13th Annual Matthew Shepard Sermon

I had a chance to preach this past Sunday at Trinity Parish Episcopal Church in Seattle, Washington.  The invitation to preach this sermon came to me after DBCC's April 17 congregational vote to stop signing marriage licenses as show of good faith to our LGBTQ members. The folks at Trinity Parish couldn't have been kinder.

You can read the full text of the sermon below. The audio file is at the very bottom of the post. You can subscribe to our podcast and catch all of the sermons at DBCC and special events like the Matthew Shepard Sermon. 

We gather here today, of course, to offer up our worship to God.  As the sursum cordareminds us, "It is meet and right so to do."   In the process, we also seek to commemorate the life of a gay man who was left to die alone.  Thirteen years ago, 2 men took Matthew Shepard from a bar in an automobile, robbed him, pistol-whipped him, tortured him, and tied him to a fence to die alone in the night.  He didn't die on the fence, because a passerby the next morning saw him.  He died 5 days later in a hospital, on October 12, 1998--a victim of senseless violence against somebody on the margins.

That Matthew Shepard was gay apparently gave those two men all the motive they needed to inflict as much damage as venal little minds could concoct.

In the years since, Matthew Shepard has become a symbol of all that hatred can do when unleashed on the world. 

It makes me wonder how you get to that point?  How do you turn your fear of that which is different into something so potent that when it breaks over the levies, everything in its way gets swallowed up in in death?

Fear of what's different?  That doesn't sound altogether right.  Of course, fear of what's different is a part of it.  But that seems too easy, frankly.  Fear of what's different is the standard answer in cases like these.

But why do we fear what's different?  I think it has something to do with the fear that we're insignificant, with our insecurities about the potential meaninglessness of our lives.  Our confidence in our own agency is so tenuous that whatever stands over against how we view the world is a threat.  We know enough native logic that A cannot simultaneously be non A.  That is to say, we know, for instance, that "World Series Champion" cannot be used as an antecedent qualifier for "Chicago Cubs."  The universe just isn't structured to allow a thing to be itself and its opposite at the same time.  We know this.

For two men in Wyoming thirteen years ago, the prospect of homosexuality coexisting in a world with "natural" sexual affinities was logically impossible.  Matthew Shepard's existence itself threatened a whole way of construing the world.

If your world is threatened, if your equilibrium is disrupted, you've got to figure out what you're going to do to restore stasis.  If violence is all you know, violence is what you bring to the existential party.

Insecurity.  Fear.  Meaninglessness.  They stand as roadblocks to an otherwise satisfying existence.

It happens.

A few years after Matthew Shepard died, on a gray day in November 2000, when the sky looked like lead and the leaves had all vanished, I went to Creech Funeral Home in Middlesboro, Kentucky, down in Appalachia where I lived, to perform a funeral for Bryan Landon.  I didn’t know Bryan; he’d spent most of his adult life up in Louisville—where he’d finally succumbed to the ravages of AIDS.  My friend Bill, the funeral director, had asked me the day before if I’d perform the funeral, since Bryan didn’t have a church home, and his family refused to provide assistance because they disapproved of his “lifestyle.”  I said I’d be happy to do what I could.  Bill said to me, “But I want you to know right off the bat that, because he was estranged from his family and his church, there might not be many folks there.”  “Not a problem,” I said.

But as I walked into the funeral home on a cold November day, it occurred to me that I’d not absorbed the full implications of Bill’s warning . . . not many people had shown up.  And by “not many” I mean, nobody had shown up.  I waited in the funeral home chapel for five minutes or so after the funeral was supposed to have started—just Bryan Landon and me. Finally, Bill came into the back of the chapel with someone I didn’t know offhand.  She sat in the back row.  Bill made his way up front.  And I said, “Oh good.  Is that a member of his family?”

“No,” he said, “that’s the woman who cleans for us.”

I looked at him, puzzled.  He said, “Well, buddy, in 25 years as a funeral director, I’ve never had a funeral where nobody showed up, and I figured somebody besides you and I ought to bear witness to this man’s passing.”

And so, on a gray November day in 2000, along with a funeral director and a cleaning woman, I buried Bryan Landon.  He died of AIDS.  Nobody who knew him came to witness that he’d ever even walked this earth.  He had a family; he’d had friends along the way; he grew up in the Baptist church, singing Jesus Loves the Little Children—all the children of the world.  But in the end, nobody came to claim him, to speak words over him, to call him a child of God.   So, we three strangers wound up offering him up to God on the wings of weary and bedraggled prayers, clinging to all the hope we could muster in a gray place.

What continues to haunt me about that day, though, is that I still cannot find words to express the sadness, the outrage, the terribleness of it all.  Where was the church for Bryan Landon?

Where's the church on this whole issue of our brothers and sisters created by God gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, transgendered?  Who stands up for them?  And what would it even look like to stand up?  I think that's the question raised by Matthew Shepard's death, by Bryan Landon's death.  What would it take for the church to make a difference in a world where people are killed, bullied, and abandoned for being who God created them to be?  What would it take?

Jesus, in our Gospel for today, has been in a long conversation with the Chief Priest and the elders of the temple.  The occasion that prompted this conversation was the first act that Jesus performed after entering Jerusalem on a donkey, way back at the beginning of chapter 21.  Remember that?  Jesus comes into Jerusalem, now a few days prior to his death, to the enthusiastic support of the people--who are convinced he's the Messiah . . . the long awaited political/military leader who will lead a revolution to oust the Roman occupation.

That little parade makes the hairs on the back of the necks of the political leadership stand up.

His first act after entering to a chorus of "Hosannas" was to go straight to the temple and start turning over the lemonade stands, telling the folks in charge that they've destroyed God's house of prayer, made it a den of robbers.  Remember that?

What happens next, though, is the really telling part of the story.  Jesus, it says in verse 14, after revealing the people entrusted with the caretaking of God's house as frauds, welcomes the blind and the lame to the temple, and he heals them.

Isn't that great?  Jesus calls out the big shots, and right under their noses receives with open arms the people those big shots have assiduously attempted to exclude.

This little jaunt into the temple makes the hairs on the back of the necks of thereligious leadership stand up.

In fact, they're so annoyed with Jesus that they button-hole him the next day, and ask him by what authority he's doing all this stuff.  Just who does he think he is?

So Jesus launches into a series of parables to tell the religious leaders who he thinks he is, and perhaps just as importantly, who he doesn't think they are.

Our parable, the parable of the wedding banquet is the third in this series, all keyed by, I would like to suggest, Jesus making a statement about who should be allowed into God's house--and what God thinks of the leaders who're supposed to be running things.

So, our parable for today, involves a king who's going to give a wedding banquet for his son.  Each time the king sends out the wedding invitations, however, they're rudely declined.  The king asks for the pleasure of his subjects' presence at a wonderful occasion, but they're preoccupied by tending to other things--things they're convinced are more important than whatever the king has in mind.

In an honor/shame based culture like that prevalent in the ancient Near East, this was the granddaddy of all social snubs.  You don't turn down a king, then beat and kill the king's slaves.

This, of course, enrages the king--so he turns over every lemonade stand in the country.   Then, what does the king do?  He invites in everybody else who wasn't important enough to get an invitation the first time around--both the good and the bad.  The king throws an enormous shindig for folks on the margins, welcoming all those people who're used to being left out of the important stuff, those who've been abused, pushed aside, excluded, those who've been bullied and abandoned to die alone.

For, you see, the kingdom of God does not exist where some are not welcome … where the lame and the blind, where the tax collectors and prostitutes, where the hungry and the poor stand on the outside looking in.  The kingdom of God does not exist where people are barred entrance because of sexual orientation or identity, because of race or immigration status.

There doesn’t have to be a sign on the door that says, “You’re not welcome here.”  People know.

Well, then, how do we tell people they're welcome?

People will finally know they're welcome–not because we advertise our solidarity (as important as that is)–but because we show them … we keep throwing open the doors and inviting people to come in.  We keep working on behalf of those who’ve been turned away by the very people who are important enough to get invited to the party.  We keep standing side by side with those left to die alone.

Ok.  That's fine.  Nice words.  But what does it mean to do the things you're saying?  What would it take for the church to accept the host's invitation to attend the party right alongside those who've been systematically told they're not welcome?

Peter Velander gives us a glimpse of what it might look like, what it I think it takes.

He writes: “I remember the day I learned to hate racism.  I was five years old."

“The walk home from school was only about five blocks.  I usually walked with some friends.  On this day I walked alone.  Happy, but in a hurry, I decided to take the shortcut through the alley.  Without a care in the world I careened around the corner.  Then I looked up—too late to change course.  I had walked in on a back-alley beating.

“There were three big white kids.  In retrospect they were probably no more than sixth graders, but they looked like giants from my kindergarten perspective.  There was one black kid.  He was standing against a garage, his hands behind his back.  The three white kids were taking turns punching him.  They laughed.  He stood silently except for the involuntary groans that followed each blow.

“And now I was caught.  One of the three grabbed me and stood me in front of their victim.  “You take a turn,” he said.  “Hit the ______!”  (I’m not going to say it; you know what they said.)  Velander said, “I stood paralyzed.”

“Hit him or you’re next!” the giant shouted at me.  So I did.  I feigned a punch.  I can still feel the soft fuzz of that boy’s turquoise sweater as my knuckles gently touched his stomach.  I don’t know how many punches there were.  I don’t know how long he had to stand backed up against that garage.  After my minute participation in the conspiracy they let me go and I ran.  I ran home crying and sick to my stomach.  I have never forgotten.

“Thirty-five years later that event still preaches a sermon to me every time I remember it.  One can despise, decry, denounce, and deplore something without ever being willing to suffer, or even be inconvenienced, to bring about change.  If there is one thing that Jesus taught us it was how to suffer with and for others.

“Jesus walked the way of the cross.  He taught us the meaning of suffering as a servant.  Perhaps my first chance to follow that example came in the ally by a garage thirty-five years ago.

“I don’t know if that black boy from the alley grew up, or where he lives, or what he does today.  I never knew his name.  I wish I did.  I wish I could find him.  I need to ask his forgiveness—not for the blow I delivered, for it was nothing, but for the blows I refused to stand by his side and receive.  I think that’s what it takes.”

That's not easy.  That's not get-up-and-go-to-church-on-Sunday-morning easy.  It's hard.  I know.  Standing up for people this culture doesn't think are worth it is hard, painful work.

But, as Father Daniel Berrigan said, "If you want to follow Jesus, you'd better look good on wood."

You see, the truth of the matter is, as a people who claim to follow a savior who was strapped to his own rough cut piece of lumber and left to die alone, we can't stand idly by and watch the world do that to even one more person.

Matthew Shepard.  Bryan Landon.  Jesus.

It's time for the rest of the children of God to stand by the side of those forgotten, abused, bullied, and left to die alone . . . and take some blows.

I think that's what it takes.

-Amen.

Matthew Shepard Sermon

Honesty Isn't Our Policy

Honesty, as the saying goes, is always the best policy.  If we believe that, the question is: Do we practice it?  Do we live our lives truthfully?  Now, someone might object that telling the truth and living the truth are two different animals.  That is to say, the question of telling the truth without living that truth begs the question about whether it is possible to be Charles Manson (i.e., a complete schmuck) and still speak something approximating the truth, inasmuch as it is argued that the truth is not contingent on anything outside itself to be true.  In other words, one account of the truth maintains that there is something that exists independently, objectively “out there” that is called the “Truth.”  What one needs to do when there exists competing truth claims, goes the thinking, is to appeal to the “objective standard” of “Truth.”

This formula works serviceably well when the question has to do with whether or not 2 + 2 = 4 or whether the population of Louisville is larger than that of Lexington.  If, however, the question raised is whether or not University of Louisville fans are less dedicated fans than University of Kentucky fans or whether or not Christianity is true, to what uncontestable “objective standard” does one appeal?

Absolutism, or the belief, not merely that there is an “absolute truth” but that that “absolute truth” can be apprehended by human beings—if they only “try hard enough”—is a difficult argument to sustain, just to the extent that it is possible to have two reasonably intelligent, reasonably passionate, reasonably sincere individuals disagree on where to go to find the absolute truth that will settle their argument.  Should they look in the Bible?  The Koran?  The Bhagavad-Gita?  The DaVinci Code?  Dr. Phil?  The periodic table of elements? Who gets to decide what’s true?  Or where do we expect to find the true account of truth to which everyone will defer?  Absolutism runs the risk in the end of only being able to communicate by monologue.

“Does that mean,” as many will quickly ask, “that everything is relative?  That there are no standards of truth to which we may appeal?  Do we throw our hands up in the air because there is finally no way to adjudicate between competing truth claims?”  No.  Relativism, as a set of truth claims, collapses under its own weight.  As James McClendon has pointed out: “As a general theory [relativism] seems to ask us to believe (a) that it is (in general) true, and (b) that nothing is (in general) true—and both can’t be the case” (Ethics: Systematic Theology, Abingdon, 1986, 350). Relativism as a theory of knowledge is logically absurd—or should we say, it’s only relatively true—whatever that means.

Therefore, to assert that honesty is the best policy is only to have begun the discussion, not to have settled it.  If absolutism is problematic and relativism is logically indefensible, how are we supposed to talk about truth?  Or as Pilate put the question to Jesus, “What is truth?” (John 18:38)

When asked “What is truth?” how did Jesus respond?  We are left to assume that Jesus said nothing, because Pilate immediately left Jesus and went outside to address the Jews.  Why didn’t Jesus say, “The truth is x, y, and z, and you would know that if you only studied your _______?”  Or why didn’t Jesus say, “Truth is such a slippery subject, I’m not sure we ought to waste time trying to nail it down to a single definition.  After all, all definitions are ultimately equal?”  In fact Jesus let the silence hang in the air, as if to say, “If you want to know what truth is, look at me.  I am the way, the truth, and the life.”

In a world in which we seem incapable of sustaining a conversation about truth between faith systems, perhaps the only way we have of judging their truthfulness is by observing the kinds of people they produce.  It seems to me that the only way we have of judging the truthfulness of a particular set of truth claims is by examining whether, and to what extent, there exists a people capable of embodying those claims.  That is to say, are the people named by a particular truth claim living the truth to which they appeal, or more to the point, are they living truthfully?  Do people who claim to follow Jesus, for example, live in ways that honor Jesus’ commitments?  Or, as Samuel Wells remarks: “Pragmatic tests of Christianity focus on Christian tradition and the ‘richness of moral character’ it produces in much the same way that science judges its theories by the fruitfulness of the activities they generate, and significant works of art become so in the light of the interpretation and criticism that surround them” (Transforming Fate into Destiny, Cascade Books, 1998, 86).

If I am right that the only real way to decide between two truth-claims from competing systems of belief is to look to the sorts of communities of character they produce, and if the only way to judge communities of character is by whether they produce people capable of living the claims they espouse, then living truthfully is the only way to establish the truth of those claims.  Put another way, brick-layers lay brick, cooks cook, and Christians live like Jesus.  Clearly, not everyone who wears the name has mastered all the practices necessary to be named a master craftsman in these crafts, but the shape of one’s life is determined by one’s commitment to living faithfully with the name—brick-layer, cook, Christian.  It is, after all, possible to take any of those names in vain by failing to practice, or practicing poorly, the disciplines of each craft.

However, when practiced well the very product of the craft (i.e., the wall, the cake, the life) stands as legitimating evidence of the value and veracity of the craft.  Consequently, for Christians, living truthfully isn’t only a matter of practicing the craft of Christianity well; it is the very means by which the truthfulness of Christianity is judged in a world where truth claims abound and compete.  In other words, speaking the truth is the product of a truthful life.

Sermon Podcast: "Pressing On" (Phil. 3:4b–14)

In today's sermon, Rev. Penwell explores the past as it relates to our future and what it means to run in a race that has already been won.

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"Pressing On" by Rev. Derek Penwell

The Hands of a Living God

“It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb. 10:31).

“We die and we die and we die, not only physically—within seven years every cell in our body is renewed—but emotionally and spiritually as change seizes us by the scruff of the neck and drags us forward into another life. We are not here simply to exist. We are here in order to become” (Susan Howatch, Absolute Truths).

The writer of Hebrews writes a letter to a community that was apparently on the verge of reconsidering its commitment to Christ. The author uses an extended argument to demonstrate to the reader that living as a Christian, as painful as it might be because of institutionalized persecution, is superior to their former lives. Commitment to Jesus surpasses all other attempts at worshiping God. Apparently, however, the readers of the letter to the Hebrews were having second thoughts, and were beginning to abandon their faith in Christ in favor of their former attachments.

The Hebrews’ writer writes: “How much worse punishment do you think will be deserved by those who have spurned the Son of God, profaned the blood of the covenant by which they were sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of Grace?” (Heb. 10:29). In effect, the Hebrews writer says, “You can’t go back.”

Let’s be honest: there are times when each of us wishes our faith didn’t ask as much from us. We wind up organizing church events for people who don’t come. We have to get out of bed on our only day off. We can’t do all the things that television causes to look so appetizing. Then we start to think that our faith is certainly cumbersome, not allowing us to do all the things we’d like. And we wonder what life would be like if we didn’t have God telling us what to do all the time, which we guiltily admit to ourselves sounds pretty good.

Prayer starts to come harder. We begin to think of places where we can get a better return on our hard-earned money. Lies come easier. We find an unlimited number of excuses for being away from the Lord’s Table.

God, this whole faith thing is costing an awful lot more than I expected. Can’t we just tone it down some? No sense being fanatical about it, is there? I thought faith was supposed to help me feel better about myself.

All of a sudden, we hear the echoes of the Hebrew writer saying, “You can’t turn back. You can’t return to the security of your former life, because you died and your life is hidden now in Christ. You must stay the course. You must grow.”

“But it asks so much of me.”

“We are not here simply to exist. We are here in order to become.”

“I don’t know if I’ll survive the changes God requires of me.”

“One thing’s for sure: you won’t survive not changing—because not changing is, by definition, death.”

“But, I’m afraid.”

“It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living God.”

Integrity Can Be Lonely

“All of them deserted him and fled” (Mark 14:51).

I was reading an article not long ago about a famous preacher. One of his admirers made the comment that one could tell this preacher’s ministry had “integrity” by virtue of the number of people in his church (50 bazillion people, or some other astronomical number). I often hear something closely approximating that same sentiment from well-meaning church folk. I was talking to a colleague on the phone awhile back, when the topic of one of this state’s “premiere” evangelists arose (I’m not sure how “premiere” qualifies as a theological descriptor). He said: “Well, look how many people he draws. He must be doing something right.” To which I replied, “Obviously, he’s doing something right — but it may or may not have anything to do with God, or faithfulness, or discipleship.”

I was taken aback by the assumptions underlying such a statement, that is, that God is most intensely present in the large, the successful, the well-attended. I am amazed that people who read the Bible are still naïve enough to make comments to the effect that the bigger the church, the more “integrity” is in evidence. If mere size is the only criterion for judging faithfulness, then Jim Jones had more integrity, was blessed in richer fashion than 99% of the ministers in the world. If size is what God uses to show us who is doing a better job at proclaiming the Gospel, then the bozos on televisions who preside over vast broadcasting empires are, by definition, closer to the kingdom of heaven than the rest of us laboring in tiny, “unblessed” congregations lacking “integrity.”

On the other hand, that leaves us in pretty good company—I mean, what with Jesus dying abandoned and alone—presumably stripped of his blessedness and integrity. (His ministry fell on hard times. I imagine it was hard to make budget after Good Friday.) Where did we get the idea that if it is getting bigger, God must be in the middle of it? Is God to be found in the market analysis? If popularity is the standard by which faithfulness in ministry is judged, then Jesus is not the person we ought to hold up as the standard-bearer for our vocation. Because Jesus nailed all that hooey about popularity and big crowds and succeeding according to this world’s standards on a cross one Friday afternoon. Tell Jesus how blessed he was as you stare into his face on the cross. (Just try not to get any blood on yourself. It can get messy being a Christian.)

That is not to say that the Gospel doesn’t have appeal; it does. But any appeal that Jesus has has to do with losing our lives, with turning the other cheek, with the first being last, with forgiving our enemies and those who persecute us, with selling all that we have and giving it to the poor, with dropping our nets and all the things the world says we need to be successful, in order to pick up our crosses and follow him. (Try selling that stuff with your anointed prayer cloths. “User-friendly God,” indeed.) The appeal of Jesus is to the last, the least, the lost, and the dead—presumably because they are the only ones who know that they aren’t successful enough to sail in under their own steam. At least in the gospels, it is precisely the big religious muckity-mucks that Jesus avoids like the plague. Jesus isn’t impressed with toothy smiles, blow-dried hair, and healthy Neilsen ratings. He spends his time with those that this world has declared losers.

Jesus doesn’t call us to succeed; he calls us to die. Success is his alone; and alone is how he died. Sometimes, integrity can be lonely.

Sermon Podcast: "The Trouble with Forgiveness" (Matthew 18:21–35)

On the tenth anniversary of 9/11/01, Rev. Penwell preaches a gospel of forgiveness.

There are no easy answers.

Maybe that's the good news.



Click the link below for the sermon audio or just subscribe to our podcast in iTunes and you won't miss a single sermon…

"The Trouble with Forgiveness" by Rev. Derek Penwell

Tying It All Together

 When God created us, God gave us a special gift unique to human beings.  It has to do with our ability to think.  Of course, other animals can think—they have a sort of rationality we recognize.  What sets humans apart is our ability to think about thinking.  Put differently, we have an awareness that ties our past, present, and future together in, what we experience as, a long and consistent chain of consciousness.  Not only do we have memories, for instance, we can recall those memories, enjoy them, study them, and in some ways re-live them as often as we need to.  It is our memories that give us the wisdom we need to flourish in the present, and the confidence that our lives will continue to have meaning in the future.

The church, from its earliest days, has recognized the need to be intentional about attending to memory.  Every Sunday we eat a meal that recalls for us the saving love of God that has formed us into the people we are—which calls attention to a larger, but often unremarked truth: communities have memories.  And community memory must be just as assiduously attended as our personal memories.  In fact, we say that the table set by Lord is a table of remembrance.  Every time we gather around that table we set about the practice of remembering.  But a big part of what communion accomplishes goes beyond rehearsing the story of Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection—as important as that is.  As the body of Christ, every time we come to the table we not only remember, but we re-member everyone who gathers around the table with us, past, present, and future.  In other words, the body of Christ consists of all those members who not only spread across the globe, but who spread across time.  We are who we are because of those who’ve gone before, and those whose way we are presently preparing.

Douglass Boulevard Christian Church has a memory that stretches over parts of three centuries.  At present we‘re experiencing feelings of great anticipation about what the future holds.  We’ve had many new faces in our midst who lead us to think about the possibilities ahead of us, and that alert us to God’s movement in our community.  It’s an exciting time to be at DBCC.

But as aware of the future as we are, we cannot leave the past behind.  As William Faulkner said, “The past isn’t dead.  It isn’t even past.”  That is no less true in the church, where, surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, we’re aware that who we are is inexorably linked to who we’ve been.  As we chart new courses, discerning God’s future, it’s important to remind ourselves that we’re not departing from or abandoning our past, we’re extending it.  That is to say, we’re carrying it with us everywhere we go, with everything we do (whether we want to or not).  The new kinds of ministries we’re engaged in at DBCC aren’t a departure from, but a continuation of the kinds of ministries we’ve always been engaged in—social justice, spirituality, compassion, and education.  We are busy carrying on the tradition that was lovingly stewarded, then handed down to us by those who came before.

On the surface, what we do may look different from what we’ve done in the past, but at its heart, our first responsibility—which is to to equip disciples for the reign of God—remains the same; and it ties together our past, our present, and our future.

Sermon Podcast: "Treat 'em Like Gentiles"

Here's this weeks's sermon podcast, "Treat 'em Like Gentiles" delivered by Rev. Derek Penwell:

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Treat ‘em Like Gentiles (Matt. 18:15–20)

We live in a society that’s grown increasingly permissive. That’s not news to you, right? Scandals in politics, in the church. Corruption. Violence. Treachery. You stay out of my business, and I’ll stay out of yours.

We’ve come a long way down some very undesirable roads, both as a nation and as a church. With the media and liberal preachers forever expounding on the virtues of “tolerance and diversity,” we bought into the lie that it doesn’t matter what I do, as long as nobody gets hurt. And the logical conclusion of such an argument is that nobody (and I mean nobody) better tell me how I’m supposed to live. How I choose to live my life is my decision, it’s between God and me. Butt out!

Of course, it hasn’t always been that way. There was a time when the needs of the community superseded the demands of the individual. But to say that today is to be labeled a socialist. There was a time, however, when the church had authority, and that authority meant something. And with all the permissiveness in our culture, it doesn’t seem too outrageous to think that the church might move to regain some of that authority. It has to do something. The church can’t stand idly by while everything deteriorates. There has to be accountability somewhere.

Sermon Podcast: "The Gates of Hell"

Rev. Derek Penwell preaches on Matthew 16 13–21, in which Simon Peter first articulates the disciples' belief that Jesus is "the Messiah, Son of the Living God."

In this passage, it's clear that Jesus sees a church playing offense--marching on the gates of Hell. After establishing that he's uncomfortable with martial metaphors for the reign of God, Rev. Penwell asks what weapons are we to use? The answer is in the passage following today's gospel, Matthew 16:21: "From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and undergo great suffering at the hands of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised."

Suffering, sacrifice, and death are the weapons of Christians. That is, as Christians we must be prepared to stand beside the oppressed and marginalized and receive the same blows they do.

It's all we've got. It's enough.

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"The Gates of Hell" by Rev. Penwell

I'm a Minister

I’m a minister.  Which is to say, I work as a minister in a church.  Historically, I’ve found myself reluctant to offer that bit of information in casual conversation, not because ministry occupies a position inherently more shameful than a host of other vocational options, but because when people find out that I’m a minister they either want me to answer their questions about I watch TBN, or they want to impart some theological nugget they’ve mined from The Prayer of Jabez or The Left Behind series.  Please don’t misunderstand—I like questions.  In fact I entered the ministry because of some of the questions I had about life and its ultimate meaning.  My problem lies not in questions in themselves, but in questions about whether or not I believe that the World Council of Churches, Democratic politicians, and certain cartoon characters on prime time television form a shady cabal intent on ushering in the anti-Christ and a one-world government—complete with standard issue UPC codes emblazoned on everyone’s forehead, or whether I’ve finally come to my senses and realized that mega-churches are the goal of God’s reign here on earth.

The fact is I like being a minister, in large part, because of the conversations that attach to a life spent following such a strange, quixotic, compelling character as Jesus.  The conversations, however, that seem to me to be important to have center on questions of justice, non-violence, grace, faithfulness, friendship, and devotion, rather than the sort of mass-produced fare provided by a popular religious culture that asks nothing more of Christians than that they act nice, refrain from swearing in public, and support any military action proposed by the American government as, ipso facto, God’s will.

To put a finer point on it, I like being a minister at Douglass Boulevard Christian Church.  I’m blessed to belong to a community of faith that takes seriously our call to live out the example of Jesus in the best way we know how.  DBCC is a community unafraid to take a chance on following Jesus down a dark alley.  I like that.  I like the sense of adventure I find at DBCC, as well as the adventurous thoughts I have when I think about what we can do together.

I guess this is all a long way of saying that my thoughts about ministry have evolved since coming to Douglass.  Many of the things I do don’t even feel particularly like work.  In fact, now when I’m asked what I do, I tell people I’m a minister at this really great church that seeks justice for the marginalized, that provides embrace for those who’ve been excluded, that looks into the eyes of the forgotten and says, “You’re welcome here.”  Though we’re not perfect, we are constantly looking for ways to grow and be better.

I’m a minister.  I just thought you should know.

Bonus Podcast: "Ave Maria"

This is too good! People who were there will agree, that the audio doesn't do the performance justice. It was goosebumps in the sanctuary on Sunday.

Click the link below for the audio or just subscribe to our podcast in iTunes and you won't miss a single episode…

"Ave Maria" performed by the DBCC Choir

"The Mercy of Bread" (Matthew 15:21–28)

Back from vacay, Derek preaches on the Canaanite woman with a demon-afflicted daughter who has the audacity to approach Jesus. In other words, he preaches about marginalization.

Our culture is so good at teaching us who we can safely ignore, but coming to the table each week reminds us that no one can ever be expendable again.

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"The Mercy of Bread" by Rev. Derek Penwell

Mary Ann Lewis: "What If..."

Both Derek and Ryan are on vacation, so DBCC has a chance to hear from Rev. Mary Ann Lewis, one of the (many) ministers in our pews each Sunday.

Preaching on Matthew 14:22–33, Rev. Lewis reminds us that God doesn’t expect us to walk on water; but, God does expect us to get out of the boat and serve as God’s partner in the continuing unfolding of creation.

Despite our fears (of failure, of loss of agency), the right question isn’t “What happens if we do?” The right question is, “What happens if I don’t?”

We must make room in our hearts for the claim of God on our own lives.

***
Derek and Ryan should leave town more often! This is a great sermon.

Click the link below for the sermon audio or just subscribe to our podcast in iTunes and you won't miss a single sermon…

"What If..." by Rev. Mary Ann Lewis

Who's Steering This Thing?

"Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth.  Serve the LORD with fear, with trembling kiss his feet, or he will be angry, and you will perish in the way; for his wrath is quickly kindled.  Happy are all who take refuge in him" (Psalm 2:10-12).

In the uncertainty leading up to an agreement on raising the debt ceiling, the financial markets have taken a hit.  As I write this the Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Dow Jones is posting its "first seven session slide since July 2010."  Republicans and Democrats are fighting it out to to see who will be able to claim to represent "what the American people" want.  What bothers me, though, is that while both are laying claim to exceptional financial vision, they will try to situate themselves as having been right all along, while both will say that the other side of the aisle has been hopelessly tone-deaf to the needs of "the American people," and is therefore incapable of managing the ship of state.  Inherent in such a political argument is that somebody, or some party of somebodies is ultimately in control—that all that stands between us and happiness and prosperity is the right political representation and the silencing of the opponent.  Precious time is wasted while the parties speak about their ability to exert dominion over the economy.  I hope the irony doesn’t escape us.

I love to feel in control.  I imagine, therefore, that other people feel this way.  Further, I imagine that people who have power are prone to feeling this way (which is probably why they got into the power business in the first place).  The illusion that we can ultimately order our world in such a way as to preclude inconveniences like poverty, crime, racism, discrimination, and danger is presumptuous at best, and idolatrous at worst.  We live and move and have our being in ways that suggest we have conjured up life, movement, and existence by our own initiative — by having such things as a sound domestic policy and a strong military.  We have repeatedly failed to see that life itself is a gift.  We have no more real control over our world than we have over God.

And maybe that is the point: We think perhaps that by our tireless organizing and speculating and legislating that we can finally impose order on God — and in the process become (of sorts) gods ourselves.  The problem with that, of course, is that God is even more stubborn about maintaining control than we are.

Thank goodness for that.

Now therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth.

"You Give Them Something to Eat"

Returning from the church's mission trip to Casa Hogar children's home in San Luis Potosi, Rev. Derek Penwell delivers "You Give Them Something to Eat," a sermon based on Matthew 14:13-21.

Loaves, fishes, transactional equity, and Al Sharpton. Hang on tight!

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"You Give Them Something to Eat" by Rev. Derek Penwell

True Nonconformity

“Instead, put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh” (Romans 13:14).

“The television commercial is not at all about the character of products to be consumed.  It is about the character of the consumers of products.  Images of movie stars and famous athletes, of serene lakes and macho fishing trips, of elegant dinners and romantic interludes, of happy families packing their station wagons for a picnic in the country–these tell nothing about the product being sold.  But they tell everything about the fears, fancies and dreams of those who might buy them.  What the advertiser needs to know is not what is right about the product but what is wrong about the buyer” (Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death, 128).

Advertising, at this point in our cultural development, is the proverbial straw that stirs the drink.  We know that.  Instinctively, somehow, it makes sense.  If consumption is the gas that drives the capitalist machine, we understand that somehow or another we must be motivated to go to the pump and do our part to keep the whole thing humming along.  Of course, advertisers do not want us to think of it in such vulgar terms.  Otherwise, the magic would be gone.  Rather, advertising is designed to keep us from thinking much at all, except insofar as it can get us to think about ourselves.  And in that sense, advertising is less concerned with selling us a new product as it is with selling us a new vision of ourselves as the sort of people who might benefit from buying a product.

In other words, commercials are inherently preachy.  Only the moralizing is so subtle that we hardly even notice it.  Later Postman says, “The television commercial is about products only in the sense that the story of Jonah is about the anatomy of whales, which is to say, it isn’t.  Which is to say further, it is about how one ought to live one’s life” (p. 131).  The seduction happens so effortlessly that we hardly even feel it.

Why, though?  Why does it work so well?  I think commercials have the power to shape us because we are so preoccupied with ourselves.  It seems as though we care less about being good people, for example, than about being perceived as good people.  Why?  Because while actually being good takes a great deal of hard work, looking like a good person takes very little effort at all–just the right kind of aftershave and life insurance.  Nowadays, one doesn’t actually have to put in the grueling hours it used to take to be smart; one need merely stay in the right hotel.

Paul, however, suggests a way to release us from the relentless grip of commercial culture.  He tells us to “put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh.”  If what we are primarily concerned about happens not to be our own image, but that of the one who gives us a self with which to be concerned in the first place, then psychodramas about acne and sports utility vehicles will have lost their power over us.  By understanding that what we truly need is not the tweaking provided by the right brand of toothpaste or the coolest brand of beer, we begin to see ourselves the way Christ sees us, rather than the way Madison Avenue needs for us to see ourselves.

According to Paul, maybe being your own person isn’t such a great deal after all.  Living the life Jesus calls you to live . . . now, that would be true nonconformity.

Following Jesus

“If you follow Jesus and don’t end up dead, it appears you have some explaining to do.”

-Terry Eagleton, Reason, Faith, and Revolution

Following Jesus.  I think it boils down to that, really.  I have struggled for some time with the realization that when the church fails—as it often does—it fails most egregiously in giving people the resources necessary for the outrageously radical act of following Jesus.  My reading of emerging/ent theology has led me to conclude that there is increasing energy around the simple idea that followers of Jesus ought to embody the revolutionary spirit found in the Gospels.  I sense a growing dissatisfaction with the traditional view of the church as either a clearinghouse for heavenly bus passes, or as a respectable organization whose primary function centers on affirming middle-class American values.  People, especially young people, are having trouble squaring the Jesus they read about in the Gospels with the infinitely malleable Jesus they see placed on offer by popular Christianity—Jesus as personal genie, Jesus as chief security guard at the courthouse of private morality, Jesus as a cheerleader for free-market capitalism, etc.  Jesus, stripped of the layers of religious spackling used to domesticate him, is irremediably subversive.

Subversive.  That appeals to me.  Of course, I’d like to continue writing clinically, about the religious climate shift underway at the hands of restless “young people,” fed up with a tame Jesus.  I’d like to make it sound as though I’m just a disinterested observer of religious trends.  But the truth is that I too find myself growing dissatisfied with that image of Jesus.  After all these years of a Jesus who I thought would help make me _______ (holier? kinder? more spiritual? more self-actualized?), I’ve come to believe that Jesus has a more cosmic, more interesting agenda in mind than super-tuning my soul.  On my way to spiritual superstardom, I’ve found it increasingly difficult to squeeze past Jesus, who stands in the middle of the road pointing to the weak, the homeless, the sick, the widowed, the displaced and un-embraced.

I’ve tried.  I’ve put forth a valiant effort.  But I can no longer envision Jesus the way I once did.  I can’t, for the life of me, picture Jesus saying, “Healthcare isn’t a right; it’s a privilege."  I can’t figure out a way to get Jesus to say, “Homosexuality is a capital crime; but fleecing the poor is a misdemeanor.”    I’m trying to track down, but as of yet have been unable to find, where Jesus says, “If you fear someone will strike you on one cheek, dial in a Predator drone.”  The church has too often been asked to give religious cover to moralities that were conceived absent the theological reflection provided by the church.  I find that the chasm between the revolutionary Jesus of first century Jerusalem and the domesticated Jesus of twenty-first century America grows more difficult for me to span all the time.

In the final analysis, the good news of the reign of God is not first that the well taken care of will be even more well taken care of in the next life.  The good news of the reign of God is that God’s reign is present wherever the homeless are sheltered, wherever the hungry are fed, wherever the rich give away their money and power in defense of the poor, wherever the forgotten ones gather to be remembered and embraced, to be told that as long as we follow God not one of God’s children will be left to die alone and unloved.

 

Looking for a Little Respect

“Am I now seeking human approval, or God’s approval?  Or am I trying to please people?  If I were still pleasing people, I would not be a servant of Christ” (Galatians 1:10).

I will ask for “the grace that I may be received under His standard, first, in the most perfect spiritual poverty, and should it so please His Divine Majesty to choose me, also in actual poverty; secondly in bearing reproaches and offenses, thus imitating Him more perfectly, provided only I can suffer them without sin on part of any other person or displeasure to His Divine Majesty” (St. Ignatius Loyola, The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius).

The inexorable pull of modern life in America is toward respectability.  One way or another, people live their lives in ways calculated to bring them honor in the context of the people or ideals they themselves honor.  If I think that hitting home runs, for instance, is a task worthy of respect, then I practice hitting in such a way as to increase my chances of hitting home runs.  If I think sewing is a demonstration of a certain kind of honorable expertise, I will practice sewing in ways that people who sew well will respect.  If I think making money is a way of earning the respect of those whom I respect, then I will work to make the kind of money that people whom I respect will respect.

Everybody knows it.  I try to write and preach in ways in which people whom I think write and preach well would approve.  Who is immune?  And that is, perhaps, how it should be.  Whether it is carpentry or microbiology, making free throws or cleaning fish, building the space shuttle or rebuilding a carburetor, people, we hope, care about practicing their craft with the requisite skill and integrity.  We assume that when the surgeon picks up the knife or the attorney redrafts the will or the USDA inspector checks the ground beef that not only do they know how to do their work, but that they understand the importance of doing it well.  We want to see them to meet standards, to find respect among their colleagues.  We care about the fact that they seek to impress the people who taught them their craft.  Given the choice between the overachiever and the apathetic slacker, if it’s my teeth about to be drilled, I want the overachiever every time.

All of which, of course, applies to Christians.  Ideally, we strive to practice our faith with integrity.  We seek to walk the walk faithfully.  We crave the honor of the ones we find honorable.  Ultimately, we desire to be pleasing to the one who was pleased to give up his life in dishonor for us.

And therein lies the rub, doesn’t it?  Christians are no different in wanting to live in ways that bring approval.  But the approval we seek cannot be provided by other human beings.  In fact, Paul says that if he had cared anything about human approval he would have sought another line of work.  Being who God calls us to be often leaves us honored in ways that the world has no way of finding respectable.  And that is because the Christian life finds respectability precisely at the point where the world finds failure.  We are honored by a God who finds honor in places the world would never think to look, like, oh, say . . . crosses.

While the rest of the world desperately seeks the honor this world provides (money, fame, glory, education, a big-screen T.V.), Christians seek the honor provided by the one who forsook the honor sought by the world in order to find the honor bestowed only by God.

St. Ignatius tells us to pray not only for spiritual poverty (Matt. 5:3), but, if it be God’s will, for actual poverty.  He tells us to pray to bear “reproaches and offenses,” rather than to pray for the world’s approval.  Why?  Because the call of the Christian life is the call to the imitation of Christ, who bore reproaches and offenses.  Humiliation, apparently, is the name of the path he took on his way to saving the world.

Only in a group of folks as weird as Christians would this reverse logic make any kind of sense.  If respect is what it’s about, I guess in the end it all depends on whose respect you really want.

 

What's in It for Me?

An elderly woman walked into a J.C. Penney department store.  Three young salesclerks were standing there (that was in the days there were people around to wait on you), but since the woman’s clothes were a tattered and worn, they figured that it was a waste of time to wait on such an unlikely prospect.  But there was a fourth young man standing nearby, a devoted Christian for whom kindness was second nature.  He approached the elderly woman, helped her make her purchases and then as she checked out, he learned that she was Mrs. J.C. Penney.

Dan G. Johnson, Neglected Treasure: Rediscovering the Old Testament

 

I find stories like this strangely distressing.  So much of what we do as a society is predicated on the idea that if you do something well enough and in front of the right people, you will receive some kind of reward.  Which is to enter every situation asking, not “How can I be of service?” but “What’s in it for me?”  If we’re honest, this story isn’t about helping someone else as much as it is about helping the right person—and, ultimately, ourselves.

Over the years, I’ve heard so many people say when asked why they stopped coming to church, “I wasn’t getting anything out of it”--as if the primary purpose for gathering for worship was somehow only to get something.  This attitude goes something like, “By Sunday morning I’m usually on Spiritual empty, and I come to church to get a fill-up on God.”  But when that attitude emerges, the church becomes merely another consumer proposition, “I’ll go where I get the most for the lowest cost to me.”

Worship is our corporate prayer to God every Sunday.  The church’s life—the way the church is administrated, the education programs, the fellowship opportunities, the acts of service—is itself a corporate prayer.  In that sense, then, our mindset ceases to be, “What will I miss if I’m not there?” but, rather “What will be missing if I’m not there?”  Each member and friend of the church plays a unique role in the prayer of faithfulness we lift to God.  Consequently, everyone is an equally vital part of the body, even if someone’s role is not always noticed by the rest.

My vision for the Church is that we begin to see ourselves as a family who, when sitting down to the table together, genuinely perceives the family as a whole, not just the sum of its constituent parts.  Indeed, when I begin to understand our connectedness, I’m freed to realize that I’m not in this just for me at all—I’m in this for you as well (and maybe even Mrs. J.C. Penney, too).

 

Growing up without Going It Alone

I guess I realized I was an adult when I found myself in East Tennessee with a new wife and no job. I had graduated from college four weeks earlier, and then got married just two weeks prior to loading up my grandfather’s Chevy pickup and launching out into the great unknown of, what I took to be, adulthood. We moved to Tennessee so I could go to graduate school. There was a little money left over from the honeymoon, which I thought would last us a month or so, providing we could eat on fifty dollars a week. I figured a month would be plenty of time for us both to find jobs and start living like grown-ups.

It occurs to me now that foresight was not a virtue I possessed at twenty-two, because I did not, as I had anticipated, find a job. My wife, at nineteen, already much more readily employable than I, found a part time job as a hostess at the restaurant in the Holiday Inn. Her income, it will not surprise you to know, didn’t turn out to be enough to sustain us. And so, with a nearly empty refrigerator and no prospects for employment on the horizon, we packed up the truck and headed back to Detroit to live with my in-laws.

We didn’t stay too long—though her parents could not have been nicer. After four months we’d both found jobs making sufficient money to move to a small apartment—her working in a doctor’s office, and me in a Speedway.

One might reasonably inquire as to why a situation that resulted in me moving back in with my in-laws made me aware of my status as an adult. Generally speaking, such a move, at least psychologically, means a failure to live up to the standards set for grown-up living. However, it strikes me that though we had folks helping us take care of our basic needs, no one was going to parachute in to right our listing financial ship. A little assistance here and there to help us keep our heads above water, but nobody offered to buy us a boat. It felt lonely at first (and still does sometimes).

But what I finally realized about our predicament was that nobody was going to live our lives for us. Being an adult takes courage and some intentionality, a commitment to hanging on when hanging on seems impossible.

But lest this degenerate into some kind of morally edifying self-help anecdote, it also occurs to me that it’s critical to point out that we were kept afloat. We had people who loved us, who wouldn’t let us fall through the cracks. It is a hard thing to realize that not everyone is so fortunate—and that we could very easily, if just a few things were different, be the people we read about living under viaducts in cardboard boxes. So while living can’t be done by proxy, it can’t be done in isolation either.

Faith, it seems to me, works along the same lines. On the one hand, the spiritual lone wolf is a non-starter; on the other hand, walking through a crowd of people on a journey you happen not to be taking doesn’t make you a pilgrim either. You can neither go it alone nor rely entirely on others to do your work for you. Somewhere in the mysterious middle lies maturity—both as a human being and as a seeker of God.