Prayer: Day by day, dear Lord, three things I pray: to see you more clearly, love you more dearly, follow you more nearly, day by day. Amen.

I recently read that the Gallup poll stated that over 90% of Americans claim a belief in God. Well, that would mean that our job is done! NOT!!! People may believe in God, but religion and public expression of faith are hugely divisive—maybe now more than ever! Denominations, pastors and priests, elders and lay people, often are found arguing with each other as to who is right, who is going to heaven, who is loved by God more, and so on…. We’re awfully good at shouting out our religious opinion, but listening to the viewpoints of others? Not so much.

Last Thursday, on The Today Show, anchor Matt Lauer interviewed Dan Merchant author of Lord, Save Us From Your Followers. Dan has gone around to some big cities doing a documentary wearing a painter’s uniform that was covered, literally covered with all kinds of bumper stickers. He has a bumper sticker for every stance to every issue imaginable. He calls himself the “Bumpersticker Man.” His main point is that “...America has become a bumper sticker culture—we’re way too comfortable with one-way communication. We like to tell people what we think, but we don’t like to listen, and I fear we’ve lost the fine art of conversation” (http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/24029744/#storyContinued, retrieved April 10, 2008).

What do you think? Have we in our culture, our communities, and our churches gone so far astray that we can’t talk to each other? We can’t engage in dialogue that allows a sharing of ideas and perspectives without saying my way is the right way and your way is the wrong way? Have we fallen victim to the practice of distilling everything down, stripping off context so completely that things of great worth and effort are reduced to a thirty second sound byte selected by a media that is hungry for exploitation and controversy?

I said in our Wednesday night Bible study class, whenever we hear some snippet, whenever we read one small phrase out of the Bible, or catch a scintillating comment online, or watch a short video clip, or read a tidbit in the Patriot News, we must remember three things: context, context, context. Rev. Otis Moss, III, pastor of Trinity UCC in Chicago lamented the fact that the media succeeded in reducing thirty-six years of Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright’s ministry to a “fifteen or thirty second sound byte” that was devoid of all context (http://www.ucc.org/ucnews/aprmay08/church-leaders-defend-jeremiah.html, retrieved April 12, 2008).

We do live in a sound-byte culture, but there is little effort in our current media to find out and report on the contexts of the snippets we hear. What we have is a cultural war where one-way communication is prominent; where short, pithy bumper sticker statements are shouted out for complex issues; where there’s over-simplification of the issues, where polarization occurs and cut and dried labels happen frequently. There’s the my way is right; your way is wrong attitude. And, in this cultural war, we are stuck with a feeling that there is an enemy, (that’s what exists in war, right?) The enemy is the person who isn’t on our same page. Oh, how far we have gone astray like sheep!

Listen to this conversation Dan Merchant had with a man named Lou on the street—this is from his book Lord, Save Us From Your Followers. Dan asked Lou five questions overall—this excerpt is for question #3:

DAN: Alright, third question: name something Jesus Christ is known for.

LOU: (thoughtful pause) Raising the dead and caring for the poor.

DAN: Those are two pretty excellent feats. Okay, name something the Christian people are known for.

LOU: Today? Selective hatred and intolerance.

DAN: The ball kinda got dropped somewhere along the way?

LOU: Between Jesus and the Christians I think it was dropped a long time ago (http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/24029744/#storyContinued, retrieved April 10, 2008).

Sheesh! Is that pathetic, or what? If Lou is right, oh, how far we have gone astray like sheep! It’s hard to hear difficult truths about ourselves, isn’t it? It’s hard to hear that we have gone astray like sheep by becoming intolerant and selectively hateful. It’s shocking to hear that we have become so used to sound bytes that we do not desire to find out the whole picture anymore, and we buy into and believe the sound byte as it stands. When we lose our desire to find out the whole picture, when we reduce our viewpoints to a bumper sticker communication, we in fact, not only cut off communication with others who differ from us, but we also cut off any kind of critical thinking on our parts, which sometimes is demanding and difficult. It’s difficult to hear that we have taken the easy way out and have avoided doing the hard work of finding out what other people think and put that in with what we might think in an effort to have a complete and more truthful picture on any given subject. It’s hard to hear that we like sheep have gone astray.

But, when we do hear what is hard to hear, then I think it is time to re-evaluate our practices. Whenever we are shocked by a sound byte or a snippet, it’s time to ask ourselves some important questions concerning how well our efforts have been in getting the context, getting the facts how well we have suffered through the inconvenience of getting that work done.

In spite of the fact that we live in a ‘I gotta have it now’ climate, that we live in a ‘I gotta have answers as quickly, as conveniently and as easily as possible’ culture; in spite of the attitude ‘I will take something for nothing’ anytime—in spite of all that, now is the time to recognize that we who have gone astray, by deliberately growing and learning with openness to diversity, can return to the high qualities of dialogue and conversation, returning to the high precepts of Jesus who said we need to “love one another.” He didn’t say we need to agree with each other, (this kind of love has very little to do with agreeing with each other), he didn’t say we need to even like each other. He said we need to love one another.

Perhaps it’s time to make the return trip to Jesus. Perhaps it’s time to come back to our roots, our heritage, our Christianity. Maybe it’s time to get re-connected to God, to get re-moored to God in Christ Jesus, to God’s ways taught to us by Christ Jesus, the shepherd and guardian of our souls.

Making the return trip means that we return to Christian principles, specifically, to what Jesus taught, and apply those all the time. More than a century ago a novel entitled In His Steps was written by Charles Sheldon, a pastor in Topeka, Kansas. Before he wrote the book, he had been in social work, and as an experiment, he once disguised himself as an unemployed printer. He then walked the streets to see what would happen. What he discovered was indifference among many professing Christians toward those in need. That shocked and saddened him, but it also led him to imagine how different things would be if Christians did not compartmentalize their lives and allowed their Christianity to be equally applied to all situations. The book, In His Steps was the result (http://www.homileticsonline.com/subscriber/btl_display.asp?installment_id=93040376&item_id=93050260&keywords= Sheldon).

We aren’t supposed to compartmentalize our beliefs and faith practices. The principles that guide our Christian thinking are also to guide our political thinking. Can’t separate it them. What steers us in our relationships with other Christians also steers us with strangers. Love one another. What guides us in our church life must also guide us in our public life. Speak the truth in love. What we practice in our homes and families must be practiced in our work places and on our nights on the town. Show hospitality, love, and respect for all people.

Be forewarned, however, Jesus said we may suffer abuse for loving each other. We may get ostracized by others for challenging the sound bytes. We may experience ridicule from others for daring to speak the truth in love. Some will experience character assassination, as I believe Dr. Wright has experienced because he and his ministry were grossly taken out of context as he preached about the past indiscretions of our country. I may experience harsh criticism for standing up for Dr. Wright in this sermon! (By the way, I have several resources that help provide the context of Dr. Wright’s preaching… I’m not saying I agree with him 100% or condone his choice of words to get his point across, but you can decide for yourself after working through these resources).

But, that’s the point. We have to work through these types of issues. And, it isn’t always easy. What Jesus teaches us in metaphor and parable we are to interpret and glean meaning for our lives, which means we have to sometimes suffer through doing the difficult work in deciphering what he meant. When Jesus mentioned the metaphor of the shepherd of the sheep leading the flock into the gate, the disciples didn’t get that Jesus was referring to himself. They didn’t work at getting his drift. So, Jesus tries another metaphor. “I am the gate,” he says. Obviously, he’s not made of iron, connected to a fence post, hanging with hinges, etc.. The disciples had to figure out what he meant. So do we.

In the contexts of our lives and our situations, we have to work at getting to what Jesus meant, and apply it. The situations we face Jesus did not face. His context is vastly different than ours. But, we still make the return trip to his ways and rely upon those ways as we learn from our past struggles. We still have to live our lives taking what we know of Jesus, and trying to live as we think he would if he were in our shoes.

Bottom lines. Let us listen to other perspectives. Let us love one another. Let us tolerate. Let us practice our faith in all contexts. Above all, let us return to Jesus, the Shepherd and Guardian of our souls. Amen.