The Meyer Minute

The Meyer Minute for May 3, 2013

With Sunday coming up and with the Seminary sending out new pastors, here’s a question I’m often asked.  “Does the Seminary teach students to preach in or out of the pulpit?”  This ranks right up there with the other great questions of the universe.  Why does God hide Himself from us?  Why does God permit suffering?  How can Christianity claim to be the only true religion and only way to heaven?  Yup, preach in or out of the pulpit?

We have chapel services on campus every weekday.  Most sermons are delivered from the pulpit.  I don’t know what our other preaching professors teach but the question always comes to me in my classes.  There are, I answer, logistical considerations.  For example, if you’re standing in the aisle, can the people on the flanks or in the balcony see you?  There are deeper considerations.  What is the congregation used to?  If they’re used to one way or the other, is this an issue worthy of controversy?  Ask the elders, I tell them.  But going farther, students, why do you ask?  It’s a big issue to some of them and I’ve learned that they imagine that standing out of the pulpit somehow means being relevant.  I also hear lay people say, “We love our pastor.  He preaches out of the pulpit.”  Huh?  The real issue is what he’s preaching.  A compelling sermon from God’s Word will be compelling wherever it’s delivered.  A sermon of theological jargon that doesn’t speak to life will be irrelevant wherever it comes from. 

So as I write this, it comes down in my mind to this.  To congregation members: Are we so at home with one worship style that we get upset by something different? Aren’t we driven to come to church by this question, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”  (John 6:68)  To students: Don’t make the pulpit the hill you’ll die on or off of.  Instead, make God’s Word so applicable to people’s lives that they’ll listen intently wherever you are.   In or out?  Sounds like a belly-button question.  Maybe it is naval gazing. I’d really like to know why God hides Himself. 

The Meyer Minute for May 2, 2013

Back in 1899 the editor of the New London, Connecticut, Bee, advertised, "Here various news we tell, of love and strife, Of peace and war, health sickness, death and life...Of old mismanagements, taxations new, All neither wholly false, nor wholly true” (Mitchell Stephens, A History of News. p. 201).

Things have changed dramatically since 1899.  Back then information came from the local newspaper and the talk you shared with neighbors and townspeople, limited sources of information.  Today the sources of information are unlimited, indeed overwhelming, and a result is that you can choose the sources that suit your preferences.  In fact, that’s what usually happens because it’s easier than dealing with conflicting information.  Cocooned with like-minded people, we can criticize others and build ourselves up without honest engagement with people who think differently.  We end up making our own realities.  “All neither wholly false, nor wholly true.” 

A friend of mine down at the gas station used to say, "Dale, when the Big Guy calls me, I'm going to tell Him I'm a friend of yours."  To which I said, "You know, that won't be your normal audit.  H&R Block won't go with you.  You have to appear on your own." (see 2 Corinthians 5:10)

So here’s a thought to consider and perhaps to share.  Discern from God’s Word what you let into your mind and what you ignore.  They used to say, a newspaper in one hand and a Bible in the other.  Today you can have both in your smart phone at your finger tip, the Bible and “various news we tell, of love and strife, Of peace and war, health sickness, death and life...Of old mismanagements, taxations new.”  But is it all relative, “all neither wholly false, nor wholly true,” with you deciding your reality?  Really, take a look at 2 Corinthians 5:10.  “Pay attention to what you hear.”  (Mark 4:24)

 

The Meyer Minute for May 1, 2013

“Last in, first out.”  That’s one of the perks of being Seminary president.  Today is “Call Day” when our students learn where the church is sending them.  The announcements happen in a festive service, joyous but anxious for students and their families, and the presidential perk is that I’m the last one to process in for the service but the first one to recess out.  When I walk out, I head straight up to the balcony so that I can watch the students, calls in hand, walk out two-by-two. 

They are going into a world they do not know and into experiences they cannot imagine.  Some go with maturity; others have maturing ahead of them.  Their average age is about 32.  Some are A+ students but will need to learn better interpersonal skills.  Others may not be good at parsing Greek or Hebrew but do have emotional intelligence, a characteristic of a good pastor.  Some have seriously heavy student debts and are worried.  Others have middling debts, and only a few have none.  I watch them walk out of the chapel and think of all the interactions I’ve had with them during their time here.  But most of all I pray that they more and more consciously follow Jesus Christ.  They know it already in their heads, that they can’t put their faith in a seminary or in the institutional church or in their own abilities, good as they may be.  They’re walking out to experience sin and grace in the depth of their souls, and in the experience to be reminded that faith has no other resort than Jesus Christ.  Looking down from the balcony, I admit that I get a bit teary-eyed.  I also wish I was a young man again walking out into life and ministry. 

“Last in; first out” also happens to be the goal of people who go to church grudgingly.  May these new pastors keep walking, walking in their communities, walking among their people, so that when Sunday comes more and more people will say, “I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’” (Psalm 122:1)

“Lord God, You have called Your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown.  Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that Your hand is leading us and Your love supporting us; through Jesus Christ, our Lord.  Amen.