Webcasts coming up

In just a couple weeks, October 23-25, I'll be preaching, giving a keynote presentation, and offering a workshop at the Western Plains District Church of the Brethren Gathering. This fifth annual event focusing on worship, learning, and fellowship is held near Salina, Kansas, but this year will be accessible to people all around the world through the wonders of webcasting.

This venture is very exciting because it networks both a physical gathering and a virtual web of participants, fostering common conversation and shared formation. It's also somewhat intimidating for me as a presenter because it will require paying attention to these extended audiences. In the end, though, I expect this endeavor to teach all of us a lot about the webinar format and the power and limitations of this form of communication.

Obviously lots of organizations and schools have been using the webinar format for some time now, but for us Brethren the October event is a pretty major step. You're invited to join in and then let us know what the experience is like for you.

Click here or on the title of this blog post to see detailed information about all the presenters and the schedule for the event. Many of the broadcast sessions will also be archived for access after the event.

Collecting mentoring stories

Can you help me?

I'm looking for stories about how young people are being/have been mentored by older adults. At a workshop at National Older Adult Conference in September, I'll be leading a discussion around how one generation lives their legacy by helping emerging generations shape their legacy. A particular interest is how these relationships shape faith.

Ideal stories describe how you've been mentored, or how you have been mentoring young people (kids, youth, young adults, even young families qualify as "young people"), and would include both the mentor and the mentee reflecting on the relationship, describing how it works, how it came about, what the commitment is to each other, what each has learned from the relationship, and what the relationship means to those involved. If both can't contribute to the reflection, the story told from either point of view is welcome.

I'd prefer to have 3-5 minute video clips that you could send to me digitally, or audio/podcast files of the same length. But I'd also take stories told in written form as long as they're 1-3 pages in length. These clips don't have to be professional quality, but they do need to be something that you're willing for me to show/share with workshop participants.

Your material needs to be in my inbox by August 31.

Email me if you have questions or are able to contribute.

No Fear

On August 2, 2009 I had the privilege of preaching at the Northern Plains District Church of the Brethren conference. The Sunday morning sermon was based on 1 John 4:16b-21 and was entitled "No Fear."

In the sermon I reflected on how fear has become a commodity in culture, and also in the church. For the Christians especially, fear is a false commodity. The real economies of Gospel living are based on love, a radical, other-wordly love as expressed by God through Jesus.

Because a number of persons who heard this sermon asked for a copy, I am posting the link here.

Click here for a copy of No Fear - Northern Plains District Conference

Servanthood

Heard a very good sermon today by John Breidenstine. John and I grew up in the same congregation in Lancaster. John's a foreign diplomat stationed in Sonora, Mexico. He and his wife Judith are also students at Bethany Theological Seminary through the Connections distance education program.

What made for such a great sermon? Integrity. It wasn't that John was so dynamic. He's really a pretty "understated" guy. It wasn't that he shared any radically new thoughts on servanthood. I didn't hear anything that I hadn't heard before, or probably even preached before myself. But John and Judith and their son Victor really exemplify the servant posture and the pursuit of God's will for their lives that John was speaking about today.

One example of that integrity is found in this YouTube post that they put together recently. It documents the work of one mission in Hermosillo that they are actively involved in. Read John 13. Watch this video. Think about living with integrity. Live a life of service.

Power of the Towel

Power's a tricky commodity. We all have it. We all use it. It's not necessarily equally distributed among people, and it can be used for good or ill. There are different types of power: some power is earned, some is inherited, some is imposed.

One form of power which Jesus taught is power in servanthood. This type of power is most clearly exemplified in the John 13 story of Jesus washing his disciples' feet. In an outrageously counter cultural act, Jesus performed a power-filled act of service for his disciples, an act typically reserved for the powerless slave.

The faith tradition of which I am a part, the Church of the Brethren, recognizes the power of washing feet. It's symbolism indicates a world turned upside down, where power is shared and relinquished for the good of the other and the good of the community. As feet are washed in basins and dried with towels the balance of power is re-distributed, and the ultimate power in the universe, God in Jesus, is recognized as a serving, sustaining power.

Some years ago I wrote and recorded a song that captures a bit of this sentiment. A few of my friends and acquaintances have been reminding me of it lately, I suspect for its musical value, or perhaps some sentimental connection they have to it, or maybe because I need to be reminded of the posture of power that comes with a towel in hand. Whatever the impetus, here's the song. Feel free to use it in any way that's helpful to you and your faith community, except for selling it! (After all, it is copyrighted material).

Singing strength

According to Pete Seeger (emphasis mine):

People ask, is there one word that you have more faith in than any other word, and I'd say it's participation. I feel that this takes on so many meanings. The composer John Philip Sousa said, 'What will happen to the American voice now that the phonograph has been invented? Women used to sing lullabies to their children.'

It's been my life work, to get participation, whether it's a union song, or a peace song, civil rights, or a women's movement, or gay liberation. When you sing, you feel a kind of strength; you think, I'm not alone, there's a whole batch of us who feel this way. I'm just one person, but it's almost my religion now to persuade people that even if it's only you and three others, do something. You and one another, do something. If it's only you, and you do a good job as a songwriter, people will sing it.

-from The Protest Singer: An Intimate Portrait of Pete Seeger by Alec Wilkinson, page 106

Parade or parody?

Today we went to our town's 4th of July parade. I'm glad we went. It was fun and gave us some great insight into our community. The highlights were the Asian dancers, the high school marching bands (go Larkin!), the old cars and lots of diverse families lining the streets. There were also some things that raised questions for me.

How can we celebrate the blessings of our country without equating such privilege primarily with the military? It seemed that much of the parade was lifting up military personnel and politicians, the primary players in war-making. What would a parade that celebrates the unique freedoms and ingenuity of our nation look like? How could we celebrate the birth of our country with appropriate recognition that it was inaugurated through a bloody, violent, and self-righteous sequence of events? We seem to be stuck in such an "all or nothing" rut in terms of non-critically celebrating or being categorized as anti-American. Not so on either account.

The parade also had more than its share of churches participating. I'm glad to see our community's churches trying to make an impact. But I was left wondering what the effect of their parading would be. Do our churches really think that by marching together wearing ears, noses and whiskers that the "unchurched" will want to join their journey? Or that by rolling a stained glass windowed bellfry with a cross on it down the street that parade-goers will be motivated to take up the cross and follow Jesus?

And then there are social activists: environmentalists, peace advocates, political reformists, and health care whistle blowers. Again, I'm actually sympathetic to each of these causes, but I question the effectiveness of trying to out-shout the marching bands with one's war opposition, or pulling your float with a Hummer H3 while advocating political reforms, or driving a school bus (even a bio diesel one) while challenging our environmental practices. Paradox all over the place; I just wonder how many of the participants see these ironies themselves. It's clear that those looking on see them.

Finally, I was astounded at how the two and a half hour parade was basically a mile-long commercial. From towing companies, to various city departments, to gymnastics and karate academies, to politicians, to nut makers, to towing companies (did I mention this already?), to secret societies, to local eating establishments, it seemed that we were given invitation after invitation to help improve the economy. Apparently we've become so outrageously commercialized that even our holiday parades are for sale.

Ooops, one more thing: Candy. Everyone was throwing candy to kids and adults alike. I mean everyone. Guess that's a way to ensure future business for our two major hospitals...

I know this post sounds like a summer scrooge. Perhaps I really am at heart. But the joy of today for me is found in the freedom to write this blog, to think and speak critically about the community that I am a part of, and to do so from my second property (because my first property is still suffering from the real estate depression).

Really though, the joy of today is in spending it with my family, napping on the sofa, hearing/smelling/feeling the rain water the earth, and knowing that my earthly residence is a great place (the United States of America) but that when it really comes to citizenship, my primary allegiances are to Jesus Christ and the other way of living to which he welcomes me.