A Holy Week Meditation

What does it mean to be "innocent?" The dictionary says that to be innocent one must be "free from guilt or sin especially through lack of knowledge of evil." With that in mind who amongst us is innocent?

It's funny that when you go to a court of law everyone talks about their innocence. But no one is innocent. That is why if you win a criminal court case you're found "not guilty" rather than innocent. We are all guilty of something. To be found "not guilty" in court just means that you don't have to pay the price for the wrongs you have done.

The only person in the Bible who is said to be truly "not guilty" and innocent from birth is Jesus Christ. In Isaiah 50 the prophet prophecies about the innocent Jesus standing in front of His accusers during the Passion. Jesus asks, "...who will declare me guilty?" In St. Matthew's Gospel narrative of the Passion, Pilate's wife is said to have dreamt about Jesus and she warns her husband to "have nothing to do with that innocent man..." Even Pilate, who examined Jesus at His trial asks the crowd, "...what evil has He done?" Obviously the answer to the question is "nothing." Jesus never has nor ever will do anything wrong. He has no sin and He has no guilt. He is innocent. But we are guilty. Pilate was guilty of murdering Jesus even though he proclaimed himself innocent of His blood. The crowd was guilty. The Pharisees were guilty. We are all guilty. Think of every sin you have ever committed as a hammer blow to the nails that hung an innocent Man on the cross.

But even as human beings condemned Him to the cross He was using the cross to proclaim us "not guilty." Even as our sin murdered Him He was using His death to set us free from the punishment of sin, and as St. Paul tells us, that punishment is death. Christ chose to die in our place. He died a horrible, gruesome, physical death so that we wouldn't have to die spiritually.

Do you understand that Jesus, the One Who died for you, is also the One Who will prosecute you in the court of Heaven. God the Father will be the Judge and He will hear your case. If you have been baptized into the Faith Jesus will stand before the Great White Throne and say these words, "Your Honor, I do not wish to prosecute this person. They're Mine and I've already paid the price for their sin." Then the Great Judge will say, "Not guilty! You're free!" That is what the Passion of Christ is all about. The Prosecutor of your soul died in your place. He took your punishment so that the Great Judge would declare you "Not Guilty."

Let our tongues sing His praise for what He has done for us. How could we do anything less?

Fr. Rick

Come On In, The Water's Fine

This is the second chapter of my book in progress on my pastoral ministry.

Enon Church is a historic church. Founded in 1760 as an independent congregation it eventually became a part of the fledgling Methodist movement that had migrated from Georgia. It had belonged to the Wesleyan Methodist connection, the Methodist Episcopal Church, the Methodist Episcopal Church (South), and eventually the Southern Methodist Church. The original building and cemetary were located on what is now the Fort Jackson Army Training Facility. The U.S. government moved the congregation before the outbreak of World War II. The log cabin church building is gone now, but the cemetary is still there and maintained by the Department of the Army.

The new building was built on Percival Road in Columbia, South Carolina in 1948. A parsonage was added in 1950. It hasn't changed much since it was built. Some new carpet, vinyl siding, and an electric sign are about the only updates to the tired old building. The parsonage remains virtually unchanged.

This was the ship that I had been called to captain. She was weather beaten and worn. Her crew was undisciplined and spiritually starved. The task ahead was truly daunting, but I was too immature to realize it at the time. If it hadn't been for the grace of God the ship would have sunk years ago with all souls aboard lost.

My first year contract with Enon was, believe it or not, an improvement on the arrangement I had with Faith Community Church. At Faith Church I literally lived in the church and paid rent on it. I was paid 20% of the weekly offering as my salary. The average offering was $25.00 a week. You can do the math. No one could accuse me of being an overpaid pastor. At Enon I was given $50.00 a week plus the use of the parsonage. All utilities were paid by the church, except for the phone bill. I thought I had died and gone to heaven!

The congregation was made up of mostly elderly couples and miltary retirees. There were a few young adults and virtually no children. A Sunday School program was in place but it was poorly attended. There were three services during the week: Sunday morning, Sunday evening, and Wednesday evening prayer service. Enon's programs were all smoke and mirrors. A Sunday School existed on paper, but no one taught or attended it. The first Sunday morning service I conducted was attended by seven people although there were over a hundred people listed on the membership rolls. The Sunday evening service was little more than a song fest. The Wednesday night prayer service consisted of conversation and very little praying. Enon Church looked good on paper, but the reality was drastically different.

Enon had a lot of things going for it; history, location, facilities, etc. Unfortunately she was lacking one thing - the Spirit of the living God! A plan was needed to salvage what was left of this congregation. The problem was that I didn't have one. I had very little experience in these matters. The last church I had pastored folded like a piece of paper. What formal education I had was all theological. I had recieved no formal education in running a church. I had no one to turn to but God Himself. Thankfully God was listening and answering when I cried out to Him for guidance.

Before entering the ministry I had been the chief of a small, rural police department. God revealed to me that building a church was a lot like building a police department. First, goals must be set. People need a vision, a dream, something to strive for. So with this in mind I announced to the congregation that we were going to have at least 50 people in attendance on Sunday mornings before my first anniversary as pastor. Secondly, God showed me that the people needed to be trained in order to obtain their goals. An ongoing program of systematic training needed to be instituted in order to sustain the membership. Thirdly, the group needed to tap into their available resources in order to maximize efficiency.

With these three things in mind I formulated a plan of attack. I began by preaching expository sermons from the pulpit. On Sunday evenings I held classes on Church doctrine and history. On Wednesdays we formulated a prayer list and then we actually prayed. Sunday School classes were consolidated so that only the most experienced were teaching. On top of that each Sunday School class was given the task of contacting inactive members in hopes of bringing them back to the church.

With God's help the plan worked. By my first anniversary at Enon we had an average attendance of 55 on Sunday mornings. People were being converted and baptized. Sunday School classes began to swell. As an extra bonus the weekly collections even went up. Life was good at Enon, at least for the moment.

Heresy: The Problem With The Truth

Do you know what the problem with the truth is? Sometimes it hurts! We Christians sometimes skirt the truth or just flat out lie about it so as not to offend anyone. This is just wrong. The prophets, apostles, martyrs, and Our Lord died for the truth. What makes us think that we should do any less if need be.

I want to believe that everyone is inherently good. The truth is that they're not. I want to believe that the world is a safe place to live. The truth is that it is not. I want to believe that my government has my best interest at heart. The truth is that it doesn't. I also want to believe that everyone will go to Heaven when they die. The truth is that they won't.

Heresy is defined as a system of thought which contradicts true doctrine. One of the most popular heresies during the course of Church history has been Universalism. Universalism is the false doctrine that teaches that everyone on the earth has been redeemed by Christ and will go to Heaven. This doctrine has reared its ugly head once again in evangelical circles. The popular evangelical minister from Michigan, Rob Bell, has just released a book entitled Love Wins. In this book Bell expouses Universalism.

Over the years I have studied Universalism and its claims. I will be the first to profess that the claims are attractive. I have looked at all of the Scriptures related to the topic and used as a defense by adherents of this heresy and I find them wanting. Taken in context the verses claimed to substantiate Universalism actually refute it.

The key argument of evangelical universalism is that Christ's love is so great for all of mankind that He would not send anyone to Hell. I agree with this statement, but I must place it in its proper context. Jesus' love is so great that He would never send anyone to Hell. And He doesn't. He became one of us to keep us from going to Hell. He preached about Hell so that we wouldn't want to go there. He suffered an agonizing death to keep us out of Hell. He rose from the grave and conquered death so that we wouldn't have to go to Hell. Jesus doesn't want anyone to go to Hell! But He won't stop us if that's where we choose to spend eternity.

We are creatures created in the imagio Dei, the image of God. Thus we are creatures with free will. God never, ever supercedes our free will. He has done everything He can to keep us from Hell. The choice is ours. The way out is there. All we have to do is make the right choice. Hell was not created for human beings. It was created for the demonic hoard who followed Satan in the rebellion against God. But when human beings choose Satan over God they also choose to dwell where Satan will abide for eternity.

Sometimes the truth hurts, but this is the truth. Some of you will get angry with me for telling you the truth, but so be it. My job as a priest is not to make you feel good. My job is to tell you the truth.

May God enlighten those blinded by heresy and bring them back to the truth. My God open the eyes of those led astray by false prophets and may they see them for what they really are. And may God help you to see the Truth, who is Jesus Christ, and follow Him to eternal bliss, rather than following Satan to eternal perdition. Amen.

Fr. Rick

Where is the Justice?

I'm angry as hell! I'm also saddened beyond words. Last night a friend of my family, a legal Korean immigrant, was murdered during an armed robbery at his restaurant. Here was a man who came to America to make a better life for his family and worked hard to do so. He was an honest man who cared deeply for his family, friends and customers. And now he is dead because some thug thought his life was worth less than a few dollars.

Last Sunday I preached on the Gospel lesson from St. Matthew's Gospel where Jesus told the disciples to "turn the other cheek." Kind of ironic since it is hard to turn the other cheek to a bullet fired at you point blank. Did Jesus really mean what He said? Was He out of touch with reality?

In that same Gospel Jesus quoted the Old Testament law of "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." Many of my brethren have construed this passage as a repudiation of that law. But I told my parishioners that this law is still in effect. Jesus told us not to take revenge for personal injuries, but that the law of "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" was not meant for us to enforce. That law was given to the judges of Israel as a restraint against unjust punishment of those brought before the court. "Vengeance is Mine," says God and justice is in the hands of the goverment according to Saint Paul. If an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth are equitable, then so is a life for a life.

As I read the online newspaper article about my friend's death people were already leaving comments about the injustice of the death penalty. I must confess to you that I am sick and tired of hearing mamby-pamby wusses whining about the injustices of the death penalty. I'm almost certain that if they had a gun shoved in their faces or had a close loved one murdered they would change their opinions. It is wonderful to be so idealistic about life when you live in a bubble. But in the nitty-gritty world of real life things are a little different.

Now I realize that I'm probably not sounding very "pious" or priest-like for some of your sensibilities, but, quite frankly, I don't care! I've been a cop for twenty-five years and a minister for twenty. I think I have a perspective on life that most people will never have the opportunity to have. I haven't had the luxury of living with my head in the clouds. I've had to live my life in the muck and mire of the trenches. But I think some of my Christian friends would be shocked to hear that this is where Jesus lived His life as well. Jesus didn't hang out studying theology at the Temple, synagogue, or rabbinical school. He walked the mean streets and went to hostile cities. He was a "dead man walking." He knew He was going to be murdered and yet He kept on walking headlong into danger.

So when Jesus tells us to turn the other cheek He understood full well the realities of this world. He knew that we live in a harsh, hateful and cruel world. He also knew that if we tried to avenge all the wrongs done to us we would destroy ourselves by becoming the evil that we seek to destroy. So He tells us to forgive the wrongs that are done to us, but He never said that we should not seek and expect justice to be done. As a matter of fact the Bible commands us to do justice. So how do we reconcile the two? By turning matters of justice over to the government. By allowing the government to fulfill their biblical mandate to execute justice at the edge of a sword. That means that Jesus not only believed in the death penalty, He mandated it!

The thug that murdered my friend had better be thankful that I am a Christian. If I weren't I can assure that vengeance would be mine! But I will leave that to God and the government. I have my biblical duty and so does the government. As a proponent of justice I expect them to find the person who did this, put them in jail, prosecute them, and then place a needle in their arm, and watch them die. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a life for a life.

I pray for the soul of my friend. I pray for the soul of the person who commited this heinous act. And I pray that justice will be done according to the Word of the Lord. When the murderer is dead, then justice will have been done.

Forgive me, Lord, for the anger I feel. Only You can take away the anger and the hurt. Be with the family of the victim. Be with the police who seek to stop this person from harming anyone else. And Lord, be with the judges who will deal with this person. May they seek Your wisdom and may they do Your will. Amen.

"For I, the Lord, love justice; I hate robbery..." (Isaiah 61:8)

Fr. Rick

Synergy

The dictionary says that synergy is "two or more agents working together to produce a result not obtainable by any of the agents independently." The word synergy comes from the Greek word synergoi which is found in 1 Corinthians 3:9, "For we are God's fellow workers..."

Acetaminophen, aspirin, and caffeine are all used to eliminate headaches. But if you put the three of them together in the right combination they can wipe out a headache faster and more efficiently than any of them can do individually. That is synergy. In the business world we know that teamwork will provide an overall better result than if each person was working toward the same goal individually. That is synergy.

In the Church Jesus himself told us that where two or three are gathered together in His Name, He will be there with us. That is synergy. We also know that when the priest consecrates the elements of bread and wine they become for us the Body and Blood of Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. That is synergy.

When we come together with the common purpose of loving God and glorifying Him we have become his fellow workers (synergoi) in the redemption of the world. Christ made the sacrifice, but we bear witness to that sacrifice. We can bear witness alone, but there is more power when do it corporately. We can pray alone, but there is more power when we do it corporately.

We need to set aside our individual agendas and seek out this synergy that comes through a whole-hearted devotion to Jesus Christ. God wants us to be His fellow workers. Are we willing to accept His offer?

Fr. Rick

Silence

I love silence. What a precious commodity it is. Have you ever stopped and tried to enjoy the silence only to have it intruded upon by the whirling of an air unit, the wail of a siren, the roar of a jet flying above? Silence is hard to find. And yet silence is essential for the health of the soul.

God calls us to silence. He tells us to be still in order to know who He truly is as God. The prophets of old wandered in the deserts to find silence. Jesus retreated to the desert and to the mountain tops to find it. The monks have retreated to the deserts, islands and monasteries in search of it.

As a modern monastic I can't always go to the desert (not too many of those in South Carolina!) or to the mountain top to seek out the silence of God. But I can seek it out in my car, my home, my walk through the woods. In a world consumed by the chaos of noise we must be intentional in our search for silence. Turn off the car stereo and meditate upon God. Get up early in the morning and leave the television off. Walk through the woods alone and leave the IPod at home.

I am a morning person. I wake early so that I can pray the Morning Office, read the Scriptures, and read religious literature. All of that is well and good, but my favorite part of the morning is sitting in a quiet house, or on my quiet patio, and listening to God speak. I hear God in the chirping of the birds. I see God in the twinkling stars. I feel God as I sit alone with Him and the gentle breeze caresses my cheek.

The Eastern monks began using the Jesus prayer to center their thoughts and then listened for the voice of God: "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on me a sinner." By calling upon our Savior, acknowledging who He is, and asking for His mercy, we are opening up ourselves to the Mystery that is God and seeking the divine mercy that must come through Him. Jesus himself said that if we seek Him we will find Him. That is a promise. The Apostle James echoed this thought when he said that if we draw near to God He will draw near to us.

So what are you waiting for? Turn off the stereo, shut off the TV, and get to work listening for God to speak to you. Be still and know that He is God.

Getting My Feet Wet

This year I will celebrate my 20th year of pastoral ministry. A few years ago I began making some notes on my early years in ministry with the thought of writing a book about my adventures. This is the first chapter of that book. I hope you enjoy. Fr. Rick

"Peter answered him and said, 'Lord, if it be thou, bid me to come unto thee on the water.' And He said, 'Come.' (Matthew 14:28-29a)

When I felt called to enter the ministry I had visions of grandeur. I envisioned myself standing behind a large, oak pulpit with a Bible the size of the I.R.S. tax code and a congregation of thousands. I imagined a huge pipe organ pumping out Bach preludes and processionals with dozens of people, banners, and crosses. I could see the nimbus encircling my head as the light of glory shone around me.

What I could not envision was the reality. The reality was the living room of a rented house that was converted into a sanctuary every Sunday. The reality was a wobbly lectern built by my step-father from some scraps of wood found in his workshop. The reality was an electric keyboard purchased by my grandmother and played by my wife. The reality was a 100 watt light bulb hung from the ceiling fan over the makeshift pulpit.

The first church I pastored was made up of a few family members and friends from the neighborhood surrounding Fort Jackson, South Carolina. We named it Faith Community Church. "Faith" because that was definitely what we started on! "Community" because we were located in the heart of the Drexel Lakes community. And "Church" because, even though there were only twelve of us, Jesus said that we qualified by having more than the pre-requisite "two of three gathered" to worship Him.

The adventure lasted almost a year. During that time we had several conversions, several baptisms (held at a neighborhood Baptist church), and a wedding which was held at a local Methodist church to accommodate the crowd. I was also ordained at this church. My father, who was a Baptist minister, the Baptist minister who married my wife and I, and my former police chaplain made up my ordination council. These were the high points of my tenure as pastor of Faith Community Church.

The low points were many. The death of my grandmother, and the subsequent funeral, nearly devastated me both emotionally and spiritually. The lack of money devastated me financially. And because of all of this my family life was less that idealistic. Within a year it was all over. Faith Community Church was no more.

But there was a glimmer of hope over the horizon. A small Southern Methodist congregation just down the street from Faith Church was looking for a pastor. I sent them a resume' and made some phone calls and within a week I met with the pastoral search committee at Enon Southern Methodist Church. A month later I was standing behind the pulpit as I began a new journey at the helm of a new church.