Showing posts with label 071118. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 071118. Show all posts
November 26, 2007
18 de noviembre de 2007 - Una espiritualidad para tiempos de crisis - Alberto Moke
MP3 File
Mi primera reacción cuando Frank me confirmo que quería que predicara hoy, fue de temor. Temor a que mis emociones le ganaran a mi cerebro y quedarme atascado sin poder decir nada. Pero después sentí que tenía que hacerlo, sacar fuerzas para compartir lo mucho que ha significado para nosotros el haber servido en Immanuel. Recuerdo que lo que motivo a quedarme en Immanuel hace cinco anos, era servir a una comunidad hispana que buscaba sobrevivir en la búsqueda de una mejor vida, mas llena de esperanza. Clelia y yo hemos conversado varias veces que en más de 30 anos de ministerio, nunca habíamos conocido una comunidad tan genuina y real y por esa razón tan bella. Creo que no hace falta decirles que ustedes han marcado profundamente nuestros corazones y nos van a hacer mucha falta. Les amamos con todo nuestro corazón.
Mi otro temor era escoger un tema que fuera relevante. Escogí este pasaje porque es uno en el que he reflexionado en más de una ocasión y me ha servido para reafirmar mi convicción de que en nuestra jornada de fe Dios ha estado siempre presente, saliéndonos al encuentro, bloqueándonos y haciéndonos cambiar de rumbo, y desafiándonos a caminar en senderos nuevos que solo El conoce. También porque ante la necesidad de buscar nuevos modelos de liderazgo nos ayuda a reconocer criterios para la selección de un liderazgo centrado en la voluntad de Dios.
La historia nos suena conocida. Una comunidad multicultural luchando, como Immanuel, por atender los problemas propios de una comunidad diversa, que necesitaba crecer y descubrir nuevas fronteras en su jornada de fe.
Es la historia que leímos. En una de las sinagogas compuesta por judíos que hablaban griego, había la queja de que a sus viudas les daban menos atención que a las viudas que hablaban hebreo y arameo del grupo dominante al que pertenecían los apóstoles. Tal vez no era la intención, pero el impacto del grupo es que estaban siendo discriminados.
Los apóstoles no se pusieron a la defensiva cuestionando las motivaciones de los que expresaron sus quejas sino que buscaron una solución administrativa que daba prioridad a la inmediatez de la necesidad humana sin caer en separaciones innecesarias entre lo material y lo espiritual. Todo lo contrario la historia nos da luces para un modelo de espiritualidad integral que toma en cuenta la totalidad de la vida.
Cuando vemos la historia de manera más completa nos damos cuenta que este incidente, tal vez insignificante para algunos estaba enmarcado en una realidad mucho más amplia y era la necesidad de que el alcance de la gracia de Dios se extendiera a una familia mucho más grande que el pueblo judío.
No hay dudas de que Dios estaba en medio de su pueblo, como lo esta también hoy con nosotros. ¿Cuantos dicen amén? Dígale a su hermana o amigo que esta a su lado: Dios esta con nosotros! Dios estaba con los apóstoles, estaba con los judíos que estaban en el poder y también con los que se sentían marginados. Estaba presente y reinaba en medio de las situaciones mas tensas. Hoy nosotros somos parte de ese pueblo tan especial al que pertenecemos por la gracia de Dios, pero ese privilegio tan grande no ocurrió sin que se tuvieran que vencer obstáculos, derribar muros y sin que un grupo de lideres comprometidos estuvieran dispuestos a morir por causa de Cristo y el nuevo reino de paz que el estaba inaugurando.
Es fácil hacer teología mirando para atrás para discernir donde ha estado Dios. Hoy damos gracias porque nosotros, quienes antes estábamos al margen ahora nos podemos sentar a la mesa, antes no éramos nadie. Ahora somos linaje escogido, ahora somos hijos. Ahora somos reyes y sacerdotes. Pero tenemos que admitir que el camino ancho por el que hoy caminamos fue antes un camino angosto en el que se dieron luchas, que hubo gente que se comprometió a vivir las demandas del nuevo reino hasta las últimas consecuencias.
Menos fácil es hacer teología en el camino, como tenemos que hacerlo nosotros hoy porque no existe la referencia de la historia y el único recurso que tenemos es la guía del Espíritu Santo, que nos corrige, y nos ayuda a enderezar nuestras sendas.
Es por eso que en momentos de crisis y dificultades necesitamos de una espiritualidad que nos coloque en el centro de la voluntad de Dios, que nos ayude a examinar nuestras motivaciones mas profundas y nos aleje de la tentación del poder, la arrogancia y el triunfalismo. Es necesaria una espiritualidad de reconozca y valore la sabiduría de la comunidad. Nos dice Lucas en el verso 2: “Los doce apóstoles reunieron a todos los creyentes y les dijeron: no esta bien que nosotros dejemos de anunciar el evangelio de Dios para dedicarnos a la administración. Por eso, busquen entre ustedes siete hombres y mujeres de confianza, entendidos y llenos del Espíritu Santo, para que les encarguemos estos trabajos.”.
Necesitamos una espiritualidad que nos invite a la acción. Es hora de actuar, mi querido hermano y hermana. Es urgente atender a las viudas, a los huérfanos, a los inmigrantes indocumentados, a los que están al margen por su condición social, a los que son menospreciado por su situación económica, por su situación mental o emocional, a los que han vivido al margen de la ley, los marginados por su orientación sexual, los mas vulnerables a ser abusados, los niños, los discapacitados, las personas de la tercera edad, los que por largos anos han vivido esclavos del vicio y de todo tipo de adicción. Dios nos llama a actuar, sirviendo las mesas, atendiéndolos, dándoles nuestro tiempo y nuestra amistad, proveyéndoles cuidado pastoral. No, esa no es solamente tarea de los pastores ordenados, es tarea tuya como miembro de la comunidad que ya fuiste llamado y ordenado en el momento en que fuiste bautizado.
EN VEZ DE REACCIONAR LOS APOSTOLES DECIDIERON ACTUAR: “AYUDEN A ESCOGER LIDERES QUE ESTEN DISPUESTOS A SERVIR DIRIGIDOS POR EL ESPIRITU SANTO”
Hay una sociedad que necesita de una comunidad sanadora, una comunidad que proclame las buenas noticias de Dios esta vivo y esta en medio de los sufrimientos de su pueblo y quiere que nosotros seamos las luces que los guíen en medio de las tinieblas.
El viernes en la noche un grupo de hermanos y hermanas de Immanuel fuimos a consolar a un grupo de personas que realizaban una vigilia por un joven que fue abaleado por las pandillas. Como comento el pastor Howard Dotson, de la iglesia First Congregational, tanto la víctima como los miembros de la pandilla es muy probable que hubieran sido bautizados en una iglesia cristiana. Para muchos de ellos el barrio y la pandilla eran su iglesia. En muchos sentidos esto es cierto porque Dios y por ende la iglesia está presente donde está la pobreza y el sufrimiento humano. ¿No será que es esta uno de las grupos que desatendemos como solemos desatender a las viudas, niños y discapacitados que no se pueden valer por si mismos?
Hay muchas otras mesas que necesitan ser atendidas por líderes llenos del Espíritu Santo que estén dispuestos a ser agentes transformadores de una sociedad que ya no quiere escucharnos reflexionar sino ver modelos de vidas comprometidas, guiadas por el Espíritu Santo, marcadas por el amor incondicional que emana de sus poros, por los dones de hospitalidad, por la sabiduría que sale de sus labios y por la disposición de vivir la fe hasta las ultimas consecuencias, aun participando de los sufrimientos por causa del reino.
Ojalá que nuestros pastores continúen enfocándose, como los apóstoles, en el ministerio espiritual, la proclamación, la ensenadaza y en el infinito poder de la oración. Y ojala que las diferentes comunidades y culturas que son parte de Immanuel acepten el desafió de ser una iglesia movida por lideres de base cuya única motivación es ser agentes transformadores de una sociedad que quiere conocer a Dios en vidas ejemplares.
Por lo demás hermanos y hermanos corramos la carrera convencidos de que “ni la muerte ni la vida, ni los ángeles ni los demonios, ni lo presente ni lo por venir, ni los poderes, ni lo alto ni lo profundo, ni cosa alguna en toda la creación, podrá apartarnos del amor que Dios nos ha manifestado en Cristo Jesús nuestro Señor (Romanos 8:37-39)
November 20, 2007
November 16, 2007
November 11, 2007 - Elizabeth Gibbs Zehnder
Luke 20:27-38
MP3 File
Airport watching
My favorite thing about traveling is the airport experience. I love watching the people - Sitting waiting at the gate, observing the stories that unfold around me. Things that when they happen to me in my life totally hook me, are just interesting when they happen at the gate – screaming kid, kicking on the floor – I give a compassionate smile to the mother, husband who didn’t pack the travel snacks, go figure. Passenger going for it with the airline representative at the counter, raising his voice, belittling the employee – its an interesting study in power dynamics. This passage is a little bit like the airport for me. Its like walking in on someone else’s argument. Sadducees, one bride, seven brothers, resurrection day….We need to know more of the back story before we can feel the impact of the Jesus’ exchange.
One bride for seven brothers. Its just a wacky idea. Even in its 1st century context it was an exaggeration, but not as strange as it sounds to us. The Levirate marriage was a way of ensuring the family line continued. It provided protection for women. We need to understand, we are talking about a male-dominated society and marriage was a crucial element in maintaining continuity. The family was the center of relational, economic and social stability. The women’s role was to bear the children to perpetuate her husband’s family. If she was widowed, without kids, the Levirate plan “B” was for her to marry her dead husband’s brother. This created the possibility that her husband’s family line would continue and that she would have economic and social shelter. So, to the ears of the crowd gathered in the temple courts that day, the concept of a widow marrying her brother-in-law was pretty neutral, and playing out that she would marry all seven brothers was mocking of Jesus.
Jesus is a hick
So Luke tells us Jesus is out teaching and preaching in the temple courts. This was the market place of theological thought. Remember his accent, his clothes, his hair all give away the fact that he’s from the backwater town of Nazareth – this a detail not lost on the sophisticated urban crowd in Jerusalem. He is interacting with the various religious leaders and groups of the day.
Pharisees – pro-resurrection
The Pharisees were one of the key forces. They believed that it was good to interpret and extrapolate meaning from the Torah. In keeping with that they believed in the resurrection of the dead.
Sadducees – urban sophisticates
The Sadducees were in reaction with the Pharisees. The Sadducees seem to have been one of the more culturally sophisticated movements of their time[1]. Their followers were often the leading priestly families and the aristocracy. The Sadducees were more conservative than the Pharisees. They argued for literal interpretations of the scripture and rejected what they saw as Pharisaic speculation on the unknowable. (Let me share a little seminary secret – you can keep them straight because they were “sad you see” because they didn’t believe in an afterlife Sadducees).
Sadducees meet Jesus – resurrection signature issue
So today’s text finds the Sadducees approaching Jesus where he is teaching in the Temple courts. Strutting their intellectual stuff and this is their signature issue. We’ve all been in on these kinds of conversations. Some one with formal education and razor sharp intellect constructs a water tight argument, then they seal the deal with a question that you’d be a fool to answer in any way other than the way they want you to – you don’t think that we should leave a child behind do you? It seems as though the Sadducees are out for sport, some theological ping pong. Certainly more eager to prove their point and underscore their influence than anything else.
Jesus’ response is interesting – at the onset it is surprisingly flat. We can imagine the crowd wondering what he would do, doesn’t he understand what is at stake? would he fold or put up a fight? Who will this woman belong to in the resurrection? – what kind of a question is that! Jesus is thinking – There is no right answer to a wrong question!
Karl Barth (a reformed theologian from Switzerland) said “the Bible gives to every person and to every era such answers to their questions as they deserve. We shall always find in it as much as we seek and no more”[2] Anytime that we “use” God or the church or a point of view to determine winners and losers or to prove that we are better than others, we become participants in deadly game, life without God. We’re just batting around a ping pong ball, keeping our own score.
Some questions belong to the people who are truly famished for an answer. The question of what lies on the other side of death is one of them. It’s the people who admit to knowing crushing defeat, whose dignity and certainty have been deconstructed – these are the people who can begin to know the landscape of a dark world which only makes sense if Christ is raised.[3]
Paul Duke shares some great insights on this question. He points out that other people we read about in the Bible get a very different answer from Jesus to the resurrection question. Jesus tells Martha in her hour of grasping for hope at her brother’s grave – I am the resurrection.
To Mary Magdalene, blinded by tears outside another grave, Jesus gave the ultimate answer of her own name spoken from the other side of death.
When we ask the question with earnest tears in the shadow of death, we may hear our name for the answer. When we inquire about resurrection as though we are counting on the response to establish us as the most insightful and progressive Christians in the room, the answer we get may fall flat on our ears and we may wonder about whether the question was heard.
Jesus, in his compassion, does give the Sadducees a response. He turns their fool-proof argument inside out and lays out how they have missed the boat.
Jesus responds that there is an age that follows this one. And in the age to come we enter into God’s presence in a profound way. He invokes Moses encountering the burning bush. After he peers over the sand dune, Moses realizes that the moment has shifted from everyday to extraordinary and he pulls off his shoes because its all that he can think to do to respond to the fact that that the ground which he is standing on is holy. His face is flushed from the heat as the bush burns brightly and refuses to be consumed.
As Michael Pasquarello points out in his blog, Moses isn’t given answers to his questions or solutions to his problems. Instead, he finds himself standing in the presence of the God of Sarah and Abraham, the God of Rebecca and Isaac, the God of Leah and Rachel and Jacob – the God of the living.
In the age to come, Jesus explains, things work out differently in terms of relationship. Its no longer about having children to added to your credit, but being God’s children. Its no longer about establishing and preserving a position or a network of security and power, but being in God’s presence.
So maybe we don’t personally run into many Sadducees when we go to the Temple courts. After reading this text, I feel prepared to put them in their place if I run in to any.
Chances are, God will catch us just like Moses, unaware, going about our business. One minute 4 year old Eva’s telling me all about the pizza they had for lunch at school and then she’s asking “Where is Fuzzy Grandpa? Nana misses him…Where did he go when he died?
So I take a breath, pushing away the distraction of trying to preserve my position of power, I kneel down on the holy ground that has opened up next to her and gently lay out my hope for the life to come. She nods her assent and requests cheese sticks for a snack. The flames recede, the bush is just a bush again.
In terms of now, this afternoon, the week that lies before us I find that God is inviting us into deeper relationship.
God is inviting us to lay down our ping pong paddles, to set aside our needs to prove our points and protect our position.
God invites us to be vulnerable and earnest in our seeking.
Because as much as we are earnest, as much as we are vulnerable in our desire to know more of God, so too will God respond with the fullest of measures.
God promises to meet us in the shadows of our grief, the valleys of our doubt, the darkness of our night.
God meets us there with the Good News of resurrection and new life.
In the age to come, for sure and now.
Amen.
MP3 File
Airport watching
My favorite thing about traveling is the airport experience. I love watching the people - Sitting waiting at the gate, observing the stories that unfold around me. Things that when they happen to me in my life totally hook me, are just interesting when they happen at the gate – screaming kid, kicking on the floor – I give a compassionate smile to the mother, husband who didn’t pack the travel snacks, go figure. Passenger going for it with the airline representative at the counter, raising his voice, belittling the employee – its an interesting study in power dynamics. This passage is a little bit like the airport for me. Its like walking in on someone else’s argument. Sadducees, one bride, seven brothers, resurrection day….We need to know more of the back story before we can feel the impact of the Jesus’ exchange.
One bride for seven brothers. Its just a wacky idea. Even in its 1st century context it was an exaggeration, but not as strange as it sounds to us. The Levirate marriage was a way of ensuring the family line continued. It provided protection for women. We need to understand, we are talking about a male-dominated society and marriage was a crucial element in maintaining continuity. The family was the center of relational, economic and social stability. The women’s role was to bear the children to perpetuate her husband’s family. If she was widowed, without kids, the Levirate plan “B” was for her to marry her dead husband’s brother. This created the possibility that her husband’s family line would continue and that she would have economic and social shelter. So, to the ears of the crowd gathered in the temple courts that day, the concept of a widow marrying her brother-in-law was pretty neutral, and playing out that she would marry all seven brothers was mocking of Jesus.
Jesus is a hick
So Luke tells us Jesus is out teaching and preaching in the temple courts. This was the market place of theological thought. Remember his accent, his clothes, his hair all give away the fact that he’s from the backwater town of Nazareth – this a detail not lost on the sophisticated urban crowd in Jerusalem. He is interacting with the various religious leaders and groups of the day.
Pharisees – pro-resurrection
The Pharisees were one of the key forces. They believed that it was good to interpret and extrapolate meaning from the Torah. In keeping with that they believed in the resurrection of the dead.
Sadducees – urban sophisticates
The Sadducees were in reaction with the Pharisees. The Sadducees seem to have been one of the more culturally sophisticated movements of their time[1]. Their followers were often the leading priestly families and the aristocracy. The Sadducees were more conservative than the Pharisees. They argued for literal interpretations of the scripture and rejected what they saw as Pharisaic speculation on the unknowable. (Let me share a little seminary secret – you can keep them straight because they were “sad you see” because they didn’t believe in an afterlife Sadducees).
Sadducees meet Jesus – resurrection signature issue
So today’s text finds the Sadducees approaching Jesus where he is teaching in the Temple courts. Strutting their intellectual stuff and this is their signature issue. We’ve all been in on these kinds of conversations. Some one with formal education and razor sharp intellect constructs a water tight argument, then they seal the deal with a question that you’d be a fool to answer in any way other than the way they want you to – you don’t think that we should leave a child behind do you? It seems as though the Sadducees are out for sport, some theological ping pong. Certainly more eager to prove their point and underscore their influence than anything else.
Jesus’ response is interesting – at the onset it is surprisingly flat. We can imagine the crowd wondering what he would do, doesn’t he understand what is at stake? would he fold or put up a fight? Who will this woman belong to in the resurrection? – what kind of a question is that! Jesus is thinking – There is no right answer to a wrong question!
Karl Barth (a reformed theologian from Switzerland) said “the Bible gives to every person and to every era such answers to their questions as they deserve. We shall always find in it as much as we seek and no more”[2] Anytime that we “use” God or the church or a point of view to determine winners and losers or to prove that we are better than others, we become participants in deadly game, life without God. We’re just batting around a ping pong ball, keeping our own score.
Some questions belong to the people who are truly famished for an answer. The question of what lies on the other side of death is one of them. It’s the people who admit to knowing crushing defeat, whose dignity and certainty have been deconstructed – these are the people who can begin to know the landscape of a dark world which only makes sense if Christ is raised.[3]
Paul Duke shares some great insights on this question. He points out that other people we read about in the Bible get a very different answer from Jesus to the resurrection question. Jesus tells Martha in her hour of grasping for hope at her brother’s grave – I am the resurrection.
To Mary Magdalene, blinded by tears outside another grave, Jesus gave the ultimate answer of her own name spoken from the other side of death.
When we ask the question with earnest tears in the shadow of death, we may hear our name for the answer. When we inquire about resurrection as though we are counting on the response to establish us as the most insightful and progressive Christians in the room, the answer we get may fall flat on our ears and we may wonder about whether the question was heard.
Jesus, in his compassion, does give the Sadducees a response. He turns their fool-proof argument inside out and lays out how they have missed the boat.
Jesus responds that there is an age that follows this one. And in the age to come we enter into God’s presence in a profound way. He invokes Moses encountering the burning bush. After he peers over the sand dune, Moses realizes that the moment has shifted from everyday to extraordinary and he pulls off his shoes because its all that he can think to do to respond to the fact that that the ground which he is standing on is holy. His face is flushed from the heat as the bush burns brightly and refuses to be consumed.
As Michael Pasquarello points out in his blog, Moses isn’t given answers to his questions or solutions to his problems. Instead, he finds himself standing in the presence of the God of Sarah and Abraham, the God of Rebecca and Isaac, the God of Leah and Rachel and Jacob – the God of the living.
In the age to come, Jesus explains, things work out differently in terms of relationship. Its no longer about having children to added to your credit, but being God’s children. Its no longer about establishing and preserving a position or a network of security and power, but being in God’s presence.
So maybe we don’t personally run into many Sadducees when we go to the Temple courts. After reading this text, I feel prepared to put them in their place if I run in to any.
Chances are, God will catch us just like Moses, unaware, going about our business. One minute 4 year old Eva’s telling me all about the pizza they had for lunch at school and then she’s asking “Where is Fuzzy Grandpa? Nana misses him…Where did he go when he died?
So I take a breath, pushing away the distraction of trying to preserve my position of power, I kneel down on the holy ground that has opened up next to her and gently lay out my hope for the life to come. She nods her assent and requests cheese sticks for a snack. The flames recede, the bush is just a bush again.
In terms of now, this afternoon, the week that lies before us I find that God is inviting us into deeper relationship.
God is inviting us to lay down our ping pong paddles, to set aside our needs to prove our points and protect our position.
God invites us to be vulnerable and earnest in our seeking.
Because as much as we are earnest, as much as we are vulnerable in our desire to know more of God, so too will God respond with the fullest of measures.
God promises to meet us in the shadows of our grief, the valleys of our doubt, the darkness of our night.
God meets us there with the Good News of resurrection and new life.
In the age to come, for sure and now.
Amen.
[1] First thoughts on Year C Gospel Passages from the Lectionary, Pentecost 24 – www.staff.murdoch.edu.au/-loader/lkpentecost24.htm
[2] Paul D. Duke, Transfigured relations – Live by the Word – Christian Century, October 25, 1995
[3] Carlyle Marney quoted by William Willimon, Paul Duke, Transfigured Relations
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