i don't need anything else

Today is, by tradition, Good Shepherd Sunday. By tradition I mean recent tradition - since Vatican II in 1962 when the Roman Catholic church located this day on the fourth Sunday of Easter. The ecumenical lectionary follows this recent innovation and, hence, so do we. It is fine with me. It means we read the 23rd Psalm. And it means that, in a few minutes, we sing my favorite version of the 23rd Psalm - the one titled “My Shepherd is the Living Lord”, the earliest published hymn in the English language. But we aren’t there quite yet. We know the 23rd Psalm well, but not that well. It comes again as a holy guest, even a holy stranger, with a new Word, a Living Word. It comes as a guest because it is not the 23rd Psalm that we host this morning but the Good Shepherd who stands among us, who speaks to us, who leads us, who restores our life.

a spin to conquer cancer

My good friend and colleague Janice Love continues to train for the Ride to Conquer Cancer in June. Today her local newspaper in Vernon published an article about Janice, her ride and her fundraising efforts. You can read it at A Spin to Conquer Cancer. Janice has now raised $1,555.00 towards her goal of $3,200 (half way there). In order to participate in the ride she needs to raise $2,500 ($945 to go). All of the donations given in support of Janice are immediately used in blood cancer research (leukemia, lymphoma and multiple myeloma). I am grateful to all of you who have already made a contribution. If you would like to make a donation in support of her ride and in aid of blood cancer research simply visit Janice's donation page (you can give online or print out a donation page and mail in your donation). A big thank-you to Janice and friends!

one year later

April 29 is a new date on my calendar of anniversaries. Last year it fell on a Friday, this year it leaps ahead to Sunday. I had returned home from work on April 27 to find a phone message asking me to call my doctor's office. When I called on Thursday morning the receptionist said that she needed to make me an appointment to see Charles, my doctor, about the results that had come back from my tests. She said he was busy and it would have to be sometime next week. Then she sounded a bit surprised and said, "Oh, he has already booked you in for tomorrow morning at 9:00 am. Can you make it?" At that moment I realized that the results must not be good.

we are more than what we have suffered

"Christians believe, however, that neither what we do nor what we suffer defines us at the deepest level. Though the way we think of and treat ourselves and the way others think of and treat us does shape our identity, no human being can make or unmake us. Instead of being defined by how human beings relate to us, we are defined by how God relates to us. We know that fundamentally we are who we are, as unique individuals standing in relation to our neighbors and broader culture, because God loves us - to such a great extent that on the cross Jesus Christ, God incarnate, shouldered our sin and tasted our suffering.

Even more, by opening ourselves to God's love through faith, our bodies and souls become sanctified spaces, God's "temples," as the Apostle Paul puts it (I Corinthians 6:19). The flame of God's presence, which gives us new identity, then burns in us inextinguishably. Though like buildings devastated by wind and flood, our bodies and souls may become ravaged, yet we continue to be God's temple - at times a temple in ruins, but sacred space nonetheless. Absolutely nothing defines a Christian more than the abiding flame of God's presence, and that flame bathes in a warm glow everything we do or suffer.

the hope that is in you

This morning at our weekly Bible at Breakfast group at a local restaurant in Vancouver we continued to read through the First Letter of Peter. Today we were hosting chapter three which begins with advice for Christian wives married to non-Christian husbands and ends with verses that link Noah and the flood with our baptism. We had plenty to wrestle with in the chapter. Then there in the middle of it all is a wonderful verse that, as one of our number put it, could easily be carved above the door of the Chapel to be read as we are leaving worship: "Always be ready to make your defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you" (I Peter 3:15).

missional & communal catechesis

A few years ago I was fortunate to be part of a small group that sought to initiate a conversation about missional and communal catechesis on behalf of the Gospel and Our Culture Network. We had hoped to bring together a number of pastors, lay leaders and scholars to engage questions of Christian formation in North America. Unfortunately, funding problems resulted in us having to abandon our initial vision. The other day I came across our original invitation. I still find the questions it raises and the framework it proposes compelling. It reminds me of our dream of a new form of catechism for the missional church. Here is what the four of us (Mike Budde, Chris Erdman, Mary Fisher and myself) drafted then ...

a missional conversion

It is surprising what happens when the meaning of one word in your vocabulary changes. In my case, that word is “mission”. For most of my life mission has referred to a journey with a purpose, undertaken by an individual or a group. As a teen I watched every mission to the moon with fascination. Growing up in the United Church I learned that the Mission and Service Fund was our calling to “live love”. As a minister I worked hard with congregations to craft mission statements that gave direction to our objectives and goals. Mission had to do with us, with what we needed to do, because – as we said to ourselves – “God has no other hands but ours”.