Spiritual and Religous

Sermon from 02/07/10 Sorry it has taken so long to put this up.

When I was younger I used to spend hours talking to the trees. I would sit and listen as the wind blow through the branches and I could imagine these noble plants imparting their wisdom upon me. After all they had been there before I was born and in all likelihood will still be there long after I’m gone. I felt connected, connected to the trees, connected with the earth, and most importantly connected to the creator of all of us.
Sadly, it has been a long time sense I have spent time with the trees and the reality is I’m coming to realize that I need to reconnect. You see that time listening in the quiet hearing the wind through the trees was truly a spiritual discipline that grounded me and routed me in connection to God and to the life that was all around me.
We are a people in desperate need of connection. Because we do not connect with other people we see violence, hatred, and indifference that degrades and strips humanity from ourselves and others. Because we are not connected with the earth we see climate change, extinction of species and loss of ecosystems that threatens life itself. Because we are not connected to God religion is used to draw circles of exclusion, to cause pain and heartache, instead of being the life giving, reconciling force that it can and should be.
There is a real want in our world to connect to something deeper, to be a part of more than ourselves. And yet for many they have been disenfranchised by organized religion, seeing it not as a place where life can be found and that connection can be nourished and grown, but rather as a place of rules and dogmas that get in the way of that connection, that spirituality. (recycle your faith video).
I would imagine that for many in this room that the story in the video connects in some way if not in many ways with you. I know it connects with me, I hear many of my thoughts spoken out loud when I see this video. I would hope that we here at Wesley Foundation and Collegiate UMC are doing our part to provide that safe place to talk about the hard questions of our spirits and journey in those questions together. But just because we are trying to be that kind of place does not mean that we do not have a lot to learn from those who consider themselves spiritual but not religious.
The fact that so many people are taking on this descriptor for themselves tells us that we as Christians need to make sure that we are not sacrificing that connection, that spirituality I was speaking of earlier for our preconceived notions of what is Church. In fact we need to make sure that as a church that we are nourishing those connections, that spirituality that so many are looking for.
The words from Isaiah we read earlier tonight speak to this connection, this wholeness that we can find through God. It tells us to seek God and poetically describes what that connection can be like. As we read the scripture it is striking that when one connects or reconnects as it may be to God, we not only connect with the creator we connect with creation.
As we spend our time connecting with God we should feel more connected to the very world we live in. By cultivating spirituality we can feel that care that God has for this world. We begin to see others through God’s eyes making us more compassionate, caring and willing to build up others humanity. We begin to see the natural world through God’s eyes. We recognize that we cannot continue to consume without thought of the impact. We begin to see ourselves through God, not as mistakes of the past, not as our insecurities but we see ourselves as what we are and may became. By cultivating spirituality we cultivate hope.
So the question becomes what can we do to connect with God, to revitalize that spirituality that is within us. We can turn to the spiritual disciplines to study, prayer, creativity, meditation, silence, fasting, service and many, many more.
You see these practices are not ways simply to be holy or to appease an angry parent in the sky. No, the reason for these practices is to cultivate a connection to God, to each other, and to the world around us. It is through cultivation of our spiritual selves that we are given the strength and energy to carry on and fight for social justice, to feed the hungry, to care for the forgotten, and to love our enemies.
Our spiritual disciplines and practices should spur us on. Spur us on to creativity. They should enliven us and invigorate us to be co-creators with God of a world that is more just, more loving, and more connected.
I think the fourth affirmation in the Phoenix Affirmations puts it well.
As Christians, we strive to respond to God's artistry in Creation by integrating the arts in worship, education and proclamation. We encourage the reclaiming of artistry and artistic expression in all Christian endeavors, both personal and communal.
We affirm that the Path of Jesus is found where Christ's followers make sincere and vibrant worship of God as central to the life of their community as Jesus did. We further affirm artistic expression as a way of reflecting God's creativity, joy, and prophetic voice in what may be seen, heard, felt, tasted, sung and spoken.
We confess that we have moved away from Christ's Path when we have failed to make worship the product of our best efforts to experience and express love for God, neighbor and self in community with others. We have moved further from this path when we have considered the arts as trivial or merely tangential to the life of a mature Christian community.

In this affirmation about worship we find a call to artistry in responding to God’s artistry. The great leaders that have gone before us who have made a differences are at their heart “social artists.” Connecting what is bigger than them and using that connection and creativity to better the world around them furthering that connection.
So what of religion then? Is it just something to be thrown to the curb? I don’t think so. We can be both spiritual and religious. At its best Christianity acts as a wide path up the spiritual mountain. It has nurtured many different people from many different backgrounds. I find that my religion works to deepen my spirituality through the understanding of those who have come before me. Our religion can act as a well marked path that keeps us from wondering around the spiritual mountain aimlessly.
I think that we can be both spiritual and religious. If we are keeping that balance right our religion deepens our spirituality and our spirituality energizes our religion. Spirituality and religion can be two sides to the same coin. When we can hold the two together in balance we can be not only in closer connection to God, but we will be more ourselves.
So I challenge you today to get connected. Pray, meditate, have a discussion with one another, talk to a tree, dance, do what it takes to be in connection with God. Because the more we are connected the more we can co-labor with God so that God’s Kin’dom can truly come. Amen.

Our Best vs. Their Worst

Over the last year or so I have spent a lot of time thinking about how divided everyone seems to be and how no one seems to be able to communicate with one another. I believe deeply in spirited debate and that two people can believe very different things yet still be respectful and learn from each other. But I don't see a lot of this kind of debate out there. So I have been wondering why that was.

As I have pondered this one thing I keep seeing is people comparing their best with other people's worst. If I'm honest with myself this is something that I myself am guilty of so as I talk about this I recognize that I have been part of the problem.

The reality is that when we begin to compare our best with others worst we do much more than than just shut down conversation we also begin to label the person or group that we are disagreeing with as "the other" or "the enemy." By making this best vs. worse comparison we deny others their humanity and we deny ourselves the ability to grow and learn by hearing other points of view.

The fact is that I have seen this vs. attitude in many of the pressing issues of our day. In conversations about religion and science, in conversations about other faiths, in conversations about politics, and in conversations about theology. We can not continue to try to make ourselves right by looking at the worst of the people we disagree with because they can look right back at us and do the same thing.

If we can learn to disagree and have a real discussion and debate where we allow both sides of issues the opportunity to speak and truly hear, not just listen to, but truly hear both sides I believe we will have a new found respect even for those who believe very different things than we do. Even if we can't find common ground we can at least hear each other.

We live in a world and a nation divided, the challenges we face each day are becoming more and more complicated. We can not longer parish as fools by blaming one another for every evil known to human kind. Instead we must face the challenges together as sisters and brothers knowing that we are not always going to come to the same conclusions. We must remember the next time we are tempted compare our best with others worse, that in the world we live not all are guilty but all are responsible.