Job 1:1; 2:1-10 Notes

As introduced in last week’s reading, Job is written as a drama. This week’s reading is the prologue to the play. In it, we see two critical pieces of background. In scene 1 (1:1, 2:1-6), God continues to brag about how upright Job is, despite having lost all of his children and all of his property and wealth. At the same time, God is convinced by the Adversary to allow the Adversary to test Job further by attacking his body directly. The sores the Adversary inflicts make Job unclean. This is why Job takes up residence in the town’s garbage dump/ash heap. Scene 2 (verses 7-10) finds Job on the ash heap, scraping his sores to relieve the itch and pain, and being told by his wife to "curse God and die." She is only the first of Job’s closest living associates to take on the role of "adversary" to him in the days ahead.

Job is often associated with "patience" in popular sayings. In modern usage, "patience" is usually understood as quiet resignation to the way things are with some measure of hope things may get better. The end of this week’s reading (verse 10) can seem to justify that image of Job.

However, as the drama continues to unfold, Job is anything but patient in that sense. He does not curse God, but he does insist that he had done nothing to deserve what has befallen him. He also demands that God show up to defend Himslef for what has happened. Job continues to do exactly what his wife now and his friends later will ask him to stop doing: he "perseveres in his integrity" (verse 9).

James 5:13-20 Thoughts

Notice how James and apostles’ approach to healing differs from that of Paul.

Call for the elders of the church (James 5:13).
Anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord (James 5:14).
The Lord will raise them up (James 515).

The community of faith prays for healing and healing comes from God. What are the implications of such a shift in thought for present-day communities of faith?

For starters, these words from James shatter the notion that only spiritually gifted people should pray for healing. When some Christians read Paul’s teachings on spiritual gifts, they are tempted to think that only spiritually gifted people should pray for healing. In James letter, however, the emphasis is upon God, who answers the prayers of the righteous.

It is not necessary for us to wait until we can identify a person whom God has chosen or used in the ministry of healing. James’s instructions are for the elders (spiritually mature) to gather for healing prayer, though it could also be argued from the examples we have in history that any Christian (new or experienced) may pray for healing because healing comes from God.

Drinking to Fit In?

Those who drink to be socially “in” are only kidding themselves. In fact, drinking only makes things worse: Not only is drinking more likely to make teenagers feel like social outcasts, but it may be causing their isolation. After analyzing health data on 8,271 adolescents from 126 schools (grades 7 to 12), three sociologists found a relationship in every type of school between drinking and feelings of loneliness and not fitting in—but these feelings were especially substantial among self-reported drinkers in schools where fellow students tended to avoid alcohol and were tightly connected to each other.
—“Drinking,Socioemotional Functioning, and Academic Progress in SecondarySchool,” by Robert Crosnoe, et al., Journal ofHealth and Social Behavior, June 2012

Todays Reading Job 1:1; 2:1-10

Job is the Bible’s most thorough and comprehensive wrestling with the problem of God and human suffering. The drama offers a serious critique of widely-held beliefs that human suffering was always and only linked to human sin. It also refuses, both in the beginning and in the end, to let God completely "off the hook" for what can only appear to him (and perhaps to us) as unjust suffering. Indeed, as we see in today’s reading, God had directly approved the suffering that Job would endure (Job 1:12, 2:6).

Job is written as a drama. This week’s reading is the prologue to the play. In it, we see two critical pieces of background. In scene 1 (1:1, 2:1-6), God continues to brag about how upright Job is, despite having lost all of his children and all of his property and wealth (in the verses not included from chapter 1). At the same time, God is convinced by the Adversary to allow the Adversary to test Job further by attacking his body directly. The sores the Adversary inflicts make Job unclean. This is why Job takes up residence in the town’s garbage dump/ash heap. Scene 2 (verses 7-10) finds Job on the ash heap, scraping his sores to relieve the itch and pain, and being told by his wife to "curse God and die." She is only the first of Job’s closest living associates to take on the role of "adversary" to him in the days ahead.

However, as the drama continues to unfold, Job is anything but patient in that sense. He does not curse God, but he does insist that he had done nothing to deserve what has befallen him. He also demands that God show up to defend Himself for what has happened. Job continues to do exactly what his wife now and his friends later will ask him to stop doing: he "perseveres in his integrity" (verse 9).

Job is often associated with "patience" in popular sayings. In modern usage, "patience" is usually understood as quiet resignation to the way things are with some measure of hope things may get better. The end of this week’s reading (verse 10) can seem to justify that image of Job.

You must wrestling with whether you are accepting God’s Will or just resigning yourself to fate. There is an eternal difference. Look to your troubles and decide.

Esther Reading Notes

Esther is a story of genocide averted. Haman had "cast lots" (Purim, in Hebrew) against the Jewish people in Persia, but because of Esther’s courageous leadership, his efforts were ended and even reversed. ("If it had not been for the Lord on our side" from Psalm 124 is the perfect Psalm response for this reading!)

In Esther, genocide was averted. Today however, genocide still continues. Sometimes it is targeted against people of a particular type (women, children, religious groups, sexual minorities, or persons of different family or tribal heritage). Sometimes, it is against a whole people by the government to stop or reverse calls for the leaders to leave office, as some say today about Syria. And sometimes, it is simply about asserting power over land and resources, as we are seeing at the border of Sudan and South Sudan, and, heartbreakingly, once again in the North and South Kivu regions of the Democratic Republic of Congo along the border with Rwanda.

The Jewish festival of Purim celebrates not vengeance against Haman (which would only perpetuate rather than end the cycle of oppression and violence), but rather God’s undoing of oppression and vengeance. And God’s undoing of these things happened because someone spoke up, exposed the genocidal plans, and called for the powers that be to end them. If your congregation has not yet been engaged actively and intentionally in efforts to end genocide and government persecution of people groups, this text provides perhaps the best opportunity in the three-year cycle for a biblical warrant to begin.

Overall, we might say today that Esther was incredibly astute politically in how she handled her request and responses. It was no accident Jesus himself called on his disciples to be "wise as serpents," (Matthew 10:16) noting that, in general, the "children of this age are more savvy than the children of light" (Luke 16:8), but that it needn’t remain so!

And in the end, the result was not simply vengeance against Haman. It was, rather, deliverance for a people, an increase of honor for the king because he had demonstrated his commitment to justice and protection of the vulnerable, and a new celebration in which the people were instructed primarily to "send gifts of food to one another and presents to the poor" (Esther 9:22). The celebration itself thus continued the acts of goodwill and mercy begun with the king’s decree in response to Esther’s request.

In this tumultuous time we live in, give thanks that the ‘Lord is on our side’.

Has the Church Become a Big Show?

Vickie Beeching says what many are asking. She is worth a good read.

Digital technology is becoming a more and more visible part of Church gatherings. This is most apparent in the States, but is becoming increasingly so in the UK, too.

Having been part of a lot of large Christian conferences, I’ve seen incredible usage of screens, lights, and film.

On many levels, it seems to deepen our ability to worship corporately – it enables everyone to see the song lyrics, even from far, far away. We don’t need to hold hymnbooks or paper sheets anymore.

However, when our Christian events begin to look more and more like rock concerts, it’s probably worth us stepping back and asking a few questions.

Humor me for a moment. Picture the average pop or rock concert.

Bright lights.

Big stage.

People on stage, being stared at by an audience facing them.

Big screens.

Loud PA systems.

All the money it costs to buy all of that high-tech gear.

And the money it costs to have people to operate them.

That picture is a portrait of many, many churches across the globe. Eerily a mirror image of the rock concert.

Having stood on those kinds of stages for over 15 years, I find myself stepping back and asking is this helping people with their spirituality or not? Is it helping me or not?

Why do we model our churches on the concert industry?

Why are so much of our church budgets going to expensive state of the art sound systems, lights, and screens?

What good is this doing and what harm?

Are we simply copying culture in a quest to be ‘relevant’?

This will never work. We need to be DIFFERENT from culture in order to offer something of value. People can get a BETTER concert at their local arena when a famous band rolls into town. What do they need from us? NOT a wannabe pop concert.

What if we all just stripped everything down?

Might that kill some of our ‘jostling to be on stage’ culture?

What if we saved ALL that money and used it for something else – like feeding hungry people?

I’m totally open to the other side of the story, too.

Perhaps it IS all ok. Perhaps we ARE on track.

Maybe we are providing something needed – to amplify sung worship, provide screens that show the lyrics, and lights so people can see the worship leader.

But I’m wondering…do we really need STAGES at all? Do they merely create a ‘them and us’ mentality?

Are they part of a modernist worldview, where someone up front ‘does something’ to the watching crowd? Isn’t post-modern participation all about community sharing, where everyone gets an equal voice? Would that bring more people into our churches?

Are You Spiritually Mature?

An interview with Peter Scazzero of the Life Church in New York yielded an insight that my colleagues need to hear. We need leaders who see to their spiritual maturity via their emotional health.

Many leaders might think if they were more consistent about prayer and Bible study that their inner lives would flourish. How can that not be enough? What more did you do?

It wasn’t enough. I started going to Christian counseling for the first time. That was very humbling. I didn’t even really believe in Christian counseling at the time, much less that I needed it.

I also started reading Henri Nouwen and other writers who were outside the box for me. I began learning about the importance of Lamentations and Psalms. I spent time looking at my family of origin, how it impacted who I am today, how it affected the way I did ministry. As I went on this journey, just looking at my own life, I started to realize I wasn’t such a lovely person on the inside. Here I’d been looking at everyone else, thinking they were the ones who needed to change. But I needed to change first.

When Geri called my bluff, basically telling me "you’re not practicing what you preach," it was difficult. But out of that crucible of pain we saw the missing link to transformation. We realized we were missing something, and it was destroying us.

That was the beginning of emotional health, emotionally healthy spirituality. It has a lot of components, but the basic idea is this: emotional health and spiritual maturity can’t be separated. You cannot be spiritually mature while remaining emotionally immature. For example, if you’re not approachable, kind, loving, gentle, warm, it doesn’t matter how much Bible you know, how gifted you are. You’re not mature spiritually

Source: http://www.christianitytoday.com/le/2012/summer/emotionalstability.html?start=2

The American Church in the Future

Culture is evolving. Christianity no longer occupies the center of public discourse. The civil religion of the American empire used to be “Christian,” but the truth of the matter is that our society (like the rest of the West) is in the transition toward post-Christendom.

“Post-Christendom is the culture that emerges as the Christian faith loses coherence within a society that has been definitively shaped by the Christian story and as the institutions that have been developed to express Christian convictions decline in influence.”

With that basic definition, here are some of the major transitions that take place culturally as post-Christendom takes root:

Our words, even when they are true, can damage our witness.

From the center to the margins: In Christendom, the Christian story and the churches were central, but in post-Christendom these are marginal.

From the majority to the minority: In Christendom, Christians comprised the (often overwhelming) majority, but in post-Christendom we are a minority.

From settlers to sojourners: In Christendom, Christians felt at home in a culture shaped by their story, but in post-Christendom we are aliens, exiles and pilgrims in a culture where we no longer feel at home.

From privilege to plurality: In Christendom, Christians enjoyed many privileges, but in post-Christendom we are one community among many in a plural society.

From control to witness: In Christendom, churches could exert control over society, but in post-Christendom we exercise influence only through witnessing to our story and its implications.

From maintenance to mission: In Christendom, the emphasis was on maintaining a supposedly Christian status quo, but in post-Christendom it is on mission within a contested environment.

From institution to movement: In Christendom, churches operated mainly in institutional mode, but in post-Christendom it must become again a Christian movement.

Choose well how we speak of the world and better how we speak of ourselves.