Calling all pilgrims

I couldn’t find any other place in scripture where the word “pilgrim” appears. It only seems to show up in the psalm printed above, a psalm you might have heard in church yesterday. The term is probably most readily associated in our culture with the first Thanksgiving in New England, which may or may not help us recognize the deep meaning of the word.

As distinct from a tourist, a pilgrim is someone who travels with a distinct purpose. Here’s how one travel site described the difference: Tourists are seeking relaxation, entertainment, and a break from everyday lives. Pilgrims, on the other hand, are seeking a deeper connection with their faith or with the universe. They are often on a quest for self-discovery and personal growth.

In other words, pilgrims are looking for something and they don’t find it by staying put. That restless quest is very much at the heart of our Christian faith. Jesus told the first disciples: Follow me. He set them on a journey. When they asked where they were headed, he simply said: Come and see. First Christians were not called Christians. They were called people of the way. On many days, I wish we’d kept that name. The term Christian suggests arrival, maybe even institution. There’s little of that when we speak of people on the way.

An insight from pastor and smart guy Brian McLaren has guided me in my ministry. He highlighted this question for our churches and denominations: Are we a club for the spiritually elite who pretend to have arrived or a school for disciples who are on the way? Asked another way: are we on a pilgrimage?

I’ve made a few pilgrimages over the course of my life, some international, some not. Friends have made powerful, transformative pilgrimages to the camino in Spain, to holy rivers in India, to sacred sites in Jerusalem, to remote islands like Iona. All thin places where discovery can happen as the distance between heaven and earth diminishes. A.k.a., thin places. Those journeys have resulted in spiritual growth, transformed lives.

But it seems to me that you don’t need to contend with air travel in order to experience this kind of discovery, for which I say, “Thanks be to God.” What seems critical is the pilgrim’s mindset. It is as the psalmist says a matter of having our heart set on the pilgrims’ way. We can do that anywhere.

I’ve discovered in my work with Renewalworks that perhaps a quarter of the congregations I’ve worked with demonstrate a spirit of complacency, a spirit that says, “We’re fine where we are, thank you very much.” There’s little interest in pilgrimage. As I reported this particular profile to one congregation, the pastor called me in response. He thanked me for the insight and tongue-in-cheek said that the church had changed its tagline in response. The new tagline for the church? “We’re spiritually shallow and fine with that.” I doubt that ever appeared on their masthead, but it says something true about our congregations. It may say something true about where each of our hearts are set.

So what would it mean to set our hearts on the pilgrims’ way? It means that there is a place to which we are called that may be different from where we are right now. It means that we are open to God’s gracious and surprising activity in our lives. A best practice principle for congregations is to get people moving, to help them see that there is more, that God has more in store for them. How might you get moving this week, my pilgrim friends?

As you ponder that, a reminder that God is with us in the journey, that the journey is in and of itself a gift, a grace. So I close with wisdom from Anne Lamott: I do not understand the mystery of grace – only that it meets us where we are and does not leave us where it found us.

–Jay Sidebotham

Interested in RenewalWorks for your parish? Learn more about how RenewalWorks works!

RenewalWorks: Helping churches focus on spiritual growth

RenewalWorks is about re-orienting your parish around spiritual growth. And by spiritual growth – we mean growing in love of God and neighbor.

Churches can launch as part of a fall or spring cohort or go on their own schedule. (Now accepting signups for Fall 2024 cohort)  Sign up now!

Fear and Love

When I worked in the creative department of an ad agency, one of the principals of the agency instructed us that there were only two motivators in advertising: love or fear. From a secular setting came a message with theological implications.

Fast forward to a few years later when I was leading a bible study, prattling on about love and its opposite hate. One member of our group interrupted. No, actually offered a course correction. She said: “You know, Jay, the opposite of love is not hate. The opposite of love is fear.” I’ve thought about that insight often, recognizing that in the history of religion, fear has been a great motivator. It’s not just true in religion. Our politics in this election year are driven in many ways by fear.

I’m told that in scripture, the phrase “fear not” appears 365 times. So what does it mean when we read in yesterday’s psalm (see above) that the fear of the Lord is a good thing, the beginning of wisdom. A mentor once told me that in the journey of faith, we have to decide what we believe and what we refuse to believe. I’ll refuse to believe that this psalm which references the fear of the Lord indicates a God who delights in our punishment. Do what God says, or else.

Given that, what might the fear of the Lord mean? I suspect in this context it has to do with the recognition that our lives unfold in the presence of a power greater than ourselves, leading us to reclaim the true sense of the word “awesome.” I forget that insight often. We forget that insight at our spiritual peril. We face the temptation to imagine we are the star of the story, with the implication that God is lucky to have us on the team. We too readily give into the temptation to worship things not worthy of our devotion, giving our hearts to that which will not satisfy our hearts. It’s a story as old as the Bible and as contemporary as our current political scene.

It’s why worship is such an important element of our faith journey, as we gather to praise God from whom all blessings flow, to be reminded that God is the creator, the source of light and life. And our worship is not only what we do on Sunday morning. As the Prayer Book notes, we worship not only with our lips but with our lives. As we commit to a life of service, we do so in response to God’s goodness, a sacrifice of thanksgiving. We do so in the spirit of the fear of the Lord.

This interpretation of the fear of the Lord means that love need not be the opposite of fear. In fact, the fear of the Lord understood in the true meaning of awesome reminds us of this important truth: Nothing can separate us from the love of God. That kind of amazing grace can be awe-inspiring, leading us to respond with love of God and love of neighbor.

The psalm tells us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. It’s the starting point. Wisdom is more than simply knowledge. Knowledge you can get from Google. We are set on a journey marked by wisdom. What can we do this week to take steps in that wisdom journey? Where do we begin? It begins with spending time thinking about the fear of the Lord, recognizing that it has everything to do with love.

–Jay Sidebotham

Interested in RenewalWorks for your parish? Learn more about how RenewalWorks works!

RenewalWorks: Helping churches focus on spiritual growth

RenewalWorks is about re-orienting your parish around spiritual growth. And by spiritual growth – we mean growing in love of God and neighbor.

Churches can launch as part of a fall or spring cohort or go on their own schedule. (Now accepting signups for Fall 2024 cohort)  Sign up now!

Taste and see/Come and see

This past week, guided by the daily lectionary of the Episcopal Church, I’ve started reading the Gospel of John. In the first chapter, we read John’s version of the calling of disciples. We meet John the Baptist, who apparently has his own disciples. Jesus shows up, and John the Baptist directs his own disciples to Jesus. That was John the Baptist’s way. He pointed to Jesus. Two of John’s disciples begin to follow Jesus. Jesus notices they are following. They get into a conversation. They ask where Jesus is staying. Jesus says: “Come and see.”

Soon after that, another disciple (Philip) was telling his friends about Jesus. They wonder if Jesus could be the real deal. Friends were skeptical. “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”, they ask. Rather than make an argument about why Jesus might be the Messiah, Philip simply says to them: “Come and see.”

The psalm you may have heard yesterday in church (printed above) invites readers to taste and see that the Lord is good. That’s an earlier version of what John’s gospel repeats: “Come and see.” That simple invitation has a lot to teach us.

God, in Christ, says to each one of us: “Come and see.” It’s an invitation to be in relationship with the Holy One. It’s not just about knowing about God. It’s about knowing God. A friend, a priest sees an analogy to cooking, of all places. She says you can read a recipe. You can have an opinion about ingredients. You can imagine what cooking techniques you would use, or what the dish might taste like. In other words, you can know about the meal. But none of that is the same as eating the meal.

Knowing about God may include biblical familiarity, theological study, liturgical correctness, ethical exercises, regular church attendance. But that’s not the same as knowing God. Often religious people focus on knowing about God because knowing God can be risky and mysterious. And here’s the scary part: It can call for change. I wonder if those disciples who followed Jesus later on wondered if life wouldn’t have been a lot easier if they hadn’t asked their question.

The invitation to come and see is not only extended to us by God. It is an invitation we’re meant to extend to others, as Philip did early on in John’s gospel. There’s freedom in that. We don’t need to argue about religion or theology. We don’t need to convince someone else that we’re right (and they’re wrong). God knows we don’t need to dispel skepticism and compel other people to believe as we do. That’s generally not all that productive. We simply have to encourage others to try out the life of faith. “Come and see.”

So how do we hear Jesus say to us “Come and see?” How are you hearing that voice this Monday morning? What does it take to respond? There’s risk involved, maybe like Peter stepping out of the boat to walk on water to meet Jesus. It may call for courage. It’s about being open to a new thing God may want to do in our lives. It’s about being all in.

And how might we invite someone else to “come and see.” I know there is reticence about sharing spiritual experience, especially among Episcopalians. These days, it seems we’re surrounded by people who do it in an annoying, intrusive way. Dave Barry put it this way: Why is it that people who want to share their faith with you never want to hear about yours?

But if we have answered the invitation that came to us, if we have responded to God’s invitation, if we have had what our youth group called a God-sighting, if we have found God’s invitation to be good news in our lives, no one can argue that away. It is a kindness to want other folks to have that holy experience. It is a kindness to share that experience with others.

What does the invitation to come and see, to taste and see sound like to you this morning? How will you RSVP?

–Jay Sidebotham

Interested in RenewalWorks for your parish? Learn more about how RenewalWorks works!

RenewalWorks: Helping churches focus on spiritual growth

RenewalWorks is about re-orienting your parish around spiritual growth. And by spiritual growth – we mean growing in love of God and neighbor.

Churches can launch as part of a fall or spring cohort or go on their own schedule. (Now accepting signups for Fall 2024 cohort)  Sign up now!

A clean heart

Here’s a piece of wisdom passed on from a predecessor, Alan Gates, now bishop of Massachusetts. He said: I’ve never met a motive that wasn’t mixed. His wit offers wisdom about the human condition, truth as old as the Bible.

It’s truth reflected in Psalm 51, which you may have heard yesterday in church (see above). Attributed to David, the psalmist reveals his own mixed motives, the forces pulling him in different directions. The psalmist is aware of unsavory parts of his interior life, aware of dastardly things he has done. At the same time, there is a desire to be changed.

Centuries later, St. Paul wrote a letter to the church in Rome and described his own inner struggles. Get a load of what he says in the 7^th chapter (verse 15-21): I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. But in fact it is no longer I who do it but sin that dwells within me… For the desire to do the good lies close at hand, but not the ability. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it but sin that dwells within me. So I find it to be a law that, when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand.

Ever felt like that?

Soren Kierkegaard said that purity of heart is to will one thing. Sounds good, Soren, but how do we get there? Maybe there’s a key in one of the verses from Psalm 51. The author prays that God will create in him a clean heart and renew a right spirit within him. That kind of purity of heart, a clean heart, is something God creates. While I feel powerless over resentments and judgments that take up residence in my soul, the good news is that God can make things new. The good news is that such renewal is not all up to me.

We may think of God the creator as one whose work is finished, God setting things in motion like a clock maker, then moving on to other endeavors. The prayer of Psalm 51 affirms that the creative work of God is ongoing, as in the bumper sticker: PBPGINFWMY (Please be patient. God is not finished with me yet.) The persistent biblical image of God as potter and human beings as clay gets at this image of ongoing creative work.

The potter metaphor can be helpful, but having said that, I feel a need to point out that we are more than lumps of clay. As God’s beloved children, as bearers of the divine image, we have a part to play in this new creation. It has to do with being open to God’s creative work.

That probably begins with a recognition, a confession that we need a clean heart, that we are pulled in many directions. It begins with asking for help. Truth be told, we all have numerous vocations: parents, children, siblings, workers, bosses, employees, citizens, artists, athletes. Those various vocations tugging at us in ways that can create inner conflict. In that inner landscape, many of the meditations of our heart are far from acceptable in the eyes of the Holy One. Like St. Paul, I suspect we all contend with that kind of conflict.

Then moving beyond confession, we can open ourselves to God’s creative power. Last week, in reading meditations by Howard Thurman, I came across his vision for a way to have a new heart. He said we are to seek each day, and several times a day, a lull in the rhythm of daily doing. He added: At first the quiet times may be quite barren…one needs to get used to the stillness. This time may be used for taking stock, for examining one’s life direction, one’s plans, one’s relations. It is like cleaning out the closets or the desk drawers and getting things in order. When the awareness of God comes in – how he entered, one does not know, one is certain that He had been there all the time. Thurman concludes this meditation by saying: Suppose you begin now, this day with the use of the quiet time in some fashion as suggested.

Not bad advice for a Monday morning with a focus on a new heart. Thank you, Howard Thurman, for helping us begin.

So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; look, new things have come into being! II Corinthians 5.17

–Jay Sidebotham

Interested in RenewalWorks for your parish? Learn more about how RenewalWorks works!

RenewalWorks: Helping churches focus on spiritual growth

RenewalWorks is about re-orienting your parish around spiritual growth. And by spiritual growth – we mean growing in love of God and neighbor.

Churches can launch as part of a fall or spring cohort or go on their own schedule. (Now accepting signups for Fall 2024 cohort)  Sign up now!