I was talking to someone from our Church on Tuesday. They asked if I had watched the Grammy Awards Show on Sunday night.  I said no because I basically stopped watching the Grammy’s several years ago when I could no longer understand most of the lyrics.  (Man does that make me sound old!)  Anyway, this guy said something like, “You really should check out the performance of “Same Love,” by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis.”  After I asked how do you spell that, he said, “I don’t want to spoil it but I was really moved by what happen.”

This is the same guy who introduced me to my favorite new music group/band so I paid attention, found the performance on You Tube and watched it.  If you have not seen this and want to…stop reading now.  You may want to either go watch it or don’t blame me because I’m about to spoil it for you.

The song is a combination of Rap and what I would call R&B, whose lyrics confront the issues of sexual identity and the questions this raises in our culture about equality.  It is a bit critical of the voice of faith.  And yet the entire set is meant to look like a church; vaulted ceilings, stain glass windows even a choir with choir robes. And then near the end there are something like 33 couples of all kinds, white and black, gay and straight, interracial and bi-racial all kinds of different couples standing in what looks to be the church isle.  They are all invited to exchange rings, a promise is invoked for them and right there in California, on national TV with Queen Latifah presiding they are married.

There are hugs and kisses and more music and tears and then fade to commercial.

After watching this I asked my friend in Nashville through Facebook what he thought of this. I’m always interested in his thoughts because he sometimes surprises me.  He said first that; “No,” he was not offended.  But neither was he as moved as was the guy from my church.  He saw it as a way to shock and get attention something of an expression of Civil Religion.  I thought it was something like the “civil” wanting to be religious. Personally, I’m in-between my two friends.

If as they say, “Imitation is the most sincerest form… or best form of flattery,” then I suppose we should be grateful. And yet most of the imitating I’ve seen that attempts to flatter is ironic at best and cynical at its worst.  So which is it in this case?  And what do we do when something like the Grammy awards gets our attention and either moves us to tears or lulls us to sleep or somewhere in-between?

I’m not saying that we need extravagant sets and people dressed to the nines and Madonna making a dramatic appearance in church to have our views on any social issue made legitimate or our awareness raised. But these things remind me that our culture as a whole is watching, and paying attention to us.

Songs like these are not written in a vacuum, the experience that is related is not made up. Sometimes we are reminded in the middle of our living room; in the middle of a TV show that there are hurting souls out there.  If we listen it also says even though we may by association be in part a cause of the pain, we also in the imitation are a part of the hope, and maybe the healing that is needed.

My friend in Nashville calls this an opportunity for the door to be opened to talk about the gospel.  My friend in Eden Prairie, I think, is saying that by being moved he has in some way had a doorway open for him. Either way there is something of God speaking in this, even if it’s a little harder for some of us to understand the lyrics of God’s song.

Keep the Faith!

Pastor Dan

I checked my dashboard on my computer before I started this and at 7:50 a.m. it said -16 degrees below zero Fahrenheit. I don’t care what that is Celsius because I know it will not sound as cold as it is outside.  I learned early on that the key to surviving here is not to fight the often cold and long winter season, but to embrace it. And I have.

When I took a group of three confirmation students to camp for a very cold January weekend we still played broomball.  Don’t ask how you really play a game of broomball with just four people in the bitter cold, but we did it.  At that retreat it was so cold that when I put my ’76 Chevette in reverse, to back out of the driveway, my reverse broke.

I‘ve also acquainted myself with a variety of winter outdoor activities.  I love down- hill skiing.  I will cross country ski on a nice day.  Heck, I’ll even go ice-skating.  My neighbor has a rink in his back yard.  So I don’t have a real excuse this year. Which reminds me that my very first true Minnesota sports loyalty was to the Minnesota Golden Gopher Hockey Team.  I’d never really followed hockey much and had never heard of college hockey before Minnesota. I’ve gotten myself into some trouble living in both St. Cloud and Duluth by still rooting for the Gophers.

All this reminds me of how it is that sometimes when you embrace a challenge or an adversity, some things can come out of it; and if not good things then at least you see a part of yourself that you had not known before…That is always good.

A week ago today I went home about 2 o’clock.  My day had started at 6 and I thought, “I’m going home to 'reflect' a little for my sermon.”  It had snowed one of those “nuisance snows;” about 2 inches. That is just a little too much to shovel and a little too little to snow blow.  I believe one of the marks of someone coping with winter in Minnesota is a clean drive way and walk.  And so I fired up my snow blower and began plowing my snow.  It went so very quickly that I decided to also do the corner walk and driveway of my neighbor to the south.  After I finished that, I decided to do the walk and driveway of the neighbor to the east. It took a little over a half an hour, it wasn’t so cold and it feels good to sometimes do something anonymously.

On Saturday morning I had planned to take it really easy, my back hurt, by knee was really hurting but it had snowed what about 4-5 inches.  I was lying in bed thinking about getting out of bed and into the cold when I heard a snow blower in my driveway.  I looked out to see Mike, my neighbor to the west, in my driveway.  He did the whole walk and driveway.  When I went outside to say hi and thanks and warn him about the newspaper he said, “No problem.” with that look that told you he really didn’t mind. Mike is young enough that I think he still really likes blowing snow.

I suppose you could say that it’s just a matter of what “goes around comes around,” or “you get what you give,” or even how lucky I am to have Mike as a neighbor, but I’m trying to say a little something more than that.  The cold and snow of these winters have within them the opportunity to bring out something warm and important.  And it’s not just a kindness, but it is recognizing that there is no place, no time in which we do not have an opportunity to choose to do something or see something that reveals Christ among us.

Keep the Faith!

Pastor Dan

When Rick, the head of our maintenance staff, more commonly known as our custodian, told us at staff that he was taking about a week off to go to his son’s wedding we didn’t think much of it.  Everybody needs a week off.  Especially to go to their son’s wedding.  Especially Rick.

I did not realize the full impact of Rick taking some time off until I was at our staff meeting yesterday reading a note sent by our Trustee chair Deb about how we were going to get by during Rick’s very much deserved and very understandable need to be away. The email mentioned a few things about setting up for this Sunday’s All Church Meeting Potluck and a few other things.   At staff we were discussing the need to keep the sidewalk shoveled for Wednesday evening activities.  We decided that I would shovel.  (I don’t mind that at all. I’ve done it at every church I’ve served.) But later, I shared this wonderful opportunity to serve the church with a couple young men who were waiting for Higher Grounds (the name of our Sr. High Group) to begin.  They really were quite eager.

Rick does a lot around here, very well.  Many of these things are things you don’t think about but are very glad somebody is thinking about them; that somebody usually is Rick.  Rick goes beyond his job description; he takes initiative and pride in what he does.  Yes he is on staff, yes he does get paid for this, but I’m not so sure we should put a time clock in one of the boiler rooms for him to punch anytime soon.

Rick is just the best example of many people, all of them not on staff, who take initiative and have pride in what they do at EPUMC. In the world of Pastors we call this being engaged.  

There are those who recognize how important our fellowship time is (following worship) to connect with each other.  They make sure that there is always at least coffee going and something warmed up and put out of our store of “goodies” in the freezer when none of the rest of us remembers to sign up to do it.

One of the things I could not believe when I first arrived at EPUMC are the amount of people who are the craft queens and kings and artists in our congregation that come a full week ahead of Vacation Bible School to help create what is in my book the best VBS on the planet for our kids.  They are so engaged that you wonder are they just doing this for the kids; or are they having so much fun together enjoying each other so much that they are also getting something important out of the experience.

Not all of us can be as engaged as Rick or some of these others all the time.  But most of us can at some time. As we prepare to celebrate 2013 and look forward to 2014 at our Annual Meeting I would like to ask you to reflect upon a time (or times) when you have felt engaged in being a part of EPUMC, when what you were doing as a part of EPUMC meant more to you than just about anything else you were doing at the time.

What I’m trying to figure out is what are we doing here together at EPUMC that our community of Eden Prairie would miss if all of us at EPUMC took a week or so off to go to a wedding.

Keep the Faith!

Pastor Dan

It was the Youth from EPUMC and the Youth from Discovery UMC serving a meal at the Simpson Shelter last night.  As you can see, Andrew did a great job of getting people to show up.  Plus, we heard from many more who were disappointed they couldn’t come.

Look closely and you will see two young adults who are home on break from college who came along.  One of them said to me just before we took this picture that if I would pay for her bus ticket to Omaha and back she would come back every month to serve this meal to the homeless.

I’ve been around youthful enthusiasm enough to know when someone is just excited to be in the moment and when a certain experience has been something life transforming.   I sincerely believe this young woman has experienced serving the homeless, working together with her friends and recognizing that her involvement makes a important impression on youth much younger than her as life shaping, life forming, life transforming.

I’m not sure why this is true for her, but I’ve heard from many others that times of service like serving the meal at Simpson Shelter have made a lasting impression upon their lives.  Perhaps, it is an opportunity to recognize something we all share in common as men and women, youth and adults, people from Eden Prairie and Chanhassen and people from nowhere spending one of the coldest nights on record in a homeless shelter.  As they say, “We all need to eat.”  But the food is just the port of entry, the place of connection, something we don’t have to reflect upon to understand.

There is something more that sticks with the youth and many of us who put ourselves in positions to experience the world in a different, somewhat intimidating way.  A big part of whatever that is, is that we don’t need to feel so intimidated.  There may well be reasons to be cautious in this environment, maybe there are a few of what we might think of as precarious characters sitting around the tables but when your serving a meal; when you are being a servant, fear often fades away.

Before we left Andrew, our youth director, Carrie the pastor at Discovery, and I played rock-paper-scissors to decide who got to pray.  Carrie won the honors of praying and her prayer is sticking with me.  She said something like, “May we see the face of Christ in those we serve tonight.” I’m thinking that even more than the sense that you are responding to a need of another human being, even more than having a good time with your friends, maybe even more than the thought that you are making a difference in someone’s life; even more than any of these reasons, the reason that serving at Simpson Shelter is so transformative to so many youth and to others is that they go there and to their surprise, and although they may not recognize him, they see Jesus. And if I believe one thing it is this; when you see Jesus fear fades away.

This Sunday in worship we will renew our baptismal vows. The Message will be focused on the willingness of Jesus, who it is said is without sin, to be baptized for the forgiveness of sins.  I suppose one take away from this thought is that if Christ is willing to do that; why should we be surprised to find him staring back at us from across the serving line at places like the Simpson Shelter.

Keep the Faith!

Pastor Dan

How long do you think what our culture calls “The Holiday Season” should linger? On the calendar it usually extends to the day or so after New Year’s Day.  For most of us, depending on the day of the week New Year’s Day falls on this lingering effect can come to an end quite suddenly. And then it’s back to work, back to school, back to the grind.  On my emotional calendar I usually allow the season to linger through the last of the college football bowl games, which this year is Monday Jan. 6th.

Allowing the season to linger until Jan. 6th  is fortunate for me this year. I still have two very important events connected to the Holiday Season to experience.  Both of them are tomorrow Friday January 3rd.  The first is our Staff Christmas get together. This is a low-key affair where we close the office for a couple of hours and go out to a nice lunch at Biaggi’s.  We get reservations, have a nice space, eat some pasta and generally have a good time together.

The second is Katie’s clan descending upon our home for the Schneider Christmas gathering. We just could not get everyone together before then. This is not a low-key affair.  Almost 40 people and the possibility of two or three different dogs come to Eden Prairie.  I really enjoy everyone in this clan, even the dogs, and yet there is just something about that many people coming to your house that, shall I say, “Keeps the Holiday Spirit Alive.” I’m going to eat a light lunch because well…“We have to get the house ready.”

In our Worship we always linger in what our culture calls the Holiday season until January 6th.  January 6th is “The Feast of the Epiphany.”  This is the day our tradition celebrates the visit of the Wisemen.  Although we read their story on Christmas Eve we also recognize that something important needs to be said about what it means for these three to arrive a little later around the manger and recognize the Christ Child.  The truth is not everyone sees what is special about the savior of the world right away.

Like a lot of other words in Church Epiphany is one of those we don’t often use in our everyday language.  For many people this is a stumbling block.  Words like Epiphany and Incarnation sound like code language that you have to be “In On” in order to understand.  And to some extent these complaints are justified; I mean the dictionary that comes with the Word program I am using says, “no results found,” when you try to look up “Epiphany.”

And yet Epiphany is an important word for our faith.  It means a “seeing something for what it really is,” “seeing something at a deeper level.”  Or “ a manifestation of the divine.”    It’s often used like, “I had this Epiphany when I went out to get the paper this morning.”  The questions then become: What was that Epiphany? And so what?

If the Epiphany you have when you pick up the paper off of your ice rutted driveway is, “I should have put a coat on because its minus whatever degrees out here,” then perhaps there isn’t’ much to do but to get back inside as fast as you can.  However, if the Epiphany is more like finding yourself frozen in the moment thinking, “I feel so alive when I breathe in this frigid crystal clear air and look up and see a sky so blue that I can’t take my eyes off of it.” Well then perhaps you have a little something more to start your day on.

The same is true when it comes to the Savior of the World.  Epiphany takes one last look at the Nativity Story and invites us to recognize what about it, what is in it that will endure, that will withstand the challenges and experiences of this new year that all to quickly is already upon us.

Keep the Faith!

Pastor Dan