As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one” (Romans 3:10)

It’s been a rough year for college football, as scandal after scandal has rocked many of the elite programs around the country. In 2011 alone, Ohio State’s football coach, Jim Tressel, resigned after he was found to have hidden violations from the NCAA, the University of Miami football team was found to have committed numerous violations so heinous that it could lead to the program being shut down, and this past week, Penn State has been under the microscope after it was discovered that one of its assistant coaches had been sexually molesting boys for years, often at the team practice facility, and that school officials, including the head coach Joe Paterno, had done very little to bring the abuse into the light. Now, the Miami scandals were not much of a surprise, given the tawdry history of the program, but the Ohio State and Penn State scandals were shocking precisely because the head coaches of both schools had been held up as models of integrity. Now, sadly, they find their reputations crumbling around them as it became clear that neither man was as he was portrayed to be.
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As I reflected on the 10th anniversary of September 11th in preparation for this Sunday’s worship service, I found myself drawn to passages that looked forward to that day when Jesus would return and set everything right. Passages like Isaiah 2:4:  “He will judge between the nations and will settle disputes for many peoples. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore.” And Revelation 21:3-4:  “And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” It is hard to make sense of a tragedy as terrible as September 11th, but one thing that I believe most people of all religious, political, or national backgrounds can agree upon is that we long for the day when there is no more war, no more death, no more mourning or crying or pain.
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 The Hartford Courant had an interesting article this morning on a fact that should not surprise many of us, which is that the number of Americans who affiliate themselves with no religion has increased significantly over the last two decades, from 8% in 1990 to 15% in 2008.  This group, called the “Nones” by the Trinity College researchers responsible for the study, is made up atheists, agnostics, as well as people who consider themselves spiritual but do not affiliate with any particular religious group. As one person interviewed in the article put it, “I do believe in something, but organized religion has no appeal.”  All in all, this group numbers about 34 million strong.

 I have a few thoughts on this trend, but I would be interested in hearing your thoughts as well.  Read more »

Matthew 6:5-6 – “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”

This Thursday is the National Day of Prayer.  This event has a long history that goes all the way back to the founding of our country, although its official recognition happened more recently in a bill signed in 1952 by Harry Truman.  The White House had occasionally hosted prayer gatherings on this day up until our last President, George W. Bush, who hosted a gathering every year on the first Thursday of May.  These gatherings included the National Day of Prayer Task Force, chaired by Shirley Dobson, wife of Focus on the Family founder James Dobson. 

This past week, the National Day of Prayer has made news as many, including the Interfaith Alliance, have been clamoring for President Obama to support a “National Day of Prayer and Reflection” “that restores and respects our nation’s best values by explicitly inviting clergy from diverse faith traditions to participate equally and fully – especially in events held on government property.”  As they see it, the day had become hijacked by the Religious Right, and represented by Dobson and the Task Force, and the day should instead be more inclusive of other faith traditions.
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This past Sunday I had the chance to check out Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw on the Jesus for President tour as it landed at Clark Elementary School in Hartford.  Right off the bat I could tell this was going to be a different experience – after all, how many nationally known Christian speakers would do a tour stop (and a free one at that) in an inner-city elementary school auditorium?  The point of using Clark School, of course, was to bring this message to the level where Claiborne and Haw live (inner city Philadelphia), where their hosts (Hartford City Mission and Hartford Catholic Worker) live and minister, and, they would probably argue, where Jesus Himself would live if He were a Connecticut resident.
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In This Corner:  King David, author of Psalm 14, written centuries before the birth of Christ, wrote these fighting words:  “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’”  According to the King, rejecting the existence of God is the epitome of foolishness, because it means ultimately living with a false view of reality.

And In This Corner:  Sam Harris, author of Letter to a Christian Nation, which I have been reading this week.  If Harris were to write a Psalm 14 of his own, it would likely read “The fool says in his heart, “There is a God, and I know what He/She/It is like.”  According to Harris’ book, those who believe in God are blinded by their narrow view of the world, have missed the obvious signs that there is no God, and are ultimately living with a false (and dangerous) view of reality.
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In the beginning of the book of Acts in the Bible, there is a fascinating story that takes place on the day of Pentecost, also known as Shavuot, or the Feast of Weeks.  The disciples of Jesus, having recently witnessed the resurrected Jesus ascending to heaven, are waiting in Jerusalem as instructed by Jesus.  As they are together in a certain house, the Holy Spirit descends, each of them is filled with the Spirit of God, and they begin to speak in other languages to the crowd of people who have gathered from all of the surrounding nations to celebrate the holy day.  And after Peter shares with the crowd the message of salvation that is found in Jesus, the writer of Acts records that about 3000 became followers of Jesus that day.  Pretty genius move by God, of course (not that He needs the compliments), to convert 3000 pilgrims who are now able to go back to the countries they came from to spread the gospel. 

What I find amazing is that this story Read more »

As we expose the American Idols – those things besides God that we are tempted to worship, emulate, or believe will save us – that loom over our land, we would be wise to go back to our Founding Fathers in order to be reminded of the values upon which our country was established.  Remember, of course, these famous words from the Declaration of Independence:  We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.  Now, I’m not much of a history buff, but I find it interesting that they considered the pursuit of happiness to be a God-given right for each individual.  Whatever may have prompted them to include that phrase, it has certainly been prophetic, as I look around at a culture doing all it can to entertain me and make me happy.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Idol #4 – the Idol of Personal Pleasure.  Let us all stand for its anthem, as sung by Sheryl Crow:  “If it makes you happy, it can’t be that bad.”
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There are approximately 1.61 billion Muslims in the world today.
I believe that there are many good and beautiful things in the religion of Islam.
I believe that there are a lot of good people who are Muslim.
I also believe that Muslims are wrong in their belief that Jesus was just a man and not God incarnate, and that Muhammed is the last and greatest prophet.

(Intolerance Alert!!!  Intolerance Alert!!!)
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I want you to try an experiment with me for a minute.  Think about all of the celebrities that are constantly parading across our TV screens, magazines, and newspapers these days – Brad & Angelina, Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, Johnny Depp, and so on – and answer me these two questions:  Firstly, do you know more about them than you do about your next door neighbors?  And secondly, has knowing the details of their lives added even the smallest bit of value to your life? 

We’re in the third week of series I’m calling “American Idols,” where I’m attempting to unmask the idols in our culture – things other than God that we are tempted to worship, emulate, or believe will save us – and discuss how they have distorted our understanding of the gospel and what it means to follow Jesus.  Idol #1 was the Idol of consumerism, with the Temple of the Mall as its place of worship.  This week’s Idol is the Idol of celebrity, and here is one of its many sacred texts:
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