Hey there. Fantasy football time here in the United States of America.
It's time when all of us who like numbers on a screen indicating performance on a field of play can match our skill at choosing who is going to have the highest numerical value each Sunday and why that makes us have value as human beings.
Cynical way of looking at it. I enjoy fantasy football-sometimes baseball too.
In case you are not familiar with Fantasy sports it is when you field an imaginary team of athletes from the particular sport and place them on your imaginary roster. Then you keep track of their real life statistics during a specific game to come up with your "team" score. It is your fantasy team-hand chosen-to produce the best set of stats you can-to outscore your opponent for that week-who also has fielded a team.
It is because I have a fantasy football team that I can honestly say that I have imaginary friends.
I was thinking how it would be amusing to have fantasy Bible study. Choose biblical characters and score them according to their accomplishments vs. their sinfulness. For instance David gets negative points for having Bathsheba's husband murdered-but gets positive ones for inspiring some of the Psalms. Then we have teams made up of a prophet, two Hebrew Bible people, a disciples, and then maybe Jesus is the all time quarterback.
How many points would John the Baptist get docked for losing his head?
Would the Pharisees get penalized for their abuse of the rules?
Maybe if it was Bible fantasy study we could say a prayer before the games and all the right wingers would be happy-and we could take proceeds from the games and give them to justice projects in the area and that would make all the left wingers happy.
The concept of fantasy sports plays along with our desire to rank and rate things in the United States. Maybe because we all have some areas where we don't find self worth happens easily. And so we rank and rate so many facets of our world that it becomes the norm to judge rather than accept. This is against the basic truth of Christian faith-to love, to know we're loved, and to proclaim God's love.
Truth is our value is something given to us at birth-all of us have it-and we can choose to believe in it or not. Its there-and its infinitely more than we imagine it. Each person has value-no one more than another...although sometimes I think Jessica Alba comes close...all of us are precious in God's eyes.
No matter how we perform the Grace of God helps us be everything we are called to be.
Grace,
Dwight
Showing posts with label God's grace. Show all posts
Showing posts with label God's grace. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Down time
Tomorrow my sermon is about Sabbath.
Perhaps one of my more hypocritical sermons because one would hope that when a preacher delivers a message that it at least has a grounding in the faith practices of the one who is doing the preaching. In short I could be doing better at Sabbath observance.
I've learned more about Sabbath from the time I was leaving seminary to the present. I do remember some things about Sabbath when I was a child. I remember my parents complained that the pharmacy WASN'T open on Sundays because of the blue laws (for those under 38 that's when stores were required to close because Sunday was "The Lord's Day"-this of course assumes that all days aren't the Lord's and that Sunday itself was actually the true Sabbath).
Seventh Day Adventists have Saturday as the Sabbath, as does the Jewish Faith Tradition. We Christians observe Sunday as the Sabbath-sort of. I know preachers who wouldn't cut their grass on Sunday-not because they wanted to spend more time honoring God-but because it seemed more righteous to live by the letter of the law rather than the Spirit of the law "Remeber the Sabbath Day and Keep it holy." being one of the top ten commandments NOT written by a team of writers working for Letterman.
They also encouraged people not to shop on Sundays-because in so doing-they were supporting the sin of those having to work on the Sabbath.
Orthodox Judaism observes Sabbath from the sunset of Friday through the Sunset of Saturday evening-and they take it to heart-letter of the law not to do any work or activity that is not completely necessary (see Leviticus for a list of things you can do on the Sabbath like "get your ass out of a ditch"-meaning your wild beast not coloquial for your own hind quarters).
But what I've learned-or think I've learned is that Sabbath isn't a set day-it's actually a way of being. It is a state in which a person chooses consciously to disengage from all that is worry driven and laden with responsibility in order to contemplate sometimes the Holy, but sometimes just the belly button. Jesus said in response to those who criticized his disciples for picking grain on the Sabbath as breakers of the law and thus sinful people ignoring their relationship with God. Jesus tells the critics "The Sabbath was made for humanity, not humanity made for the Sabbath."
So resting, spending quiet time-not necessarily prayer and Bible reading-but that can be part of it-spending time just BE-ing. Not moving necessarily, maybe counting breaths, maybe just holding on tightly to your loved ones in a hug, or smelling the flowers in your back yard, inhaling the air intentionally from a breeze-it is in short an awareness that all is not centered on you-and that you in fact are part of something-a reality much bigger than yourself-and that the world and all the planets will go on spinning even if you decide to stop and do something to care for yourself.
So perhaps the definition of Sabbath I believe is: The act of caring for oneself as a response of gratitude for the grace and love God has shown us in an active or passive way of being-happening during a set period of time-at least twenty four hours in length and having at least some connection to the awareness that there is a God and it is not you. It may require being by oneself, and also can include those who nourish and build you up and require from you only that you be your authentic self.
So I hope for my sake-and the sake of all who read this-that I am able to observe Sabbath faithfully to honor God-and to honor the gift of who I am. It is in our honoring of our authentic selves that we bring glory to God for having created us in the way that God did.
Much grace to you and yours,
Dwight
Perhaps one of my more hypocritical sermons because one would hope that when a preacher delivers a message that it at least has a grounding in the faith practices of the one who is doing the preaching. In short I could be doing better at Sabbath observance.
I've learned more about Sabbath from the time I was leaving seminary to the present. I do remember some things about Sabbath when I was a child. I remember my parents complained that the pharmacy WASN'T open on Sundays because of the blue laws (for those under 38 that's when stores were required to close because Sunday was "The Lord's Day"-this of course assumes that all days aren't the Lord's and that Sunday itself was actually the true Sabbath).
Seventh Day Adventists have Saturday as the Sabbath, as does the Jewish Faith Tradition. We Christians observe Sunday as the Sabbath-sort of. I know preachers who wouldn't cut their grass on Sunday-not because they wanted to spend more time honoring God-but because it seemed more righteous to live by the letter of the law rather than the Spirit of the law "Remeber the Sabbath Day and Keep it holy." being one of the top ten commandments NOT written by a team of writers working for Letterman.
They also encouraged people not to shop on Sundays-because in so doing-they were supporting the sin of those having to work on the Sabbath.
Orthodox Judaism observes Sabbath from the sunset of Friday through the Sunset of Saturday evening-and they take it to heart-letter of the law not to do any work or activity that is not completely necessary (see Leviticus for a list of things you can do on the Sabbath like "get your ass out of a ditch"-meaning your wild beast not coloquial for your own hind quarters).
But what I've learned-or think I've learned is that Sabbath isn't a set day-it's actually a way of being. It is a state in which a person chooses consciously to disengage from all that is worry driven and laden with responsibility in order to contemplate sometimes the Holy, but sometimes just the belly button. Jesus said in response to those who criticized his disciples for picking grain on the Sabbath as breakers of the law and thus sinful people ignoring their relationship with God. Jesus tells the critics "The Sabbath was made for humanity, not humanity made for the Sabbath."
So resting, spending quiet time-not necessarily prayer and Bible reading-but that can be part of it-spending time just BE-ing. Not moving necessarily, maybe counting breaths, maybe just holding on tightly to your loved ones in a hug, or smelling the flowers in your back yard, inhaling the air intentionally from a breeze-it is in short an awareness that all is not centered on you-and that you in fact are part of something-a reality much bigger than yourself-and that the world and all the planets will go on spinning even if you decide to stop and do something to care for yourself.
So perhaps the definition of Sabbath I believe is: The act of caring for oneself as a response of gratitude for the grace and love God has shown us in an active or passive way of being-happening during a set period of time-at least twenty four hours in length and having at least some connection to the awareness that there is a God and it is not you. It may require being by oneself, and also can include those who nourish and build you up and require from you only that you be your authentic self.
So I hope for my sake-and the sake of all who read this-that I am able to observe Sabbath faithfully to honor God-and to honor the gift of who I am. It is in our honoring of our authentic selves that we bring glory to God for having created us in the way that God did.
Much grace to you and yours,
Dwight
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