That "Heard It in the Chapel" book I made last week has now become "Quoted: 2009." I hear so many good quotes all over the place, so I don't want to limit it to chapel.
From my perspective, today's chapel service was incredible. The preacher was Otis Moss III who is a preacher and pastor for Trinity UCC here in Chicago. I can't really summarize it very well, but it focused on how Moses was one amazing leader/pastor/individual, and then he died. But before he died he placed his hand on Joshua. And Joshua was his own sort of amazing leader/pastor/individual. They were different. Moss was trying to say that you can't preach/pastor to a "Joshua world" the same way that you'd preach/pastor to a "Moses world." I think some people probably got offended or felt that this was an attack on their particular ways of understanding the church and its role/mission. But I really don't think that's what he was trying to do. I think he was just pushing us out of our comfort zones in order that we might expand our vision of what the gospel if REALLY about and what we're called to be doing with it.
My favorite part was when he talked about how Jesus is his favorite DJ because in the Bible Jesus is always remixing Old Testament texts and putting a fresh spin on them. SO TRUE! I love that vision of Jesus as the remixing DJ. Moss said that we need to be in the business of remixing, too. We aren't CHANGING the gospel. The good news doesn't change, but the methods with which we share it are always shifting, changing, and expanding. I really liked today's good news a lot. Plus, it's always sort of wonderful to see people clapping, nodding, and totally interested in what's happening in the pulpit. Thank you, Holy Spirit.
No comments:
Post a Comment