Got Diligence?

Here is my sermon from Sunday. The text Proverbs 6:6-11; 14:23; 21:5, 25; 24:30-34; 26:13-14: 

In 1904, Max Weber, a German economist and philosopher, began writing what became his seminal work, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. It is considered one of the founding works in the creation of the field of sociology. Weber argued that it was the Protestant reformation which created the spirit of capitalism and drove the northern European countries to economic prominence because Protestantism imbued the idea that everyone was called by God to be productive in life, that all had a calling, and that the ideal was no longer to be secluded in the religious life, which eschewed things like making money, and instead the ideal became working hard for the community and for yourself, with all the benefits that came from that. Weber argued that in particular this was driven by the Calvinist belief in predestination, and since under predestination you didn’t know if you were truly saved or not, the only evidence might be seen in what happened in your life, and hard work and frugality were seen as signs of election, plus if you were gaining wealth it must mean that God was blessing you, and therefore another indication that you were saved. Now it could be argued whether Weber is correct or not in his analysis, but this idea of hard work has been tied to our understanding of labor, wealth and worthiness in America. That if you are poor, it must be your fault, at least to a degree, an idea we will come back to. And yet, some of our ideas about work go back much further than Weber. It goes back to scripture, and in particular, to the views, or at least some of the views found in the book of Proverbs. And so today we are going to be looking at some of the proverbs about work and laziness, or a more general term of diligence.

Now to help us understand these proverbs in particular, it’s important to remember the purpose of Proverbs which is to provide instruction to young men of a certain social position as they are about to embark into adulthood, meaning getting married and also assuming their proper role in society as leaders. And so while the proverbs may have been known to those of lower class, or day laborers, that was not to whom proverbs was primarily addressed. Additionally, as I said in our introduction, Proverbs is an overly optimistic book, and while it is not fully this way, it does at least give off the impression that if you do the wise things, and work hard, that good things will result, including wealth and success, and if you follow the way of foolishness that the opposite will result. That is if you do x, y will happen, and thus if bad things are happening, it is not because of outside forces, it’s not because God is punishing you for something, but because of what you have chosen, or not chosen, to do. And since one of the things that the teachings and laws want to do is to make sure first that there is a next generation and second that they will be protected and cared for, the proverbs can make a little more sense within that context.

In the Beginning

Here is my sermon for June 7. The text was Genesis 1:1-2:4a:

Last week I said that Peter’s line that the disciples aren’t drunk because it was only 9 am was one of my favorite, but the opening line from today’s Genesis passage is one of the most important in scripture, because it proves that baseball is the greatest sport there is, because God starts the creation in the big inning. Perhaps it’s also a sign that maybe the season will start soon. But the opening line here is probably one of the most famous in scripture, although what we have in Christianity, is more than likely a mistranslation. The Jewish Publication Societies translation, as other Jewish translations say, “when God began to create heaven and earth,” which might be more accurate, but it ruins my baseball joke, and so we’ll pretend as if it’s not there. This is the first of two creation stories in the Bible, and they are very different stories, as we will see, and contain different reasons for being and different understandings of God, and we’ll explore some of them over the next two weeks. But the simple fact that there are two different creation stories, telling of creation in different ways, should eliminate most of the arguments that we have about the Bible verses evolution.

But, unfortunately it doesn’t, and I can’t say why, but for simplicity sake, and I know this won’t be a problem for most watching today, you can indeed both be a Christian and believe in evolution. They are not incompatible ideas, and we’ll touch only briefly on this, but the earliest church’s opposition to evolution came not because of contradiction with scripture but because of the idea of social Darwinism, or survival of the fittest in humanity, which still exists today, which argued that he poor, handicapped, criminals, and others deemed unworthy, or unimportant by society should be weeded out, allowed to die, or purposely killed in order to protect humanity as a species. In arguments saying that we should just let senior citizens die so that we can get the economy going again is a social Darwinist argument, and something, I hope, that we find morally repugnant. But, that’s a different message for a different day.

Traveling the Prayer Paths: In Solitude

Here is my sermon from Sunday. The text is Luke 5:12-16:

In December, the Rev. Howard-John Wesley, senior pastor of the historic Alfred Street Baptist Church in Alexandria, Virginia, a historically black church which worships 4500 in every week, announced to his congregation that he was stepping away from his ministry for a season because he feels far from God, tired in his soul and needed to recuperate mentally and physically.  He will return to his church and the pulpit on Easter Sunday, but is taking the time in between to try and rest and recuperate and reconnect with God. He said that early in his ministry he was asked by an older woman in the congregation why he worked seven days a week, something endemic to clergy, and he replied “The devil doesn’t take a day off.” To which she said, ‘Why is the devil your role model?’ Jesus models that we need to rest.” But, he didn’t listen to her advice, and he said that now he is tired in his soul “and a nap aint gonna’ fix it.”

Today we begin a new worship series entitled Traveling the Prayer Paths of Jesus, based on a book of the same name by John Indermark, in which we will look at the way that Jesus prayed in order to learn about ways, or things we should be doing in our own prayer lives. Now I guess I should start by saying that if we want to look at the nature of prayer, or what we should say, that when Jesus is asked about prayer, he gives us what we know of as the Lord’s Prayer, but that’s a different message for a different time. Because while what we say can be important, much of what we see about Jesus’ prayer life is where he is praying and why. And even the Lord’s Prayer itself comes from a specific place, as Jesus has gone off to pray and then when he is done, the disciples ask him to teach them about praying. It is that reality that we want to focus on today, because Jesus often goes off to be by himself, or sometimes with a small group of others, in order to pray.

Proverbs: Work and Reward

Here is my sermon from Sunday. The text was Proverbs 6:6-11; 14:23; 21:5, 25; 24:30-34; 26:13-14:

In 1904, Max Weber, a German economist and philosopher, began work on what became his seminal work, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. It is considered one of the founding works in the creation of the field of economic sociology as well as within sociology itself. Weber argued that it was the Protestant reformation which created the spirit of capitalism and drove the northern European countries to economic prominence because Protestantism imbued the idea that everyone was a minister, that everyone was called by God to be productive in life, that all had a calling, and that the ideal was no longer to be secluded in the religious life, which eschewed things like making money, and instead the ideal became working hard for the community and for yourself, with all the benefits that came from that. Weber argued that in particular this was driven by the Calvinist belief in predestination, and since you didn’t know if you were truly saved or not, the only evidence might be seen in what happened in your life, and hard work and frugality were seen as signs of election, plus if you were gaining wealth it must mean that God was blessing you, and therefore another indication that you were saved. Now it could be argued whether Weber is correct or not in his analysis, but this idea of hard work has been tied to our understanding of work, wealth and worthiness in America. And yet, some it goes back much further than Weber. It goes back to scripture, and in particular, to the views, or at least some of the views, in the book of Proverbs, and so appropriately enough for this Labor Day weekend, we are going to be looking at some of the proverbs about work and laziness.

Now, as we heard from the few passages from this morning, Proverbs wants to make a direct correlation between work and prosperity, laziness and poverty, remembering that in Proverbs it wants to present that there are two paths we can choose, the path of wisdom or the path of folly, and thus you can guess which path it is that those who are wise follow. This is also a critical piece in Proverbs of warning about consequences. That if you do x, y will happen, and thus the results of the bad things that occur are not because of outside forces, it’s not because God is punishing you for something, but because of what you have chosen, or not chosen, to do. So, for example, it could say, if you choose to step off a tall building, you will fall to your death. If you smoke for 50 years, you’re going to get cancer. While much of wisdom literature is concerned with the question of why, and in particular of asking God that question, why did this happen? Why is there suffering or evil in the world? Proverbs, for the most part isn’t concerned with that question because it knows what the answer is: Because we choose not to follow the right path.

Speed. I Am Speed.

Here is my sermon from Sunday. The text was Luke 10:38-42:

Today we continue in our series in the gospel in Pixar looking at the movie Cars. Cars tells the story of Lightning McQueen, whom we just say, a racecar who is trying to become the first rookie racer to ever win the Piston Cup (He did what in his cup?) In the last race of the season, McQueen has a huge lead on the last lap when his tires blow allowing the two main competitors Strip Weather, also known as The King, who is in his last season, and Chick Hicks, the racer who is in perpetual second place, to catch up and there is a three way tie to end the race. McQueen’s tires blow because he has fired three crew chiefs and refuses to listen to the rest of his team, because, as he says, he is a one-man show, which then causes the rest of the team to quit. It is decided that to resolve the tie that there will be a three car race in California the next week, but on the way to California, Lightning accidentally comes out of the truck he is riding in, and in his confusion, ends up in a small town by the name of Radiator Springs, the cutest little town in Carburetor County, along Route 66, and while being chased by the police for speeding ends up tearing up the main street, where he is then arrested and sentenced to pave the street before he will be allowed to leave. While in the town he encounters a strange collection of characters that includes another former piston cup racer who has become the town doctor, but who has hidden his true identity from everyone else.

Up to this point, McQueen has seen racing and life as a zero sum game, as he has just said, there is one winner and 42 losers. One person is at the top, and everyone else is a loser in both senses of that words, of not winning the race and also not winning at life. Lightning has confused the idea with winning with being a winner, the same mistake that Chick Hicks will make at the end of the film, and we often do the same thing. There are some things in life that really are races, but not many, or certainly not as many as we would like to make them, especially when we turn life into a race and want to declare winners and losers. Seth Godin has said, in a competition in which the point is to win, you’re not supposed to enjoy the ride, learn anything, make your community better, slow down for anything, you’re supposed to win. It also justifies the use of any means in order to reach that end, winning. And when we treat life as a race, with winners and losers, then we end of cheating, literally and figuratively, everyone, most especially ourselves.  And so what Lightning has to do is to come to the realization that that is what he is doing with his own life.  He has equated “I won the race” with “I am a winner,” and he realizes how he has treated everyone else in his life, that he doesn’t have any real friends, that everything and everyone is a means to an end, just as others, like his agent Harrv, only see him as a means to an end.  As a result he is rushing through life, and life is rushing by him, and he’s never getting the time or taking the time to stop and learn how to smell the roses, as it were.  This becomes clear to him when he has an afternoon off from paving the road, and Sally, the owner of the local motel, the Cozy Cone, takes him for a drive…