Why Use A Liturgy?

It’s an interesting question and one I was asked recently by an individual who thought that liturgical worship was unbiblical.

He was surprised to discover that we liturgical Christians take our cues from the Bible. It comes from the worship mandated by God in the Old Testament in what is called the Deuteronomic Liturgy. It describes how God wanted the temple set up and how we are to worship Him.

One of my grievances with contemporary worship is that the focus easily falls on the self/individual instead of on God. Not only is the corporate character of worship lost, but the goal and purpose of worship is lost. Many contemporary praise and worship songs focus more on one’s feelings, hopes, desires, etc. than on God. It’s been my observation that what is called contemporary worship is most conducive for the people rather than what is most glorifying to God.

The contemporary service literally rises or falls on the individual and his or her sermon. It becomes a 45 minute lecture complete with graphs, charts and handouts. But this is not the model of worship Scripture gives us. What I see happening is that the contemporary pastor has forgotten that worship is not the same as teaching. We need to return to authentic forms of worship, we need to re-learn how to worship again.

Liturgy is the form and content of the worship of the early, ancient church. It includes the Psalms, creeds, hymns, and verses used by the earliest Christians. It exists and has connected us as God’s people throughout time.

In the liturgy we recite the Kyrie, “Lord have mercy. Christ have mercy. Lord have mercy,” which has its origins in the Hebrew Hosannah. It was later used by the ancient Greek Christians and was standardized by the fourth century. The Gloria in Excelsis was derived from the angelic hymn used to announce the birth of Jesus. All of the major components of the liturgy, including the Eucharistic prayer, find their origins in Jewish, Biblical, or very early Christian worship.

Liturgy also invites participants to worship God holistically with body, mind, and spirit. It’s an invitation to worship more fully. Our intellects may be engaged by a sermon or teaching, but in contemporary worship our bodies usually are not. Participants should not be mere spectators. In a liturgical worship environment, one’s body and senses are fully engaged. Your body participates along with your mind and spirit through the physical acts of kneeling, rising, and coming forward to the altar. The senses are engaged through visual means in art, candles, symbol, and through the hearing and singing of music, as well as through taste and touch in Communion. All of these invite us to lift up our hearts, minds, and bodies to God in praise, adoration, and worship.

A part of worshipping God holistically with our bodies is something we all hear at the liturgy to “offer yourselves as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to the Lord” (Romans 12:1).

Our faith is an incarnation faith. (Incarnation is the embodiment of the spiritual in a material form.) Christianity is focused on a person: Jesus Christ who is God Incarnate. It’s God’s way of speaking through people and the prophets, God communicating to us through the scriptures, and through Jesus Christ himself, the ultimate incarnation. Liturgy allows us to take this incarnation experience and utilize it fully. We are called to be open to God’s touch and message and can expect to see it in the beauty of creation, and in the rhythm of worship; in water, bread, wine, or in the radiance of a candle flame - a God who graciously comes to us in these ordinary, earthly ways - just as God came to us in God the Son.

Be Liturgical,

Bishop Ian

Sacred Ground

Over the last few weeks the rights of Muslims has dominated discussions regarding the building of a mosque at Ground Zero in New York City. The whole issue rests not so much with the building of a mosque but it has become a human rights debate regarding the treatment of Muslims here in the US. We are somehow “racist” for opposing the building of this Muslim Cultural Center when it is clearly inappropriate. Those openly critical of Islam are sometimes dubiously slurred as racists, regardless of what their true views on race may be. In fact, Islam is not a race; Islam has nothing at all to do with genetics. It is an ideology – a set of beliefs about individual behavior and the rules of society. Neither are Muslims a race of people. In fact, there are Muslims of all races. So criticizing Islam is not racism. There is no such thing as "anti-Muslim racism" any more than it makes sense to pretend that there is "anti-Christian racism," "anti-Methodist racism," or "anti-Capitalist racism."

Ground Zero in New York is truly sacred ground. A mosque being built on the spot is not the symbol of healing for a nation. It picks the scab and is more a “Victory” monument for radical Islam despite what the Muslim and political leadership claim. Not one of the Imams engaged in this project have come out against the atrocities committed there on 9/11. In fact they blame the US and its policies towards Muslim nations as the reason this occurred. It’s our fault and we got what we deserved. But is that all there is to the story? While left wing human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International (which even went the politically correct route of appointing a Muslim Secretary General) have jumped in to the business of protecting the rights of Muslims in the West with both feet. Yet very little attention is paid to the rights of Jews or Christians living in Muslim countries. Try building a Christian church or Synagogue in Saudi Arabia, or Yemen, or Iran. While Muslims incessantly shout about their rights in Europe, America and Israel, it might be a good idea to take a look at how non-Muslims are treated in Muslim countries. As much as 90 percent of Dubai is run by foreign guest workers who slave away for the Emirs. As much as 40 percent of Saudi Arabia consists of foreign guest workers and is built on the foreign oil companies they seized, built by American and British oil workers, serviced by Asian and African laborers. Many have their passports seized and are housed in little more than slave labor camps. Keep an eye out on who funds the Ground Zero Mosque as many of the organizations clamoring for the rights of Muslims in the West are either Saudi fronts, such as CAIR (Council on American Islamic Relations), or Saudi funded, such as Human Rights Watch.

Until the Muslim world gives the same rights to non-Muslims as to Muslims, the same rights to women as to men... Muslims have no right to make human rights demands of anyone else. When religious minorities can live in peace and security in the Muslim world, only then can Muslims issue demands to non-Muslim countries.If Muslims abroad were treated as they treat others at home, they would enjoy few rights, they would be murdered at random and their attackers let off with a fine, their children would be seized to be converted to another religion and their women would be jailed for not complying with local customs. Instead, Muslims enjoy legal equality in their host countries, even as they spread the poison of an Islamist ideology that calls for the murder of non-Muslims - sometimes acting on it. Times Square and Fort Hood are good examples.Despite all the talk about hate crimes against mosques, Muslims abroad have committed far more violent attacks on other people's houses of worship, than have been committed against theirs. Muslim rapes far outweigh any rapes of Muslims. Muslim terrorist attacks on non-Muslims far outweigh any terrorist attacks carried out against Muslims.

Yet the politicians and the media go out of their way to appease the Muslim leadership with the endless barrage of "Religion of Peace" propaganda. Yet, we have the squealing by Saudi front groups crying about the fate of Muslims living high on the hog in America, while spinning their favorite anthem of, “Death to Everyone Who Isn't Us.” Perhaps before Muslims here in the US complain about their rights, they should first begin honoring the rights of non-Muslims here and in their home countries. The Qur’an places an enormous distinction between Muslims and non-Muslims that is hard to miss. Believers are loved by God, whereas infidels are hated to the extent that they are tortured for eternity (3:32, 4:56) merely for not believing. Muslims are told to shun unbelievers (3:118), who are called “helpers of evil” (25:55), “wicked” (4:160), “fond of lies” (5:42) and compared to the worst of animals (8:55, 7:176, 7:179). Members of Islam are told to be merciful to each other, but ruthless to those outside of the faith (48:29). Violence is also sanctioned against those who defy Islamic rule (8:12-13, 9:5).

So, if Muslims were a race, Islam would not only be a racist ideology, but arguably the most hateful and destructive in history. It is bad enough that hundreds of millions of people have been killed in the last fourteen centuries by divinely sanctioned Jihad and slavery, yet here they stand espousing religious supremacy and racial superiority ready once again to build a mosque on top of the blood and ruble of a place considered “Sacred Ground” by the families and friends of the victims of 9/11. A place their “Religion of Peace” helped to destroy.

Building a “Muslim Cultural Center” at ground zero is the wrong place. It always will be.

Be Informed,

Bishop Ian

Being Good Enough

When a good person dies, you will always hear someone remark, “Well if anyone’s in heaven, its Grandpa Joe, He was such a good man. He was so good you know; he’d give you the shirt off his back.” Or how about, “She’s in heaven now; she was such a good and kind person.”

Well, OK, who wouldn’t want to have a funeral like that? Imagine an alternative one with everyone standing hand-in-hand at Aunt Bessie’s graveside service with the rousing chorus of, Ding Dong the Witch is Dead, offered as the recessional hymn.

There are many people who were good in life and have left a wonderful legacy to their family and friends with great memories for those left behind. Still, is being good, good enough? Now that’s a good question. When you consider the length of eternity it’s pretty important to understand how to get into heaven. And if goodness does it, exactly how much of it do you need for the Golden Ticket?

If you die young and haven’t had much chance to chalk up a lot of “good” what happens then? Since we have all done some bad stuff in life, does it cancel out whatever we have done that’s good? Then, are we looking at scales to see which has the greater weight? What happens if we do good but with bad motive? Are we ever good enough?

The truth is that no one is good enough on their own to get into heaven. Heaven is the home of Almighty God who is holy and pure and perfect. How can any of us rightfully stand in his presence?

“All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags.” (Isaiah 64:6).

Uh Oh! There it is in black and white. According to Isaiah, being good isn’t good enough. Now what? Being stuck for eternity in the depths of the hoary underworld with Satan and all his minions? Is there any other way?

According to the Bible, God bypassed our good because it wasn’t good enough and made a better and easier way to spend eternity with him. How about if someone who really is good stands in for us? How about if we get in on somebody else’s Golden Ticket? That’s exactly what happened.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life." (John 3:16)

God the Father sent Jesus, God the Son, to take the punishment for our sins so we could get into heaven on His goodness.

Look at it this way; imagine standing before the throne of God and being asked to justify your life. “How do you plead; guilty or innocent”? Tough one, eh? If you plead innocent you are a liar because we are all guilty by our very sin nature. But then if you plead guilty you are condemning yourself to eternity in H.E. double hockeysticks. Here’s the deal, as a Christian you always Plead the blood! It is the blood of Jesus, God the Son that secures heaven for any of us.

Well gee Bishop Ian; if being good doesn’t secure heaven does it have any value? Absolutely; doing good is our legacy if we have accepted the righteousness of Christ and become his disciples. Look again at the verse above, and then check out the one below.

“For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” (Ephesians 2:10)

Certainly we are supposed to do good every chance we get and we will receive rewards in heaven (though not heaven itself) based on our good works while we lived. Being good extends the kingdom of God here upon the earth and as His disciples we are all called to that service.

No one wants to think of a good man or woman being anywhere after death other than heaven. I understand that. But the real question is: when he or she is before God to give an account of their life; whose goodness are they standing on? What about you?

Be Standing with Christ,

Bishop Ian

Santa Claus is Suing the Pope

Have you seen this? No kidding, a guy named Thomas O’Connor, a 63-year-old Lake Tahoe man, who legally changed his name to Santa Claus (no middle initial) in 2005, is suing the Pope. The article reveals that he was recently elevated to the title of missionary bishop in the Apostles' Anglican Church, an ecumenical Christian denomination based in Ohio and Michigan. On behalf of the many children sexually abused by priests, his mission is to, “explore and utilize a variety of legal means,” the statement read in part, "to hold the Roman Catholic Church, especially the Pope and the Vatican, accountable for the suffering of many thousands of vulnerable children at the hands of clergy, straight and gay, young and old, celibate or not."

I know, it sounds like an episode of “Boston Legal.” The jolly old elf shows up at Denny Crane's office with a naughty and nice list with the Pope at the top, and a big bag of coal for all the Roman Catholics in the world. Fuming mad, Denny Crane takes the case and strikes a blow against the church and saves the suffering children.

Don’t get me wrong, like many of you I am appalled at what happened to these children at the hands of those clergy and it was an abomination. Every child deserves to be nurtured, protected and loved. We are called to condemn these actions and every Christian including Roman Catholics have. But here’s the problem. The article says ‘his mission’ is "to hold the Roman Catholic Church, especially the Pope and the Vatican, accountable..."

"If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him." (James 1:5)

The Bible tells us that God wants us to be wise when we deal with people in the name of Christ. Folks, Santa suing the Pope is perhaps the dumbest thing I have ever heard of. Instead of calling for prayer for the victims of these crimes he calls for litigation.

"Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should." (Colossians 4:2-4 )

What did the Apostle Paul do to make sure that he would be wise to those outside the family of God? He devoted himself to prayer, and he asked others to devote themselves in prayer for him. In other words, Paul understood that it was absolutely vital to first go to God about the people before he went to the people about God.

A wise person once said, "Almost every man wastes part of his life in attempts to display qualities which he does not possess." This is a man who is trying to be someone he isn’t and doing it in the name of Christ, as an Anglican bishop. It’s dumb… It’s moronic… It brings no glory to God and makes all of us “Anglicans” appear foolish.

"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses it saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men." (Matthew 5:13)

On the next episode of Boston Legal, The Easter Bunny sues the major candy companies for making children fat.

Be wise, be salty…

Bishop Ian

Perfect Conditions

"Whoever watches the wind will not plant; whoever looks at the clouds will not reap."
(Ecclesiastes 11:4)

This verse is basically saying that if we wait for the perfect conditions to do something we will most likely never get anything done because those perfect conditions never arrive. So what do we do? Take a leap of faith, just a little one, trusting that God will guide and provide.

"And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him." (Hebrews 11:6)

I just got back from a week in Manchester, Vermont. Two granddaughters were being baptized and many family members were there for the occasion. Many of the family work on Wall Street and were lamenting the current financial situation and recession. It wasn’t that they had no reason to complain as we are indeed in a bad fiscal situation, not just in America but all over the world. Some spoke of current conditions and what needed to take place to allow for growth while others stated it was time to buy gold, guns, and prefab bomb shelters. Unfortunately, there seemed to be no perfect condition available in anyone’s opinion to remedy the current financial issues of the day.

Everyone is looking for the perfect condition to make decisions or to make a forecast for the future. It’s Human Nature; the problem is that we are expressing faith in those conditions rather than in God. Now understand, I am not saying that we blindly barge forward and completely disregard all logical thinking. God has graciously given us a mind that he expects us to use in a sensible way. However, I think you will agree that very often we can allow our sensibility to create all kinds of excuses for not taking the step of faith that honors God.

Writers of the Old and New Testament remind us often that we need to honor God first, and then move forward. “Well you are a Bishop; you’re supposed to have that kind of faith.” Yes the clergy are supposed to set the example but we alone are not the torch bearers of faith for everyone else. To find faith we must trust, to trust we must know God, to know God we must give up self and serve Him who gave us life.

"For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." (Ephesians 2:10 )

Will your faith be tested? Of course it will, but take the step anyway. Will you meet with opposition that will challenge your commitment? Of course you will, but take the step anyway. Will you meet with negativity that will question your sanity? Of course you will, but take the step anyway. We honor God when you show trust in God. The families of our two granddaughters’ had faith enough to know they needed to be baptized. That was a small leap of faith.

We had a great time Vermont; we had good weather, good food, and good fellowship. It is always a joy for Robin and me to wander such places as these. Realize that God gave us these beautiful places to play in. If we are faithful in this life, think of the beauty and love He will give us in the next. Fulfill the purpose you have been created for and bring glory to God....you will not be disappointed!

Be of good faith…

Bishop Ian

Space - the Forgotten Frontier

I don’t often go off on tangents in my Blog. But there are exceptions. Here’s one of them.

NASA's new mission: Building ties to Muslim world.

This was the headline I read on AOL as I ate my breakfast. It was one of those double take moments. I thought, ‘maybe it’s an acute case of dyslexia or my computer juxtaposed a story’.

Nope, as I read on I was horrified (and I don’t use that term lightly) to discover that the new NASA administrator, Charles Bolden, had been given three tasks by President Obama. He was quoted from an AL Jazeera interview no less. “He (Obama) wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math; he wanted me to expand our international relationships; and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering." You can’t make this stuff up. NASA’s foremost mission is to make Muslims feel good? I mean the President does realize that the “S” in NASA stands for “Space,” right???

I grew up with astronauts as my heroes. I love astronomy, and I’ve read every book I could find about the space program, and by the astronauts who flew the missions. I’ve seen “From the Earth to the Moon” six times. And now, I wake up to read that the new mission of NASA is to make the Muslim world feel good about their contributions to science, math and engineering? What are we talking about here, two or three guys, who like the Germans of WWlI, escaped fascism and were given an opportunity to build a space program in the confines of freedom and liberty here in the US?

They can’t seriously be trying to give the warm fuzzies to the guys in Iran - those same guys who are trying to come up with a guided missile delivery vehicle to blow up Israel are they? Maybe NASA can have a class on how to build a better IED. "Hi kids. Wanna see science? Today we are going to make an explosive device from common household items." It’s…well, lunacy.

The writer from the Washington Examiner goes on to say, “Obama's proposal stunned U.S. space heroes Neil Armstrong and Eugene Cernan -- the first and last men to walk on the moon -- who, along with Apollo 13 commander Jim Lovell, made a rare public statement denouncing the plan as a "devastating" scheme that "destines our nation to become one of second - or even third-rate stature."

Look, even John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth, who later became a Democratic senator and an Obama supporter, chimed in on the president's plan to rely on the Russians to ferry American astronauts to the international space station. "We're putting ourselves in line for a single-point failure ending the whole manned space program."

I was 6 years old when Glenn orbited the earth. I remember following every mission, from Mercury to Apollo. I was 13 when Armstrong walked on the moon, and I was 16 when Gene Cernan closed the hatch on the Lunar Module and flew home. I stood on the bridge of the USCGC Hammer anchored near Titusville, FL and watched as the last Apollo mission left Kennedy Space Center in Florida. It was the Apollo-Soyuz mission with Deke Slayton, one of the Original 7 Mercury Astronauts, and he was flying his first mission into space. Every launch and every mission I ever watched always left me with one word, WOW! It was a huge source of national pride, not just for me but for most of the nation.

In 1997, I retired from active ministry in the Episcopal Church and went to work at a national TV network in Washington DC as one of the Post Production Supervisors. I bought a small townhouse in Baltimore and commuted to Washington’s Union Station everyday. It was a late night and I was waiting to take the last MARC train - the 10:15 back to Baltimore. There were three of us in the terminal area, when two spry elderly people came and sat next to me. He looked at me smiled and said; “How are you tonight young man.” It was John Glenn, and his wife Annie. It was another one word moment - I was sitting next to Mercury Astronaut John Glenn!!!. WOW…

He was taking the train to NYC to do one of the national morning TV shows before heading back to Florida. He was training for his trip back to space and he had just spent the evening with President Clinton.

I worried about being intrusive especially with a living legend so I congratulated him on his upcoming flight and I thanked him for his service and I told him how I remembered his first flight even as a young child of 6 years old. I rambled on about how he and the others had inspired me to get a telescope and study astronomy and learn about rockets and space. He smiled, stood up and shook my hand and said, “Young man, I am glad to hear you say that. I get asked all the time why I am doing this, and that is the reason - that’s it right there, what you just said, the reason I’m going back up, to inspire young people to start looking up again.”

Now c’mon folks, NASA for the last 50 years has been about Space. When NASA put John Glenn into orbit and landed Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the Moon, the whole world went, WOW. They have done things in their fifty year history that made people; ordinary people like me from all over the world look up again and say WOW.

We have a president whose vision of America’s greatness lies in our humility, rather than the greatness we have achieved as a nation. Nothing embodied that greatness like the accomplishments of NASA. Making Muslims feel better??? Yes, I thought, WOW, when I read the article. It wasn’t the good kind of WOW factor. This is politics, the worst kind; NASA deserves better. America deserves better. All of mankind, who NASA has inspired for fifty years, deserve better.

Be Inspired,

Bishop Ian (boldly going where I haven't gone before)

The Fourth of July: Remembering America as a Nation Under God

"The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: that it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity."

- John Quincy Adams

The signers intended the Declaration of Independence to officiate the separation between America and Great Britain. However, they based the Declaration, which has served as a foundation for the beginning of the American nation, upon a greater foundational belief that God, or as written in the Declaration, a “Creator,” was the source for men’s irrevocable rights.
Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration, also believed, "God, who gave us life gave us liberty.”

Two of the Continental Congress’ first actions were to hire military chaplains and to purchase 20,000 Bibles to remedy a national shortage.

Although America was already a free nation during the presidency of George Washington, as the first president of the United States, he suggested that only religion could uphold its morality. During his farewell address he said, "And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle."

The first settlers in America, the Pilgrims, clearly stated the purpose for their voyage even before stepping off the Mayflower; “...undertaken for the glory of God and the advancement of the Christian faith...”

The U.S. Supreme Court also identified America as a Christian nation in 1892 after 10 years of examining hundreds of documents on the foundation of the country. The justices came to the unanimous conclusion that the documents undeniably "add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a religious people, a Christian nation."

After the constitution had been ratified, John Adams, the second president of the United States, summed the document up this way. “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other."

The late Ronald Reagan, 40th President of the United States, held the conviction that God cannot and should not be moved from the social and governmental construct of America. He said, "Without God there is no virtue because there is no prompting of the conscience....without God there is a coarsening of the society; without God democracy will not and cannot long endure....If we ever forget that we are one Nation under God, then we will be a Nation gone under."

People who want to remove all mention of a God from schools, public buildings, government, and society in general, use the First Amendment to the Constitution as their rallying point. But if you read that amendment carefully, you will note that the words "separation of church and state" do not appear. The amendment simply prohibits "an establishment of religion." That means there should be no nationally mandated or tax supported church. The amendment promises the federal government will not start a national church, like England has the Church of England.

We have to answer to God for our national life, because it was God who gave us our national life. It was God who was often called upon by our leaders and credited with our victory in America’s War for Independence, and not just "good fortune" or "luck" that allowed thirteen colonies to defeat the greatest military power in the world at that time.

Be Patriotic,

Bishop Ian