Matthew Paul Turner of Jesus Needs New PR has a rough story that just rips at my heart. A member of Mars Hill church was confronted about some of his actions by the MH leadership. And what follows is commonplace in rural fundamentalist Calvinistic churches…but I didn’t realize how intrinsic it was to the Neo-Calvinist resurgence.

Part 1 of the story is essentially this: A church member Andrew was engaged with another church member, cheated on her, the relationship ended and Andrew confessed his sin to his accountability group friend. After the church leadership got involved with many meetings, each time Andrew felt more and more ground under their feet. Andrew learned he was “under church discipline” and what that meant:

Something in his spirit told him not to trust them. Something caused him to believe that the men sitting in front of him were far less interested in restoring him than they were in having control, feeling powerful, throwing their spiritual weight around. Beating down a sinner like Andrew.

Andrew says that many of Mars Hill’s men feel beaten down. “Because that’s what happens there, especially when you question a pastor. You get beaten down. Until you submit.”

Andrew was offered a discipline statement to sign. Jesus Needs New PR has it on their blog post, but it entails (edits by MPT, CG = small accountability group):

Andrew will attend XXX’s CG and meet with XXX on a regular basis (define).
Andrew will not be involved in serving at MH.
Andrew will not pursue or date any woman inside or outside of MH.
Andrew will write out in detail his sexual and emotional attachment history withwomen and share it with XXX.
Andrew will write out in detail the chronology of events and sexual/emotional sinwith XXX and share it with XXX and Pastor X.
Andrew will write out a list of all people he has sinned against during this timeframe, either by sexual/emotional sin, lying or deceiving, share it with XXX and develop a plan to confess sin and ask for forgiveness.

So far, this is okay. I’ve done a behavior covenant before with a parishioner who needed it. That’s okay if a individual needs it and in your pastoral concern it would seem helpful. Fine.

Part 2 of the story gets REALLY scary: Andrew declined to sign it and told the pastoral leadership that he was leaving the church. The leadership wrote back that he would still be “under discipline” if he left and it would be “escalated.” Andrew had no idea what that would entail: Mars Hill posted on the church’s private social network an extensive letter about Andrew’s sins and how the church parishioners should act with Andrew in public in “permissible” and “impermissible” ways. For example:

What is not permissible? Refrain from associating with Andrew in social settings, such as eating a meal, attending a concert or movie together [Scripture references]. Such disassociation from Christian Community is designed by God to help him realize the seriousness of his sin and need for repentence (gospel shame – 2 Thess 3:14)

Read it all here. Amazing.

While others have written that this type of church discipline is closer to John Wesley than the UMC might be, I’m more interested in the term “gospel shame”

The term “gospel shame” is taken from 2 Thess 3:14 which says in the Common English Bible:

 Take note of anyone who doesn’t obey what we have said in this letter. Don’t associate with them so they will be ashamed of themselves.

But how often do the Church Discipline crafters go on to the next verse 15:

Don’t treat them like enemies, but warn them like you would do for a brother or sister.

As the New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary states:

On the one hand, the larger church has the authority to shame the erring ones because of the latter’s deviation from the writer’s word as given in the letter (v.  14). On the other hand, the parameters of the reform are clearly prescribed: The larger church must not regard the erring ones as enemies, but (as in 1 Thess 5:14) they must “warn” or “admonish” them as believers.

Maybe I’m from the University of Phoenix of religions, but I think that refraining from social contact, posting a warning to other churchgoers about a forsworn former member, always reminding him in every social interaction that he is “unrepentent” sure is treating the individual more like an enemy than a brother or sister.

So…Gospel shame? Is this the Gospel? I’m not sure. But I’m pretty sure it’s mainly shame, or the relying on psychological and sociological pressure to enforce biblical rigidity rather than relying on the Gospel and the love of Christ to transform hearts and minds.

I think this is a situation that reminds us all to examine our church disciplinary norms and procedures and see if we are treating the other with love or with rancor, with a twisting of Scripture to exert control.

As MPH closes his blog series with:

When I first read this letter, I was sitting in Starbucks, and I was shaking. Shaking because I was hurting for Andrew. And too, I was shaking because I was so angry that somebody (heck, a lot of somebodies–not just Mark) would use the words and messages of Jesus in such away.

And if this is how they plan to treat Andrew–as an “unbeliever”? How in the world do they treat people who really are non-Christian? (And not to mention the fact that Jesus hung out with Gentiles, tax-collectors, etc.)

Fine. If they don’t want Andrew to be a member of their church, take his name off the list! But this? I mean, seriously, did any of this letter, except for perhaps the “heavy heart”, infer that Mars Hill loves Andrew? Oh I know they think their actions represent love. But really, many of us have experienced firsthand that kind of “love,” and we know very well that it’s an abuse of the term.

I honestly wouldn’t wish this so-called “gospel shame” on Mark Driscoll, let alone somebody I know personally, somebody I’m called to love, somebody I am hoping to help restore.

And you know what’s sad? Many (not all) of Andrew’s friends (from Mars Hill) are “obeying” the advice in this letter. While every one of them has implied that they believe Mars Hill is completely out of line and blowing this out of proportion, they all end up using some variation of the words that Mars Hill told them to say.

Indeed. Thoughts?

The ancient Romans believed in a lot of gods, gods like Apollo, god of music, Jeff the god of biscuits (hat tip Eddie Izzard). But among their gods they had a god of doorways. His name was Janus. Janus had two faces, one looking forward and the other looking back. He was the god of beginnings as well as endings. He was the god of transitions. He gives his name, of course, to this month, “January,” the beginning of the new year and the end of the old year. And incidentally, Janus, the God of doorways, is also where “janitors,” get their names, as the keepers of doorways.

The two heads of Janus and that Janus is the god of doorways remind me vividly of the two gates of the Oklahoma City Bombing Memorial. In 1995 there was a bombing in Oklahoma City at a federal building. I was living in Oklahoma city, going to school 9 miles from the site. My father had worked (or would be working) at the building a few months before it was destroyed in April 1995. My classmate’s father was a first-responder and told of the tragedy that he found there.

Today on the site is a memorial with two gates, one marked 9:01am, the other 9:03am. In between those two gates, held in stasis, is the horror of domestic terrorism that happened at 9:02am on April 19 1995. Rows of chairs mark people’s passings, rows of smaller child-sized chairs marked younger passings at the buildings’ nursery. There’s a reflecting pool, and at night the chairs have lights that seem to glow underneath them. I’ve walked it many a late night in college. The entire memorial is encased in two doorways, two arches that enclose the moment.

It is beautiful and poignant but the problem I have with these gates is that they are identical. Everything about them is the same except for the time. It’s as if what happened between the gates didn’t affect the gates because they were identical before and after. While it can be a symbol of American patriotism and steadfastness, I found it telling that we wanted to isolate what happened and not let it be integrated into the new gate, to not let the wound show.

For us, transitions are like those gates. We remember the events between them, but we don’t often let them change us. We remember the bad times and the hardships, but we still make the same resolutions year after year. We still hold to the same routines year after year. We expect our church to be the same year after year. We transition to a new year still wearing our old habits and we wonder year after year why thing never change. Like Einstein is reported as saying “the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

And we have the god Janus to blame. The problem we have with transitions is that we are used to being janitors, keepers of the doorways, rather than walking through the doors and entering a new space with gusto. In other words, we are very good at maintaining the doorways but not actively walking through them. Look at our resolutions for the new year. Probably to lose weight, join a gym, spend more time with our family, save money, take a vacation. Those are resolutions aimed at managing our stress and our lives, re-allocating resources to do better. But they are just maintaining the doorways. We aren’t looking for something new, we are just making do with what we have.

In January, most of America worships still the god Janus, keeper of the doorway, when we maintain the status quo in our lives even as we seek to change it.

But to those hackers among us, those who are not content with what they are given, those who tinker with their theology, those who don’t just regurgitate the preachers’ or authors’ words back to our own lives, we are living in an in-between time. We are living between the first coming and the second coming of the reign of God. And it is this god of transitions that maintain the status quo that we are called to reject.

And so, as we step boldly once again across the threshold into a new year, our greatest hope should be that in this in-between time, God is not finished with us. God is still at work in our lives and in creation. God is making all things new. Slowly at times, but working nonetheless

What we need now are not better janitors of our lives, but hackers who build better rooms beyond the doorways. Janus was the god of transitions, he looked both forward and back as he held up the door. In Christian theology, our God refuses to be contained to simply holding up our burdens, helping us manage our pain, but instead gives us the strength, vision, and common purpose to let go to make all things new even in the midst of the old. Our God is not a god of doorways, but is God with us who walks through life with us, never abandoning us. When every new thing comes our way, we are not alone; we are with God.

And so, fellow holy janitors, keepers of this new day, let us pray that God may fill our hearts with joy and hope in believing; save us from our fears and doubts; and give us courage and strength to be instruments of the in-breaking of God’s promised reign.

Thoughts?

From my day with Leonard Sweet that I blogged about last week, one of his base concepts is that the language of the church is changing. He calls the shift the most important since Gutenberg created the printing press and that indeed the times we are in require a shift in perception and a willingness of the church to learn the language of the culture. The Gutenberg culture thinks in words and verses; the Google culture thinks in stories and narratives. And right at this moment both cultures are getting closer and closer to parity and both need to be taken seriously.

Sweet describes the paradigm shift from the Gutenberg World to the Google World well in this video:

Guiding questions:

1. How is your church learning the language of the culture?
2. How is your ministry context connecting with the images and narratives of the culture?
3. How do you retain the Gutenberg generation while reaching the Google generation?

I think the most important concept is that Missionaries either taught the people English to explain their concepts or they learned the people’s language and re-framed the Christian concepts. In the former, the natives had to translate foreign concepts in an odd tongue. In the latter, the missionaries had to be the agents of translation from an English culture to the native culture.

Is your ministry context providing the translation services or are you expecting the culture to do the translation?

Thoughts?

A pastoral colleague sent me an interview with Robert Lupton whose recent book Toxic Charity has some controversial elements in it, among them criticizing the one-way relationship charities often have: The people with food give food to those without, etc.  Here’s a quote from the interview:

Q: You say churches and charities can harm those they propose to help. How?

A: Typically, the giving is one-way: those of us with the resources give to those with a lack of resources. One-way giving tends to make the poor objects of pity, which harms their dignity. It also erodes their work ethic and produces a dependency that is unhealthy both for the giver and the recipient.

I was reminded of a brief blog post from two years ago that is reprinted with some edits below. I think it encapsulates the charity work in a relational context rather than a one-way context.

September 24, 2009

I was traveling with a wise elder minister. We drove through a town and saw two different churches side by side.  The United Methodist church ran a clothing store where clothing was sold for 25 cents, jeans for $1, shoes for $2, etc. The other church advertised free clothes, jeans, and shoes.  Neither was open at that time in the evening so I had no idea of which was busier.

My travel companion and I had the following conversation:

Me: Well, I hope the Methodists don’t get put outta business.

Elder (craning her neck to see the churches): I would hope so, because that means that everyone is clothed and taken care of.

Me: I meant that the other church is giving clothes away while the UM church is selling their clothes. Seems like an easy choice.

Elder (twinkle in her eye): You think the UM church is selling clothes? They aren’t. Anytime you can buy something and feel a bit more like the rest of the world, you are getting dignity in the deal. So they aren’t selling clothes. They’re selling dignity.

Wow.  Neat.

Thoughts?

(Image credit: Charity on Flickr)

The lectionary text for this week is Matthew 22:1-14 (CEB/NRSV), the Parable of the Wedding Banquet.

The temptation is to do an allegorical reading, meaning that each character represents a real-life person. The king as God, the king’s son as Jesus, and the unworthy subjects who kill the king’s messengers as those who persecuted and killed prophets, and especially those who persecuted and killed Jesus and his apostles.  This makes sense and it has made sense to most of the commentaries I’ve read, from John Wesley on down.

But I’m with Dylan on this one: I can’t wrap my head around seeing the King as God. And if I can’t do that, then the whole parable becomes something utterly different.

The kings burns buildings down, not just seek justice for the killers, but burns entire cities. This is the God says elsewhere “an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth” not “a city for a killed servant.” And the king judges and dismisses a person on sight…this is the God of eternal love and forgiveness who has forgiven me and every reader of this blog…this king represents God?

Why is a story of a God who burns down people’s houses in this bible? We’re used to it in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament a God of fiery wrath and destruction isn’t found anywhere other than Revelation and one or two scenes in a particular Gospel called Matthew.

Maybe I’ve been reading it wrong. Maybe the King isn’t God at all. Maybe the King is a King.

If so, then maybe this isn’t a story of how God deals with backsliders or those who reject God and God burns them in fire. Maybe this is a story of how we ought to resist when the Empire and the World tries to bend us into shapes we do not recognize.

Reversing the Text

Some historical perspective: In the time of Jesus, Israel was occupied territory. Like any occupied nation, it would likely respond to the Empire around it in one of two ways. It would either fight them off by force, or it would try to preserve their values and their customs. Israel did both:  They had zealots who fought the empire with armed resistance, and Pharisees who taught rigid law abiding lessons and kept their culture pure and isolated from the Empire.

Why is this relevant? Look at the text again. When the king came calling, some went away to their homes and businesses and isolated themselves from the king’s wrath. Sound like anyone we’ve just mentioned? And some took and killed the king’s servants…sound like anyone we’ve just mentioned?

If you were an original hearer of this story, that might be the immediate connection. Some isolate from the king and make their places pure, some do violence to the king and are destroyed. Israel did both but now the Zealots have been killed. The Pharisees are losing by attrition the number of impure people they exclude to keep the holy pure. So what’s the better option?

Luckily there’s a third option. Remember the end of the story? The countryside is in flames from the king’s wrath. People are gathered probably awkwardly at the king’s banquet (hello your majesty, thanks for burning my city down, where’s the wedding cake?), and in their midst stands a garmentless man. Not just a poor man for history tells us that at a wedding, robes were given to the attendants at the door, so this man intentionally did not wear the robe. The king is enraged, angry, asking why the man has no garment, no wedding robe. The man is silent and is thrown into the darkness.

Now wait-a-minute, thrown into the darkness and is silent before a king. If I was a first-century Jew, that would spark a memory of Isaiah 52-53, the suffering servant. The one whose suffering will ease the pain of a nation. The one who is silent before kings. The King reacted in the only way he knew how: violence.

For us today, do we know anyone else who was silent before his accusors, was bound at his hands and feet, and thrown into darkness? A few chapters later Jesus is in front of his accusors, first the judean leaders, then Herod, then Pilate himself. He is crucified at the outer edges of town where the lights do not play. He was bound at his hands and feet, and the words of the Centurian “this ought not have happened”

When the world comes knocking at your door, demanding your allegiance, demanding you trade your values for its values, you can fight, you can flee, or like Jesus you can participate in your world but not be conformed by it, not be bent and unrecognizable by it.

Reshaping The Message

The story starts with a king knocking at people’s doors and getting them to do what he tells them to do.
Maybe this isn’t a story of how God deals with backsliders or those who reject God and God burns them in fire.
Maybe this is a story of how we respond when the world comes knocking and tries to bend us into a shape that we don’t want to be in.

We know a bit about this, don’t we? We’ve been bent into a shape of a mom who gives all her time to her kids and takes none for herself.
The shape of a dad who was is demeaned at work so he can put food on the table.
The shape of an elder parent moving in with their daughter when they lose their home to foreclosure.
The shape of a youth who starves herself to fit into skinny jeans.
The shape of a boy who doesn’t want to play sports but is forced to to be accepted.
Many of us have been bent into shapes that we wouldn’t have thought of being in years ago.
If you think back to years ago, would you have expected to be in the shape you are in today?

We are all being bent by the world, and we come to this text today not to be guilted into confessing God is king, but to see what help we can have when we have to respond to the world around us.

Remember that Jesus is the one telling this parable. In utter contrast to the worldly king, Jesus will give His life rather than take life. A few chapters back in Matthew 11:22, Jesus says “from the days of John the Baptist until now the kingdom of God has suffered violence and the violent take it by force.” If we isolate ourselves and seek purity, kicking out non-conformity, then the kingdom burns, and our only hope is a man who refuses to bow down to any king other than the one who sent him. The kingdom of heaven suffers violence, it is not delivered from it.

You are invited to build the kingdom, a kingdom opposed to all other kingdoms who rule through violence and force. If we are called to be kingdom builders, we will have to make the same choice. We can flee from responsibility, we can react in violent and unhealthy ways, or we can suffer together through the rough patches and emerge the other side wounded, bent, broken, but a little patch of the kingdom is redeemed.

We started this conversation because we were uncomfortable with the image of God as an unrighteous king. We will always be tempted not only by a kingly God, but that we can be kings too. Jesus sets us free from this temptation to become kings and rule our kingdoms with harsh judgment. As long as we feel personally charged with deciding who should pay for their sins and how, there will be no rest for us — not only because there is always some crime which we might feel charged to avenge, but also (and perhaps more importantly) because when we’re caught up in the vengeance cycle, those dark places we see and lash out at in others are bound to be projections of unacknowledged and therefore unhealed dark places in ourselves. In other words, people seeking vengeance are “treating” something that isn’t the wound, leaving the real wound to fester.

Jesus is the suffering servant. And I’m convicted that he invites you to resist the temptation to judge, try, and convict others today, and instead find new ways to suffer together when the world tries to bend us out of shape. And when we struggle together, there in our midst is a garmentless man, taking the brunt of the world’s force, taking the edge of the knife, taking our sins and rendering them powerless over us, if we only trust him to do so.

May all your images of God as a harsh judge be replaced by a God who sent God’s son to redeem the world.
May all the moments when you suffer violence for the kingdom be helped by knowing our Lord Jesus Christ suffered violence but was not overcome by it.
May when you look at your life and see it bent out of shape, do not be afraid. Our God is with you, and you can hide, or you can protest, or you can stand in silent refusal. And whatever you choose, God will never ever leave you alone.

Thoughts?

(Photo credit: “wedding banquet” by Andrew Juren, used by Creative Commons license)

It’s no secret to readers of this blog and my clergy colleagues that I really don’t like contemporary praise and worship music. But I do appreciate self-deprecating humor and ones that point out the tendency of praise music to praise one’s self or become performance rather than praise.

So here’s a video for you that if you know any P&W songs, or if you avoid P&W songs, you will totally get.

(h/t Missy Meyers on Facebook)

Hilarious!

This is a parody performance of some contemporary worship songs. Here’s the basic titles of the parodies so you can see which of your favorite worship songs they are satirizing.

• I could sing of your love on Sundays.
• I surrender some.
• I stand amazed at my hairdo.
• How Great is This Song.
• Savior, I don’t need a Savior. I’m busy livin’ my life.
• I sung this song for years. And I just go, go through the motions.
• I exalt me.

My pastor in high school was Rev. David Stephenson, who is now a Reverse Missionary to Bolivia. On one of his many trips to the region, he sat next to someone who had the following conversation:

I sat next to a guy on the airplane on the way down here yesterday, and he asked what I do.  He didn’t seem religious, so I just told him about my work with Engineers In Action. He seemed shocked to find out 1 in 9 children die by the age of 5 (found out from the government that it is reduced to 1 in 10 – Progress! Around 10,000 less children died in 2010 then in 2007! Yay!)

He then said, “Why are you saving those kids lives? They’ll just add to the population explosion and add to the problem of hunger.”

Holy carp. I nearly flew out of my seat when I read that line. We have no idea how David handled such a statement. Actually ::reads more:: looks like we do! David continues:

The engineer in me (charts, graphs, numbers, spreadsheets, science) screamed for me to say, “It would actually be better for the world if YOUR children died, because they use 100 times more food, 1,000 times more potable water, and 10,000 times more energy and oil (I made up those numbers – but you get the point). But the pastor in me said, “No Dave, don’t speak the TRUTH to this guy. He couldn’t handle it!”

What I did say was: ‘The problem is not having enough water or enough food. The problem is getting to the water, to drink and to irrigate with. There is good clean water in virtually every town of Bolivia. It’s just below ground. Down 20, 30, 50, 100, 150 meters there is clean water just waiting to be used to drink, water livestock and irrigate crops…God’s given us the water and the technology of how to clean up the surface water and how to reach down into Pacha Mama and drink from her stores of clean water. We just need people who will sacrifice a little to bring water to those who do not have it.”

To me, the statement reeks of teleological ethics, or ethics that are focused on outcomes not methods. To a person whose ethical system revolves around results, then saving dying children certainly doesn’t help the population problem which seems like the bigger problem.

But to me and to hopefully most sensible people, the bigger problem would be if we sacrifice children and third-world countries as our method to deal with the population problem. If we lose our soul, what have we gained not only as Christians but as humanity?

With Bolivia, the water is under the surface and people like us know how to get down there and retrieve it. If God has given us this knowledge through the privilege of our country of birth, then we are called to share that knowledge to help others reach the same level.

One final point is that usually problems are linked: the problem of population growth would seem to be fixed by killing more people off, but as David has observed, it seems to be fixed by healing people!

There is an odd phenomenon that happens. As the infant mortality rate falls, eventually so does the pregnancy rate. We have seen it over and over here in Bolivia. There is a lag time of a generation, and therefore some population growth for 10-20 years. But often times the birth rate will come back into alignment. But obviously, once you solve one problem, it leads to an additional need (good plentiful potable water leads to sanitation issues for example). That is why we stay involved in communities for 5 years or longer, building those additional facilities that are needed.

As Paul writes in Hebrews 12, “let’s run the race that is laid out in front of us.” Help us remind ourselves that Missions is not a sprint but a marathon: one lived out in relationship with others, one with ethical considerations to methods and outcomes, and one that is constantly allowing questions of how we run the race being as important as finishing it.

Thoughts?

(Image Credit: Bolivia & Oklahoma Methodist Partnership, used under Fair Use)

While some of us watch detached from the budget conversations in Congress and in the political world, there is a great program that is on the chopping block…one that heavily supports a United Methodist ministry that my OK  colleagues are passionate about: Project Transformation.

What is Project Transformation?

For the last 10 years, Project Transformation has been transforming lives of low-income children, college students, and churches across Oklahoma. This unique collaboration of churches, individuals, local foundations, corporations, and even government entities has made a tremendous impact in the communities they serve and has transformed many of the churches that host the program. It has led to higher reading scores, better behavior, and overall growth for the elementary students that participate. It has given college students who lead the program a chance to grow as leaders in our society and to connect with those who have deep needs. And it has helped churches who are in difficult neighborhoods connect with God’s mission that is all around them. Furthermore, it connects successful churches with those who are struggling and suburban churches with churches in the central parts of the city. Put simply, it is amazing program that is changing lives every day.

In 2011, we have planned sites in Tulsa, Oklahoma City, Bartlesville, and, for the first time, in Muskogee. With the addition of a new city, even more young people will be given greater opportunities to succeed in school, and will be able to connect to churches near them.

See the Facebook page for more information.

Why is this program threatened by the Empire?

Unfortunately, all that is at risk for this summer thanks to a budget resolution in the US House of Representatives. That resolution is to fund many aspects of the federal government for 2011 and it unfortunately shows a $0 budget amount for AmeriCorps. AmeriCorps is a federal program that connects college students with places in need and gives those students an educational stipend for their service to the community. AmeriCorps not only provides all of the college students who help run Project Transformation, they also are our largest funding source by far with a total of $138,000 that also includes funds for our two full-time staff positions. To lose AmeriCorps funding most likely means an end to Project Transformation as we know it.

See the Facebook page for more information.

What can we do about it?

We need your voice to be heard with US Representatives who will likely vote on this matter on Thursday, February 17th. We need you to contact your legislator today and ask them to either (a) vote against HR 1 or (b) attempt to amend the bill to reinstate the proposed funding for the Corporation for National Service (the agency that oversees AmeriCorps). Amendments are due today (Tuesday, February 15th) so time is of the essence.

The US Capitol Switchboard phone number is 202-224-3121 and you can find out who your legislator is at www.congress.org. More information about the impact of Project Transformation as well as sample letters, e-mails, or phone calls to your congressman will be available soon.

See the Facebook page for more information.

Call. Pray. Spread the word.

Political information:

The Corporation for National Service (which oversees Americorps) would cost each household $11.36 if it is kept in the budget for 2012 (it is less now). That’s a tiny sliver of a cost to support low-income families and programs (for reference, Social Security costs each household $7,000).

If you see Americorps as a negative program, remember that it has strong bipartisan support across the political spectrum. Here’s an article about it.

Call. Pray. Spread the word.

(Photo Credit: OKUMC Ministries | Text Credit: Save Project Transformation Facebook Page)

I love church bulletins that put as much information in them so that I have something to read during service. One section that I find in many churches is the Year To Date report on the giving to the church. For instance, in October the section shows $250k given of $280k expected…a subtle hint to get back on your pledge! I did that myself in my first church’s monthly newsletter, as I didn’t want it in the weekly bulletin (nor to calculate it weekly either!).  Regardless, the practice is using +/- abstract numbers to encourage faithful giving, which may or may not be effective to church folk.

Professor Richard Beck of Abilene Christian University recently presented an idea to “hack” church giving: present the congregation an offering receipt. He remembers in 2009 a group estimated how much of a person’s tax went to certain programs (ie. of $5,400 given in taxes, $28 paid for NASA, $1 paid for the Smithsonian…and $1000 paid for social security. Yikes!). He wonders what that idea might look like for a church:

Dropping money in the collection plate is kind of like paying taxes, psychologically speaking. You put your money in the collection plate but you don’t know where or how that money is spent. You know abstractly that you are paying for everything around you, just like the taxpayer, but the lack of specificity makes it hard to feel a connection. But if you listed out the particulars, like with a tax receipt, then you might increase the feeling of a connection.

If you’ve ever heard someone rant about the government not doing anything for them while they drink water from a federally-inspected water treatment plant or have their home saved from firefighters paid for with local taxes, you get the idea that a abstract concept doesn’t translate as well as concrete language.

I’ve got at least two thoughts on this.

First, transparency is actually a letdown when it comes to church finances in this manner. Let’s be honest, if we broke down a person’s $100 gift to the church, its percentages would not inspire more giving in most churches. I’ll offer up my own church budget from 2008 for example (it has since been significantly adapted…and the 2008 budget is the only one I could find in my laptop’s documents atm). If I wrote in the bulletin what a $100 gift broke down to:

• $23 would go to the Pastors’ (plural) salary/pension/health insurance
• $14 would go to Apportionments (support for UM ministries/global missions/church bureaucracy beyond the church walls).
• $10 would go to the staff salaries
• $7 would go to insurance
• $6 would go to building utilities
• And so on…

From my old 2008 church budget, the highest mission or ministry “outward-facing” line item (although staff have roles that face outward and clergy obviously do) is the Youth Ministry Budget at $2. Although I would argue that with community/ministry groups using the building means that insurance and utilities expenditures are ministry when the community comes into the building.

So by breaking it down, it may not inspire but it does illuminate the reality of church budgets require plenty of staff and plenty of upkeep and plenty of trust in the people to initiate and sustain the ministries of the church. And it can start a conversation about priorities and how to better adapt the church budget so that a higher percentage goes to direct ministry support.

For your churches that may not need more inspiration (or your percentages horrify you, which is good if you do something about it), Prof. Beck talks about using language of “with your offering, we let AA use our building free of charge and 12 men/women had one more day of sobriety support.”  So a narrative budget, which I’ve seen before, might be helpful.

Second, I am concerned as I think such a thing is theologically backwards in a Wesleyan (ie. Methodist) context. We believe in prevenient grace which is recognizing the unmerited work God does for us. We are loved by God from before our first breath and through our own recognizing God’s presence and love in our life.

So when we approach the altar with our tithe or offering, I often talk about that we give not to support the church or for the church to even continue to do the work we do. Rather, we give with a thankful heart, thankful for what everything God does everything from it. We give out of recognition of what God has already done, not out of expectation of what could be done.

For the duration of the entire service, the direction of our focus is on what God has done, through our own lives, through the lives of the bible stories, through the stories from the hymns. We let what we “get” out of church to be on faith, trusting that when we leave the church doors that we become the gospel we have heard, not expect that our dollar becomes the gospel. It does support the gospel, let’s be clear, but the theological focus  is on what God has already done and building our faith that God will continue to be our companion on the journey.

So, those are my thoughts. What are yours?

• Has your church done a tithe/offering receipt like the above?
• What are other ways that churches can make the connection between the collection plate and the ministries of the church.

Discuss. And thanks for your comments!

I have a confession to make.

I’ve been reading Zaccheus wrong my entire life.

But it’s ok. There’s many more to blame.

The story of Zaccheus in Luke 19 is about a dude who wants to see Jesus so he climbs up on a tree. Jesus says, “dude, I’d like to eat at your house.” The dude is like “dude, totally” and the crowd is like “dude, that guys bogus” and the dude says “dudes, I’ll right now give away half my stuff and repay anyone I owe big time.” And Jesus is like “dude, awesome, salvation is here.”

OK, that was the surfer version.

Here’s the real problem. I have several children’s storybook versions of this story. Here’s how it reads the end (verses 7-8).

(1) Zacchaeus heard what the people were saying about him, and he must have known that they were right. So he said, “Listen! I will give half of everything I have to the poor! And if I cheated anyone, I will pay them back four times as much!”

(2) Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.”

(3) People began to criticize Jesus because he was going to the house of a “sinner”, but Zacchaeus was a repentant sinner. He was sorry for the bad things he had done. He told the Lord that he would give half of his possessions to the poor, and if he had cheated anybody out of anything, he would give back four times that amount.

(4) When Zaccheus had welcomed Jesus to his house, he made a promise. “Here and now I promise to give half of whatever I earn to the poor. I’ll also give back four times whatever I’ve cheated from others in the past.” He bowed his head. Zaccheus knew who Jesus was. He was ready to change his life for Him.

Those are the children’s story versions. #2 is exactly what the NRSV reads.

But look at how King James interprets the line:

And Zacchaeus stood, and said unto the Lord: Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken any thing from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.

And the new Common English Bible is similar:

Zacchaeus stopped and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord, I give half of my possessions to the poor. And if I have cheated anyone, I repay them four times as much.”

There’s a problem. The verbs are in the present tense in the bible passages above. The verbs are in the future tense in the children’s versions.

Why is that important?

• If they are future tense (Zac will do these things) then it’s a story of repentance and turning your life to Jesus.
• If they are present tense (Zac already does these things) then it’s a story of claiming one’s actions are unnoticed by the crowd and Jesus affirms them.

The greek supports the present tense. However, the New Interpreter’s Bible Commentary argues for the traditional reading of future tense, given its form of confession and the couplet by Jesus at the end that seems to describe a change in Zac as evidenced by Salvation is coming to his house.

As with any bible story, a multiplicity of conclusions are supported by a multiplicity of translations and knowing that even being inspired by God doesn’t mean the Gospel writers had perfect Greek written.

But I’m finding a lot of meaning in this alternative textually-supported interpretation.

• It can be a story of the power of gossip. The crowd had claimed Zacchaeus as a terrible person due to his status. But Zac shows the reputation does not hold water. The crowd is the sinner and Zac is still a sinner but shows how he makes up for his shortcomings. What is the crowd doing other than spreading falsehoods in this passage?
• It can be a story of the power of naming and standing up for one’s self. The crowd named Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus spoke the truth. Jesus affirmed the truth. By claiming his name a son of Abraham, Zac named who he was against who they thought he was. Perhaps then the lost Jesus refers to is the crowd not Zac…well, Zac too.
• It can be a different understanding of Salvation being not an event but a person, as Jesus says “salvation has come to this house” could be a reference to Jesus and not the changed heart that dictated an event of salvation.

What do you think? Was Zacchaeus referring to his past actions or his future promises? Either way, what causes Salvation to come to his house?

Discuss.