Pastor Miller

I remember Pastor Miller preaching at Barclay Heights Community Church. We met in the lodge of an old YMCA camp on Esopus Creek near Glenerie Falls. When the lodge became our permanent home, we changed the name of the church to Glenerie Chapel.

I remember Pastor Miller praying; his opening prayers were nearly the equal of his sermons. These were not pithy, punchy, sound-bited perfunctories; his prayers were ten minutes of engagement with God on matters of the day, from local to global.

I remember Pastor Miller’s velvet singing voice. It reminded me of a baritone Andy Williams with a bit of Mel Torme. From where I sat, singing seemed to be pure pleasure for him.

I remember Pastor Miller telling us about Christ’s Passion during a springtime Sunday night service thirty-some years ago. One of the other teens ran out of the lodge, weeping – overtaken by the description of what Jesus had endured for him. I ran after him and listened to his story.

I remember Pastor Miller’s Christianity including humanness. He didn’t try to portray himself as saintly; he wasn’t aloof from his congregation. He wasn’t afraid to laugh.

I don’t remember when Pastor Miller invited me to call him “Bob”. The truth is I never really got used to it. He was simply “Pastor” to me.

I remember Pastor Miller saying he thought I’d become a pastor someday. I didn’t like that, and I fought it for a long time. But over the years, his was among a small number of voices through which God conferred that calling to me. I don’t wear it as comfortably as he did but I try to be true to my legacy.

Today, I’m remembering to remember because it’s the day of Pastor’s memorial service. I wish I could be present. He and his family are very much on my mind. I’m praying they feel the support of their communities as they find their way forward. I’m praying they know they’re not carrying his memory alone. And I’m praying they find grace today to celebrate him with all their might.

God Sings

“The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
he will quiet you with his love,
he will rejoice over you with singing.”
Zephaniah 3:17, NIV

This little segment of ancient poetry is dense with mystical imagery. The first sentence states God’s nearness, potency, and liberation. The second sentence is a three-dimensional portrait of a shockingly good God.

Delight: There is an unshakable assurance of all-is-well in the notion that my Creator is happy with me. It forms a supremely livable world.

Quiet: I am a noisy-souled man and I live in a world of noise. Love brings peace and sorts the cacophony into intelligibility.

Music: Divine delight manifests in spontaneous melodic improvisation. Aesthetic order emerges in the sounds of everyday life. A key puzzle piece of my theology is that God sings.


Copyright Scott Burnett 2006

music & worship

In the Seventies I led the singing for a youth Bible study. A few years later, it became acceptable to play those types of songs in church services. In the Eighties I joined a church where there was a rock band instead of an organ.

Over the years we shorthanded the phrase, “A sequence of songs about our relationship with God that helps facilitate an atmosphere conducive to a collective experience something we identify as worship” into “Worship”. At first it was just a convenience of language; we knew the music was not actually worship – or at least it was not the sum total of worship.

But over the years our linguistic laziness contributed to a serious error; one that seems to be common to most of the “contemporary worship” movement. We began to equate our 20-ish minutes of singing with worship itself. That’s a lot of pressure to put on a handful of dopey little songs!

The first few sentences of the twelfth chapter of Romans contain some of the most important insights available to us on the subject of Christian worship. This passage forms a “hinge” that connects the two essential elements of Paul’s theology: 1) the Gospel achieved by God; 2) the Gospel applied by us.

“With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship, to give Him your bodies, as a living sacrifice, consecrated to Him and acceptable by Him. Don’t let the world around you squeeze you into its own mould, but let God re-make you so that your whole attitude of mind is changed. Thus you will prove in practice that the will of God is good, acceptable to him and perfect.”
Paul’s Letter to the Romans 12:1-2 (Phillips – Revised Edition)

One of our principle works of faith is to abide in the moment of transformation, remaining open to change and continually yielding to realignment with the Spirit of Christ. We must return again and again to God’s mercies, with our eyes wide in wonder at the endless interventions of grace into our lives.

Music is uniquely effective in both softening and empowering us to worship. Music isn’t worship, but it is a pivot-point where the whole human soul (physical, emotional, cognitive, spiritual) can turn toward God.

Copyright Scott Burnett 2006