Author Archives: salooper57

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About salooper57

Husband, father, pastor, follower. I am a disciple of Jesus, learning how to do life from him. I read, write, walk, play a little guitar, enjoy my family.

Holy Week Meditation: Maundy Thursday

Posted on April 9, 2020 by salooper57

If you and I had been with the apostles on Thursday evening of that first Holy Week, this is the kind of conversation we might have heard.

“Sunday was the day. I could just feel it. People were ready. If he’d have called us to take Jerusalem back, thousands of men would have responded. Just the Galileans outnumbered Roman forces five to one, maybe ten to one. And the Judeans would have joined us. Oh, man, he had them in the palm of his hand. If he had said: “Today is the day we back the holy city from the infidels,” it would have happened right then. Instead, he started crying! Sunday was the day. I just don’t get it.”

“Yeah, Sunday was great, but Monday was the day. I mean, he single-handedly took control of the temple. He was a lion! No one could stand against him. And, look: It’s not enough to fight Rome. We can kill every Roman in Israel, but they’ll be right back unless we got rid of the aristocracy, the priests.

“Yeah, if he’d called people to arms on Monday, there wouldn’t have been a Roman left alive in the city by nightfall. By the time they heard about it in Caesarea, the entire countryside could have been mobilized. The aristocracy would be in prison. But instead of calling people to arms, he started teaching from Leviticus and the Psalms. I just don’t get it. What he is waiting for? The blacksmith doesn’t wait for the fire to die down before he forges the sword.” Continue reading →

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Join Us…

Posted on April 5, 2020 by salooper57

Join our (abbreviated) worship service at Youtube or on Facebook. Our sermon text is Philippians 3: Heavenly-minded and Earthly Useful. God be with you all.

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The Stubbornly Silent Future: Learning to Trust

Posted on April 4, 2020 by salooper57

Our governor’s “Shelter in Place” order has changed the way we live. Rather than meeting people at church or in the coffee shop, I’ve been meeting people on Zoom. Pastoral visitation has not happened in people’s homes but on our phones. I and others have been calling our church family, checking on their health, and seeing if they need groceries or meds. Many of these members are older and, to a person, they are doing remarkably well. They are a resilient bunch.

It turns out that many of our older members were spending most of their time at home, even before the governor’s order. The pandemic has not affected them in the same way it affects the soccer mom, who puts 25,000 miles a year on her van, or the retired couple who eat out five nights a week.

While our church family is doing well, the question on their minds, and on their friends’ and neighbors’ minds is: How long will this last? They want to know what’s coming next and when things are going to return to normal.

All of us have a sort of inner gravity that constantly pulls us back toward normal, even when normal is not healthy. When will things be normal again? Our routines, which always have suffered interruptions, have now been turned on their heads. Everything has changed.
Continue reading →

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Scapegoating, Responsibility, and Neighborly Love in the Plague

Posted on April 1, 2020 by salooper57

Here’s a very relevant article to the age of Covid-19 – a brief history of the church’s response to another pandemic – this one in the 14th century. There are lessons for us here, and I recommend it to you.

The writer is my son, Joel Looper (PhD, University of Aberdeen), author of the forthcoming book A Protestantism without Reformation: What Dietrich Bonhoeffer Saw in America (Baylor Press). Continue reading →

Posted in In the News, Theology, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | 4 Comments

Cross Your Mind: The Humble Mind of Philippians 2

Posted on March 29, 2020 by salooper57

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrOP9Fehk4c Visit Lockwood Community Church in Coldwater Michigan. The worship service is abbreviated (a few songs, prayer, and a sermon) for online worshipers. The message is from Philippians 2 and explores the kind of mindset that can enable us go … Continue reading →

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Pray for Your Pastor During the Covid-19 Crisis

Posted on March 28, 2020 by salooper57

After the reading of the Gospel, I pray. Today it was a disjointed prayer of submission, adoration, and intercession. As I prayed, I found myself wondering why I have been feeling so anxious. I am not, by nature, an anxious person but the last couple of weeks have been stressful. As I thought about this before the Lord, three particular stressors came to mind.

I find making decisions very stressful when I don’t have sufficient information. During the Covid-19 crisis, I (and tens of thousands of other pastors) have had to make one decision after another: First it was, “Do we cancel in-person services?” Then, how long must we cancel in-person services?

The decisions just keep on coming. How do we communicate during this time? Do we live stream Sunday services? How do Family Ministry, Youth Ministry, Kid’s Min communicate? Do they live stream? How do we care for our most vulnerable population? What about our staff? Will they work from home? Will they have enough to do to occupy their time? Can they afford the time off?

All this is uncharted territory. We do not have the facts, don’t know how long the social distancing measures will be necessary. Continue reading →

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Good News (in the middle of the mess)

Posted on March 24, 2020 by salooper57

Is there any good news in the middle of this mess? You bet! The same good news that has sustained the people of Jesus through many crises and continues to change the world. Read Philippians 1 and take note of every use of the world “gospel,” which means “good news.” Consider its context and think through how Paul was using the word. Then, listen to the message at one of the links above, and share your thoughts below. Continue reading →

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Join Our Church's Worship Time

Posted on March 22, 2020 by salooper57

Like millions of others, we are streaming today’s (abbreviated) worship service. If you’d care to join us, just go to http://www.lockwoodchurch.org and click the link titled, “Click for Links.” It will be on YouTube and Facebook at 11:00 AM. Continue reading →

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Dealing with Isolation During the Covid-19 Crisis

Posted on March 21, 2020 by salooper57

In 2016, long before the advent of Covid-19, The New York Times ran a piece by a Dr. Dhruv Khullar titled, “How Social Isolation Is Killing Us.” “Social isolation,” Dr. Khullar wrote, “is a growing epidemic—one that’s increasingly recognized as having dire physical, mental and emotional consequences. Since the 1980s, the percentage of American adults who say they’re lonely has doubled from 20 percent to 40 percent.”

What effect will the social distancing measures ordered by state and federal leaders to combat the spread of Coivd-19 have on this older and more pervasive social isolation epidemic? When it’s over, will people make an extra effort to connect with others following weeks of enforced social distancing? Or will these temporary measures have legs—will they continue on after the executive orders have expired?

Digital distractions have already replaced human interactions for many people in daily life. The coronavirus may exacerbate this new reality.

Experts say that about one in three people in the U.S. lives alone. Among those who are over 85, the number is more like one in two. Katie Hafner, reporting in The New York Times, writes that “studies … show the prevalence of loneliness among people older than 60 ranging from 10 to 46 percent.” Khullar states that “A wave of new research suggests social separation is bad for us,” impacting sleep, altering immune systems, and raising stress hormones levels.

When isolation becomes the norm, outsiders become a threat—and for many people, isolation is the norm. Continue reading →

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Powerful Prayers: The One Who Is Able (Ephesians 3:20-21)

Posted on March 18, 2020 by salooper57

We began the “Powerful Prayer” series eight weeks ago. Each week, we have looked closely into one or the other of the Apostle Paul’s great prayers for the church. What we have seen has been extraordinary. We have had a master of prayer – St. Paul himself – show us why he prayed and what he prayed. Yet our in-depth study of these remarkable prayers will make no difference if it doesn’t inspire us to pray.

If we’ve learned anything, I hope we’ve learned that God expects us to pray for the church, including Lockwood Church. I hope we’ve learned that praying for the church is critical. So, after two months of hearing about praying for the church, are we praying for the church? Have you prayed for Lockwood this week? Have you used what you’ve learned to pray for our church family?

I’ve met people who believe in God but don’t believe in prayer. They think God is going to do what he is going to do, whether we pray or not. That prayer is just a matter of adjusting our attitudes and expectations.

But I don’t believe that. I agree with Henry Emerson Fosdick, who said: “Now if God has left some things contingent on man’s thinking and working, why may he not have left some things contingent on man’s praying? The testimony of the great souls is a clear affirmative to this: some things never without thinking; some things never without working; some things never without praying! Prayer is one of the three forms of man’s cooperation with God.” Continue reading →

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