Communion Seconds

Today I served communion during a chapel service at Duke Divinity.   My side didn’t have very many people so my station moved over next to the center aisle.  As one man came up to take communion, I noticed him chewing a piece of bread.  Then I realized he had taken communion from the station next to us!  In the back of my mind, I wondered if I should serve him again but he already had a piece of bread.  Plus, I was so taken aback that I didn’t think to do anything but offer him the cup.

After the service it hit me.  Why shouldn’t he have taken communion twice?  What if he decided today that he needed a little more grace?  Who am I to stand in his way?

Aren’t there days, even weeks, when you wish you could take Eucharist more than once?  Aren’t there times you would like to have seconds?

Review of “The Gospel According to Lost”

I should offer two disclaimers here.  First, I received a free copy of this book from Thomas Nelson Publishers as part of their book reviews bloggers program.  For more information, visit BookSneeze.  Second, I actually have never watched Lost.  I’ve heard bits about the show from friends who follow it closely but this book was my first real exposure to the characters and basic ideas.

Oceanic Flight 815.  The island.  John Locke.  Jack Shepherd.  Ben Linus.  The Others.  The television show Lost has quickly become a global phenomenon.  Perhaps most impressive is how the writers weave together numerous philosophical, scientific, and ethical strands.  With such attention to detail, it comes as no surprise that Lost has attracted religious dialogue.  Christ Seay addresses the show from a theological perspective in The Gospel According to Lost.

Fans of Lost will be pleased to know that Seay does not spoil anything for the final season.  Instead, Seay looks for the theological echoes within the lives of the characters.  He often finds them in their narratives, as they grow and develop over the course of the show.  Sometimes the revelations of their flashback scenes show how much they have matured even before the crash.

Unfortunately, many of Seay’s examples are fairly surface-level.  He does not tend to delve deeper into the characters.  For example, he considers the implications of various names among the “Losties.”  While not insignificant, his insights are hardly ground-breaking to the committed fan.  Furthermore, Seay shows a tendency to rely too heavily on particular scriptural themes.  While several characters may all share particular motifs, I would have preferred to see Seay develop different ideas rather than continuing to return to the same ones.

Review of “The Sacred Meal”

I recently discovered this opportunity through Thomas Nelson Publishing to receive a book in exchange for posting a review on my blog.  So while I’m not connected to Thomas Nelson in any other way and not required to post a positive review, I thought I should be clear that this isn’t just clear out of the blue.  For anyone who might be interested, here’s the link to sign up: http://brb.thomasnelson.com/

Eucharist, Communion, the Lord’s Supper. Different terms for the same event in worship. One that is full of strange language and often unfamiliar symbolism. Yet one that remains integral to churches worldwide.

Nora Gallagher takes a look at this historic practice in “The Sacred Meal.” She walks the reader through the various aspects of communion, showing how a healthier understanding of this practice addresses our modern desire for community and personal connection. She deftly weaves together the history of communion in the church with other teachings of Jesus. Intertwined with these biblical quotations are poignant vignettes of her own history with the practice.

Gallagher’s personal touch makes this book come alive. You want to know where her story is going, how it ends. Each discovery she makes builds upon the previous one. The book teaches but not in a way that feels authoritarian. Because these are lessons she herself has learned through the practice, they are much easier for us to swallow. She invites the reader to grow with her, rather than telling us where we are lacking.

Anyone looking to learn more about Eucharist and deepen their own understanding of this practice, would be well served by reading this book.

Doubting Thomas Sermon

My most recent sermon from class on John 20:19-31.  I’ll put some other stuff about the passage up soon but I wanted to go ahead and post the sermon.

This passage appears in the lectionary for the Sunday after Easter so that’s when I envisioned it.

I would love to find a way to post audio or video of this one because the assignment was to preach it with notes, rather than a full manuscript.  A very interesting experience which I’ll talk about in the future.  It’ll be interesting to compare what I actually said because I know it wasn’t word for word what I wrote.

I never really found a title I loved.  I also considered “The Power of Presence” but I think that would actually be a slightly different sermon.  I’m definitely open to suggestions for this one.

An Offering for Faith

Have you ever woken up one morning and realized that your life would never be the same? I imagine that was I’ll call a “first” day. Think back with me over those days in your life. Your first day at a new school, perhaps high school or college. First day after your wedding. First day after the birth of a child. Unfortunately these memories are not always around happy occasions. Perhaps you thought of the first day after the death of a loved one. Regardless of which memory you picked, I imagine you can remember every detail from that morning.

What about those days when your life was forever changed but you had no idea when you woke up? Try rewinding some of those special moments. The day you got your acceptance letter in the mail. The day of the proposal. The day the pregnancy test was positive. I’m sure you remember exactly where you were when you got the news. But what about that morning? Do you remember anything about that morning? Probably not.

The disciples in the gospel reading had one of those mornings. Their lives would be forever different after this day. But when they woke up on this morning they had no idea.

Hebrews Sermon – Writing a Better Story

Here is my sermon for class.  A couple things to note.

This passage appeared in the Common Lectionary on World Communion Sunday, so I prepared it with a view towards preaching it on that Sunday.

This sermon was written for Reconciliation United Methodist Church, my local church here in Durham, NC.  I didn’t preach it there but prepared it for that community.  The church strives to promote racial reconciliation in Durham and has embraced different styles of worship in order to foster that vision.

Writing a Better Story

I recently read a book by Donald Miller titled A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. In it he describes the process for turning one of his books into a movie. Along the way, Miller learns the aspects to crafting a good story and discovers, to his dismay, that he is living a boring story. The rest of the book tracks the decisions the screenwriters make with the movie alongside the decisions Miller makes with his life so that he can live a better story. Which made me wonder: what if communities also have stories? What is the story of this community? How do we make it a stronger story?

Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:5-12

This was the text for my first sermon assignment in my preaching class this semester.  I’ll put the passage after the jump, so you may want to go read it and then come back for my reflections.  I’ve included two translations, because the differences highlight an important

Clearly the author of Hebrews thinks very highly of Christ.  The account of creation and the Son’s eternal nature follow the same pattern seen in the prologue to the Gospel of John, although it’s unlikely the two authors would have been familiar with one another.

One of the trickiest parts of the passage is how to handle the psalm quoted in the middle.  Hebrews 2:6b-7 is actually Psalm 8:4-6.  The vagueness of the Hebrew in the psalm creates some interesting questions.  The pronouns are masculine singular, which is why the author reads this psalm as looking towards Christ.  However, Jewish tradition read this text as referring to humanity in general, which is why the NRSV translation opts for the plural pronouns.  Both readings are accurate but unfortunately the NRSV’s use of pronouns clouds how one could read the psalm as Christ centered.

One of the phrases sure to give theologians throughout history fits comes in 2:9.  Jesus was “lower than the angels,” if only for a period of time.  Given the church’s early history of fighting against viewing the Son as lesser than the Father, this passage can be uncomfortable.  It has been explained in various ways over the years, usually in reference to Jesus’s suffering and death since the other eternal beings do not experience such things.  In order to faithfully portray Christ’s nature, this part of the passage must be carefully examined.

Children and Communion

The United Methodist church I attend in Durham has communion every week.  So it’s rare that the experience feels unique but yesterday was special to me.  The children usually leave for the bulk for the service but they always return for communion.  Throughout the liturgy I could hear the children but rather than being aggravated, I felt they added something to the service.  All the grown-ups were going through the responses very orderly and reverently (which I appreciated since I take the sacraments very seriously) but from the back of the sanctuary came all these sounds of life.  It reminded me of going over to a friend’s house for a party and discovering there was food.  Such excitement at getting to share a meal with friends.  Yesterday I honestly could not find a better metaphor for the act of communion.  Christ, our close dear friend, invites us to share a meal at his table with other good friends.

Have you had a similar experience with children in worship?  What other metaphors would you suggest for communion?

(I should add that while I affirm the presence of children in worship, I did not grow up around kids so I don’t always know how to respond to them, especially in church.  So this was definitely a grace-filled moment for me to view their presence in a new light.)

I’m Published… sort of

Confessio, the Duke Divinity School online student journal, has resumed posting articles.  A more polished and finalized version of my article on the Sign of the Cross went up this morning.  I invite you to go check it out!

http://confessio.org/?p=267

Seminary Rivalries

I know that schools develop rivalries, which is probably unavoidable.  And I know that competition can be a good thing when it inspires people to improve.  But I still wonder about its place in the church, especially among seminaries.

Last Wednesday, the preacher in Goodson Chapel drew unfavorable comparisons to two rival seminaries.  Now, he did say beforehand that they were unfair statements.  They were done mostly for humorous effect and yes, I laughed.  But they bothered me in the moment and still do.

For starters, it was the first chapel service of the year.  This was the first message the incoming students heard in Goodson Chapel.  For the rest of the student body and staff, this sermon helped set the one for the year.  A tone that I feel was inappropriate.

What possible good can come from maligning the education that our future peers in ministry received?  I still remember hearing a pastor take several shots at my choice to attend Duke, simply because he went to a different school.  It deeply bothered me, especially because his alma mater is no longer closely associated with the United Methodist Church, which was a major factor in my decision of which seminary to attend.

The majority of students from these three seminaries (Duke and the other two mentioned) will go on to serve in the United Methodist Church.  Why should we fracture the denomination based on school affiliations?  Even worse, all graduates of these schools, regardless of whether they get ordained, will go on to serve the church universal and Jesus Christ.  We talk a lot about reconciliation, here at Duke and in the church.  But reconciliation will never occur if we continue to create arbitrary and potentially damaging divisions amongst ourselves.

Preaching Twice on Sundays

This summer I had the opportunity to preach two Sunday services.  Because so many people visit the Cashiers area in the summer months, the church expands to offer two services on Sunday at 8:30 and 11:00.  It’s rare that I ever attend two services on the same Sunday and certainly had never preached twice in the same day.

It was definitely a unique experience.  While I enjoy the art of preaching, it can be very draining.  Having to do it twice can leave one honestly exhausted.  I’m fairly certain I took a nap each afternoon, even though I had gotten plenty of sleep the night before.

I remember feeling worried that the 8:30 crowd was getting short-changed.  Yes, it was the same sermon.  Yes, I had practiced my sermons before Sunday.  But still, 8:30 sometimes felt like a dress rehearsal for the 11:00.  In some ways, this makes sense.  It’s hard to get practice in front of an audience, so the 11:00 delivery always has that advantage.  In some ways, this is inevitable as extra practice never hurts.  But it still bothered me.  Maybe the only answer is to have the sermon better established before Sunday.

My delivery at 11:00 had one other advantage; I had some idea of how the congregation would react at certain parts.  But what do you do when the reactions are different?  Handling unexpected laughter I feel is fairly easy.  Pause, smile, and consider repeating yourself if necessary.  But what do you do when you were expecting a reaction and there is none?  Do you try and force it, by admonishing the congregation?  My supervisor will do this on occasion, albeit playfully.  I tried it myself once and it seemed to work fairly well.  Although I did learn to be flexible when using audience participation.  You may not the answers you expected.  You may also get many more than you expected.

Something I did learn with pulpit humor is that the punchlines were sometimes earlier than I expected.  More than once people laughed at what I considered still part of the set-up, as opposed to the joke.  Having not watched the sermons yet myself, this may have been an issue with my delivery.  Or perhaps that’s simply part of preaching.  Like many of my questions in this post, only experience can provide the answer.

I also discovered an odd personal temptation.  The few times I’ve heard multiple sermons from established preachers, they changed between services.  The basic message was the same but the order of the sermon might be different, details elaborated on.  So my first Sunday in Cashiers I tried to do the same.  Nothing too elaborate, just a few little extras.  I was surprised by how much that threw off my rhythm.  Changing things at the last minute impeded my flow without adding anything substantial to the sermon.  I may hold this up as a goal for the future but for now, I think changing sermons at the last-minute is a bad idea for me.

For any preachers out there, what has been your experience with preaching the same sermon twice?  For any non-preachers, have you ever heard the same sermon twice?  How was that experience?