The Meyer Minute

The Meyer Minute for June 16, 2011

I didn't know George Plumb.  A milkman in Chicago for 40 years, he fell in love with a young woman named Ann on his route and they were married 62 years.  Mr. Plumb died recently.  I did know  Mr. Jack Craemer of San Rafael, California.  A newspaper man, Mr. Craemer went home to His Lord after 70 years of marriage to his dear Jean.  You also know couples married for many, many years.  Their decades together for better or worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health until death parts us, are real life commentaries on the biblical truth, "Marriage is honorable in all." (Hebrews 13:4)

 

The Census Bureau reports divorce rates since 1996 have fallen 5% for most age groups.  Polling by Rasmussen Reports says 85% of Americans say their marriages are good or excellent.  Why this welcome trend?  Therapist Doreen Zaborac says many marriages flounder because husbands and wives feel entitled and expect instant gratification.  Many couples she counsels think "it's all about me." Christian love, what the Bible calls agape love, is about the spouse ahead of self.  Maybe we're starting to get it.  (Southtown Star, June 12; page 4)

 

Today I thank God for 38 years of blessings from marriage to Diane.  I wonder how many good years she's had?

 

The Meyer Minute for June 15, 2011

The Constitution of the United States says, “No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.”  (Article VI).  That little sentence is a great blessing, as the following story from the Wall Street Journal demonstrates.

 

Egypt is divided into 27 regions, each led by a governor appointed by the prime minister of Egypt.  All these governors have been Muslims, except in the upper Nile governorate of Qena.  Qena has 3 million people; 1 million are Coptic Christians.  When the new Egyptian prime minister appointed General Emad Mikhail, a Christian, to be governor, fundamentalist Salafi Muslims protested.  An activist said, “The imams said that a Christian cannot rule over Muslims.”  Angry crowds shouted, “We want a Muslim!”  One Christian who had his ear cut off by the Salafis said, “Here there is a war against the Copts.”  In response to the protests and violence, the national government suspended the new Christian governor for three months and replaced him with the deputy governor, a Muslim.  (WSJ, June 11-12; A1, 10)

 

So when you pray, include a prayer for persecuted Christians.  And also offer a prayer of thanks for that little sentence, “No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” 

 

 

The Meyer Minute for June 14, 2011

“Does that star spangled banner yet wave o’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?”

It’s just a piece of cloth, but today, Flag Day, we remember it’s more than “just a piece of cloth.”  It’s a symbol of our history, often glorious but not always so, our continuing sacrifices for the common good and our aspirations for the future.

If our eyes look up to that flag, our hearts are invited higher to the banners of the Eternal God.  “You have set up a banner for those who fear You, that they may flee to it from the bow.  That Your loved ones may be delivered, give salvation by Your right hand” (Psalm 60:4-5).  “His banner over me is love” (Song of Solomon 2:4).

Living and working on this earthly side of Jordan, it stirs us to look to the stars and stripes, to that symbol of this great nation.  And on both sides of Jordan and on the other side, the side to which the Savior is leading us, we thrill to live under the eternal banner of divine love.

“May we shout for joy over Your salvation, and in the name of our God set up our banners.” (Psalm 20:5). 

The Meyer Minute for June 13, 2011

What's your favorite Bible translation, and why?

 

Yesterday was Pentecost and the church celebrated God's Holy Spirit coming upon the first followers of Jesus.  A Rosetta Stone experience!  They were able to speak to visitors to Jerusalem in the native language of those visitors.  "We hear them speaking in our languages the mighty acts of God." (Acts 2:11)

 

This year is the 400th anniversary of the King James Version.  Albert Cook of Yale University wrote, "No other book has so penetrated and permeated the hearts and speech of the English race as has the Bible." True enough, but after 400 years it's not easy to understand.  For example, Psalm 88:13 says, "In the morning my prayer shall prevent Thee." Huh?  Praying to God in the morning will stop Him from doing things?  No, "prevent" used to mean "come before."  "In the morning my prayer will come before You."  The King James has over 500 words that have changed their meaning or are no longer used.

 

One of the lessons from Pentecost is that God wants us to understand His Word in our own daily language, the way we really speak.  Is the King James your favorite for sentimental reasons?  Is it dusty?  What translation best helps you understand the "mighty acts of God?"

The Meyer Minute for June 10, 2011

Today is Friday, which should mean your pastor is working on Sunday's sermon.  Let's hope your pastor is not like the old joke about the minister who used the hymn right before the sermon to prepare!  It is, after all, your sermon...at least in part.

Thomas Long of Candler School of Theology writes, "The picture of the preacher sitting alone in the study, working with a biblical text in preparation for the sermon, is misleading.  It is not the preacher who goes to the Scripture; it is the church that goes to the Scripture by means of the preacher."  ("The Witness of Preaching," p. 49)

We all have questions about life and about God.  Many laypeople work for a living, with little time during the week to study the Bible.  Those who are faithful in studying the Bible haven't had the privilege of a seminary education in the Scriptures.  So we come to church with legitimate expectations about the sermon.  We want our pastor to voice the questions we have for God and...this is why it's partly your sermon and all God's...we want the sermon to give us a good word from the Bible.  Could it be that one reason some sermons aren't engaging is because we're not telling our pastors what we need to learn from the Word?

The Meyer Minute for June 9, 2011

Yesterday I was looking through a list of names, paying special attention to the names with an asterisk.  It’s alumni time on campus and an emotional time is the Jubilarian Service that commemorates our graduates from 50 years ago.  The names with asterisks were those from the class of 1961 who had died.

 

As we get older, we know that an asterisk will be coming to our name.  That makes reunions and getting together an indescribably rich human experience.  For us who are a bit younger but old enough to know what life is like, seeing jubilarians get together is encouraging, especially when they gather with confidence in the resurrection.  They say the dash between a person’s birth date and death date is most important.  Yesterday’s service had a prayer for all of us still “living the dash.” 

 

“By joys of life, by human love, by affection and fidelity of friends; by capacity for pleasure and sense of humor; by persistency in hope of things to come: Edify us and draw us ever nearer to You.  By sorrows of life; by our falls and failures; by our disappointments and disasters; by stern discipline of loneliness; by realized dreams and by heartache of unsatisfied desires: Form us and draw us ever nearer to You.”

The Meyer Minute for June 7, 2011

 

Yesterday Representative Anthony Weiner admitted and apologized for wrong sexual conduct on-line.  For over a week he denied what he had been doing for several years.  During those years he seems to have thought that he could get away with it...if he even thought it was wrong.  What Weiner did is despicable, a sordid act of political theater that may seem far removed from us.  The story does present a soul-searching question for everyone.  How do you guard yourself against destructive self-deception?

 

Some less spectacular but still real examples of harmful self-deception: A person hears all the warnings about texting while driving but does it anyway, no self-discipline but self-deception.  How many die?  A husband or wife works long, long hours, convinced it's the godly way to provide for family.  Wakes up one day to find the spouse gone and the family broken. 

 

St. Peter wrote to Christians who realized they had been deceived.  "You have spent enough time in the past doing what pagans choose to do." (1 Peter 4:3). Peter's advice?  Spend time and engage in honest conversation with sincere, caring and moral followers of Christ.

 

Is there a part of your life that seems OK but is really your Achilles' heel?

The Meyer Minute for June 6, 2011

A picture in our home has puzzled me for years.  This print of a 1527 painting by Sebald Beham shows the resurrected Jesus...  He's resurrected because you can see the wounds on his body but you also see the three empty crosses in the background.  This resurrected Jesus is sitting on a stone, body slumped forward, head down, weary if not exhausted.  Huh?  The resurrected Christ does not grow weary.  He's victor over sin and death, not someone who just squeaked by.  Resurrected but weary?  It doesn't fit the way the story unfolded.

 

So you can appreciate my curiosity when I learned about a display of more art works like this.  The exhibition was at the Museum of Biblical Art at the American Bible Society in New York, where I happily happened to be.   An essay introducing the exhibition said, "The works...reject temporality, the visionary superseding the actual."

 

"Aha!" I thought, "It's not about cold facts but about warm devotion."  Devotion can transcend accuracy to the historical sequence without becoming groundless, wishful thinking.  Finally the resurrected victor, yes, but so many aspects before His resurrection help us who are not yet resurrected.  Weary Christ, weary me, weary you.   Ultimately He's also the victor...and we will be too.  I need every aspect of His life.  Don't you?

The Meyer Minute for June 3, 2011

 

I'm writing from 57th Street and 7th Avenue in Manhattan...and I'm people watching.         Thousands of people hurrying...but after what?

 

New York Times columnist David Brooks writes that we have poorly prepared young people for real life.  "This year's graduates are members of the most supervised generation in American history.  Yet upon graduation they will enter a world that is unprecedentedly wide open and unstructured.  Worst of all, they are sent off into this world with the whole baby-boomer theology ringing in their ears...the litany of expressive individualism." Frank  Sinatra sang if you can make it in New York, you can make it anywhere.  Not by navel gazing, David Brooks would say.

 

St. Peter agrees.  He wrote to people who had sought happiness by satisfying their personal desires with like-minded peers.  "You've had enough of that.  Look outside yourself." "To this you have been called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in His steps." (1 Peter 2:21). David Brooks: "Most people don't form a self and then lead a life.  They are called by a problem, and the self is constructed gradually by their calling."

 

People watching...and people are always watching us.  Will they learn we're fulfilled outside ourselves, by our problems, by His call to service?

The Meyer Minute for June 2, 2011

When we kids were having troubles, Mom used to say, "The sun is still shining."  We all have our cloudy days, and for those days it's interesting to think about clouds in the Bible.

After the Exodus from Egypt, "there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain...The Lord descended to the top of Mount Sinai" (Exodus 19:16, 20).  God came close to His people in that cloud, but by that cloud He protected them from seeing His glory.  No one can see His glory and live (Exodus 3:20).

When Jesus took His disciples up to the Mount of Transfiguration, "a cloud appeared and covered them...  A voice came from the cloud, saying, 'This is My Son, whom I have chosen.  Listen to Him'" (Luke 9:34).  The divine cloud tells us to hear the words of Jesus.

Today the Church remembers the Ascension of Christ.  "He was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid Him from their sight" (Acts 1:9).  The divine cloud again!  Jesus was taken into the glory of God, the glory He set aside when He came to earth with forgiveness, love and hope.  Today the Church is drawn on by the words of the ascended One, "Christ in you, the hope of glory" (Colossians 1:27).  Yes, "The sun is shining!"