Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Hebrews 1: Forward Movement

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 01/23/2011

3 part series on Hebrews, Chapter 1…

In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, 2but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. 3The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. 4So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs.

5For to which of the angels did God ever say,

“You are my Son;

today I have become your Father”?

Or again,

“I will be his Father,

and he will be my Son”?

6And again, when God brings his firstborn into the world, he says,

“Let all God’s angels worship him.”

7In speaking of the angels he says,

“He makes his angels spirits,

and his servants flames of fire.”

8But about the Son he says,

“Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever;

a scepter of justice will be the scepter of your kingdom.

9You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;

therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions

by anointing you with the oil of joy.”

10He also says,

“In the beginning, Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth,

and the heavens are the work of your hands.

11They will perish, but you remain;

they will all wear out like a garment.

12You will roll them up like a robe;

like a garment they will be changed.

But you remain the same,

and your years will never end.”

13To which of the angels did God ever say,

“Sit at my right hand

until I make your enemies

a footstool for your feet”?

14Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?

Hebrews 1v1-14

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The forward movement of God’s activity in the world is an important theme in the book of Hebrews. It’s a movement toward deeper relationship and higher risk. A movement from the more comfortable and less powerful to the life-soaked dangerous and trans-formatively potent. It’s a movement towards more love and more power. It’s a movement from the angels to Jesus.

[Prayer class illustration… Cathy & Jon + Sarah illustration… compassion ministry illustration…]

Some background on the book of Hebrews will help give us some context to begin our exploration of this theme.

Unknown author (Maybe Apollos? Maybe Priscilla?) to an unknown audience. Clues that it is written shortly before Rome destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem, during a time the early church would have been facing some serious difficulties. Clearly written to Jewish followers of the way of Jesus, who were under severe pressure to give up their Christian distinctives and return to Judaism. Some of that pressure came because Christianity was an outlawed sect in the Roman empire, and subject to persecution (Hebrews 10 describes them being put in prison and having property confiscated). Some of that pressure came from their fellow Jews who saw faith in Jesus as a threat to their historically Jewish faith, especially with the influx of non-Jewish people into the family of God through the influential ministry of Paul.

The people to whom this letter was written were having to decide whether it was worth it to continue following Jesus, wherever he might take them, or return to the more comfortable life they had known prior to hearing the good news. That’s why there is all this talk about the angels – in traditional Jewish thought at the time, the angels (messengers) were the ones who had given the law to Israel. So it was a choice between embracing the implications of the good news of the Kingdom of God given by Jesus on the one hand, and more traditional faithfulness to God’s old covenant with the Hebrew people established on Mount Sinai with the ten commandments and all the rest.

The particulars of this challenge are foreign to most of us today, what with the religious freedoms we enjoy in the West. But the message of Hebrews lands at home with us nonetheless. Every one of us faces the question of whether or not to find a more comfortable and safe way to live our lives in this world, or whether to press on in following Jesus into the dangerous waters of his Kingdom of God mission.

Maybe for you there are pretty direct parallels with the Hebrews to whom this letter is addressed. Perhaps you grew up in a home and a family that perceives the way you are following Jesus as a threat to their way of life, and so you experience social pressure from them to “come back” to the kind of life they have. Maybe that’s a religious expression that’s more cultural than heart driven, like a civic faith, or some forms of traditional Catholicism, for example… Maybe your family background is Jewish, or Jehovah Witness, or Mormon, or Islam, or Hindu, or Buddhist… Maybe your family was irreligious or agnostic or atheist…

Maybe for you, right now, the parallels are less direct but just as strong. Does being involved with God in this world mean for you living the best, most comfortable life you can without hurting yourself or others? Or does it mean moving forward into whatever terrifying adventures God might be calling you into with his Son Jesus, in the anticipation that he might use you to change the world, whatever the cost? Are you going to stay where you are and be safe, trusting that the chaos won’t intrude? Or are you going to plunge into the chaos with Jesus, trusting that he has the power and authority to bring joyful order to it all with your cooperation?

So the author of Hebrews is painting this picture of a God who is moving forward, and making the argument that all the life God has for us comes from pressing forward with him. The argument that moving backwards is a lesser life, with less power, and in fact is more dangerous than moving forward, because if we stay still, we’re left to engage the enemy alone, but if we join with God, we’ll be right in the thick of his victory march.

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What is the forward movement of God? We get a sense from the main thrust of Hebrews 1. The angels to Jesus. The messengers of God’s word to the word of God himself. Flames of fire (nice.) to the radiance of God’s glory (c’mon!).

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This is a movement towards deeper, more direct relationship. God speaks out of the heavens, sends signs and burning bushes, sends angels and prophets, puts his law on tablets, and then he comes in person. We aren’t receiving just his communication anymore, we are receiving (or rejecting) him. We aren’t trusting just his commands anymore, we are trusting him. Not just, “obey my commands” but “follow me.” We aren’t loving just his law anymore, we are loving him. He is not just dwelling in a tabernacle or a temple or an ark in our city anymore, he is making his dwelling place in us through the spirit of his son Jesus. It doesn’t get much deeper or more direct than that, does it?

I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”

John 17:26

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With this movement towards deeper, more direct relationship comes a movement towards higher risk. The first risks were at the level of risking being frustrated at being ignored, misunderstood, or disobeyed. (Dr. Phil level risks: “And how’s that working out for you?”) And then, when he attached his name and reputation to a tribe of people through making a covenant with them, the risks ratcheted up. They might abuse his name and reputation, making it harder for the world to know who he was. Now he was on the hook for defending them and correcting them and cleaning up their messes. (This is why parents get so upset when their kids disregard them…) But in coming among us personally in his son Jesus, the risks skyrocketed. It’s not just a prophet that might be rejected now, it’s God’s own son. It’s not just a prophet that might be sent out of the city, it’s God himself. It’s not just a prophet that might be killed, it’s the beloved only begotten son. The potential for pain and hurt and suffering on God’s part has just gone up exponentially, hasn’t it? And if this attempt to set things right goes wrong, there’s no plan b. Everything is riding on Jesus. And Jesus himself takes it one step further, letting everything he’s done now ride on his church. [John 20: If you forgive the sins of anyone, their sins are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven."] That’s true risk. Some might even say reckless. As a mentor of mine said in a blog post recently, Risk is not a game by Hasbro. All true risk starts with the risks God takes. He is, after all, the God who built free will into the universe.

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Why the movement toward deeper, more direct relationship? Why the movement toward greater risk? Because that is the way that leads to life.

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There are two sure roads to death.

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One is the road to insulation by isolation. Insulate yourself from others and the life will drain out of you like heat from your fingertips on a cold winter’s day. Your fingers were made for mittens, not gloves. You were made for the kind of insulation that love provides, and you can only know that kind of warmth through vulnerability.

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The other is the road to security by playing it safe. Pursue security by playing it safe and you will be like a greyhound chasing a wooden rabbit around a race track. There’s a lot of running and huffing and puffing, but rabbit is not on the menu for dinner. You were made for the kind of security only love can bring, and that kind of security only comes from risking everything on love.

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The road to life is the road of vulnerable relationship and betting-the-farm risk on that relationship. Because that’s the way of reckless love. And all true life and power comes from love. And all love comes from God.

Think about loving someone. There is a direct relationship between how deeply and directly you connect with them and how much potential the relationship has to give you life. And there is a similarly direct relationship between the amount of risk you take in the relationship and the transformative power that relationship has in your life. [examples…]

This is the invitation of Hebrews 1 – and indeed the whole letter to the Hebrews: Move forward with God. Risk everything on relationship with Jesus. God risked everything – his only son Jesus included - on relationship with you. Even if what you’re risking is the comfortable life of faith you’ve had so far, there is more in Jesus. There is deeper, more direct, more personal relationship with God available. He has more of himself to show you, to share with you. There is more adventure to be had with him than you’ve had so far. He has more for you to do. And more of his power available for you to do it. It may be scary. You may get hurt along the way. But life lies this way, and this way alone. Power for transformation of yourself and this world lies this way, and this way alone.

God is moving forward in reckless love for the sake of saving his creation. May we say no to the insulation of our comfortable life and the false security of riskless living and join him in that reckless love.

Practical Tips:

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1. Do the Funky Franklin. Then set it on fire. Do the Modified Ben Franklin Boredom/Not-Boredom Exercise. Take a piece of paper and write in the middle of the page “Boredom” on the left and “Not Boredom” on the right. Draw a line between them, making two columns. In the left column, above the word boredom, write down the pros of boredom for you. Below the word boredom, write down the cons. Above the word Not-Boredom, write down the pros, and underneath, the cons. [give example…] Compare the cons. Circle the cons you’d rather take a chance on. Consider the pros. Circle the pros you’d rather pursue.

(Note on picture: I reversed the pros and cons on my example on the “Not Boredom” side.)

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If you end up circling the non-boredom side twice, tear off the boredom side, crumple it a little, and burn it as way of saying to God, “I’m all in.” Use the non-boredom side as a bookmark for your bible.

2. Make an Anti-Boredom Vow. Make a settled decision to never leave a church because you’re bored. [We have only ourselves to blame for boredom…] Sometimes we complain that we “aren’t being fed.” Jesus said he had food his disciples knew nothing about. His food was to do his Father’s will. It’s not insignificant that Jesus said this after taking a major risk in relationship with a Samaritan woman. Our nourishment comes from taking risks in love. You’ll never be bored doing that. (by the way, I’m sure there are good reasons to leave a church, but I know being bored isn’t one of them. You’ll just go be bored somewhere else if you’re looking for food that’s different than Jesus’ food.)

3. Email Jesus for a week. Start a two-way conversation with Jesus at the start of every day for a week. Jesus, get my attention if there is anything you want me to do for or with you today or anytime down the road. See what happens. See how he moves you forward. See how it feels. Expand it to asking him for his opinion on challenges you’re facing, or decisions you have to make. Jesus, get my attention if there is anything you’d suggest, or a decision you’d recommend for me. Jesus is someone you can have a real relationship with, unlike the angels. (email jesus (at) jessewilsononline (dot) com).

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Hebrews 1: The Medium is the Message

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 01/16/2011

In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, 2but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe. 3The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. 4So he became as much superior to the angels as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs.

5For to which of the angels did God ever say,

“You are my Son;

today I have become your Father”?

Or again,

“I will be his Father,

and he will be my Son”?

6And again, when God brings his firstborn into the world, he says,

“Let all God’s angels worship him.”

7In speaking of the angels he says,

“He makes his angels spirits,

and his servants flames of fire.”

8But about the Son he says,

“Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever;

a scepter of justice will be the scepter of your kingdom.

9You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness;

therefore God, your God, has set you above your companions

by anointing you with the oil of joy.”

10He also says,

“In the beginning, Lord, you laid the foundations of the earth,

and the heavens are the work of your hands.

11They will perish, but you remain;

they will all wear out like a garment.

12You will roll them up like a robe;

like a garment they will be changed.

But you remain the same,

and your years will never end.”

13To which of the angels did God ever say,

“Sit at my right hand

until I make your enemies

a footstool for your feet”?

14Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?

Hebrews 1v1-14

God wants to communicate with us. This is one of the fundamental witnesses of the scriptures. It is not that God is up there, and we are down here, and he just sets everything in motion and lets it all spin to see what happens. It’s that God is interested in a relationship with us. A relationship with communication at its very center. He wants to communicate to us who he is and how he feels about us and what he desires for us. And he wants us to communicate with him, and to know that he hears us, and is responsive to our communication. Because it is through communication that communion happens. And it is through communication that love is expressed, and it is in communion that love is experienced.

Hebrews reflects on this idea of God’s desire to communicate right from the beginning. “In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets in many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son…”

Let’s think about some of those many times and many ways. At the beginning, of course, it’s face to face. When all was well between us and God, the scriptures describe God and Adam as walking together and talking, like you and I might today. But when the relationship breaks down, the medium of communication changes. The very word “prophet” indicates something of this new medium. It’s a compound of the Greek words for “above” and “say”. Words from above. Like Noah, hearing about building an ark. Seems to be a voice, not connected to a body. Then a rainbow. Three strangers show up to communicate with Abraham one time. A burning bush for Moses. Stone tablets with the ten commandments on them. Many times, in various ways.

The media God uses to communicate with us are carefully chosen by God. Because the medium is the message. Even moreso sometimes than the message is the message.

That expression, “the medium is the message,” comes from Marshall McLuhan, an obscure literary professor who studied and wrote about media and communication in the 1960s. To understand what’s going on in Hebrews 1, it’s worth trying to understand McLuhan’s idea that the medium is the message.

A medium is just the tool we use to communicate. There are a nearly infinite variety of media. A newspaper or a book would be a medium. Television would be a medium. An mp3 audio recording. Radio. The internet. Spoken words. A letter. A telephone. A billboard. Body language. Text message. Tattoos. And on and on.

The medium is the message says that the medium that is chosen to communicate the message embeds itself in the message, shaping the message itself, influencing how the message is perceived. It says that the medium itself communicates something – something that may reinforce the content of the message, or undermine the content of the message, or even be completely unrelated to the content of the message. [flickering light ad…Shane Hipps story of satellite church…] And that sometimes, the medium through which the message is expressed may be even more powerful than the content of the message.

Some examples would probably be helpful.

For instance, a keep out sign in needlepoint vs. two axe heads with keep and out written in blood… The medium is the message.

For instance, a lengthy email received recently saying how important it was that we talk about an issue personally, but that the sender might not be available until next Wednesday. The content of the message was that this was something important to work out. But the medium suggested that this was something the sender wanted to offload and feel better having done so. The medium is the message.

Or, for instance, your dad told you that it was important to hold women in high respect, but you saw him abuse your mother regularly, and objectify beautiful women by whistling at them and making catcalls whenever you were out and about with him. Or, on the other hand, your dad hardly said a word about how to treat women, but you saw him honor your mom regularly with his words and actions, and the one time you said something disrespectful to your mom was the only time you ever heard him raise his voice to you in your life? The medium is the message.

To further the point of how powerful media is, historically speaking, consider how the predominant media of a culture shapes the culture and the brains of the people in the culture even more powerfully than any particular thing that is said through the predominant media of the day.

When the unamplified and untransmitted human voice was the predominant media, sharing information required that we gather in extended family and tribal groups regularly to share what we knew and remembered and discovered and thought. Memory itself required community, and our brains’ capacity for remembering was shaped by repetition and stories and songs. In an oral culture, you reached adulthood by the time you could understand stories and songs and when you could commit information to verbal memory; so in one’s early teens, one could contribute productively to the community. Older members of the community maintained power and authority because of the amount of information and stories they had committed to memory over the years and could recall and communicate when the tribe needed it. The medium matters.

Then, when the printed word began to become the primary medium for communication (especially in the western world after the invention of the printing press), it was no longer necessary to be in that kind of proximate communion to receive and transmit information. It was possible to communicate independent of an extended family or tribe or village. Information could be stored in a way that was not dependent on the memories of older members of the community. It became less and less important for survival and productivity to live in close-knit community. Our brains began to be good at processing and following ordered and logical arguments. Adulthood was delayed until a young person could become fully literate and access the information required for productivity in a print media dominated world, pushing adulthood to the late teens or early twenties. Those with power and authority tended to be those who were the most literate, the most able to follow and create the logical syllogisms and rational arguments that sprang up in a printing system dependent on the careful arrangement of the 26 symbols of western alphabets. (The impact of the print medium is all around us – prior to the Gutenberg bible, there were just open spaces for worshippers to gather. Shortly after the printing press, churches ordered their seating like the columns in the Bible.) The medium matters.

Today, the dominant media of our culture are technological and image-based. What’s on the surface matters most. Images access the emotional parts of our brains more directly than the printed word, and so how we feel about things matters more than it used to. Our brains are less developed in their capacity for rationality, and more attuned to certain forms of emotionality and empathy. Attention spans for rational argument have reduced dramatically. (some of you have already forgotten what we started talking about: In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways, 2but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son…”) Those with the ability to control images are beginning to have the most power and authority in our culture, along with those who are competent with the technology through which most of our information is accessed. There is a fuzziness about parent/child roles and adulthood as children sometimes have better access to information through their comfort with technology and facility with images than their parents. The medium matters.

Remember John 1: In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the Word was GodNo one is better at communication than God. God masterfully chooses the media that he uses to transmit his messages. Because, in a very central way, the medium is the message. When he speaks to Moses out of a burning bush, the words are part of the message, but so is the burning bush itself. Take off your shoes for you are on holy ground is reinforced by the mystery and power and unexpectedness of a bush on fire but not being consumed. It’s something that makes you draw near out of interest and intrigue, but also makes you afraid because of its otherness and danger. When God gives the law to Moses on stone tablets, the medium of carving in stone says these are commandments that are solid, reliable, unchanging, weighty, important, long lasting. The message would have been very different if they were given as handwriting on a beach at low tide, only to be washed away when the waves came in.

The message of Hebrews 1 is a message about the medium that God has finally chosen to use to communicate to us. Every other communication, every other message, every other medium has been building up to this most perfect message in this most perfect medium. Not a disembodied word in our heads. Not a burning bush. Not stone tablets. Not a cloud by day or fire by night. Not a tabernacle in the desert. Not powerful natural phenomena. But his Son. Jesus of Nazareth. The radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being in the divinely incarnated flesh and blood of Mary and Joseph’s son.

(“exact representation” = charakter = the stamp of the emperor on the coin, the most perfect kind of representation available in the ancient world; “of his being” = hypostasis = underlying nature or substance. In other words, not the exact representation of his image, like a coin would be, but the exact representation of God’s true nature)

God wants to communicate to us by coming among us a person who loves us. Who serves us. Who heals us. Who accepts the invitation to our parties. Who is not afraid of our diseases or our sin. Who listens to us. Who allows us to change his diapers and nail him to a cross. Who eats with us and drinks with us. Who is strong enough to stand up to our enemies. Who is vulnerable enough to bear our burdens. Who washes our feet. Who forgives us. Who we can accept and befriend and surrender to, or reject and wound and stand above and kick in the teeth.

God wants to communicate to us by coming among us as a person who gets to know us like he is one of us. Who suffers what we suffer. Who speaks our language and knows our lives. Who feels our fears and is tempted by our temptations. Who experiences our hunger and our thirst and our sorrows.

God communicates to us by coming among us as a person who knows the favor of his Father and is filled and enlivened with the presence of God’s mysterious and holy spirit. Who speaks with tender mercy to the broken and with unquestioned authority to the powers that be. Who defeats every darkness and radiates a light that outshines every lesser truth. Who walks simultaneously in humility and obedience on the one hand, and extraordinary power and creativity on the other. Who dies a sacrificial death and is raised to unprecedented resurrection life.

We may have never heard a single word that Jesus ever said, and yet still, if we have encountered Jesus, we have encountered God’s communication to us. And if we have heard every word that Jesus has said, but not encountered him, then we have missed the essence of what God wants to say to us. The medium is the message. Jesus is the message. His words and actions merely serve to amplify and explain and give commentary to the message that he already is.

Practical tips:

1. Look & Listen for Jesus. Do you want to know God more? Have meaningful communication with him, for example? Get a sense of what he might be saying to you? Or what he might be wanting to you to do? Start by asking him to reveal Jesus to you. Start by asking Jesus to show you more of himself. Find a place you can say it out loud: “Jesus, show yourself to me.” (I know that sounds very mystical. But the truth is, Jesus is alive and well and God desires personal relationship with you that involves communication and his most powerful communication is through this extraordinary person, Jesus. The tricky thing of course, is that Jesus is revealed to us today, since his ascension, through the Holy Spirit, and through his body, the church, and through the scriptures that bear witness to him. But nonetheless, through all of those, he makes himself personally known to us in a way that is God himself making himself known to us. Any communication from God that is not mediated through Jesus is less than communication mediated through him.)

2. Be Yourself. Do you want to be part of helping others to be in communion with God, as you’ve gotten to know him in Jesus? Be yourself. Your life is God’s communication to others about Jesus. You and your brothers and sisters are the medium that Jesus has chosen to reveal himself. You are part of the church, which is Jesus’ body. The commandments are no longer God’s preferred medium. A tract is not God’s preferred medium. A youtube video is not God’s preferred medium. A great sermon is not God’s preferred medium. A website with all the answers is not God’s preferred medium. We are. You, and your brothers and sisters, and me. We are. So be yourself with people. Be the broken person you still are. Be the transformed person you are becoming. Be the person full of new joys and hopes. Be the person with doubts and struggles. Be the person in whom God is alive and healing. Be the person who feels God’s absence at times and suffers setbacks. And let us together be a church coming among those who are suffering and broken and serving them and loving them and eating with them and who are not afraid of their diseases and their sins and who are strong enough to stand up to their enemies and vulnerable enough to bear their burdens and who are living in humility and obedience and who are demonstrating extraordinary power and creativity and who are dying sacrificial deaths and tasting resurrection life, and all the rest. The medium is the message, and Jesus will only be revealed through us as much as we are free to be ourselves with others, flexing our newly formed biceps and basking in a new awareness of our beauty, and not covering over our warts and wounds.

3. Read the gospels minus the red letters. Read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, skipping over Jesus’ words. Try to hear what God is saying through Jesus even without words.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Lament

sermon notes from the Vineyard Church of Milan 01/09/2011

Happy new year.

Sometimes that tiding carries with it a hollow ring, or at least the echo of hollowness, does it not?

Suicides... Deaths of friends and loved ones... Injuries and illness… Troubling relationships… Long standing struggles with yet to be determined outcomes... Existential crises... Even good things that cause mourning…

The promise of the gospel, the promise of Jesus, Immanuel, God with us, the promise of the good news of the Kingdom of God, of course, is that God enters into even those things to bring life to us, here and now. The promise, of course, is also that those things are passing away, that they will not be our companions forever. The promise is that Jesus, in entering them and taking them on his shoulders, has been given authority over all things and is in the process of setting everything right.

Yet.

Here we are. And here they are. The losses are real. And they are felt deeply and have real emotional and spiritual and mental and even physical effects. What are we to do in the midst of them?

[Summertime experience with Joel Seymour, Lancaster Vineyard…Jesus has something for us in that, but I’m not sure when…now is the time.]

Today we are going to talk about lamenting. The word lament means to grieve or let out a complaint. Lamenting is a way of engaging ourselves with God that has a long and important history in the scriptures. (The first lament recorded is “The lament of the Bow” that David wrote when King Saul and his son Jonathon were killed: “A gazelle lies slain on your heights, Israel. How the mighty have fallen…”) There are more psalms of lament than psalms of praise. There’s a whole book in the bible called Lamentations. Even Jesus laments.

Part of the challenge for us, though, is that our culture doesn’t do lamenting particularly well. Our culture respects people who grin and bear it. Our culture believes in the attractional power of positive thinking. Negative energy is something to be controlled and channeled into productive work. We want people to have a celebration of our lives when we die. This isn’t all bad, not by any measure, but it can come at a cost. And one of the costs is that we don’t come by healthy experiences of lamenting very naturally. [Compare a middle eastern funeral procession with a western one.]

Dr. Terry Wardle’s story of learning to shoot a bow with his Dad. Two rules.

1. Never “dry fire” a bow. Dry firing is shooting without an arrow on the string. Without an arrow, all the energy created from drawing and firing the bow stays in its limbs and weakens the bow, causing micro fractures, eventually causing it to snap. However, when an arrow is on the string, the energy leaves the bow and sends the arrow on its way. The limbs release all the power into the arrow and the limbs return to a state of rest without the slightest damage.

[Kinect Sports Volleyball…]

2. Only shoot at the target set in front of you. Otherwise you might hurt someone, or even yourself.

We’re dry firing all the time, aren’t we? Tough stuff happens, it’s present in our world, our lives, and it takes its toll. We’re like bows with all sorts of energy stored up in them. But we have nothing to transfer that energy to. We get cracks. We feel like we might snap the next time pressure is applied to us. We feel like bows that have been dry fired.

Or maybe we’re loading up arrows and firing them, but we’re shooting at the wrong targets. We’re lashing out, aimlessly, at whatever happens to be on the other end of our sights. At ourselves. Or others. All it does is wound. Nothing life-giving comes from it.

This is where lamenting comes in. A lament is like an arrow we affix to our strings and fire at God. The lament can transfer the energy of this broken world off our bows and let it fly straight and true to the target that has been given us to absorb it, allowing our limbs to return to a state of rest.

What does lamenting look like?

Consider Jesus in the garden on the Mount of Olives.

Step 1: Steal away with God in a safe place.

39Jesus went out as usual (came out and proceeded as was his custom) to the Mount of Olives, and his disciples followed him…He withdrew about a stone’s throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed, 42“Father, if you are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but yours be done.” 43An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. 44And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.

Luke 22v39-41

Notice how Jesus has a habit of pushing the pause button in life. He’s got a time and a space to do it. And during one of these pauses, he withdraws even further. The rush of life will get in the way of lamenting, so we’ve got to push the pause button to do it. This perhaps is why it’s difficult for us moderns, what with all our hustle and bustle. But it’s not impossible. And it is way better than the halt that comes to life after dry-firing too often.

And notice how Jesus is in a safe place, a place he feels good. Lamenting happens best when we can find a place we feel safe, secure, at home. Kind of like in our mother’s arms, right? Maybe a place in nature, or in our homes. But also private, secluded, protected so we won’t be interrupted (Jesus disciples nearby). Maybe it happens in a less idyllic real-world place, but we enter some equally real place with God in prayer, through our praying imaginations (even though we may be in a bathroom, for example, or in our car at the top of a parking garage.)

[My first lament after “A River Runs Through It”; to God, but Ronni there with me]

Step 2: Express yourself without censoring anything.

36Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” 37He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. 38Then he said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.”

39Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.”

40Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. “Couldn’t you men keep watch with me for one hour?” he asked Peter. 41“Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.”

42He went away a second time and prayed, “My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done.”

43When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. 44So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing.

Notice how open Jesus is with how troubled he is. My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death…My Father, if it’s possible, may this cup be taken from me (which he repeats 3 times – there’s no holding back going on here.)…even his address to his disciples: “Couldn’t you keep watch with me for one hour?” This is a man who has abandoned politeness for the sake of lamenting honestly before God.

Expressing the full extent of the pain (at least, as much as you can identify) is the real payload on the arrow, it’s the arrowhead of the lament. It doesn’t have to be cleaned up. Its better, sometimes, if it’s not. Here’s what I lost. Here’s why it sucks. This is what doesn’t feel fair. This is the future I had imagined, and now it’s gone. This is the past I wished I had, and I never got to have it. This is the present reality I’d been looking forward to, and what I meet now that I’ve arrived just doesn’t measure up, and this is how that makes me feel.

Sure, we feel like we shouldn’t blame people. Sure, we feel like we need to take responsibilities for our own stuff. Sure, we feel like we need to let God know we don’t think the world revolves around us. But still. The Lament has no power if it is not honest. And sometimes, the honest truth is that we feel others are to blame, or that we have been wronged on balance, or that we have gotten the short end of God’s attentions. The power of the lament is to deliver all of that to him, knowing that he can handle it. Sometimes, in flight, the wind removes the things that are false from that arrow, and God returns it to us, ready to be shot clean and afresh.

Step 3: Listen for God’s response.

43An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him.

The cause for the lament was not undone. Jesus would still have to go to suffer. Yes, God will address the sources of our lament. He is not deaf to our concerns. But the point of the lament is not to get God to fix everything we’re upset about it. He may. He may not. He may later. He may already have and we don’t know it yet.

What God did do was send a messenger with strength for Jesus. This is the point of the Lament. Strength from the heavens for the path we are given to walk here on earth. Maybe it comes in a word of truth from the Spirit about the area of loss you are lamenting. Maybe it comes from something a friend says to you. Maybe it comes from a passage of scripture you are directed towards that strengthens you. Maybe it comes from a sense of God’s embrace and presence in the midst of your loss.

[My experience recently…]

The net effect of lamenting is really quite profound.

For Jesus, it meant he was able to be in control on the path he was on instead of being controlled by it.

Then he returned to the disciples and said to them, “Are you still sleeping and resting? Look, the hour is near, and the Son of Man is delivered into the hands of sinners. Rise! Let us go! Here comes my betrayer!”

Throughout the rest of the story, you get the sense that the only one who is fully in charge of himself is Jesus, even though these incredibly powerful forces are at work around him (the mob, the political and religious leaders, evil itself). In lamenting, he gave all of their power over him to God, and he was set free to be who God made him to be in those moments.

It’s interesting if you read the Psalms of lament as well. So many that contain laments end with a note of praise, of hope. There is something that happens in lamenting that opens the door afresh in our hearts for hope. There is a way we encounter God in lament that gives us new reason to praise, even though nothing has actually happened with regard to the loss we are lamenting.

Practical Tips:

1. For those for whom there’s no really raw losses to lament at the moment: Take the next week to lament 1 thing a day, just to get the hang of it for when you really need it. Maybe start with a run-of-the-mill disappointment. Not getting a promotion. Some personal deficiency that’s always bothered you a little (not being able to sing, being bad at sports, being terrible at math). Try a different place each day until you find a place that works well (someplace in your house, someplace outside, in your car, etc.). Try a different method until you find a method that works well (writing, speaking out loud, praying in your head, calling your own voicemail and imagining your leaving a message for God). Aim for a 60 second lament, but go as long as you feel like it. Be as honest as you can. If you feel like it’s fruitful, try something more significant. Like a relationship that isn’t in good shape. Or a long term personal struggle. Don’t worry about who is to blame or whether or not you think it will ever be fixed. Just lament it as the loss that it currently is.

2. If you’ve got a raw loss (a death, a fresh relationship fracture, a major life disappointment, a new normal ahead that you’re not excited about), get a friend or spouse who can help guard some time and space for you to do a more extended lament with the Lord. Maybe start with Psalm 13, out loud, to get yourself warmed up. And then just go for it. Write it down. Say it out loud. Say it matter of factly. Cry. Or don’t cry. Be angry. Or rational and calm. Doesn’t matter – just be yourself. Then imagine Jesus is next to you, doing his own lamenting alongside of you. Imagine you are both in the garden at the mount of Olives, lamenting together. When you’re done, read Psalm 22 out loud, remembering that that was how Jesus finished his lament on the cross.

3. If your lament is mainly about you and God, spend some time meditating on Lamentations 3:1-33. Try rewriting it in a way that would be true for your experience. Once you have, read it out loud to him.

4. Give your kids space to lament. What they learn to do with you will help them lament to the Lord later.