One thing I’ve noticed since moving to Durham is that young adults in this area is pretty transitory.   This might not be anything geographically unique, but  we come for a couple years go to grad school and then move on.  I first spent extended time in Durham in the Summers of 2001 and 2002  when I was here for an internship and since 2003 it’s been home.  I’ve seen many people come and go.  Someday I will also and I imagine I’ll go with mixed emotions.  I haven’t always enjoyed the time I’ve spent here.  I feel like there are more loose meandering threads than anything clear or concrete.

Without relatives in this area I probably would have never come and upon arrival and I started attending Durham Mennonite Church with them.  For as long as I’ve been there it’s been missing a solid group of 20-somethings.   Brad and Beth Yoder moved into the area and from them I found out about this Mennonite Church Plant in Chapel Hill.  I visited but the service for me at the time was a bit much and I didn’t return until about 4 years ago.  In that time it had changed to something I found more palatable and since then I’ve been attending both churches.  Those who have sojourned there and at Durham have gotten me into a fair number of things.  From Fred and Elizabeth Bahnson I got involved in Anathoth Garden.  On Tuesday nights I try and get out to to the work session in the garden, It’s a bit of a haul but there’s a potluck after the garden work is done and a Mexican lady makes these fresh tortilla’s that are to die for.  Jonathan and Leah Wilson-Hartgrove were part of the same Christian Peace Maker Team as Shane Claiborne and I got to know some of the folks from Rutba house as that formed and gotten to know something about the New Monastic Movement.  I led the youth group at Durham such as it was until everybody graduated from High School about two years ago.   We did a few things with Raleigh Mennonite and I got to know folks from there.   So I feel like I’ve formed a life here, but it’s spread out, everything requires driving 20 minutes to get there and I move from event to event, group to group without a lot of connection.

… Cue Ramble On - Led Zeppelin …

So when the Jesus for President tour comes to Raleigh I’m only mildly interested, I think I know a bit about this Shane Claiborne character.  I figure I know the community he’s writing from and his story, but even still it’d be fun to see the pageantry.   He and Chris Haw didn’t disappoint as it was more than I expected.  Their dialogue interspersed with fragments of song from the Psalters was raucous, awesome in the classical sense and I love that sort of thing.  But I feel like I’m in the choir.  I’m not really sure we’re the crowd who should have been there.  I’d have loved to see how a bunch of Southern Baptists or Presbyterians would have reacted.  I thing that most us of attending probably agreed with him going in, so for us it’s nice hear another voice speaking counter to the market.  It’s refreshing to hear a prophet who isn’t shilling for the man.  It allows us to tune out the messages in the media a little while longer.  So although the audience might have been the wrong one, to me it was the audience was the most significant part of the evening.  Amidst this motley crew of 700ish people that showed up, there were those I know from the Mennonite Churches in the area(Greensboro, Graham, Raleigh Durham and Chapel Hill), people I know from playing Ultimate Frisbee on Sunday afternoons, people I know from Habitat from Humanity, from Anathoth and from Rutba house.  It made me really happy to feel like all these fragmented pieces that seem so disconnected are part of a larger community, if only for one night.

A meditation from:
Zechariah 10:6-12
Luke 7:18-23
2 Corinthians 1:10.

I like to travel. I’ve visited a few places in the last couple of years and what I like about traveling is the sense of adventure, of seeing new places, experiencing new foods and meeting new people. However the thing, I think I like the most is the sense that I’m not completely in control. I’m a little bit out of my comfort zone. Sometimes a lot. In that lace of control I feel like God works. One thing I keep on saying about travel is that God is my travel agent. Unexpected things always happen in ways that continue to startle and amaze me.

For instance at the end of 2005, I went to Djibouti in East Africa. I thought that I was going to teach some computer education classes, but I didn’t really know what I was getting into. Somewhere between taking off in Raleigh and landing in Djibouti 40 hours later those plans fell through. Within two days I had the opportunity to write an Open Source Application to manage the Pharmacy of a free AIDs clinic funded by the WHO and teach a local about the tools and code I used to create it so he could maintain it after I left. Oh and did I mention that they speak French there? My French isn’t very good.

As I describe that situation to you, it might sound like I’m a very adventurous person and thus you might be surprised by the fact that I don’t necessarily gravitate toward doing these crazy things. Rather, I want to be that sort of person and I choose to put myself in situations where I am forced to be stretched. It is at these times when I must rely on the strength of God and he does not disappoint. Life seems fuller and more vivid in these times. I’m not sure I want to make to much of that fact because it starts to sound a bit like a drug addiction. However the fact remains, in times of trial God’s strength prevails.

Some one asked a rabbi, “why do you always teach using questions?” to which he responded. “What’s wrong with a question?” I think that some of the hardest issues in my life I can only talk about using questions. It’s “easy” for me to trust God and expect him to move when I travel, but it’s much harder when I’m living a quiet life in North Carolina. It’s hard to expect to see God move in new ways when I’m putting in a 40ish hour week and new isn’t the pattern. Yet as I reflect on my life there is a nagging question, When do I need to rely on God’s strength and not my own?

What are the things I need? Relationships? Opportunities? Money? I don’t think I like to rely on God for money, it seems like poor stewardship. I don’t like leaving things to chance, l try and plan and use my resources wisely. Yet safety is a myth and my best laid plans are fragile. I was reminded of that just a few weeks ago when I blew out my knee. That injury of an instant put in jeopardy the weeks of planning and shopping I had spent for the bike trip I am still hoping to go on next week. I still may go, but it is very uncertain. This desire for safety I think is a result of fear and fear limits us.

John A. Shed wrote, “A ship in harbor is safe — but that is not what ships are built for.”

That’s a great quote but having heard that and asking hard questions isn’t enough. I still wonder if I am attached to things? My house, new bicycle, pottery studio? The temptation is to prevent their loss. But what if that is the expense of obedience? Jesus gives us some tough instructions about money. Do I value obedience to God above all? Stewardship seems like a good value but if I put safety in the name of stewardship above obedience to God, that’s a problem.

I am not the only one with questions. I have good company. John the Baptist sent his disciples to ask Jesus if he was really the Christ or if they should expect someone else. Jesus doesn’t give a straight yes but answers John’s doubt in a very explicit way. Understanding his answer requires us to go back a bit earlier in Luke, where Jesus starts his ministry by reading from the scroll of the prophet Isaiah,

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Jesus answer is a once again claiming the prophecy from Isaiah, but one interesting thing is that he has preached the good news to the poor and this is before his death and resurrection, so what is this good news? Looking again what’s happened in Luke’s gospel we see that Jesus says to the poor, yours is the kingdom of Heaven, you will be satisfied, you will laugh.

This must be comforting. Comfort in the midst of suffering, maybe a bit like what Paul talks about in 2 Corinthians.

However, this same passage that describes the good news to the poor also gives me some discomfort since it describes woe for situations too which I feel painfully close.

“But woe to you who are rich,
for you have already received your comfort. ”

“Woe to you when all men speak well of you,
for that is how their fathers treated the false prophets”

The example of Jesus is a challenge to us. It isn’t easy to follow his teachings. As I read about his life I find hard questions that I feel the need to wrestle with. How do I rely on God’s strength? Am I projecting what I expect on who he is?

“Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor. Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me.”

Delivered at Durham Mennonite 5/13/07

A meditation from:
Isaiah 55:1-5
Psalm 145:8-9, 14-21
Romans 9:1-5
Matthew 14:13-21

There is no such thing as a free lunch–TINSTAAFL. TINSTAAFL is one of the first lessons one learns in high school economics. I took economics the spring of my junior year at Lancaster Mennonite High School. It was an unruly class with a teacher that cared greatly for his students but didn’t have the most disciplined of classrooms. TINSTAAFL is one of the few concepts that I remember from that class, it looks at the factors behind “free” and counts the hidden costs. It’s the idea that somebody always has to pay whether it’s money, resources or time. There are always costs and why they might be negligible; they are always greater than “free.”

Isaiah 55:1-5 has a basic philosophy on money. Why spend money on what is not bread and labor on what does not satisfy? That’s the first thing that stands out to me. It is a validation of simply living which reminds me of another thing that happened in the spring of my junior year. I and a group of other students asked the question how much is enough? For one month we limited ourselves to 5 outfits of clothing, 2 electrical appliances and shorter showers. We looked at the disparity of wealth between ourselves and the majority of the rest of the world and asked how best to be stewards of what God has blessed us with? I still take things away from that learning experience. In this passage I find justification for that lifestyle. A biblical answer for the question we asked matching what we had decided. If you spend your money on food and labor on what satisfies that is enough.

That is not the whole passage though. This statement is parenthesized by an invitation to those who have no money to buy wine and milk without cost, a request to eat what is good and that flows into a restatement of covenant. This is free lunch, and an extravagant free lunch at that. Wine and milk were and are not basic foods. Wine without cost is a Mennonite dilemma. It’s not a bad bargain. We who are thirsty, downtrodden, come and listen and we are blessed. We are promised faithful love, we will summon nations not for any reason of our own right but because of the Lord our God–The Holy One of Israel, that endowed us with splendor. Yet this gives me pause. I have questions. Why would I want to summon nations and what is good to eat.
Summoning nations is difficult, I have an easier time with the eating. It’s both literal and figurative. Literal in the sense that God does give us our daily bread, but I’m also reminded of Daniel asking for vegetables rather than food sacrificed to idols and dietary law laid out in Leviticus. At the risk of preaching a social gospel, I wonder if this might be partially a call that we should try and eat properly: 4 food groups, 8 glasses of water, 3 meals a day, that sort of thing. While it might be wise to do those things, we cannot forget another meaning, one more spiritual and philosophic; eating referring to our consumption of life and what is good, to our choice of activities, conversations, and yes even careers. There is a difference between good and happy. Our constitution guarantees the freedom to pursue happiness. That quest does not always involve good actions and things that are good don’t always make us happy. Good leads to Joy. Good builds up ourselves and those around us. Good uses our talents for the kingdom. Good is simply loving and caring for others.

I don’t have to wonder how well my own life measures up to this. I must that confess that this week I wasted time, I didn’t labor anywhere near 6 days and I probably didn’t get a full day of rest. I didn’t eat breakfast most days and I very possibly buried some of my talents. Some of my motives weren’t pure and I didn’t trust God as much as I ought. I made more money than I needed, spent some of it on things other than food and food preparation and yes even took more than one long shower. My life is busy with stuff.

Come all who are thirsty. Our salvation is not from works. I remember Psalms 145:8-9, 14-21 and I paraphrase:

The Lord is gracious and compassionate; slow to anger and rich in love. He has compassion on all that he has made.

The eyes of all look to you and you give them their food at the proper time. The Lord is near to all who call on him it truth. My mouth will speak in praise of the Lord.

These are the promises God made to his chosen. I notice the food again and also an invitation to come and call on him in truth. Time and time again these promises are made. Come and I will bless you. Yet I don’t have to point to you to very much of the Old testament to show evidence of their disbelief. It seems too simple really, and maybe that’s part of the problem, we don’t feel like we’re doing enough. We feel we need to earn our blessings. Isn’t that the definition of a blessing: something we didn’t earn? In Romans 9:1-5 I think Paul feels this desperation at the plight of the Jews.

For I wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race.

These are drastic words and they seem selfless. He offers his life for many. He sounds so noble, but Paul is not Christ. For all that he taught, he cannot save others, the only sacrifice of life he could make was his own. Only he could choose to come. Only he could choose to eat what is good. Paul sacrificed his life in labor for the church, he was cursed as he tried to win the Jews, but he also was blessed and certainly not cut off from Christ. He is right though. Theirs were the promises and blessings. It is from Abraham, from David that Jesus came. It was the Jews that could enter the inner court of the temple. How callous are we to forget what a privilege to worship. It shouldn’t be a chore, a burden but celebration of privilege. It is only because of Jesus that we can gain a closer proximity to God than any Levite in the Holy of Holies. We can choose to worship. No one can force us. In that choice lies the beauty, that I can choose to come to Christ. It is individual choices that make up this amazing bride of Christ. I can do many things in the name of Christ—for Christ. Though ultimately the only certain thing I can control is my own Choice. I choose to come and eat that which is good.

The 5000 came. Jesus has withdrawn privately by boat to a solitary place. He is in the wilderness because of the death of the John the Baptist. Despite this shadow, the people refuse to leave Jesus to his lonesome. They come and listen. They come and Jesus heals their sick. They have come to the point of forsaking food. The disciples are feeling despair. They want Jesus to send the people away. Jesus doesn’t send them away though. He gives them something more. He takes 5 loaves and 2 fish blesses it and some how there is a feast.

It’s ripe with symbolism 12, 5, bread. 12 tribes, 5 books of the law. It’s almost as if Jesus is saying, you Israel, 12 tribes, I am taking your law, your 5 books of bread, breaking them and through me I am restoring Israel. But the crowd doesn’t see that, they see Free Lunch.

The 5000 are blessed as a result of seeking out Jesus. It’s fulfillment of drawing close and listening. God is faithful. They receive food that was bought without cost. There is a cost, the cost that Jesus pays with his death. This day is still dark with John’s death, it is the final message from the voice crying in the wilderness. It is reminder that that though Jesus’ ministry is to bring life, it also involves death on the cross. The 5000 hound him and they come and receive healing of the sick, food for the hungry: Blessing in the midst of despair.

Come, all you are thirsty,
Come to the waters,
And you who have no money,
Come, buy and eat.
Listen to me eat what is good,
And your soul will delight in the richest of fare.

Delivered at Durham Mennonite 7/31/05 based on the common lectionary.