The New, Ancient Mandate

New mandate? What do you mean it is a "new" mandate? There is nothing new about it. We are reading from a book that is 1900 years old. How on earth is that considered new? And isn't that part of the problem? We want something new all the time. I just got a new car (a red Saturn Vue to be exact), and my wife just bought new furniture for the upstairs family room. (0% financing and good deals makes for a buyers market . . . recession ha ha ha.) And the faith we are given is ancient, almost timeless.

It is Holy Week and Passover, so even secular talk radio has religious experts on as guests. Emergent experts were a day or two ago. And yes, we need something new. The way we have done church for the last 150 years is not working. But how much has to change? It is hard to say what is most important. If we are given an ancient faith that will stretch into the end of time, how do we keep it fresh? If we really are given a new, 2000 year-old, mandate tonight, how do we embody that today?

I want to make a modest proposal that we start with our Christian brothers and sisters. We have to stop looking at each other as the enemy. I think one of the major broken pieces in the modern church is that for the last 150 years, we have said, "I disagree, so I am parting ways." We have churches all over the landscape, but we have little love for one another. The ecumenical movement of let us all hold hands and act cordial is ridiculous, because one group will look at another and overtly or passively say, "You are not REALLY Christian."

So, I beg my fellow Christians, clergy and lay, to take serious the new mandate. "Love each other as I have loved you." Let's take something new out of this ancient word.

Silent Night

This year, for our 11:00p.m. Christmas Eve Service, I chose for us to sing Hark, the Herald Angels Sing and not, as is tradition, Silent Night. Just at the thought of it people questioned, pondered, and even rebuked the change.

My thoughts on this change are two-fold.

1. We were using the service of Nine Lessons and Carols as developed and presented by King's College. If you look on the King's College website, http://www.kings.cam.ac.uk/, you will find they traditionally end with O Come, All Ye Faithful followed by Hark, the Herald Angels Sing. I figure if it is good enough for King's College Cambridge, it is probably good enough for us.

2. There is a theological bend to this question as well. If we listen to the Christmas story as told in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, we find that the angels tell the shepherds the shepherds tell someone for "all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them." The star tells the Gentiles, who in turn tell King Herod (ok, so that wasn't the best person to tell).

So what do we do when we hear this story again? That's right, light a little candle, sing a song about being silent, and warm up in our own personal glow space. We are not called to be silent with the news that a child has been born. We are to be heralds, bearers of the news. We have a gift to share and it did not come from Jared's.

We need the good news of a savior, who brings peace, to cover the face of the earth. And we, the people who worship this child born in Bethlehem, are the ones who need to share the message with the world in turmoil.

T.V. News

I know this is a bit out dated, but it came up while watching Boston Legal on TIVO last night.

A couple of weeks ago, a Dallas Police Officer struck and killed a 10-year old boy. The boy was riding his bike in the evening on a poorly lit street. The Police Officer was driving his patrol car over the speed limit in a residential area with no lights and no siren.

I am not here to talk about the boy or the officer. I grieve for them both. My wife and said again last night, "We cannot image how desperately lost the parents must feel at this time." I also cannot begin to imagine how horrified the officer must feel knowing he accidentally killed an innocent child.

I am here to talk about the TV news coverage in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. More than once, they showed some or all of the video from the perspective of the dash board cam in the patrol car. I know they said, "The images you are about to see are disturbing." I know they said, "Parents, you might want to remove your children from the room." I know they stopped the video before the car actually struck the boy. I also know my wife and I both cringed at the thought and grabbed the remote and turned off the TV. It was unnecessary. It was vile. It was tasteless. It was senseless.

Yes, that video needs to be used in police training sessions. Yes, use it in court. Yes, keep it as public record. But the freedom of the press does not mean the press needs to be Faces of Death V. Remember you are here to serve the public as the fourth estate. And yes, as a member of the first estate (look at your French History for this one), I am calling you to a higher standard for the common good.