Jim Harbaugh, head coach of the San Francisco 49ers and John Harbaugh, head coached the Baltimore Ravens, faced each other in the 2013 Super Bowl (interesting side note: James and John are described in the Bible as brothers of Jesus). John’s team won.
I saw a report on The Today Show the next day of a news conference in which John Harbaugh described his brother as "the best coach in the NFL”. He said, “what he has done in past two years is incredible.” In fact he spoke mostly about his brother in that report.
It reminded me of the story of a man who was facing hard times and his car stopped working. He couldn’t afford to have it fixed. His brother stepped in and gave him a car.
Someone who heard that story exclaimed, “Wow, I wish …”
Let me pause here. I’d like to ask a question. I’d like to ask how you think that sentence ends?
I think most people would say, “I had a brother like that.”
The sentence, the way I heard it, ended “I could be a brother like that.”
Moving beyond our own interests to serving the needs of others is central in the Christian life. It living our response to what God has already done for us. “We love because he first loved us.” 1 John 4:19
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
Friday, February 1, 2013
The One Who Needs Me the Most
This year two brothers will face each other as coaches of rival teams in the championship game of their sport for the first time in American sporting history.
Jim Harbaugh will coach the San Francisco 49ers and John Harbaugh will coach the Baltimore Ravens in Super Bowl 47.
They played each other in 2011. The Ravens won. After the game their parents went beneath the stadium to the locker rooms.
Their mother, who had sat stoically through the entire game, not wanting to show anything that could be interpreted as favoritism, said that as she and her husband walked past the Ravens locker room she thought, “We really aren’t needed here…” (LA Times, January 24, 2013). But when they arrived at the 49ers locker room and found their son, by himself with his hands on his head, in coach-mode, they knew that was where they needed to be.
It has been argued that all living things are hard-wired to favor the strongest offspring as they are the ones most likely to pass on their DNA. That may well be true, but human being can be and are more than their wiring.
It can also be argued that in the Christian life, we are more like the mother who, when she was asked if she had a favorite among her children answered, “Yes. The one who needs me the most.”
Jesus came to those who needed him, to those who knew their need for a savior. “’Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners’.” Matthew 2:17b
Jim Harbaugh will coach the San Francisco 49ers and John Harbaugh will coach the Baltimore Ravens in Super Bowl 47.
They played each other in 2011. The Ravens won. After the game their parents went beneath the stadium to the locker rooms.
Their mother, who had sat stoically through the entire game, not wanting to show anything that could be interpreted as favoritism, said that as she and her husband walked past the Ravens locker room she thought, “We really aren’t needed here…” (LA Times, January 24, 2013). But when they arrived at the 49ers locker room and found their son, by himself with his hands on his head, in coach-mode, they knew that was where they needed to be.
It has been argued that all living things are hard-wired to favor the strongest offspring as they are the ones most likely to pass on their DNA. That may well be true, but human being can be and are more than their wiring.
It can also be argued that in the Christian life, we are more like the mother who, when she was asked if she had a favorite among her children answered, “Yes. The one who needs me the most.”
Jesus came to those who needed him, to those who knew their need for a savior. “’Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners’.” Matthew 2:17b
Our Normal Is Jesus
Someone posted a graphic on Facebook that I shared at worship last month.
The top showed three people huddled together in heavy winter clothes, looking miserable, captioned “50° in San Diego”. The bottom showed three people in shorts and light tops having a picnic, captioned “50° in Wisconsin”.
Having grown up in Wisconsin and having visited San Diego, I can attest to the only somewhat exaggerated truth in that graphic.
We get used to things in our environment. They become our normal, our “tradition”. We like them because we just do, and we are unable to think critically about them.
We need a standard outside ourselves to know what it real, what is true.
Jesus is that standard. “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’.” John 14:6
The top showed three people huddled together in heavy winter clothes, looking miserable, captioned “50° in San Diego”. The bottom showed three people in shorts and light tops having a picnic, captioned “50° in Wisconsin”.
Having grown up in Wisconsin and having visited San Diego, I can attest to the only somewhat exaggerated truth in that graphic.
We get used to things in our environment. They become our normal, our “tradition”. We like them because we just do, and we are unable to think critically about them.
We need a standard outside ourselves to know what it real, what is true.
Jesus is that standard. “Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me’.” John 14:6
Light Into The Darkness
I mentioned to one of the “Sandys” in our congregation that this was not a good month for people with her name.
Between the devastation of Hurricane Sandy and the sorrow of Sandy Hook Elementary School, this has been a horrible month.
Christmas comes with lots of cute ways that we celebrate it, but they are cultural.
Read the Christmas story in the gospels of Matthew, Luke and John and try to understand it as it is.
It is the story of a young rejected family, hunted and alone, except for the odd, smelly shepherds and the terrifying angels.
It is a cold night for God become human flesh as a BABY.
And yet God comes in the midst of dislocation and suffering.
God brings light into the darkness.
And, though the darkness is still around the light, it has not overcome it.
Between the devastation of Hurricane Sandy and the sorrow of Sandy Hook Elementary School, this has been a horrible month.
Christmas comes with lots of cute ways that we celebrate it, but they are cultural.
Read the Christmas story in the gospels of Matthew, Luke and John and try to understand it as it is.
It is the story of a young rejected family, hunted and alone, except for the odd, smelly shepherds and the terrifying angels.
It is a cold night for God become human flesh as a BABY.
And yet God comes in the midst of dislocation and suffering.
God brings light into the darkness.
And, though the darkness is still around the light, it has not overcome it.
Given First
One of our members at Faith Lutheran Church in San Dimas asked the rhetorical question before our Thanksgiving-eve worship service, “Wouldn’t it be nice if people were camping out to get a into churches like they are to get into stores?”
I’ve heard of people who do go church “shopping”. Some are looking for the place at which God is calling them to witness and serve.
Others are doing what shoppers line up for, getting the greatest benefit for the lowest cost. They are making a consumer decision.
At Christmas, we offer the best deal imaginable, but it comes at a cost.
God has become human flesh in Jesus Christ. His death was the punishment for our sin. That was the cost.
God has given salvation to all who accept the gift.
That's the deal.
The Christian life is our response to the love of God given to us first in Jesus Christ.
I’ve heard of people who do go church “shopping”. Some are looking for the place at which God is calling them to witness and serve.
Others are doing what shoppers line up for, getting the greatest benefit for the lowest cost. They are making a consumer decision.
At Christmas, we offer the best deal imaginable, but it comes at a cost.
God has become human flesh in Jesus Christ. His death was the punishment for our sin. That was the cost.
God has given salvation to all who accept the gift.
That's the deal.
The Christian life is our response to the love of God given to us first in Jesus Christ.
Mark Luther
Sally and I go to a fund raiser for the dinosaur museum at the Webb Schools in Claremont every year near the end of October, and we meet our friend Mark Luther there.
Mark is a direct descendant of Martin Luther.
How he knows that is a long story, but it is remarkable to shake the hand of someone who carries the DNA of Martin Luther, as it usually happens, just before Reformation Sunday.
We carry the spiritual DNA of Martin Luther as Lutherans now 495 years after the beginning of the Reformation.
Martin Luther called the whole church to reestablish its Christian DNA in the Bible as our only authority, and in salvation through faith alone through God’s grace alone.
That movement continues, and we are a part of it.
Mark is a direct descendant of Martin Luther.
How he knows that is a long story, but it is remarkable to shake the hand of someone who carries the DNA of Martin Luther, as it usually happens, just before Reformation Sunday.
We carry the spiritual DNA of Martin Luther as Lutherans now 495 years after the beginning of the Reformation.
Martin Luther called the whole church to reestablish its Christian DNA in the Bible as our only authority, and in salvation through faith alone through God’s grace alone.
That movement continues, and we are a part of it.
Hope and Trust
Sally and I were at a dinner, following a regional worship service Sally had planned and led last month, in a participant’s back yard in Pasadena.
As I scooted my wooden folding chair under the table, I somehow managed to pinch the skin under the fingers of my left hand inside the chair.
My legs were now under the table, their weight on my hand, so I could not get up.
There were people all around me and, well, there is no graceful way to extricate one’s self from this kind of awkward social situation.
I shifted my weight to the other side and pushed my chair back with as little facial expression as I could manage.
We sometimes face decisions where there is no good alternative. Something bad will happen, no matter what we do. We must simply choose the best alternative, and act.
How wonderful, therefore, that we are saved by faith through God’s grace. We can act, if not with perfection, with hope and trust in God.
As I scooted my wooden folding chair under the table, I somehow managed to pinch the skin under the fingers of my left hand inside the chair.
My legs were now under the table, their weight on my hand, so I could not get up.
There were people all around me and, well, there is no graceful way to extricate one’s self from this kind of awkward social situation.
I shifted my weight to the other side and pushed my chair back with as little facial expression as I could manage.
We sometimes face decisions where there is no good alternative. Something bad will happen, no matter what we do. We must simply choose the best alternative, and act.
How wonderful, therefore, that we are saved by faith through God’s grace. We can act, if not with perfection, with hope and trust in God.
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