2019-09-18 Chuck Cavert, Ridin’ the Storm Out

Gospel Reading, Luke 8:22-25

            One day he got into a boat with his disciples, and he said to them, ‘Let us go across to the other side of the lake.’ So they put out, and while they were sailing he fell asleep. A gale swept down on the lake, and the boat was filling with water, and they were in danger. They went to him and woke him up, shouting, ‘Master, Master, we are perishing!’ And he woke up and rebuked the wind and the raging waves; they ceased, and there was a calm. He said to them, ‘Where is your faith?’ They were afraid and amazed, and said to one another, ‘Who then is this, that he commands even the winds and the water, and they obey him?’

            I would like us to go back to the story from the Gospel of Luke for a moment.  If Chuck were a disciple in Palestine with Jesus, he may have been the one to put into Jesus’ mind the idea of getting into a boat and going out on the Sea of Galilee.  Unlike the others, he may not have been afraid of the storm, rather, he may have been setting the sail to run with the wind as fast as boat would go.  After Jesus calmed the storm, saying, “Oh, man. Let’s do it again.”  If he sang a song on the boat, it may have been REO Speedwagon’s “Ridin’ the Storm Out.”

            As you have heard, Chuck was a man that worked hard and played hard.  As you have experienced, Chuck was a man that loved to build things.  The thing that he loved to build most, was to build people. 

Chuck built a relationship with Lisa.

            It may be a simple thing to say that Lisa and Chuck met in college and married.  But the story is a little more fun than just that.  In 1968, Chuck played football at Manchester College under Jack Jarrett. That year they went 7-1 only losing to Hanover.  Lisa having completed a six month tour with International Farm Youth Exchange in Brazil was on a lecture circuit to full fill her obligation for having been chosen for the program.  One of her lecture engagements brought her to Manchester College in 1968.  

            Lisa stayed with her friend, Joy.  While there Chuck happened to drop by.  Lisa assumed that Joy and Chuck were “together.”  She soon found out that he was just a friend that dropped in for a visit.  He treated them both to dinner driving them in his 1964 convertible through the snow. Was the top down or up?  Lisa’s fuchsia dress caught his attention.  

            Because of her busy speaking schedule, Lisa could not clear a date for a date with Chuck until April.  She arrived from Purdue for a trip to a festival wearing red elephant pants and a peasant shit.  Chuck was impressed with her “Purdue” clothes.  Their first official date was in Lafayette to see the movie, “Camelot.”  I asked Lisa how she knew this was the guy for her. She said that she usually went out up to three times with a guy.  At that point, she usually was bored with him.  No one had made it to a fourth date.  With Chuck, she wasn’t bored even after four dates and never had a boring moment since. 

            He proposed during Christmas of 1970 delivering a ring to Lisa on the flat bed car of the train that circled the base of his Christmas tree.  They married the following August and celebrated 48 years together this year.  

Chuck built a life for Cilissa (list) and Ashley

            Building a life for Cilissa and Ashley started with having the perfect house.  It had to be on a lake.  They found an undeveloped lot and were fortunate to buy it.  He kept the plans for the house in his head.  Lisa and he worked to build their home together.  By the late 1970’s they had a home on Tippecanoe and baby in the garage.  

            Through the years, he loved giving Christmas gifts. He hide presents. He coded presents. He booby trapped presents. Invariably he would forget who’s package went to whom.  Stopping the gift wrapping with, “Oh wait, that’s for mom.”

            He loved anything on water, liquid or frozen. He taught the kids to ski on hills from Mount Wawasee to Breckenridge, Colorado.  He loved Skidoos and Slalom skis, pontoons and motor boats.  He was the Captain of the Boat.  Because of his work at Main Channel Marina and teaching, he knew most everyone on the lakes.  As Captain of the Ship, he narrated a cruise of the shoreline telling stories of the people that they lived and worked with through the years. 

            Lisa and Chuck created a home where the girls friends found a welcome and parents felt secure.  He loved his grand kids.  As life slowed for him, he fished with grandkids in front of the house and piloted the pontoon to take them tubing. 

            He loved his grand dogs.  He would fill his pockets with treats and lay on the floor for them to find them.  He just wanted to create fun.   

Chuck built a life for others.

            For Chuck, fun was in the games and in the teaching but the purpose was to build people.   I asked what artifact may represent Chuck.  The girls said a basket full of stuff.  Chuck believed all things can be used.  I take that to mean all things have value.  Especially when the “things” are students and players or customers and friends.  

            Chuck had your back.  If a youth had a hard way in life and lacked basic items, Chuck provided. He knew that one small thing could change a life.  He guided. Gently corrected.  Never passed judgement.  It is no wonder that people surrounded him.  A simple trip to Lowe’s may take two hours because of all the folks that wanted to talk with him.  

            Chuck gave everyone an opportunity to be the best that they could be.  He was thoughtful and big hearted.  

            The last couple of years have been tough on Chuck and the family.  There are some storms in life that cannot be calmed with words.  However, we do have the capacity to be calm in the midst of the storm.  After all that is exactly what makes playing football, snow skiing and water skiing and scuba diving and adventure in general so exhilarating.  We put ourselves in calculated chaos.  It tests our capacity to remain centered and present within the chaos.  

            When life hands us a storm, like having a body that fails to thrive, it challenges our ability to remain centered and calm. Here is where faith steps into the moment.  Jesus was not bothered by the storm on the sea.  I suspect that he rather enjoyed it, the sliding sensation like surfing down the waves and the roll of the boat.  My faith helps me to remain calm within the storm rather than calming the storm that I am in.  This is the unexplainable peace of Christ.  This peace comes to us when all evidence suggest that we should be panicked.  You can flip this the other way.  Peace is the tail tale sign that God is present. 

            I have had the honor of knowing Chuck these past few years.  What I marveled at on each of the visits to a hospital is the peace I experienced from Chuck. I did not experience panic or fear.  It was not a resignation to an un-preferred outcome.   It was the peace of someone ridin’ the storm out with those he loved.  

“Wait for Lisa.  She uses big words.”

2019-10 Make Time for October

Make Time for October

Ecclesiastes 3:1, (KJV), “To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven…”

A time for pumpkin-flavored foods… Whenever October rolls around, everyone starts making some of the most delicious pumpkin-flavored foods that you could ever taste in your life!  My favorite the pumpkin doughnuts at Fashion Farm in Ligonier. 

A time for festivities… October is the time of year for all of the food festivals to come alive. How about the Covered Bridge Festival in Park County?

A time for the beautiful change in colors… Whenever October comes around, you are probably already aware of how gorgeous your street looks. Covered in various shades of browns, yellows, reds, and oranges. Nothing quite gets you in the Autumnal spirit unlike the changing of colors in our surrounding nature.

A time for movie/TV season… October is the best time for all of my favorite shows (Sunday Night Football). Whether they are a television series you've been waiting all summer for or all of your favorite classics that you love to watch every single year when Fall is outside of your door.

A time for the lovely weather… October's weather changes are some of the best transitions. We get to experience the summer cooling off.  It always feels so good to be able to put on your favorite hoodie and be at the right temperature all day no matter where you go.

A time for the abundance of candy… When October rolls around, you already know what's about to happen at all your favorite grocery stores. That's right, all of the delicious and awesome junk food that's going to hit the shelves.

A time for cuddle season… Our anniversary is in October.  October is cool enough to cuddle.  Whether it's family or a specific loved one, you need to get all of your favorite blankets and cuddle with each other. Maybe make some tea, hot chocolate, eat a little bit of pie, and just cuddle. 

From further in chapter three,  “I have seen the business that God has given to everyone to be busy with. He has made everything suitable for its time; … I know that there is nothing better for them than to be happy and enjoy themselves as long as they live; moreover, it is God’s gift that all should eat and drink and take pleasure in all their toil.” Enjoy October!

2019-09 September change

September represents for me change.  In August, the temperatures of the summer begin to fall.  In September, we start out with warm air and green grass, by the end of the moth, the trees begin to turn.  

            The cooling air of change can be felt in the church as well.  We restructured The Youth and Upward.  We upgraded the sound in the sanctuary.  We reformatted Wednesday Night Dinner Church.  We see new faces on Wednesday evenings.  We see changing faces in the Praise Team.  We begin the cycle of holidays leading to Christmas and New Year’s Eve. 

            I don’t like change because, as the French poet, Paul Valery says, “Every beginning is a consequence.  Every beginning ends something.”  I grieve the things that end.  

            The youth and Upward volunteer staff heard these words at our transitional meeting, “Before you can begin something new, you have to end what used to be.  Before you can learn a new way of doing things, you have to unlearn the old way. Before you can become a different kind of person, you must let go of your old identity.  So beginnings depend on endings.  The problem is, people don’t like endings… Yet change and endings go hand in hand:  change causes transition, and transition starts with an ending.” William Bridges, Managing Transitions, p. 23.   

            What does not change is Jesus Christ and the love of God. Hebrews 13:8, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”  Grieve what ends.  Celebrate what begins.  Hold on to Jesus.

2019-09-22 A Strange Story

A Strange Story

Luke 16:1-13

Then Jesus said to the disciples, "There was a rich man who had a manager, and charges were brought to him that this man was squandering his property.  So he summoned him and said to him, 'What is this that I hear about you? Give me an accounting of your management, because you cannot be my manager any longer.' Then the manager said to himself, 'What will I do, now that my master is taking the position away from me? I am not strong enough to dig, and I am ashamed to beg. I have decided what to do so that, when I am dismissed as manager, people may welcome me into their homes.' So, summoning his master's debtors one by one, he asked the first, 'How much do you owe my master?' He answered, 'A hundred jugs of olive oil.' He said to him, 'Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it fifty.'

Then he asked another, 'And how much do you owe?' He replied, 'A hundred containers of wheat.' He said to him, 'Take your bill and make it eighty.' And his master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly; for the children of this age are more shrewd in dealing with their own generation than are the children of light. 

And I tell you, make friends for yourselves by means of dishonest wealth so that when it is gone, they may welcome you into the eternal homes. "Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest also in much. If then you have not been faithful with the dishonest wealth, who will entrust to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful with what belongs to another, who will give you what is your own? No slave can serve two masters; for a slave will either hate the one and love the other, or be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.”

            The parable from Luke is a strange story. The parable comes in the context of the three parables of lost things - sheep, coin, son. These were told to an audience which included sinners, tax collectors, and grumbling Pharisees.  Jesus tells the three parables: lost and found sheep, lost and found coin and lost and found son.   After telling the three stories of lost and found, Luke records, “Then Jesus said to his disciples…” (16:1).  The immediate connection between the prodigal son story and this strange story is the rarely used word, “squanders”.  The prodigal son squanders his inheritance.  The manager/ steward is accused of squandering the rich man’s money. Now, we know we are getting a story about the use of wealth.  We also know that we are set up to get a lesson on how to squander wealth. 

            In order to understand this story, you need to know how the economy worked in Jesus day.  Remember that Judea and Galilee are occupied territories of Rome.  Judea is to the south.  Galilee is to the north.   In Jesus’ day, all powerful and wealthy people of occupied Palestine were centered in the south in Jerusalem.  All the farmers and the poor where centered in the northern areas of Galilee.   Rome had two occupation goals:  exploit all the natural resources of occupied territories for the wealth of Rome; exploit all of the labor of the people in occupied territories for the wealth of Rome. Rome accomplished these two goals through a system of taxes.  

            The poor held the natural resources and the labor Rome desired.  Rome taxed the poor leaving the rich to go without being taxed.   The rich folks in the south in Jerusalem would go to the poor in the north and say, “We know you can’t pay your taxes.  We will pay your taxes for you.  All you have to do is to sign over the deed to your property and give us a percentage of your produce.  We will allow you to remain on the land as tenant farmers.”  Under this scheme the rich got richer and poor got poorer. 

            Because the wealthy owners in the south were so hated by the poor in the north they could not go there to collect their percentages.  The rich man in the south would hire mid-level managers or stewards to collect the percentage of the resources.  Barabara Rossing, Working Preacher, “Rich landlords and rulers were loan-sharks, using exorbitant interest rates to amass more land and to disinherit peasants of their family land, in direct violation of biblical covenantal law. The rich man or "lord" (kyrios, v. 3, 8), along with his steward or debt collector, were both exploiting desperate peasants.”

            In this story, the mid-level manager is put on notice because he was not squeezing enough from the farmers.  The manager was caught in the middle between the rich and the poor.  The manager may have worked years for the rich man yet had no security.  He was expendable.  And so, he switches sides, he says to himself, I will arrange things to have friends among the poor.  Note that he still gets a return for the rich land owner while giving a break to the poor. 

            Rossing says, “When he reduced the payments, the steward may have been simply forgiving his own cut of the interest. Or he may have been doing what the law of God commands, namely forgiving all the hidden interest in the contracts. As Richard Horsley describes, "To ingratiate himself with the debtors, he had them change the amount they owed on their bills to exactly the amount they borrowed, eliminating the hidden and prohibited interest." If the rich landlord was not a Gentile, but a Jew (the text does not say), he would know the Torah teaching against interest. The rich man, "suddenly recognizing that he needed at least to appear to be observing covenantal laws, commended his steward."

            Notice that Jesus drives home the point at the end of the parable by naming the wealth of the rich man “dishonest wealth.” Jesus is telling us about the purpose of money in the Kingdom of God.  Money is not the measure of all things.  Love of money makes you improperly value others things.  Love of money causes you to see the landscape and its people as resources to be exploited for short term profits for the people at the top of the economic pyramid.   Everyone and everything is expendable.   In the Kingdom of God, everybody and everything matters and has value.  

            In older translations, the Greek word “Mammon” is kept, where newer translations use “wealth” or “riches.” Mammon is a personification - or even deification - of wealth. Barbara Rossing suggests that “perhaps we need to retain the personified idol named Mammon, as a reminder of how a financial system itself can function as an idol or "religion,"” This idea of naming “Mammon” as the opponent of God reveals the dangerous idolatry that can so easily seep into our relationship with money.

            To worship mammon is to give free reign to profiteering.  The moral code or ethical standard of mammon is to increase wealth without regard.  Jesus teaches that we better learn that money is not the measure of all things.  Wealth is not evil - the worship of wealth is.  Jesus teaches to use money in the service of relationships not relationships in service of money. 

            This “draws from the story (use your wealth), but it counters the story (make friends for yourself). Instead of employing your money to create a group that owe you favors, make friends with your money. Friendship involves commonality and equality, not indebtedness. Halvor Moxnes comments, ‘To “make friends” by “unrighteous mammon,” therefore, was the opposite of enslaving people in need. To “make friends” by giving to those in need had a liberating effect. It meant to put people on the same footing.’” (Charles Cousar, Texts for Preaching, Year C, p. 526)

            The steward uses dishonest money to secure a home (oikos).  To underscore his lesson, Jesus does not promise eternal homes (oikos) in vs 9, rather eternal tents (skenas).  “Jesus does not promise to provide what the unjust steward sought, the stable abode of those who have possessions and security. Rather, Jesus promises the unstable abode of the wanderer, the refugee, and the pilgrim, whose mobility requires the dispossession of goods.” - Scott Bader-Saye, Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary - Feasting on the Word – Year C, Volume 4: Season After Pentecost 2 (Propers 17-Reign of Christ)

            FromThe Fat Pastor blog: “Perhaps the level of confusion that this parable stirs is evidence of how remarkably important it really is.  This one blows our mind, because it seems to go against all of our common understanding of fairness. 

            And that’s just it. The Kingdom of God has little to do with fairness.  It has little to do with keeping proper ledgers and making sure that everyone gets what is their due.  The Kingdom of God is about relationships.  It is about reconciliation.  It is about forgiving our debts, as we forgive our debtors.  It is not an easy story to hear.  It is sometimes an even harder story to live.  It doesn’t make good economic sense.  Jesus had a funny way of not making  sense.

            It doesn’t make sense to plant a weed in a garden.  It doesn’t make sense to ruin a whole vat of flour with some leaven.  It doesn’t make sense to turn your other cheek, throw a party for people that can’t invite you to theirs, leave behind a flock because one sheep strayed, or throw a party for your good-for-nothing son who finally came back home with his tail between his legs.

            It doesn’t make sense that God would come to earth and take on flesh.  It doesn’t make sense that God would claim me as his own, or invite me to the Table of Grace.  It doesn’t make sense that Jesus would do all he could for a people that responded by nailing him to a cross.  It doesn’t make sense that a tomb was empty, or that disciples have been able to experience Christ in the breaking of bread for centuries since he was said to be dead.

            How can you use your wealth your position in this world to build the Kingdom of God?  

            “…  It is a challenge to look at what cancelling debt really looks like.  It is a challenge to take a close look at how I serve wealth over God.  It is a challenge to look at how I spend money, how I save money, and how I treat others.  This parable is a strange one, all right. Maybe that’s how God intended it.”

2019-09-08 Throwing Pots

Throwing Pots

Jeremiah 18:1-11

The Potter and the Clay

The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: ‘Come, go down to the potter’s house, and there I will let you hear my words.’ So I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was working at his wheel. The vessel he was making of clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he reworked it into another vessel, as seemed good to him.

Then the word of the Lord came to me: Can I not do with you, O house of Israel, just as this potter has done? says the Lord. Just like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. At one moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom, that I will pluck up and break down and destroy it, but if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from its evil, I will change my mind about the disaster that I intended to bring on it. And at another moment I may declare concerning a nation or a kingdom that I will build and plant it, but if it does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it. Now, therefore, say to the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem: Thus says the Lord: Look, I am a potter shaping evil against you and devising a plan against you. Turn now, all of you from your evil way, and amend your ways and your doings.

            The image of the Potter is a beautiful one. We see God as divine Potter for the first time in Genesis 2, and that image is repeated many times in scripture, including in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Paul, and also with Jesus, as He heals a blind man with a poultice of clay.   The name Adam, means “clay” or “dirt” animated by God’s breath.  Genesis 2:7, “then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.”  In the Jewish tradition, a mass formed of clay is a golem. Fans of Harry Potter will recall the character by such a name. Golem is a human looking lump of clay with no breath of God or humanity in it. Once God breaths into it, it becomes something more. 

            The best way to understand the metaphor of the potter is to examine clay. When clay is moist, it is moldable. And no matter how dry it gets, if you add water to it, it will be malleable yet again.  All moist clay can be brought to new life, a new shape, a new mission, as long as it remains moist enough for the potter to spin it into a new, revitalized shape.  When a pot gets out of balance or too moist or too dry, it may become wonky. If it’s wonky, the potter has to redeem it, meaning return it to a round and start shaping it again. 

            So what does a potter do?  

On the Wheel

1. Round the Clay.

            To start, the potter rounds the clay.  When I have watched kids playing in a mud puddle they instinctively round mud into a ball before patting it flat.  It’s the same action with the potter.  She rounds the clay before setting it on the wheel. 

2. Center the Clay.

            An important step in throwing a pot is getting the clay centered. Before anything is created of the round of clay, the potter properly centers it on the wheel or it is doomed. If we are all clay and want to avoid the painful crush of going wonky, perhaps we should take some time to learn to get centered first. Center on what matters to Christ.

3. Open the Clay.

            The potter presses into the center of the round of clay to open the clay to begin shaping it.  When God does something new in your heart, God presses into you.  

4. Shape the Clay.

            You can’t force the clay. You let the wheel do its work.  Hands are required to shape, reshape, begin again, refine. The outside conforms to the inside as hands shape the open round of clay into a new form. 

            The potter that Jeremiah studied saved the clay that was not yet suited for his intended purpose and set it aside. Later, after adjusting the wheel and the water and the speed of his spinning, the potter made the clay into a different vessel. Although different it was again a creation that “seemed good to him” (v.4).

            Pottery may be frustrating. Jeremiah pinpoints that moment the potter (God) wants to start over and make the clay into something new and different, so resistant is Israel to God’s way. Israel is wonky, needing redemption. 

            Once the pot is in its final shape, its ready to be removed from the wheel. 

Firing

5. Prepare the Clay. (Trim and Dry)

            The pot is trimmed and removed from the wheel. The potter takes care because this is a delicate process.  The newly formed pot is fragile.  Once trimmed and removed from the wheel, it is set aside to dry. 

6. Transform the Clay (Fire)

            Once satisfactorily dried, the potter places the pot in a kiln and raises the temperature to fire the clay.  It transforms dry clay into a hardened vessel that may be kept and used for years.  Whatever shape the pot is in, becomes permenant.  

            Unfortunately, there are lots of folks who are “hard-fired.” Once your life, your ideas, your hopes, your dreams, your offerings, are “hard-fired,” change is hard. 

            Once “hard-fired,” the potter cannot remold your clay. The kiln that bakes in beauty and goodness and love forever into a creative work of art can also burn hatred and despair and ugliness into a life unwilling to change.

7. Finish the Pot.  (Second Fire - glaze)

            If the new creation survives the first firing, if it does not crack or break in the transformation of the kiln, the potter may paint glaze onto the pot to give it is final finish and beauty.  Once painted with glaze, the pot is fired for a second time. 

Ending Reflection

            Augustine’s famous thought: “O Lord, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they find rest in you.”  God made us for God’s own self.  This story of Jeremiah is a story of the willful disobedience of people of faith. Israel knows its identity in God yet they choose to disobey.  Think of this Christian community of faith as the people of Israel.   In pottery terms, we chose to be wonky. 

            God’s hope is that the people of faith will turn. God intends good for people, but as a response to our disobedience, he devises a new plan. God hopes that this plan will not be implemented. The parable of the potter at the wheel shows that God is hoping things can be fixed.

            “The process of judgment may itself be the remolding of the spoiled clay. The pot will not work in its present shape, so the potter molds it back into a lump of clay and begins to work afresh with it… God is reshaping the blemished clay vessel so that it is right in God’s eye.” (Patrick Miller, New Interpreter’s Bible, v. VI, p. 716).

            Remember the action that God wants for Israel: “If you truly amend your ways and your doings, if you truly act justly with one another, if you do not oppress the alien, the orphan, and the widow, or shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not go after other gods to your own hurt, then I will dwell with you in this place, in the land that I gave of old to your ancestors forever and ever.” (Jeremiah 7:5-7)

            Through the image of the potter, God calls us to allow our lives and our hearts to be reformed for God’s pleasure and purpose.  Like David, let us pray, “Create in me a clean heart, O God.”   Let us turn to Lord and let our “hard-fired” attitudes and prejudices be reworked into a new creation.