use to wash ourselves, to keep clean from bacteria and viruses – it’s cleaning; water is what quenches our thirst and allows us to live- it’s life-giving.

But it’s also the water of the ocean and the river … and the swimming pool. Water that we play in and enjoy and cool off in. Water that… frees us to be without worry.

There’s an image of swimming that will stick with me – not from the Olympics or from my competitive days. But from a hot day this summer at my parents’ house. Dad had set up an inflatable pool – big enough for me to lie down in submerged if I was so inclined, with sides high enough that our three-year-old needed a steps tool to get up and over. We swam and splashed and played during the heat of the day, but nap time called, and my little guy had to go to his nap.

The adults enjoyed different activities throughout the afternoon, and my wife brought our three-year-old back out to the yard. He giggled about his nap, and without further thought, he turned and jumped through the inflated side of the pool and began splashing around.

That’s about what you expected, right?

But see, he went in, without rinsing his feet, without climbing the step stool. Without changing into a swimsuit. He was that excited – and he knew that the water was good.

It’s this water in which we’re baptized – just like Jesus was, at the moment when he was reminded that he was loved by God, that God had a plan for him. We’re about to move into a service of remembering our baptism (and take in a few new members) and speak together John Wesley’s Covenant of Renewal:

“We are no longer our own, but yours, Put us to what you will, rank us with whom you will, Put us to doing, put us to suffering. Let us be employed by you or laid aside by you, Exalted for you or brought low for you. Let us be full, let us be empty. Let us have all things, let us have nothing. We freely and heartily yield all things to your pleasure and disposal. And now, oh glorious and blessed God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, You are mine, and we are yours. So be it. And the covenant which we have made on earth, let it be ratified in heaven.

We’ll see our lives again in the perspective of God’s saving grace, in repentance and forgiveness, out of control and in God’s control. We’ll see ourselves as people wandering in the wilderness, confronted by the truths of our lives, and freed by the truth of God’s love.

And maybe, we’ll find ourselves wondering, if it’s not something in the water, something in the baptism, something in the grace that makes us think the world could be different tomorrow. If we’d follow, and stay focused, and grow deeper as disciples.

If we would repent. If we would give up holding onto the things we don’t need, and the selfishness of our hearts; if we would embrace our neighbors and our enemies as children of God, and learn to love as God’s love; if we would recognize that our hurts and our pasts aren’t an excuse to hurt others, but opportunities for grow.

If we would recognize that God has already done the work, that in baptism, we just acknowledge it. “The difference between Christianity and religion,” Bill Hybels says, “is how they are spelled. Religion is spelled, ‘do’ – do this, do that, do, do, do… Christianity is spelled ‘done.’ Christ has already done everything we need. We just need to receive the gift of ‘done.’

If we would acknowledge that God is God and we are not.

If we would acknowledge that God loves us – that we are God’s children – and that God is in control.

If we would only bellyflop  in the water of grace and splash around.

The water is that good.

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