A Glad Obedience: Why and What We Sing

As a young minister's wife in an aging congregation, I was asked to play the piano for the weekly pre-worship hymn sing. They handed me a 1930s hymnal and called out hymn titles.
I did not know the hymns that meant something to this older congregation: Trust and Obey, Softly and Tenderly Jesus is Calling, Standing on the Promises, I Need Thee Every Hour.

The people were confounded. I was asked, "If you don't know these hymns what will you think of on your deathbed to bring you comfort!" Other hymns, I responded.

As my husband was moved from church to church there was an adjustment to each congregation's most beloved hymns and the challenge of teaching hymns from the new hymnal.

Hymn singing is a communal act that reinforces a congregation's identity and faith commitment. It is often the highlight of worship for most in the pews. The hymns comfort and they confirm and they spur to be better.

As choral singer since childhood, I have long understood that to sing is to be part of a community, working together toward a common goal. Singing in worship is an act of praise, a confirmation of faith, and can spur a recommitment of intent.

Walter Brueggemann's A Glad Obedience examines the tradition of song in worship, beginning with the Psalms and then considering classic and contemporary hymns including “Blest Be the Ties That Binds,” "Holy Holy Holy,"“God's Eye Is on the Sparrow,” "Love Divine, All Loves Excelling," "O For a Closer Walk With God," “Once to Every Man and Nation,” “Someone Asked the Question,” and “We Are Marching in the Light of God.”

In Part I, he asks, Why do we sing this psalm? Beginning with Psalm 104, a creation hymn, he breaks down its parts to explain what it meant to its original singers. For instance, "the song is sung in an arid climate" and uses water imagery (You make springs gush forth in the valleys) as affirmation that all life, human and plant and animal, "stand together before the life-giving gifts of God."

As Brueggemann walks us through the Psalms he leads readers into a deeper understanding of the text and faith.

"We sing our penultimacy as an act of resistance and as a proposal of alternative. The resistance performed by this singing is against the reduction of creation to a series of commodity transactions because it is all gift...It is the affirmation that we live in a generous context of abundance in which there is enough for all of God's creatures." from A Glad Obedience by Walter Brueggemann

Part Two, What We Sing, Brueggemann considers traditional and contemporary hymns. He "relishes the words, phrases, and images that lie deep in our faith tradition" to show how attentiveness to the hymn lyrics challenge the "dominant worldly ideology" and can lead to"joyous risk-taking obedience."

One of my favorite hymns, God of Grace and God of Glory by Harry Emerson Fosdick, is included. "Grant us wisdom, grant us courage, for the living of these days," "Cure thy children's warring madness, bend our pride to thy control," "Save us from weak resignation to the evils we deplore," are lines that seem to be always relevant.

Brueggemann first presents the hymn's historical context, written in 1930, during the depression and in a time when the world "struggled with systemic disarmament." He considers the theological bent of Fosdick's Social Gospel and how the hymn's theology is related to that of his contemporaries Paul Tillich and Reinhold Niebuhr (author of the well-known Serenity Prayer). Then he breaks the hymn down with a commentary.

A neglected hymn which Brueggemann admires is based on James Russell Lowell's 1845 poem "Once to Every Man and Nation." Lowell wrote the words as a protest against President Polk's expansionist war with Mexico as a way to add slave states to shift the balance of power.

Once to every man and nation
Comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of truth with falsehood,
For the good or evil side;
Some great cause, God's new Messiah,
Offering each the bloom or blight,
And the choice goes by forever
'Twixt that darkness and that light.
            from Once to Every Man and Nation

Brueggemann relates the hymn's time and purpose to the current president's immigration policy. Brueggemann writes, "...when we sing this hymn...we also sing concerning our own moral crisis in which the quality and future of our common humanity is at stake."

Brueggemann prods us to pay attention to what we sing, to let the words deepen our faith and make manifest in our actions the values we proclaim to hold.

The Rev. Dr. Walter Brueggemann is the author of over 100 books. Read a sample of this book at
https://www.wjkbooks.com/Products/0664264646/a-glad-obedience.aspx

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

A Glad Obedience
Why and What We Sing
by Walter Brueggemann
Westminster John Knox Press
Pub Date: 15 Jan 2019
ISBN: 9780664264642
PRICE: $18.00 (USD)

Surrendering My Ordination: Standing Up for Gay and Lesbian Inclusivity in the United Methodist Church

In 2017, Philip J. Wogaman surrendered his ordination after serving for 60 years as a United Methodist Church (UMC) pastor and educator. This book is his apology--a reasoned argument in justification of his action.

When Wogaman saw an outstanding candidate for ordination denied a hearing because she was married to another woman he could no longer "remain inside the association of clergy when someone like her must remain outside and even be stigmatized."

Over my husband's entire career as an ordained UMC minister, spanning from 1972 when he was a seminary student to his retirement in 2014, the UMC has struggled to agree on key social issues.

My husband was in seminary when the first Social Principles was created by the UMC church. It included the statement that "self-avowed practicing homosexuals" were excluded from candidacy for ordination. Homosexuality was described as "incompatible with Christian teaching." A friend left seminary knowing his sexual orientation meant he would not be accepted for ordination.

The world has changed in its understanding of human sexuality--even Wogaman admits his understanding has grown. But the UMC, unlike other mainline denominations, remains entrenched in excluding homosexuals. (And yet there is nothing in the principles regarding other sexual orientations such as bisexual or transgender persons!)

There is no reference to the specific teaching the principle is based on, so it appears to represent the kind of societal prejudice that influenced church polity to segregate African Americans.

Wogaman considers the theological, ethical, and pastoral meaning of ordination and describes the high standards of qualifying for ordination in the UMC.

Ordination candidates are asked a series of questions including if they are "going on to perfection"--which Wogaman understands as 'perfection in love.' Pastoral ministry is essentially comforting the afflicted, being present in times of need, reminding that God and his people care. Ordination makes one a representative of the entire church, called to love and care in the name of the church, the hands and heart of Jesus and God in action. Pastoral ministry as spiritual leadership brings God's love to the individual and to the entire community.

Wogaman identifies racism as heresy and condemns the construction of barriers to God as collective sin. For example, barring women from ordination was based on cultural bias and not a theological principle.

He affirms that God's creation is inherently good and that all human life is a gift from God and that we are all equal in value. He identifies sin as putting one's self-interest first, self-centeredness instead of God-centeredness. But grace is always there to be claimed, not earned and never denied.

"...being secure in God's love, we can act not out of fear but out of love. We are free to be what God intends us to be. We are not slaves to divine or human law but free and responsible human beings who can act lovingly and creatively."

The church is a human institution and clergy are flawed human beings. Consequently, decisions made by the institution must be challenged when legalism is protected and are not grounded in the law of love.

Biblical literalism and proof-texting (the quotation of scripture out of context) leads to bad theology and bad church law.

"...we are driven, in our uses of Scripture and tradition, to distinguish those aspects of the writing that are basic to our faith from other aspects that are limited by cultural views and historical conditions."

A story about John Wesley who founded the movement called Methodism patterns disobedience to human law in light of the call to share God's love.

Wesley was an Anglican priest who went to the people, preaching in the fields. A Bishop told Wesley he was not commissioned to preach in his diocese. Wesley "replied that he must preach 'the gospel wherever I am in the habitable world,'" a "priest of the Church Universal." Would he break the law? And Wesley replied, "Shall I obey God or man?"

The book is like a crash-course in Christian theology: grace vs legalism; the Book of Discipline wielded as law and limiting the outreach of God's grace and love; spiritual piety being manifested in love of neighbor and a passion for justice; free will; sin; the heresy of excluding groups as outside of God's love.

In the second part, Wogaman shares his personal journey and what led him to his decision, including the theological, ethical, and pastoral considerations.

A life-long United Methodist, Wogaman earned his Ph.D. degree in social ethics, taught at seminaries, became a Social Justice activist, and served as pastor at Foundry UMC where he was the pastor to President Clinton. He was elected to the General Conference four times, part of the world-wide group that sets the agenda and standards for the denomination.

In 2017 the Judicial Council had to rule if Karen J. Oliveto's election to bishop by the Western Jurisdiction was legal considering she was in a same-gender marriage. The church law that excludes "self-avowed practicing homosexuals" as clergy created a "don't ask, don't tell" environment and unless a pastor admitted they were a "practicing homosexual" involved with "physical acts" it was assumed the pastor was in compliance with church law. In 2017 the Judicial Council declared that being in a same-gender marriage was an admission of being a "practicing homosexual." Read my review of her book Together at the Table here.

Wogaman was alarmed by the reiteration of the undefined clause, "incompatible with Christian teaching." He knew it was time for action and not just talk.

"...I must acknowledge that there are times when pastoral responsibility must preempt church law..."

Finally, Wogaman addresses "A Way Forward" considering the divided church options and shares the 2019 General Conference proposal for resolving the issue.

Wogaman's book was an interesting read. I was thankful that I audited seminary courses and could keep up with the theological arguments. I saw one reviewer comment they were disappointed in a lack of scriptural arguments, but I disagree. Wogaman does not 'proof text' but shows a deep understanding of scripture.

As a clergy wife, I did not shrink from answering questions on homosexuality, even writing a response to a local newspaper editorial. My husband's ministry was focused on the pastoral, but as a lectionary preacher, he raised up the importance of social piety and the law of love. His favorite scripture was Micah 6:8--"And what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?"

What is just and kind? I think of our seminary friend who dropped out. We did not know then the reason behind his decision. We three spent many evenings together, drinking teas and listening to records. He was sad, we knew, but not the real reason. The church he loved had made it clear he was excluded, rejected, anathema.

In 2019 the denomination has a decision to make. The UMC is a worldwide organization and some countries will reject inclusion of homosexuals as clergy. Will the split finally be realized? Can we agree to disagree, and build on the pivotal beliefs of our faith and move forward together?

I received a free ebook from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Surrendering My Ordination
J. Philip Wogaman
Westminster/John Knox Press
ISBN 9780664264178
PRICE $15.00 (USD)

The Rise and Fall of Adam and Eve by Stephen Greenblatt

I found great enjoyment in reading The Rise and Fall of Adam and Eve by Stephen Greenblatt.  He examines the stories humans have created of our first parents, from prehistory's myths to the challenge of scientific evidence shaking a literal reading of the Bible.

Adam and Eve is one of the great stories in Western literature, a tale that has morphed from folklore to Christian canon to inspiration for artistic and literary masterworks and finally become relegated again to myth--a story with meaning--it's historic veracity disproved by science.

In the beginning we humans created stories to explain the world and our place in it. Stories from societies immemorial have come down to us via clay tablets, the Enuma Elish and the epic Gilgamesh. These known four-thousand-year-old tales are but 'later' contributions in human history.

In the Western world, the biblical story of Adam and Eve had its roots in the earlier myths but soon displaced them with the spread of Christianity. Early theologian St. Augustine insisted on a literal reading of the story. Renaissance art focused on Biblical stories, bringing Adam and Eve come to life as real people. John Milton, a radical in many ways, wrote his masterpiece Paradise Lost, which consolidated Christian's vision of the 'real' Adam and Eve.

Greenblatt contends that this very elevation of the story of Adam and Eve from a story with meaning to 'historic truth' was in fact its downfall. There are too many questions that arise. I recall, back in the early 1980s, when a man asked, "Where did Cain get a wife? " He told me he figured that Cain took an ape as wife and that is where people of color come from. This is the awful kind of problem that literalism leads to!

Darwin's observations during his time on the HMS Beagle led to his life's work proving and testing the theory of evolution. Theologians scrambled to reconcile science and the literal reading of the Bible.

I was taught (auditing a seminary class) that a myth is a story with meaning, humanity's endeavor to put into words the unknowable. It is not diminished because it is not literally true. Science holds the Theory of Evolution as a theory, the best understanding that scientific evidence and observation and testing can offer us at this time. Oddly, DNA evidence offers us an "Eve"-- a common first human ancestor.

I enjoyed how Greenblatt brought everything together into a rich narrative.

I received an ARC from the publisher in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

The Rise and Fall of Adam and Eve
Stephen Greenblatt
W.W. Norton
Hardcover $27.95
ISBN: 978-0-393-24080-1