Last night I passed my last test on the way to getting my Coast Guard Captain’s license. I’m officially waiting for my paper work to be processed but until them it has occurred to me there we’re a few questions I didn’t ask my instructor.

1. Since I’m a minister in the state of Texas and a Captain in the Coast Guard does this mean I can perform a marriage at sea?

2. If I forget to put the plugs in my boat and it starts to sink do I have to go down with it?

3. Do I have to wear one of those funny hats Captains wear?

4. Does anyone have to salute me? (I really hope my wife does but I’m guessing that’s not the case.)

5. Where do I get that accent that Sean Connery had on The Hunt For Red October? (All captains need an accent)

6. Can I make some one walk the plank?

7. Do I get a parrot to sit on my shoulder?

8. Do I have to use the term arrrrrrrrrrrgh matey and if so how often?

9. How do I acquire a treasure to bury and if I get one, do I have to bury it?

10. Do I have to wear a patch over one eye and if so which one? Could I switch back and forth each day?

I’m glad its over and I'm glad to have achieved the rank, but I won’t miss the work. It’s been to long since I was in school and I know now I really don’t want to go back. Not if I have to pass.

Doctrine II

I spent some time with a friend last week who is getting ready to go back to school for a Master in Divinity. We had a great time discussing reading material, Greek tenses and all the stuff that comes with this territory. On one level I feel sorry for him and on the other I envy him. He’s about to enter a world full of questions and very few answers.

With this in mind I want to return to our discussion on doctrine. Theology has been described as faith seeking understanding. We seek to understand an infinite God with our finite abilities. This means we’re not just capable of error but guaranteed of it. Whatever understanding I come to today is still open to discussion thought and debate tomorrow.

If anything I believe is possibly going to change in the future how am I to deal with those who disagree with my positions? In fact we could put the question even more simply; why should anyone believe anything at all.

The fact is I do believe some things. I do believe Jesus is the Christ, the promised one and the hope of my salvation. Past this I’m very willing to discuss just about anything. People will have different views on baptism, what is and is not sin, what is faithfulness and a myriad of other things. While I may or may not be convinced to change my position on any of these subjects I feel compelled to offer those who believe differently the right hand of fellowship if we can agree on Jesus.

I think this means that what we believe is important is not ultimate until we come to the person of Christ.

I’m bummed. Tonight my wife and I along with a few others will serve for the last time at the Mission of Hope. This is a church/kitchen/outreach on the wrong side of town. Over the last few years we’ve spent Tuesday nights serving meals to the homeless and down and out. This Friday the mission will stop feeding due to lack of financial support.

I know there are plenty of other places to serve but I’ve become attached to this particular place and people. These Tuesday nights have help keep me grounded. I get to see places people and problems I’m not familiar with. To be honest this place has played a large roll in changing the way I look at almost everything from politics to church.

These people will still have food to eat and a place to worship but I won’t have a place to be a part of it, for while at least. I’d like to say I’m the one who will suffer the loss but that would sound unbelievably trite. I’m just going to miss these Tuesday nights.

Doctrine I

Having been raised in the American Restoration movement and firmly entrenched in the importance of, truth of, and power of scripture this may seem like a weird question but here goes. How important is doctrine?

If Jesus is the center point, foundation, the beginning and end of our faith, how important is the other stuff? Is what I believe outside of Jesus really important and if so just how important is it? Is it worth dividing a church over? Is it worth leaving a church over? Is it worth fighting about?

In my preaching career I’ve received more complaint and argument over two statements I’ve made then every thing else put together. The first is, Jesus is God. I won’t take the time to lay out my understanding of the text here but this is what I believe. The second is that humans are broken and without hope. We are not almost good enough and God makes up the difference. Drowning in sin we are hopelessly lost and have nothing to offer God in return for his Grace.

Both of these are doctrinal positions. The first one I will not budge on. The second one I’m willing not only to talk, but to let you see it differently if you choose. Are either of these doctrinal positions worth fighting about and if so why? The first position in my opinion is because it has to do with how we understand who Jesus is. The second isn’t because it doesn’t affect our understanding of Jesus.

Whatever the case we are going to have to decide what hills were going to die on. I just hope there are fewer hills in the future then there have been in the past.

Last year my wife and I celebrated our 25^th anniversary by taking a cruise. While on the cruise we met a wonderful couple and spent a lot of time together. We talked a lot about family, friends, work and all the other things we had in common. We also talked a lot about church and God. Seems this couple had some bad experiences with a church just like most of us have.

Why is it that the place that should be the safest place in our live ends up doing the most damage? This is not exclusively the realm of the church. Families do horrible things to their members when the family should be a safe place. Still my thoughts revolve around the church.

I know the first response is usually the church is full of broken people and broken people tend to hurt each other. I’ll be the first to agree but this doesn’t really address the question.

The fundamental question here is what is the church? Is the church a hospital for sinners, a recovery group for sinners, a place to become better people, have better marriages, be better parents or is it something totally different. Is the church a place where we call the lost to join us? Is the church a place to experience and share the grace of God? I tend to think if we can answer the second question about purpose, we might understand the first question about hurting people.

I’ve been getting ready to preach on community for quite a few months now. One of the things I do is any note, article, quote or idea having anything to do with community gets thrown in a folder. As I was going through the folder today I came across a reference from my niece’s blog. Here’s part of it.

Robert Fulghum tells a story about Alexander Papaderos, a Greek man who worked to heal the hurts and hatred between the Germans and the Cretans, wounds which have existed since WWII, when the Nazis invaded the island of Crete and were met by villagers wielding kitchen knives and hay scythes. The retribution by the Germans was horrible, and whole villages were lined up and shot for assaulting Hitler’s finest troops.

Papaderos, a native of Crete, has established an institute to heal the wounds of war on the site of those horrible events. Once, Fulghum got the chance to ask him if he knew the meaning of life. He tells it this way:

Papaderos held up his hand and stilled the room and looked at me for a long time, asking with his eyes if I was serious and seeing from my eyes that I was. “I will answer your question.”

Taking his wallet out of his hip pocket, he fished into a leather billfold and brought out a very small round mirror, about the size of a quarter.

And what he said went like this:

“When I was a small child, during the war, we were very poor and we lived in a remote village. One day, on the road, I found the broken pieces of a mirror. A German motorcycle had been wrecked in that place.

“I tried to find all the pieces and put them together, but it was not possible, so I kept only the largest piece. This one. And by scratching it on a stone I made it round. I began to play with it as a toy and became fascinated by the fact that I could reflect light into dark places where the sun would never shine—in deep holes and crevices and dark closets. It became a game for me to get light into the most inaccessible places I could find.

“I kept the little mirror, and as I went about my growing up, I would take it out in idle moments and continue the challenge of the game. As I became a man, I grew to understand that this was not just a child’s game but a metaphor for what I might do with my life. I came to understand that I am not the light or the source of the light. But light—truth, understanding, knowledge—is there, and it will only shine in many dark places if I reflect it.

“I am a fragment of a mirror whose whole design and shape I do not know. Nevertheless, with what I have I can reflect light into the dark places of this world—into the black places in the hearts of men—and change some things in some people. Perhaps others may see and do likewise. This is what I am about. This is the meaning of my life.”

And then he took his small mirror and, holding it carefully, caught the bright rays of daylight streaming through the window and reflected them onto my face and onto my hands folded on the desk.

This is a great concept. We’re all part of a broken mirror and the more we come into community the more the mirror gets put back together.

Captains Class Part II

A week in The Coast Guard Six Pack class was enough to remind why I never really liked school. School was never this bad but there are similarities. For seven days I spent 8 hours in class and then was supposed to go home and study. The last two days I took a test at the end of the day over the material we just covered.

I still don’t like school.

While I enjoy learning the idea of a test never appealed to me. I failed the last test in this course and will have to go back and take it again. While I have several valid excuses for my failure the bottom line is I vapor locked on this baby; read the first question and my brain totally shut down.

I still don’t like school.

What I did learn this weekend is I don’t do to well under pressure. Pressure tends to make me act like a cat trapped in a room full of German Shepherds. In my mind I’m bouncing off the walls and never seem to get anywhere. There is always this set of huge set of white teeth about to take my head off and that just doesn’t inspire me to a great performance.

Last night I watched a documentary, (If a documentary can be about a baseball game) about Kirk Gibson’s homerun that beat the A’s in the first game of the World Series. Gibson had two bum knees that were so bad he couldn’t walk out to be announced at the beginning of the game. He sat on the bench for 8 innings and then decided he could pinch hit. He warmed up and in the ninth inning decided he’d go out and do something great. Sure enough he wound up with a three, two count and hit the next pitch out of the park. Here’s a guy who loves pressure.

I wish I were like that but I’m not.

I still don’t like school.

I’m glad God’s not giving test.

I’m home at last. I took five days one week and two days the next to get my Capitan’s license. This is a Coast Guard regulation for any one who takes paying customers on a boat. While the class was challenging and full of some great information it was the people who made the time worthwhile.

Our teacher, Capitan Bennie, was a joy. A former minister now retired who teaches this course, host an outdoor radio show and fish’s tournaments. By the end of the week Captain Bennie could barely teach because he was laughing so much. You gotta love a laughing teacher.

My table mate Russ, who is one of the finest men I have ever met. Confident, quiet and a joy to learn with. Russ works part of the year doing engineering work and the rest of the year he runs his fishing camp in Alaska. There are not too many folks in this world who know what they want, and just do it. Russ was a breath of fresh air.

Lee, who has fished all over the world was worth the price of admission. His stories and sidebars kept me in stitches.

My Sunday night dinner partner whose name I’ll with hold reminded me about life. I was honored to hear about his daughter’s battle with a terrible disease. I was reminded that we are all people and we all have a story.

Drew who helped me study Tuesday afternoon and had the confidence in me to get me to test. Sorry dude, I failed the test Tuesday night but I’ll get it next week.

There were 7 other guys who I could write about but won’t. Each of them was a joy.

As a minister I seem to be trapped with good church folks and rarely get to experience folks who aren’t church people. I’ve got to say the experience was exhilarating. Now good Church people are a joy also but this was a refresher course for me. Jesus moved among the lost, the worldly and the every day people.

I’ve got to do more of that.

It’s been awhile since I posted. I spent the last week in Houston testing for my Captain’s license. My school days are way in the rear view mirror so this has been a real challenge. It’s good to be home and back to a normal routine. I’ll write about the experience next week when I settle in.