Welcome to Pastor Jack Buckley's weekly blog and podcast.
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Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Praying in Plain English
Matthew 6:1-8
Prayer is the most natural thing in the whole wide world, according to a Bible point of view. Not a rigorous spiritual discipline, nor strenuous theological gymnastics. Much more like breathing in and out.
God's ultimate reality, and real presence in the world, is simply assumed. "In the beginning, God..." says Genesis 1:1. And so, communicating in some way or other with our God is to be expected.
I love the way, in Genesis 3, that God drops in on Adam and Eve in the evening for a stroll around the Garden of Eden, chatting it up on how the day has gone. It encourages me to approach prayer as a spiritual conversation.
Not too casual or chummy, mind you. But open hearted, and open to giving and taking with God about what I'm thinking, feeling, wanting, and needing. And to listening for what God has to say about all that as well.
This week's sermon sets that kind of context for the next two months' worth of messages on The Lord's Prayer.
Listen to the GODcast!
posted by Jack Buckley at
10:15 AM
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Royalty
The First Letter of John 4:7-21
I was away this past Sunday on retreat with about 70 members of our church family, so my longtime friend Joel Mackey stepped in to bring the message in Alameda. Joel is executive director of Harbor House Ministries in Oakland, a creative outreach organization which has served East Oakland's multi-cultural communities for 35 years. On Thursday, October 11 they will celebrate with a gala event at First Presbyterian Church in Oakland. But for now...
Listen to the GODcast!
posted by Jack Buckley at
3:41 PM
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
Some Notes On Prayer
This coming Sunday I'll begin a sermon series on The Lord's Prayer, just a few simple lines that Jesus gave us, that just happen to span the whole wide world of human experience. More on that next week.
For now, I want to share with you a few of the ways I prayed last weekend while over 60 members of our church family and I were on retreat in the redwood forest of Sonoma County.
First I breathed a sigh of thanks to God for the natural beauty all around us at St. Dorothy's Rest, the Episcopal conference center we've retreated to for 12 years now. There's a palpable serenity in the air, under the canopy of giant trees, even though you pass scores of private cabins as you drive up the winding hillside road to get there.
Then I told God "thank you" for safe journeys all around -- even if a bit delayed here and there by busy Friday traffic on highway 101. And for each person/family who'd chosen to drop out of life's usual busy-ness, just to see what God might do in our time-out away. What a delightful mixed group we were: ages 3 1/2 to 80-something; longtime members and newbies; a lot of Presbyterians and a few good Methodists. (Plus the hospitable team of Episcopalians who outdid biblical Martha in attending to our every need -- even a bit o' plumbing repair and flea extermination.)
In every teaching session I prayed for God to open my heart and mind to receive what Rev. Kelley O'Connor had to say about being the church in a new and challenging century. Kelley's one of the Methodists I mentioned, pastoring in Forestville for 7 years now. She's been our music leader in the past, and this time we received both the church's music and God's words translated through her gracious personality. She and God conspired nicely to answer my prayers for new insight.
I also prayed for God to smile on the person for whom I was a Secret Pal. Over the weekend, I struck anonymously to bless my person with a note card, a chocolate bar, and a little piece of handmade pottery. Nothing fancy. But grace notes of care. Multiply that by the number of retreaters and you've got the makings of a mini-revival.
Saturday evening I got to pray like crazy for help and protection, when my wife Joanne got woozy and worried in our meeting. My first thought was blood sugar weirdness, since she's diabetic. When she couldn't even remember what she'd done about insulin before dinner, I got scared. We called 911. Two staff members, just happening to be an EMT and an RN, ministered to her. Then off she went in an ambulance to the hospital half an hour away. With me and a volunteer companion following right behind.
The good news is she had nothing serious wrong and was discharged from the ER in time for us to fall into bed by 2:15 a.m. It boiled down to a sinus infection playing tricks on her inner ear, causing vertigo and nausea. In God's funny way, Kelley had distributed airline barf bags as a teaching point (don't ask) in the very meeting where Joanne fell sick.
Sunday morning my bit o' honey was embarrassed by all the concerned attention. But she was grateful for the love that lay behind it. And during our Communion celebration she said so, among scads of testimonials we all shared about the blessings of our weekend together. Then we prayed in sentences, phrases, even single words, to tell God and each other what was in our hearts.
Prayer, in all its varied forms, is the Christian's life-breath. We exhale our wants and needs to God, who knows us better and cares about us more than we could ever do for ourselves. And we inhale God's presence and wisdom and power to do more than we could imagine, let alone hope for.
So breathe deep. Relax. Rejoice.
Then, repeat.
posted by Jack Buckley at
12:11 PM
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Faith Follows Through
Psalm 37:1-6; Luke 14:25-33
Six years ago, on September 11, all Americans were instantly traumatized as never before -- and all the world along with us -- when four hijacked planes were used as explosive weapons, all in the name of religious faith.
During the past year, three books decrying the foolishness of religious faith have risen to the top ten on national best-seller lists. All in the name of rationality and scientific honesty.
In times of general uncertainty, of terror and turmoil, like we've lived in these last six stressful years, one inclines towards either doctrinaire beliefs or skeptical unbelief. Our cultural temperature goes up and up; our collective temper grows shorter and shorter. All exacerbated by conflicting faiths, dueling doctrines.
But, biblically speaking, faith is not really about beliefs. Well, not so much... Of course, ideas and doctrines and creeds do matter. Very much so. For Christians, what you believe about the Cross of Christ is crucially important.
Yet biblical faith is a dynamic thing. It's the driving force of your life. It's your rock-bottom commitment to what is real and really important. It's what brings you alive to God, keeps you close to God, and opens you up to God's way with the world.
Listen to the GODcast!
_______________
My wife Joanne and I started dating seriously when we were college sophomores. Well, as seriously as we could on a campus famous for its "6 inch rule" -- the minimum amount of air space required at all times between male and female hands and all other body parts to the north or south.
Anyway, we were mutually smitten at age 19 and we've lived lo these many years to tell about it. Within 4 years we'd got married, graduated, and had our first child. Now we were looking for God's lead into whatever was next.
It turned out we headed back to Joanne's home area to work with the Youth For Christ ministry she'd participated in as a high schooler. It served 4 rural counties in Upstate New York, running 16 after-school Bible clubs and holding evangelistic rallies on Saturday nights.
We went there on faith, believing God would lead us into good new beginnings.
And we immediately encountered tests of our faith.
For instance, in our first interview the boss asked Joanne, "Are you prepared to be a YFC widow?" Heh heh. Well of course she and I would pay whatever price it took to help kids learn how to live God's way in God's world. We envisioned me putting in long hours, driving long distances, going for the long haul. And her, at home alone with our baby boy all the while.
What the boss didn't think to explain was that Joanne was part of a package deal: She'd be secretary to both the boss and me; we'd live in an upstairs apartment in the house where the boss and his family of seven lived; the office would be in a converted garage out back; and all of us would volunteer on Sundays in a little church at a nearby country crossroads.
He didn't think to explain any of that in advance. And we never thought to ask. But God was good, forgave us all, and made it work out somehow.
Even so, it didn't take long for our little family to move forward in faith. Seminary! Yes!! We would move far away from New York and I would learn how to be a minister!!!
And that's what we did 2 years later. The rest, as they say, is history.
I remember all this right now because of the way, in Luke 14:25-33, Jesus starts right off with the truth when he invites people to join his team.
A huge crowd of wannabe disciples are enthusiastically following him, looking and listening to see what he'll do or say next. It's easy enough to follow Christ in a crowd. But that's not what he is looking for.
So he turns to call them, like a shepherd to his sheep, and with just a few words he culls the flock better than a collie ever could.
"If you're serious about following me," he says, "then you need to want me more than anything or anyone else on earth. Family, friends, your very life itself -- all of 'em can be second-best at best." [Yikes.]
And then he draws them a brutal word picture for the kind of commitment he's calling for. "Pick up your cross," he says, "and get in line behind me and my cross." What a grotesque parade -- a ragtag troupe of dying clowns, dragging their own death-poles, sweating and grunting out their misery in public pain and shame.
Now that's a radical call to commitment.
Some wiseguy said, "When you order a plate of ham and eggs, think about the animals who made it all possible. On one hand, the chicken is involved; but the pig is committed!"
And a wise man once said, "Nothing focuses the mind so well as a clear view of the gallows through the bars of your jail cell window."
I think Jesus' gruesome call to cross-bearing means something like this...
Realistically, we're all going to die one day sooner or later. Younger, older, by accident, on purpose, from natural causes... Sooner or later, everybody dies.
So, realistically, how are you going to live your life today?
What choices will you make this day, with your last day on earth in mind? What words will you speak? What things will you be sure to do, or not to do? What people, places, plans are important enough to put into your personal history today -- to make your last day one of satisfaction instead of sorrow?
Listen, the road may be rough and patchy, and your feet can get badly bruised. But look who it is that walks beside you, leading the way step by step to the very end. Walking with Jesus, you never need to lack strength for the journey, or wisdom for making the better choice all along the way.
He assures us, in as many words, "If you believe in me, you can also trust me! Here's what I give you... A life that's really worth living! Gifts of faith, hope, and love, to enjoy and share around! A legacy of grace, and goodness, and peace!"
He calls us to open up our spiritual hands, to let go of control over our own lives. And he promises to fill those open hands with all the good things God wanted us to have in the first place.
Bank on it: God's promises are always true; God's surprises are always good.
posted by Jack Buckley at
2:59 PM
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
Faith Steps Forward
Genesis 12:1-9; Philippians 3:1-11
Labor Day is a bittersweet holiday, one last hurrah -- or gasp -- for summer. The calendar may say we have three weeks left before autumn begins, but we know... We know that it's already all over.
Even so, I hope that as you scan back through your own summer you can give thanks for some special new memories you created there. For the rest of your life, you know, they'll always be just a heartbeat away. Ever ready to call up, to retreat into, as little sanctuaries of love, joy, and peace for your soul.
But now, at the front edge of autumn, we take stock of the fact that Faith always steps forward into God's promise of good new beginnings. That's the message I take home from St. Paul's encouraging words to his friends in the Philippian church, and from Father Abraham's example in the Book of Genesis.
Listen to the GODcast!
posted by Jack Buckley at
3:18 PM
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