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Fine Prints: April, 2008 Be Sure Your Sins... April 5 Four Handicaps of Poverty April 12 Poverty Revisited April 19 Treating People as if They Count April 26
Be Sure Your Sins...
What you’re about to read was written for the congregation’s youth.
However, adults are also welcome to check it out. I know this will come as a surprise, but when I young, I
was somewhat of a smart-aleck. For example, when I filled in forms, I
wasn’t above responding in a bombastic manner. A case in point is the
application to Sunnydale Academy that I handed in following my Junior
year. I don’t remember the exact details, but I know the type
of thing I probably said. For example, when a form would ask for "race,"
I’d put down "human," "rat," "space," "nuclear arms" or whatever other
cheeky response happened to come to mind. I totally forgot about the incident until some fifteen later when I’d become an upstanding pastor and editor. Back in Missouri visiting family, I had a conversation that went something like . . . "I’m working in the registrar’s office at the academy," my nephew told me when I asked what type of after-school employment he had. "In fact, I came across your student file while we are archiving some old documents the other day. You had a pretty good Grade Point Average." "Top in my class," I said, feeling a little smug and certain that he must be impressed by his uncle’s academic achievements. "And you had a pretty good ACT score too," he added with due deference. "I didn’t know you’d received a full-tuition scholarship to the University of Missouri." "Yes," I said, "but I declined it to go to an Adventist college instead." It felt good to know how impressed he must be by not only my achievements but also by my commitment to the church. How could he feel anything but admiration? "You weren’t quite as gifted in art, were you?" he said, leaving me to wonder just what he was driving at. "I mean, if you hadn’t actually stated that you were a member of the ‘human race,’ I probably wouldn’t have figured it out based solely on the ‘artist’s conception’ you provided on that application for your senior year." And suddenly I didn’t feel quite so smug or quite so impressive or quite so worthy of admiration. But I did have a new appreciation for that age-old adage "Be sure your sins will find you out"!Jim Coffin, Senior Pastor
Four Handicaps of Poverty
Christians, not just society
in general, face a significant challenge in knowing how to respond to
the poverty that not only surrounds us but is the plight of many
Christians themselves. Granted that the Bible has much to say about our
obligation to the poor, it’s a topic we can’t just ignore. Jim Coffin, Senior Pastor
Poverty
Revisited
Last week I talked about four poverty-induced handicaps. I’d like to
continue that line of thought. But, first, a joke. Bruce Anderson, chair of the church’s Finance Committee,
describes the difference between Republicans and Democrats this way:
Suppose some hapless person falls into a deep pond and is flailing 100
feet from the shore. The Republican throws out 50 feet of rope and tells
the struggler to swim the other 50 feet. The Democrat throws the
struggler 200 feet of rope! He also jumps into the water to save the
endangered man. As a result, they both get tangled in the rope and
drown. Neither approach seems to work––until we bring in the
German philosopher Georg Wilhem Friedrich Hegel, that is. In classical philosophy there’s a form of argumentation
called "dialectic." Point struggles for supremacy against counter-point.
Thesis argues against antithesis. And, theoretically, the better
argument wins. But Hegel came up with a new way of dealing with
opposites and alternatives. Instead of one argument overpowering or
disproving the other, he decided that the best of both arguments could
be used to create a new and even stronger position. So when thesis and
antithesis appropriately merge, they yield a synthesis that’s better
than either of the component parts by themselves. I suggest that when it comes to meeting our moral
obligation to the poor, a synthesis of Republican thought and Democratic
thought comes closer to the biblical model than the traditional platform
of either party on its own. The Bible is emphatic about ensuring that the plight of
the poor isn’t ignored. That’s where the Democrats shine (though some
would say their concern is nothing more than a self-serving solicitude
for the sole purpose of ensuring votes; and others would say that it
isn’t the legitimate role of government to help solve the problems of
the poor). The Bible is also emphatic about responsibility and
accountability. It promotes the dignity of labor. In fact, it goes so
far as to say that those who don’t work shouldn’t eat. So the fiscal
responsibility once strongly espoused by the Republicans (and still
given lip service) is biblical, as well. The problem is this: Those who carry the Republican perspective to
extremes can be perceived to be––and in some cases may actually
be––indifferent to the plight of those they may consider to be
"visionless" and "lazy" "mismanagers" who’ve fallen into poverty
and/or refused to extricate themselves from it. The Democratic extreme,
on the other hand, has never met a handout it didn’t like. The plight of
all who are adversity-affected should be mourned over, they seem to
feel. And asking for any accountability or self-help is nothing short of
cruel and unusual punishment. The biblical model, I suggest, is the Hegelian synthesis
of these extremes. In the Bible, the haves of society clearly face an
obligation to truly help the have nots. Mere handouts are emergency
measures for extreme, short-term or unusual crises. Overused, they lead
to a self-destructive addiction––a handout dependency. It seems that the
Bible’s goal is long-term independence, self-sufficiency, financial
health, and the pride and joy that can come only from being a
participating and contributing component of society. Jim Coffin, Senior Pastor
Treating People as if They Count
OK, I admit it. I worded the
title badly. It could be taken to mean: Even though people don’t really
count, treat them as if they do. That’s certainly not what I meant. I
intended to say: Treat people appropriately because everyone counts. Anyway, all of us have met rude, dismissive people. They
may be high dignitaries or run-of-the-mill people. But their obvious
indifference and disdain leaves us cold. Or, more likely, livid. By contrast, we’ve all met people who treated us as if
we were dignitaries, whether they occupied prestigious positions or were
the lowliest of the low. But they certainly made us feel important. Remember the story of how mothers brought their kids to
Jesus to be blessed? The disciples thought Jesus would be wasting His
time. So they tried to shoo them away. But Jesus made it clear that, to
Him, kids were important and deserved His time and attention. And remember the story of the woman at the well in
Samaria. She came to draw water in the middle of the day because she
didn’t want to be taunted and talked about behind her back by the other
women of the village. Her reputation was . . . well . . . let’s just say
. . . less than stellar. But Jesus treated her as if she counted—because
she did. And it made an impact. Treating people as if they count—because they do—always
makes an impact. In part, because it happens less and less frequently in
today’s world. So we take note when it does happen. It’s kind of like
seeing a shooting star. We say, "Wow!" Back in the spring of 1970, I went to Washington, D.C.,
to compete in the national finals of the Voice of Democracy
speech-writing contest sponsored by the Veterans of Foreign Wars. I’d
won at the local, regional and state level. So I was off to compete
against the 49 other state winners in the national competition—which I
didn’t win! While there, the Veterans of Foreign Wars sponsored a
banquet for the Who’s Who of Washington, D.C. (I even got to shake hands
with President Nixon that night.) Before the banquet, however, they
hosted a reception in which representatives, senators and other
dignitaries in the nation’s capital had been invited to meet the state
winners of the speech competition. As a farm boy from Missouri, I was a little overawed by
the event. I sat alone quietly, just taking it all in. Suddenly a man
slipped into the seat beside me. "Hello," he said, "my name’s Mike.
What’s yours?" I told him. Then he began to talk to me, asking
questions, making comments and acting as if he had all the time in the
world and as if what I had to say was spellbinding. After a few minutes he got up and paid a similar
compliment to another state winner. And then another. I’m certain that
several high-school students went back to their hotel room walking with
more spring in their step because Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield
had treated them as if they really counted. And to him, I think they
really did. Jim Coffin, Senior Pastor
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