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Over the past several weeks there have been many protests across the United States. These protests are about free speech, white supremacy, black lives matter, equal rights and other ideologies people believe are important to call one-self an American. It has been interesting and heart-breaking to watch the unfolding of these events. Last night I was thinking about all the relationships I have built over the years. Some of my friends are very conservative. They love President Trump, have a conceal and carry permit, vote Republican and consider themselves part of the political right wing. Some of my other friends are very liberal. They can’t stand President Trump, they go to rallies carrying rainbow flags, vote Democrat and consider themselves part of the political left wing. So many views, so many opinions… how do we get past all of the differences and become a people and a community God has created us to be? Here are three steps to having a peaceful conversation with someone with different views. Listen Twice As Much As You Speak There is an old saying that goes: “God gave you two ears and one mouth so we can listen twice as much as we speak”. There is truth and wisdom to that. When you are having a conversation with someone you disagree with, are you guilty of any of these? You are constantly thinking about what you are going to say next You act like you are listening, but really you are in defensive mode and only care about making your own points You interrupt and talk over the other person while they are speaking If you have done any of the above, it might be time to intentionally start practicing your listening skills. James 1:19 – “You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger” Speak Calmly and Respectfully I think we all have been in or witnessed a conversation that gradually becomes more and more intense. Voices slowly become louder, words become more intense, and the next thing you know… it’s a verbal battle. After the event you walk way confused and wonder how things got so out of control. Did anyone win? Was anything really settled? Speaking calmly and respectfully to someone who you are in disagreement with will do three things. First, it tells the other person that you hold them as someone of value. Their opinion and feelings are worth being heard. Second, it gives the other person a template of how to treat you. If you show respect in a calm way, hopefully so will they. Third, it will save the friendship and dissipate any awkwardness or resentment held towards each other. Proverbs 15:1 – “A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.” Focus On What You Have In Common When you know someone who believes differently than you about politics, race, equality and other social justice issues, it is difficult to think you could have anything in common. It takes work to find common ground. It could be a sport, a hobby, kids, or if you are both Christians that common ground is Jesus. Common ground gives both people a reason to move forward in the friendship. Common ground gives each person a conversation topic to fall back on when disagreements happen. Focusing on common ground builds unity and gives the relationship a space to grow. Psalm 133:1 - How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity! We all have people in our lives that we don’t see eye to eye with, but we can do our best to keep peace in our friendships by listening well, speaking respectfully and finding common ground. ___________________________________________________________________________ The Table is a Christian Church in Davenport, Iowa, pursuing transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith Worship Sundays at 5pm 102 E. 2nd St. Davenport, IOWA 52803

I just got back from a trip to Washington DC, and man, that city is covered in quotes. Every important building, memorial and monument is hallowed by words that designers chose to guard the integrity and guide the morality of America’s people, from generation to generation. Spend a few hours visiting attractions in the capital, and you’re struck by how thoroughly DC is a city stamped by aspiration. Our seat of government is covered in words about who we hope to be as a people. The words may not testify to who we actually are as a nation, at any given time; Rather, they speak to the kind of nation we want to be, and believe we can be. For those willing to study and pay attention, our national monuments remind us how different our personal and national conduct has been from our engraved ideals, over the course of our history. For example: There’s a lengthy anti-slavery quote from Thomas Jefferson engraved at his memorial, despite the fact that Jefferson himself enslaved 609 (!) human beings (whom he did not free during his lifetime) and built his fortune on their exploitation. Lincoln’s memorial features his entire second inaugural address, which casts a vision for peace and vitality in America, which he says would only be possible after the eradication of slavery from the nation. Lincoln’s first inaugural address, in which he explicitly stated that neither he nor the congress would take any action to abolish slavery, didn’t get engraved onto his legacy, go figure. On the wall of the Holocaust Museum, there is a quote from Jimmy Carter, expressing confidence that America would never allow such an atrocity to happen again. The 39th President spoke these words before the US and the international community allowed genocide to proceed in Bosnia and Rawanda. So yeah, our national ideals don’t necessarily represent our actions. And because of this uncomfortable truth, because our nation often does not abide by the principles we enshrine in quotes on our monuments, it’s a deliberate choice for me to call these words ‘aspirational’ and not ‘hypocritical.’ I do choose to call these words aspirational, because despite the fact that our leaders throughout history have failed to fully embody the ideals we claim to uphold as Americans, the words we’ve chosen to immortalize on our monuments are not congratulatory statements about our own inherit righteousness (for the most part). Rather, the words on our monuments are essentially words of judgment – imploring us to always compare the ways we are conducting ourselves in society and government to the eternal principles of honor, fidelity and justice that we believe should undergird the life of our nation. “Each of us bears responsibility for our action and for our failure to act. Here we will learn that we must intervene when we see evil arise. Here we will learn more about the moral compass by which we navigate our lives and by which countries will navigate the future.” - George H.W. Bush, from the Holocaust Museum “The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we have provided enough for those who have too little.” - Franklin Roosevelt, from the FDR Memorial "The nation behaves well if it treats the natural resources as assets which it must turn over to the next generation increased, and not impaired, in value." — Theodore Roosevelt, from the Capital Building Monumental quotes are bold assertions, not of who we are, but of who we are called to be as Americans. In DC, I never saw an engraving of the statement “America is the greatest country on earth,” despite the popularity this sentiment among elected officials on t.v. (If such an engraving does exist on a national monument, memorial or building, please send me a pic, so I can adjust my claims!) Instead, I read quotes time and again that insist that American peace and vitality depend on her people choosing in every generation to live lives of honor and hard work, and to rise valiantly to meet the highest standards of moral courage. “The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” - From the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial The wisdom we’ve etched in stone is about striving to be who are meant to be. If indeed a community ought to immortalize any common commitment, it seems altogether fitting and good to me, that we’d engrave at our most sacred sites, not a law or a label, but a common calling. _______________________________________________________________________ The Table is a Christian Church in Davenport Iowa, pursuing transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith Worshp atThe Table Sundays at 5pm. 102 E. 2nd St. Davenport Iowa.

Several years ago I lived in an apartment on the top level of a house. My downstairs neighbors were from Mexico. I didn’t know much of their story, but I knew the mom’s name was Maria, her husband worked the night shift and they had two loud children who loved to play tag in the house. They were outsiders in the community. I worked late on Friday nights and came home around 10:30-11:00 o’clock at night. Most of the neighborhood was asleep by that time, but not Maria and her family. They were grilling out with extended family, played loud festive music and well… having a party. The first time I came home and saw them, I politely smiled, but inside I was incredibly annoyed. I was tired and all I wanted to do was grab a snack and go to bed. I walked in my door, sighed and stewed in my anger. I thought for a moment of how I could stop the party. Then I decide…I could call the police! They are disturbing the peace! I will call the cops! That will show them not to have late parties in my backyard! Then suddenly there was a timid knock on the door. I slowly opened it and before me stood Maria with a huge plate of food. She had rice, refried beans, grilled chicken and all the Mexican fixin’s sitting on a paper plate covered in foil. She smiled and said, “I hope we don’t bother you. We thought you might be hungry”. I smiled back, never taking my eyes off the food and I replied, “Nope, you are not bothering me at all!” A few weeks later they had the family over again for a backyard late night party. I came home, climbed the stairs and I was only in my apartments for a few minutes before a timid knock came at my door again. “I hope we are not bothering you”, Maria said as she handed me a plate of food. Another few weeks went by… another party… another knock… another plate of food.By the time they had their 4th party, I didn’t care how loud or how late they partied. As long as they kept feeding me they could do whatever they wanted! They had won me over. Sometimes in life we come in contact with people who don’t fall into the rhythm of our life. They have their own rhythm going on. They do things differently, live differently, believe differently and sometimes stay up late playing loud festive music into all hours of the night. Maria’s commitment to doing good and treating me with kindness… regardless of my attitude towards her won me over. Her hospitality and good cooking won my heart. I loved having Maria and her family as my neighbors. 1 Peter 3 13-18 (The Message) “If with heart and soul you’re doing good, do you think you can be stopped? Even if you suffer for it, you’re still better off. Don’t give the opposition a second thought. Through thick and thin, keep your hearts at attention, in adoration before Christ, your Master. Be ready to speak up and tell anyone who asks why you’re living the way you are, and always with the utmost courtesy. Keep a clear conscience before God so that when people throw mud at you, none of it will stick. They’ll end up realizing that they’re the ones who need a bath. It’s better to suffer for doing good, if that’s what God wants, than to be punished for doing bad. That’s what Christ did definitively: suffered because of others’ sins, the Righteous One for the unrighteous ones. He went through it all—was put to death and then made alive—to bring us to God.”

If you’re like me, you know what’s like to be driving down the highway and feel your right foot getting steadily heavier. You may not even be late for anything, but you look at the dash and see you’re traveling much faster than is wise. Life is like that. We’re told and we tell others that life is a journey, not a destination, but that doesn’t keep us from being in an awful hurry much of the time. Until, that is, something stops us. We’re cruising along quickly and comfortably, among a hundred other cars, when we suddenly see dozens of pairs of brake lights shining from the backs of the vehicles in front of us. We are brought to a quick halt there on the very road we count on to usher us quickly and without interruption. Our smooth and speedy travel is replaced by slow and sporadic progress. From the moment we realize that this transition is happening, we suspect we know the reason. There has been a crash. The longer we spend inching down the road, the surer we become. Because the highway we’re on is several lanes wide, we know that whatever is causing the traffic jam cannot possibly be blocking the entire road. When we finally reach the scene of twisted metal and smoke, and see the misshapen human form strapped to a gurney being loaded onto an ambulance, we know why traffic has been held up. It’s because every person ahead of us has done the very thing we ourselves are now doing: Stop and stare. The disassembly of a human life is arresting, isn’t it? It’s horrifying, and it’s hard to look away. Cynics will tell you that this is because people have a sick fascination with the suffering of others, that we get a kind of grizzly enjoyment out of knowing that something really bad is happening to somebody else. That may be part of the reason we dwell on scenes of death. But I suspect that something even heavier is also at play. As we drive by and stare, each of us knows in that deep place where knowledge doesn’t even need words… That could be me. That could be my blood on the windshield. The impatient words that person threw at spouse and children in a rush out the door could have been my last words. Next week my loved ones could be planting flowers near the road at the spot where I died. The cross is a wreck. It is human life taken apart in travesty. We stop and look – we don’t want to, but we must. The Gospels tell us that Jesus didn’t have to take on this suffering, but he did take it on, because suffering is real, and God’s love is real. So the wreck of the cross stops us, we cannot speed past. The good news is, when our lives are taken apart, when we find ourselves mangled and bleeding, we know that God knows what it’s like, and will be there with us, from the dawn of our despair through its dusk. That’s the good news, but it’s not all the news. As we survey the highway wreckage, our eyes soon find the police car 25 feet further up the road, parked next to a damaged but not crushed third vehicle. Lights flash on the top of the black and white sedan, above a solemn man seated with head bowed down in the back seat, and as we drive by, we stare at him, too. With one look at his face, we know that the crash was not some tragic fluke. Its cause was not some momentarily blinding ray of sunshine, it was not a misfortunately located patch of gravel. From the look on this person’s face, we see the crash was his fault. Maybe he was inattentive and sloppy with his lane change. Maybe he had chosen to drive drunk. Maybe he had an unexpected burst of road rage. Even worse possibilities exist – maybe he knew and despised the person on the gurney, but didn’t fully know until now that his bitterness and spite really were instruments of death. We don’t know the details of the crash, but we know the explanation – he is to blame, and he knows it, too. We think about this as we stare at him and say again, in that same deep place within us, that could be me. I, too, am senselessly destructive. I can take lives apart, too, with my actions, my haste, my indifference, my foolhardiness, my fear, my anger, my unfeeling, unthinking use of the power than is given to me. The cross is a wreck. And it’s not the kind of wreck that just happens. It is an outcome of human sin. The same fears, the same resentment, the same preoccupied indifference, the same hatred, the same cruelty, the same delight in wrong, the same unfeeling, unthinking use of power that put Jesus on the cross exists in all of us. Most of the time we spend traveling this highway, we go quickly on our way, unimpeded, with disaster off the mind. But on Good Friday, there is the wreck. We are stopped. We look, and we know the truth. ______________________________________________________________ The Table is a Christian Church in Davenport, Iowa. A community of transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith Good Friday Tenebrae Service 4.14 6:30pm 102 E. 2nd St. Davenport Iowa Good Friday

Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, one of you will betray me.” They became distressed, and said to him and to one another, “Surely not I?” - Matthew 26:22 I wish I didn’t relate to this scripture, but of course I do. I know too well the reflexive need to distance myself from ugly facts. An awful truth is laid out, and I must convince myself and anyone who might be wondering that it has nothing to do with me. Do you feel this impulse? Something is terribly wrong and your first thought is to let yourself off the hook? To say, “Well, that sucks, but it’s not me.” Every time some vile crime is publicized, there’s a hashtag: #notallwhitepeople #notallchristians #notallmen #notallpeopleinwhatevergroupIminthatmightmeanImpartofthis Surely, not I, Lord? We inherit Christ’s story 2000 years after he walked the earth, but we know he’s being betrayed in our time as surely as he was back then. Jesus came to love and heal the world, but there’s a lot of greed and violence going on. And let’s just be real: Our great calling as God’s beloved is decidedly NOT to look at the problems throughout the world, and say, “but it’s not me.” Sometimes, we’re directly, specifically the perpetrators of crimes, like Judas, who literally sold Jesus out. Most of the time though, we’re caught in a web of injustice, and we do less than we could to right what is wrong all around us, just like the 11 disciples who bailed on Jesus when the going got rough. In our time: Cities full of children are being poisoned, when politicians cut costs and let lead contaminate the water. Generations of black and brown boys are being groomed for prison and social isolation by a culture of fear and a dysfunctional criminal justice system. Funding is being cut for early childhood education, and organizations that support victims of child abuse, sexual violence, and the comprehensive legacies of racism and poverty, while budget dollars are redirected to build weapons of war. A culture of suspicion and vitriol pits neighbors against one another in silos of self-righteous ignorance throughout our land. The list goes on and on, and in all these things, Christ is betrayed. It’s understandable that we would want to distance ourselves from the harsh facts of our life together, but a Christ-centered response is to ask two questions: ‘How do I contribute to these problems, either by my actions or my inaction?’ And, ‘How would Christ have me live, in light of the tragic realities that betray him?’ When the disciples said, ‘Surely not I Lord?’. Jesus responded, ‘The one who dips his hand in the bowl with me will betray me.’ Because, of course, they all had dipped their bread in that bowl. They were sharing a meal, and they were all a part of it. And therein lies the truth of our lives, as well. None of us can look at the troubles of the world, the trauma, the sin, the abuse, the suffering, and say, ‘That has nothing to do with me.’ All of it has everything to do with all of us. Because we all have a part to play in the God’s redemption of the world. ________________________________________________________________________ Holy Week Worship: 4.13 Maundy Thursday, 6:30pm 4.14 Good Friday, 6:30pm 4.16 Easter Sunday, 10:10am 102 E. 2nd Street, Davenport Iowa The Table is a Christian Church in Davenport, pursuing transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith

A few weeks ago I was at a store trying on clothes. In this particular store there was a mirror outside of the dressing room where you could see how you looked. So I stood in front of it, saw my reflection and said, “Wow, I look good!” But then I realized between the lighting of the store and the angle of the mirror, it made my image appear a little bit thinner. I thought to myself, “This is a good mirror! I love this mirror! How can I take this mirror home with me?” There is another mirror I see every day. I have it in my bathroom. It hangs above my sink with three bright lights beaming down like little spot lights on my face. When I look in that mirror, it reveals every blemish, every scar and every imperfection. I don’t like that mirror. Lent is a season we look into a mirror which is much like my bathroom mirror. We look at our reflection through the light of Lent and we come face to face with our human imperfection, our flaws and our blemishes. It is not pretty sometimes, but it is reality. Often times, we like to ignore or pretend our flaws and imperfections are not there. We don’t like seeing our humanness. We don’t like looking at our sin. But here is the great part about Lent….It is during this season we have the opportunity to look at our reflection in that mirror and say, “I don’t want that”. It is our choice to turn, to repent and begin living a different way: The way of Jesus. May this Lent season be one of not being afraid to look deeply into the mirror Lent. May it be a time to come face to face with our flaws, our imperfections and our sins. May it also be a time to make a choice to turn and become more like Jesus. Mark 1:7-8 (The Message) As he preached he said, “The real action comes next: The star in this drama, to whom I’m a mere stagehand, will change your life. I’m baptizing you here in the river, turning your old life in for a kingdom life. His baptism—a holy baptism by the Holy Spirit—will change you from the inside out.”

A farmer’s barn caught on fire. Attached to the side of it was a small chicken coop with chickens in it. As the fire grew, the flames began to lick the outer frame of the coop. The farmer ran to the door and quickly yanked it open so the frantic chickens could escape. They all bolted out and scattered. After the fire was out, the farmer approached the coop and stepped inside. It had heavy fire and smoke damage. As he was assessing the situation he came across a nest. Snuggled inside of it was a lone hen. She had died in the fire. Her feathers were blackish gray and singed from the flames. Her head hung low. The farmer was confused because all the other chicken were frantic and scrambling to get out… but not this one. She stayed on her nest. Why? He reached out with both hands to lift the hen and was startled as he felt wiggling underneath her. Then, he took one hand and gently turned the hen over to reveal four little chicks alive and well. The mother hen chose to protect her young chicks by gathering them under her wings and protecting them. She sacrificed herself so they could live. In Luke 13:34, Jesus compares himself to a hen gathering his people under his extended wings. He longed to protect his people. As we read through Luke, we find that the extended wings of a hen become Jesus’ extended arms on the cross. Was Jesus a chicken? Yes, but he was more than just a chicken. He was a protective hen who chose to sacrifice his life to save ours.

A friend of mine studied culinary arts under a master chef, and the chef always insisted that his students eat the food they ruined. Or even slightly messed up. You eat your mistakes. Burned. Dry. Poorly sifted, proportioned, or kneaded. Something went wrong with this thing and it comes out just… bad. The chef says you have to eat it, for two reasons: First, food is precious, and you don’t waste it. Getting a recipe wrong is no reason to discard something that is still nourishing and needed for life, especially in a world where so many people are starving. Second, you have to understand – fully understand – what happens when you mess up. Our actions have consequences, and even if we’re well-intentioned, we have to really deal with problems when things go wrong. We need to know what really happened, and how the things we did shaped the outcome. When you mess up, you gotta own it. You gotta eat it. Like a kitchen worker in a restaurant, all of us make day-to-day mistakes that effect other people, the ones who will be served what we prepare. Accepting and studying these mistakes is crucial to being a decent person in a community. But even in private matters, we must grapple with the consequences of getting things wrong, or else we can’t hope to make things right. Of course, this is the opposite of what we want to do, because it’s really embarrassing when you screw up. There’s shame, there’s guilt, there’s wounded pride. If there’s any way to move on and pretend the mistake didn’t happen, we’ll usually pick that option. That’s why it’s important to note one reason the chef didn’t give for eating your mistakes. He doesn’t require his students to consume food they messed up as any kind of punishment, or to make them feel bad about themselves. There’s no agenda to humiliate people who burn the truffles. Consuming mistakes is just about coming to terms with what happened, so that we can re-order and re-calibrate our efforts with the next opportunity. Lent is a season of humility in the Christian Church, when we focus on facts of the human condition that we’d rather ignore. We die, we break, we fail, we sin. Lent asks us to acknowledge how short-sighted and amateurish we are when we try to do good, and to confess our sins when we wittingly or unwittingly cause harm to others and to ourselves. It stings a little bit to fess up to this stuff, because we’re shining a light on things about ourselves we wish weren’t true. But God’s purpose is not to shame us for being human, to punish us for being fallible. God made us, and we’re imperfect. Imperfection is not something we are supposed to transcend or repress. God does intend to call and guide us, warts and all, toward experiencing and practicing grace. God’s will is for us to grow into a lifestyle and identity as faithful people that will enable us and the people impacted by us to thrive. That’s what Lent is about. There’s no shame in messing up the recipe. Eat the cookies, ask for help, and keep trying. ___________________________________________________________________________ The Table is a Christian church in Davenport, Iowa pursuing transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith Worship Sundays at 5pm 102. E 2nd Street

A while back I was talking to a detective who told me something he’d observed in suspects he’s detained over the years. Holding cells are full of anxious and agitated people, but some guys are completely at ease when they’re arrested, and many actually lay down and sleep the moment the cell door slams shut. If you didn’t know better, you’d think the relaxed person knows he’s innocent and will get him out soon, so he has nothing to worry about. But this detective’s experience was the opposite: the guys who rest easy the first night they’re in jail are almost always found guilty of the crime. He had a theory as to why this was the case. Jail is a very stressful place, and certainly, if an innocent person was arrested, the fear of being wrongly convicted would spawn full-scale panic. The guys who go to jail relaxed are leaving a situation that was more stressful than being caught. He explained that a person who’s committed a serious crime has been monumentally stressed for days, weeks, months, before being arrested. He’s been living on the run – either actively fleeing the law, or hiding the truth of the crime while going about daily life, pretending everything is normal. This guy is always looking over his shoulder, carefully peeking through window blinds, and wondering every time he sees a cop if he’s finally been found out. The stress of living like this is so enormous that being caught is actually a relief. The person who no longer runs from the truth can finally rest. Lent begins this week with Ash Wednesday, a time when we confess our sins and acknowledge our mortality. We place ashes on foreheads and speak the truth, “You are dust, and to dust you will return.” Sometimes this strikes people as morbid or depressing, but the Church offers it as a release, an easing of burdens. Because much of the time, we run from the truth, and that’s no way to live. The gospel doesn’t need to catch anybody who has committed crimes, doesn’t worry about locking people up for their transgressions, but it does invite people to stop running. Many voices tell us to flee the truth. Our culture celebrates flawlessness, denies the reality of death, and doesn’t know how to seek forgiveness and reconciliation, when wrongs are committed. Ads, articles, and facebook say we’re supposed to be mighty and joyful in every moment; we’re supposed to be beautiful and young, forever. We’re supposed to be right all the time. But that’s not us. It’s not anybody. And if you try to live up to those kinds of impossible ideals, it will suck the life right out of you. In truth, we’re everything we’re not supposed to be. We’re frail and finite. We get old. We make the same mistakes over and over again. We have far more depression and worry in our lives than our instagram feeds suggest. And we know how often our actions hurt the people and the planet that we love. God knows these things, too. God is the source and the destination for all of our lives. We are created with all of our limitations, and God’s will for us is not that we be or pretend to be perfect. It’s that we allow ourselves to be embraced and guided by almighty love, between the dust and the dust. If you’re tired of hiding from the truth, of senselessly denying the reality of the human condition, Ash Wednesday is for you. This beginning moment in the journey of Lent is a time when grace reminds us that, even though we face pressures from every side, we never need to pretend with God. It’s a time to remember the promises of God’s faithfulness and forgiveness, and to choose honesty and freedom. And friends, you’re invited. __________________________________________________ Ash Wednesday Service March 1, 6pm The Table 102 E. 2nd St. Davenport, Iowa 52803 The Table is a Christian church in Davenport, seeking transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith

When people say that somebody “goes the extra mile”, they usually mean that the person works really hard, is truly dedicated, and does an especially good job. That is a misunderstanding of the phrase. The saying comes from the Bible, Matthew 5:39, when Jesus instructs his listeners, “If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two.” Jesus is referring to an exploitative practice of his day, whereby a Roman soldier or administrator could requisition the labor of a Jewish peasant, and force him to carry a load for a mile, without pay or the ability to refuse. To go ‘the extra mile’ is to respond to a person who is abusing you, not with animosity, but with grace and generosity. This teaching is given alongside a couple of others, which are similarly counter-intuitive and not what most readers want to hear: “If anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also.” and “If anyone sues you for your coat, give your cloak as well”. All these instructions run counter to normal human instincts, and so they’re very difficult to accept. If someone is abusing you or ripping you off, you don’t want to just take it. You want to push back. You want to hurt them as bad, or worse, than they hurt you. Make them regret ever messing with you. Jesus knows the instinct to hit back is natural, but he commands something different, because retaliation is a trap. Retaliation ensnares us in a cycle of escalating harm that can ultimately destroy everything we care about. In Jesus’ specific context of first-century Palestine, to fight a Roman soldier would result not only in the resister’s death, but possibly also horrific violence visited on one’s family and village. In the decades before and after Jesus walked the earth, the area he lived in experienced many uprisings against Roman rule, many efforts to fight the oppressor on the terms of the oppressor – with swords and spears. Without exception, every uprising ended with staggering amounts of bloodshed and misery, and Rome remained. In offering the counter-intuitive, nonviolent teachings that he did, Jesus understood that, when we are abused, we experience not just the pain and indignity of the mistreatment in that moment, but also rage and hopelessness at having no control over our lives and our bodies. The violent oppressor wants his victims to play by his rules, because it increases his dominance over them. Jesus did not counsel hurting the oppressor as the oppressor hurts you, because that doesn’t actually work. But neither did he say, “There’s nothing you can do.” Instead, he tells people to do the thing no one is expecting. Treat evildoers in the opposite way they are treating you. Next week, I’ll write another post that goes into how Jesus’ teachings are actually a subversive form of resistance, which indeed diminish the power of oppressors. The non-violent way of Jesus was NOT a passive acceptance of abuse. But the first point is simply that Jesus encourages us to believe that we can make active choices even as we are being hurt and oppressed. In an impossible situation, where agency is being stripped from the abused, Jesus helps us discern where control can be found again. In the face of wrongdoing, acts of grace and goodwill are the first and best way to say, “My life, my time, my body, my actions, belong to me.” _____________________________________________________________________ The Table is a Christian church in Davenport, Iowa, seeking transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith Worship Sundays, 5pm

She gave birth to her firstborn ​son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. Luke 2:7 The scripture doesn’t say there was no room at all in the inn. It says there was no room for them. The inn may have been completely full. Perhaps the owner was turning people away for hours before Mary and Joseph showed up. Or maybe Joseph and Mary didn’t have enough money to pay for a bed. Perhaps the spaces were being saved for more affluent clientele. ​ Maybe they had money but were discriminated against. Mary and Joseph were from out of town, maybe they had a different accent or dialect, and if they arrived after dark, the innkeeper didn’t like the look of them. Or maybe there were rumors going around about Mary being pregnant out-of-wedlock, and the innkeeper didn’t want to give accommodations to people like that. Or maybe it was simply the fact that they needed help that made them unwelcome. Mary was about to give birth. She could've been in labor already when they knocked on the innkeeper’s door. Sometimes people just don’t want to deal with somebody else who’s in crisis. Don’t bring your needs and your issues in here. We’ve got enough problems without adding yours to the mix. Whatever the reasons, Mary and Joseph were turned away. They were literally left out in the cold. So Jesus was born an outsider. The holy family was met and encouraged that night by other outsiders, people who were used to sleeping in the cold, used to the humble life. The shepherds could see something the innkeeper couldn’t – God’s care for the down-and-out. This is the frame of mind required of you and I, if we really want to draw near to the newborn Jesus at Christmas. He is shut out. His family is excluded. He has nothing to his name, but God’s grace. He is the vulnerable, the penniless, the vagabond. We will know him, really know him, in bonds of friendship with the poor. We will adore him with acts of benevolence toward the hungry, the sick, the stranger, the imprisoned. We will honor and serve him in our empathy and generosity with the abused and the outcast. Keeping Christ in Christmas means doing Christmas with the outsiders. _____________________________________________________________________ The Table is a Christian church in Davenport, Iowa, pursuing transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith Christmas Eve Service: Saturday, Dec. 24, 5pm 102 E. 2nd St. Davenport, Iowa 52803

When Jesus’ mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. – Matthew 1:18-19 The first thousand times I read this passage, I thought it meant that Joseph’s plan to reject Mary privately rather than publicly was proof of his righteousness. Maybe that’s right, or at least what the writer of the words meant to convey. Over time though, I started to consider how his rejection would feel to Mary, or to the child she’d raise alone in desperate conditions. Would Joseph seem righteous to them for abandoning them in the ‘nice’ way? The fact that someone was cruel, but not as cruel as they could have been, is generally not much consolation to the ostracized and penniless. And so I started to wonder, what if Joseph’s ‘righteousness’ was less about his sense of moral duty, and more about his sense of himself? It is, after all, quite easy to imagine a man who is respected in his community and protective of his reputation, having not just his feelings hurt but his pride wounded by the discovery of his fiancee’s pregnancy. Even if he believed Mary’s promises that she’d been faithful to him, and that this moment in their story together was greater than he’d ever comprehend, you can see how Joseph, like most men, might still doubt himself, resent his wife, and worry about what other people would think. What would having a pregnant bride in that day and age say about him? And so, being a righteous man, he planned to dismiss her. Greed is often about selfishness, hoarding resources, not sharing. But sometimes it’s more about self-importance, an inability to tolerate threats to one’s personal narrative or community standing. Greed can be an unwillingness to the bear the personal cost of caring for another’s well-being. In Jesus and Mary and Joseph’s story, God needed to intervene, and speak plainly with Joseph: “Take Mary as your wife… the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you will name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” Worry and pride and pain and greed are powerful forces – they shape how we relate to one another, when we are willing to extend grace and trust, whether we will provide help and allow our own vulnerability. But it turns out that, because of the love God has for the world, it is possible to move toward generosity and bravery, even amidst daunting circumstances. Joseph, who chose and built a life with Mary and Jesus, who in the end was not merely privately righteous but morally courageous, will tell you it’s true. _____________________________________________________________________ The Table is a Christian church in Davenport, Iowa, pursuing transformation: from greed toward generosity from violence toward peacemaking from isolation toward neighborliness from fear toward faith