The Pulpit's Backside

by Bob Setzer, Jr.
Sunday morning as I was waiting to preach, I noticed a small fan humming away from inside the pulpit. It was angled to cool the preacher as he delivered the sermon on a day the heat index reached 109 degrees. A 109 degree day--plus the additional hot air being generated in the immediate vicinity of the pulpit--might lead to head stroke. An unseen angel thoughtfully added a fan.

That fan was just one more strange artifact to end up on the back side of the pulpit, a holy place most people never see.

In the great Temple of Jerusalem, the innermost sanctum was the Holy of Holies, a small chamber where the Ark of the Covenant was kept and the High Priest went to atone for the sins of the people. No one save the High Priest could venture into the Holy of Holies and he but once-a-year.

Our “holy of holies”--the back side of the pulpit--is available for all to see, though few adults ever bother to look. The children do, though, and they can tell you what is found there: a glass of ice water (just in case!), a box of Kleenex, two reading lights, a hymnal or two, and a foot stool for children to stand upon when reading Scripture during the service.

Then there’s all the stuff that ends up inside the pulpit that doesn’t “belong”: abandoned sheet music, a director’s baton, somebody’s reading glasses, broken pencils, forgotten bulletins and sermon notes, a half-devoured pack of Hall’s throat lozenges, and a necklace or ear ring bound for lost-and-found.

Perhaps those who picture the sanctuary a serene and holy place where heaven and earth meet find the truth about the backside of the pulpit disconcerting: all that chaos, debris, and inelegance! Shouldn’t everything in the sanctuary be in perfect order, prim and proper to a T?

I hope not because if the sanctuary is that kind of place, nobody I know is welcome. Each of us is comprised of both a shiny, presentable exterior and a hidden, interior world filled with anxieties and fears and secret hopes and longings. Occasionally somebody gets to see the “real me,” the “essential you,” but such moments are rare. Mostly the only One to see the back side of the Soul is God, before whom the secrets of every heart are disclosed (Psalm 44:21).

Thus, for Christians, the holy of holies is not some supposed perfect place but rather honest heart where we quit pretending to ourselves, to others, and to God. And this, we can dare to do for we have a high priest who has opened up a “new and living way” to God that starts with being real about our need for grace (Hebrews 10:19-22).

Miss Manners notwithstanding, I don’t worry much about the unkempt nature of the back side of the pulpit. We are a Good News people, after all, a people of grace.

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Vacation BIBLE School

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by Julie Long
Several years ago, I was having dinner with a family of the church in the weeks preceding Vacation Bible School.  Since the wife was volunteering at VBS, the conversation naturally shifted toward our preparations. As we clamored on about the jazzy theme, decorations, and schedule of activities, the husband sarcastically snorted, "I remember the days when the theme of Vacation Bible School was THE BIBLE!"

Many times since that occasion, I have remembered that comment – mostly when I have been on a ladder hanging a sparkly decoration from the ceiling or rearranging the sanctuary to create a beach scene or space shuttle mission control center!; Sometimes, when I have been racking my brain for a creative backdrop or am exhausted by the countless hours of preparation, I have been tempted by the same wondering – can’t VBS just be a little simpler?; Maybe you have wondered the same thing as you’ve entered the festive building on the Sunday morning before VBS!

But then, the Monday morning of VBS arrives, and I see the wonder-filled eyes of our preschoolers and children as they see this familiar place take on a new shape.  For this week, their imaginations are allowed to run wild.  The church becomes outer space, or a western ranch, or an exciting summer camp.  They enjoy games and snacks and music and science experiments.  They make new friends, both with kids their age and with various generations of adults who have given their time to help.  Above all, they LEARN because they are having fun!  And they feel special because they know that all of this energy and excitement and preparation is done just for them.

So is all of the effort and planning and time and money worth it?  Does what we invest in Vacation Bible School make a difference?  Yes.  For the 90-something kids that entered these church doors last week to worship the God of the universe, it did.  For the 60-something adults and youth who volunteered their time to laugh and play and be a role model for children, it did.  And for a church who looks hopefully toward her future, it is worth every dime and every moment.

I overheard a long-time VBS volunteer say last week, "VBS is not what it used to be! But that’s a good thing." No, VBS is not what it used to be.  All good things must endure some change in order to survive.  But for the children of this church and community, VBS continues to be a wonderful gift.  It teaches our children that they are loved by God and by this church, and it teaches them to share the love that they have received with our community and our world.   When that happens, no matter what the decorations say, the theme of Bible School is the Bible!

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Time, Time, Time

by Bob Setzer, Jr.
The Sunday after Father's Day, I marched into the sanctuary five minutes late. Not a "few minutes" late but five minutes late. On the dot.

At the time, I didn't realize I was late so I was shocked to open the sanctuary door and find the service already in progress. It was like awakening from a dream to discover the world you thought was real, was not, while the real world had gone on quite nicely without you.

Still dazed, trying to figure out what happened, I now realized why I hadn't heard the choir sing their final warm-up next door to my study. But it was June, after all, and sometimes in the dog days of summer, we have a solo rather than a choral anthem. The uncommon quiet and stillness in the moments just before worship should have been a warning, but lost in final preparations for the service, I didn't notice.

So standing up there in front of God and everybody, five minutes late for the high and holy hour, I wracked my brain: How did this happen?! My digital watch clearly said "11:05," which meant I was right on time because I have run my watch five minutes fast for years. The practice provides an extra measure of protection to prevent just such embarrassing moments as this!!

Then it hit me. My daughter, Whitney, gave me a new watch for Father's Day. And this high-tech wonder automatically syncs with the national automatic clock in Colorado. So even though I set the watch five minutes fast, it automatically corrected the "error" without bothering to tell me!

Since then, I've been trying to readjust my life to live on "real" time.  Like the most annoying of friends (you know, someone like Jesus) the watch insists on always telling the truth! So far, I’ve been spared any further embarrassments, but I've also been surprised at how hard it is to retrain my time-keeping habits. Even small lies, once long-held and fiercely coddled, are not easily surrendered.

The experience left me wondering about all the other "little lies" that shape or rather, mis-shape my character: Lies about my good intentions ("This time will be different"), lies about diet and nutrition ("Really need to start that new regimen--tomorrow") lies about money ("One more credit card purchase can't hurt"), lies about...

On Sunday, we'll come face-to-face with one of the saltiest of the prophets, Amos, who proclaimed God was dropping a plumb line into the life of Israel (Amos 7:7-9). What was straight and right and true would stand; what was warped and twisted was destined to fall.

Plumb lines, atomic clocks, and yes, Jesus, proclaim there are certain, unerring truths that define our lives whether we like it or not. I don't like that rule, but as my five-minutes- late worship caper proves, I am stuck with it. A loving God long ago decided, "The truth shall set you free" (John 8:32). The only play we get to make is deciding when to fess up and find the true freedom our lies can never give.

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"Christian" is a Noun

by Bob Setzer, Jr.
With July 4 looming, I expect the usual flurry of e-mails telling me the following: (1) On the aluminum cap atop the Washington Monument are two Latin words, Laus Deo, meaning, “Praise be to God;" (2) the Founding Fathers were deeply religious men who founded the American republic on Christian principles; and, (3) the phrase “separation of church and state” does not appear in the United States Constitution. All those points are true or mostly true, in my view; however, the usual implications drawn from them in the free-floating Internet ditties I receive are not.

As to point one, yes, “God language” is and always has been a prominent part of our national dialect. The president’s recent speech addressing the disaster in the Gulf was rich in religious imagery. He spoke of the blessing-of-the-fleet ceremonies in which Gulf fishermen appeal for God’s protection and help in good times and bad. Despite highly publicized attempts to remove “In God We Trust” from our coins or the phrase “under God” from the Pledge of Allegiance, the Supreme Court has consistently held that such generic references to “God” are permissible. It is advancing one religion at the expense of another that violates the spirit and substance of the First Amendment.

As to point two, it is true most of the Founders were conventionally religious for their place and time, meaning they were Deists. They were not, for the most part, evangelical Christians, but more philosophically minded believers who thought God wound up the Universe like a clock and was now letting it run according to “natural law.” So, yes, the Founders believed “God” was, in some sense, watching over the republic, founded on the general principles of the Judeo-Christian heritage that characterized the Western world.

Nonetheless, they deliberately did not create a “Christian Republic,” but a secular one -- despite some of those present at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 pressing for a formal acknowledgment of Christianity in our founding document. This faction did not prevail -- not because the other delegates were anti-religious, but because they were fiercely committed to freedom of conscience for all people and had seen the atrocities perpetrated by state-sponsored religion in both Europe and the
colonies.

As to point three, it is correct that the literal phrase “separation of church and state” does not appear in the Constitution. Neither does “separation of powers” nor “a trial by a jury of one’s peers.” Each expression is, rather, a shorthand phrase that summarizes important constitutional provisions.

The phrase “separation of church and state” is usually dated to Thomas Jefferson’s letter to Connecticut’s Danbury Baptist Association in 1802. The Baptists were thankful for Jefferson’s strong support of religious liberty, since they were then facing rebuff and ridicule from the local Congregational religious establishment.

“Separation of church and state” means the state doesn’t get to “establish” religion or “prohibit” its “free exercise.” As always, the devil is in the details, and conscientious Christians and other people of faith (and no faith) will disagree about the application of this principle in practice. But the all-too-common sentiment this time of year that America is, or should be, a Christian nation is neither true to the facts nor to the American experience.

Nations, after all, can’t be Christian. Only people can. As that Baptist maverick of yesterday, Carlyle Marney, would remind us, “Christian” is best used as a noun, not an adjective.

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