Finding Hope in Easter

Lent is a time for reflection and “looking forward to the joy of Easter.” Certainly it seems there is much to reflect on at this time. Some of it personal, some of it bigger picture reflections about where we are in our society and the wider world.

These are not easy times in our nation. The much debated and talked about recession has not gone away and some projected economic forecasts are far from healthy. It is likely that more people will lose their homes and jobs. In short, there’s not a huge amount of hope going around this Easter.

Yet, hope is a key theme in the New Testament. When Paul reflected on the resurrection of Jesus he concluded that, “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all people.” (1 Cor. 15:19.) In other words, because of the transforming power of God in raising Jesus from death, hope is born not just for this life but for all eternity.

The loss of hope is indeed a loss. We are paralyzed without hope. To be without any hope is effectively to be disempowered, to see no way out. Despite the promise of Jesus that He would rise from the dead, those around the Cross on that first Good Friday experienced the hopelessness of it all. They wondered whether the past three years they had spent with Jesus had just come to an unfortunate end.

The resurrection brought hope then and it can bring us hope today. This event, Paul would have argued, is primary evidence that the promises of God will be fulfilled. Without it, the hope that faith in God can bring would be unavailable to us. It would be in doubt.

The resurrection means that God can take the most impossible and hopeless situations and transform them; that His power to change things has been ultimately vindicated in Christ.

Do we believe that things can change in our lives, in our churches, in God’s world? If you’re not sure how to answer that question then you have not grasped the power of the Resurrection hope and we will never know that “joy of Easter”.

To rediscover hope is to be changed and to believe that, however awful the circumstances, things can change in our life, in our culture and in our world. Jesus teaches that with God all things are possible, not least of which is his rising from the dead.

My prayer for all my readers this Holy Week is that we rediscover the “joy of Easter” and reconnect our lives to the things above.

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly. John 10:10

Be Joyful,

Bishop Ian

Celebrating Lent

Let’s face it; Lent has gradually lost its meaning for some of us. Most people in today’s world live in a noisy, materialistic society that has no idea what abstinence, prayer and meditation are all about. Even Christians are becoming bored with Lent. It’s lost it meaning because it becomes a “just do it” thing rather than a “here’s why it’s important” thing.

So why is Lent important? Let me ask this question; is Lent celebrated to benefit God or benefit us? Do we make life difficult during Lent as a way to pay Jesus for what he went through for our salvation or to reap the fruit of his suffering and death?

Lent isn’t about just giving up candy or coffee; it’s also about remembering and celebrating. Yes I said celebrating. Years ago I sought to enjoy Lent as a celebration instead of an observance. When Lent is approached as an observance, it has a tendency become dry and lifeless, some folks say even boring, something to be avoided. But when we approach it as a celebration, it is refreshing and full of life, and if we remain steadfast, each passing year has something new to teach us about the Word become flesh. Look for example at this passage in Lamentations.

“The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is his faithfulness” (Lam 4:22-23).

Cool verse, but so what? Look at it this way; Lent is not celebrated to benefit God but to benefit us. Seems an odd statement but let me clarify. There is nothing we can do to pay for what Jesus went through for our salvation. God does not expect us to carry the cross during Lent or mourn or torture ourselves. Remembering Lent is to remember (reflect), celebrate (yes, by denial and self evaluation) and renew our hearts in prayer and meditation, and re-commit ourselves for the work of salvation done by God in Jesus Christ.

We are the ones to put our faith in action and share with those around us the finished work of salvation. In his 33 years of earthly life, he left us an example of how we can live for God on earth as humans. Jesus’ earthly life reveals that he identified with our human nature by becoming flesh as a God-man. He suffered and was tempted but denied himself worldly “things” for spiritual ones.

This Lent, consider what Jesus went through for our sake through his passion death and finally the promised resurrection. For me, Lent is a cherished period of self evaluation and gratitude celebrating the life and teachings of He who would take away my sins. Lent is a period in which we can prepare ourselves for personal mission and learn how we can, through Jesus’ example, overcome the many troubles that come with being human. We celebrate with praise and thanksgiving the opportunities to share in the victory he has already gained for us. The period of abstinence in Lent can help us abstain from so many of life’s challenges that lead us to sin; a period where we can reflect on our own commitment to the gifts we have been given as members of Christ’s Body.

It is my hope that this approach will help us celebrate what’s left of these forty days with some relish as the grace filled period and opportunity God has made possible through God the Son. Use the time left to really prepare your hearts and minds for the greatest celebration of all. Abstain, give up, and throw away those things that keep you from the benefits, the grace, and the peace and truly celebrate what it means to be serving the creator of everything.

Be Benefitted,

Bishop Ian

Lent: What's New, What's Normal?

I was listening to several of the talking heads lapping up the Kool-aid and saying this recession is the barometer for the “new depression,” and rising gas and food prices were the “new normal.” My parents grew up in the depression of the 1930’s. So did my wife, Robin’s, parents. The depression stamped them for life and yes, there is reason to be concerned about today’s recession, but there’s also a reason to be hopeful. I’ve been remembering my first Lent as a young teenager; it was a time that I felt that pull of the Anglican faith and practice that shaped my life.

By requiring fasting and abstinence, the observance of Lent somehow helped me cope with the multitude of early teen angst many of us had to grapple with.

This was also the time that I attended confirmation class. We were asked to give something up. I gave up eating candy. The main point for me was just to get through those 40 days. I remember being told that this was the same number of days a famished Jesus spent in the desert and the number of years the Hebrews wandered in the wilderness. “God’s will” was the name we gave to suffering, and God’s grace was the promise that it would end ... eventually.

Lent is one of the most important seasons in the calendar, but now self-denial seems more a suggestion than a requirement. Maybe it’s this notion of the “new normal.” We are inundated with the statistics of unemployment and poverty on the rise. Who needs Lent to give something up? We have all sacrificed, so I suppose Lenten self-denial could be forgiven this year.

There are plenty of difficulties in everyday life without choosing to add new ones. Job loss is hell enough. I mean this is America; yet it seems this whole economic mess came out of nowhere and revealed that we weren’t as secure as we thought we were.

Yet, I would argue that traditional Lenten observances offer one particular contrast to today’s “new normal.” Lent begins with the word remember; spoken when a cross of ashes are smudged on the forehead…remembering what we are and where we came from; ashes to ashes, dust to dust; we are the created.

This year it struck me that the millions of people who started Lent in the same way simply go through the motions and deny the scriptures as they say, “Remember thou man we are dust, and all things are passing,” This is a hard cold fact . This “new normal” put a sharp focus for many on material worries, and should instead remind us of what matters most in life.

Lent will end and sacrifices will go on. There is nothing wrong with job security, and yet, it seems there is nothing right with suffering. That is exactly what our Lord came to do. To suffer for us, so we don’t have to. It seems insecurity is normal again and that’s okay, because if Lent teaches us anything, it teaches us to get used to it. "The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and on the third day be raised." Luke 9:22 .

We are all part of the human situation. This recession is new but it certainly isn’t normal. We will suffer from time to time. This Lent remember we may be dust, but because he suffered and was raised. We are redeemed dust.

Be Remembering,

Bishop Ian

Fear - Love's Opposite

Those of you who are fans of Charlie Brown will remember the time Charlie Brown visits Lucy at her Psychiatric booth and talks to her about his fears, yet he can’t quite get a grip on it so Lucy proceeds to run down the list of every “phobia” there is until she gets to “Pantaphobia, fear of everything.” And Charlie screams out, “THAT’S IT!”

I think if we are honest about it, fear is a large part of what it means to be human. In general, it‘s not that we are afraid of specific things like snakes or spiders. We are just afraid...period. We fear the outcome of our relationships – am I with right person? Will I ever find love? We are afraid that this job or that job will not last long, or we are afraid that it will. "Am I stuck doing this same thing for the rest of my life?” We are afraid that people who meet us will not like us, or we are afraid that they will - (maybe too much.) We are afraid of failure, or we are afraid of success and what that might mean for our comfortable lives. We are afraid of dying young, and we are afraid of growing old. Often, we are more afraid of life than we are of death. No wonder Prozac is the number one prescribed drug today.

It’s Lent; slow down a little; read I Corinthians 13 (The love chapter) each day. Usually we think of Hate as the opposite of Love and in some respects that‘s true. But, I would argue that this first Sunday in Lent and Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness demonstrates that fear is the opposite of Love.

Look at it this way; fear may be expressed as anger or abuse - (“I am afraid that you may not love me anymore."), or greed - (“What if I run out of what I have now?”), or addictions, violence, and corruption. All of these things that we think of as the opposite of love are simply symptoms of fear. When true love is absent, our fears drive us to hate that which we fear. There are many different ways through which we can look at the temptation story. This year I would like to look at it in the context of love.

The temptation of Christ was a stretching and testing of the humanity of Christ. Before Jesus could be totally operating with Love, in a way that would lead him to the cross, Jesus had to go to the desert and face fear in its totality. These were temptations far beyond what you or I could endure. I would argue that Jesus is tempted by Satan who uses fear - “turn these stones to bread, eat this here or you may never eat again.” How about corruption and greed? Satan tempts Jesus to get on board and share in the leading of the kingdoms of the world. “You are out here all alone. You may just wind up with nothing.” That’s also fear of isolation or loss of status. The final temptation is, “Are you sure God is still with you out here in the desert? Maybe you could jump from a high place just to be sure that God is protecting you. You know if God is not watching closely you might just die out here in this desert?” That’s fear of abandonment.

To Love completely is to trust God. The temptation is to Fear, to abandon Love, to abandon the relationship of trust with God. The temptation in the Garden of Eden is the same temptation as Jesus faced. “Eat this fruit. God is leaving you out of the loop. You do not know everything that God is up to, so you better eat this fruit.” The opposite of Love is Fear. In both temptations the tempter uses the same temptation that we all face every day. Will my life, my decisions, my relationships be driven by fear of will they operate out of love. Each moment we are deciding to function in one mode or the other.

“God is Love. And he who abides in love abides in God and God abides in him. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.” “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.” I John 4

Ok, great so how do we live by love?

Within each of us lives the Spirit of God; the Spirit of Love. God is Love. Within us is Christ who overcame these temptations and fear.

I remember reading once that Michelangelo was asked how he had created such wonderful sculptures as David, Moses, and others. He answered that it was God who created these great works of art. Michelangelo said, “My job is to remove the excess marble that surrounds God's beautiful creation.” I like that; I think that’s right on. There is no perfect me or the perfect you, yet the perfect God, is within you and within me - there to chisel away the excess fears and phobias that turns our attentions away from Him who is perfect.

Spend time reading 1 Corinthians 13 this Lent; Love is patient, Love is kind, Love is not envious, boastful, or rude,” as we focus on the Love of God that already resides within us, allow the Holy Spirit to chisel away at the those fears.

Maybe Lucy was right. Maybe we start by honestly examining our lives to find what we fear most and how is it damaging our relationships and the decisions that we make. Then we can allow the perfect love, Christ within us, to flood that area of our lives as we focus on love. Allow the Holy Spirit to chisel away the fear that surrounds us until we are left with only the great and perfect master piece. Love.

Be fearless in love,

Bishop Ian

It's Hard To Stumble If You're On Your Knees

It’s been said that when God is about to do something great, he starts his people praying. His supernatural strength is available to praying people who are convinced to the core of their beings that He can make a difference. Skeptics may argue that answered prayers are only coincidences, but as Bishop JC Ryle once observed, "It's amazing how many coincidences occur when one begins to pray." For it is only when we have first spent time on our knees before God, that we will then be able to go and stand before people.

“Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out! Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been his counselor?” (Romans 11:33-34)

The great evangelist of the 19th century, D.L. Moody, was once asked why a godly man such as himself would need to pray so much. He responded, "Because I leak." Moody means that all the blessings the Lord fills us with need constant prayer to keep our spiritual tanks topped off and full.

We as Christians are wisest and safest when we are on our knees in prayer. Why? Look at the title above. It is pretty hard to stumble when you are on your knees. Scriptures are very clear and consistent that Jesus was a man of prayer. The Gospels show us that Jesus’ natural response to any situation, be it crisis or decision, was to seek the Father alone in prayer. His earthly life not only lived out the practice of prayer, it was one of His most consistent teachings.

Therefore let everyone who is godly offer prayer to you at a time when you may be found;surely in the rush of great waters, they shall not reach him. You are a hiding place for me;you preserve me from trouble; you surround me with shouts of deliverance. (The Psalter 1928 BCP p. 378, Psalm 32:7-8)

We have a rich history, and an historic prayer book full of prayers and devotions that have been said by faithful Christians for thousands of years.

O GOD, the strength of all those who put their trust in thee; Mercifully accept our prayers; and because, through the weakness of our mortal nature, we can do no good thing without thee, grant us the help of thy grace, that in keeping thy commandments we may please thee, both in will and deed; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. (Collect: The First Sunday after Trinity. Pg. 188 1928 BCP)

This Lent, let God do something great in your life through prayer,

Be Prayerful