Undercover Pastor

We just had our Ash Wednesday worship service at Trinity this week.

It turns out that the traditional way to produce the ashes for the worship service is to save some of the palm fronds from the previous year’s Palm Sunday and burn them to create the ashes.

There’s something deep and true about it…  Palm Sunday is when we remember Jesus’ trimphant entry into Jerusalem.  Everyone was singing praises, throwing down their coats before him, and waving palm branches as they would to welcome royalty.  But within days, they were shouting to ”crucify him.”  It is the symbol of these feigned praises that we burn and mark ourselves with as we enter into a time of reflection and self-examination.

Are we doomed to repeat this cycle endlessly, or can the power of the Risen Christ burn away our pretension and lead us into an authentic faith that can endure?  That is the promise of Easter.  But we can’t get there until we walk the road to the cross.

I had an interesting experience yesterday and it got me thinking… I took the boys to a McDonald’s with one of those “play place” areas with tubes and slides to play in. Well, as always seems to be the way, as soon as we got our food and were ready to eat, Johnny had to go to the bathroom. I didn’t want someone to haul off our tray and throw out the food we had just paid for so I sought out one of the employees to let him know that we would be right back.

He looked at me uncomfortably and started gesturing to another employee. I decided that he probably spoke only Spanish so I started talking to him in Spanish, but he kept gesturing to the young woman behind the counter. I finally asked, “No habla español?” He said “No.” “No español.” And he proceeded to ask the woman he had been pointing to to translate for us. I told her what I wanted to communicate. Then she translated it into Spanish for him!

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Hey, all!  You can listen to my preaching now without even coming to West Sacramento!  (Though it’s still better live, and you also get to hear and sing some great music.)  Visit our church podcast.

And if you do, please leave a comment or two on there.  The silence is deafening.

Well, the church finances are looking bleak so far this year.  People haven’t stepped up and we’re short more than $30,000 for 2007 – after the obvious cuts.  The shortfall is almost twice the savings we have in the bank.  As pastor, I’ve been struggling to come up with a plan, but I can’t seem to find one.  We’d have to get rid of more than one staff person or cut my pay in half or cut 75% of our mission giving or cut all of our program funding to make it work. 

The options seem to be to cut back our ministry significantly –  which would be a big step backwards – or to trust that our needs for ministry will be met somehow.  But where is the line between trust in God and foolishness?

I have prayed and asked people to pray.  God has been acting in our church, and I don’t believe that he’s done with us.  Still, we have to make a decision before the end of the year.  Well, I received a message today.

Johnny was “reading” his children’s Bible this morning, and he came up to a page with a picture of a fish with a coin in its mouth.  “What’s this Daddy?” he asked.

It was the story of Jesus and Peter paying the Temple tax.  They didn’t have any money so Jesus told Peter, “go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.”  (Matthew 17:24-27)

The children’s Bible stated confidently that we can trust God to provide for our needs.  The message?  If Jesus can provide for monetary needs with a fish, won’t he provide for our church?  There are many possible ways for God to provide.  There were 199 people in worship on Sunday.  Can’t God move them to give?  Or provide some other means of support?

Johnny pointing out this story as I was struggling this morning really felt like a message from God.  “Don’t worry, Steve.  We’ll get through this together.”  I look forward to telling you how it works out.

If you read this posting, please pray for Trinity Church.  “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” – James 5:16b