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The Irresistible Gravity of the Grace of God

The Irresistible Gravity of the Grace of God

John 12:20-33

Jeremiah 31: 31-34

Probably the best known story about Jesus is the story of his prayers in the Garden of Gethsemane, before He is about to be arrested, tried, and executed. Jesus knows what’s coming, so he goes to the Garden of Gethsemane to pray. As Mark tells it, Jesus “fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. “Abba, Father,” he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.”

After he prays though, God has shored up his confidence, and Jesus goes to his sleeping disciples and says, “Awake, the hour has come.” And right then Judas comes leading a mob to capture Jesus and take him to the high priest.Read More »The Irresistible Gravity of the Grace of God

PC(USA) Sanctions Against Israel Are the Wrong Way to the Right Answer

I will be away from June 12-18 to attend the Presbyterian Church (USA) General Assembly in Detroit. I will be there not as a delegate, but as an advocate, hoping to dissuade commissioners from voting in favor of divesting from, boycotting, or sanctioning Israel and businesses supporting it. Those who promote boycott, divestment, and sanctions (called “the BDS movement”) are good-hearted people outraged by the plight of Palestinians in the occupied territories. Unfortunately, sanctions on Israel are not a solution to the problem and reflect a misunderstanding of the situation on the ground. Furthermore, for our church to promote such sanctions will only further alienate our Jewish friends in the United States while doing little or nothing to advance us to a positive role in promoting peace in the Middle East. To take such a position undermines the very nature of Presbyterian peacemaking: we are a reconciling community, not one that chooses sides.Read More »PC(USA) Sanctions Against Israel Are the Wrong Way to the Right Answer

Presbyterians and Middle East Peace

Further Insights from My Recent Middle East Trip

By Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch, St. Stephen Presbyterian Church, Fort Worth, TX

This June, I will be attending the Presbyterian Church (USA) General Assembly meeting in Detroit, MI. I’m not going as a delegate, but rather as an advocate. I will be trying to convince commissioners to vote “no” to the several motions that will be before the assembly this year to use economic sanctions and other tools to punish Israel for its occupation of the West Bank. I will be there in cooperation with an organization called “Presbyterians for Middle East Peace” (PFMEP), whose stated mission is to promote investment in peace rather than divestment in Israel. They sponsored my trip this past February to Israel and the PalestinianTerritories. It was an eye-opening trip that confirmed my opinion that boycotting, divesting, or sanctioning Israel is a bad idea for Jewish-Christian relations, Palestinians and Israelis, and peace in the Middle East. Read More »Presbyterians and Middle East Peace

Tuesday Bible Study

On a recent Tuesday, a group of 15 students, ranging in age from their 20s to their 80s, were gathered around a table in St. Stephen’s Eastminster Room. They were comparing the Book of Job in the Bible to Archibald Macleish’s brilliant poem/play JB. How did Macleish’s post World War II rewrite of the biblical book that asks why God allows suffering give us insight into Job? How did they differ? The discussion was lively and insightful. At the table were a varied group–a faithful older lady who is a dedicated volunteer, a PCUSA missionary, a young man who teaches English at a high school, a middle-aged administrator on his lunch break, an older couple, one of whom is in a wheelchair, and a formerly homeless woman originally from the Bahamas. The energy is palpable.Read More »Tuesday Bible Study

A Way Away

How can I take it all in–a surfeit of nourishment for anyone, and served in all of nature’s rugged beauty sating the hunger of a famished soul.  The splendor of the Scottish Highlands overwhelms at first.  They have been witness to a long, often brutal history.  How could such magnificence attend this violent history?  They stand sentinel and passive witness devoid of any emotion yet at the heart of engendering unbridled emotion as we, the tiniest fleck on an eternal time line fulfill our own life journey.Read More »A Way Away

A Personal Journey, 3: Theology “In The Flesh”–The AIDS Crisis

Some time after seminary, when I was serving my second parish, in rural Virginia, I was in a regular case study group of pastors and counselors led by a Clinical Pastoral Education supervisor. One participant was a very sharp Christian counselor. He presented the case of a young man who came in and confessed that he was gay and wanted to leave his marriage. I can’t remember what the counselor told him, but he explained to us that his philosophy of counseling was that the Bible was like a mathematical formula, into which you plug the variable of a human life, and then you get the answers you need.

We immediately challenged him on this. The Bible is not in fact a formula, or a manual like a car’s manual, or any sort of mechanistic analogy. And people are not variables in God’s formula for life.Read More »A Personal Journey, 3: Theology “In The Flesh”–The AIDS Crisis

The Sermon I Preached After Last Year’s NEXT Church Conference

The Presbyterian Church “NEXT church” conference is in Dallas at the end of this month. I found last year’s first NEXT con inspiring and educational. This is the sermon I preached on my return. It was Transfiguration Sunday.

The Vision Glorious

1 Peter 1: 16-21

March 7, 2011

St. Stephen Presbyterian Church

Fort Worth, TX

Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch, Preacher

This past weekend I attended the “Next Church” conference in Indianapolis. I always feel l have to explain that this isn’t the “Next Church” as in, “What’s the next church I’m going to be pastor of?” I’m not going anywhere. No, it’s “Next Church” as in, “What is the next church we, as a denomination, are becoming?” The conference brought pastors, elders, and seminarians together to discuss the future of the PCUSA. It was exciting but also sobering. I’ll start with why we are asking the question in the first place.

The PCUSA and denominational Christianity in general, appear to be at a crossroads. Our authority is no longer taken for granted. Indeed, the authority of the Christian message seems to be universally questioned. Both the church’s message and the forms we use to convey that message seem quaint and outdated, or worse, oppressive and exclusive. We seem both unwilling and unable to change with the times. Are we a dinosaur? Jurassic Church, hopelessly outdated and unable to survive the speeding, earth-shattering impact of the comet of change that’s transforming the world around us?Read More »The Sermon I Preached After Last Year’s NEXT Church Conference