Day 720 - The Why of Hope

A sermon given at New Hope Presbyterian Church, Chattanooga, TN, on Nov. 30, 2014, The First Sunday of Advent

OT Reading: Deuteronomy 34:1-8

NT Reading:  Luke 24: 36-49

I fairly sure you have heard sermons on the first Sunday of Advent that explain Advent is the beginning of the church year and a season of waiting from two perspectives, a historical one that recognizes the birth of Jesus and a future one that hopes and waits for the return of Jesus and our own resurrection.

I hope this sermon on “The Why of Hope” encourages us all to use this time of waiting to consider prayerfully the reality of Christian hope.

 Especially in a theological sense, hope is expecting a future event that every shred of rational experience tells us is impossible. Christian Hope acknowledges the reality of two impossible things, first that Jesus defeated death for all of us Easter people, and second, Christ is coming again to bring his people home.

Think about “home.”  All Christian hope is really is the hope for home…but hope for home is not just a Christian hope. Hope for home is built into the fabric of being of all God's people (we are all God’s people) across all of time, from the Israelites who were oppressed under Pharaoh’s hand and wandered in the desert looking for the Promised Land to our own time today where we struggle to live as Christians under the burden of the world today wondering in the words of the prophet, “How long O Lord, How long will your people struggle under this burden?”

The story of the death of Moses poignantly captures the hope for home of Moses and Israel. God called Moses to lead Israel out of Egypt with only the promise that they were going to the Promised Land. Given the tumultuous and rebellious history of the Israelites along the journey, we could say that the hope and faith in that promise gave Moses the strength to carry Israel home on his back.

Moses deepest hope had to be to see the Promised Land, dip his feet in the Jordan River and step on that hallowed ground. When they get to the Jordan River after forty years, because of their rebellion all the Israelites who left Egypt but Moses are dead and only the children will enter…even Moses who brought the people to the Promised Land will not enter. God fulfilled his hope, just not in the way Moses thought.  Atop Mt. Nebo God showed Moses the Promised Land from the desert to the south to the land of the north, from the glimmering sea to the Jordan River.

Moses died there and Israel wept for 30 days until the period of mourning was over. That really is the way with leaders. They can take us so far, but then we must wipe away the tears and take up the baton ourselves…

For us, here at Advent, 2014, the capstone of our hope for home and freedom is Christ’s final return. We can reduce the hope of Advent to the simple statement, “We hope for home. There is a home and we are sure to get there… There is a home…”

Why do we hope? What is the “why” of hope? More directly, “Why are we here in this sanctuary on Sunday morning since we know already there is a home?” Does our hope for home present us with an obligation or duty while we are waiting?

The passage in Luke gives an answer. Luke is concluding the story of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus. His disheartened disciples with their world crumbled around them are huddled in a house petrified with fear.

Can you imagine the range of emotions that the disciples experienced in the ministry of Jesus, from joy in the early days when this mesmerizing man Jesus healed the blind, challenged the rich and religious authorities and entered Jerusalem as a King to the abject fear to see him crucified dead and buried in the most humiliating way that the Romans could devise for a rebel or slave?

After Jesus meets two of the disciples on the road to Emmaus, he appears to all the disciples in human form, instructing and explaining to them everything that happened…every thing that they had witnessed was required as God’s purpose. Then… he gave them his promise, he said wait here…”wait here for the Holy Spirit to come and empower you to witness to the world.”

Because that promise of empowerment by the Holy Spirit was fulfilled is why we are here today in this sanctuary. Luke’s words of Jesus speak to us across the two thousand years to the tumultuous times of uncertainty and doubt that we live in today. Our fears may be as real as the disciples in their destroyed world as they waited for Jesus and the promised Holy Spirit. Many of us worry about and fear the secularization of church and society. The loss of people in worship, our aging congregations and decreasing budgets make many of us feel the world has abandoned us.

The reality is, I could walk into almost any Presbyterian congregation and hear the same laments and questions, “What should we do about our decreasing numbers? Maybe we need to redo our sanctuary?” I might hear, “What should we do to grow our small youth group? Maybe we need a new sound system or a video projector?”

In any congregation that has lost its pastor, such as New Hope, I might hear worry over your sense of loss and search for hope to move forward into the future.  Others may not grieve but ask, the “what” question, “What do we do next?”

I recently attended a course at Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond and we talked about the “What? How? and Why?” questions as they pertain to our congregations. We viewed part of a film (“The Golden Circle andPower of Why” by Simon Sinek) that gives a perspective on how successful and less successful companies or organizations use these three questions, what, how, why.

This film maintains that these three questions face organizations when change becomes necessary (families and congregations are organizations). Usually the question people ask first is “What?” “What do we need to do to grow?” (Profit, congregation, youth group, etc.)

After the “What?” question is answered we often brainstorm answers to the next question, “How do we do it?” “How do we grow our worship attendance?” or “How do we increase our youth group?”

We may say, “Let’s redo our worship space so it looks more modern or more attractive to young people” or “install a better sound system.” Then we are liable then to ask, “How are we going to do that?” The answer might be, “We'll do a fundraiser, or a capital campaign, or maybe we can go to the Presbyterian get a loan with no interest in a long term of repayment.” We have gone from the “What” question to the “How” question but never asked “why?” or thought how “why” connects to what we do next.

The film says if we want to build and enliven a vital organization we cannot start backwards with “What are we going to do?” because we may never get to the most important question, “Why are we doing it, or why are we here?” The best sequence is to ask first, “Why do we want to do something,” then ask “How we are going to do it?” and finally “What we are going to make or what does it look like?”

He uses Apple as an example of a company that follows the why/how/what method and Microsoft as a company that follows the what/how/why path. (By the way I don’t want to get into an argument over who makes the best computer, but Apple is the largest corporation in the world and approaches computers entirely differently than Microsoft who is number two, both larger than Exxon.)

The mindset at Apple asks, “Why do we want to make a computer?” They answer basically people want an invisible machine, be it a computer or iPhone, that lets them make notes, organize their recipes, send messages to their friends, keep track of their household finances, play games and the like. Except for scientists and engineers, most people really don’t want to learn computer programming to get the thing to work, or be required to learn how the hardware and operating system of the computer work to add or remove things.

Most people want a machine that you charge up or plug in, turn on, and it starts up working with an intuitive interface that that makes the computer almost invisible to the user and works with the least amount of effort by the user.

Having answered “why?”, then Apple asks How do we build than kind of computer, and then they ask what should it look like? They follow the sequence “Why,” “How,” and then “What” and make a magnificent computer that works almost without knowing it is there. Apple has been handsomely successful for asking “Why?”

Microsoft on the other hand started by asking what the computer should do, then they created an operating system and user interface that required the user to user be knowledgeable about the hardware and software (unless they paid someone to set it up). Microsoft may have not even asked the why question until they saw the success of Apple.

How do we use this why, how, and what idea to nurture a vital, healthy congregation? I suggest we begin asking, “Why are we here in this sanctuary today?” and not the “What?”:  “What do we need to do to generate more members?”

When we ask, “Why are we here?” the response is almost unavoidable: “We are here to glorify God and enjoy his grace forever.” This is the essence of the first commandment, “Love the Lord with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind.” … Why are we here? We are here to worship, to participate in discernment of our calling through bible study, Church School, prayer and conversation. We are here because discernment comes by the Holy Spirit that empowers our own spirit. It empowers us to support every one who is called God to find a way to walk in the world is Christ did.

After the why, we might ask, “How does God call people to Him?”  The answer might be “By the Holy Spirit.”

So part of the answer to our “why” question is: “We are here in our waiting for home because we have hope to become empowered by the Holy Spirit to walk in the world the way Christ did. The other part of the answer to our “How?” is “learn to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.” When those two commandments are written in our hearts we model and remind all God’s children that they can follow us on the way home. We are not there, but we are well on our way. We will grow in faith.

Let me put this in practical terms. A few weeks ago one of the eighty or so young students at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga present at a sumptuous Tuesday lunch at Hope 808 (that New Hope might have prepared) asked the “why” question.  She asked, "Why are you doing all this for us?”

The answer is: “The least we can do for you is give you a taste of home just as Jesus does for us. Jesus gave us the why of our Hope - we are going home, so eat, enjoy our hospitality and wait with us together for the call home.

While we wait in this Advent season, let’s use our hope as strength to live a holy life in a world that does it absolute level best to make us unholy and diminish the hope that empowers us to live as a vital congregation.  

Why we are here is to let our hope shine so people see our joy, our compassion, our forgiveness, our willingness to lend a hand to a stranger, an alien, or even an enemy. When people see that kindness and compassion they are going to ask "Why are you all doing that for us?" When they ask that question they have opened their ear to hear God’s call to come on in and enjoy the feast while we wait.

At that point we understand why we are here in this sanctuary this morning and know what God is doing with us. Let’s be a beacon on a hill waiting for the final fulfillment and glory of his return. God is using our actions to invite his people home”  Amen.

Day 718 - Why?

OT Reading: Micah 6:1-8
NT reading: Mark 12:28-34

I have been thinking about the question of " Why?" I admit the impetus for doing this was a video by Simon Sinek called something like "The Golden Circle and Power of Why?" His presentation is a little overdramatic but his point strike true.  (Microsoft just passed Exxon as the second largest US company behind Apple.)

Especially in our congregations we get caught up in the question of "What?" A classic line of thinking might be, "Our congregation is dropping in numbers so we need to do something. what? Well, let's try building a new sanctuary so folks will be attracted to our new presence." Or, it might go, "Let's  start a early worship service with some praise bands so we attract young speople."

What is missing in those two questions? I suggest what is missing in the preliminary quote is the subversive question, "Why?" "Why am I sitting in this pew in a worship service?

I suggest you dwell on the question, and seek an honest answer. But consider the reading from Mark first. The Scribes and Pharisees sought to trap Jesus to justify his arrest. After some arguing, one Scribe  seeking to trap Jesus asked, "What is the greatest commandment?" The answer was the Shema, "Hear O Israel: The Lord our God, The Lord is one. You shall one The Lord with all our heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength."

 And then, Jesus would not stop but continued,  "The second is this, "you shall love your neighbor as your self. There is no other commandment greater than these." The Scribe voiced his affirmation of the words of Jesus, and Jesus replied, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." Mark concludes, "After that, no one dared ask him a question."

I suggest to you that the answer to the question,  "Why are we here?" lies in this exchange with the scribe. We are hear to glorify God with our entire being, and the central striving in that striving is to love our neighbor she love ourself."

So, the "Why?"  question forces the question, "How do we do it?" We need to ask "How do we glorify God and love our neighbor?" Do we do it with a new sancturary or a early youth-oriented worship service? Or do we do it another way.

A student asked one of the elders at Hope 808, the Presbyterian ministry house on  the campus of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, "Why are you doing all this, making these big meals, inviting anyone who comes by to enter and eat, sitting around listening to our worries and the like?"

The answer to her why is our answer, we do it because we seek to glorify God and love our neighbor unconditionally. We have answered the how, we offer an open ministry, we have answered a "How" offer meals. And that ministry has grown from 6 or so students to over a hundred when we serve ouch on Tuesdays.

The answer the students hear is "We don't judge you or want to see your religious credentials. We just want you to know our loyalty to God, our reason for "Why are we hear?" is to love you. Come with us and get a little closer to God."

It is a subversive question because we have to say, the big steeple and different worship service are the "what" things we do may help us achieve a sense of closeness to God, but do not necessarily tell the world who we are or why we are here.  A young person might say, there are homeless people all around your church, why are you building a new sanctuary instead of building housing for them?   There may be numerous good reasons for building the sanctuary (we do need a place to worship) but what the world sees us doing suggests why we are here. The young person might opine there are too many steeples full of people who judge me and disinvite outsiders or are members of another congregation that they see as practicing errant Chrisitan belief.

Let's put the questions in order: "Why do we believe who we are?" "How we do to tell the world why we believe who we are?" "What is required of us?'

The "Why?" Question becomes the most subversive because it challenges us to ask the how question, " how do we love The Lord and love our neighbor?" and to answer the "What" question. We make think it is up to us to work out the "What and how," but really the "What" question was answered by the prophet Micah (6:1-8), "He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?"

Please heed these words of Micah before you go off and define your own "What shall we do?" and be sure you have honestly answered the "Why?"  It will challenge you to do things you have not done, to approach worship and life in new and powerful ways, it will demand of your heart, your soul, and your strength. It is subversive because it will change your life.

Grace and peace,

Henry

Day 686 - Reflections on the Reformation, a Reprise

August 26, 2014 Quo Vadis?

My prior three posts trying to understand the criticism of Viola Larson leaned heavily on the nature of the Protestant Reformation.  I referred to work by H. Richard Niebuhr who proffered a very penetrating analysis of the dilemma of the Reformation that in its most basic form was an overthrow of institutional order for benefit of spirituality.  Let's look a little further.

In spite of professed interest in "orthodoxy," the primary objections of many modern critics seem to concern exploring or changing forms of faithful worship and understanding how to apply scripture in a modern scientific world outside their personal historical experience. I can empathize with that frustration and desire for simple, formulaic answers.

I  grew up in a congregation and seemingly simple way of life that was imprinted by the church. In my congregation I was introduced to music at an early age and have sung in church choirs for over fifty years.  I grew up singing works by Bach, Handel, Ralph von Williams, Faure, old 1800 hymns from the Baptist Hymnal, and many, many others. The power of the Requiem mass by Faure, or Handel's Messiah as part of a true worship experience for me cannot be understated.

Worship is music. Music touches the soul of the person. Many people who matured in my era worshipped in forms involving the classical ordered structure and music and as penitent congregants. We  should continue to sustain the form of that spiritual comfort for folks our age, it does not hinder necessarily our ministry to the newer world.

But worship leaders and laity face a higher loyalty, to be an effective and authentic witness of the power of the Gospel to the world. People of my children's age and younger are left flat often by the institutional ritual form of our older protestant worship service, by the music and passivity and the judgments of the congregants in the worship experience. To them, we are not authentic Christians but old skeletons.

If we structure an order of worship and its content to provide an authentic witness to the power of God to these age groups, must we constrain ourselves to this older worship form and music? The answer is obviously "no"  if we care about those who do not worship at all.

As a mediocre church musician, I can walk away from that old form of worship (with some selfish sense of loss), but I find also power in music by the Blind Boys of Alabama, Annie Lennox, Ben Harper, Bob Marley, just to name a few. Many of my colleagues cringe at these songs. I cringe at the somewhat vapid (to me) content of so-called "modern pop Christian songs." I can find and sustain spiritual comfort in new worship forms that bring in those who are outside our congregations. Frankly, it is an obligation rooted in Matthew 28. "If it plays in Peoria," I'll try to use it there.

Where am I going?

This little reflection on church music in worship makes a simple point about the larger issue of authentic Christian worship. If we take our responsibility seriously that we are ministers of Christ in the world, then we must ensure we speak in a language the people of the world understand as they live in this dirty, chaotic old world. We must project Christian compassion in an authentic experience for modern people.

This is a hard task for many people who grew up in the church in the early to mid-twentieth century. Some might say an unfair task to expect us to abandon our old comfortable ways to bring the Good News to people who see our old ways as leaden and devoid of Spirit, regardless of how spiritually uplifting it may be to us.  (Neil Young sung a song called "Old Ways." A signature line is "Old ways, it is so hard to change them,...(they) can be a ball and chain.")

The message of the Gospel is, "It is not about us, it is about the lost sheep." In the greater scheme, our present discomfort with new ways of worship are not very high concern on that obligation.

Something happened at worship this Sunday morning that brings all this home to me. I left worship today angry, not joyful because we were told that the session is going to tear out the old windows of our Greek Revival sanctuary and put in more modern plastic ones without even inquiring how we felt. It is embarrassing how persistently the old ways of tradition hang on and how easy it is let tradition cloud worship. This experience certainly shows how easily I can get lost longing for tradition, while even here I critique it. (My wife says, "get over it, they are only windows." And you know what? She is right.)

A Reprise

This brings me to a reprise of my comments on the grief of Viola Larson. Her grief pains me both for the hurt she does to good Christian ministers as for her own anguish and fear. Those old single pane, double hung windows in the sanctuary hammer home that point to me.

Perhaps many people like her who are so upset today over the changes in the church should appreciate exactly what happened when Luther and Calvin and others launched this revolution against the Catholic Church.

In truth, the Reformation was not a revolution against the Catholic Church but a revolution against frozen institutionalism that extinguished the connection of the person in the pew with the spirituality of God's presence in their lives, not some transcendent, unchanging, immutable distant God embodied in a symbolic icon but one whose presence is guaranteed by the immanence of the Holy Spirit found in authentic worship.

Calvin would argue strongly that spirituality had left the Catholic Church in large part being replaced by institutional practices of ritual and objective forms whose underlying connection to the Holy Spirit was lost. (But even Calvin recognized that there were people in the Catholic Church who felt the presence of the Holy Spirit, regardless of its rigid form of worship.)

If you think about it, much of the criticism against reform today uses a similar defense. They accuse the modern reformers of trashing the historical tradition of the Protestant orthodoxy, uprooting its form and circumstance, and erasing the authority of scripture to guide faith. Some conclude because new congregations do not use the same words (even though they are often are code words for a broader collaboration of cultural conservatism and their "orthodoxy") these new congregations and their pastors must be heretical.

Just as the threat to Catholic orthodoxy by the Reformation was horrifying to those leaders and participants of the Church who were responsible for its promulgation and defense, the struggle to find new authentic forms of worship for the new "lost sheep" threatens "Reformed orthodoxy."

I do not want to pick on the Presbyterian Layman, but if you listen to their objections to the changes in Presbyterian polity, for example as espoused byViola Larson, you cannot avoid seeing the similarity of reaction to that of the Catholic Church in the 1500's.  Rules are more important than substance. The answers of rigid, brick-like, prescriptive scripture is more important than working out our salvation in fear and trembling. Telling you how to believe is more important than working it out for yourself. Their "Reformed orthodoxy" is sometimes meaningful, but often is a selfish smoke screen to resist uncomfortable changes in the institution - like those sanctuary windows.

This year we note the 500th anniversary of the birth of John Knox, the so-called father of Reformed Presbyterianism. (Shouldn't we name the founder Christ?) Perhaps we should pause to consider this dilemma of our ongoing Reformation in a more earnest and humble way. Are we worshipping the Lord or are we worshipping "orthodoxy" and denominationalism that serves as a supposed port in the storm?

In another way, Are we dry bones with no spirit, or so alive with the promise of faith that we cannot wait to share with the world the message that there is a home?

As leaders and heirs of Reformed Protestantism, we have no port in the storm to rest from our duty. But, we know we are going home.

Grace and peace

Day 685 - Who is Viola Larson and Why Is She Attacking Mercy Junction, 1001 Worshipping Communities of the PC(USA) and the Presbytery of East Tennessee? Part III

August 25, 2014, Viola Larson and Advice on a Way Forward

As described in Part II, the writings and recent reactions of Viola Larson seems to embrace the dark side of Calvin, e. g., his penal attitude that used the consistories and State to drag people off to jail feeding them on bread and water for missing worship or forgetting the sermon title (see footnote 4), and who preferred hanging or the sword for heretics rather than burning them at the stake (Servetus). 

Earlier she voiced a conciliatory attitude towards those who desire to go their own way in the denomination, but she seems lost when the denomination itself begins to ask itself, “What is the more effect way to achieve the charge to be Christ’s ministers to the world?”

 I conclude Ms. Larson is willing to provide forbearance only to those she judges to be right in her view of Christian faith. Her criteria of “right” is that they must adhere to the literal voice of the early confessions and an inerrant, literal scripture, all frozen in a prescientific time gone by. Discernment seems persona non grata.

The Dilemma of Reformed Protestantism

Reformed Protestants believe that all the historical confessions speak from and to a time and place expressing the current place of the church in the world. We believe the confessions are our limited way to state our contextual view of reformed Christian theology. However, we also believe the confessions are subordinate to scripture and the ultimate interpreter of scripture is individual conscience tempered by the body of the church. We are always in the dilemma as to whether the institution or individual conscience is more "orthodox."

That is why there are multiple confessions that place reformed Christian duty in the context of current reality. For example the attempt of Hitler to control the German Lutheran Church led to the Barmen Confession, and the racial and antiwar circumstances in the United States in the mid-20th century to the Confession of 1967. That is why we do not subscribe today to the parochial language of the older confessions that differentiate the status and role of men and women in the congregation and assail the Catholic Church as evil. 

Viola Larson would have us cling to these older confessions quite literally, as well as to a literal inerrancy of Scripture not subject to interpretation guided by spiritual discernment - tempered by the church or not. She does not admit the possibility that our role as Christians may need to take into account present circumstances to define the context of faith and action, regardless of how distressing the circumstances may be. There appears to be no place for vigorous debate or faithful compromise  on current critical issues. What was good in the 1500’s is good for the present time.

In many places across Europe and the USA today, the poor state of the congregations of the mainline denominations comes from holding onto old "orthodox" unthinking(institutional) ways, and old dogma. That state testifies to denominations that have so tightly closed their doors to those seeking faith and forgiveness in a threatening culture that the people have wandered away.  (Karl Barth might be held responsible  to a great degree for this state of affairs of neo-conservative orthodoxy.) 

People who stake claim to this self-labeled neo-conservative orthodoxy should be free and comfortable to pursue it if it enhances their sense of worship and spirituality. I welcome it. 

The same people should also acknowledge that by insisting on absolute, universal conformity to their view they may be refusing to feed and turning away the hungry sheep passing by their door seeking grace. As Viola Larson says, “I don't think it is right when those staying malign those leaving… (I) believe the most important aspect of upholding each other is seeing the other and relationship to Jesus Christ. I cannot call the other person (for) upholding the fate of the church universal whether standing or journey." 

Should I Assail Viola Larson to Defend Mercy Junction and other 1001 New Worshipping Congregations, the Presbytery of East Tennessee ?

I wondered at the outset, should I defend Mercy Junction, other 1001 New Worshipping Congregations, and the Presbytery of East Tennessee by assailing Viola, as she has done PC(USA) and those honorable, faithful people struggling to find an effective way to witness to the world such?

I think not. It would make me a bigger hypocrite than I am already. To the extent I believe these groups are part of the universal congregation of believers, I understand that neither God, Christ or his Church needs my defense. I actually feel a great deal of compassion towards her for the worry and stress the changes in the world and church create for her. 

Rather the proper course is to remind her and those other neo-orthodox reformed believers who seem to bury their heads in the sand in the face of a church being reduced to insignificance of her own early words quoted previously about the charity of forbearance among Christians (minus the judgment). Therefore, I leave us all with the words of James 4:11-12, 16-17,5:9-11, 19-20 that I quote here (from NRSV):

 11“Do not speak evil against one another, brothers and sisters. Whoever speaks evil against another or judges another, speaks evil against the law and judges the law; but if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is one lawgiver and judge who is able to save and to destroy. So who, then, are you to judge your neighbor? … 16 As it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, commits sin….5:9 Beloved, do not grumble against one another, so that you may not be judged. See, the Judge is standing at the doors!  As an example of suffering and patience, beloved, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Indeed we call blessed those who showed endurance. You have heard of the endurance of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful. ....19   My brothers and sisters, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and is brought back by another, you should know that whoever brings back a sinner from wandering will save the sinner’s soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.” This is the Word of the Lord.

I believe Mercy Junction, First Creek of our Presbytery of East Tennessee, 1001 Worshipping Communities of PC(USA) are listening to these words of James and in their own way seeking to follow them laboring on under the burden of human uncertainty assuaged by the Holy Spirit. I welcome Viola Larson to join a common effort to bring lost sheep back into the fold. I invite her to step into the deep water, to get out of the boat.

I can only pray that Viola Larson will understand none of us are in a position to judge another’s faith and that she will perceive the meaning of her own earlier words, that people who hold to true Christian belief should not be driven out of the church because they struggle under the duress of both the present world and their brothers and sisters in Christ to find effective ways to bring the sheep back into the fold.  We know there is a home.

Grace and Peace
Henry

Source Documents, continued

4. The Registers of the Consistory of Geneva at the Time of Calvin: Volume 1: 1542-1544 , edited by Isabella M. Watt, Robert M. Kingdon, Thomas A. Lambert, Grand Rapids: Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. (2000) (English translation of original French book published in 1996). This is a hard copy version of the link in text.

Day 685 - Who is Viola Larson and Why Is She Attacking Mercy Junction, 1001 Worshipping Communities of the PC(USA) and the Presbytery of East Tennessee? Part II

October 25, 2014, Who exactly is Viola Larson and what is her theology? 

To be fair, we should consider seriously Ms. Larson's criticism of Mercy Junction and the Presbytery of East Tennessee (PET) because (1) I believe she is, or was, a member of PC(USA) denomination, (2) she judges other Christians as non-Christian, (3) she challenges a basis credo of all persons of the Reformed faith that honors at its core the freedom to raise a question seeking dialogue in the continuing struggle to be reformed and always reforming and faithful. 

If there is no vigorous debate, there can be only a rigid, unchangeable denomination that risks at best death by irrelevancy and at worse abandonment and replacement by its Creator. Richard Niebuhr proposed this idea in 1935, in an essay “What must the Church do to be saved?”² 

Richard Niebuhr identified also the fundamental dilemma of Reformed Protestantism, it is a cultural expression of faith and the reality it faces is that it has created the ultimate anarchy, "...the church reformation was not a structure but a life, a movement, which could never come to rest again in secure habitations, but needs to go on from camp to camp to its meeting with the ever-coming kingdom."³ In other words, there can never be a port in the storm for Reformed Protestantism. It's Christianity is to sail place to place, seeding believers to fabricate a new reality.

It is for this reason alone (survival of the current Church) that it is important to understand exactly what basic theology Viola Larson holds to support her judgments.  

The question you must answer is does her theology further the work of the Church in the world and does it stand even on orthodox Reformed belief? (I will tell you in advance I do not think it does, though it may give her personal spiritual sustenance.) 

Ms. Larson only criticizes the theology of these organizations and does not propose a counter hypothesis of her own. Therefore, I set out to discover what she believes from her writings. I went to her blog and did a little web browsing that led me to the web site of the Presbyterian Layman (a group who is extremely hostile towards the current PC(USA) in order to discover, “Who is Viola Larson and what does she believe?” 

I discovered that she is part of the movement best represented publically by the Presbyterian Layman and lives in California. She has been writing a blog since the mid-2000 timeframe. Before her current blog, she authored a blog called Voices of Orthodox Women (VOW) that has been archived by the Presbyterian Layman on its website.

The earliest posts of a web author is where we often find the rationale and belief of the blogger. In an Aug,8, 2007 post, Ms. Larson self- identifies as a “Presbyterian Calvinist.” 

Although she says she is a Presbyterian, she maintains the local Presbyterian Church is of congregational nature since it has the right to demand that their pastor preach the "biblical truth." (She does not define what “biblical truth is in her post, but later she refers to the “inerrancy” of Scripture which she seems to think means its absolute, literal truth, word for word, especially if it resists changes in the Book of Order and Confessional declarations.)

In this same post she says concerning schism, "I don't think it is right when those staying malign those leaving. I know there is despair and a feeling of abandonment on the side of those staying yet the church is God's church and certainly he has not abandoned any part of his church. I don't think it is right when those leaving malign those staying. I know there is a feeling of despair and weariness of the battle (emphasis is mine) on the part of those leaving yet the church catholic is God's Church and you will not abandon any part of his Church." 

I assume this balm is good for all, those who stay and support the denominational church, those who determine to leave, and those who remain but disagree. Her advice does seem to put the ones who decide to stay but disagree with the majority, such as her, in a difficult spot. 

Her stated  compassion towards those with leaving the denomination seems a far cry from her current judgment against Mercy Junction, First Creek Communion, the Presbytery of East Tennessee, 1001 Worshipping Communities, and PC(USA). I wonder if she has even engaged in dialogue with the ministers in Chattanooga and Knoxville to fully understand their theological grounding.

She opposes even discussing non-canonical literature in a more recent post.  She accused a spokesperson of the Presbyterian News Service of promulgating heretical Gnostic ideas by simply discussing a particular book that analyzes newly found “pseudo-“ Gospel fragments. (Gnosticism deserves an entirely separate discussion. The early Church was rift with Gnostic-like perceptions of the world as good and evil.)

In her August 13, 2007 post,  she revisits disagreement in the church and what I would call her reservation about generally applying the charity of forbearance.  It is a very Calvin-like reaction:

On dismissal of churches from PC(USA), she says we should release each other with dignity and respect as brothers and sisters in Christ “But I believe the most important aspect of upholding each other is seeing the other and relationship to Jesus Christ. I cannot call the other person unfaithful if I (Viola Larson) see them following the call of Jesus Christ (emphasis is mine), while upholding the fate of the church universal whether standing or journey." 

Note that in spite of her conciliatory statement towards those with whom she disagrees, she reserves her right (emphasis is mine) to be judge of their faith and to determine “whether or not they follow the call of Jesus Christ.” 

In a subsequent post she says she “believes that pluralism has this culture in such a grip that in the future every Orthodox Christian will be affected by the by the culture’s intolerance towards the Lordship of Christ.”

Some of her later posts that reveal more of her “orthodoxy.” She criticized Presbyterian Women for criticizing capitalism. Her exact words are, "I think it would be wise not to alienate the national leadership of PW from women and the pew belief (that) capitalism is certainly not perfect but is a solid economic system and who espouse a conservative political stance.” So we know she also is supportive of Conservative political views.

I feared I would have to infer for myself what burrs are in her saddle until I came to her post of November 22, 2009.  It reveals a concise statement of her theological vantage point. She endorses a document called The Manhattan Declaration; A Call of Christian Conscience. 

This document summarizes its belief, “Because the sanctity of human life, the dignity of marriage as a union of husband and wife and the freedom of conscience and religion are foundational principles of justice and the common good, (emphasis is mine) we are compelled by our Christian faith to speak and act in their defense. In this declaration we affirm: 1) the profound, inherent, and equal dignity of every human being as a creature fashioned in the very image of God, possessing inherent rights of equal dignity and life; 2) marriage as a conjugal union of man and woman, ordained by God from the creation, and historically understood by believers and non-believers alike, to be the most basic institution in society and; 3) religious liberty, which is grounded in the character of God, the example of Christ, and the inherent freedom and dignity of human beings created in the divine image." (See link)

This document is quite pernicious in its use of the term “religious liberty.” It encourages civil disobedience to achieve its goals. (The defense by the Beachy Amish- Mennonite group that kidnapped the daughter of a lesbian partnership and fled to Nicaragua used this document as a defense.) She said she has signed it encourages her readers who agree to sign up as it is a very important theological and political document. 

This declaration essentially says her theological position is (1) all abortion is evil; (2) marriage is only between a man and a woman, (3) homosexuality is evil, (4) anyone who holds this theology and feels the State is opposing them should engage in civil disobedience against the state, (5) change of any of these tenets threatens orthodox faith.

Clearly she believes the idea that reforming the confessional status of our documents and our book of order somehow leads us astray from of her idea of orthodoxy. She believes if the church restates its sense of Christian values in the context of modern times it has abandoned all faith.  For her orthodoxy is defined by Calvin’s Institutes and only subsequent early Reformed confessions (Westminster, Helvetic, up to Barmen, it is not clear she would include the confession of 1967. Belhar is clearly not in her “orthodoxy). 

In a post of October 31, 2012, she states "the moral code has been rewritten...personal taste now rules supreme; …Every thing is reduced to individual reaction and opinion…This is the context of the Orthodox in PC(USA) (emphasis mine); they are in the midst of an organization that has lost its way-the PC (USA) cords are speedily turning into ropes. Using capricious human experience and desire, Presbyterian leadership is starting to turn Biblical morality upside down. Any guilt that exist(s) is hidden under layers of disbelief. There is little effort to do, the fruits are already weathering."

My conclusion is that Viola Larson began as a classical Barthian orthodox Calvinist Presbyterian but has swung into a reactionary stance that labels all change in the denomination standards as bad. She holds tightly to and favors the confessions of the era of the Reformation, and the prescientific worldview and circumstances of John Calvin. It is ironic to call this Reformed Protestant orthodoxy since as Richard Niebuhr pointed out, the fundamental nature of the Protestant Reformation is revolution against institutionalization of spirituality and faith.

Source documents, continued

2. H. Richard  Niebuhr, The Question of the Church[1935] in The Responsibility of the Church for Society," edited by Kristine A. Culp, Louisville:Westminster John Knox Press, (2008), p16-21.

3. H. Richard  Niebuhr, The Kingdom of God in America, Middletown, CT:Wesleyan University Press (1988) (original copyright 1937 Harper&Row), p44 (see p 28-44).

Day 685 - Who is Viola Larson and Why Is She Attacking Mercy Junction, 1001 Worshipping Communities of the PC(USA) and the Presbytery of East Tennessee? Part I

October 25, 2014

I apologize for the three long posts that follow, but as T.S. Eliot said (paraphrased), "Complex questions do not deserve facile answers." 

Viola Larson presents herself as a self-appointed defender of what she calls orthodox Calvinist Presbyterianism. Recently in her blog, she severely criticized the 1001 Worshipping Communities of the Presbyterian Church (USA), and the Presbytery of East Tennessee for giving a grant to, and sponsoring Mercy Junction (a ministry of a friend of mine, Brian Merritt). In so many words she said that both Mercy Junction, the Presbytery of East Tennessee(PET) and the PC(USA) had deviated from “orthodoxy” into heresy, or even apostasy. Using highly limited, if not superficial information, Viola Larson says Mercy Junction, “by actions … infer that Jesus is not the only way to a relationship with God.”(Her October 7, 11 and 22, 2014 posts).

Subsequently she also attacked another emerging worshipping community in Knoxville called First Creek Communion (See her October 22, 2014 post).

Frankly, I had never heard of Viola Larson until this criticism was pointed out to me. I thought it prudent to discover the basis of her criticism and judgment of these worshipping communities and exactly what she proposes as an alternative route to authentic worship. In fairness I include the link associated with Ms. Larson’s blog so you do not have necessarily to accept my assessment.

To do this, I am posting a response to Viola Larson in three parts, particularly concentrating on her severe condemnation of Mercy Junction, although the treatment of First Creek Communion is as egregious.

This first post provides a fairer and more accurate characterization of Mercy Junction than Ms. Larson’s October 7 post. 

In post II of this series I explore exactly where Viola Larson stands on Reformed Protestant theology.  In fairness I include the links associated with Ms. Larson’s blog so you do not have necessarily to accept my assessment.

The third post offers my own personal commentary on her criticism and these two ministries. This final post offers a reflection on her theology, her criticism of these new emerging ministries and a suggestion for future discourse.  I attempt to provide links to all places I gleaned information.

A disclosure

 In full disclosure, I know Brian Merritt, the activities of his ministry and his wife, a creative Presbyterian author, Carol Merritt. Brian graduated from Austin Seminary, one of the more respected Presbyterian seminaries and is an ordained pastor/evangelist in PC(USA). I am a graduate of Georgia Tech holding undergraduate and graduate degrees in science and engineering. I recently graduated from Union Presbyterian Seminary. 

My ministry is director of Urban Outreach Ministries in Chattanooga, a ministry to homeless and un/underemployed men of the community. We seek to build a commitment to Christian vocation to persons who desire to take the first step towards a changed life.

As part of this ministry we work with three groups, Mercy Junction, St. Andrews Center, a 501 ( c ) 3 non-profit and Mustard Tree Ministry, a UMC ministry with similar aims. In the past summer with support of Mercy Junction and Mustard Tree Ministry we farmed a plot on donated property and were able to deliver ~1,000 lb of fresh sweet corn to the Chattanooga Food Bank and sell a smaller quantity to sustain operation. Another part of the donated corn went to a “Free Market” operated by Renaissance Presbyterian Church, a predominantly African-American PC(USA) congregation on the Westside of Chattanooga. Mercy Junction supports this free market by growing vegetables and gave several bushels of our donated corn to people who cannot afford, or have access to fresh vegetables.

Who is Mercy Junction

For reference, Mercy Junction has a web page that states, “ We are an ever-evolving ministry of the Presbytery of East Tennessee, located in Chattanooga’s Southside. (We) sustain a healthy food-sharing ministry with a “pay-what-you-can” market, and share worship and community focused on action-to-neighbor, and provide a gathering point for teaching and spiritual reflection.” Mercy Junction also uses Facebook extensively where interested readers can find out more of their day-to-day ministry.

Viola Larson is extremely offended by an “e-zine” called the HolyHeretic that Mercy Junction publishes. It elicits ideas about God and God’s work in the world from, of all things, the people of the world at large, the target ministry of the Christ’s Church. It seems to me, however raucous it may be to refined ears, it engages the disordered world in conversation so that witness may follow.

Because Holy Heretic encourages reflections from different (and also no) theological perspective, it is natural we will read unusual, seriously non-orthodox, and what an orthodox Christian might consider heretical ideas. Brian has not told me this, but my sense of his e-zine is that he is following an idea of John Cobb who once said it is the responsibility of every worshipping Christian to work out their theology rather than rely on other “scholars” to simply inform them.¹

Holy Heretic offers an opportunity for people inside and outside the congregation of believers to worship and refine their sense of theology in the presence of pastors and ministers. Mercy Junction seems to find itself in a similar demography to that Jesus first ministered. That world is where we find those who live outside the congregation of believers, and those who may live far from the mainline church, especially the part of the Church that clings rigidly to a sense of orthodoxy defined in the era of ~400CE to ~1600CE.

(I am not providing an extensive summary of First Creek Communion led by Rev. Kally Elliot in Knoxville, but my comments concerning Mercy Junction and Viola Larson's criticism apply as well to this new ministry. That may await a future post.)

To be fair, we should consider seriously Ms. Larson's criticism of Mercy Junction and PET because (1) I believe she is, or was, a member of PC(USA) denomination, (2) she judges other Christians as non-Christian, (3) she challenges a basis credo of all persons of the Reformed faith that honors at its core the freedom to raise a question seeking dialogue in the continuing struggle to be reformed and always reforming and faithful.

I will continue analysis of Ms. Larson's criticism and her particular theological stance in the next post.

Some source documents

1.     John B. Cobb, Jr., Becoming a Thinking Christian, Chapter 1, Nashville:Abington Press, (1993) p11ff.

Day 683 - Who Am I?

Who Am I? October 24, 2014

Usually I post sermons on the blog, or reflections on what I feel are important spiritual experiences. Beginning tomorrow I intend to post a reflection on the turmoil within the Presbyterian Church(USA) over its struggle to define its place as a theological mooring in a new and dramatically changing world. I specifically will address critics among us who seem to be tearing the fabric of faith.

This turmoil has cause congregations to reject the denomination and leave for other sister denominations. It has given motivation for some who remain to attack the consensus, and it has motivated those who may find themselves barely in the majority to push their theological agenda on the church when perhaps, forbearance might have been the better choice. It has reduced many of us to poor examples of Christian charity and drives away seekers hungry for solace.

The result has been the denigration of persons with homosexual leanings, castigation over the painful reality of abortion, efforts by some to drag the denomination into political spheres, and mean-spirited ad hominem attacks that ignore the fundamental spirituality of Christ's Church that has open arms to all sinners and love for every one of God's people.

I want you to understand the theological position that form my daily activity before you read my comments.

I grew up in the Southern Baptist Church and understand its congregational nature intimately. Since 1978 or so I have been a member of the United Presbyterian Church or PC(USA) as a ruling elder. I am a graduate of Union Presbyterian Seminary and certified ready for receiving a call. My primary ministry now is urban ministry to homeless and under/non-employed people. Daily I minister to people who are without hope, clothes, hungry and imprisoned.

I embrace the formal declaration of PC(USA) Book of Order that describes the foundation of Presbyterian Polity and how we understand our duty to Christ as Christ's Church in the world.

I embrace the essence of Reformed theology that the church being loyal to our duty to Christ as Christ's Church in the world must always search to address the reality of current affairs and how its ministry is shaped to address the people of the world in those affairs.

The reality of Reformed Protestant faith is a fluidity of understanding, even uncertainty, of the nature of concrete worship. Since Reformed faith fundamentally honors the discernment of personal understanding guided by consensus of the whole body of the Church, there will be dissent and the probability of error by the majority or minority. As a result only vigorous debate of positions can forge understanding.

In light of the propensity of error of the Church since it does in fact express its cultural understanding of faith, it is the duty of all professing Reformed members of Christian faith to bring a healthy dose of forbearance to those who differ, recognizing our own fallibility as well as the fallibility of our friends.

This is healthy as long as we embrace a common understanding that Jesus is Lord, the greatest commandments that encapsulate the law are to love the Lord with our maximum intensity and to apply the same love to our neighbor, and we constantly strive to walk in the world as Christ walked.

Dissent over polity and dogma is a smokescreen for absence of spirituality or fear of change, all human emotions. Fundamentally the way we approach the person on the street reflects our Christian values.
Peace be with you,

Henry