Books I Read

Here are the books I read in 2017. This is more for my records, then for others, but I would recommend nearly all of them.

1. 1984 by George Orwell
2. 23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism by Ha-Joon Chang
3. A Fighting Chance by Elizabeth Warren
4. All That Glitters by Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez
5. America at War with Itself by Henry A. Giroux
6. American Religious History by Patrick Allitt
7. Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson
8. Avenue of Mysteries by John Irving
9. Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of Our Everyday Lives by Gretchen Rubin
10. Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates
11. Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain
12. Black Man in a White Coat: A Doctor's Reflection on Race and Medicine by Damon Tweedy
13. Canada by Mike Myers
14. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
15. Christmas Every Morning by Lisa Tawn Bergren
16. Clip In: Risking Hospitality in Your Church by Jim Ozier and Fiona Haworth
17. Con Ed by Matthew Klein
18. Considering Hate: Violence, Goodness and Justice in American Culture and Politics by Kay Whitlock and Michael Bronski
19. Conversations with Scripture: The Gospel of Mark by Marcus Borg
20. Damnation of Theron Ware by Harold Frederic
21. Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydide's Trap? by Graham Allison
22. Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
23. Do Not Ask What Good We Do: Inside the US House of Representatives by Robert Draper
24. Engineered for Murder by Aileen Schumacher
25. Finding God is a Galaxy Far, Far Away: A Spiritual Exploration of the Star Wars Saga by Timothy Paul Jones
26. Flash Foresight: How to See the Invisible and Do the Impossible by Daniel Burrus
27. For Men Only: A Straightforward Guide to the Inner Lives of Women by Shaunti and Jeff Feldhahn
28. For Women Only: What You Need to Know about the Inner Lives of Men by Shaunti Feldhahn
29. George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones
30. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling
31. Hitler's American Model: The United States and the Making of Nazi Race Law by James Q Whitman
32. Holy Spirit by Stanley Hauerwas and William Willimon
33. Homosexuality and Christian Faith: Questions of Conscience for the Churches edited by Walter Wink
34. How Dogs Love Us: A Neuroscientist and His Adopted Dog Decode the Canine Brain by Gregory Berns
35. How English Became English: A Short History of a Global Language by Simon Horobin
36. How to Fall in Love with Anyone by Mandy Len Catron
37. How to Read Proverbs by Tremper Longman III
38. In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrick
39. Irresistible: The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked by Adam Alter
40. Islam: A Short History by Karen Armstrong
41. Island of the Blue Dolphins by Scott O'Dell
42. J.M. Barrie and the Lost Boys by Andrew Birkin
43. Jim and Casper Go to Church: Frank Conversations about Faith, Churches and Well Meaning Christians by Jim Henderson and Matt Casper
44. John Birch: A Life by Terry Lautz
45. Lost at Sea: An American Tragedy by Patrick Dillon
46. Love Works: Seven Timeless Principles for Effective Leaders by Joel Manby
47. Lovingkindness: Realizing and Practicing Your True Self by William Miller
48. Men Without Work: America's Invisible Crisis by Nicholas Eberstadt
49. Mere Christianity by CS Lewis
50. Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
51. No More Work: Why Full Employment is a Bad Idea by James Livingston
52. On Immunity: An Innoculation by Eula Bliss
53. On Tyrrany: Twenty One Lessons from the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder
54. One Summer: America, 1927 by Bill Bryson
55. Paper: Paging Through History by Mark Kurlansky
56. Phasma by Delilah S. Dawson
57. Physics of the Future: How Science Will Shape Human Destiny and Our Daily Lives by the Year 2100 by Michio Kaku
58. Preaching from the Minor Prophets by Elizabeth Achtemeier
59. Printer's Error: Irreverent Stories from Book History by J.P. Romney and Rebecca Romney
60. Putting God Second: How to Save Religion from Itself by Rabbi Donniel Hartman
61. Raising the Floor: How a Universal Basic Income can Renew our Economy and Rebuild the American Dream by Andy Stern and Lee Kravitz
62. Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder and One Man's Fight for Justice by Bill Browder
63. Seeing What Others Don't: The Remarkable Ways We Gain Insight by Gary Klein
64. Sex God: Exploring the Endless Connections Between Sexuality and Spirituality by Rob Bell
65. Since We Fell by Dennis Lehane
66. Talk Like Ted: The 9 Public Speaking Secrets of the World's Top Minds by Carmine Gallo
67. Tall Tales and Half Truths of Pat Garrett by John LeMay
68. The Arena: Inside the Tailgating, Ticket-Scalping, Mascot-Racing and Dubiously Funded, and Possibly Haunted Monuments of American Sport by Rafi Kohan
69. The Central Park Five: The Untold Story Behind One of New York City's Most Infamous Crimes by Sarah Burns
70. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime by Mark Haddon
71. The Deadliest Cast Member by Kelly Ryan Johns
72. The Earth Moves: Galileo and the Roman Inquisition by Dan Hofstadter
73. The End of Leadership by Barbara Kellerman
74. The End of White Christian America by Robert P. Jones
75. The Evolution of Useful Things: How Everyday Artifacts came to be as They are by Henry Petroski
76. The Gospel According to Star Wars: Faith, Hope and the Force by John C. McDowell
77. The Great Degeneration: How Institutions Decay and Economies Die by Niall Ferguson
78. The Great Emergence: How Christianity is Changing and Why by Phyllis Tickle
79. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
80. The Kindness Challenge: 30 Days to Improve Any Relationship by Shaunti Feldhahn
81. The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe by CS Lewis
82. The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann
83. The Martian by Andy Weir
84. The Meaning of Human Existence by E.O. Wilson
85. The Other 1492: Ferdinand, Isabella and the Making of an Empire by Teofilo Ruiz
86. The Plot Against America: A Novel by Philip Roth
87. The Second Death of George Mallory: The Enigma and Spirit of Mount Everest by Reinhold Messner
88. The Undoing Project: A Friendship that Changed the World by Michael Lewis
89. The Wars of the Roses: The Fall of the Plantagenets and the Rise of the Tudors by Daniel Jones
90. The Way We Never Were: American Families and the Nostalgia Trap by Stephanie Coontz
91. The Whistler by John Grisham
92. The Wilderness of Ruin: A Tale of Madness, Fire and the Hunt for America's Youngest Serial Killer by Roseanne Montillo
93. The World America Made by Robert Kagan
94. Thrawn by Timothy Zahn
95. Three Weeks with My Brother: A Memoir by Nicholas Sparks
96. Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal World by Rutger Bregman
97. When Bad Things Happen to Good People by Rabbi Harold Kushner

Star of Wonder

Here is my sermon for Christmas Eve. The text was Matthew 2:1-12:

I was camping in northern New Mexico one year, and when I say camping, it was walk 20 miles into the woods with a pack camping, and so we were in the middle of nowhere, with no artificial lighting around, and it was in August at the time of the Perseid meteor shower, which is usually one of the best meteor showers of the year, with normal output of around 100 meteors an hour, and sometimes as high as 250 an hour. So, we stayed up late, and walked into a meadow, away from our campfire and just watched as meteor after meteor entered and burned up in the earths atmosphere. But these were just little displays, we were watching them streak by lasting for 7-10 seconds, and not just one doing that, but dozens. Until we went to see the total eclipse this year, it was by far the most amazing astronomical phenomenon, or show, that I had ever seen. And it is something that we are normally separated from because of the ambient light, or light pollution, that is always around us, that drowns out the night sky. There are people who have never really seen the stars at night, have never experienced the brilliance of the Milky Way being splayed out across the sky, have never seen thousands of stars shining, maybe never have even seen a hundred stars. There was a truck commercial this fall in which a father gives his daughter a telescope, and then realizing that she couldn’t really see the stars, he takes her in his nice new truck out to the forest so she can gaze at the sky, of course he then leaves the headlights and the interior lights and the light in the bed of the truck on, which sort of defeats the purpose of getting away from lights, but did show off the truck really well, although I don’t know which brand, and so I’m not sure how effective it really was.

It wasn’t always this way, of course. We don’t have to go back very far in our history to a time in which they night was not perpetually lit all around us. When people paid attention to what was happening in the sky, and depended upon knowing because often their lives or livelihood depended upon it and they couldn’t get up in the morning and ask google or Siri what the weather was going to be that day. The 19^th Psalm begins, “The heavens the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. They have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them. Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.” (psalm 19:1-4 NIV) I think that Calvin is right, and that’s not John Calvin, but Calvin and Hobbes, that if we spent more time looking at the stars, of seeing the splendor and wonder of creation, that we might all live a little differently, or at least approach how we live differently.

Songs of Thanksgiving

Here is my sermon from Sunday. The text was Luke 1:39-56:

If you were here last week for our incredible Christmas Cantata, for the scripture reading you also heard the passage known as the annunciation, in which Mary is told that she will give birth to a child and she is to name him Jesus. Additionally, we lit the third candle of Advent, the candle of joy. The other candles of Advent are purple, which represents royalty for Jesus, and the coming birth of the king, but also for repentance and suffering, which like Lent, are part of the season of Advent, although they are now greatly downplayed in importance. The pink of that third candle also comes from a Lenten practice, in which on the fourth Sunday of Lent, there was, and is, a pause from the theme of repentance surrounding Lent, and also the color purple, with a change to pink, or rose and it was a Sunday of rejoicing, a break from the penitential practices of the season. It is seen as a day of hope as we approach the darkness of holy week and then the celebration of Easter. Traditionally no one could be married during Lent, except on this day, it was a day of celebration. And so, when Advent came into being as a liturgical practice, it followed the time of Lent, and the third Sunday too was represented by pink, and the theme of joy, that no matter what is going on in our lives that we can have joy in the presence of God and in the expectation of the coming of Christ.

I think that idea is important as we think then about the stories of Elizabeth, whom we have been hearing about since the first Sunday of Advent with the announcement to Zechariah that she was to bear a son in her advanced age, and then with John the Baptist preparing the way for the coming of Jesus, and even in the annunciation, Mary is told that her cousin Elizabeth is with child. Now it’s not clear why Elizabeth plays such an important role at the beginning of Luke’s gospel, and he is the only one to mention her, and she disappears after the birth of John the Baptist. Perhaps it’s to emphasize that John is not as great as Jesus, after all he leaps in his mother’s womb in praise of Mary, not the other way around. And then, of course, John says that one who is greater than he is coming. Or perhaps Elizabeth is seen as playing the mothering role for the young Mary, as there is no mention at all of Mary’s family. But whatever the reason, Elizabeth clearly plays an important role in Mary’s life at this time, and her response to her pregnancy, and to Mary’s pregnancy, perhaps gives more indication to Mary of how she too should feel and approach the coming birth, as will then be seen in Mary’s song of praise, known as the Magnificat.

If We Make It Through December

Here is my sermon for our Blue Chritmas service. The text was Romans 8:18-28:

There’s an old Merle Haggard song entitled If We Make It Through December. It tells the story of a man who has hit hard times after he has been laid off at the factory, but who is hoping for the best, and for better times. He says, “Now, I don’t mean to hate December, it’s meant to be the happy time of year, and why my little girl don’t understand why daddy can’t afford no Christmas here.” And so, he says, if only they can make it through December, everything will be alright. Occasionally you will actually hear that during this season being played along the other songs of the season, but it’s pretty rare, because it doesn’t really capture the feeling of the season that people think you’re supposed to have. It’s not holly, jolly and certainly not merry, and so I suspect if they played it too often people would start complaining. And yet, for many people it sums up their feelings a little too well, and I’m assuming for most of you as well, that you think, “If we can just make it through to the New Year, then things will get better. It won’t hurt as much.”

I’ve said this in year’s past, but I think this is the most important worship service we do every year, and yet it is the one I struggle with the most, because it’s the hardest one to sort of encapsulate what might need to be said, because that need is different for everyone of you, and I feel the need to try and say something, to try and give some level of comfort even in my inadequacies in doing so. I know some of you might think it’s because us preachers just can’t be quiet and if given the chance to talk, we have to fill up the space, even if just to hear ourselves talk. But honestly, it’s more out of fear. One year I am going to be strong enough to just come here and let us sit in silence for 10 minutes, but I’m not ready to do that yet, and maybe you’re not ready either. Sometimes we need to hear some words of comfort, some words of promise some words of hope in this time, in this moment, that at some point everything might be alright and so I hope that they are more than the words offered by the friends to Job in the midst of his suffering, because as long as they were silent, everything was okay. It’s once they began to speak that they got themselves into trouble, and perhaps that was because they then tried to give justification for why Job was suffering, rather than simply being present for him.

Making the Way

Here is my sermon from Sunday. The text was Mark 1:1-8:

Last week we heard scripture from the gospel of Luke announcing the birth of John the Baptist to his father Zechariah. But, because he and his wife are getting on in years, Zechariah does not believe the angel Gabriel’s announcement, and for that reason he is struck mute for the length of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, which had to be a long wait. And yet, they had already been waiting a lifetime for this momentous occasion to come. They had been praying to God for a miracle to take place, for them to have a child, thinking and probably believing that it was never going to happen. And so, as we look through their eyes at the miraculous birth of their son, who we are told will make the way for the coming of Jesus, we see their waiting and the waiting that John the Baptist will also have to do, although we don’t have to do that same waiting because last week when the scripture passage ended Elizabeth was 5 months pregnant with John and today we encounter him, and he is around 30 years old, man does time fly.

John is a special character in scripture, because he is the only person who is continually referred to by what he does, that is he is John the Baptist. So, we have to note that John is not a Baptist, it’s not like saying John the Methodist, but he is known for being the one who baptizes, which we will dig into a little more in the new year when we come back to Mark’s account of Jesus baptism by John. As part of the proclamation to Zechariah, he is told that John “must never drink wine or strong drink; even before his birth he will be filled with the Holy Spirit. He will turn many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. With the spirit and power of Elijah he will go before him, to turn the hearts of parents to their children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” What this statement means is that John was a Nazarite, which again has nothing to do with a specific denomination like the Nazarenes, but instead this was a very special group of people, men, in Judaism who took special vows. Two of the most famous Nazarites were Samson and Samuel, who both also happened to be the result of births of formerly barren women, and they entered into their vows because of pledges their mothers had given to God about what they would do with their child, if they were able to have a child. Of course, in this case, it’s not the pledge of the mother, or at least not that we know of, although Elizabeth was praying hard for a child, but instead the pledge that God is making on behalf of who John is and who he will be.

Silenced By God

Here is my sermon from Sunday. The text was Luke 1:5-25:

Time is a strange thing, because although we measure it in seconds, and minutes and hours, and days and years and even longer, and we can say how long each of these things are, it turns out that these are not actually set amounts of time, because time changes We all know that time is not constant. It can go long, or it can be slow. In fact, Einstein’s theory of relativity even says that the length of time varies depending upon which relatives we are around. If we want them to go away soon, then time goes slowly, and if we want it to last longer, then it goes too quickly. Or at least I think that’s what the theory of relativity is about. But, that’s when we have to understand that there are two different types of time. There is Chronos time, that is the time measured by the clock, or sequential time, this is what we normally mean when we talk about time. Then there is Kairos time, which is about God time, about those thin moments in life, when we encounter the divine, when time slows down. It’s a time that often comes with waiting, or as Paul says its about the fullness of time, and that’s what the season of Advent is about, a season of waiting and preparation.  And, as I say nearly every year, there is not a war on Christmas, which doesn’t start until December 25, and then we have 12 days of celebration, there is a war on Advent. I think some of that is because waiting is hard to do because time is not a constant. For those of you who are a little older, do you remember when you were a child, how long it took for Christmas to arrive? And the closer you got to it, the longer it seemed to take, time slowed to a crawl. Now it just seems to fly by, except when it doesn’t, and we see something very similar in the story of Zechariah.

The passage begins by telling us “In the days of King Herod of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly order of Abijah.” Does that introduction sound familiar to other parts of the Bible? That’s right the prophets, so right at the start, Luke is making a connection to the historicity of Judaism. Abijah is a descendent of Aaron, who was the brother of Moses, and the head of the priestly class, and he represented one of 24 divisions into which the priesthood was divided under king David. We are then also told that his wife Elizabeth was also a descendent of Aaron, so this is a family that has some historic connections although they are not at the top of the social circle. Additionally, we are told that both are righteous and blameless before God, which means they are following all of the commandments and regulations of God. Luke gives us that information as well so that those who were not familiar with those terms will understand what that means. And yet, Elizabeth is also barren, or without child, which she says has brought disgrace upon her, and by default on Zechariah. And so, we have a juxtaposition of ideas here.