Thinking about church, community, our kids and all their families

Aunt Jan's funeral was yesterday. It was sad, moving, and glorious. Lots of crying and laughter, just like most funerals of the saints.

There was a lot of talk about the Rylie church that was the home church for Aunt Jan and Uncle Jack and mom and dad for about 60 years now. It is the church that they helped to found and where I and many of those at the funeral "grew up;" A lot of the talk was about all the good that came out of that small community, often in spite of our religious beliefs. We talked about how Rylie's saving grace was the love shown in the strength of the relationships: people stayed in the same place, were involved in each others lives, and "showed up" at each others' significant events - marriage, funerals, hospital stays, etc. I would also add that, for me, another saving grace was the emphasis at Rylie on God as our ultimate authority and the fact that the Bible was his Word, the revealing of his will. We were taught and believed that God was to be taken seriously - more seriously than anything else; therefore, pay attention to his word. This was a great thing for me, because ultimately, God used these tenets of faith to help deconstruct for me some awfully bad theology that we lived with.

Here's the thing. As great as the gift of Rylie was to us, and as great as it was to have for my entire childhood this small community of people as supports in our lives, it is God who works to produce what we need and he does that through a variety of different family, church and social situations.

I did not give my children the same church, home and school situation that I enjoyed. We did not have the same kind of lifelong friends that my parents had with Jack and Jan, going to church with them week after week, in the same place for 60 years or so. But I think that our kids did receive other spiritual advantages because of their childhood situations. They in turn will not be able to give their kids all the same advantages that they enjoyed, but they will bless their children with different blessings.

Here is the key I think for blessing our children. First, understand that it is through God that all blessings flow. He is the source of all blessings and throughout his long history with his people he has found ways to bless through all kinds of different cultural and social situations. Then, bathe everything that you do in love: love God with all your heart, always seeking to do his will, and love your neighbor as God has loved you. If you do this - and you will make mistakes and you will experience "sin interference"- still, God will bless your children's lives just as you were blessed, your parents before you, and their parents before them.

Praise be to Him!

Musings Along the Road

There's a story of Elisha in a city surrounded by enemy armies who have come looking for him. Elijah's servant is terrified. So Elisha asks God, "O Lord, please open his eyes that he may see." (2 Kings 6: 17). The servant’s eyes are opened, and he sees the hills surrounding the city filled with "horses and chariots of fire." The curtain has been drawn back, the veil between heaven and our dimension has been ripped apart, and for a brief moment an earthling sees Reality as it is.

I love the "walking along the road to Emmaus" story. Two are walking along the road on the Sunday after Jesus' death (husband and wife? two friends? family members?). Then Jesus "comes near" (a fast walker?). But they don't recognize him. They talk about Jesus' death and their own disappointments, grief and surprise at the talk that some had seen Jesus alive. He sets them straight - they haven't understood that all this was "necessary." They all stop and eat, and, Jesus, still the stranger, praying, then breaking the bread to begin their meal. Then, an electrifying moment of recognition - it's Jesus! But just as quickly, he's gone. The curtain has been drawn back, the veil between heaven and our dimension has been ripped apart, and for a brief moment new creation has been fully in view.

I was on the road to Commerce praying and thanking God for the wonders he has given us. I was imagining the creation as it is, raising its branches, shining in light, shouting its praises, bursting into song to the Lord of Glory. And I begin to wonder if the Amish were right after all. 

The Amish do not participate in "modern practices." They drive buggies instead of cars. They dress plainly and live according to rules that seem to rule out most if not all industrial products and practices. Probably because of my religious background, I had always thought they must be the ultimate restoration legalists, trying to live their lives according to first century rules, like the Rechabites of Jeremiah's time who seem to believe that the only true way to live was to live in tents like Abraham had done. 

But what if the Amish have stumbled on to a way of living that recognizes reality: the earth is the Lord's and all that is in it? That one day, the groaning creation will "will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God?" That right now it would be a good time to take care of the earth by living according to different kinds of goals and values? Maybe producing the most at all costs is not the ultimate value in life? Have they stumbled onto the fulfillment of the first command to take care of creation?

After a demented man entered one of their schoolhouses and massacred their children, the Amish community went to that man's family to grieve with them and offer their forgiveness and compassion. Even our mass media was "in shock and awe." But I am wondering - maybe a people who have not been blinded by compulsive consumerism and its justifications and rationalizations have learned to see more clearly the things that are important, eternal, and real.