Thursday, February 28, 2013

Bye Bye Pope, Hello March Madness!

As Pope Benedict takes off his red shoes and flies into the sunset of his ministry (on a helicopter), so the month of February finally comes to a close.

Tomorrow begins March!  A Conclave of Catholic bishops will lock themselves into a room for prayer and discernment while the rest of North America glues their eyes on ESPN and FOX Sports so that we can discern our NCAA brackets!

In honor of the occasion I will give you a visual aid on one of the teams that I will be choosing as a top seed in the men's and women's tournament play.
 For the past three years our Calvary UMC staff have had our own March Madness bracket competition.  (No there is no gambling involved... we are against that.  But we do have a trophy for the winner.  A basketball that the winner signs and then has in her/his office for the next year.)

Two out of the three years I have won.  So, I better start doing my homework so that my reputation is not diminished.  (Although the staff are very basketball savvy (especially the IU fans) and I was almost beat by our bookkeeper last year.)

Bring on the madness of discernment... and basketball!

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

The Great Tithe Experiment

If your ears are better than your eyes... go to this link to listen to my recent sermon on tithing.  Apparently, it has caused quite a fuss!   http://www.calvaryunited.org/#/about-us/sermons

If your eyes are better than your ears, here is the manuscript version!


Malachi 3:10
“Only Way God Can Be Tested”

Let us pray…Come Holy Spirit and bring clarity, purpose and passion to our lives so that our hearts and our wallets reflect your great abundance and generosity!  Come Living God, come.  Amen. 
Brace yourselves. We’re going to talk about money today.  More specifically, we’ll talk about your money and mine.  And what we do with our financial resources or don’t do with it. Yep.  So get yourself prepared.  I know you would rather we talked about sex, drugs or rock-n-roll in worship than tithing. Somehow those subjects are more appealing. Apparently, Scripture and our Triune God have other standards because money parables are the most frequently used parables Jesus ever gave.
Doesn’t matter if you have big savings account or if your wallet is empty; you are impacted my money and it impacts you.  Everyone in this room has something to hear from this message today.  Why?  Because according to the Bible what we do with our money (however much we have) matters to God.  Because giving, according to the Bible, is an act of worship.  (Hint: that is why there is an offering every time the people of God gather to worship.  You just thought it was a handy fundraising technique!  Not so. Ha!)
More specifically, tithing is an act of worship because it is a response to God’s provision.  Tithing as extreme Bible as you can get.  By definition tithes are 10% of your yearly income: 10 cents on a $1; $10 on $100; $100 on $1000.  Tithes are to be brought into the store house (aka the church). Tithes are paid on what you make not on what you have left over. Abraham was the first to give a tithe… and it continues all the way into the New Testament in Matthew 23:23. 
There is a profound difference between a tithe and tip.  If you are not yet giving 10% of your yearly income you cannot technically call what you give a “tithe”… while you may be growing it into a larger percentage of giving (which is a super and good for you).  Also, to be precise an offering is a sacrificial gift over and above the 10% tithe.  From the Bible’s point of view offerings come from surplus.  
There you have it.  The Bible asks of believers (both from OT and NT) to give a tithe and their offerings.  The provocative question and the question that makes us squirm is… are we being faithful to this God-intended standard?  According to our reading from Malachi 3:10… the people of Israel were failing in their giving of the tithe.  And the prophet challenged the people to ‘test God’ or in the words of John Wesley “experiment with God” through the tithe (from Wesley’s Notes on Malachi 3:10).  And we invite those of you who are not yet fully at a tithe of 10% or those of you who have never tried regular proportional giving to the church… to participate in the Great Tithing Experiment.  Tithe for March, April and May of this year and see what happens.   
Be mindful we don’t ask anything of you that is impossible or not modeled by leadership. Your two appointed ordained elders from the Indiana Conference of UM tithe.  Pastor Todd and Becky can speak to how that is meaningful and significant to them.  Eric and I would tell you how it has changed our faith, our marriage and our understanding of what it means to be “fully invested in the workings of God through Calvary UMC”.   Eric has told our congregation how I grew him into a tither… and then how together we’ve been challenged to deepen our generosity through the giving of our time, talent and financial resources. 
Moreover, did you know our church congregation tithes?!  10% of the income received to our operating budget goes beyond Calvary to our Indiana Conference, our UM denomination, and out into the world through the World Service Fun.  Therefore, your pastoral leadership and church leadership invite you to do something (i.e. tithing) that we are doing.  The best leaders lead by example, don’t they?!
But why give?  What does it matter? Why is it important?  Listen to what Dave Ramsey has to say… (show view clip) God expects us to offer our tithes.  Why? (1. Because it shows our submission to God’s ownership of everything.  (2. It makes us realize that all we have comes from His hand, not our own cleverness and skills.  (3. Keeps us humble, we don’t own everything!  (4. It prevents us from worshipping "things." (5. We give because we believe in the mission of the UM church to “make disciples for the transformation of the world”!
If you pay attention and ponder deeply you can begin to see that tithing is really about trust not in money, but in God!  Tithing puts our trust in the One Who gives us every good and perfect gift.  I like what our Bishop Coyner shared, “I don’t think of tithing as a ‘rule’ but as a ‘revelation’ from God – namely that God has revealed to us that tithing is the way our lives are best lived for a joyful and prosperous life.”  As Christians, we believe that God is love and is a generous giver of all good gifts.  We believe that God has created us to be generous givers as well.”(from Indiana Tithing Task Force 2011).
The ancient people of God during Malachi’s day were stealing from God because they failed to give and worst yet, because of their scarcity mindset they were actually losing out on God’s blessings! This is a hard concept for some people to grasp … giving to God won’t leave you with less, in so many ways, you gain!  God is always faithful to help those who obey His ways, and giving is one of His ways! Our blessings may not appear as lottery winnings, new leather couches, diamond earrings, or BMW’s, but God blesses in so many intangible ways.  You just can’t lose when you give.
One day a woman said to her preacher: "Pastor, I just don’t see how I can give 10 percent of my income to the church when I can’t even keep on top of our bills." The pastor replied, "Jane, if I promise to make up the difference in your bills if you should short, do you think you could try tithing for just one month?" After a moment’s pause, Jane responded, "Sure, if you promise to make up any shortage, I guess I could try tithing for one month." "Now, what do you think of that, Jane “mused the pastor. "You say you’d be willing to put your trust in a mere human mortal like myself, who possesses so little, but you couldn’t trust your Heavenly Father who owns the whole universe!" 
Our total income for CUMC (adding together operating budget, building need (mortgage) and missions) is about a million dollars a year.  If you take just the operating budget which is over 787,000 a year and divide it by our resident members… we would meet our annual operating budget if very person gave $79.75 a month or a total of $957.00 a year.  Hard to do that with youth being part of those resident member numbers. 
So consider this…data from the 2010 census reveals that the median (average) income per household in Hendricks County is about $64,239 a year.  Now that may be high… so let’s make this easy and say the average income for Calvary UMC families is about $60,000.  If every family tithed 10% of their $60,000 income our church income or giving for the year would be $1,800,000. (Remember we currently receive about 1 million in contributions.) That would almost double our income as a congregation. 
Think of what God in Christ could do with another $800,000 invested in making disciples for the transformation of the world?!! Think of how our mortgage debt would be paid off in less than 2 years and how that would then open up an additional $300,000 in our church budget for missions, ministries, staff, or another amazing dream of ministry we can conjure up! Then, we’d have an additional million to do ministry with!  Imagine the possibilities for mission and service within Hendricks County we could do together! The lives we could change and touch! WOW!  All would be possible because we are worshipping God with a tithe of income and not a tip.
I heard a story about our recent denominational evangelism gathering in Georgia… where the campus pastor from Georgia State University gave the message.  He congratulated the folks on their giving to the UM church. The average age of people there was around 58. And this is the demographic group within United Methodism who gives over 80% of the overall contributions to our denomination.  He said, “You are to be congratulated.  Well done, good and faithful servants. You should get the kind of church and denomination that you want or that meets with your tastes and preferences.  However, you follow a savior who said, “Deny yourself and follow me. Remember, he told them you give for the sake of others.” 
Folks, on Wednesday we enter a season of the year which prepares us spiritually, intellectually, emotionally and financially for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world.  We follow a Savior who asks us to deny ourselves.  We are a part of a body who are committed to making disciples for the transformation of the world. 
You may give something up this year…when you do… take the ‘cost’ of that item and give it to God’s work in the world.  Your weekly Starbuck’s splurge will add up after 6 weeks.  Others of you may consider how you want to make a sacrificial offering to God at the end of Lent above your current tithe.  Still others of you may think and pray about what it would be like to experiment with tithing for 3 months.  Test God. Try it.  Watch how God provides.  We offer a money back guarantee.  Well, mostly, God does.
Let us pray…




Monday, February 25, 2013

The Monday Bask

Shhh... don't tell, but I am supposed to be at a continuing education conference not home with my cup of tea and my laptop.  Don't worry the conference is always a good one and the people there (my United Methodist clergy colleagues are terrific). It is just that I am worn out from the weekend with the confirmands, I am behind in all things on the home front, and juggling childcare and piano lesson today around this schedule fell apart.  So, I am trying to work smarter by not making life harder. 

Rarely, do I enjoy a Monday morning to bask in how God has moved through, in spite of, and around me during a weekend.  But today, I am basking in God's glow. 

Reteat Basking:
WOW- what a weekend!  Fascinating young people with amazing young personalities, questions, concerns, passions and eagerness to know and understand the workings of God.  Very curious (and silly) group of young people.  They took to our quiet time of prayer like fish to water!  Slurping up some one-on-one God time! 

Earlier in the evening during our lesson on worship one of our young ladies registered her complaint that our silent prayer time was not long enough. Ha!  Apparently, she needs more conversation time with God and was mad that I or Pastor Todd interupt her too soon. 

Well, I asked her, after our 15 minutes of silent prayer if she got all her praying done; she high-fived me a: YES!

I must brag on our mentors who always impress and amaze me that they willingly give up a bed, a shower and their families to join us on retreat.  Not only are they there... but what they add from their faith and their knowledge and wisdom are such GIFTS! 

Then, there are the silly moments when we laugh so hard we cry and my sides hurt.  And my all time favorite part of the weekend is asking our students about their lives and what is happening in their worlds.  I have learned even more about the culture of middle school and what our boys and our girls experience.  It is intriguing what they worry about and what they are still sheltered from... it has changed how I pray for them.

Calvary Devotion Basking:
Since I have been gone and forgot to take my Lent Devotional from Calvary with me on retreat, I have been catching up on my reading this morning.  Then, I just sat and re-read the whole devotional (again).  And I am filled up to have the privilege to know these people who write such awesome faith stories! Listening to these stories fills my heart so much!

And more people have talked to me or asked me about the Feburary 22 devotion than I was prepared for... yet another opportunity to brag on God.

Great Tithe Experiment Basking:
Since we launched the Great Tithe Experiment I have been praying for a specific number of families that would chosoe to take on the experiment. After last week I was really discouraged and worried we would not even come close to our minimum goal.

Imagine my joy, when returning from retreat, to find three more registration forms in my box that put us right over our goal!  Yes, I did a happy squeal and hugged a few students (who had no idea what I was happy about).

So, this morning I am basking... like a lizzard in the sun or a sunflower growing in the garden. I am basking in the warmth of God's love.  Feeling the rays of light, hope, joy, and peace settle into my soul so that I am strengthed and healed, but also so that I worship and adore the Giver of all Good and Perfect Gifts!

Celebrate with me...just how good God is!  Bask!

Friday, February 22, 2013

Graduated from Therapy (again)

One of the reasons my blog writing has slowed down in recent months is that my journal writing picked up speed while I re-entered therapuetic work (again).  Writing is always a key thing for me to process my thoughts and emotions.  I just don't understand folks who don't find journal writing appealing or helpful.  It is sooooo in my DNA!  In fact, I need to buy a new journal.  My current one is about full. 

Anyway- I am pleased to say that I have met my goals for this recent return to therapy.  Yes, I am even goal-oriented in this arena. On Wednesday of this week, my therapist and I both agreed that I was ready to graduate!  (Whatever that means, but we had a good laugh.  Because who ever really completes their personal growth on this side of heaven?!)  In her words, "Michelle, you've worked your butt off!  Good for you!"  Not sure Freud would appreciate the turn of phrase, but I did!

Yay for me!  I have a new set of fresh skills, good psycholoical knowledge, and better understanding about how to go foward with a relationship in my life.  Just have to live what I have learned. 

I tried to convince my husband that I deserved a treat for my graduation!  He laughed! 

One of the things I picked up during my work (which included loads of reading)... were these two helpful lists.  I enjoy passing on 'gems' to folks so see if this might help you with a difficult relationship in your life.

In Al-non folks learn:
  • not to suffer because of the actions or recations of other people.
  • not to allow ourselves to be used or abused byt others in the interest of another's recovery.
  • not to do for others what they could do for themselves.
  • not to create a crisis.
  • not to prevent a crisis if it is the natural course of events.

 
I also read about the three C's and three G's-

I didn't cause it.

I can't control it.

I can't cure it.

Get off their back.

Get out of the their way.

Get on with your life.
 
 
I think these little lists are terrific... in fact maybe I'll get some cards laminated and hang them up.

Hanging Out with Middle School Students

The preparations have begun... we leave tomorrow on our annual Confirmation Retreat.  Overnight in a gym on the floor with eighteen middle school students and their mentors!  I am not eager to sleep poorly, but I am excited about the time I get to spend with these amazing, wacky, and silly students.

Great moments for God happen every year.  Some moments we try to plan... other amazing glory-bump moments the Holy Spirit surprises us!  Mostly, I am eager to chat with the students about their lives and where and how they live. I've got my anthropology, sociology- like questions all lined up.  :) 

And oh, did I mention how cool it is to be with our mentors?  These are the awesome people in our church, I mean really?  They are willing to give up a night with their families to sleep on the floor with a bunch of wiggly middler school students.

How cool, is that?!

And where else can that sort of amaing generational moment happen out-side school and the family, but CHURCH!

Pray for us.  (and my back...)

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Ants- Returned!

As a sign of our wacky Indiana weather, sure enough, the little scout ants have arrived in my kitchen, bathroom, living room and along my front entry way.  They are looking for something to eat in some place warm.  After 60 degree weather yesterday afternoon... today the clouds, wind and snow are back in full force. 

No wonder the ants are searching.

I too am looking for a sign of warmer temperatures and milder weather to come.  I too wish the food fairy would do all the grocery shopping, cooking and clean up for me. 

Alas, I am on my own! 

Sorry, ants, no food for you!

Thursday, February 7, 2013

Generosity Looks Like...

On the Sunday before Lent begins I am preaching on a text that usually appears on the Advent lectionary.  Weird, I know.  Also, I am preaching on stewardship, giving, and tithing during a time in which we are NOT actively seeking a capital or operating campaign drive.  Double weird, I know.

But, here is the thing, I believe, that anytime is a good time to talk about money and giving and God.  So why not do it on the Sunday before Ash Wednesday when we are reminded we are dust?!  And why not use a text for Advent prior to Lent?  And why not talking about tithing and what it means and why we do it when we're not focused on 'making the budget' or passing a budget or paying off debt. Why not?!

As we were finishing our work on the 2013 Lent Devotional I spent some time looking at pictures of generosity... here is a word picture of generosity.  I liked it very much...

 But sometimes a picture says more...
Here is one that I really thought would be great for our cover art, but then I knew we could not do the color justice...
and finally, these words express so much to me about giving, generosity, and who God calls us to be...
What is your picture of generosity look like?