We are in Holy Week.  This year I have been more aware of the fragility of life because so many people I know are recovering from various surgeries.  The most recent is my dog Gaby, who had knee surgery on Friday.

As I attempt to take care of Gaby now that she’s home, I am reminded of how many times I’ve wondered about what motherhood would have been like for me.  I am able to do the work I do largely because I have so few responsibilities at home—except for the short time I was caring for my father, my only care has been for myself and my pets.  So as I struggle to watch out for this injured creature, I can only marvel at the love and energy expended on the care for a precious child.

Of course, the great mystery of this week is the suffering of Jesus, God’s own precious child, whose love for the outcast, obedience to his heavenly father, and challenge to the establishment church and political leaders culminated in his rejection and killing at the hands of the world he came down to love. 

Every year the question “why did it have to be this way?” comes to me, and honestly I don’t think this is a question any mortal can adequately answer.  Even Jesus wondered about this in Gethsemane garden, and yet in faith he continued on his journey to the cross.

When I was in seminary, my spiritual hero was a woman who was undergoing chemotherapy from the breast cancer that eventually killed her.  The chemo came in a bright red liquid, and she came to equate the chemo to the blood of Christ presented to all of us in communion.  She even went so far as to connect the harsh cleansing of the chemo, which seemed to almost kill her in order to eradicate the cancer, with the cleansing of sin that comes with taking the cup at the Lord’s table.  Are we willing to give our all, to be willing to die to self in order to gain the life that God wills for us? 

As we experience the limitations and even horrors of mortal life, may we learn to appreciate the radical lengths Jesus went in order to bring us back to God.  As we consider our love and care for those we love, may we remember the pain that God was willing to go through, watching Jesus die in pain and humiliation for the sake of a world that hated him.  As we ask God for everything that comes to our mind, may we every once in a while take a moment of silence and dare to listen for what God might want of us, and may we trust that whatever we do for Christ, we will also find peace in the eternal love of God.

The poet Richard Jones considered the great faith of Mamie Till, the mother of Emmett Till.  For mothers like her, Jesus’ sacrifice proved that God knew her pain.  And through mothers like her, God’s healing and justice are furthered in this broken world.  Even in the depths of our own personal pain, even as the blood of life is shed for reasons of injury or violence or even birth, may we entrust our lives to our Lord, in gratitude for the life-saving love of Jesus.

“The Face”
by Richard Jones

Emmet Till’s mother
speaking over the radio

She tells in a comforting voice
what it was like to touch her dead boy’s face,
how she’d lingered and traced
the broken jaw, the crushed eyes—
the face that badly beaten, disfigured—
before confirming his identity.

And then she compares his face to
the face of Jesus, dying on the cross.

This mother says no, she’d not recognize
her Lord, for he was beaten far, far worse
than the son she loved with all her heart.

For, she said, she could still discern her son’s curved earlobe,
but the face of Christ
was beaten to death by the whole world.

In faith and gratitude,

Wendy

Last Saturday we held our Presbytery meeting.  I thank Divine Light Presbyterian Church for hosting the meeting so beautifully, as always.  They consider hosting the Presbytery as a part of their ministry with us, and I thank Rev. Sam Kim and the members for their great hospitality, and the leaders of “The Tent” ministry, a 1001 New Worshiping Community in Koreatown, for the beautiful music during lunch.  The Tent’s leader, Rev. Daniel Bahng of Pacific Presbytery, has deep family connections with Divine Light.  

At this meeting, we considered the amendments to the PC(USA) Constitution.  All of the amendments were approved without comment, except for Amendment C.  I was interested to see the response to Amendment C, which was mixed but with some strong concern about restricting the church’s prophetic call especially in a time when political leaders seem to run counter to Christ’s call to care for the poor, the widowed and orphaned, the outcast, the foreigner.

The reason I was intrigued was because the amendment came about in response to the weakening and rumored repeal of the “Johnson Amendment,” a part of the IRS tax code that restricts non-profits (including churches) from endorsing or opposing political candidates.  Those seeking to repeal the Johnson Amendment have tended to come from conservative churches and politicians, and the concern has been that the power of the pulpit would be used to impact political campaigns.  Besides the philosophical concerns about separation of church and state and the pastoral concerns of fomenting discord or undue spiritual pressure on church members, the intent of Amendment C was an attempt to maintain the tenets of the Johnson Amendment within the PC(USA), in case it does get repealed.

So God had the last laugh when some members, critics of the anti-Johnson Amendment camp, raised their concerns about Amendment C.  The Presbyterian tradition has a deep and inherent concern for justice in the world, including in government, and the Bible repeatedly condemns prophets and disciples who stay silent in the face of injustice.  But we see again that Christians can see injustice in wildly different ways, yet all feel it would be unChristian to stay silent, whether you see the current President as God’s gift to the nation or an affront to God.  So this attempt to stay comfortably silent, even with good intentions, was a dodge to “play it safe” which Jesus often rejected.  The question is, for what and for whom will you speak out?  May our voice, and all our actions, be guided by Christ.

Another highlight of our meeting was the image of God’s family in San Gabriel Presbytery.  For many of us, Presbytery is a meeting of this family of God’s choice.  We are not just a biological family, bound by genetics; nor are we a family of choice, formed by our personal desires.  We are a family of God’s choice, bringing together diverse people who live in the same area, and our presbytery has been faithful in reflecting the diversity of our community.  Yet we are family—discerning together, praying together, gathering around Christ’s table, and welcoming cousins from near and far into the fold.

So we manage household finances and support members in need, including a DACA recipient and two churches who offer food to the hungry in their neighborhoods.  We make decisions together on how we will live together.  We hear announcements about what’s happening in our houses of faith, and share ideas on ways to care for each other and our neighbors.  And we hear from Maggie Harmon of the Presbyterian Foundation and Clayton Cobb of the Board of Pensions about programs and events they are holding for our benefit, including:

• First Call First Steps Seminar with Board of Pensions, 10 am-1 pm on April 23, at Fuller
• Benefits Connection Seminar with Board of Pensions, 10 am-2:30 pm on May 15 at La Canada Presbyterian Church—go here to register
• Luncheon on Long-Term Financial Sustainability with the Presbyterian Foundation, June 11 at 11:30 am at Westminster Gardens.

And we welcome new (or returning) members, this time Larry Ballenger, as he returns to Arcadia Community Church as Interim Pastor; Charlie Campbell, who was ordained by this presbytery and now will be serving Northminster Presbyterian Church as Pastor; and Pipi Dhali, ordained by Gereja Kristen Indonesia (GKI), a Presbyterian sister denomination in Indonesia, now serving a church in Covina who are hoping to join our Presbytery.

Whenever we connect with each other, at Presbytery meetings and visiting each other’s churches, may we be ever more grateful for God’s blessings on us, and the many ways we are responding by blessing others.

As we prepare for Holy Week, as we continue to see ourselves for who we are as God’s beloved but broken children, may we give thanks for Christ’s gift of life, and Christ’s call and assurance that we love one another.

In faith,
Wendy

In the last couple of weeks I have had conversations with two people in our presbytery who have experienced other Christian faith traditions.  In one case, the person grew up Catholic, but has been Presbyterian for some 40 years.  The other person is ordained Presbyterian but has been serving ecumenically in another Reformed denomination for 10 years.  During these years of declining membership in all Christian churches in the United States, it has been somewhat comforting to know that people have chosen (or been led to) the PC(USA) to live out their faith.  I remember several years ago, then-Stated Clerk Gradye Parsons informing a national gathering that over half of our membership did not grow up Presbyterian.  We received this news with a sense of the vitality we gain from members new to the tradition, and also a responsibility to be more intentional about explaining why we believe and do the things that we believe and do.  One of the fallacies of the PC(USA) is that we learn how to be Presbyterian by growing up Presbyterian—and even if we did, another fallacy is to assume that all Presbyterian churches are the same!

As a cradle Presbyterian, I understood that ecumenism was an integral part of our faith tradition.  And yet, I realized that our ministry formation ensures that we focus rather intensely on our little Calvinist branch of the Christian family tree.  This realization came a dozen years after my ordination.  I was in a Doctor of Ministry program and was talking with my dissertation project advisor (the project which I never actually got going).  My topic was a book of worship resources that could be useful to the PC(USA) because they would have been vetted as suitable in Reformed worship; they would welcome and celebrate the Holy Spirit (which, in my mind, is almost ignored in Reformed worship); and they would be rooted in different cultures, and would honor the cultures that contributed them.  I once bemoaned the way churches misappropriate the gifts of the Black church while disrespecting the people; one friend who knows this from personal experience responded with “they love the fruit but hate the tree.”

My advisor approved of my dissertation project topic, and like a good advisor, he asked me two challenging questions.  The first was whether such a book could also help to lift up the sense of belonging for non-European Presbyterians (he shared how Black Presbyterians like him struggle with this—they are considered not Black enough because they are Presbyterian, and not Presbyterian enough because they are not White).

But it was his second question that has stayed with me:  “Could there be a defect in the [Reformed] tradition?”

My first internal response was that this was some kind of heresy!  But quickly I realized how my training had led me to believe that John Calvin had an answer for any situation we were to face in ministry, if we just dug deep enough—but perhaps that wasn’t true.  I was working for a seminary at the time, and I thought of this student who was a member of a PC(USA) church, but who was also attending another church and trying to get us to acknowledge the teachings of that church as properly Reformed, which they were decidedly not.  This student was intellectually brilliant, African-American, a veteran with severe PTSD, and who had struggled with drug addiction and homelessness—and he was not getting a healing word from Calvinist theology.

Now even if we conclude that there may be some defects in our tradition, I’m not suggesting we reject it out of hand—one of my pet peeves is when we church folk take an “all or nothing” approach to evaluating something—or some people.  I don’t believe that any one church institution completely reflects or teaches about the Kingdom of God.  I do believe that every institution has a vulnerability towards idolatry and self-preservation, and it is dangerous when any church claims to be the one true church.  Just as we had four gospels in the New Testament, humanity is too diverse to know faith through any one expression.  This is also true in the Jewish, Islamic, and Buddhist traditions—and even Jesus said that in his Father’s house there are many dwelling places.  But this diversity does not have to be a barrier to faithfulness, and our imperfections are not an excuse to stop serving our more than perfect God.

So we continue to be faithful, and trust the wisdom of those who have gone before us, while also being humble enough to know that in every generation we are called to renew and reform our tradition—and also to accept the fact that neither we nor any other church is the comprehensive manifestation of Christ’s mission in the world.  We strive for unity, but not by suppressing our varied gifts and perspectives.  And until we can find unity without someone feeling the winner or the loser, we will have to settle for—and continue to work through—our defective faithfulness.

As individuals and as church and presbytery, we acknowledge that we are imperfect, yet as we seek to be faithful to God and give ourselves to be servants in Christ’s mission, God can do wondrous things through us. 

In faith,
Wendy

I am back in California after a week in the state of Georgia.  When I started with you as Executive Presbyter, I had the opportunity to attend the Presbytery Leader Formation training program.  It is a three-year program, and we are put in a particular cohort based on the year we started.  The cohort I was in was unusual—we were smaller in number, younger in age (though several of us already had experience working with presbyteries), more strategic, and our contexts differed markedly from the imagined presbytery the faculty was training us for.  To the faculty’s surprise (and dismay, for some), we were very clear how their training didn’t address our experience—which may have a little to do with the fact that two of the eight in our cohort are now tasked with overhauling the presbytery leader training approach.

We were also unusual in how strongly we bonded, so we continue to meet for a week each year.  This year’s host, Deb Tregaskis, is the executive for Flint River Presbytery, south of Atlanta.  The big surprise for me was that this rural area, Sumter County, has less than 33,000 residents, yet it has been the home of a small group of Christian revolutionaries, including:

• Clarence Jordan, who wrote the Cotton Patch series, which restates New Testament passages within the context of Civil Rights-era Georgia, where Jews and Gentiles are rendered as “white men and Negroes,” crucifixion is lynching, Rome is Washington, DC, and Jerusalem is Atlanta.  Jordan also co-founded Koinonia Farm, a group who tried to live like the Acts church, sharing a common purse and inviting Blacks and Whites to live as equal neighbors—which led to violence by segregationists in the area.
• Millard and Linda Fuller, who lived at Koinonia before founding Habitat for Humanity.  Millard was also a law-school classmate and business partner with Morris Dees, founder of Southern Poverty Law Center.  (They made millions in publishing while still in Alabama, which helped fund their respective non-profits.)
• President Jimmy Carter, whose home is close by and is still teaching Sunday School at his church in Plains, and who lent his fame to Habitat for Humanity, making it a global organization.

We had the privilege of having dinner with Linda Fuller Degelmann, Millard’s widow and former partner, a formidable Christian justice activist in her own right.  As I learned more about this group, I noticed that several of these people suffered in their prophetic witness.  There was discussion about Millard being forced out of Habitat for Humanity, and Linda mentioned how Morris Dees was just fired by Southern Poverty Law Center the week before.  We remembered how Jimmy Carter was criticized as President, including after a speech on energy conservation and sustainability that was amazing in its foresight and Christian ethic of self-sacrifice (which almost never wins votes).

In our discussions about these prophets, we theorized that while there may have been actual misconduct which warranted discipline, often prophets are pushed out because they do not have the ability to “scale up” as their movement grows.  In Silicon Valley, it’s generally considered that start-up founders or new technology wizards often find themselves forced out of the very company they started, either because they don’t have the skills to manage a much larger organization, or the aggressive personality that helped them promote their invention ended up alienating the people who came alongside them to develop the business.

I have often considered John the Baptist this way—a prophet whose passion for God’s kingdom was needed to foretell the coming of the Messiah, but whose unbending sense of righteousness got him in some trouble.  Now I would not make a parallel between Jesus, the real Messiah, and large-scale corporate administrators, but Jesus did offer a much more nuanced message than John.  Jesus had his moments of righteous anger, but the dominant message from Jesus was one of forgiveness and grace extended not only to honorable Jews but also the outcast “sinners” of society, including even Gentiles.  Jesus was not only a prophet of judgment, but also a prophet of radical, life-giving love and acceptance, and his resurrection was proof of God’s promise of hope for all of us.

As we continue on our Lenten journey, may we take seriously this promise of hope, and our call to be prophets in our own ways.  May we accept the fact that no one of us can be the right voice for all people at all times, so even as we might come up short, even within the Christian context, let us give thanks that there are others who can step forward and continue the mission with varied gifts and skills.

But let us hold to a few constants, including what I consider the core lesson of Lent:  that Jesus loves us so much, and obeys God so well, as to give up his life even in disgrace—and that God then lifted him up to God’s glory. 

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.  John 3:16

May we live as followers of Christ, in our work, in our lives, even in the face of danger and death.

Trusting in the promise of the Gospel,

Wendy

This last week I was shocked twice.

The first shock came on Tuesday, through a short message from Rev. Dr. J. Herbert Nelson II, our Stated Clerk:

It is with a heavy heart that I share the news that Robina Winbush died today in New York.  Robina, who served as Associate Stated Clerk and Director of Ecumenical Relations with the Office of the General Assembly, was traveling with a PC(USA) delegation to the middle east when she collapsed while deplaning a flight.  Emergency personnel were unable to revive her. 

I knew that Robina was out of the country, because as recently as a week ago, I had written her asking for advice.  Robina was a very wise woman who somehow managed to connect with the world, as a big part of her job was maintaining relationships with our sister Presbyterian churches in all the countries around the globe.  She was also one of the core leaders of the World Council of Churches, and she was a gracious and helpful guide for myself and others when we attended the Evangelism Conference in Tanzania last year.

My personal favorite memory of Robina was a major “aha!” moment she gave me a few years ago.  I served for a short time on the GA Committee on Ecumenical and Interfaith Relations, and we were discussing how the PC(USA)’s pronounced distaste for bishops was a hindrance in our work with Churches Uniting In Christ, a major ecumenical movement that grew out of the initiative of then-Stated Clerk Eugene Carson Blake.  All the other partner churches accepted an episcopal structure for CUIC, even those churches that did not have bishops.  But the Presbyterians could not imagine participating in any organization that would require us naming any individual as a “bishop.”

I knew that there are other Reformed churches, even some called Presbyterian, that have bishops, so I wondered aloud why we have such a negative reaction to them.  Robina suggested that it grew out of our roots in the Church of Scotland, whose violent rejection of bishops stemmed from the role of bishops as agents of the Church of England, and of the English king.  That clicked for me with the importance of the cause of freedom—and freedom of religion—that our Scots-Irish forebears brought as a foundational value for the United States, and the PC(USA).

This belief in religious freedom has been sorely wounded by the second shock, the anti-Muslim terrorist attack on two mosques in New Zealand.  The thought that people could be gunned down as they gathered for prayer is almost beyond my imagination, and yet it has happened too many times these recent years—in a Sikh temple in Wisconsin, at Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, and now this.

As horrifying as this action was, I was able to find hope in the swift and strong response of the people of New Zealand and around the world, offering love to drown out the hate.  New Zealand’s Prime Minister expressed her solidarity with the Muslim community, many of whom had come to New Zealand to escape violence in their homelands, declaring that the Muslims are integral and beloved citizens of New Zealand:  “they are us.”

Closer to home, the first email I saw regarding this shooting was from Benjamin Ross, a Jewish rabbi in Los Angeles, sending his love to the leaders of the Islamic Center of Southern California.  Rabbi Sharon Brous then shared the following:

My heart hurts for my Muslim brothers and sisters. You have been targeted with a crude and shameless bigotry . . . Your faith has been desecrated for political gain, your bodies and holy sites threatened by an unapologetic hatred. I am a Jew and a rabbi. I reach out to you with love and in solidarity.

I also found that within a few hours, the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh set up an emergency fund for the victims of the New Zealand attack—if you’d like to give, you can find them at jewishpgh.org.  And New Zealand Jewish synagogues closed their services, in solidarity with the mosques that were told to stay closed out of concerns for their security.

I was struck with the speed and strength of the Jewish community’s response to this attack on Muslims.  But, just as God told their ancient forebears, they know what it is like to be oppressed as the “stranger,” and from that history comes compassion.  As they were once strangers in the land of Egypt, Jews—and, later, Christians—are called to welcome the stranger in our midst.  As they have suffered attacks for their faith, Jews step forward to support Muslim victims of hatred.  As they know what it feels like to be unsafe in their own place of worship, Jews and Christians in Los Angeles and elsewhere went to local mosques, showing with their presence their support and concern for their Muslim neighbors’ safety.

And just as we give thanks this Lenten season for Jesus’ sacrifice for us, and just as we take comfort that in Jesus, God has chosen to feel our pain, may we be moved to show compassion to others—not just those who are like us, but even those who are not.  If nothing else, let us all pray for comfort and safety for those who are being treated as strangers.  Let us pray for Christ’s peace for Robina’s family and friends.  Let us pray that again God would stay the hand of tyrants and abusers, here and around the world.

Blessings to you and yours.  I am in Georgia this week, and may be hard to reach for some days, but Twila knows how to reach me, and I will be back on Monday March 25.

In faith,

Wendy

Last week was Ash Wednesday, when we are reminded of our own mortality.  If someone put ashes on you, it’s likely they also repeated this snippet from Genesis from the end of the punishment God stated to Adam at the time of the Fall.

So last Wednesday, I was thinking of my own mortality as I awaited the ashes.  I am now of the age when I think of mortality once in a while.  It occurred to me that I now have an opportunity to be reminded of my mortality—or more precisely, my physical frailty—because I’ve been having trouble with my eyes for several weeks now.  I was diagnosed with moderate glaucoma a few years ago.  It doesn’t impact my eyesight; the only reason I know is because my cousin told my sisters and me about the incidence of normal-pressure glaucoma in our family (it’s more common in Japanese).  Due to an allergic reaction to my current prescription, my eyesight is affected as I try new eye drops I can tolerate.

As it happens, several of us on your Presbytery staff are being reminded of our human limitations.  This coming Wednesday morning is the funeral mass for Twila’s mother, Loretta Guimond.  And this last Friday, Lauren Evans had emergency surgery to remove her gallbladder.  Twila will be out of the office Tuesday and Wednesday this week, and Lauren was told by her doctor to take two weeks to recuperate. 

This is tough for us, because as one pastor noted, we are a “get it done” kind of staff.  Lauren was especially disappointed because she just started her work with Monte Vista Grove, and the people there were so welcoming to her as she began to meet with them.  So I ask for your prayers for healing, and ask your patience as we need to slow down somewhat, and tend to some earthly cares.  (Also, I will be in Georgia all next week, doing continuing education with my cohort of presbytery executives.)

So it’s getting easier for me to spend the Lenten season contemplating our mortal weakness.  But because we live on this side of Good Friday, we know that we are not condemned to be dust for eternity.  We are an Easter people, living in the hope and promise of eternal life that Jesus brings.  In his resurrection, Jesus Christ vanquished the death sentence that this world gave him, and he saved us from the punishment that God gave Adam:  “Just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we will also bear the image of the man of heaven.”  (1 Corinthians 15:49)

This last weekend, several things happened that gave me hope even in my Lenten disciplines.  First, Char Sevesind, former leader of South Hills Presbyterian, finally got to go home from a month in the hospital, recovering from surgery.  Prayers of healing for her and her home nurse, husband Don (who has been a godsend for the presbytery, especially helping with the properties of South Hills, Baldwin Park, and West Covina). 

On Sunday, Northminster Presbyterian Church called Charlie Campbell to be their pastor with great optimism and gratitude.  They have experienced significant transformation in recent years with Jake Kim.  As they move forward with their installed pastor, they hope to build on their new outlook and lessons they’ve learned. 

And on Saturday, I attended an event at Chapman University.  I was looking forward to the event, partly to see Cisa Payuyo, associate director of Chapman’s Office of Church Relations and a national leader of the Disciples of Christ for many years.  Cisa shares a common link with Dave Tomlinson, David Cortes-Fuentes, James and Charlene Jin Lee, Diane Frasher, Frank Hsieh, Bong Bringas, Zihong (Bob) Huang, Deidra Goulding, Brian Gaeta-Symonds, Jack Rogers and several other former pastors of this presbytery (and many others I am failing to mention), and myself—we have all been teachers or students at SFTS’ Southern California campus.  I have not seen Cisa for several years, so it was a blessing to reconnect.  I also heard briefly of the events of her life, which included a medical issue that blocked her ordination path.  But the joyous news is that from this life-threatening crossroads, she has emerged as strong and vibrant as ever, and she is scheduled to be ordained this Pentecost!

Indeed, we are mere mortals, created out of the stuff of this universe, imperfect and subject to illness and grief, pain and sin that cause fear, anger, and oppression.  And yet, we are created by God who is almighty and creative beyond imagination, and in Christ we are loved beyond our shortcomings and mortality.  So even as we accept our frailty and need for God, let us also hold fast to the faith and our own experience of God’s life-giving love in Jesus Christ.  And, empowered by the Holy Spirit, let us go out and share Christ’s good news of new life to all the world.  

In faith,
Wendy