Wake up dead man

The gospel of John tells the story of several people who have encounters with Jesus and are reborn in some respect. The Samaritan woman, an outcast, is reborn into her community. A blind man is healed, becoming a new person who can see and who believes in Jesus.

With Lazarus, this weeks lesson, the rebirth becomes literal. Lazarus dies and is given new life.

Jesus showed up at Lazarus' tomb while his family, Mary and Martha, were in mourning. Jesus saw their pain and wept with them. Sometimes through the death of someone close, or a broken relationship, or the loss of a job we find ourselves mourning an old life. Rebirth is painful because it means letting go of what we know. Jesus commiserates with us in letting go of the old and gives us new life.

Blind man sat by the road...

This week at Crossings we read the story of the man born blind. Talk about the blues!

This guy is a blind beggar, minding his own business when the disciples decide to turn him into a morality question -- is the blindness his fault or because of his parent's sins.

Jesus spits on the ground and puts mud on his eyes and tells him to wash... people talking about you, putting spit on your face. Kind of a bad day. But this guy seems to be used to the blues. He just goes and washes.

MIRACLE! upon washing the guy can see!

This sets everyone off. Is it really the blind guy? can he really see. Everyone starts whispering. It turns into a big ordeal and people start questioning the guy over and over. Were you really blind? How can you see now?

The man tells his story but no one listens. They are all getting puffed up about Jesus spitting and how improper that is and how he isn't supposed to work on a holy day ("making mud" counts as work).

They keep asking the guy to say that what Jesus did was wrong but the guy can't do that. His life was changed by Jesus. So what they do? They kicked him out the the church.

Dude, talk about the blues. Going from one kind of outcast to another.
but yet, the guy doesn't seem to have the blues. Jesus touched him. Jesus changed him. He has joy that most don't understand.

An encouter with Jesus

Continuing our Lent journey through John, this week's lesson brought us to the encounter between Jesus and the Samaritan woman. Their conversation, like and onion had many layers. Each exposing what it is like to have a genuine encounter with God.

First. Jesus approached the woman. She was going about her own business and Jesus interrupted it.

Second. It was an invitation to step out on a limb. By asking the Samaratan woman for a drink he is asking her to step outside her comfort zone into a situation that is strange and uncertain.

Third. It is mysterious. Jesus transforms a conversation about the physical into a conversation about the spiritual.

Forth. It is honest. Jesus knows about the woman and the woman does not hide from Jesus. As he tells her "everything she's ever done," she neither excuses it nor denies it.

Fifth. It is transformative. The encounter with Jesus causes this woman to go from timid and outcast to bold and uniting.

God comes to us where we are, invites us into something uncomfortable and if we can be honest and if we can be brave. He can transform us and use us in amazing ways.

When life seems empty...

This week at bible study we read John 15. Jesus's last teaching to the disciples during the last supper. He says, "I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful."

A woman in our group has beautiful rose bushes in her backyard. And she called her dad about how to take care of them. His answer was to hack them until there's nothing left but a dead looking stump.

Reluctantly she hacked away till the beautiful, life-abundant bushes were nothing more than dead stumps. Afraid she had killed them, she looked out at them all winter, wondering if they would ever grow back.

In the spring, they grew. Bigger and more beautiful than the previous year.

Sometimes when life seems to strip down to nothing. When we lose our jobs, our health, our friends, our family, our favorite activities, when we have nothing left of us but dead dry stumps which seem lifeless. God is at work.

In those times all we have is God, and if we remain in him and let his love and spirit work in us, spring will come and we will arise and bear much fruit. Our lives richer and more beautiful because every unimportant and useless part had been chopped away.

So if God is pruning you. Live in it. Sing the blues. Read scripture. Pray. God will grow you again.

Rebirth

As our lent journey through John begins, we find ourselves with Nicodemous at night coming to Jesus and asking - who are you? who is God? what is heaven like?

In the evening our spirit stirs and we ponder the deep questions of life.

Jesus answers, "Unless you are reborn, you will not see the kingdom of heaven."

Well, if I can't understand God or heaven without being reborn. What does a person do to be reborn? We can't actually become a new person. We are stuck with the bodies we have.

Jesus answers, "You can feel the wind, but you can't see it. So it is with those who are born of water and spirit."

What is spiritual rebirth? and how does it open our eyes to understanding who God is and the deep questions that elude us?

At Crossings this past week, we tried to find words to express spiritual rebirth by reading poetry, stories and verses. As we continue on this lenten journey we seek to find out what this rebirth is and can mean for us.

John and the Blues

During my time at Holden, most of my study revolved around preparing to lead Crossings through the season of Lent

Since ancient times, the church has used certain readings from the Gospel of John to prepare new believers for baptism. I was curious, why these passages?

We've also developed a tradition of playing blues music and african american spirituals during lent. On a gut level, this music - FEELS - like lent. But is there something deeper behind this music that I could connect to the spiritual revelations in John?

Of course!

John is essentially a two part gospel. The first part focuses on what it means to be "born again" not born again in the accept Jesus as your person Lord and Savior sense. But to be recreated with a new life in faith. The second part shows us the path to walk on once we've committed to a new life in Christ.

It is not an easy Gospel. It is about letting go of our identity - letting go of our jobs, social status, patriotism, insurance plans and individualism for a new identity shaped by a call from God to live out the Gospel.

The Blues were born out of a need to express the raw pain and reality of slavery and of abject racism of a post civil-war south. The Blues are the truth of our experiences and the reality of being human in a broken world.

The Spirituals however are born of a different theology. Slaves saw Jesus as God taking on the burden of being human. Not simply human, but a human born in a barn as a slave is born, whipped by oppressors and killed humiliated and rejected. Yet, he was God's chosen lamb who died to free all of us and to make us all God's children.

The Spirituals are the expression of joy, hope and freedom that will come to those who are reborn not as slaves but as children of God.

So, together, the blues and the Spirituals embody the theology of John. Each of John's stories begin with a human condition that is broken. Each start with the Blues. With the acceptance of Jesus and the Gospel message, each is reborn as children of God and into the hope of the Spirituals.

This lent, we goin down to the river.

A Mountain Top Experience

I kicked off Lent far far away in a village called Holden, a Lutheran retreat center hidden away in the great Winatchee National Forest. I was at least 3 hours from cell phone reception and buried under two feet of freshly fallen snow.

It was definitely a period of spiritual renewal as I was able to spend much time in study, in prayer and in nature.

I had adventure too. Don, our drummer, is a ski patrolman and was fascinated by huge avalanche depositions all around the village. We made numerous hikes with our snowshoes to investigate the avalanches.

I am from the Midwest and am deeply acquainted with large amounts of snow. I am not however, accustomed to avalanches. I therefore listened intently to all Don's descriptions of how and why avalanches happen and what to do if you find yourself in one.

For the most part, there's nothing you can do if the avalanche is really big. In some cases, the wind alone is strong enough to kill you.

Taking this in, I went with Don on the mother of all avalanche hunts. We hiked 5 miles over the hills and surveyed 6 avalanche deposition areas, viewing even more avalanche trails on the opposing mountain faces.

It got quite warm and as we hiked we felt snow melting under our snowshoes causing us to start slipping as we walked the narrow steep trail. At the end of the trail we paused to look at the view. Startlingly beautiful and remote. I gazed around nothing but mountains for miles and miles on every direction.

Suddenly, a booming sound like a cannon echoed across the valley. I turned and looked to the cliff face next to me seeing pieces of snow and ice chip off of a frozen waterfall. There was no shelter, no way to run. I was certain that I had only seconds before an avalanche would come spilling over the cliff face. Never in all my life have I been so scared. Not in the face of gang violence in Detroit or war in Haiti. In this moment, creation was so much bigger and relentless than anything I've ever faced and I was filled with absolute dread.

After 10 seconds or maybe less (that felt like an eternity) I saw a fighter jet fly through the ravine. The culprit was man after all and the mountain and the snow stood still while I collected courage to move.

I am struck by the largeness of God and of creation. The vastness and the extremity that things so beautiful like snow and water and mountains are also so deadly. That we, in some circumstances are so hardy and resilient and in others so fragile.

"Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, the Lord is with me." took on new meaning.