Faith Works 4-15-17 (let's get ahead, shall we?)

Again noting: this is a "get ahead" column for the Easter weekend; you should have just gotten the 4-8-17 column for this Saturday.

Pax, Jeff

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Faith Works 4-15-17

Jeff Gill

 

A beggar boy and his goods

___

 

Their Iesou died a few hundred years ago, but they kept coming. His mother had died when he was a boy, and the beggar child just thought of himself as "Boy" (if anyone noticed him at all, that's what they called him, too), but they all knew HIS name.

 

Since the emperor's mother had come to Jerusalem a few years ago, the Roman wealthy showed up regularly, in groups from ships down at Caesar's harbor making the long walk up into the hills from the Middle Sea to this, the Holy City.

 

All the boy knew that was holy to him tended to be gold, but he wouldn't hesitate to take silver, or copper if such was all that was at hand. A gold coin could feed him for a week; depending on whose face was on it, a month, and he was good at judging from faces of shopkeepers which caesar's face he had.

 

In the heaps of rubble near where a church was slowly going up, massive limestone block by massive hoisted stone, the boy was still small enough to squirm down into the ruins of the temple that had been here before, and into stones that felt, in the darkness, older even than those foundations.

 

Questing fingers could find the particular cold of iron, and the long iron Roman nails were what he sought: for today's Roman visitors would pay, and pay well, for these corroded pieces of metal. The tale was told that their Iesou had been nailed, hand and foot, to timbers which Empress Helena had already taken away, around the well of which the church was being built. But they did not find all the nails.

 

The key, of course, was to be not quite clever, and not to show your hand too quickly. He had learned long ago, in his own terms as a child himself, that if you just walked up to a gold-trimmed gown wearing Roman tourist and pulled out a long, thin iron nail and said "here's one of the nails they used to crucify Iesou" they'd give you the back of their hand, hard, and no coins at all.

 

But if you approached them nervously, hesitantly, and whispered that you thought, you might, a friend could have . . . and if you could get them to leave their friends behind and follow you down streets and turns and alleys and lanes, the farther they went with you, the more they believed that what you had was what they sought, and the more they would pay.

 

You'd sold dozens of these Roman nails to willing purchasers, always (well, since the unsuccessful beginnings) saying you didn't know for sure, but it had been found very near the Calvary rock, deep in the ruins of the earlier church, and who knows . . .

 

And who did know? He had been so deep in the rubble pile, down to country rock itself, and found oddly curved and twisted nails that seemed exactly as if they'd been pounded deep into timber and pried out with great effort later. Those, he thought with a chuckle, were the ones people paid the least for, and might be most likely to be what was said of them. It was the long, straight, dark ones that got the gold.

 

Why did they want these nails? He assumed they wanted to own a piece of the story, the legends, the amazing reports they said again and again to each other about this man: that he was who he said he was, that God Most High spoke through him, and that his death on a cross was, for him, not an ending, but a new beginning.

 

If he could sell a few more nails, he would relax a bit. Perhaps when Helena's new church was built around the tomb they said he rose from, he would get a new robe, wash his face, and attend one of their services, and learn more about this Iesou. For now, there was work to do, and visitors to greet. Could it be? Who knows.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; tell him your story at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

 

Faith Works 4-8-17

Faith Works 4-8-17

Jeff Gill

 

Processions around and in and through

___

 

This weekend, Hebron Christian Church celebrates their 150^th anniversary with special events through the weekend and a guest preacher, Rev. Dr. Tamara Rodenberg, president of Bethany College, to anchor their Sunday worship.

 

I was privileged to serve as their pastor for five years myself, and know their history, starting as it does with a returned Civil War veteran named Thomas Madden who wanted something more out of life at age 24 than just a good career.

 

Deacon Street in Hebron, that runs past the elementary school, is named for him or rather the role he held in the Christian Church; he was never college or seminary trained, but his preaching built up that congregation along with the occasional visiting "trained" evangelist; the church he helped establish there sent a Timothy (a youth raised out of a congregation who goes into ministry) of about 24 to Newark, where George Crites became the first parson for the church that I now serve, founded in 1884. Crites went on into state society work, and Thomas Madden stepped in to help sustain what became Central Christian in Newark through the first decade of the 1900s, skating some eight to ten miles in his seventies during the winter along the frozen Ohio & Erie Canal. He'd preach for us in Newark, then strapped on his skates to be home with Virginia by dinner.

 

I think about his journeys both winter and summer when I drive Rt. 79 between Heath and Hebron, and the faith that kept him going, which keeps us going today.

 

Sunday afternoon, and Monday, we have another cycle of "open house" days at Octagon Earthworks, part of the 2,000 year old Newark Earthworks complex, a site of pilgrimage back and forth from Chillicothe, we believe from the evidence, 60 miles one way. The double-walled processional ways can be traced in fields and forests behind the shopping zone in Heath, and on old maps and memories over fields down past Hebron and the National Road.

 

As we prepare to give tours for the more infrequently opened portion, at the end of N. 33^rd St. and Parkview Rd., during the afternoon hours tomorrow and Monday as well, I think about the years we've been doing tours officially now, since 2000. In those seventeen years, we've gained new "friends of the mounds" and had others move on, move away, some pass away – and those memories are even greener in the spring, with the budding trees and flowering shrubs and occasional patch of spring beauties in the grass reminding us of walks long ago, in our memory and in the land's memory as well.

 

But it is Palm Sunday, after all. The start of a week of Christian observances all well known, if not always generally understood. The beginning is a commemoration of the triumphant entry of Jesus of Nazareth into the royal city of Israel, Jerusalem.

 

Were they celebrating who Jesus was, or hoping for something more? Do we celebrate with an understanding of the bittersweet nature of the regal symbols presented to the man entering the gates of the walled city, or are we just caught up in a traditional celebration ourselves?

 

And it's not only Christians who have wondered, on reading or hearing the Gospel accounts, if some of the same cheering voices shouting "Hosanna!" would be jeering out a "Crucify him!" later that same week. They may have been largely different crowds with separate agendas, but I wonder.

 

A procession, from the Mount of Olives down through the Kidron Valley and up to the Lions' Gate. Well, that's what it's called today, though it's new. It's only 500 years old, which in Jerusalem is new. But somewhere in that vicinity, a triumphant entry on donkeyback, palms waving all around, and a man dimly seen at the head of the parade of people.

 

Come Friday, a different procession out the opposite side of the city, to a skull-like knoll of rock peering above a garden patch  studded with rock-hewn tombs. No triumph there, only defeat, and desolation, and death.

 

Yet in time, we would come to see the one obvious celebration as somewhat mistaken, and the sorrowful scene to be at the heart of humanity's greatest triumph. It seems that some processions, some parades, you can't just watch to understand, but you have to find your place and participate yourself to really see where it's all going.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; tell him about processions you've been a part of at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

 

Notes From My Knapsack 4-6-17

Notes From My Knapsack 4-6-17

Jeff Gill

 

You Can't Tell Me What To Do

___

 

For my sins, I'm a homeowner's association (HOA) trustee. Long story, but I've been one quite a while now.

 

Call it self-interest, if you like.

 

We're those three people (elected for three year terms, a new trustee in theory every year, if you had enough people willing to do the work) who are responsible for public areas, getting them mowed and trimmed and the lights that are under our responsibility lit, collecting annual dues, and checking in with residents of this particular neighborhood about . . . the covenants.

 

Each property in this little development has a set of covenants attached to it, legally, at the county recorder's office, but the existence of any limits or restrictions beyond simple zoning guidelines in the village is not always disclosed by the sellers, the realtors, the title companies. Ours are really fairly loose, with guidelines built in for mailbox style, color schemes and materials for exteriors, and no basketball hoops permanently attached to the house. Actually, if you read the covenants (something too few people actually do) it says they can't face the street. So technically, you could put one on your house on the back of it, but . . . anyhow.

 

Trash totes can't stay out for more than a day, and have to be screened if not in your garage, and you're expected to have landscaping, though there's not much about what kind or how well maintained.

 

So we live in an odd zone between village ordinances, like the requirement to clear sidewalks of snow within 24 hours if it's two inches or more, or the fence height restrictions in front and back yards, which gets interesting if you live on a corner. Suffice it to say that there's often debate over when the two inch trigger is pulled (and who decides) and our covenants in this particular development call for a higher "minimum" fence height than the village. So you can pay for your permit down at Village offices, and start in fence building, and learn that you can't legally do that, at least in this association. Abe Lincoln would split a rail trying to figure some of this stuff out.

 

And when it comes to zoning and building, I'll just fully disclose that I'm currently chair of our village Board of Zoning and Building Appeals, also and mercifully known as the BZBA. For that service of the last decade, I have no excuses. It's just being a glutton for punishment.

 

But what I've learned, to my chagrin, in both positions of mild responsibility and little authority, is that it is all too often true, and a real limitation on the good I can do, that next-door neighbors often have never spoken to each other. At all. I don't mean keep your back door open and let them come and go, I'm talking about just having met before, and said two words ever. Like "Please?" or "Thanks."

 

Folks often come to HOA trustees or the BZBA with a request to do something that impacts their neighbor, or for us to do something about their neighbor. My invariable question is "have you spoken to them about this?" And I'll be honest. If your answer is "uh, no, we've not spoken at all" my interest in helping you force the issue just about vanishes.

 

As spring is popping out all over, windows are opened, and porches at least could be occupied again, I have a request for everyone. Could you just say hi to your neighbor? It could make a remarkable amount of difference for our community.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's old enough to know better, but he keeps on volunteering – someone stop him. Tell him about your neighbor at knapsack77@gmail.com.

Faith Works 4-1-17

Faith Works 4-1-17

Jeff Gill

 

A modest proposal for churches to consider

___

 

It's time for congregations to get out of the property and real estate business.

 

Our buildings eat up a fair amount of most faith community budgets, and the paid staff we have, the other largest chunk of how we use our members' contributions, spend significant amounts of time dealing with issues around the use, maintenance, and expansion of our physical plants.

 

Whether a small country chapel by a cemetery, or a mega-ish campus with multiple buildings on the property surrounded by parking prairies, let's just all agree to stop. Let it go. Let those hunks of real estate roam free.

 

They'll go back, in many cases, onto the property tax rolls as businesses and other everyday uses occupy the square footage, or be torn down for additional strip malls and big box retailers, bulldozed for new residential options.

 

Some older church buildings in our area have been repurposed and remodeled for residential use, and a few in the Columbus area have become clubs and restaurants and other businesses. A bank's office operations are in an old church structure in downtown Newark, and it was a muffler shop before that, so there's precedent.

 

Yes, let's see all our Christian churches of pretty much any stripe or sort sell off their buildings, and use the proceeds for ministry. This is a refrain that many younger advisers to church life in the US are starting to say, especially to older congregations with antique buildings, of which our area has quite a few. The counsel is to cash out, and put that money to use in "creative ministries" and not "just spend it on ourselves" but use the donations of church members more flexibly, with outreach a higher priority.

 

Of course, there's a catch. Or two. Or three. One is that we can't all do this at once. The real estate market for distinguished older edifices couldn't absorb so many properties all together, without the prices for them plummeting below what you can currently get for a retired church building. So we're going to have to figure out: who goes first? You? Me?

 

Then there's the whole concept of weekly Sunday worship (or Saturday for some of you, Friday for a few, to think more broadly across faith traditions, but we're thinking all religious bodies should join in with this move). Some new church plants start in middle school auditoriums, which aren't getting used on Sundays mostly anyhow, so it's a revenue source for school districts with minimal cost.

 

If we all get out of our buildings, there's probably not enough rent-able spaces around for all of us to go into. We might see more merges and combined congregations if we all shed structural investments, but in general, this move would swamp the meeting halls and gathering spaces on weekends. Then you'd see rents going up for such use, as it becomes more of a sellers' market than a buyers' advantage.

 

And sooner or later, someone is going to sit down and do the math, and say "you know, for what we pay each year for this space, we could put up a decent building." So folks would get together and say "for that matter, we'd really like it if we could set up the raised platform this way, and seat the people here, as opposed to what we're stuck with." Then some others would say "if we're creating a dedicated space for worship, we should honor our God by making it beautiful, with decoration that spurs good thoughts, divine aspirations." Some will call for simple lines, others a more ornate elegance, but those buildings will develop and elaborate over time as people try to express their faith through architecture.

 

So how long would it take, even if every church property was sold or liquidated or divested to the private market tomorrow, for faith communities to build again what would simply be another generation of church buildings? I'd guess about a generation, tops.

 

Maybe it's not such a good idea after all. Perhaps church buildings are ministry tools we need to look at for what they are, how we use them in worship and for service, and be willing to change where we must, honor what we should of the past, and be flexible in new construction down the road. We can do building audits occasionally to make sure our buildings serve us, and the church doesn't serve the building.

 

Never mind. And Happy First of April!

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's glad his congregation has a lovely, useful building. Tell him about your sense of church buildings at knapsack77@gmail.com or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.

Faith Works 3-25-17

Faith Works 3-25-17

Jeff Gill

 

Starting Conversations, Sharing Stories

__

 

I would greatly appreciate it if you could put Wednesday, April 26 on your calendar for 6:30 pm at Newark High School.

 

It doesn't matter if you live elsewhere in the county, this is for all of us, and the auditorium at NHS is big enough we can fit quite a few in, centrally located. There's a speaker and a program that night which is not for my church – in fact, I'm cancelling our usual Wednesday night Bible study to ask our people to attend – or for any religious body, but I hope clergy and leaders and workers and members and friends of faith communities all across Licking County can come be a part of starting some conversations that night.

 

Have you ever heard of Xalisco, Mexico? Well, they've heard of Ohio. We've been a wonderful market for their products. They make black tar heroin down there, and they've figured out how to make it cheap, and market it well.

 

But this isn't about the drug trade. Not just about the sale of illegal substances, anyhow. It has to do with legal but dangerous substances, and about our communities, and about you and me.

 

And addiction. I was sorry to miss the program Bishop Frederick Campbell brought to St. Francis de Sales parish last week; the Catholic Church long has done good week in building community and facing addiction, and our Newark parish has been a good neighbor to a big part of our community response to addiction.

 

What really caught my eye was seeing that the Bishop focused on how we have created for ourselves "an addictive culture." I think he's right about that. We're accustomed to abusing things that can be good in and of themselves, that are healthy and even healing at the right time, in the right way.

 

But fast food, eaten too often, becomes a craving. Boxed snacks in cellophane wrappers, consumed regularly, become a master of our emotions, not the relief we were seeking. Prescription drugs, misused and abused, can be desperately hard to shake off, and invite users into criminality; prescription drug companies, mindlessly seeking profit regardless of proper use, can criminally exploit hard-working people with aches and pains and needs.

 

Opiates have a place. I spend too much time in hospice units not to know that. And I hate it when an elderly person hesitates to push their pain management button "because I don't want to get addicted." We're muddled, we're confused about addiction: as a society. Addiction isn't a thing, it's a series of choices complicated by our own biochemical tendencies. Some people have more or less resistance to sugars, but we don't blame them for getting diabetes and tell them they're on their own. There is a genetic predisposition, it seems, to alcoholism, and some can drink and not drink at will, and others take one and can't stop. Diabetics have episodes when they aren't as careful as they could be with sugars, but we don't call it a relapse and say they don't deserve help because of their choices. How do we look at cigarette or alcohol or drug abuse? I'm still wrestling with the words and concepts.

 

Sam Quinones is one name you should know for April 26. He's the main speaker. He's written a highly regarded book titled "Dreamland" whose title comes from a now lost location in Portsmouth, Ohio; his wrestling took him tumbling through the world of big pharma, into Oklahoma and New Mexico as well as into Mexican drug cartels themselves, but he kept coming back to Ohio. To Portsmouth, and Chillicothe, and to Columbus, and to . . .

 

He doesn't mention Newark. Marion gets a moment on stage, and "other places in Ohio." But trust me when I say "Dreamland" is a book about us, both here and now. You really should read it, whether you can come Apr. 26 or not.

 

The other name you should know is Doug Ute. Our superintendent at Newark City Schools has pulled together a panel of community leaders, of which I'm proud to be a part, but the idea and the effort and the hardest work to pull this all together is Doug. I mean, Mr. Ute. The Big Guy. I salute what he's trying to help us do, in Newark and in Licking County, which is to start a conversation, to get us to share our stories.

 

Because as Bishop Campbell said, we've got an addictive culture on our hands. We all know addicts, sometimes very closely indeed. Sharing stories starting with Sam's is how we're going to get somewhere from the talking to the right action.

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; tell him about where you see the faces and reality of addiction around us at knapsack77@gmail.com or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.