Friday, January 05, 2024

Book Review of Little Prayers for Ordinary Days by Katy Bowser Hutson, Flo Paris Oaks, and Tish Harrison Warren and illustrated by Liita Forsyth





Little Prayers for Ordinary Days

by Katie Bowser Hutson, Flo Paris Oakes, and Tish Harrison Warren

IVP Kids

ISBN 978-1-5140-0039-8

Reviewed by Clint Walker





What a wonderful little book! Designed for kids, but appropriate for persons of all ages, Little Prayers for Ordinary Days is a collection of prayers for children for moments during the day. Some of the moments are more daily, such as putting on clothes and going to school. Some of them may be more occasional, such as when a child loses something or chooses to look at the stars. 

Through each prayer, and through use of this book as a whole, children will be taught that God is near, that God cares about our everyday life and concerns, and that God wants us to connect with, talk to, and believe in Him. 

The prayers that are written are brief, easy to read, and down to earth. I could see my girls using this. Even more, taking some of their favorite prayers and attaching them to a mirror in their bedroom, or something like that. 

The biggest challenge, in this day and age, will be to get the kids you know to open and read a book with prayers in it on a regular basis. A lot of kids would prefer and an app or something like it. I would have preferred the book to be more of a standard size, but that is only because I would like to copy pages and hang them up. 

This would make a wonderful present for kids at significant moments in their lives and faith journeys.

Monday, April 18, 2022

What Happened?--An Easter Message Rough Cut

 

What Happened?

            You know how it is. You may have heard about it. Someone may have told you what was going to happen. But then it happens, and even if you were expecting it, you were totally not expecting it?

          I know, sounds strange doesn’t it? Let me explain.

          I knew that my oldest child was going to enter kindergarten. Kind of looking forward to smaller day care bills even! Yet, when we got to that point, I was really not ready. I wasn’t ready for her eagerness to run in the door. I was not ready for Mattea to scream and cry because she was missing her sissy (I have that on video mind you). I was not ready. Even though I was prepared and ready.

          I just sat down in the quiet of that night and said to myself, “What happened?”

          You decide to get married. You plan a day. You have people gather around and you say I dos. The reception, the honeymoon happen, and you walk into your new home together. And all of the sudden you are like, “what just happened”. It was like you were living your life, but you were somehow watching it in a movie at the same time. And now I have to share all my space and all my stuff. Wow.

          I suspect, that this phenomenon is even more pronounced after deep trauma. And no doubt, the death of Christ was a profound lifeshock, an earth shattering trauma. They watched him beaten, bleed, and eventually suffocate and die.

          The disciples were not ready for Jesus’s death. He had told them he was going to die. He had done this over and over. Even the week of his death, after that Palm Sunday procession, he told the disciples that one of the women was anointing him because she was preparing for his burial. But often we hear what we want to hear.

          Our loved one tells us they are not going to make it much longer. We tell them to stay positive, and to keep fighting. They tell us there is not much time left. But we don’t want to hear it. And then….they are gone.

          And then the death of Jesus is interrupted by the Passover Sabbath. In Jerusalem. No opportunity to care for the body. No ability for over 24 hours to bring spices, to care for his corpse, to do any of that. He died and he was rushed off to a borrowed tomb, and then a day of rest and worship where nobody could do anything. Which brings us to where the passage starts, on the first Easter Sunday.

They were still trying to find out, what happened? What happened on Good Friday?

          So, early in the morning, the Scripture says, the women get busy going out to care for Jesus’ body. There is a stone that has been rolled away from the tomb. They look in. They do not find the body of Jesus.

          New Testament scholar Tom Wright says in his translation called THE KINGDOM NEW TESTAMENT that “they were at a loss what to make of it all”. The NIV puts it, “they were wondering about this”.

          They were wondering what happened? They walked in ready to care for a body, but there was no body there,

          The angels reminded the women of what Jesus had said and taught about his death, burial, and resurrection. The Scriptures said that the women then remembered what Jesus had taught them.

          The women went and told the 11 what happened. And they thought they were just women telling stories, and they did not pay much attention to what the women had said.

          Now mind you, from the context I believe they told the men about the empty tomb, but then they also reminded them about what Jesus had said that they had remembered after they were confronted by the angels. They preached their experience, but they also preached some theology. Nevertheless, the men all thought that all that they were saying made no sense. Probably just emotional women telling stories.

          All of them, anyway, except for Peter (and probably John from the other gospel accounts), did not respond at all to what the women had said.

          Luke says that Peter got to the tomb. He too saw that it was empty. Wright translates it this way, “he too saw the grave clothes, he went back home, perplexed at what had happened”. THE NIV translates it as “wondering what had happened.”

          And that is how that first account of the resurrection account ends. Perplexed. Shocked. With the people who encountered the empty tomb saying, “what happened”?

          It is a little disappointing isn’t it? You mean the early disciples encountered the empty tomb and they didn’t have it all figured out then and there? They didn’t have a theology developed, a sermon prepared, and a ministry plan ready to go?

Nope.

They didn’t have all the answers.

But, they were lost in wonderment.

The experience of the risen Christ rocked their world. Their hopelessness turned to eternal hope. Their brokenness begun to be made whole. Their confusion was transformed to clarity. Their apparent loss and defeat was turned into victory.

They may have been perplexed and confused, they might not have had all the answers or put everything together right away. But this one thing we see in the passage, and in the encounters people had with risen Lord throughout history. People who were drawn into the movement of Christ were captured by a sense of wonder.

You see, my friends, we may have lived life with great church programs, wonderful Christian friends, awesome memories of great childhood Sunday school teachers, and more.

But I worry we have lost the sense of wonder and awe that stems from encountering the power and truth of Almighty God, and surrendering ourselves to his call.

The men on the road to Emmaus had their hearts burn within them.

Does your heart burn within you because you are living in the presence of the risen Lord?

I have to be honest. As a pastor, one of my worried as a parent has always been that we will live near the church, and they will live under the day to day operations of church life, and because of all the kind of “church business” that they live with day to day they will miss encountering the power of the living God. Or worse, they will live with it so surrounding them that they see it as commonplace. I have seen it in youth group with church kids whose parents go to meeting after meeting, and the things of God become common place. It concerns me. It grieves me.

This is my prayer for you today: Don’t lose that sense of awe and wonder that you have been called by the one who conquered sin and death, who died a painful death to show us his love, and who now shows us how to live in supernatural victory through transformed lives.

Don’t lose the wonder, friends.

 

Poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning puts it this way,

 ““Earth's crammed with heaven, And every common bush afire with God, But only he who sees takes off his shoes; The rest sit round and pluck blackberries.”

Miracles are breaking through all around us. God’s glory is at work in every nook and cranny of the universe. Some of you take off your shoes, raise your hands and cry glory.

But many of us are oblivious, and so we just sit around and pluck blackberries.

Don’t lose the wonder.

Don’t lose the wonder.

I’m still in awe that God broke through to my broken heart and found me. A lonely teenage who was in middle school, wondering if my life was really worth living, wondering if my life really was worth anything, wondering if I had any value. Wondering if there was anything anyone saw in me that was loveable. Wondering how long I could really go on.

And somehow this fat, awkward kid, who had some semblance of a knowledge of Christ from Sunday School years before, found his way into a small church that met in the little league clubhouse, and then the seventh day Adventist church on Sunday mornings.

And somehow I encountered this Jesus who loved me when I felt unlovable, who called me to trust and follow him, who slowly pulled me out of my life of hopelessness into a life that had some sort of purpose that he gave to me.

I am still wondering how and why I went on to sense some sort of call of God on my life in full-time ministry, encouraging others to know Christ and grow deeper in their relationship with him. I mean, I am not really all that smart or gifted. And I am certainly not

I am still in awe in how I am so blessed to have someone like Jennifer to walk in this life with me, and how I got two little girls that are so wonderful and smart to raise and hopefully point them Jesus.

Don’t lose the wonder, friends.

Christ is risen! God has done marvelous things, and given us a lifetime to work out what happened on that first Easter morning.

He has given us the opportunity stare in the empty tomb with wonder. And to know that that empty tomb means new life, victorious life, a life of beauty, and life everlasting.

 

When the Rooster Crowed--Maundy Thursday Meditation

 

WHEN THE ROOSTER CROWED

Can you imagine what it must have been like for Peter, when that rooster crowed?

He had seen Jesus have arrangements made arrangements for the meal. And then as he walked into the meal, there he was, dressed like a servant. Washing feet. The feet of his friends. Then Jesus made his way to Peter. I must wash your feet as well.

“No way!”, Peter said. I should wash your feet.

“Peter this is both a lesson for you and for others. You have no part of my or my kingdom if you don’t let me wash your feet, “ Jesus replied.”

“Well, wash me all over then”, Peter said.

Your feet will do just fine, Peter replied.

So passionate. So enthusiastic. So eager to be the one standing by Jesus. Just a few hours before!

Can you imagine what it must have been like for Peter, when that rooster crowed?

“Someone will betray me”, Jesus said.

“Who?”, Peter replied

“The one whose bread was dipped in the cup,” Jesus replied

It was Judas, and immediately Judas left the meal.

I will not betray you, Peter said.

Before this night is up, though, Peter, you will deny me three times, Jesus said.

NEVER, Peter answered.

Soon the disciples went to the garden to pray. Pray with me Jesus asked. Peter and his friends kept falling asleep.

Can’t you stay up for at least an hour and pray with me, Jesus asked.

And soon Judas came with the soldiers to arrest Jesus.

Could you not stay up an hour, Jesus asked

Can you imagine what it must have been like a few hours later, when you were Peter, as the rooster crowed?

The soldiers went to grab Jesus and arrest him. Peter took out a sword, and cut off Malchius’s ear. Jesus healed the ear, and rebuked the violence. They let him away.

Can you imagine what it must have been like, if you were Peter, when the rooster crowed.

They led him to the house of the chief priest. A preparation for a mockery of trial had already been started. Peter stood in the courtyard. People kept thinking he looked familiar. You are with that Jesus, aren’t you. He denied him once. Then again. Then a third time. As the led Jesus out the rooster crowed? Peter wept bitterly.

Peter started out passionately committed that day. Eager. Enthusiastic. Passionate. Committed to Christ.

By the end of the day, Peter had argued with Jesus, failed to stay awake with him, lashed out in violence and was scolded, and then finally denied Jesus three times before the sun had even come up.

We have all failed. We have all lost our nerve. We have all failed to have courage when we needed it most. We have all not done what we should have, and we have all done what we should not. We have all sinned.

We have also all betrayed Christ. We have betrayed his trust, denied his provision, failed to stand for what is right, failed to love the least of these…..

Can you imagine what it must have been like for Peter, when that rooster crowed, and just as Jesus had told him would happen.

Maundy Thursday that Jesus was willing to serve us even when he knew some of us would betray him, others of us would deny him, and others would shrink and hide away in the difficult moments.

Maundy Thursday reminds us that we cannot be made whole through our own efforts. Christ was broken so that we could be made whole. Christ’s blood was shed so that we might be set free. Christ gave us the model of a servant God and a sacrificial savior because he knew that we needed that model, and he sent us his Spirit and his church because he knew we could not do this on our own.

Can you imagine what is was like to have been Peter, I bet you can.

But we know now what Peter didn’t understand until later. That grace is offered freely. That forgiveness and redemption are the hallmarks of the life of a disciple. That no failure is ever fatal. That God’s love is bigger than our failures.

So, lean on the Lord this evening and this week. Let his meal sustain you. Let his example inspire you. Let his love heal you. Let his grace set you free.

Amen.

Thursday, January 06, 2022

Book Review of Isaiah and the Worry Pack

 


Isaiah and the Worry Pack

by Ruth Goring

Illustrated by Pamela C. Rice

IVP Kids

ISBN 978-1-5140-0106-6

Reviewed by Clint Walker


    Isaiah has a lot of concerns that are heavy on his heart. Will his mom make enough money? Can his dad do alright living away from the rest of the family? Will his sister ever behave? Will he ever be able to sleep? So he carries his concerns with him everywhere, like a backpack full of heavy blocks.

    One night his mother comes to check in on him. After listening to his worrries, she leads him in an imaginative prayer exercise where he encounters the loving and risen Christ. Jesus helps Isaiah lean how to deal with his worries.

    Written with a child's ear in mind, the author shares a story of compassion, thoughtfulness and deep spirituality that relates to the lives that kids are living every day. The book provides a good story for kids, and some helpful tools for the adults who are reading with their kids in helping their kids bring their burdens to Christ.

    What a beautiful book.

Wednesday, January 05, 2022

Book Review of Saint Nicholas the Giftgiver

 


Saint Nicholas the Caregiver

Retold and Illustrated by Ned Bustard

IVP Kids

ISBN 978-1-5140-0180-6


This book is a deftly written story weaving the historical story of Saint Nicholas, and some of the modern legends of Santa Claus. Careful to on one hand not destroy a child's Christmas by saying "there is no Santa", while on the other hand describing the modern Santa more mythologically, author Ned Bustard seeks to ground all Saint Nicolas stories as a reflection of the gospel. 

The illustration work is well done. It at times refllects the story at face value, while at other times the drawings add to the story reflected in the written word. 

Subtle Christian symbolism permeates the artwork. Stars are reflected throughout the book. This connects with the author's efforts to tie the generosity of Saint Nicolas to the wise men. Also, the Trinitarian symbolism in the final drawing is just brilliant. 

I highly recommend this book to families. I would suggest, as we are now at Epiphany eve, that people buy the book this year, so they are prepared with it when Advent begins next year.



Monday, January 03, 2022

How John the Baptist explains repentance

 John the Baptist, most people believe, was an Essene. This means that the community that formed him and trained him for ministry was a community that valued withdrawl from societal institutions and norms in order to be faithful to God's call on their life. Although we have no proof of John the Baptist's Essene bona fides, his appearance and ministry tends to demonstrate and affinity for Essene ideals. Essene's were in the desert preparing for the Messiah and the end of the world as they knew it. They had baths for regular ceremonial washings of repentance and purity. They dressed and acted a little different. They did life on the geographic and social periphory of ancient Israel. All of this seems to be reflected in the life of John the Baptist. 

Yet, according to Luke 3,when people were baptized with John's baptistm of repentance, and they asked John what they should do, John always gave them answers that encouraged them to return to their community and vocation. As they did so, John encoruaged them to practice their vocations in different ways. To the tax collectors, they were told not to extort money. To the soldiers, they were told not to abuse their power. To the rest, they were told to share their extra clothing with those less fortunate. 

John called the repentant to simple, practical acts of engagement in community and culture, not withdrawl from culture as a sign of loyal faithfulness and true repentance. This has important ways of challenging us today. 

There is a part of Christian culture that thinks that we should withdrawl into homeschooling, homechurching, home working as an act of faith. These same people guard their associations with others. Yet, in Scripture, the model of cultural withdrawl in taking on the role of the prophet encourages others to engage community and culture faithfully in order to give glory to God. 

Something to consider here.

Friday, April 16, 2021

Book Review of What Is the Church and Why Does It Exist by David E. Fitch


What is the Church and Why Does It Exist?

by David E. Fitch

ISBN 978-1-5138-0570-2

Herald Press

Reviewed by Clint Walker


    David E. Fitch has written a new book that is being published this spring. It is from Herald Press, and is part of their "The Jesus Way" series of small books that pack a big punch. Fitch's contribution to this series is fitting, as he argues for a missional ecclesiology, and gives some helpful hints in how to put this way of doing church into action.

    What is the Church and Why Does it Exist is a book centered around three questions: What is Church? Why Church? and How do we do Church?. The book has a partner video curriculum by the same name with the new streaming platform SeminaryNow as well. For those familiar with Fitch's other writings, Fitch borrows heavily from some of the content in his book Faithful Presence in communicating his vision for how churches should structure and function, but each work stands apart from the other with a slightly different focus. 

    Fitch challenges his collegues and student to be pithy in their communication, and works on that himself. However, anyone who has went to David Fitch's lectures or had a conversation with him knows that he himself leans less toward the earthy pithiness of  Ernest Hemingway in his communication, and more toward the wordy thoughtfulness of Nathaniel Hawthorne. 

    For this reason, this book is an accomplishment for Dr. Fitch. He packs a lot of his conceptual work he has done over the last twenty years or so about what the missional church is all about in a relatively brief, thoughtful, easy to understand book that you can share with people in your small group or congregation. There are discussion questions in the back of the book that allow conversation to begin.

    I have worked through the material in this book with a small group in my congregation. They interacted well with it. At times they thought what David Fitch shared was common sense, and at other times they were challenged by his perspective, which is exactly what I wanted. For our people, we were affirmed in our commitment to congregational life, and also challenged to practice our faith together, in our homes, and in our communities. 

    This will be a helpful resource for any church to look at as they consider how to connect with the continually changing, post-Christian world. It honors the wisdom of having a community called the church. Yet at the same time challenges us to move out of siloed churches and siloed living into a wholistic, authentic way of living for Jesus together as believers in the world for the love of humanity and the glory of God.



Wednesday, March 24, 2021

Detectives of Divinity

 

On Being a Detective of Divinity

          So, this morning I got a call for someone with an unusual request. “Pastor, I live at the Liberty House, and we have been on lockdown. My brother says I need someone to bring me communion. I really want communion. Will you bring me some?”

          “Sure,” I said, “do you believe in Jesus?”.

“I believe in the Father, Jesus, and the Spirit. And I am a Baptist, because John the Baptist was a Baptist too,” she replied.

“Will 2:30 work?”

“Yes! I will see you at 2:30. Thank you! Thank you! Just come around the back and will meet you there.”

So, like a meth dealer around the corner of a rehab clinic, I smuggled the body and blood of Jesus down the back alley of an assisted living facility on lockdown. “This ought to be interesting,” I thought.

As I approached, I prayed, “Lord, be present in this moment. Let your love and grace present in the sharing of the bread and the cup in such a way that we are all sense your Spirit at work among us. Amen.”

I drove down the alley to what appears to be the main entrance of the facility. I brought with me the elements I had packed. Three pre-packaged and sealed communion servings were loaded into three plastic easter eggs to make the transport of the elements easier and were sitting on the passenger seat of my car. I had no idea why I packed three servings, I just felt led to do so.

I get out. “Are you the one bringing us communion?” my new friend yells out.

“I am. Do your friends want to share with us?”

“Yes, two of my friends heard and want to do communion too.”

So, I get out all three Easter eggs containing the elements of the Lord’s Supper. I read through I Corinthians 11.

“The body of Christ, broken for you,” I proclaim. Then I help each one of them open their wafer off the top of the cup.

“This is the new covenant in my blood,” I say, and help them with the cup.

It was a sacred moment. Three adults, each with challenges that make it hard for them to live independently, stood hungry for the inbreaking of the transcendent God into their lives. Having the body and blood smuggled to them through a back alley delivery, they experienced the love of Christ in the ritual of the Lord’s Supper.  Through presence of the church in delivering and sharing this moment with them, and in their longing for a tactile way to connect with the grace of God, the Spirit of God broke through in a powerful way as four people shared communion in a parking lot on Sixth Street and Willow.

Alan Roxburgh, a prolific Christian author and leader of the missional church movement, says that missional leaders/pastors do their work best when they are detectives of divinity. In other words, as we go out into the world around us, we do our best work when we open our eyes to what the Spirit is doing and join God in it.

I have no idea, in the end, how meaningful that moment was for my new friends. But I know it was meaningful for me. It helped me to remember that God is as work in ways I never expect. And it reminded me that sharing the table, and remembering the sacrifice of Christ, is a powerful way to experience the love of Christ, and to offer solidarity and love to one another. It reminded me, as I enter Holy Week, that I should not take the Lord’s Supper or what happened on Calvary for granted. As a matter of fact, we should all be hungry and thirsty for the presence of God.

I drove out of the parking lot today remembering the Emmaus Walk of those two people with Jesus, who discovered in the breaking of bread that Jesus had been present with them all along. And I mumbled to myself, “Wasn’t my heart burning within me in the breaking of bread?”

 

Book Review of Little Prayers for Ordinary Days by Katy Bowser Hutson, Flo Paris Oaks, and Tish Harrison Warren and illustrated by Liita Forsyth

Little Prayers for Ordinary Days by Katie Bowser Hutson, Flo Paris Oakes, and Tish Harrison Warren IVP Kids ISBN 978-1-5140-0039-8 Reviewed ...