This morning I preached an Advent sermon about Joy.  I focused on the text in Luke 2:1-20, especially the angel’s annoucment that the Good News of Joy was for ALL PEOPLE.  I thought the story of Darth Vader was a great illsutration for this radical inclusion… to listen to the sermon click here.

For more insight into Advent Conspiracy listen to the podcast HERE.

This Christmas I’m joining a movement with Christianity called Advent Conspiracy.  Advent Conspiracy is a new way to engage the season of Advent and Christmas itself.  Rather than getting caught up in a consumer-driven mindset for Christmas that is fueled by captialism Christians all over the world are rethinking Christmas and the way we celebrate it.  We are choosing to honor the birth of Jesus by spending less money on gifts (and asking for less in return) and instead of buying motorized tie-racks that will quickly be forgotten we are putting money into clean water projects throughout the world.

Just under 4,000 people die every single day because they do not have access to clean drinking water.  Experts say that it would take 10 billion dollars to solve this crisis and make sure that everyone had access to clean safe drinking water.  And every year Americans spend 450 billion dollars on Christmas.  We feel like there’s something just not right about that.

So I encourage you to spend less on Christmas this year, give more money to clean water projects (like Living Water International), and give more presence to your loved ones this year.  Celebrate the birth of Jesus by saving someone’s life this year.

For Lent this year I gave up television with the exception of LOST. I got a lot of flak for including this caveat when I was asked about lent. I understand why people would think this was only going half-way or just a lazy attempt at spiritual discipline. The truth is I was really fasting from useless background noise.

Tv and film for all their similarities have very different effects on the viewer as well as the intended outcomes their producers have in mind. On a very basic level their relationship to selling products is very different. Insightful critiques about the constant product-placement in film not withstanding, the film is the product. The film is selling itself, we pay to see the film and then for 2 hours we watch the film uninterrupted. Television is set up to draw us to the tv for long enough that we will sit through commercials trying to sell us products. The show itself is not the product but the means by which we are exposed to the product. And so it is in the interests of television creators to create content that always leaves us unsatisfied, always wanting something better to watch. An excellent film will likely attract more attention and then more ticket buyers, but a television show that can be entertaining enough to keep our attention while always leaving us wanting something better helps to perpetuate the genre and expose us to more advertising. Bad tv is good for tv.

If you’re like me, you’ve fallen into this trap. I’ll turn on the tv hoping to find something good to watch (knowing full well that I can count the number of quality programs on one hand) and just end up having the tv on as background noise. After years of doing this I’ve become so comfortable with having the tv on in the background I felt awkward alone in a room with out it’s constant stream of sound. This is bad.

I never have a film on “in the background” simply to fill the air with sound. When I watch a film I do just that, sit down and watch it. So for lent I decided to give up all tv. I put the LOST exception in there because I interact with LOST like film, I sit down and engage the narrative and then turn off the tv and talk about it. LOST is never “background noise” I use to eradicate silence in my life. Tv in had become just that for me… a way to eradicate silence.

So for the entire season of lent I watched 8 episodes of LOST and the Oscars. That was it. In forty days I had watched 11 hours of television. It was so good. I wasn’t staying up as late, I was way more productive in my work and I began to read so much more. So I’m trying to keep up the habit. I haven’t been as strict as I was during Lent, but I’m trying to only watch tv if I’m going to engage it and turn it off if I find myself using it to drown out the silence. Because silence is good for the soul.

by wendell berry

What hard travail God does in death!
He strives in sleep, in our despair,
And all flesh shudders underneath
The nightmare of His sepulcher.

The earth shakes, grinding its deep stone;
All night the cold wind heaves and pries;
Creation strains sinew and bone
Against the dark door where He lies.

The stem bent, pent in seed, grows straight
And stands. Pain break in song. Surprising
The merely dead, graves fill with light
Like opened eyes. He rests in rising.

(from A Timbered Choir: The Sabbath Poems 1979-1997, p. 25)

Thanks to Church and PoMo Culture for the Wendell Berry poem.

This past year I’ve been thinking a lot about film as a medium to tell the stories of our faith. At the same time the church calendar has been increasingly guiding my own journey through the year and shaping my faith. In this vein I got together with some friends (like Wil and Thomas) last November to create our first “liturgical film” which we intended to be a narrative short film that told an Advent story. Not “the” Advent story, but an “Adventish” story. What we were setting out to do was to take everyday life and (re)narrate life by connecting it to the different stories we tell at each season. Our Advent film was about waiting, hope vs. cynicism, what it looks like to look forward to the return of Christ. It was a learning process in many ways but sparked something that I hope will continue.

So over the next week or so I’m going to be asking you to think liturgically with me about films we’ve already seen. And appropriately so, we’ll begin with Advent. What films have you seen that strike you as having an “Adventish” feel to them. What films tell an Advent story even though they may not intend to? Why? Let’s (re)examine some movies in light of the Advent story!

I’ll get us started. Among the top “Advent” films on my list would be last year’s Children of Men. This is a story about a deeply troubled dystopian future where women no longer are able to bear children. Those on the margins of society, minorities, immigrants, etc. are trampled upon by the oppressive government. The population is in despair and most give in to either depression or cynicism. Suicide is a given (and widely advertised) part of day to day life. These are a people whose future is in limbo. And then a child is born. The very presence of this child brings hope to a people who were previously hopeless. This child means that a future is possible. He is not born to those in power but rather to a poor immigrant, and early on his life is in danger from those who would take him from his parents. The fate of the world hangs entirely in the tiny hands of a baby born to a poor mother.

So, what about you?

Several months ago I incorporated something new into my devotional life… a podcast. That wonderful group of Catholics called the Jesuits have been doing a daily (during the week) scripture meditation called Pray-As-You-Go. It’s really very similar to Lectio Divina. The podcast begins with some contemplative music ranging anywhere from monks chanting to solo guitarists singing in Spanish. Scripture is then read and there is a long time for prayer over the scripture passage, then the scripture is repeated and more time is given for prayer. There are usually some questions to think about during the prayer times. As the Jesuits say, it’s really more of a framework for your own prayer than a sermon, etc. They usually last anywhere from 9 to 12 minutes long and are always keen to observe the Christian calendar. In the spirit of Mike King any many other wise people, I wanted to practice this and actually have incorporated it into my life before I went and started recommending it to others. That being said, it has been a blessing in my own life and has given structure to my own prayer time that I think many of you might find helpful.

This is the first year that I’ve really become immersed in the Lenten drama from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday. I have previously participated in Lent by fasting and prayer, but this year for the first time, I was truly drawn into the drama of the Christian calendar. This is in large part due to the growing role of the Christian calendar in my own teaching as a youth pastor as well as the growing importance of the Christian calendar in my own spiritual formation.

The Church calendar teaches us how to live in the rhythms of life. Through Lent we walk a period of darkness, self-deinal, self-examination and repentance. It is a period of preparation as we journey with Christ to the cross during holy week. Holy week, when celebrated well truly draws the Christian into the ongoing drama that was the week leading up to the crucifixion. Too often churches try to tell the whole story, or just preach the cross all the way leading up to and indeed after Good Friday. This year was different for me, as I began waving Palms at Jacob’s Well, participated in two Passover Seder meals, and helped arrange and organize our own Church’s Good Friday service. Each of these days celebrated that specific day, instead of a “general easter theme,” and as the week drew on each day brought us closer and closer to the cross. As I prepared for Good Friday I experienced a powerful “march to the cross” as I was immersed in the life of the Church through these holy days.

Good Friday was a beautiful train-wreck. The service went perfectly, which meant that it was awkward, dark, dissonant, off-putting and hopeless. The youth groups performed the Good Friday dramatic liturgy for the rest of the church. Although it was light outside, we had black sheeting covering all windows, and with the exception of the five candles and our projectors there was no light in the sanctuary. Those candles were snuffed out as we walked with Christ through his black Friday when he is betrayed by two of his friends and finally nailed to the cross where he dies. The last candle is snuffed out. Complete darkness. That’s it, no benediction, no closing remarks. People awkwardly and confusedly wonder what has happened… is it over? There is no resolution except that God has been killed, all hope is lost. Evil, violence, military might, the death penalty have been effective in killing God, our only hope.

Saturday was a still day. A day of rest, but also continuing in the darkness we left on friday.

Sunday morning we left the black sheeting up on the windows so that we might “continue where we left off” on that dark black Friday. When the stone was rolled away all the windows were uncovered and we experienced through light that God has vindicated Jesus and raised him from the grave. Evil has not won, violence and death do not have the last word. Our God is risen! People jumped out of their seats, I held back tears as I celebrated the resurrection. After going through the darkness of Lent and especially Holy Week, Easter was made so much more real this year.