Demythologizing Esther

Esther is a great story of redemption - one that comes about in a great crisis forced upon Esther. But, we often re-tell it as a Christian fairy-tale - one that equates her beauty with goodness (just like all fairy-tales seem to do).

Of the course, the storyline framework of "pretty girl" equals the "good girl" and star of the story has all kinds of problems, especially if you think about the consequences on young girls. The truth is that Esther enters (some may read it as she is coerced into entering) a contest that is not about simply being the prettiest or with the best homemaking skills. The contest centers on a series of comparative sexual performances for the Persian monarch.

Martyrs and the Baffling Loss of Framework

The news of twenty-one Coptic Christians beheaded on a Libyan beach by Islamic radicals proclaiming their allegiance to ISIS is heartbreaking.

It is also deeply troubling that, in the desire to remove religion from the discussion, the White House comment lamenting the murders only designated those beheaded on the beach in Libya as "Egyptian citizens." No mention of any religion whatsoever. Since these twenty-one were slain, according to their murderers, because they were among the "crusaders," the omission is baffling.

Apparently the whole world, without their knowledge of consent, has been unilaterally assumed to embrace the politely privatized religious assumptions of western Europe and the U.S. It seems that many in the west have no framework to grasp any reality where religion might be more central to a person's primary identity than family, tribe, nation-state or ideology. This loss of framework has left many without the grammar to comprehend words being shouted right at them.

For a much clearer voice, here is a link to the reaction of Pope Francis: 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0-FPpvkIV4

I Don't Believe in a Hill Called Mount Calvary

While criticism of contemporary worship music is sometimes fully justified, I'm baffled that older gospel songs seem insulated from such scrutiny.  The truth is hymns, gospel songs, and contemporary worship music all have their fair share of either shallow, silly or even wholly heretical (a phonetic oxymoron) lyrics.

We ought to stop longing for A Mansion over the Hilltop.  In 1611 the word "mansion" simply meant a place to live.  The actual idea in John 14:1-2 is clearly the "Father's house" has more than enough room for everyone.  The gospel song seems to suggest heaven is going to be a land of millions of eternal antebellum southern plantations.  I would note this is an image of heaven many black Christians, for some reason, find less than appealing.  

Racism and Dressing Up for Church

As the title suggests, this post will explore dressing up for Sunday worship and racism. Racism, I need to acknowledge at the outset, may not be exactly the right word, particularly if someone is thinking about a consciously malicious way of looking at people based on ethnicity or skin color. Myopic cultural provincialism would actually have been a better description. But, then again, would you have read the post even this far if I stuck those words in the title? While it may start to sound like I’m writing about proper clothing for Sunday worship, bear with me to the end and you’ll find the point I want to make is considerably more important than clothing for church.

In an undergraduate course on Christian worship, I was concluding the unit examining the history and traditions of African-American worship in the United States. Since the students had seen the videos and pictures, my question was, “So, why do predominately black churches dress up for Sunday worship?”

Does God Care about Ritualistic Worship?

Stephen Lawson* oversees a course in the history of Christian worship for The Consortium for Christian Online Education.  A student recently asked a good question in an online forum that many evangelicals ask.  The question, and Stephen's response, are worth reading.

A student's question:

Does ritualistic worship matter to God?  I realize that it may matter to some men or women, but does God really even care about the ritualistic parts of our worship of Him?

Ode to Lent

A reflective and candid meditation for the season....

I pause now and want to lament
The bad poetry I have written for lent
But rhyming is just so tempting
And easier than actually repenting

                                    - Tom Lawson, 2014

Monkeying with History

First, I do apologize for getting off topic.  This isn't about worship.

But, I just finished reading over yet another evaluation of the recent televised debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham.

It was one of several reviews I have read recently that bring up the specter of the Scopes trial (the so-called "monkey trial").  In this case, the reviewer (somewhat begrudgingly) said that at least Ken Ham was better informed than the hapless William Jennings Bryan when confounded by brilliant Clarence Darrow about the earth being created in just six days.

Rhythm

Sometimes the message might be when there is no message.

It is a shame Protestants, especially Evangelicals, give little thought to the liturgical seasons. The reality is that advent is four weeks of anticipation. A little four-week metaphor on longing for what has not yet happened. And, yes, it does not end with Christmas. But, for nearly 80% of the world's believers, it does not end there.

Epiphany, associated with the visit of the magi, as well as the baptism of the adult Jesus in the Jordan River by John, is on January 6. In the Orthodox tradition, Christmas falls on our calendar date January 7. But, even those are not the end.

World Without End: Unpacking a Perplexing Lyric

Try as I might, it's hard not to be a teacher.  So, with apologies for giving way to the pedantic, I'd like to help explain a perplexing phrase used by many churches in one of the oldest praise songs still is wide use today.

While some evangelicals may not know it, a large number of believers regularly sing a doxology called the Gloria Patri:

Glory be to the Father,

 And to the Son,

And to the Holy Ghost.

 As it was in the beginning,

Is now and ever shall be,

World without end. 

Amen.  Amen.

(Traditional musical setting by Cynthia Clawson)

The problem comes from the second to the last line.

When Worship Leaders Worship: A Call for Comments

Over the next several months I will be involved in conversations with several local worship leaders (whether called worship pastors or ministers or whatever).  A part of the conversation will be to dialogue about our worship needs.  Is the worship they lead on Sundays enough?  If they were able to go to a worship service they had not planned as nothing other than one of the worshipers, what kinds of things would they hope to find in that service?

The Problem with Praise

Amanda was pretty excited to find out her husband, Jack, was reading the new bestselling book in marriage enrichment, A Praise Centered Marriage.  It wasn't that their relationship was bad or anything.  It just wasn't always as good as Amanda had hoped it would be.

Her hopes seemed to all come true  when, that next Tuesday evening, Jack looked at her across the dinner table and said, "You are wonderful.  You are simply the best.  I love everything about you. You fill my life with joy."

What more could a woman want out of a marriage?  At least, that's what Amanda thought six months ago when the process started that would eventually ruin their marriage. 

Meditations on the Typewriter

  Like some ancient creature that does not know it
is long extinct, the typewriter plods along.  Once
 the cutting edge of technology, the MacBook Pro of
 some past age, it stands now only as a curiosity -
 a relic of forgotten years.

 Yet, when animated by human flesh and muscle, the
keys still miraculously snap shapes on to blank pages -
Preserving thought and idea for some future mind not
yet born to read and ponder.

 All the trinkets of the now, with their bright pro-
mise of a better world, have not deepened the mind or
 made tender the human heart… although now our rage
and violence can be communicated at light speed to
 thousands of others who live vicariously through light
emitting diodes.

 But still, somewhere, hands guide ink over paper or
push keys that force metal forms over inky ribbons.  Words,
at times, need to be slowed . . . backspaced . . .
 corrected . . . easing out in a trickle, not a flood.

Slow us down, O Lord.  To write and read and live deeply
may be better than to live quickly.  Too many words may
 be worse than none at all.

 May the value of words not be measured by volume, but
 by their depth.

-Tom Lawson