Dear Mr. Aykroyd,

I assure you that this letter is in the kindest spirit it can be. I'm not writing as a person who hates your work, although I have to admit that the world would have been a better place without the cinematic abominations that were Blues Brothers 2000 and the abysmal CGI Yogi Bear. But just as I'm sure I've written a sermon or three that fell flat, I'm not going to fault you for a misstep at this point in your career. And the world will always appreciate your contributions to SNL and countless other roles over the years. So believe me, when I say what I'm about to say, understand it's not from someone who hates you; it's from a place of love.

Please, Mr Aykroyd, do not make Ghostbusters 3 without Bill Murray. I'm begging you - for my sake; for your sake; for the sake of the children of the world. Please don't do it.

The first two Ghostbuster films are two of my favorite 20 or so movies of all-time, and frankly, the original just may be the greatest 105 minutes ever put to film. It's just perfect in every way, shape, and form - the characters, the story, the one-liners that people still quote nearly thirty years after the fact - it's just perfect.

But without Bill Murray, all of that falls apart. Sure, the other characters are good, but without Peter Venkman the group is just two scientists and a token black guy. Would I still have watched it? Sure. But I certainly wouldn't have spent much of my childhood running around my neighborhood with my toy Proton Pack strapped to my back pretending to catch ghosts with my toy Ghost-Trap.

You know what Ghostbusters 3 without Bill Murray would be like? A church that didn't teach, at its core, a gospel of grace and love. And believe me Mr. Aykroyd, I've known plenty of churches like that - everything is 'don't do this,' and 'be a good person' and 'give 10% of your money and God will bless you,' and all sorts of things that should make the average, thinking individual call into question what the church's real motivation for existing is. After all, the bible clearly teaches that the entire point of Christianity is believing in a God that loves us in spite of our faults, and trusting in a Savior who paid the price for our mistakes. A church without that as its focus is just a country club of Pharisees justifying themselves with hate-mongering, and for the life of me, I can't imagine someone wanting to follow Jesus if that's how it is. 

Perhaps you're wondering why I use that as an illustration; it's silly, after all, and someone needless to the point at hand concerning your admittedly awesome concept for a third Ghostbusters. But all I'm trying to say is that sometimes it's easy for even the best of endeavors to lose their way, and I believe, sir, that you've done just that if you think a Bill Murray-less Ghostbuster movie is worthwhile. For the life of me, I can't imagine someone wanting to see it if that's how it is.

So, in conclusion, get Bill Murray on board or forget about making the movie. I wish churches would do the same - preach love and grace or close their doors - but where many of them have failed, you can succeed.

Good day to you sir, and remember - when I call the Ghostbusters, Peter Venkman better be on the other side of the line.

Sincerely,

A Concerned Fan

Every day, countless numbers of people die. Actually, it isn't 'countless'; in fact, if you trust the always reliable Yahoo! Answers page, the number is 70,000, or, roughly, the combined populations of Jefferson City and the University of Missouri in Columbia. Perhaps it would have been less depressing not to look that one up.

At any rate, with all the people who die every day, there's probably no reason you should take note of the passing of Mike Flanagan. Sure, he was a sem-famous baseball player three decades ago, and yes, he was widely liked among those who know him. And yet, until today, the truth is I hadn't heard of him, and chances are good that even if you HAD heard of him before today, you had long forgotten about him, getting rid of him in your head to make room for this week's grocery list, complaints about the economy, and, of course, the intimate details of Kim Kardashian's wedding.

But for some reason the death of Mike Flanagan has hit me. Here was a guy who spent his life doing what he loved to do - playing baseball. And once he retired, he stayed close to the game, as an analyst and a front office executive for the Baltimore Orioles. His life was my hobby, a child's game that distracts us from so much of the world's ugliness. And yet, despite the accolades (he won the American League's 'Best Pitcher' award in 1979) and the support of those around him (not only was he universally beloved among his peers but was blessed with a wife that loved him), he still chose to take his own life.

I suppose I could try to make a point about the futility of the world's riches or the fleeting nature of life or something like that. Or I could attempt to answer the unanswerable question that everyone and their brother asks ministers at times like these concerning the eternal destinations of those who commit suicide. But all I can think about instead is how sad it is for a man to experience a quality of life that 99% of people in the history of the world didn't, and yet, he found it so unbearable that he found the only way away from the misery to be the business end of a gun. And I can only imagine how his loved ones are feeling today.

But if there's anything to take solace in, it's this: the God of this universe feels the same way we do when things like this happen. Jesus Christ was the physical representation of God, and so we can learn from His actions and emotions how God feels about things. And when Jesus was confronted with the death of a friend, He felt all the things we do: anger, confusion, and sadness.

I know that doesn't fix anything, and I know to someone in the middle of a tragedy that it's small consolation. But the truth is that whenever we weep, God weeps with us; when we're broken, God's heart breaks too. The God of this universe really, truly loves us, and because He does, He shares in our grief, and the grief of the friends and family members of the 70,000 people who pass away each day. He's more upset about death than anyone else, which is, of course, why He has taken care of it for eternity.

Right now, though, death is a very real, and tragic, part of our lives that we all have to cope with, whether or not we're famous athletes. And when we do, and when our lives are at our darkest, if nothing else, we can know that our Father in Heaven feels the same way we do. And He's right there beside us, doing what we are:

Weeping.

I am a criminal.

I know this can be a disconcerting thing to find out about your local preacher, but I cannot hide from my true character any longer. I'm ashamed; I'm forlorn; I have shamed not only my home, but the home and names of my ancestors.

Sorry, Mom.

My crime? My weeds are more than 12 inches high.

Last week my wife arrived home from work to discover a menacing note on our door: the City of Ashland had come for a visit, and they were not pleased. We had been cited (Or ticketed? Or something?) because of our 'grass and weed length.' Considering I had just mowed a couple days before, I could only assume that it was due to our not-so-perfect flower beds that we had failed to clear of weeds because of the summer-long heatwave.

At first, I was angry - after all, I thought I lived in Ashland, Missouri, not Great Depression-era Berlin. And considering we've owned our house for more than five weed-filled years and had never been bothered, I couldn't figure out, for the life of me, what had changed, especially since, to my knowledge, I had never actually seen or received a list of standards that my lawn had to live up to. After all, I'm the one who has to make monthly mortage payments; if someone else wants to take over the lawncare, they're more than welcome to take the mortgage as well.

But after I thought about it for awhile, I couldn't help but laugh at just how petty (and, to be a bit more blunt, pathetic) our lawmakers can be. I can't help but imagine someone on their knees, ruler in hand, making sure each fair citizen of Ashland is up to code. It's sad, really, what people care about and judge people on, but since there's nothing any of us can do, it's best just to laugh it off.

The good news, though, is that God doesn't operate like the City of Ashland. Sure, there was once a time that He required His people to follow a strict set of standards, but that point in time was both for a specific purpose that had nothing to do with whether or not He'd accept them, and, over more than 2,000 years ago. When Jesus came to earth, He did so to convey God's unconditional love and grace to all people, and in doing so, made it so no standard - not even God's laws - could be held against us. As the apostle Paul so eloquently wrote, Christ is the 'end of the law,' since His perfectly righteous life accomplished its purpose on our behalf. And anyone who attempts to please or get to God by following a set of rules and regulations will find that they're barking up the wrong weed - I mean, tree.

In this world, you and I have to adhere to rules and laws, even if they're inane, if we want to avoid punishment - even if it's equally inane. But in the next, all that will matter is whether or not we've trusted in and accepted the one who ended law and in doing so, showed us that He loves us without condition.

And He doesn't care what your lawn looks like.

ho·ly
[hoh-lee]; 
adjective, -li·er, -li·est,noun, plural -lies.

1. specially recognized as or declared sacred by religious use or authority; consecrated: holy ground.

2.dedicated or devoted to the service of God, the church, orreligion: a holy man.

3.saintly; godly; pious; devout: a holy life.

4.having a spiritually pure quality: a holy love.  

blame·less
[bleymlis]; 
Adjective

1.Free from or not deserving blame; guiltless: a blameless child.  

fault
[fawlt]; 
noun

1.a defect or imperfection; flaw; failing: a fault in the brakes;a fault in one's character.

2.responsibility for failure or a wrongful act: It is my fault thatwe have not finished.

3.an error or mistake: a fault in addition.

4.a misdeed or transgression: to confess one's faults.  

There are a whole lot of ways that people define themselves. We gain an identity as a member of our family or a professional doing a job or an aficionado of a hobby or a recreation or a social group. We see ourselves through the eyes of other people, think of ourselves in the way that we’ve been taught to from the time we were in diapers to the time you opened this webpage. We place a value on ourselves that’s based on the value system of an ever changing and evolving society and culture.  

In other words, when you look in the mirror, the one you see looking back at you has shaped and formed and developed by a myriad of factors, influences and people. Sometimes that’s a good thing. And sometimes, that’s a bad thing. 

When God looks at His children, however, there is one opinion that counts: His. And in His opinion, you are specially recognized and declared sacred. You are saintly, godly, pious, devout and free from and not deserving of blame. You have no defects or imperfections, flaws, failings, errors, mistakes, misdeeds or transgressions. 

You are perfect, because you are His. 

No, really. It’s the truth. 

I guess the old saying is true: one man’s trash is another man’s treasure. And in this case, what the world deems in so many ways to be trash is, in fact, God’s greatest treasure: 

You.

When I was a kid, I wasn't a nerd. Instead, I was the only thing sadder:

I was a wannabe nerd.

For as long as I could remember, I've loved comic books. More accurately speaking, I've loved the idea of comic books. It probably began on Saturday morning when, shortly after my favorite show, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the X-Men came on, and I did everything in my power to make sure I watched both. It continued every day after school when some variation of Batman was on, and it continued as I fell in love with Michael Keaton's version of Bruce Wayne. Later in life, Hollywood decided that every comic character that's ever been printed needed a movie, and I couldn't have been more excited. I happily enjoyed them all from the critically acclaimed (The Dark Knight, Iron-Man, etc.) to the so-bad-even-the-actors-knew-it-was-horrible-while-they-filmed-it (The Fantastic Four, Ghostrider, etc.).

And yet, I had literally never read an actual comic book. Heck, I'd never even glanced at one. The reason was simple: trying to get into comics is one of the most overwhelming tasks in the world. Most hobbies are simple - if you want to follow a sport, just learn the rules; if you want to learn to cook, just make something up from what's in your pantry; if you want to get into art or writing, just get a pen and paper and start.

But comics are a different story altogether. If you want to read all about Batman, you have more than 70 years of comic books to catch up on. And he's not the only one with a crazy long history. Superman debuted in 1939; Spider-Man in 1962. Captain America? Thor? Green Lantern? 1941, 1962, 1940. In order to fully understand the twists and turns of these characters, you might as well take a graduate level college course to get all the details.

All that changed a couple weeks ago, though, when I decided to take the plunge into the world of comics. The series I chose was perfect: The Walking Dead. I had been introduced to it by the TV series on AMC, and it had a simple, slam dunk premise that I could get behind: a police officer named Rick Grimes is shot and wakes up to a world overrun by zombies. It's basically 28 Days Later, except much, much better; it's grisly and compelling and thought provoking and beautifully illustrated; in other words, it's amazing.

And best of all? It's only eight years old, and after plowing through just one book, I've already half-way caught up. I may never be an expert on comic books, and I'll probably never get into another comic series, but hey - it's a start.

I wonder how many people feel the way about Christianity as I do about most comic books. After all, when you get right down to it, if someone was to try to learn all there is to know about my faith, they'd have to go back 2,000 years. And if you're just interested in learning the bible, that's not easy either. You can get a four year degree (in fact, I have) and still have a lifetime of learning to get to (in fact, I do). Or, maybe you want to just learn about a specific church - I'm an ordained minister in one of the youngest Christian movements in America and we go back nearly 200 years. And even if someone just cuts through all the history and biblical disputes and denominations and tries to look at what's 'essential,' there are still a lot of confusing terms that Christians throw around that no one should expect an unbeliever to understand. I can't imagine what it must be like for a non-Christian to hear us talking about baptism and communion and repentance and atonement and justification and countless other things.

Christianity, then, can be hard to understand, and frankly, it would be hard to blame someone on the outside looking in if they're overwhelmed. But at the end of the day, it really IS simple: the one who created this universe and all the life in it loves us. And when we trust in what Jesus has done, we get to spend our lives here and for eternity with Him. That's it - the rest is just needless details; they're interesting, life-enhancing details, for sure, but they're still just details.

We need to learn the lesson of the church at Corinth, who got so bogged down in religious talk that the Apostle Paul warned them that everyone who visited them left more confused and lost than they came. We need to make sure that in all we do, we're reflecting the simple, beautiful message of love that Jesus taught us, and most of all, it's imperative that we don't needlessly complicate things and in doing so, put up a barrier for non-Christians to believe.

Reading a comic book should be fun, and so should believing in God. But when we create a system where it's easy for there to be people who get it and people who just want to get it and can't because of its complexity, we completely miss the point.

And when that happens, it's the saddest thing of all.

It's a Tuesday tradition that cannot be broken. Regardless of what's going on, if I'm in the office, the very first thing I do, every week, is go to Youtube and search for the newest video from my favorite channel:

Epic Mealtime.

Now, before you click that link, know this in advance: this is not a family friendly cooking show. This is a foul-mouthed, whiskey drinking group of Canadians who come up with the craziest concoctions they can come up with. They've used lamb hearts and bone marrow and sheep heads and turtle meat; they've topped 100,000 calories in a single meal, used a liter of Big Mac sauce in a table sized lasagna made of fast food, and made a chili that is literally illegal in several countries. It's hilarious, somewhat unbelievable, and, as the name suggests, Epic. And every person I've shared this with has loved it.

And yet, when you think about it, Epic Mealtime is absolutely a glorification of an act of sin. The bible mentions time and time again that gluttony is sinful, and while, admittedly, to watch Epic Mealtime isn't actually to sin yourself, if Epic Mealtime glorified other types of sins, you and I would be appalled. But for whatever reason, gluttony is one of those sins that isn't a 'big deal.' I've never seen anyone picket outside of Bob Evans with a sign that says 'God Hates Gluttons' or 'Make Fried Food Illegal'; I've never heard of someone who's addicted to food treated the way that a drug addict is; I've never been taught that an person who eats himself into obesity is 'living in sin' the way that couples that live together or homosexuals are. The fact is, even though the bible teaches that gluttony is absolutely, positively a sin as effective at separating us from God as anything else, we don't seem to care about it.

Why is this? If I had to guess, I think the answer is simple: we can all empathize with people who overeat, because we ALL overeat. It doesn't matter what your food vice is - Sweets? Soda? Greasy/Fried/Fatty Meat? - we all over-indulge from time to time. And even if we don't, we've all been tempted to eat that last piece of pizza or finish off the candy bar, so we all know how it feels to be faced with that particular sin. Therefore, because we can empathize with those who struggle with this, we're perfectly willing to extend grace, mercy, and compassion to them.

All sins are like this. There are some sins we all 'understand': drunkenness, divorce, not loving your neighbor, etc. And we respond to those sins the way Jesus did - with love and a hope that God will forgive. But Jesus was perfect; He never lusted or hated or lied or slandered or drank too much or ate too much. He couldn't empathize with ANY of our vices. So when He responded to sin with love and hope for forgiveness, He did so for actions that were personally disgusting and appalling.

Remember that the next time you think about a homosexual or someone who's had an abortion or a terrorist or atheist, and think of how Jesus sees your sin when you're wondering who is and who isn't worthy of the kingdom of God. Because the truth is while you and I may laugh at something like Epic Mealtime and not think some sins are a big deal, God sees sin differently.

In God's eyes, EVERY sin is heartbreaking, because every sin hurts someone He loves. 

Even so, He showed us more mercy and grace than we can even describe. You and I, whether or not we can empathize, are called to do the same.

And that is a tradition that should not be broken, no matter what.