Day1 Weekly Radio Broadcast - Day1 Feeds

  I am a lectionary preacher. The lectionary is the prescribed readings for each Sunday in a three-year cycle. It is designed to offer readings with lengths that can be heard comfortably. But I would argue that our reading from the Gospel of Matthew chapter 6, ends a verse short. To me, verse 34 is vital to the hearing and understanding of Jesus' whole message saying, "So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today." I like this call to take life one day at a time. I like this call, but I may not have always heeded it. I was an anxious adolescent. I worried nonstop. But with the benefit of age and experience, I can see how little worry accomplishes. I love the way that author and activist, Corrie Ten Boom, speaks of worry writing, "Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength." I think this notion strengthens Jesus' message that worry lessens our faith. Listen to Matthew 6:25-34.   "Therefore, I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? And can any of you by worrying add a single hour to your span of life? And why do you worry about clothing? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you - you of little faith? Therefore, do not worry, saying, 'What will we eat?' or 'What will we drink?' or 'What will we wear?' 'For it is the Gentiles who strive for all these things; and indeed, your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But strive first for the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. So, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today."

  Do you know why you are a Christian? If someone were to ask you why you follow Jesus rather than the myriad of religions and philosophies in the world, what would you say? Would your answer be convincing? I confess there was a time when that question haunted me. I really didn't have a good answer for it. I grew up in the church. Sang Jesus Loves Me. I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior at a young age and was baptized. But when I entered my teenage years and began thinking critically, I asked, "If I had been born into a different religion, would I still choose to follow Jesus?" What makes Christianity so special? There are roughly 4,200 religions in the world. Why should Christianity be any different than the rest of them? Maybe you have asked the same question. Do you wonder why you follow Jesus instead of another religion. Is it because you were born into a Christian home? Maybe a professor challenged you, a skeptical friend criticized you, or you watched a documentary on world religions which caused you to question the validity of your faith. Or perhaps you have always been on the edge of becoming a Christian. You want to follow Jesus, but the one obstacle for you has been the question, "Why Jesus instead of another religion?" I am going to tell you why. At the end of this message you will be able to tell your skeptical friends a compelling reason why you are a Christian. And if you are someone still searching for faith, this message just may be the tipping point for you.

  When I was in college, I went to a pool party. I remember it being pretty tame by college standards. The parents were home! However, the dad of the house was a lot of fun. We joked around, laughed and carried on. Later in the evening, we were sitting by the pool and the father asked me what my major was. I told him it was religion. He laughed and said, "Yeah, right." I said, "No, I'm serious, it is religion." He asked, "Why religion?" I told him I was going to be a preacher. He said, "A what? You don't seem like any preacher I know (I took it as a compliment). You laugh and joke and have fun. You seem normal." Before I left the party, he said something to me I will never forget, "I'm in my 50s and you are the first Christian I've ever met that I actually enjoy being around." I don't tell you that story because I'm the hero, because believe me, I'm not usually the hero of my stories! I share it because that dad at the party was not alone. There are many people who have never had a positive experience with Christians. Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, "I might have entered the ministry if certain clergymen I knew had not looked and acted so much like undertakers." Robert Louis Stevenson once entered in his diary, "I have been to church today, and am not depressed!" Of course, Gandhi was famous for saying, "I like your Christ. It is Christians I have a problem with." Shane Claiborne put it well, "Over the years, Christianity has lost its fascination because it looks less and less like Jesus."

  I used to live in a slowly collapsing farmhouse. Just a few years back, in a small town in rural Virginia, my family and I were renting an old two-by-two that at some point in its long and undocumented history had clearly suffered either the slow withering of the foundation or perhaps it had been partially washed away by floods but the result regardless was that the house was slowly sinking in on itself. This had a variety of ill effects - no toy cars would stay put when you set them on the floor. Furniture along the outer walls of the house had to be carefully selected so that it wouldn't fall on top of us. Hanging pictures so they look level - which was never my specialty in the first place - became nearly impossible. But mostly, after a while, you just got used to it. A few extra hooks would align the pictures. A few extra bolts would secure the furniture. And for the rest of it, like the time during one particularly cold winter that the heating duct just snapped off from the vent underneath the living room, for the rest of it, we just relied on that most elemental repair tool. We just used duct tape. Thank God for duct tape. It couldn't fix the foundation but at least it could make the heat work. Without duct tape I don't think that place would have ever felt quite like home. Of course, duct tape's reputation precedes it. You don't need me to tell you this. These days duct tape has a bit of a magical reputation - for household repairs, sure, but also for construction on a grander scale. A quick glance online will unearth dozens upon hundreds of uses I'm sure quite unimagined by the folks who first put duct tape into the world: we've got duct tape as a fabric, with which folks have made everything from everyday wallets to prom dresses; we've got something called Duct Tape Occlusion Therapy, in which duct tape gets applied to warts and left on the skin for an extended period of time, though the results of this treatment are somewhat in dispute. Not to mention of course the many, many ways in which duct tape has become a repair tool for projects far beyond its original imagination: like, as a tarp that covers storm damage or as a patchwork fix holding up a streetlight. As a cradle for a car bumper as it cruises down the interstate. Even a quick fix wrapped around the wing of an airplane as it streaks through the skies. You don't need me to preach this Gospel. It's pretty well attested. The world breaks all the time. Our old house wasn't the only place with a crack running through the foundation. Good thing we have duct tape to patch it all back together.

  It's frustrating to ask a direct question without getting a direct answer, so I apologize, that as is the case so often with politicians, doctors, and lawyers, where many significant statements are made but few direct answers are given, we also have this Scripture lesson from the 38th chapter of Job, where after Job asked a direct question to God - "Why, Lord, must the innocent suffer?" - not even God seems willing to give a clear and direct answer in response. It's frustrating. What Job wants is the truth, but God seems to be echoing those iconic words of Jack Nicholson when he starred in "A Few Good Men," "You want the truth? You can't handle the truth." Our passage begins: "Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind: 'Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Gird up your loins like a man, I will question you, and you shall declare to me.'" This is not a gentle response, nor is it a direct answer, but anyone who asks questions has learned that sometimes you get an answer and sometimes you don't. I remember well enough a day in Sunday School long ago, we were in 4th or 5th grade and had just read the account in the Gospel of Luke chapter 2, "After eight days had passed, it was time to circumcise the child..." "Mr. Farrah," I asked my teacher, "what exactly is circumcision?" "Well that's a question you should probably ask your father," he responded.

  You know, some relationships end - and some seem to end more easily than others. I was in 6th grade and I had a girlfriend. Her name was Katherine and we really made our relationship official when at the end of our 5th Grade year we couple skated holding hands at the local skating rink. Unfortunately, then we went on to 6th grade, that was middle school and in middle school things were different. There was this guy there named Ben and he gelled his hair and before I knew it I was climbing into the school bus when one of Katherine's friends ran up and told me that Katherine would be breaking up with me because Katherine was now going with Ben. It seems to me that after you've couple skated with someone the decent thing to do is to at least break up with them face-to-face, but Katherine didn't see it that way and just like that the relationship was over. It was less simple for a friend of mine in 8th grade. She called up her boyfriend Steve to deliver the bad news - that they would be breaking up - but Ol' Steve, he saw it coming a mile away and wasn't about to let this relationship end, so he had this Boys to Men song playing in the background when she called: "'Till the end of the road, Girl I can't let you go, It's unnatural, You belong to me, I belong to you."   Now with that song playing, this break-up wasn't so easy.

  In this story, Job is not, shall we say, winning. In chapter one he loses all his material wealth. His servants are killed by invaders; his livestock are killed by fire, and a tornado knocks down the home of his eldest son, killing all of his children. That's one terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. But bad days like that never seem to come by themselves, and Job's not-winning streak is not over. Here in chapter two, he wakes up with every inch of his body covered in painful sores, and we find him - understandably - just sitting in ashes, scraping his skin with a piece of pottery. His wife swings by to tell him to quit with all the integrity already and just curse God and die; then his friends show up to tell him it must be his own fault. You would think this tale of catastrophe and suffering would resonate with people more. If we live long enough, many of us experience some version of this where, through no fault of our own, we suffer enormous, painful loss - and, like Job, it comes in waves. The economy tanks and we lose our job, our home, our business, or maybe all three. Our loved ones are taken by disaster, violence, or disease. And those stresses take their toll on both our emotional and physical health until we end up depressed and sitting in the ashes, wondering if God either sees or cares. But despite all those points of connection, a lot of people avoid the book of Job. Some forget that this is a story that begins with the Hebrew equivalent of "once upon a time." Those readers take the literary device at the beginning literally and think God actually is awful enough to bargain with Satan and do all those horrible things to Job for the sake of some grand lesson. "Not my God" they think and move on.

  The Israelites cried out to Moses, "We remember the fish we had in Egypt, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic."  There are a lot of foods I like - lemon meringue pie, enchiladas, blueberry muffins. There are even some foods I crave - like chocolate in any form. But cucumbers, leeks and onions? They're not at the top of my list. In fact, they're not even onthe list. Two years after the Exodus, vegetables were very much on the minds and in the hearts of the Israelites. Stirred up by the "rabble among them," they wept for meat and cried out for cucumbers. Certainly, the Israelites had complained to Moses before. At the edge of the Red Sea, with Pharaoh's army breathing down their necks and a watery abyss before them, they cried out, "Were there no graves in Egypt that you have taken us away to die in the wilderness? What have you done to us, binging us out of Egypt? ... It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness." That longing for Egypt echoes throughout the Book of Exodus. When they ran out of water, the Israelites railed against Moses, "Why did you bring us out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?" Facing starvation, they remembered fondly the fleshpots of Egypt. But this complaint in the book of Numbers - this longing for the cucumbers of Egypt - was different. The Israelites weren't dying. They faced no imminent threat, either from Pharaoh's army or the lack of food or water. Pharaoh and his troops didn't make it past the Red Sea, and God had provided manna for the Israelites every single day of the last two years. The Israelites' complaint sounds more like someone who's bored rather than someone fearing for their life. One could argue the Israelites were akin to the young adult in their first apartment or off to college, finally free of Mom or Dad's demands to fold the laundry or sweep the floor - but now missing the parental washer, dryer, and vacuum cleaner.

  My friend Anne declares that there are two different kinds of houseguests. Anne divides them in two groups. "Change the sheets" or "don't change the sheets" houseguests are her categories. With a parade of children and grandchildren, one group is not guests so much as they are staying over. Then there are the houseguests where you hope to make the right impression - your daughter's new in-laws - a work colleague from out of town. For those, you not only change the sheets, but you straighten the pillow shams, turn on the lamps, set out some finger foods on the coffee table. Soft instrumental music in the background. Then there are the guests who are not family, but they might as well be. They are childhood friends, college buddies, "the girls." These are the friends you don't set out a cheese ball and crackers for - you just tell them if they are hungry, they should get up and fix something. Then, at night, way past late, these are the friends you sit with on the sofa, pull your knees up to your chin and the conversation turns to things that happened 10, 15, 20 years ago. Then the conversation turns to hopes for 10, 15, 20 years from now. We share what we accomplished and what we hope to accomplish. We share how it did not turn out like we thought or hoped. Ambitions unfulfilled - regrets. The things I wanted; the things I still want. It does not go away - it is like an unsatisfied craving. We think, "There is something out there that I still have not acquired that will make this all feel better."

  Here's a pop quiz. What do the following items have in common? A wild beast, a rudder on a ship, a small fire, a deadly poison, and brackish water. If you said these items are all images that James uses to talk about the tongue, you are correct. He minces no words in the third chapter. Control your tongue. He isn't the only writer in the Bible to give this command, of course. Proverbs is chock full of these kinds of nuggets, like in chapter 21, verse 23: "Those who guard their mouths and their tongues guard themselves from trouble." So is the book of Psalms, like in 34:13: "Then you must keep your tongue from evil and keep your lips from speaking lies!" Even Jesus has a lot to say...about what to say. For example, in Matthew, he says that it's not what goes into our mouths that defiles us, but the words that come out of them. Clearly, the Bible understands this universal truth about the human condition: our tongues need taming. But James is unique in the vividness and flair that he uses to make his point. He uses word pictures to illustrate the power of words. The tongue is like a small bit that can bridle even the wildest horse. It is like a small rudder that can determine the course of a giant sea vessel, and small spark that can set off a blazing fire, a tiny bit of poison that can cause great harm, and a toxic mixture of salt and fresh water that can destroy life. That is some vivid verbal flourish.

  What good is faith without works? What good is doctrine without deeds? What good is Christian belief without Christian behavior? None at all, says James, none at all. He isn't just questioning the usefulness of faith without works; he's questioning the validity of it. "Can this sort of faith save you?" he asks. The implied answer is no. James strikingly suggests that faith without works is not saving faith. In case we wonder exactly what he means by the term "works," James offers a concrete example. If a brother or sister is in need of clothing or daily food, and we say, "Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill," and yet do not supply their physical needs, what is the good of that? A kind word is not enough; an act of love is necessary. Likewise, faith is not just something we say, but also something we do. Faith is not just something we think, but also something we enact. Faith is not just a property of the mind, but also a property of the hands. Years ago, a Christian friend explained to me that once we have faith, good deeds will follow. But that's not quite accurate, according to James. In James' view, if we have saving faith, there's no sequence of faith first and works second. They exist simultaneously. Faith and works are intertwined. Faith and works are integrated.  Works are not an addendum to faith, or a supplement for faith, or a product of faith. Works are a constituent element of faith. Works are part of what makes faith, faith. Faith without works is like chocolate pie without chocolate. Faith without works is like vegetable soup without veggies. Faith without works is like a turkey sandwich without turkey. It's something else entirely. Faith that does not work just doesn't work. Saving faith is working faith.

  We Christians talk a big game about the Bible. Some of us say the Bible is "authoritative," or "divinely inspired," or "infallible." Some Christians say they believe every word of the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. I heard about one preacher who said he believes the whole Bible from Genesis to maps - as in the maps of ancient lands included in the back of his Bible. Some churches have a huge Bible at the front of the sanctuary, and they don't start the Sunday service until someone ceremonially flips it open. Some churches stand whenever Scripture is read aloud in worship. There are many ways people venerate the Bible. Some say the Bible should never be put on the floor. Some say you should never write in your Bible, or fold down the corners of pages, because it's so holy. Many folks broadcast their esteem for Holy Scripture. They put the 10 Commandments on billboards. They put Bible-verse bumper stickers on their cars. They wear T-shirts that say, "God said it; I believe it; that settles it." Families seek to honor the Bible, too. I have visited homes where there are Bible verses on the walls. I've walked into houses where there is a big Bible with gold lettering and white lace on the center of the coffee table. Many homes, including my own, have more copies of the Bible than any other book. Politicians and public officials praise the Bible as well. They quote the Bible in speeches or name it as their favorite book. In 2016, lawmakers in the state of Tennessee, where I live, made national news by approving a bill that would make the Bible the official book of Tennessee. Alongside milk, our state beverage, and the raccoon, our state wild animal, they wanted to add the Bible as our official state book.

  A few years ago, I received a letter at the parsonage where I live with my family. It was on heavy paper - even heavier than the kind they use to tell you that you've been accepted to college. It almost declared its own momentousness, that paper. In fact, for a moment, I wondered if someone had left the church a big bequest in their will, and I worried that someone had died and I hadn't written them a note. But it turned out not to be that. Mercifully, nobody had died without telling me. Actually, it turned out to be something far stranger. Because what it was, was a letter from a company that made VIP panic rooms, or, as they preferred to call them, "safe rooms." "The world is a troubled place," it explained. "But your home, and your loved ones, should always be secure." Who could argue with that? The letter went on to explain that they could design a room within our house, complete with its own power source, communications hub, ventilation system, secure entry, weapons cache, food preparation area, full-spectrum lighting, hidden or public as I preferred, and designed to whatever specifications I chose: perhaps I wanted a wood paneled study with button-tufted leather chairs and cut crystal whiskey glasses, like an English gentlemen's club; or perhaps a western-themed ranch longhouse effect, or even a speakeasy with a pool table and a bathtub...I think the bathtub was for making gin, or something. I found myself idly wondering if that one came also with a machine gun, and I suspect that the answer was that it probably could provided, of course, that I were willing to pay for it. could not help but reflect on what kind of a panic room I might want.

  Let me begin by admitting that it's a little bit of a tall order for a preacher to try saying something new about "wisdom." There's a certain school of thought that says, if it's new, well then by definition, it can't be wisdom. Wisdom is timeless - the very opposite of new. It isn't simply that wisdom "offers perspective," wisdom is perspective. It's an animating power in its own right. It's not a particular set of facts - if you just learn this or that, well then there you go: you've got wisdom. Wisdom is more like a way of knowing. I remember when my dad taught me to drive stick in the empty Sunday afternoon parking lot in front of our local competitor to Woolworth's, which was called the Ben Franklin 5 and 10. Do you remember learning to drive stick? It's all about the feet, right? Learning that strange two-step with the clutch and the gas. I remember my father explaining that move from zero to first gear, with his hands looking like they were playing invisible bongo drums, left...right...left...right. There are facts about how to drive stick. Of course there are. But until you can actually drive stick, it's as if the facts make no sense, isn't it? You have to know them in some deeper way before you can understand them. You need to have the peculiar wisdom of driving before any of the facts make sense. It's like it says in the Book of Proverbs: "Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting, get understanding" (Proverbs 4:7).

  In 2016, Netflix produced a series called, Cooked, based on food-writer Michael Pollan's book about how basic ingredients are transformed into food through the four basic elements of fire, water, earth, and air. Although the series was full of surprises regarding the history of food, it is fairly easy to imagine how fire, water, and even earth create the food of myriad human cultures. But, air? Pollan admitted at the outset that "air" as transformation is the most mysterious, perhaps the most spiritual, of all the ways in which we cook. Despite the mystery of it, "air" has also give us the most basic of all food: bread. Bread was a bit of an accident - about 6,000 years ago in Egypt, when, as Pollan says, "some observant Egyptian must have noticed that a bowl of porridge, perhaps one off in a corner that had been neglected, was no longer quite so inert. In fact, it was hatching bubbles from its surface and slowly expanding, as if it were alive. The dull paste had somehow been inspired: The spark of life had been breathed into it. And when that strangely vibrant bowl of porridge - call it dough - was heated in an oven, it grew even larger, springing up as it trapped the expanding bubbles in an airy, yet stable, structure that resembled a sponge." (Cooked, p. 207) Bread. With bread, everything changed. We learned how to turn grasses into food human beings could eat, store, and transport. We learned how to cultivate grains and manage fields, how to harvest and mill and leaven and bake. We created agriculture. We developed entire communities - entire civilizations - devoted to the making of bread.