I don't consider myself to have a beautiful singing voice, I don't think too many people do. Today at Nassau Presbyterian the Keystone State Boychoir preformed and all too well brought me back to the realization of my decrepit vocal range and virtual lack of rhythm. Their harmonization of the beautiful Tallis' Canon swiftly transported me to fond memories of dinners around Dale Cooper's table surrounded by brilliant minds, boisterous spirits, and sparkling Christian fellowship. They were good; they were darn good.
After a well-earned, spirit-filled applause the pastor happened to mention, among other phrases of laud, that the Keystone State Boychoir had the unique distinction of being the only choir to ever preform on the continent of Antarctica. Antarctica? Really?!? My inner, fiscal utilitarian derived from my Dutch ancestry immediately kicked in. I immediately began mentally calculating the sheer quantity of cash it would cost to transport 30, hungry teenagers across the ocean to the most remote place on our planet under the harsh chill in order to preform a concert for a handful of researchers and a congregation of penguins. What did their director think when he was informed to pack his bags for a concert in the frigid emptiness that is the Arctic? It reminded me of when I was 8 and my great-grandma bought my brother and I a collection of crossword puzzles for Christmas; nice but completely useless and superfluous for a pair of brothers who would rather do about a million other things before a hearty crossword puzzle.
What a waste of music. What a waste of money. What a waste of the time, effort, and talent of these boys. What a waste. Period.
Then again, we live in a culture of excess. The norm standard for living is a brand new house, two cars in the driveway, 2.5 kids, weekends at the lake and enough extra to fund yearly winter vacations, a vast tangle of electronics, and purchase of knick-knacks which are anything but necessary. This isn't anything new; the invisible hand of capitalism has been at play ever since the American religion of individual freedom and self was put into motion. Yet, today we see the current results which yield a culture which can seem hallow, purposeless, and self-destructing. We get and get and get to the point that we end up having more than we could ever want at the expense of the composure of our homes. We waste our paychecks and labor on silly trinkets in order to keep up with a standard very few can keep up with and find ourselves struggling to get by and left behind on the super-highway that is 21st century consumerism. From the over-the-top birthday parties of 8 year old girls to the social insistence of "the new" we find ourselves constantly disinterested with the old, the aging, the "last year's" model, and the outdated and perpetually find ourselves throwing out the treasures of yesterday for the brilliant glow of tomorrow. A doctrine of consumerism is only able to exist if it is accompanied by a doctrine of waste. If anything, we are not the products of modern capitalism but the result of society's continual cycle of waste.
This includes choirs singing for penguins.
In a culture where so much is unnecessary how strange is Grace? Grace is the polar opposite of waste. Grace does not waste anything; there are no empty, meaningless moments for God's Grace for every moment and event touched by Grace is of the most dire importance. Christ calls out to us and says "My grace is sufficient for you" (II Cor. 12:9) and doing so calls us to put aside our societal weaknesses and vulnerabilities which arise from our surroundings and calls us to find meaning in the old, the unattractive, and the unpopular. The Greek word for sufficiency is the verb arkeo, which actually starts the phrase in the Greek New Testament. According to the word order, a more proper translation might just be "Sufficient for you is my grace." The word arkeo originally meant "to ward off, to keep off, or defend" in the context of fighting off enemies or even death as found in Homer. As time went on, the word's meaning changed in that warding off the enemy is, essential, to have sufficient resources and power to do so.
If Grace is "sufficient" this doesn't mean that there's just enough Grace to go around and get us through the moment. Rather, "sufficiency" goes beyond that. "Sufficiency" means that Grace has power; actual power. Grace is not meanly a vague, theological concept but the sustenance of a loving Father (Phil. 4:19) such that we have hope in our future, not because of the coming of the new, but because we treasure the Grace of our God who has ever been and ever will be (John 1:14). Such Grace reaches out not just to big moments but to little moments as well. Being "sufficient" means that the work of God reaches out to every sphere of our world. In turn, Grace is never wasted, for Grace always has a purpose, a plan, and the anticipation of the coming kingdom. Grace might be given to wasters but it truly is never wasted.
Unlike concerts for penguins.
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Food and Family
I heard a story about a friend of a friend who, during a charity barb-i-que, spent the good part of an entire morning and afternoon monitoring, marinading, and flipping a vast amalgamation of burgers, steaks, and wings for an astonishing crowd (talk about a feeding of the 5,000). What was funny was that, when all was said and done and all the hot dogs and cuts were served, that he never even got as chance to eat himself. The tragedy! To be so preoccupied cooking a delicious meal for hundreds that you'd forget to feed yourself.
That's what it's like to study God's Word at time: you get so preoccupied you forget to eat it. Not LITERALLY of course, but it seems that sometimes our study and dedication blinds us to the gaping need for Christ that still persists; with or without our acknowledgment. How ironic that we prepare such a banquet to the finest detail only to forget to nourish ourselves in what God has provided.
This morning, I went, for the first time, to a Syriac Orthodox service. The Syriac Orthodox tradition is Eastern in origin, deriving from the first Antiochian Christian communities established by St. Peter, and maintain one of the oldest liturgies surviving today. This was not your usual Reformed service consisting of a couple praise songs, a three point sermon, and a dose of Midwest simplicity all compressed together in an hour and ten minutes in order to get everyone home in time to watch the Lions stumble through another Sunday. It was beautiful, regal, and poignant. The smell of incense lofted throughout the sanctuary and the voices of priest, deacons, and monk alike sang the liturgy in Syriac, calling us to sing along at certain moments in praise to God. The phrase Kurie Eleison is used frequently, Greek for "Lord have mercy" as the entire congregation engages in meaningful prayer. The bread and the wine are blessed by beautiful melodies and are the central focus of the entire service: Christ's compassionate sacrifice always in the forefront. The message was short, ten minutes at most, which called for us to, by the grace of God, to stand and praise without fear or self-regard.
It was then the monk came and spoke, telling of the horrific slaughter and persecution of Syriac Christians only days prior in Baghdad (http://www.persecutionblog.com/2010/11/iraq-muslims-attack-church.html) leaving 59 Christian brothers slain; murdered for their faith during the worship of Christ. These people were not simply innocent statistics or a handful of words printed on page 7 of a New York City newspaper; they were family. They were fellow Syriac Christians; people whose tradition bears many memories to persecution through every century. This act of violence was nothing new for these people, but it was still heavy and burdensome. How often we ignore such events in our comfortable, American-Christian atmosphere? How often we, as comfortable middle-class citizens fail to realize that those who share our deepest life blood are dying for the very same God we believe in, for the very same Savior we hold our hopes in, and by the very same Spirit which works in us? How often have I become disjointed, displace, and dishumanized not only to my fellow man in general, but my fellow Christian brothers and sisters?
Christianity is a family. We are not a building or a composite of members. We are not conjoined through common activity and liturgical preference. We are not individuals drifting in through their own existence through ritual which holds no meaning. We, as Christians, should be bound not through our culture, our ethnicity, our preferences, our individuality, or the factors of our entertainment. We are bound through who we are and who we are becoming in Christ Jesus our Lord, who died for us.
He died for us! God died for me! As the communion was passed and the bread and wine touched our lips through the hands of the priest in the midst of our crossing I realized I had let myself starve lately; that in the midst of such abundance of spiritual food I had disassociated myself with my fellow Christians and my need for Christ and instead indulged on the fickle matter that is my individual. As I rose and was blessed with the Eucharist, I pondered my Syriac brothers and sisters; those here and those far away, those living and those having moved on, and realized that I was starving for my Lord, starving for salvation, starving for the hope of the coming kingdom.
So I tasted. I ate. I was filled.
How good is our God? Even in the shedding of our family's blood, He always provides new life, new hope, and new compassion. He prepares a broad place for us, He tends to our wounds and heal us, makes us whole, and yet leaves us the scars in order to suffer with those who suffer; to be truly human. In our true humanity, it has been far too long that we've, that I've, sat comfortably by as I see my brothers and sisters die at gunpoint for the very Lord and Savior whom I worship safely and repetitively without worry. God is never safe. He is good, but never safe. To be full implies a danger, implies a stepping-out, implies going against the grain.
And it implies we take a moment to truly fill our spirits.
Qadishat Aloho
Qadishat hayelthono
Qadishat lo moyutho
destlebte hlofayn
ethrahama layn
Amen - The Qadishat Aloho in Syriac
Holy God
Holy Almighty
Holy Immortal
Who was crucified for us
have mercy upon us
Amen
That's what it's like to study God's Word at time: you get so preoccupied you forget to eat it. Not LITERALLY of course, but it seems that sometimes our study and dedication blinds us to the gaping need for Christ that still persists; with or without our acknowledgment. How ironic that we prepare such a banquet to the finest detail only to forget to nourish ourselves in what God has provided.
This morning, I went, for the first time, to a Syriac Orthodox service. The Syriac Orthodox tradition is Eastern in origin, deriving from the first Antiochian Christian communities established by St. Peter, and maintain one of the oldest liturgies surviving today. This was not your usual Reformed service consisting of a couple praise songs, a three point sermon, and a dose of Midwest simplicity all compressed together in an hour and ten minutes in order to get everyone home in time to watch the Lions stumble through another Sunday. It was beautiful, regal, and poignant. The smell of incense lofted throughout the sanctuary and the voices of priest, deacons, and monk alike sang the liturgy in Syriac, calling us to sing along at certain moments in praise to God. The phrase Kurie Eleison is used frequently, Greek for "Lord have mercy" as the entire congregation engages in meaningful prayer. The bread and the wine are blessed by beautiful melodies and are the central focus of the entire service: Christ's compassionate sacrifice always in the forefront. The message was short, ten minutes at most, which called for us to, by the grace of God, to stand and praise without fear or self-regard.
It was then the monk came and spoke, telling of the horrific slaughter and persecution of Syriac Christians only days prior in Baghdad (http://www.persecutionblog.com/2010/11/iraq-muslims-attack-church.html) leaving 59 Christian brothers slain; murdered for their faith during the worship of Christ. These people were not simply innocent statistics or a handful of words printed on page 7 of a New York City newspaper; they were family. They were fellow Syriac Christians; people whose tradition bears many memories to persecution through every century. This act of violence was nothing new for these people, but it was still heavy and burdensome. How often we ignore such events in our comfortable, American-Christian atmosphere? How often we, as comfortable middle-class citizens fail to realize that those who share our deepest life blood are dying for the very same God we believe in, for the very same Savior we hold our hopes in, and by the very same Spirit which works in us? How often have I become disjointed, displace, and dishumanized not only to my fellow man in general, but my fellow Christian brothers and sisters?
Christianity is a family. We are not a building or a composite of members. We are not conjoined through common activity and liturgical preference. We are not individuals drifting in through their own existence through ritual which holds no meaning. We, as Christians, should be bound not through our culture, our ethnicity, our preferences, our individuality, or the factors of our entertainment. We are bound through who we are and who we are becoming in Christ Jesus our Lord, who died for us.
He died for us! God died for me! As the communion was passed and the bread and wine touched our lips through the hands of the priest in the midst of our crossing I realized I had let myself starve lately; that in the midst of such abundance of spiritual food I had disassociated myself with my fellow Christians and my need for Christ and instead indulged on the fickle matter that is my individual. As I rose and was blessed with the Eucharist, I pondered my Syriac brothers and sisters; those here and those far away, those living and those having moved on, and realized that I was starving for my Lord, starving for salvation, starving for the hope of the coming kingdom.
So I tasted. I ate. I was filled.
How good is our God? Even in the shedding of our family's blood, He always provides new life, new hope, and new compassion. He prepares a broad place for us, He tends to our wounds and heal us, makes us whole, and yet leaves us the scars in order to suffer with those who suffer; to be truly human. In our true humanity, it has been far too long that we've, that I've, sat comfortably by as I see my brothers and sisters die at gunpoint for the very Lord and Savior whom I worship safely and repetitively without worry. God is never safe. He is good, but never safe. To be full implies a danger, implies a stepping-out, implies going against the grain.
And it implies we take a moment to truly fill our spirits.
Qadishat Aloho
Qadishat hayelthono
Qadishat lo moyutho
destlebte hlofayn
ethrahama layn
Amen - The Qadishat Aloho in Syriac
Holy God
Holy Almighty
Holy Immortal
Who was crucified for us
have mercy upon us
Amen
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