Continuing the Conversation

February 22 - Ash Wednesday

2012-02-22T17:00:00.000-08:00

Almighty God, may you guide us toseek the truth- come whence it may, cost what it will, lead where it might.Amen.

Why?Why do we come for Ash Wednesday? Why do we celebrate Lent? Don’t we alreadyhave enough guilt, enough to do? Isn’t there enough doom and gloom in theworld? Politicians fighting in Washington, Israel and Iran in a Cold War thatis getting hotter every day, rampant poverty and famine around the world,dictators in Syria, Cuba, Venezuela, and North Korea, a global debt crisis, notto mention all the stress and anxiety that we all carry around from ourpersonal lives. It seems that instead of a season where we are moreintentional, we need a vacation from it all. So again I ask, why Ash Wednesday?

Whyis the most important of all the questions, as it gets to the purpose and endof things. Why is the language of inspiration, of core values, of meaning. Theother questions: how, what, where, when, and who are just the details. What wasinteresting about Rosa Parks wasn’t how she sat at the front of the bus, it waswhy she did it. The Wright brothers were the first in flight, even though others hadbetter financing and better tools, the answer to why they were first is a storyof ingenuity and inspiration. Where or when Jesus was crucified doesn’t changemuch about our lives, but the why certainly does. Why is also the hardestquestion to answer. We’re all busy, we have a lot to do. Turn the news on, andthey’ll give you all the details in about 20 seconds, but they don’t speak tothe why. Why is also a subversive question, as it challenges our motives andassumptions. Many of us I’m have been stumped by a child who asks that piercingquestion- why? And “because I said so” isn’t a good enough answer. Why did mydog die? Why do people fight? Why doesn’t that man on the corner have a houseto live in? Why is a tough question.

Andwhy is the reason for Lent. Lent has always been a season of preparation. Inthe early Church, the process for Baptism took at least a year, and Baptismonly happened on Easter. So the 40 days leading up to Easter were a time forfocus, for preparation, for answering why. Why do you want to be baptized? Whydo you want to be a Christian, knowing that the Roman empire could very wellkill you for this?

Thisseason of Lent, we need to examine the why, because that is where meaning comesfrom, because that is the question our hearts yearn to have an answer for. Solet’s walk through the traditional Lenten disciplines and consider both themodern problem and the why.

We’llbegin with prayer. The problem with prayer is that most of us don’t do it.Surveys suggest that 58% of Americans pray daily while 83% identify as beingreligious. And the survey didn’t get into how people define prayer. Now I’mgoing to make some generalizations in this sermon, realizing that for some ofus, these generalizations do not apply, but they speak to cultural truths. Alot of people don’t fully understand prayer. Prayers such as “please don’t letme get pulled over for speeding,” “please let me get this job,” “please be withmy sick uncle” are certainly prayers, but that’s not the sort of prayer thatJesus is commending to us.

Throughoutthe reading from Matthew, Jesus challenges our assumptions about acts ofreligious piety. People often prayed in public to be seen, so Jesus encouragesthem to pray in secret; that is, have a relationship not with others and yourego, but with God. This is the why of prayer. Prayer is about relationship buildingwith God, and others through being mindful of them; and prayer is also aboutworking with God. Why do we pray? To be in touch with the divine. This doesn’treally happen though when we do all the talking, when we do it in a few shortsentences of petition. I’m not dismissing intercessory prayer, but ratherhighlighting the fact that it’s only one aspect of prayer. And in the same way,if your prayer life only consists of walks in nature or doing yoga, then youaren’t getting it all either. And let us not forget about the Bible in prayer.The Bible isn’t just that book that sits on the coffee table so that othersknow of its importance to you. The Bible is a good book to read. I can onlyimagine how the world might look if every Christian read from the Bible daily.At St. Francis this Lent, let’s not have to wonder. Let’s ground ourselves inprayer, in Scripture, in getting to the why- having a robust relationship withGod. And hopefully we’ll be transformed, and people will ask us, “why?” andwe’ll have a good answer.

Fastingis another traditional Lenten discipline. The problem here, to put it bluntly,is that we are gluttons. America has many industries that are built on theassumption that we will consume that which is bad for us. For the most part, the diet, pornography,cosmetic, and self-help industries all assume that we will fill ourselves withempty calories which only satisfy us in the short term and leave us hungry inthe long term. These are all multi-billion dollar industries, and there issomething deeply wrong with the culture that leads to their thriving.

Sothe answer to “why fast?” is rather simple- gluttony leads to death. Death ofrelationships, death of self-confidence, death of our bodies. In Lent, we areinvited to fast, to give things up. In seminary, I spent a month in theDominican Republic and I was struck by both the simplicity in people’s lives,but also the great joy. I went to a church service that lasted for severalhours and was held in what our parish hall might look like if you dropped a fewbombs on it. It was a three-walled concrete structure with a tin roof. And yet,that worship service was one of the most joyous and festive I’ve ever seen. Noone thought about a capital campaign to add a fourth wall or some stained glasswindows. Why? Because they had what was necessary and they lacked nothing whichthey truly needed. This is a lesson we could learn. I didn’t talk finances withthe priest there, but I’m guessing they had a very small maintenance budget.Gluttony not only takes us away from what is healthy and important, but it alsocosts us a lot. This Lent, let’s focus on why we do what we do, and leave offthe stuff that we can’t come up with a good answer to “why do we do this?”

Lentis also a season where we highlight almsgiving, not because the church budgetis tight, but because money says a lot about our priorities. The problem israther easy to identify- we live in a world in which money is the tool to valuetime and goods. If churches and charities had greater financial resources, theripples of their ministry would extend further and further.

Sowhy should we give? I would suggest to you that we give not for tax purposes,not even because it’s right thing to do, but rather we give because if wedon’t, we become slaves to our own money. I’ve said it before and I’m going tosay it again, if you want to know if you have control over your money, then tryto give it away. If you can’t, then your money controls you. And I’m nottalking about throwing $5 in the offering plate, that’s not a test. Try givingto the point where you have to rethink your budget. I’m not suggestingalmsgiving to the point of losing your house or not feeding your children, butI am talking about significant giving. There is no magic percentage or dollar amount,you have to do the soul searching on your own on this one. Why give? For one,it changes the world, but perhaps more importantly, it changes you.

Andfinally, I’d like to consider one other Lenten disciple- that of introspection.The problem is that most of us don’t take the time to stop and think; we don’tsee spiritual directors or therapists to debrief. Far too many people have verylittle sense of self-awareness. That’s one reason why we put ashes on ourforeheads today with the words “you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”We’re all going to die, each and every one of us, even Jesus did it. There is abook written in the 1970s called TheDenial of Death, and it address the fact that most people live their entirelives in the fear of death, instead of embracing the reality of life.

Considerwhat an apology sounds like today- “I’m sorry if you were offended by mycomments,” which insinuates that we did nothing wrong, but that you’re theproblem. No one ever says “I’m sorry for being offensive.” If we can’tunderstand ourselves, if we can’t objectively look at our faults alongside ourgifts, then we are just zombies walking around, going through the motions oflife. Socrates said that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” Aparaphrase might be “a life without the why isn’t a life at all.” Withoutintrospection, without asking and contemplating the why, life passes us bywithout us understanding it. And if we can’t understand the why, then we can’tbe responsible.

Look at whathas been happening in the Roman Catholic Church with the sex-abuse scandal, orwhat happened at Penn State. No one took responsibility. There was nointrospection. Everyone knew the details, what who did to whom and where. Andthey all knew what would happen if this got out, so they kept it quiet. No oneanswered the question “why are we covering this up,” “why are we protecting theabusers at the cost of the victims?” Answering the why can make us see thethings we try so hard to forget but need to deal with. This season of Lent, letus be introspective by considering the whys in our daily lives.

So we’re backto the first why. Why now? Why Lent? Well, as Joel and Paul say, “blow yourtrumpet…the day of the Lord is near…now is the acceptable time.” There is notime like the present to wake up to the reality of the why. Why is aboutconversion. And we live in a place and time that needs some transformation. Weare hungry for depth. We are hungry for love. Our world needs more followers ofJesus and less admirers of him. A lot of people like see Jesus as a great moralteacher, as a wonderful man, as someone to admire. But then there are those whofollow Jesus, who follow him to the cross and the grave because they know the whyof God’s love, of God’s transformative power.

This season ofLent, let us ask ourselves why. You don’t always have to come up with theanswer alone. We can answer it together in community, God can help you toanswer it. May we explore the why through prayer, fasting, almsgiving, andintrospection.

Let us pray-Almighty God, as we embark on our Lenten journey, may you give us the honesty,strength, and courage to ask why. Guide us in our answers, that in all we do wemight answer faithfully and to your glory. And through asking why, may we comeinto a deeper understanding of your Truth and Love. This we pray in the name ofour Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

February 12 - Epiphany 6B

2012-02-12T10:07:00.000-08:00

In the name of God- Father, Son,and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Todaywe are presented with readings that deal with issues of healing and compassion.So that we’re all on the same page, healing in both our reading from 2 Kingsand Mark means “to make clean or pure.” Note that the language here is aboutritual purity, not medical healing, nor is it the language of salvation. Theother word which we run into is compassion. The word itself doesn’t actuallyshow up in either reading, but it is implied throughout. Compassion is acompound word in Latin, with the commeaning “together” or “with;” and the passiomeans suffering- so “suffering with.”

Hereat St. Francis Episcopal Church in Greensboro, we have as our core values-simplicity, compassion, and hope. So today it is good for us to consider thevalue of compassion, reflecting on the way that we can take compassion from aslogan to being a way of life.

Theway I’ve structured this sermon is to take a look at the three people involvedwith these healings in 2 Kings and Mark. First we’ll consider the healedperson, then the agent of the healing, and finally the healer.

Inboth of our readings, the presenting issue is leprosy. The deeper issue reallyisn’t the actual medical diagnosis, perhaps they had Hansen’s Disease, perhapsit was some other skin condition. What mattered is that they were both unclean,they were contaminated. Society viewed them in the same way that we viewed thefirst HIV/AIDS patients in the 80s. These are people that were kept away fromothers, they were quarantined, lest they infect others.

We have thebenefit of modern science and we now know that leprosy is not very contagiousand is transmitted not through touch, but by breathing in the cough or sneezeof an infected person. Furthermore, about 95% of the population is naturallyimmune to this disease. What plagued Naaman and this man was not leprosy, butit was a cultural stigma. They were deemed to be unacceptable- not for who theywere, nor for what they said or did, but they were cast out because of fear.The fear of compassion. People were afraid that if they spent time with thesepeople, that they would literally be suffering with them. And as I mentioned,this fear was misplaced. Had people taken the time to minister to these lepers,they would have seen that they themselves would not have been infected.

And the same istrue of those people whom we avoid like the plague. If you minister to thehomeless, you don’t lose your house. If you have same-sex marriages in yourchurch, you don’t erode the sanctity of marriage or family values. If you visitsomeone in prison, you don’t become a felon. If you pray with a Muslim, youdon’t become a terrorist. If you’re a Republican, by talking to a Democrat youdon’t become a socialist. If you’re a Democrat and you converse with aRepublican, you don’t become a ruthless capitalist. If you drive your carthrough a Hispanic or African-American neighborhood, you don’t have yourwindows shot out. Maybe we don’t run into lepers on a daily basis, but we suredo treat a lot of people like they have leprosy.

The reason whyI’m making this point so that we don’t do what many people do when they readthe Bible. They say “I’m so glad that we now understand leprosy and don’t treatpeople like that” or “this story is 2,000 years old and has nothing to do withme.” Modern day leprosies exist because of prejudice, our own actions ofpre-judging people, our insistence that we know what the other side willrespond with before we even say anything.

We do treatpeople like lepers, but sometimes we need to be healed too, and these readingshave something important to say to us, who needing healing, as well. The firstthing to notice is that healing takes a while. Naaman has to bathe seven timesin the river. He even had to go through a process. A modern translation of thestory would read a bit differently. Naaman would have started by seeing hisprimary care physician, and then he went to the local specialists, but theydidn’t have an answer. So he had to call his insurance company and go back andforth with them for a while about being allowed to see an out of networkspecialist at a large university hospital the next state over. But the dean ofmedicine there decides that he doesn’t have a clue what’s wrong and doesn’twant to deal with it. And eventually he gets healed by some faith healer on theoutskirts of town. I know many of you are facing health struggles, and if youaren’t, I’m sure you know someone who is, a parent, a sibling, a friend, aneighbor. As a priest, I’ve gotten to know my way around Greensboro nursinghomes, Cone and Long hospitals, even Baptist in Winston; there is a lot of hurtin our lives Don’t we all wish it was as simple as a quick healing? But as wesee in Naaman’s case, sometimes it takes a while.

And for the manin Mark, it wasn’t any easier. He had likely had leprosy for years, he hadlikely give up hope. But he heard of a new drug trial, he heard that this manwas going throughout the region healing people. Now Jesus wasn’t the firstmessiah figure to be running around Israel, he had probably heard of other such“faith healers” and had been disappointed by their robust promises. But thisman had a lot of trust in God. He didn’t come up to Jesus and greet him the waythat most sick people in the Bible did. He didn’t say “have mercy on me, Son ofDavid,” he didn’t even call him Lord. He just said, if you choose, you can makeme clean. What faith!

What if Jesusthough didn’t cure him? A lot of people have hope and faith that rivals thismans, and yet they die of cancer or other diseases. Mark wasn’t exactly adoctor, he really didn’t know if this man had leprosy or not. Maybe he did,maybe he had some other, more serious skin disease. Again, remember that in thetext of these readings, Jesus didn’t technically heal anyone, he just made themclean. And in being made clean, these people were allowed to rejoin society.Maybe this man died 2 weeks later of a more serious ailment. But what Jesus didfor him allowed him to live those two weeks fully. Jesus took away the stigma,Jesus made it so that he could rejoin society, so that he could again see hisfamily and friends. And the same is true for us in our dealings with diseaseand death. Sometimes people recover, sometimes they don’t. But what God offersus is the opportunity to have a good life, and a good death.

We don’t haveto be alone in our diseases, we don’t have to face our fears alone. And now I’mtalking about more than medical diseases, I’m back to modern day leprosies. Ifwe follow Jesus in showing compassion, in standing up for justice, in seeingthe dignity in every human being, then we too can help to make sure thateveryone has a good life that ends with a good death.

And one finalpoint on those who are healed. They took part in their healings. The man inMark answered Jesus by saying “I do choose to be made clean.” Naaman sought thehelp of others and went through the ritual washing, which seemed ridiculous tohim. Isn’t that how healing is? Sometimes we do have to go to strange placesand take part in strange rituals. But what is important is that we take thestep in doing so. Healing would not have come to either of these people if theyhad not been resilient.

Next, I’d liketo turn to the agent of the healing. Sometimes translators of the Bible getthings wrong, and they completely struck out in this Mark reading. Ourtranslation this morning says that Jesus was moved with pity, which really is anice sentiment and makes for a nice story. But the problem is that scholarsagree that the more accurate and historical translation is that Jesus was angeredor annoyed. Sure does change the story, doesn’t it?

Why would Jesusbe angry with someone asking for help? Have you ever had someone come up to youand ask “I hope I’m not bothering you, but I just need…” Or about the letters that you get from variouscharities asking for money? Or how about the church, do you get angry when youhear a stewardship sermon or get that pledge card in the mail?

If you’ll thinkback to our reading from last Sunday- Jesus did a healing, then went to prayand said “let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim themessage there also; for that is what I came out to do.” So here’s Jesus, allexcited about his mission, energized to go out and preach about the Kingdom ofGod, and he can’t even take a step towards the next down without being heldback. Does that ever happen to you? You get set to do something, and then lifehappens? If I had a dollar for every daily schedule that I’ve had to readjustbecause of funerals and hospital visits, well, I couldn’t quite retire, but I’dhave a nice stack of cash. Now don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I don’t wantto minister to people, it’s just sometimes I have, in my mind, things that Ineed to do. It’s when you have dinner reservations to a nice restaurant and afriend calls to say that they really need you to come help with a bout of depression, alost dog, a sick child. Getting sidetracked isn’t something that most of usenjoy.

This is reallywhere the etymology of compassion really comes into play. Showing compassion ishard because it means to suffer with. When you are interrupted to do the workof compassion, it does drain you. Being compassionate with your time makes youbusier and might add to your stress level. Being compassionate with your moneymeans you have less of it. I know it’s basic math, but if you give 5% of yourincome to charity, then that’s 5% less to go on vacation with or put towardsdebt. Everyone thinks homeless shelters are good things, but who wants onebuilt next door to their house? Jesus told this man not to tell anyone aboutthe healing. Why? Perhaps because Jesus knew that compassion would cost himsome freedom. As his reputation grew and grew, more and more people wouldsidetrack him. Or maybe he was worried that word would get out that he hadtouched a leper, and he himself would now been seen as unclean and he’d beunable to do his ministry of preaching. Compassion does cost us- it will costus time, money, freedom, emotions, and energy.

So why do webother with showing compassion? Why should be concerned with healing others?After all, shouldn’t we take care of ourselves? Frederick Buechner once said“compassion is the fatal capacity for feeling what it is like to live insidesomebody else’s shoes. It is the knowledge that there can never really be anypeace and joy for me until there is peace and joy finally for you too.”Compassion is one of those God given gifts that we have. You know that queasyfeeling you get in your gut with you refuse to look at the homeless person onthe street, when you refuse to fill out your pledge card, when you don’t makethe time to call a friend in need? Some of it stems from guilt, but it’s a partof feeling compassion. It’s you suffering along with them. As long as there issuffering in our world, you too will suffer. It is our task to build theKingdom of God so that there won’t be any more suffering to suffer with.

And finally,let’s take a look at the healer, that is the source of the healing. I hope thatwe can all recognize this as God. One of the things we see in these readings isthat God’s focus and care isn’t too global to care about our local problems. Alot of people think things such as “God doesn’t care about my problem, myillness, my fear because there are genocides, famines, wars, earthquakes, anddictators in the world. Those are real problems, and God should focus on them.”And that’s half right. God is working in the hearts and minds of people aroundthe world on the “big” issues like war and hunger. But God too cares about yourbeing out of work or your nagging pain in your back. After all, Naaman was arich and powerful leader, his disease wasn’t a huge hardship for him, Naamanwasn’t even a believer in God until after he was healed. But yet, God hascompassion for him, just as God has compassion for all of us.

God is thesource of our healing, the strength that allows us to embrace our brokennessand hope for rebirth. But it’s important to remember that healing doesn’talways mean a cure. Good things happen and bad things happen. That’s simply thenature of the world that God created. We have free will, so does nature, sodoes cancer. It is not that God chooses to heal some people and ignore others,but rather that God loves us and trusts us enough to give us that free will.But when that free will leads to suffering, when it leads to death, when itleads to evil, God is a God of compassion, a God who will suffer with us. As I’vesaid before, what God gives us is maximum support, with minimum protection. Theglory of the Resurrection only comes after the suffering of the Crucifixion.

We’ve covered alot today in examining healing and compassion. Healing is a process thatrequires us to take a part. Healing isn’t always about the cure, sometimes isabout being given the grace to live. Those who act as agents of God’s healingfind it to be a challenging task, as they are called to suffer with people inshowing compassion, but we do this work to make our world whole. We do all ofthis knowing that true healing comes from our compassionate God, who deeplyloves and cares for each and every one of us.

It has beensaid that if we don’t make a difference by trying, we’ll make a difference bynot trying, and the same is true in showing compassion. The way to healing ourown hurts, the way to healing our world, is in showing compassion; in takingthe time to be with others, to hear about their suffering, and to suffer withthem. Remember, our task is not to be healer, that is God’s role in thisprocess. But let us constantly seek ways to bring the grace and compassion of Godto those in need of healing.

Let our prayertoday be in the words of our Psalm today, verses 11-12, if you’ll allow me thisparaphrase- “be with me, O Lord, and show me your compassion. O Lord, be myhealer. You can turn my crying into dancing; you can relieve my suffering andclothe me with the joy of redemption.” Amen.

Christianity, A Four-Letter Word?

2012-02-07T09:33:00.000-08:00

So last week a Facebook friend was lamenting the fact that everyone seems to be obsessed with the Mayans and asked why this was the case? I responded in agreement and said that it's odd that no one really consults the Mayans on other daily decisions. No one ever asks themselves "what would the Mayans do." And I suggested that I had some ideas for the obsession with the Mayan apocalypse, but said those would be better suited for a sermon instead of a Facebook post.

Another person, unknown to me, then also replied in a rather flippant and hostile manner to my comment. It wasn't really about the substance of my message, but rather, this person was reacting to the religious tones in my comment. And I wondered, why so much hostility for simply alluding to church and religion?

And it's not just on Facebook. Open a newspaper, or check out the best sellers list and you'll find articles and books about the "new atheism." As many of you know, I like to get out of the office, even if it's just to do "desk work;" so I spend at least a morning a week at Delicious Bakery down the street from the church. I don't eavesdrop, but I do hear things. Often when I sit down, people will talk about religion. If I had a dollar for every conversation I've heard where people start explaining to their friend why they don't like church, well, I couldn't retire, but I would have enough money to buy a bunch of coffee. People see the collar and they react. Why so much resentment towards religion?

You can see it in the news too. Christians, it seems, are hell-bent on being right and fighting. Roman Catholics fight about contraception and healthcare; evangelicals fight over abortion and marriage rights; Anglicans fight over authority and church governance. Why so much fighting?

The title of this post is supposed to be provocative. Is Christianity a four-letter word? I'll let you all come up with which four-letter word you'd like to use, but the ones I'm thinking of aren't quite appropriate for a G-rated blog. How have we gotten this bad reputation? Why is there so much animosity around religion? Why does the mere mention of religion turn people off? Why are we written off as irrational zombies that just follow some old-fashioned mythology? Why do so many people choose to identify as spiritual but not religious (more on that question in a future blog post/sermon)? What is Christianity a four-letter word to so many?

I don't have one answer for that. We do fight too much. We do take ourselves too seriously. We do act with a sense of entitlement. We do talk more than we do. We are hypocritical. We are out of touch with culture.

But this doesn't have to be the case. What if Christianity got back to its roots? What if we focused on being about some other four-letter words. What if we reclaimed "Lord?" What if we focused on the God who created, redeemed, and sustains every living thing on this planet (and I do mean everything and everyone)? What if we recognized that it isn't about us, but is about the Lord?

Or how about that other four-letter word? Love. What if instead of fighting, judging, or playing the game of one-upmanship, we focused on loving others? And by love, I really mean love. What if we visited those in prison, clothed the naked, fed the hungry, consoled the sad, brought peace to the warring, shared the Good News, stood up for the downtrodden, gave abundantly, prayed often? Well, I think our world would look a whole lot more like the Kingdom of God.

Christianity is about love, always has been. Love of God, love of self, love of neighbor. Let's reclaim that love- in our minds, in our hands, in our words, in our hearts, in our deeds, in our dreams. Maybe then Christianity would be another four-letter word: love.

Feb 2- Pick Your Feast

2012-02-01T12:41:00.000-08:00

So February 2 gives us two things to celebrate, either Groundhog Day or The Presentation of our Lord Jesus Christ in the Temple (readings). Groundhog Day of course is a day where we look forward to the coming of warmer weather and remember the actions of Bill Murray in the movie of the same title. The Feast of the Presentation is the time when Jesus was presented in the Temple according to Jewish purification laws. The prophets Anna and Simeon both offer their proclamations about the child. I've always loved the Book of Common Prayer's translation of Simeon's words:

Lord, you now have set your servant free *
   to go in peace as you have promised;
For these eyes of mine have seen the Savior, *
   whom you have prepared for all the world to see:
A Light to enlighten the nations, *
   and the glory of your people Israel.

So what will you be looking for? A prognosticating groundhog or signs of the Savior, who is a light to enlighten the nations and the glory of Israel, all around us?

It has been said that "what you count is important and it is important what you count" in church circles. Often folks are referring to attendance figures; do you measure church vitality in the number of people who attend your services, or in the number of people who live transformed lives as as result of their church attendance? Not many churches keep figures on the latter.

In the same way, what we focus on is important. Without getting too political/partisan, what have Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney decided to focus on? Negativity, attacking each other and President Obama? How do people of self-claimed faith focus on so much negativity? And what do we listen to? They wouldn't be doing it if they weren't finding results. Does negativity speak louder to us than positive messages? Would we rather know why Candidate X is a terrible person more than we want to know why Candidate Y would be a good leader? What do we focus on?

In our interactions with family members, cashiers, students, teachers, colleagues, do we focus on their mistakes and shortcomings (of which we all have many) and ignore all the good in them? Are there people you interact with for whom you focus on finding the flaws so you can discredit them?

Or how about in yourself? Where do you focus- the joys, the sorrows, the limits, the pain, the triumphs, the hope? It's more complex than asking yourself if the glass is half-full or half-empty. In focusing on something, we affect it. In quantum physics, this is called the Observer Effect. So your attitude and thoughts really do matter. This isn't to say that having "bad" thoughts is a bad thing, but rather it is an invitation to focus on the things that matter the most to us. Leave work at work, leave the driver who cut you off on the road, but focus on what truly matters- love, joy, God.

What day is today? Is it Groundhog Day? Is it the Presentation of our Lord Jesus Christ in which we are reminded of the Savior who has been prepared for all the world to see? Depends what you want to focus on.

January 29, 2012 - Epiphany 4B

2012-01-29T11:30:00.000-08:00

Let us pray: Lord God, almightyand everlasting Father, you have brought us in safety to this new day: Preserveus with your mighty power, that we may not fall into sin, nor be overcome byevil; and in all we do, direct us to the fulfilling of your purpose; throughJesus Christ our Lord.

Thissermon comes with a warning. Often sermons focus on things such as grace, love,and salvation, but today our readings present us with the other side of thecoin. This is a sermon about evil, demons, and sin. I had a professor inseminary who had a good friend that worked at the Holocaust museum inWashington. This friend was working on a thesis and spent a lot of time in theHolocaust archives, and they warned my professor- “when you are around so muchevil, you must take care that it does not begin to absorb you.” And so I offeryou this warning before we begin. Evil is like a solar eclipse, if you stare atit for too long, your vision will never be the same. So today, it is good andfitting to pay attention to evil, because any competent theology must accountfor it- but don’t spend your Sunday dwelling on it.

Evilis one of the most misunderstood and unexplored aspects of Christian theology,which I think is exactly how evil likes it. To talk about things such as demonsand “unclean spirits,” as our text puts it, seems unscientific andold-fashioned. In The Screwtape Letters,CS Lewis has a demon say this- “that devils are predominately comic figures inthe modern imagination is helpful to us. If any faint suspicion of ourexistence begins to arise in their minds, suggest a picture of something in redtights and persuade them that since they cannot believe in that, they thereforecannot believe in us.”

Sowhat is evil you might ask? For the purpose of this sermon, I’m going to tie upevil, sin, Satan, and demons in the same bag. There are shades of differencebetween them, but we’re really talking about different sides of the same coin. Anexample of sin is found in our reading from 1 Corinthians. Paul tells peopleabout their interconnectedness and warns them against eating meat, or doinganything, that strains that relationship. The act is the sin, the intent is theevil. Demons are the anthropomorphization of evil.

It’s worthpointing out that our images of hell, evil, and demons are not Biblical, ratherwhat most people think of comes from either ParadiseLost by Milton or Dante’s DivineComedy. Some have said that evil is the “privation of the good.” Others saythat evil is that which is opposed to the will of God. Theologian Karl Barthpostulated that evil is nothing, and this is contrary to God because Goddesires purpose and redemption for all things, so if evil is nothing, evil can neveraccomplish that. Some will talk about original sin, others will talk aboutdistinctions between light and dark, and yet others will say that evil has todo with free-will. So the question remains, how do we reconcile an all-powerfuland all-loving God with the existence of evil?

Idon’t have an answer. But standing on the shoulders of theological giants- I’dsay this about evil. Evil exists because love exists. God could have made aworld full of evil without love, or full love without the room for evil. ButGod wanted the most amount of love, and there has to be the possibility for thelack of love, that is where evil creeps in. Evil is not a force that is opposedto the good. Christianity is not Star Wars, there is not a light side and adark side, there is only the God side. Evil does not exist in any sense of theword, much in the same way that darkness does not exist, but rather is theabsence of light. But we can choose to ignore God and live for ourselves, andthat is evil. Evil and sin are the straining of the relationships of love towhich we are called. And sadly, throughout time, people have chosen to ignorethe love of God, and what we would call evil has happened. So what do we dowith evil?

Eachof the gospels paints Jesus in a different light. For Matthew, Jesus is theteacher; for Luke, Jesus is the preacher; for John, Jesus is the incarnate loveof God. Remember where we are in Mark, our reading today starts at chapter 1,verse 21, so right at the beginning of the gospel. Mark is still introducingJesus to the audience. So far in Mark Jesus has been baptized by John theBaptist, tempted in the wilderness, and called his disciples. So this incidenttoday is Jesus’ first public appearance, and in telling the story this way,Mark is defining Jesus as exorcist. That’s not a title we often claim for Jesusis it, exorcist? But it’s valid, and Mark invites us to explore that titletoday. Exorcise literally means to implore out; but it is often used to meandriving out evil or restoring health.

Soas Jesus is beginning his ministry, a man with an unclean spirit approaches himand says “what do you have to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come todestroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” That’s quite theprofession. Not until after the crucifixion does anyway ever make such a boldclaim about Jesus. And really, it’s a statement of faith, isn’t it? Somehow,this man knew more about Jesus than the disciples did, perhaps he had heardJesus say “the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the goodnews.” Maybe this man didn’t want to hear the good news or have the Kingdom ofGod anywhere near him. Maybe he didn’t take kindly to being told that he neededto repent. Maybe he would not accept that fact that he is possessed. And aren’twe all a bit like this man?

Howmany of us would say that we are possessed? Can any of us say that somethingunclean doesn’t live in us? Are we free from jealously, selfishness, addiction,pride, unhealthy lifestyles, racism, homophobia, worry, unforgiving attitudes,sexism, elitism? Do any of us live without sin? Aren’t there issues that wedon’t speak out against? Do we live as fully for God as we could? We are allpossessed, and we this Jesus to be our exorcist.

Jesussays to the man “shut up and get out of him!” And the man cried and convulsedand became a new man. Now I know that the text says that the spirit convulsedand came out of him, but there are major problems with reading this textliterally, with giving too much reality to demons and evil forces. For one, asI mentioned earlier, we are Christians, not dualists. Secondly, God is the solesource of Creation, not the Devil or Satan. To say that there is a source ofevil opposed to God that creates twisted angels is to erroneously take themetaphorical and make it literal. And thirdly, it is to abandon allresponsibility. For centuries, demons were the scapegoats for mental illness,addiction, murders, and many other unspeakable crimes. Demons aren’t behindthose things, people are. Mental illness is not a curse from God, nor isaddiction something over which a person is helpless to control. As Jesus latersays, there is nothing outside the body which can defile it, but ratherdefilement comes from within. Responsibility is a Christian virtue, and toascribe too much reality and power to demons and unclean spirits is to abdicatethat sense of Christian duty. So was there really a demon in that man that day?You can decide for yourself what you think, but I think the greater evil is inascribing too much power to a force other than God and leaving behind our accountability.

SoJesus exorcised this man of what was plaguing him. We don’t really know what itwas, could have been fear, could have been some old resentment that he held onto, could have been prejudice towards Jews; the point is that Jesus exorcised itout of him, and Jesus can do the same for us. Jesus is the cure for ourpossessions and the sins which we commit.

Thosegathered there that day were amazed and said “a new teaching, with authority!”Authority means both that Jesus had the ability and right to teach somethingnew, but also that he has the power to do so. Jesus offers the new teaching-that evil is nothing to stop us from pursuing the Kingdom of God. Jesus showsus that we can be saved from the ills that plague us, we can be set free fromthat which possesses us. But like the man in this story, we have to acknowledgethat Jesus has the power to do so. The man calls Jesus the Holy One of God, soyou might say that he realizes that Jesus has this authority. So for us toembrace Jesus as exorcist, we must also stand with Jesus, as he alone has theauthority.

Wealso stand with Jesus to resist evil when we encounter it. Jesus doesn’t ignorethe evil that he encounters, which we so often tend to do. It’s easier to notthink about the clothes we wear coming from a sweatshop. It’s easier to eatmeat when we ignore the fact that unless we buy organic and free-range meat,those animals were very likely abused. It’s easier to invest in companies whenwe disregard their predatory lending business tactics. You all I’m sure haveheard the quote from the pastor in Nazi Germany- “first they came for thecommunists, and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist. Then they camefor the Catholics, and I didn’t speak out because I was Protestant. Then theycame for the Jews, and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew. Then theycame for me, and there was no one left to speak for me.” Evil thrives notbecause it is a force in this world, but because we allow it to happen. Evil happenswhen we are silent, evil happens when we look the other way.

Andof course, evil also happens when we ignore Jesus’ words that the Kingdom of God hascome near. Sin happens when we live for our own sense of pride and greedinstead of thinking about the Kingdom of God. We become the demons of our worldwhen we say things such as “I earned mine, let them earn theirs,” things like“well, it’s not illegal,” phrases such as “I want this and I’m entitled to it.”Another CS Lewis quote- “like a good chess player, Satan is always trying tomaneuver you into a position where you save your castle only by losing yourbishop.” When we negotiate with our morals, when we ignore our ethics, when wefocus on our kingdoms instead of God’s, then we do evil.

Ourinvitation today is to follow Jesus, our Exorcist, in standing up against evil,both in our own lives and in our world. There is a great story from Greekmythology that advances this point. Sea travelers had to be aware of manydangers as they sailed. One of these dangers was the Sirens who lived nearSicily. They were beautiful creatures, part-bird and part-woman. Sailors wouldbe lured in by their sweet songs and their ships would crash and they wouldbecome the victims of the Sirens. In Greek lore, only two people ever evaded them.One was Odysseus, as his crew tied him to the mast and then put wax in theirown ears. The other was Jason and the Argonauts on their search for the GoldenFleece. They took along with them, Orpheus, who was a musical hero in Greekmythology. As they passed the island of the Sirens, Orpheus began to sing withthe most alluring and beautiful melody that one could ever imagine. Orpheus’song was so sweet that it made the song of the Sirens sound like discordantchatter. And Jason and his crew sailed safely past the Sirens because they didnot desire to go any closer.

Thisis how it is in standing with Jesus against evil. The songs of sin and evil arevery tempting, as was the song of the Sirens. It can be rather fun to amasswealth, to ignore conscience, and do whatever we want. The results of sin canseem quite fun. Evil indeed knows how to sing a very sweet song. It can bequite hard to drown out the song of evil, because it can be rather loud and isheard is most places. But in our journeys, we have an Orpheus with us in theperson of Jesus, a person who sings a different song- a song not of temptationand selfishness, but a song of grace and love. If we listen closely, if welearn the lyrics of the Kingdom of God, we will know that its song is much sweeterand doesn’t cause us to become shipwrecked.

Onelast caution- make sure that in resisting evil, you don’t focus on hating evil.The follower of Jesus should love good and hate evil. If you only love good andare indifferent towards evil, then you’re just a sentimentalist. And if youhate evil more than you love the good, then you’re just a good hater, and wehave plenty of those already. Let us remember that the key to all of this isthe love, the redemption, the grace of the ever-present Kingdom of God. That ishow Jesus is our exorcist, he points us towards and strengthens us to live inthe Kingdom of God. He shows us that there is a better way than evil, there aregreater rewards to be found than those that possess us.

Evilis a dangerous thing. One the one hand, we don’t want to dismiss its effects,but on the other we shouldn’t ascribe too much power to it. As Mark introducesus to Jesus in the gospel, he introduces Jesus as the exorcist, the vanquisherof evil, the builder of the Kingdom of God. The encounter between Jesus andthis man with an unclean spirit is an invitation to be exorcised, a call to heara new song, a challenge to healthy living, an opportunity stand up with Jesusagainst evil. With our faith focused on Jesus, with our actions orientated onthe Kingdom of God, and with the courage to proclaim the authority of Jesusthat makes him the Holy One of God, we too can join the chorus of the saintsand angels. The old saying is that no one ever leaves the church humming asermon, but everyone leaves with a song on their lips. Let our song this day bethat sweet song of Jesus the exorcist, whose song calls us to new life andresisting evil.

Amen.

Confession of St. Peter

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The Confession of St. Peter is one of the holy days in the Church Year. On this day we hear Peter confess that Jesus is "the Messiah and Son of the Living God." And Jesus then says that Peter is the rock upon which he will build the Church. Peter is an interesting fellow, here are some of the highlights-

Walked on the sea, then began to sink
At the Transfiguration, he didn't quite get the point and asked to build 3 tabernacles for Moses, Elijah, and Jesus
Confessed Jesus as Messiah, as noted above
Argued against the inclusion of Gentiles into the new church, then changed his mind as he was guided by the Spirit and others
He denied Jesus three times during the Passion

Peter is a great reminder to us all that we don't have to get it all right the first time, or even the second, or the third... If the Church is founded on Jesus, then it is founded on a second chance, and a third chance, and so on. He is the hero of not giving up, of remaining faithful, of being forgiven; and that is an example we all could use, especially our political leaders in Washington. How might they be different if they tried to be like the person of Peter instead of a statue of Peter (trying to be the solid rock that is never wrong).

At Diocesan Convention last weekend, Bishop Michael Curry shared a Scottish poem in his Pastoral Address, which is a paraphrase of the servant girl's words accusing Peter of being Jesus' disciple, this was the final denial by Peter. The poem goes

O that it might be said of me,

surely thy speech betrayeth thee,

thou wast with Jesus of Galilee.

Bishop Curry then challenged us all to be a church and individuals who looked like we have been with Jesus, so speak as if we intimately know Jesus, to live lives closer to Jesus. Peter struggled to embrace this accent which gave him away. After all, taking up your cross (and Peter literally did) is not easy work. Let us all give thanks for Peter, for second chances, and let us all seek to be transformed by Jesus in such a way that anyone that meets us on the street might say of us "thou wast with Jesus of Galilee."

How To Post Comments

2012-01-18T13:52:00.000-08:00

A few people have told me that they read the blog, and would like to comment but don't know how.

Under the post, there should be a green hyperlink that says "1 comment" or "2(or whatever the number is) comments." Click that, then a comment box will appear. Once you've typed your comments, there is a box below that where you can select how your comments are published. You can use your Google (or other types) of accounts to sign in. This will put your name on the line. If you don't want to login, you can select "Anonymous" and then anyone can post a comment. I do ask that if you choose this option, you do actually type your name in the comment box at the end. Anonymous posting is one of the pitfalls of the internet and leads to a less responsible posting and negative tone in the dialogue. Questions still? Send me and email, I'd love to have you continuing the conversation.

What's the Least I Can Believe and Still Be a Christian?

2012-01-17T11:26:00.000-08:00

This blog post's title comes from a book by the same name. I was reading/commenting on another blog where it was mentioned. The title is intriguing, but in looking at the table of contents and in reading reviews, it doesn't appear to be worth the read. As many reviewers pointed out, it's really the wrong question to be asking. But then again, the author is trying to sell a book, and it is a provocative title that makes you want to read more.

Instead, the better question to ask is along the lines of "how does being a Christian play out in your life?" Do you remain hopeful when you might not otherwise? Do you live in the power of the Resurrection? Are you more confident in yourself knowing that you are the beloved child of God? Do you find yourself being more moral when you ask yourself what would Jesus do? Do you act less selfishly when you recall that it's not about you, but instead is about us and the Kingdom of God?

A lot of times, we all try to forget about writing papers in school because of the work and stress, not to mention the fact that we often don't really want to be writing the paper. But from seminary, one really sticks out from me. I had a homiletics professor who asked us to write a sermon based on 1 Peter 3: 15 "always be ready to make your defense to anyone who demands from you an accounting for the hope that is in you." How would you make an account for the hope that is in you? Or in other words, what makes you Christian? For you, what is so seminal to your faith, that without it, you could no longer be a Christian?

I can't answer that for you. For me, it is the abiding sense of the Holy Spirit. The trust that God is active, that God loves me through that presence, that God is doing something new in this world (namely, building the Kingdom of God) is crucial and central to my faith. I would urge you all to consider how you would account for that hope in you. Is it the hope given to us through the Resurrection? Is it that God created and loves all of the cosmos?

And please, help to make this a vibrant and active blog- post a reply so that I know someone reads these things!

January 8, 2012- Epiphany 1B

2012-01-08T12:23:00.000-08:00

In the name of God- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

The baptism of Jesus is a wonderful way for us to begin the season of Epiphany. It is the season of the Church that begins after the 12 days of Christmas. Epiphany comes from a Greek word which means “appearance” or “manifestation.” Epiphany has its roots in the appearance of the Christ-child to the wise men from the east who came to visit the Holy Family, as it celebrates the manifestation of God’s love, redemption, and presence in the person of Jesus of Nazareth.

It’s also wonderful to be preaching on a Sunday on which we normally would have a baptism, but don’t. Typically when you preach on baptism Sunday there is a rule- keep it short and have one point. You’re often preaching to extended family members who are not familiar with the Episcopal tradition, or even the Church. And you have to contend with a crying baby. So it is nice to have this opportunity to more fully explore baptism, which is perhaps one of the least understood aspects of the Christian faith. What is baptism all about? I’ll get there, but first I want to explore perhaps the most important and most theologically challenging passage in the entire Bible.

“You are my son, the beloved; with you I am well pleased.” In our baptisms, the same is said of us as it was Jesus. God says to each of us- you are my son, you are my daughter, the beloved; with you I am well pleased.” Notice that in Mark, God says “you are my child,” not “this is my son.” God is speaking not just to Jesus, but to John the Baptist, to the crowd that was gathered that day watching the event, to you and to me.

So in this baptism event there are two things that happen- the first is this acknowledgment from God, and the second is the gift of the Holy Spirit. Let’s explore this voice from heaven first. You are my son or daughter. This is the language of adoption. In the Hebrew custom, by naming a relationship, you consummated it. The marriage ritual was rather simple, the man would simply say “this is my wife,” and it was done. God is saying “you are my child,” and we are. The language of adoption is important. Under Roman law, a birth child could be disinherited, but an adopted child could not. Once the adoption took place, it was permanent. By using the language of adoption, God makes it clear that this is not a temporary relationship; God will not change God’s mind on this, you are God’s son, you are God’s daughter.

What I love about this passage is where the voice comes from- the heavens. But notice how the voice comes. In Matthew, it says that the heavens were opened. So maybe the clouds moved apart and the voice came, rather boring. But in Mark, our translation reads “torn apart,” in Greek, it’s the word schizo, which is violent and strong. It’s not just that God parts the clouds to come to us and call us God’s son or daughter, God is ripping the heavens apart to get to us. It’s the image of a mother or father lifting a car to save their child. It’s messy, it’s raw, but nothing, not even the heavens, will hold God back from telling you that you are God’s child.

Next, God names us as the beloved. In baptism, we are given our core definition: beloved. No matter what, our most basic name is beloved. And when I say that this passage makes the hardest theological statement in the Bible, this is what I’m referring to. People can struggle to understand the Incarnation, they’ll buy into the Virgin Birth because they believe in the power of God, they grapple with the Resurrection, they can’t figure out the Holy Spirit, but they trust in it. But how many of us believe that we are the beloved of God?

Now to be fair, most of us would acknowledge that God loves us. But how many of us put that at the top of the list. I’ll bet you my bottom dollar that if we all took out our business cards, none of them would say “beloved child of God” under our name. Henri Nouwen, in the book The Life of the Beloved writes about the trap of self-rejection which we all fall into. The world will call you a lot of things. You’re fat. You’re ugly. You’re worthless. You’re stupid. You’re lazy. Why can’t you get over your depression? Why can’t you just stop drinking? Why can’t you loosen up and be more outgoing? You’ve been outsourced. You’re dead to me. You’re a nerd. You’re unlovable. You’re selfish. And those are just the things that are rated PG. And we start to believe them. They start to take their toll.

The symptoms of this self-rejection are low self-esteem and arrogance. Either we define ourselves by these terms and are depressed, rejected, and always think that we could be better. Or, in a move of self-defense, we become arrogant. We start slinging the mud back at others, or we paint ourselves as pillars of virtue to make ourselves feel better. But the name that God gives us in much simpler- beloved.

Beloved doesn’t mean that you’re perfect, it doesn’t mean that you can’t improve yourself, it doesn’t mean that you stop working to better yourself and your world, it doesn’t condone poor decision making or sinfulness, but it does mean that, at your core, you are who you are supposed to be. You are complete, you are loved, you are sufficient as you are. You are loved, you don’t need to show proof in order to get this love, you don’t have to complete a task to earn the love, you are loved. And this is our end, our call, this is really all we need, to be beloved; that is our fulfillment. Making a big name for ourselves, building wealth- that’s all beside the point. You are the beloved. Scripture tells us that God watches over us, that God knows the number of hairs on our heads, that God knew us while we were in our mother’s wombs. You have always been loved, and you can’t be undeserving of this love; at your very core, you are loved.

But how many of us act as if that is true? Our economic system of capitalism is built on the premise that you aren’t complete and you need something to make you better. Make up, weight loss pills, or a fancy car would make you a better person and more attractive. If you just had more money your life would be better. If it was drilled into you from the time you were born that you were loved as is, how would you be a different person? If you tried to better yourself not to please your parents, not to impress your boss, not to position yourself for a raise; but instead, what if you did what filled you and allowed you to live as a child of God, how might you make decisions differently?

In saying “with you I am well pleased” God is affirming us. God is saying “you are who you are supposed to be.” Again, this doesn’t make you perfect or give you permission to do anything you want to do, but you are pleasing to God. God is happy with having you as a son, as a daughter. I can’t say it enough because the voice from heaven is easily overshadowed by the voices of this world, but you are loved. Theologian Paul Tillich once said that “faith is the courage to accept acceptance.” And so it is. We live in a culture of self-help books, of always trying to be better, of never being good enough. Our culture is one that is built upon self-rejection and the monetization of catering to people with low self-esteem, and it does take courage to go against the grain and accept your acceptance, to accept the fact that you are the beloved child of God and with you God is well pleased. It’s the hardest theological statement in the Bible, but if we can believe it with every fiber of our being, and realize that it’s true for each person in this world, then our lives and our world can be truly transformed.

So that is the first part of Baptism, becoming the beloved of God. And secondly, in Baptism we are bestowed with the gift of the Holy Spirit, which is a mystery of sorts. I recently read a transcript of an dialogue between Christopher and Peter Hitchens. Christopher died recently and was the world-famous, militant atheist. Peter, his brother, is the former atheist turned Christian author. What struck me in reading the transcript was that 1) Christopher clearly didn’t know what he was talking about. It would be like someone who has never tasted wine before trying to explain away the complexity of a vintage Bordeaux or Borolo. And 2) Peter fell into the trap that so many academic Christians do; he didn’t embrace the mystery of God. Mystery is not simply something Christians claim to win arguments which they’d otherwise lose, rather mystery is the acknowledgment that we are finite and only get glimpses of the epiphany, not the whole thing.

The Holy Spirit is one of these mysteries of the faith. Poet William Blake once penned that “he who sees the infinite in all things, sees God.” Ever since the Enlightenment, Christianity has been reduced to superstition, at least from the view of reason and the academy. If you can’t prove it in a lab, then it’s not true, such as a mystery. This takes us back to the question I asked earlier, what is baptism all about anyway? Well, without mystery, it’s just a cultish ritual that has no impact on our lives. Most Episcopalians would say that baptism doesn’t determine whether you go to heaven or hell when you die. A lot of good people have never been baptized and a lot of evil people have.

I read a story about a man who worked at the Ford plant in Detroit. Back before machines made cars, the factory workers would often take tools home with them and would rarely bring them back. The practice was widespread and no one knew how to address it. This particular man was preparing for baptism and conversion to Christianity. As he was learning more and more about the faith, he began to feel guilty about the tools that he had taken, so he returned them to his supervisor, who was shocked that anyone would do that. So he told his boss and it went up the ladder and eventually Henry Ford received a cable about it while in Europe. He replied and said “dam up the Detroit River and baptize all of them.”

That is what Baptism is about, the mystery of conversion; the mystery of believing that you are loved and taking that as a call to live a life of loving others. It is the mystery of the cross and the mystery of the empty tomb. What if life isn’t about what we know and understand, but instead is about the mystery? I don’t pretend to be an astrophysicist, but I find the theory of dark matter to be fascinating. We all assume that our world is made up of atoms which we can observe and describe. But the theory of dark matter says that as much as 83% of the universe if made of dark matter, which is relatively unobservable and unknowable to us. If that doesn’t scream mystery and “you’ll never know it all,” I don’t know what does.

Take the mystery, the Holy Spirit, out of baptism and you’re left with an empty ritual or a really fast bath. Part of the mystery of baptism goes back to the point of being the beloved child of God. As the beloved, you are sanctified, you are adopted, you are given salvation, you are initiated into the Christian community, you are given the Holy Spirit. How does this happen? I don’t know, but I trust that it does; I know that it does.

I read an interesting Facebook status this past week. A friend of mine from seminary was writing about belief in God. He wrote “there are things in this world that make me believe in God. I'm not talking about the certain modes of thinking. I'm also not talking about seeing a beautiful sunset and thinking ‘how could someone not believe in God?’...No, I mean that there are things that, when they happen, I am overcome, overwhelmed, and saturated with a sense of something so much greater than I could possibly put into words. Belief not as conscious decision, but as acknowledgment of a reality that pierces you to your core. One year ago, my daughter was born. This was one of these moments.” I think we’ve all experienced those sorts of moments, when there are no words, there are no explanations, there is only mystery.

And the love of God is one of those mysteries. Don’t try to explain it, don’t try to encapsulate it, you’ll ruin it. Just be loved. What was so powerful about this passage from Mark to the Jews gathered there that day was that there hadn’t been a prophet in at least 400 years; people assumed that God no longer spoke to people, that prophesy has ended. And we say the same thing, even the Church has said that the period of prophecy is closed. But I disagree.

I say that each and every day, God still calls out to us, “you are my son or daughter, the beloved; with you I am well pleased.” God is tearing the heavens apart to get us. Can you feel it? Do you hear God calling to you? If not, then I’d suggest taking up the practice of contemplative prayer, or using some other method to be quiet so that the voices and distractions of the world can be put aside so that you can hear the voice of your loving Father in heaven.

Henri Nouwen wrote “God not only says ‘you are my beloved.’ God also asks us ‘do you love me?’ and offers us countless chances to say ‘yes.’” You are the beloved of child of God. If you can accept and say “yes” to this love and share it with others, our world will be forever changed. And wouldn’t that be a wonderful thing to do after Christmas? Instead of putting Christmas into a box and shoving it into the attic for 11 months, may we continue celebrating Christmas by sharing the gift of God’s love with the world.

Amen.

January 1, 2012- Holy Name

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In the name of God- Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

What is in a name? Shakespeare famously wrote “that which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” Proverbs 22:1 says “a great name is to be chosen rather than great riches.” And so it is. We all know the power of a name. Last names such as Bush, Vanderbilt, or Kennedy all carry great power with them. Some names even become part of the language- Einsteinian. We’ve lost the sense of definition of names in our culture. But often in the Bible we read about people whose names are titles. Abraham means “father of many,” Isaac means “laughter,” because of the preposterous situation of a son being born to the very old Abraham and Sarah. Names in the Bible are powerful, as they are titles of definition. And titles in our world are important too. Look at a business card, everyone these days is a vice president of something. We like big titles, just as the people of the Bible liked big names.

The question of a name is really about how do you see yourself? How do you define yourself? If you could choose one word to describe yourself, what would it be? Names don’t really capture that anymore. Robert is a German name, meaning “fame” and “bright.” I won’t complain about those attributes, but I think I agree with Shakespeare, a name is just a name. I’d like to think that if my name were Thomas, Steve or anything else, that I’d be the same person. But the idea of a name in the Bible, when we talk about the name of God, Jesus, or any person in the Bible, name really isn’t the right translation. We’re really talking about their character, their identity, their title. So names, in that Biblical sense, really are important. The Biblical name is perhaps what you’d put on your tombstone, or what you’d want future generations to remember about you.

I think it is fitting that we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Name today. It is a tradition that dates back to at least the 14^th century. We commemorate of the circumcision of Jesus eight days after his birth; this was the time in Jewish custom when a child was named, or given a sense of identity. And in being named, they officially became a part of the family and an heir of the promise God made to Abraham. Different churches celebrate this day at different times, and it’s fairly rare in the Episcopal Church. Holy Name always falls on January 1, and January 1 does not often happen on a Sunday. New Year’s Day is a great time for us to be considering the ideas of name and identity.

Everyone is talking about resolutions, which, in essence, say “how do I want to be different this year?” “How do I want to be known differently.” In the Biblical sense, “how do I change my name, or how do I live into my name in a truer way.” As we begin the year, we think about what we want to accomplish, what we look forward to, what we hope to avoid. Sometimes we even name the year. The year of self-control, the year of exercising more, the year of traveling more, the year of retiring. As we begin another year, what name will you claim for yourself?

The name that was claimed for the son born to Mary was “Jesus.” Jesus was actually a very common name; it wasn’t a special name. Jesus is the Hebrew form of “Joshua,” which was just as common then as it is today. Jesus is a fitting name though, as it means “God saves.” There are the traditions of casting out demons simply by using the name of Jesus. I’m sure we’ve all known people who in moments of fear or being at the end of their rope repeat the name of Jesus to themselves. In charismatic circles, chanting the name of Jesus will ward off evil spirits. Jesus’ name is something people have been willing to fight for and to die for. Philippians says that at the name of Jesus, ever knee should bend. It is a name taken in vain often, but also a name given great respect. There is great power and healing power in the name of Jesus.

But, as I said, Jesus was a common name and the actual name of things isn’t nearly as important as the identity of a thing. And the identity of Jesus as God salvation is what truly matters. The person of Jesus of Nazareth is what we venerate and follow as Christians. What the name of Jesus communicates to us is God blessing.

Jesus is the agent of God love, God grace, God redemption, God presence with us. And that is why the name of Jesus is so important- it reminds us of those blessings. Christmas is the season where we celebrate the rebirth of hope, where we celebrate that God has become incarnate in our world. This is unique in Christianity. No other religion claims that God, the creator and redeemer of all, the source and end of everything, has taken on the flesh of Creation and joined it. And that is a true blessing. This earth is blessed through Jesus’ presence on it, and so are we. We breathe the same air that Jesus did, we walk on the same earth, we awake each day to the light of the same sun.

The blessing of the Incarnation is in the name of Emmanuel, which means “God with us.” It was the yearning of the Hebrew people, and it is our deepest desire- to know that we are not alone, to know that we are always being held in God hand, to know that we are redeemed. As I’ve said in other sermons, what God gives us is maximum support, with minimum protection. The blessing of God does not mean there will be no pain, no loss, no depression, no illnesses, no layoffs, no deaths; but what the blessing of God presence does mean is that we will not be alone in those things. It means that God will be there to redeem the situation.

This connection between names and blessing is found in our Old Testament reading today as well. This passage is often called the priestly or Aaronic, as in Moses’ brother Aaron, blessing. God says to the people “so shall they put my name on the Israelites, and I will bless them.” Being united to God in God name is a true blessing. In our baptisms, in our self-identity as Christians, we receive this blessing through God name.

In Judaism, this priestly blessing is extremely important and sacred. It is recited only by priests and there are many customs attached to its usage to ensure it is used reverently and properly. There is also an interesting bit of trivia out there about the hand signal used in the priestly blessing. Leonard Nimoy, better known as Spock from Star Trek, grew up in a very religious Jewish household, and he used a variation of the hand sign and priestly blessing in the show. In Jewish custom, the priest makes this sign when pronouncing the words. So you can see how it got adapted to “live long and prosper,” which is a sort of paraphrase of the whole blessing.

The priestly blessing is a beautiful prayer. God tells Aaron to use these words instead of human words. There are no ifs, no perhaps, no maybes in this blessing. It is definite- God will do these things. And throughout this passage from Numbers, the emphatic “I” is used to stress that God loves and cares for God people and will bless them. There are three movements to the priestly blessing. The first is that God will bless us and keep us. These are words tied to ideas of sustaining us. These are the words used to talk about the blessing of harvests, land, and descendents. Secondly, God will make his face to shine upon us and be gracious to us. It is a blessing of God presence with us, that God light will shine on us, despite the darkness of the life. It asks that God be gracious to us and that God show us mercy. And finally, it asks that God show his countenance upon us, giving us peace. In Hebrew, the word for peace is shalom, which is full of meaning. It is used throughout the Bible to mean such things as prosperity, longevity, happiness, safety, security, good health, friendship, well-being, and tranquility. Like the Lord’s prayer, it is a simple prayer, but all-inclusive and full of beautiful language. And at its conclusion, God says that this prayer of priestly blessing puts God name on them and blesses them.

You all go by many different names, but perhaps our names in the Biblical sense would be “children of God.” And in being named that, we locate ourselves in relationship to God. This is a relationship of being blessed. This name is a blessing of inward grace. The world might call you a lot of things, it will judge you, you will be called names, in the negative sense. But those are not your names, you are not defined by those terms, or even the attributes you put on yourself. Instead, know that you are the child of God. That is your name. And in this name, you are blessed.

And, of course, there is the other side of the coin. Bearing God name means that we have a mission to fulfill. This is not a blessing to enjoy in our own little corner. This is not a secret name that we carry, but it is to be proclaimed to the world. This name that we have is a call to action. In bearing God name we will be blessed, but we will also be challenged. Our example is Jesus. He bore a very special name, the name of God Messiah, of God Incarnate- and he was greatly blessed in that. But Jesus also shed blood, sweat, and tears for his name. He did not hide his name. When it would have been politically or personally expedient to change his name, he stuck with it. Though he only had minimum protection, he was constantly blessed with maximum support; and the same is true for us.

This New Year’s Day, as we consider our resolutions, as we contemplate on the upcoming year and the names we’d like to go by- let us remember our most basic name- “child of God.” And in that name, we will be blessed with God presence, God love, God peace. Remember each and every day this year- you are blessed.

Amen.

December 25, 2011 - Christmas Day

2011-12-25T10:30:00.000-08:00

In the name of God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Merry Christmas! Sometimes days like Christmas are the hardest to understand and preach on. We get so many mixed signals about what today is about, what it means. Commercials tell us one thing, family traditions tell us another, the Bible something else. Today, instead of talking about what I think Christmas is all about, I want to focus on what Luke thought it was about.

There is a book called The First Christmas by Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan that I’d recommend to you all. In it, the authors explore the birth narratives of Matthew and Luke. What they claim is that the nativity story is really an overture to the gospel. Many symphonies begin with an overture. The overture summarizes the entire work by giving you hints and nuances of what is to come, and it sets the tone for the rest of the story.

Part of the problem that we’ve gotten into in the Church is fighting about the Bible. Are the stories true or are they fiction? Was Jesus really born in a manger, or was he born somewhere else? Was Mary really a virgin, or not? Did wise men really come to visit the newborn? We’ve fallen into a dichotomy where things are either true or false, but are those really the only two options? The authors of that book don’t think so, and neither do I, nor does Jesus. Consider how Jesus taught during his ministry- he told parables. Parables are earthly stories with heavenly meanings. No one fights over whether or not there really was a prodigal son. No one says “well, if there wasn’t a son who came back to his father, then I’m going to ignore the story and dismiss it.” It is a story that in some sense, happened, and continues to happen, but speaks to a larger Truth. Parables are not intended to be historical accounts; even the Bible isn’t intended to be a history book. The idea that the Bible is a diary of what happened is a very modern idea, and certainly not the one Luke had.

After all, think about it- how would Luke be able to write what he did? Luke never met Jesus, he was a friend of Paul, who himself never met Jesus. Luke was written at least 50 years after Jesus lived. Do we really think Luke somehow went around and found those shepherds and asked them what the angels said, did he go and ask Mary about the encounter? How about the fact that no author from that period ever speaks of a census by the Emperor. And why are these stories only in Luke? Mark and John don’t mention a single word about the nativity, and Matthew presents a very different picture of the nativity. I’m not trying to disprove the nativity, I’m trying to allow it to function the way Luke intended, as overture.

Parables are so often used because everyone likes the story and no one thinks that it’s talking about them. Parables though are often very subversive, they challenge those in power, and that is the case in the parable of the nativity in Luke. Now I want to make this clear so that you don’t report me to the bishop- I do think that Jesus was born to a woman named Mary, I do think that he is the Messiah, I just am not sure that the Bible tells the literal story of his birth. Instead, the Bible tells the more-than-literal Truth, capital T, of his birth.

Look at what we see in the nativity: the role of women is elevated. Mary and Elizabeth have the major roles in Luke. The angel speaks to Mary, not Joseph as in Matthew. The power of the Holy Spirit is seen in Luke, as it moves and orchestrates the events of Jesus’ birth. Jesus is clearly seen as a king. In Luke, there are no wise men, that only happens in Matthew; instead, Luke has the shepherds, the poor peasant class, come to worship the newborn king. Doesn’t that sound like the rest of the Gospel? Jesus ministers to the poor and the outcast throughout Luke. There’s your overture; these notes we hear in the nativity will show up again. Jesus is called the Messiah at his birth, and will also be the Messiah in his death. Luke is setting up the Gospel with the nativity.

There is another reason to read the nativity as a parable, and that is out of necessity. For Jesus to be taken seriously, he had to have some larger-than-life elements. The Emperor of Rome was called the Son of God. The Emperor was also called the savior of the world, bringer of peace, and Lord. The Emperor was thought to be the son of Apollo, making him the light of the world. The Emperor, also, was born of a virgin. When telling the story of the birth of a heroic figure, there simply were certain elements that had to be in the story in that culture. Like today, horror stories start with “it was a dark and stormy night,” fairy tales begin with “once upon a time,” and in Luke’s time, stories about the birth of savior figures began with virgin births and glorious titles. So if we read the nativity literally, we are forced to believe things that seem very implausible, but if we read them as parabolic overture, we see that Luke is pointing to the Truth, again, capital T, about Jesus. Jesus is other worldly, he is something special.

So if I’m right, that the nativity is an overture, then how do we have the sounds of the nativity stick with us throughout our life? The theme that I find in our passage this morning is joy. Joy of the birth of a firstborn child. Joy of the birth of the Messiah. Joy in the song of the angels. Joy in the shepherds as they saw their Lord lying in a manger. Joy in Mary’s heart as she heard all that was said about her son. Joy in Mary and Joseph, who found a way to remain committed to each other through the difficulties of the circumstances.

CS Lewis said that joy is the “unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction.” Joy, as we all know, is often most appreciated in times of hardship; in those times where we are surrounded by adversity, joy shines the brightest. Joy is not the same as pleasure. Pleasure comes and goes, it doesn’t fill us; joy is different. There are two kinds of joy. And neither joy is something you possess. Joy is simply a reminder, a reminder of the grace which is set before us. The first is a sort of ecstatic experience- your team winning a close game, the birth of a child, getting a raise at work. And this is good joy. The other kind of joy though is the joy of the Gospel. It is a joy of being filled, of being at peace, a joy of being grateful.

We see much joy in the birth of Jesus- the joy that the Messiah has come, that things will be redeemed. Christmas is the rebirth of hope in our world, and there is much joy in that. But we all know the story of the Gospel- there will be many fights with Pharisees, there will be run-ins with the government, there will be doubters and naysayers, there will be a crucifixion. But this is a story of joy. And Luke, by putting so much joy into the nativity, sets the tone for the whole of the gospel. The notes of joy found here today are also audible in Nazareth, in Jerusalem, in Gethsemane, on Golgotha. These notes of joy are found in our lives as well, even if they are faint, even if the noise of the world seems to drown them out.

We have much to be joyful about, and perhaps we also have many things to be sad, frustrated, and depressed about. Joy does not mean that everything is the way you want it. Joy does not take away the pains of loss and trouble. There is joy in being loved by God, there is joy in our Savior Jesus Christ, joy in family, in friends, in having homes and food, in having clean water. Even in the darkest moments of life, there is still joy to be found. For Mary, Joseph and the shepherds, there was much darkness. They were all poor, living under the oppression of Rome. Mary was unwed and just had a baby, which is not the situation she would have chosen. And yet, there was great joy brought to them by Jesus.

Luke reminds us that the story of Jesus is about joy. The joy of redemption, the joy of peace, the joy of our Messiah; and though there will be dark times ahead, joy is still there. It is a reminder that God’s joy overshadows the darkness of death, of fear, of injustice, of doubt. Christmas is about rejoicing in this joy. Today is a time to proclaim “joy to the world, the Lord is come!” Let the joy of today be the overture for your life, the theme music that plays in the background, even amidst the low notes of life.

May the first and last words on our lips this Christmas Day, and every day, be that of joy. May God bless us and grant us all a very joyful Christmas. Amen.

On the Incarnation

2011-12-20T11:00:00.000-08:00

"On the Incarnation" is the title of a work by St. Athanasius, in which he outlines the orthodox arguments for the redemption given to humanity through the work of Christ. This post isn't really about that, but is just a good title for this week's topic.

I was struck this morning by something I hear on NPR. They were discussing Kim Jong Un, and his father Kim Jong Il. The state media in North Korea is praising the new leader, hailing him as "born of heaven." Immediately, I thought of another person that we talk about who is "born of heaven." In their book The First Christmas, Crossan and Borg explore some of the claims surrounding Jesus' birth. They argue (and I'm inclined to agree with them) that the birth narratives found in Matthew and Luke are parabolic overtures to the Gospel.

Symphonies often begin with an overture, which sets the tone for the rest of the work, but also, in a very condensed way, summaries the whole piece. These authors see the birth stories as doing the same. They also remind us of the charged political climate in which Jesus was born, namely that of the Rome. The emperor was seen as a deity, and in order for Jesus to "compete" with this notion of what God should be, some of these elements are found in nativies. The emperor was born of god, so is Jesus. The emperor is king, Jesus is referred to as the king of the Jews. The emperor brought the pax romana (peace), Jesus is the prince of peace. The emperors titles included: Son of God, God from God, Lord, Redeemer, Savior of the World. Sound familiar? The point is that to be divine, you had to have certain credentials, and the writers of the gospels wanted to be sure that Jesus was seen in this same divine light as the emperor.

So with that in mind, I heard the North Korean claim that the heir is "born of heaven" as as similar sort of claim. They want (mostly their own people) to know that this is the only leader. And I got to wondering, in our context, what would we claim about Jesus to make him seem divine? If we were to re-write the birth stories, what would we say about Jesus? That he has a career batting average over .400? That he leads a congregation of 15,000 worshipers? That he gives millions to charity each year? That he has bipartisan support?

Of course, none of those apply to him that was born in poverty and ate with sinners and tax collectors. Jesus never really ended up being the sort of king that the Emperor was. As we approach Christmas, let us reflect on the incarnation. In the person of Jesus, the fullness of God dwelt (paraphrase of Colossians 1:19); or in other words, in the incarnation we get a glimpse into God. And if we can trust this vista, then perhaps God isn't as concerned with power, prestige, wealth, or even royal birth as we thought. This coming Christmas, let us remember the God we worship: not the expected military messiah, not the royal king; but instead the champion of the poor, the spokesperson for the outcast, the advocate for the poor, the non-violent leader, the suffering servant, the speaker of Truth, the embodiment of love.

Week of December 11

2011-12-13T08:03:00.000-08:00

Not preaching this week- so I'll offer some quick reflections on the lectionary. Readings are available here.

We read about the everlasting throne of David being established, the Annunciation and the Magnificat (we'll use it instead of the Psalm for the day). Our Gospel reading includes the wonderful line: "'For nothing will be impossible with God.' Then Mary said, 'Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.'"

What I like so much about this encounter between Mary and the angel, and the person of Mary in general, is her willingness to live for God. The Church desperately needs more Marys. Mary was a young teen when she was told that she was pregnant (or became pregnant, I'm probably not what you would call orthodox when it comes to the doctrine of the Virgin birth), and for that she could have been exiled, or even killed. But she did not run from the situation. She trusted that God was with her and that God could redeem any situation, including this one. And because of her great faith, courage, and openness to the Spirit, she is now known as the theotokos, or God-bearer.

As we approach the fourth Sunday of Advent, we should all consider how we are all theotokoi. How do we bring Christ into the world? How do we (or don't we) trust in God's redemption? How often do we say "let it be with me according to your word? What helps us to say that? What prevents us from saying that?

In Christmas, we see God's ultimate "yes"- God's yes to redemption, God's yes to incarnate love, God's yes to all of Creation. Let us consider how it is that we are messengers of that yes and how we accept and affirm God's affirmation of us.

December 11, 2011 - Advent 3B

2011-12-11T11:00:00.000-08:00

O Come, O Come Emmanuel. Amen.

So today is an interesting Sunday. The third Sunday of Advent is full of history and tradition. One such tradition is that of gaudete Sunday. Gaudete is a Latin word which means “rejoice!” Historically, Advent had been a season of fasting and introspection as we approach Christmas. Our readings the last two Sunday have been challenging as we heard about the coming of the Son of man, and then last week we met John the Baptist who calls us to repent. Gaudete Sunday began as a break from the rigors of Advent. This is why we light the pink Advent candle this Sunday, as pink is lighter in intensity than purple. And though this tradition started in a different place and for different circumstances, we too need to hear the words of “rejoice!” this morning. We are at the half-way point in Advent; two weeks in, two weeks until Christmas. Are you rejoicing, or are you coping? Do you end you day with a smile as you reflect back, or do you let out a stressful sigh? Let this Sunday be a reminder to us to remember what this season is about, the coming of our King, and for that, let us rejoice.

The other piece of history is that today is also called “Stir-Up” Sunday. Our Collect today begins “stir up your power, O Lord, and with great might come among us.” Traditionally, most Sundays leading up to Christmas had the Latin word excita in the Collect. Excita of course is tied to the word “excite.” As the story goes, pudding was always prepared for the Christmas season, you know, figgy pudding, and it had to stand for a few weeks before being served. So some say that the use of the words “stir up” were also a reminder to cooks and servants that they needed to be stirring the pudding so it would be ready for Christmas. But there is also a spiritual meaning to it. Stir up is a call to wake up and focus, it’s our half-time pep talk as we go through Advent. Maybe the first half of Advent has been great and full of spiritual meaning for you, maybe it hasn’t. Either way, let today be a reminder to let the excitement of the coming of our King stir up your hearts and minds, your hands and feet.

These tones of rejoicing and excitement are found within our readings from both Isaiah and John. This portion of Isaiah comes from what scholars denote as Third Isaiah. Chapters 1-39 are written before the Babylonian Exile, chapters 40-55 come from Israel’s time in Exile, and 56-66 are written after they return to Israel. So at this point, the people have returned to their homes, and they are joyful. There is good news to share with the oppressed. The brokenhearted will be bound up, or better translated, made whole. The captives will be set free. The prisoners of darkness will be released. The year of the Lord’s favor will be proclaimed. And those who mourn will be comforted. Scholars also see this passage as one of the Servant Songs. The Servant is seen as Israel’s Messiah. Now there is a danger in reading Jesus into Isaiah, but it is acceptable to read Jesus in the light of Isaiah. Afterall, Jesus saw this passage as essential to his self-identity. In Luke, when Jesus begins his ministry in the Temple, he reads this passage. The thing which we are to be excited about on Christmas is this sort of good news, and this is a good reminder to us of that message of hope.

This passage from Isaiah is also a favorite of liberation theologians. Liberation theology has its roots in the 1950s in Latin America, where government abuse, human rights violations, poverty, and social injustice were spoken out against. Liberation theology calls for Christianity to transform our world, to change our politics, our personal actions, and our prejudices so that justice and equality might thrive. It realizes that Christianity has become the slave to money, to success, to power, to prestige, and that it has ceased to be the radical and counter-cultural movement which it once was under the leadership of Jesus the early disciples. Liberation theologians called attention to the fact that the Church was not transforming our world, the Kingdom of God was not coming on earth as it in heaven, at least not through the Church. Instead, culture was transforming the Church. The Church was more interested in self-preservation and its growth of power and influence. And they were right. Christianity should be odd, not the norm. Christianity should be transformative to our world. So this reading from Isaiah is an invitation for us to consider our own issues of liberation and transformation.

One of the great things about the Advent season, about all of these readings about the coming Messiah is that we are reminded that we need a Messiah. If any of you do not need to be set free from something, if you don’t need a Messiah, then I’m not sure why you are here. We need to be redeemed. So the first question in considering our liberation is- what enslaves you? Is it work? Is it some image, either self-generated or from others, of what you should be instead of what you are? Is it addiction? Is it the need for revenge? Is it doubt? Is it fear of not having enough? Is it watered down religion? Is it guilt? Is it fear of death? I know it’s not easy to think about these things. These are the sorts of things we all try so hard to forget, the pains, the rejections, the stereotypes, the mistakes, the prejudices.

One thing that the Republican nomination process has shown us is that we all have skeletons in our closet. Isaiah speaks of the coming of the year of the Lord, which is also known as the jubilee year. It is a deeply Hebraic and Biblical idea of liberation for all people. The jubilee happened every 49 years, and it was mandated that all stolen property be returned, all slaves be set free, all debts be forgiven, all fields will rest for a year. Isaiah is proclaiming the ultimate jubilee year, a time where we all are set free from our debts, our enslavements, our crises.

But the interesting thing about this concept of being liberated, is that we have to let go. God can only free you if you let loose of the chains. If you continue to define yourself by your mistakes, by your shortcomings, by your fears and doubts, then you will never be liberated. Your faith will never transform you. We hang onto these things because we think we can control them, because we’ve hidden them so deep in our mind that they’ve taken root in our souls. Advent is a season about preparing for the coming of Christ the King, and this King will liberate us from all of these things, but we have to let him.

One thing that desperately holds us back from doing this during Advent is Christmas. We need to be liberated from Christmas. I’m not talking about the celebration of the birth of Christ, I’m talking about Santa, shopping, and sentimentalism. I really don’t mind the commercialization of Christmas. Shopping helps the economy and giving is not really a bad thing. But the sentimentalization of Christmas is a major problem.

I recently read an interview with the author of a new book- and I love this title because it is so straightforward and truth-telling, the book is called Christmas Is Not Your Birthday. And isn’t that true? Christmas morning seems like a birthday party on steroids for each of us. People are starting to realize that what we do during December is unhealthy and unchristian. There are big movements online right now called “Advent Conspiracy” and “Occupy Advent,” which urge us to spend less, give more, and love all people. And they have some truth to share. Americans spend $450 billion on Christmas. Some analysts suggest that global hunger could be eliminated with only $30 billion a year. And remind me, how is that dichotomy helping us to celebrate the coming of our King? Is it Jesus’ birthday, or ours? This isn’t to mention the fact that we spend over $500 billion a year as a nation on making war. For every $1 that Americans earn, we spend, on average, $1.22. I forget that part about spending beyond your means in the Sermon on the Mount. How would Greensboro and our world be different if for every dollar you spend on gifts, you also donated a dollar?

Or how about the ethics of Santa? We teach our children that Santa brings toys to good kids and coal to bad ones. What about a generous and loving God who gives grace and salvation to all people? How about our Christmas outreach? We adopt a family by spending an extra $50, which is a nice gesture, I’m not trying to diminish that. But is $50, or even $100 really a sacrifice? Wouldn’t the bigger sacrifice be to live in such a way that poverty didn’t exist?

I really don’t mean to be raining on the Christmas parade. It’s just that Christmas has the potential to be truly transformative, Christmas has the ability to change our world for the better, but not in its current form. It is sentimental and devoid of meaning or sacrifice. I want to reclaim Christmas for Christ, the King of the outcast, the champion of the poor, the spokesperson for the oppressed. If Martians landed in America today and did a study on Christmas, what would they think it was about? I don’t think Jesus would be on page 1 of their report. Let’s change that, let’s liberate Christmas and thereby transform our world.

What we must ask next in our survey of liberation is- who is the oppressor? Now, I’m not encouraging you to scapegoat here, a lot of the problem is with the person in the mirror, but there is injustice that needs to be spoken out against, this is what’s going on with the movements of the Arab Spring. It’s also what Isaiah was talking about. When he speaks about the captives being set free and the oppressed getting good news, he’s talking about the abuse of the poor. When the Israelites returned home, the rich people became gluttons for power and money. They reclaimed all of their old lands, and grabbed up land that wasn’t theirs. There was a system that kept the poor under the heel of the rich, a system that kept the outcasts outside. And folks, I don’t think I have to say it, but these systems are alive and well today. Isn’t this what the Occupy movements are all about? Now it doesn’t matter where you fall on the political spectrum, and I don’t fully agree with all that Occupy stands for, but you can’t deny the absurdity of the top 1% owning 35% of the wealth and bottom 80% owning only 15%. That’s simply not the Kingdom of God.

In considering liberation, we must realize that we are liberators sometimes, sometimes we are the enslaved, and sometimes we are the oppressors. Yes, in the US we are the 99%, but compared to the rest of the world we are the 1%. In fact, an annual income of $40,000 would put you in the top 97% of the world’s wealthy. There are a lot of ways to address this. We can live more simply, we can buy local to cut down on carbon emissions, we can avoid products that are made by slave labor, we can give more to charity. But I’m just wanting to do is to remind of ourselves of this fact- we are the 1% and we are the 99%. But neither of those are our calling as Christians. Instead, our task is to be the agents of God’s liberation for all people. Our mission is to stand up for justice, to stand up for better regulation, to stand up for the Kingdom of God.

And the final thing for us to consider in liberation this morning is-who is the liberator? Let’s turn to our reading from John. People really didn’t know who this John the Baptist character was. They could tell he was important, that he was proclaiming God’s vision, but was he the Messiah? Was he Elijah the prophet? And he says “I am not.” He is simply the voice crying out in the wilderness. As the gospeller John so eloquently puts it, John came as a witness to testify to the light, so that all might believe through him.

John the Baptist reminds us that religion is bigger than you, bigger than me, even bigger than us. And this is because it is about God. There is a temptation out there these days to be spiritual but not religious, to say that you find God in nature, to claim that being a moral person is how your live out your faith. In other words, folks are making up their own religion; which is preposterous because we have a God for that. We don’t need a man-made religion because we have a God-made religion. John the Baptist reminds us that there is a light shining. We don’t need to search for the light, we don’t need to kindle the fire, we don’t need start a fire; it’s already burning.

And remember, John the Baptist was a bit weird. There’s a reason why he wasn’t a prophet in Jerusalem, he was on the outskirts of town for a reason. And he is a reminder to us that this light of God shines in odd and unexpected places. One theologian said that the light of God can only shine through a cracked skull, and don’t we all have some cracks? The light of God shined 2,000 years ago in an unwed mother, and it still shines there today. It shines in the cracks of interfaith dialogue, it shines in moments where Christians surround Muslims in prayer to protect them from danger. The light of God shines in hippie college kids protesting in Zuccotti Park, it shines in soldiers reaching out to children in Afghanistan. It shines in weird and counter-cultural people like St. Francis, Martin Luther King, and Nelson Mandela.

And this light of God is transformational. This light is liberating. This light overcomes the darkness of fear, of extremism, of doubt, of death, of disease, of betrayal, of injustice, of apathy, of a sentimental Christmas, of dictators, of intolerance, of greed, of evil. This is the light of the world, we don’t need to reinvent it; we just need to be mirrors- so that we can reflect this light and share it with others, so that it can transform us and our world.

As I started this sermon, I talked about Stir-Up Sunday and Gaudete Sunday. As we approach Christmas, let us be stirred up. Stirred up to transform how we celebrate the coming of Jesus, stirred up to stand up to our oppressors, external and internal. Stirred up to take a counter-cultural stance to free the captives and comfort the oppressed, and stirred up to live a truly transformational faith. And let us also rejoice this Advent. Bask in the light of Christ, the light that transforms darkness and liberates us from all fear.

And I know this is hard. I know it’s hard to re-envision how we celebrate Christmas. I know it’s hard to be counter cultural. I know it’s hard to face our captors. I know it’s hard to embrace our liberation because we’re not sure what comes next. It’s difficult to stand up to liberate others. It’s difficult to be transformed in ways that seem odd and challenge all the things we’ve assumed and done for so long. But let us take solace in Christ, our Light and our coming King, whose has gone before us in transforming and liberating. Let us all join in the song of saints and angels- “this little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine.”

Week of December 4

2011-12-06T05:55:00.000-08:00

So last night I had dinner with a fraternity brother before an alumni association meeting for our Chapter. He graduated a year after me from Wake, so we got to know each other fairly well. He is a commissioned (yet to be ordained) Methodist minister in a small town in eastern NC. I enjoy talking with him once a month or so and getting up with him the few times a year when our schedules bring us together. Over dinner we discussed some of the struggles, joys, and conundrums of parish ministry. Specifically, last night we discussed the difference between American Christianity (that is, Christianity in name only) and Transformational Christianity (that is, authentic and faithful discipleship).

He told me about NT Wright's writing on the four spiritualities, which I was not familiar with. I did a little research this morning and it appears that these are discussed in Simply Christian. From what I can gather, Wright says that each person hears "the echoes of a voice" which calls them to do something. The way my friend explained it is that each person, Muslim, Christian, atheist, or deist all are motivated by at least one of these voices or spiritualities. They are:

longing for justice (equality issues, social justice, outreach)
quest for spirituality (prayer, academic study of religion, meditation)
hunger for relationships (outreach to others, friendship gatherings, dinner groups)
delight in beauty (art, spending time in nature, music appreciation)

God is in each of these movements, and God's Kingdom can be built through each of these with some intentionality. Hiking is listening to the voice of delight in beauty; but we all know that hiking, in itself, isn't spiritual, nor does it really accomplish the work of the Gospel. But that isn't to say it can't be those things. It can. Our focus is what matters. I think that many of us hear these "voices" daily, but often we over look them as calls from God or as invitations to be spiritual.

As we talked, I wondered which of these spoke to me the clearest. This morning I served with others at Urban Ministry as we prepared breakfast for the homeless, and I realized that for me, the longing for justice is what I most yearn for, it is the voice that I continue to hear.

So going back to this past Sunday's readings, what is the voice calling out in the wilderness saying to you? Which of these four voices calls the loudest to you? How do you ignore or silence these voices? How do you respond to these voices? How do you help others to hear the call? Some good things to consider this Advent season.

Week of November 27

2011-11-29T07:47:00.000-08:00

I'm not preaching this upcoming Sunday. We have some wonderful readings awaiting us though. Isaiah gives us the wonderful message of "comfort, O comfort my people." We also get our yearly Advent introduction to John the Baptist who proclaims the coming of the Lord.

In my sermon last Sunday, I mentioned that December is a month of tradition, not innovation. Now don't get me wrong, I love traditions (how could I be an Anglican if I didn't?) and have many in my family. But the danger in tradition in that we stop examining why we do what we do, or even what we're doing and we just start going on auto-pilot. As long as we focus and are intentional about them, traditions are wonderful ways to celebrate Advent and prepare for Christmas. Traditions point to a meaning beyond us, unite us to the past, and give us something to look forward to in the future.

In this post, I invite you all to share some of your favorite holiday traditions (and feel free to reflect on them, either on this blog or to yourself).

One of mine, which I no longer get to do since I've been ordained, is Christmas Eve dinner. In my family my father's mother makes homemade lasagna (they are Italian). We would eat and then attend the "Midnight Mass" afterwards. Now I do dinner between services, perhaps I'll pre-make a small lasagna dish and have Tyler put it in the oven to eat it between services. What are those traditions that you do which make the holidays the holidays?

November 27, 2011 - Advent 1B

2011-11-27T11:00:00.000-08:00

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel. Amen.

So today is the first Sunday of Advent. What is Advent you might ask? I’m sure all recognize it as that season that the Church does between Thanksgiving and Christmas, but seems disjointed and has nothing to do with the rest of the world. After all, it’s Christmas already, right? Shopping lists are made, perhaps you braved the crowds this weekend and did some shopping. Santa Claus has come down 34^th Street in the parade. I’ve noticed that many of my neighbors have had Christmas decorations up for over a week now. Maybe the Church should just concede defeat and go ahead and celebrate Christmas for the whole month of December since no one really pays attention to Advent anyway.

But maybe not. What if Advent was the key to having a joyful Christmas, a Christmas that truly fills us instead of just giving us stockings filled with things we could live without, a Christmas where we really proclaimed the birth of the Messiah in our world? What if we put as much energy into Advent as we did Christmas? I encourage and charge you all to celebrate Advent this year.

So, what is Advent? Advent comes from a Latin word which means “coming.” Advent is the season where we anticipate Christmas. It’s a tough season because we are celebrating the already but not yet. Already Christ was born in a manger nearly 2,000 years ago, but it’s not yet time to be celebrating that right now. Advent is a wonderful and splendid season. It has been said that if Christmas is the season where we celebrate the rebirth of hope, that Advent then is the season where we hope for rebirth.

Advent is a time to slow down and reflect. There is a reason why December seems more stressful than the rest of the year: shopping to do, parties to plan, holiday gatherings that you have to suffer through, extra stress at work because co-workers take time off. Plus, it gets dark earlier, which just makes it feel as if there are fewer hours in the day. Let Advent be your excuse to slow down. Use Advent as the chance to take the proverbial “chill-pill” and relax. This is not only good for your health and sanity, but will also all you to truly prepare your heart and mind for Christmas when it comes in four weeks.

This sort of high stress and anxiety level is right where we find ourselves as we walk in on Jesus and the disciples this morning. Earlier in chapter thirteen, Peter, James, John and Andrew privately ask Jesus “tell us, when will this be, and what will be the signs that these things are about to be accomplished?” They were referring to Jesus’ comment that the Temple will fall. And Jesus warns them about following false prophets and he says “when you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed; this must take place, but the end is still to come.” Jesus talks about earthquakes and famines, and says “this is but the beginning of the birth pangs.” So the question we might ask ourselves upon hearing these words is- “are we there yet?”

And Jesus says “no.” Mark was written around the year 70, when the Temple did fall. When there were wide spread persecutions, when there were wars and rumors of wars. And Jesus tells the disciples “hold your horses, this isn’t it.” Our reading today picks up here. Jesus says “in those days” referring to the real coming of the Son of Man, “the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light, and the stars will be falling from heaven, and the powers in the heavens will be shaken.” Last I checked, the sun still shines and the stars still fill the sky. Jesus wants to make it clear- when it is time, you will know it and it will be painfully obvious. So are we there yet? No. Well, when will we get there? “But about that day or hour no one knows.”

What is this all about? What in the world is Jesus talking about? A few years ago when I was in the Diocese of Washington, we had an Advent clergy gathering and the session was led by author Jon Meacham. He said to us “I have a room full of clergy and I’m going to ask the question that I’ve always wanted to ask. If Jesus talked like this, that the end of the world was coming before that generation passed away, and it didn’t, then what does that say about the credibility of everything else that Jesus said?” We all sat there in silence. Eventually, one poor soul tried to piece together an answer which was going nowhere fast, so he concluded by saying “just don’t mess with my Jesus.” But it’s a serious question. There is that famous proposition made by CS Lewis about Jesus- either that he was a liar, that he is Lord, or that is was a lunatic. In this particular passage, to us, 2,000 years later; lunatic might seem to be a valid choice.

Maybe there’s more to it than that. Jesus died in roughly the year 33; and as I said, Mark was written in 70. When Mark wrote those words, those of Jesus’ generation were already dying. And Mark clearly didn’t think Jesus was a lunatic, so maybe Mark is talking about something bigger than the “end of the world,” and we’ve just been misinterpreting this text for too long. Perhaps Jesus was talking about something else.

Advent is the beginning of the church year, and as we change our liturgical calendar to a new year, we focus on a different Gospel. The way the lectionary works, in Year A, which was last year, we read Matthew. This is Year B and we’ll be reading Mark. Next year we’ll read Luke. John doesn’t get his own year, but is sprinkled in throughout the other three. So in preparation for a year of Mark, I recently read a book called Conversations with Scripture: The Gospel of Mark by Marcus Borg. It’s a very approachable and short book which gives a solid overview of Mark. In reading it, I was reminded that Jesus rarely, if ever, talks about Heaven, the nature of the soul and the afterlife, or the end of the world. But what Jesus does talk about more than anything, is the Kingdom of God. Mark is sixteen chapters long, and the Kingdom of God is mentioned twenty-one times. The Kingdom of God is the reign of God’s glory, where peace, love, servant hood, and joy abound.

We all know that Jesus used parables and metaphors. What if we’ve been taking Jesus literally when we should have seen him pointing to the Kingdom of God instead of the end of the world? Well, my brothers and sisters, I hope that you can see that would make all the difference in the world. Jesus and the writers of the Bible didn’t get it wrong; we did. The Kingdom of God is clearly coming, we see signs of that all around, but it’s not here yet. It’s already, but not yet.

So what do we do with this reality? As Jesus says, we keep awake, or watch or be ready, as other translations put it. Let’s take a look at three important questions about watching and waiting. What is it? How do we do it? And why do we do it?

So first, what does it mean to be ready and wait? It’s sort of like the difference between a person standing on the side of the road waiting for a bus and that same person standing on the side of the road waiting for a parade. In waiting for a bus, it’s a passive sort of waiting. You’re just there, hanging out, not doing much, maybe playing with your phone or reading a book. But in waiting for a parade, you’re expectantly waiting. You work hard to listen for the sounds of drums and trumpets. Maybe you’re standing on your toes to see over the crowd or look around the corner. So to keep awake as Jesus suggests, we must be expectant, looking forward to something, to the rebirth of hope in our lives. A good exercise might be for you to make a Christmas list to help you figure out what you’re staying awake and being watchful for. And I’m not talking about new clothes, videogames, or a tablet. I’m talking about what you hope for, what you yearn for. Maybe peace in your family, maybe a job offer, maybe a cure from a disease, maybe end of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, maybe for the return of civility in politics. But one thing is for certain, you can’t expectantly wait for something if you don’t know what you’re waiting for.

Jesus’ words are difficult for us. Do we really need to be told to “keep awake?” Americans are sleep deprived. I’m so glad to see you all this morning, but I know that there are plenty of St. Francis folks who are in town this morning and are taking today to sleep in and recover from Thanksgiving. We don’t need to stay awake, we need to get some rest. Furthermore, it’s not easy to keep awake in the spiritual sense when we’ve been doing it so long. Advent comes around every year, and every first Sunday of Advent, we get a similar sort of reading- be ready, stay awake. But if this Advent is no different from the one before it, and the one before that one, and the one before that, then why bother staying awake?

Jesus’ call might be better translated as “focus.” Advent is a time to be intentional, to not simply go through the motions. Most of us can do December in our sleep- we know where the decorations go, the same place they do every year. We have our shopping routines, we have our recipes that we follow. December is not a month of innovation, but Jesus is inviting us to focus on what we do. And as we focus, consider how it is that we can participate in the things that you hope for. Maybe you take some time to volunteer at the shelter, maybe you pick up a religious book, or even the Bible, and read some to feed your soul, maybe you only write 20 Christmas cards, but you send them with personal notes to people who have truly changed your life. Change it up a bit, but whatever you do, focus on it.

So how do we wait? One of my favorite books is The Screwtape Letters by CS Lewis. In this book, Screwtape, a senior demon, writes to his younger nephew, Wormwood, counseling him on the ways to lead humans away from God. In one letter, Screwtape writes “our business is to get them away from the present…it is far better to make them live in the future…Nearly all vices are rooted in the future. Gratitude looks to the past and love to the present; fear, avarice, lust and ambition look ahead.” That’s another reason not to get caught up in reading this passage as a prediction of the future. When we look ahead to the end of the world and try to understand it, we become obsessed with it and we cease to live in the present, which is the only time we can experience love and God. But it also speaks to how it is we can stay awake and be watchful.

It is a similar point to my previous one about the need for focus. You all know about Advent calendars- those little calendars where you open a door each day and find a chocolate. If you open them all on December 1, you then feel depressed about not having any more chocolate. And don’t save them all for December 25, or you won’t enjoy them throughout the month. But if you open them a day at a time, you get a daily treat. Maybe those calendars have some wisdom in them that we can use for our own celebration of Advent. Instead of worrying about the stuff to-do this holiday season, perhaps we can enjoy the things we do. Take it a bit a time and focus on finding the little chocolates of the day- the moments of grace, the moments of love, the moments of the Kingdom of God.

The thing to remember in answering “how do we wait,” is that we need to be active. There is a great word play in Spanish that we don’t have in English. In Spanish, the word for wait is esperar, which is the same word for hope, and the word for breath is espirar. These ideas of breathing, of hoping and waiting are so linguistically intertwined that there is hardly a difference between them. As you live and breathe, you wait with hope. You can’t do one without the other. Waiting for the Kingdom of God doesn’t mean sitting around and twiddling your thumbs. It doesn’t mean just keeping an eye out for it. Waiting means making ourselves and our world ready for it. Next Sunday we’ll hear John the Baptist proclaim “prepare the way of the Lord.” That is how we wait, not passively, but we actively work for the Kingdom of God as we expectantly hope for it’s coming.

And finally, why do we wait? Don’t we have enough to do already? The simple answer is because there is work to be done. There is a great story that comes from New England during the colonial age. As the story goes, there was an unexpected lunar eclipse. It might have seemed that the sun really was being darkened. There was a state legislative meeting going on, and several people panicked and moved to adjourn the meeting. But one person stood up and said “Mr. Speaker, if it is not the end of the world and we adjourn, we shall appear to be fools. If it is the end of the world, I should choose to be found doing my duty. I move, sir, that candles be brought in.” We actively watch because we have a job to do. The task of the Gospel- of loving others of serving God, of making this world reflect the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven.

Advent is a tough season, a season of the already, but not yet. This year, let’s make Advent different. Let’s not just go through the motions. Let’s not just skip Advent and go straight to Christmas. Instead, let’s expectantly wait and hope for the rebirth of the Messiah in our world. Let’s stay awake and focus on what really matters this Advent. Pay attention to the signs of the Kingdom of God which surround you each and every day. Find ways to build up the bricks and roads of the Kingdom.

And should I be wrong about all of this, and sun really does become darkened and the moon stop giving light, then let us be found hard at work this Advent season- preparing our homes, our hearts, our minds, our relationships, our church, our world for the coming of Christ.

Amen.

Thanksgiving Day

2011-11-24T10:00:00.000-08:00

In the name of God- Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Happy Thanksgiving! I am so glad that you all have come out this morning for this service. You all know the history of today. Thanksgiving, of course, is one type of prayer, and the early European immigrants to this land were prayerful people. Services of thanksgiving were commonplace. The formalizing of Thanksgiving began in Jamestown in 1607, where the charter mandated that on the anniversary of their ship’s safe arrival, they would have a yearly service of thanksgiving. What we have come to call the "first Thanksgiving" happened in Plymouth in 1621 and really was more of a harvest celebration than a thanksgiving meal. The European settlers had insufficient food supplies to make it, and with the help of the native Americans, they were able to have a successful harvest, for which they were thankful. In 1777, George Washington declared a day of Thanksgiving in December after a victory at the Battle of Saratoga. And days of thanksgiving were called for every handful of years thereafter. In 1863, Abraham Lincoln declared that the final Thursday in November should be a yearly day of thanks, and hence the modern tradition began. Roosevelt in 1942 then made the holiday an official and legal US holiday. And slowly the traditions of feasts, football and parades crept into this annual day of thanks.

I give you this history not to bore you, but to put into perspective the reasons why we are gathered here today. Thanksgiving is a largely secular holiday; most people will only devote 15 seconds in a pre-meal prayer to actually giving thanks to God. But as Christians, it is our duty and honor to put more thought and meaning into this day. So first of all, thank you all for being here. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday, right up there with Easter- for one, I think that we too often forget the power of being thankful; and to be honest, I really like stuffing and gravy, the football and the family. I won't keep you long, but I'd like to reflect on the two necessary movements for this day- remembering and giving thanks.

In our reading from Deuteronomy, we see the seeds of a religious thanksgiving. Moses is speaking to the Hebrew people, they are on the precipice of entering the Holy Land, the land to which they have been journeying for a generation, a land that they have been promised, a land which they will finally be able to call home. He recounts what God has done for them and how God has blessed them. Moses then says "But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, so that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your ancestors, as he is doing today." The operative word here is "remember."

“Remember” is a rich word. It means to consider, to bring to mind, to reflect on, and in the Hebrew language, it means to make present; to remember is to recall the past to be present again in the now. November, I think, is a great time for Thanksgiving. We have had the harvest, we have just about finished up another year, and we are preparing to enter the season of Advent on Sunday- the season of hope. This is a great time to take stock of our lives, to be mindful of our needs and our blessings before we consider what it is we need and want going forward, and I'm talking about something deeper than a Christmas shopping list. We began this month with the Feast of All Saints', a day in which we call into presence all the saints who have gone before us, where we remember those loved ones who have died. In England, November is the time when Remembrance Day is celebrated; the day when World War I ended and the bombs stopped dropping.

So let us take some time today to remember, to recollect, to ponder. Between the parades and the touchdowns, take a few moments to think. Maybe take some time at dinner, whether you eat alone or at a large gathering, and remember. Talk about the year- its blessings and its disappointments; I'm serious, do this.

Remembering is important because it is so easy to not. It is too easy to let the past stay in the past. It is too easy to not think about how we have been loved, how we have been kept in God's hand, how we have been supported. And in remembering, we gain perspective. We can stop and breathe, we can be not anxious about the global economy or politics; we can refocus on our attention on what truly matters, we can relax and take the higher view of life to gain some perspective. But you have to slow down and be intentional about doing this. Take sometime today to remember.

One theologian said that the language of thanks is not natural for us, it is learned behavior. That's why you hear so many parents reminding their children to say "thank you." Being thankful is a habit, something we must practice. A writer once said that the hardest arithmetic is that which allows us to count our blessings. In counting our blessings, we must remember. And you and I know, sometimes remembering is a painful process. When we remember, we do recall those good things- but we will also remember the bad. We will remember the pains of rejection, of sickness, of job loss, of the reality of the economic downturn, of betrayal, of disappointment, of death. I've said it before, but it bears repeating today: what God offers us is maximum support, with minimum protection. Being blessed does not mean that curses will not follow. Sometimes it is easier to forget the blessings than it is to remember the curses.

But we are all here because we realize that to be a faithful people, we must be a thankful people, and thereby a remembering people. So that is the first part of today, remembering. Moving on, we do something with these memories and that is to give thanks. Karl Barth said that the basic human response to God is that of gratitude. It is dangerous to not be thankful. If you cannot give thanks then you either are utilitarian in your outlook, meaning that we just do whatever is best, so good outcomes are to be expected; or you are entitled, meaning that you think that you deserve whatever good comes your way by your virtue. Being thankful is different- being thankful sometimes means accepting curses along with blessings, it means realizing that you are not the agent of your own success, that you aren't always the one to get the credit, or the blame. Being thankful keeps us grounded.

In giving thanks, it is important also to remember the object of our thanks- God. Pick up a newspaper and read some of the columns about today. You'll find history lessons, notions of how we are blessed to be Americans, and other nice reflections on thanks. But you won't find God. I'm not sure if has to do with being politically correct, or what the reason is, but people are trying to be thankful in the abstract, without an object. And we all know that dog just won't hunt. It's like trying to be loving without dealing with other people; it can't happen. If we are to be thankful, we must give thanks to someone, and as Christians, to God.

It's what is going on in our reading from Luke today. Nine are healed, one is thankful. Now, I don't want to condemn the nine, they did what they were told, and there were likely ecstatic to be healed. But one gave thanks. And in giving thanks, he received an even greater blessing. When I was in seminary, about a month into my first semester both my friend and I received a care package from a church in this diocese. Neither of us had any connections to this church, but this church made it part of their mission to support seminarians by sending care packages. I immediately wrote a thank you note to the church; my friend never got around to it. It was the last package he received from them in his three years of seminary; for me, it was the first of nearly a dozen more. I tell this story not to toot my own thankful horn, but instead to say that often in being thankful, we set ourselves up for greater joy and continued blessings. Receiving a gift or grace is easy, anyone can receive and it is one way. But in giving thanks we come into relationship.

It was easy for me to give thanks, after all, I got a gift. But we are called, as people of faith, to, as the Psalmist writes, give thanks to God in all things. So do we give God thanks for losing a job? For a fight with a loved one? For the death of a close relative? For the things in our life that we would give anything to change? I find it interesting that Lincoln began the tradition of a yearly day of Thanksgiving during the Civil War. How in the world could he be thankful?

For one, Lincoln counted his blessings. He said that though we had a bitter military war happening, the rest of life was good. He didn't let the cloud of darkness, even if it was a huge cloud, overshadow the whole sky. He wrote "[these gifts] are the gracious gifts of the Most High God, who, while dealing with us in anger for our sins, hath nevertheless remembered mercy. It has seemed to me fit and proper that they should be solemnly, reverently and gratefully acknowledged as with one heart and voice by the whole American people."

He might not have known it, but Lincoln was expressing the idea of living a Eucharistic life. Eucharist is the Greek word for thanks, so when the one leper gave thanks, he eucharist-ed. This is what today is all about- the Eucharist. The Eucharist we will share here, around this altar, as we remember and give thanks to the giver and redeemer of all things; the Eucharist we will share over meals today; the Eucharist we will share in smiles, in giving money to charity, in stopping and recalling that we are loved, and we are blessed, no matter what the world might say otherwise.

Happy Thanksgiving. Take some time today to remember- remember that you are the beloved child of God, nothing can change that. Remember the ways that you have been blessed and nourished. Remember the lessons you have learned from falling down. Remember the victory of Easter that shows us that there is no darkness that can overcome all light; no sadness so deep that there cannot be joy; no curse so profound that blessing cannot come; no war so fierce that there cannot be peace; no death that there can't be resurrection. Remember these things today. And having called them to mind, give thanks- live the Eucharist by thanking God in words, in actions, in love, in dedication. Thank God publicly at dinner tonight, at work, at church. And in remembering and giving thanks, we will continue to be upheld and blessed by God. And for that there is only one thing left to say- thanks be to God!

Instructed Eucharist

2011-11-20T11:00:00.000-08:00

Before the Opening Hymn

So today we’re going to be doing something a bit different- we’ll be celebrating what is known as an Instructed Eucharist. We’ll pause at various points to offer commentary and reflection. It has often been said that “praying shapes believing,” so it is worthy of our time this morning to explore how our faith is being shaped by our prayer.

On Sundays, we see the importance of communal worship over individual prayer. Your individual daily prayers are important, but a communal aspect is needed. Recent studies have shown that more people are praying, but less people connected to a religious institution. There is a danger in this. If your spirituality is only about you and God, all you do in prayer is confirm your own suspicions about God. The value of being together, of praying together, of knowing God together is that we are challenged to see a bigger view of God. Theological growth takes place in conversation with each other. The Church is often called the Body of Christ; Sunday worship is about bringing the various parts together for intentional time together.

Our primary worship occurs on a Sunday- the Christian day of Sabbath. Sunday, the first day of the week, is the day that our Lord Jesus Christ rose from the grave- this is the focal point of our faith and it is for this reason that we come to church on Sunday.

I’m sure you’ve all heard the word “liturgy” before. Liturgy is a Greek compound word coming from the combination of laos, which means the people, and ergos which means work. So liturgy means “the work of the people,” not “the work of the clergy.” The clergy facilitate the service, but it is your work. Our prayers are no more valuable to God than yours. Speaking for myself, your singing could easily be more pleasing to hear than mine. This notion of work is why there is so much activity by the laity. You stand, you sing, you kneel, you respond verbally. These actions might seem cumbersome, but they are a way to pray with our body, as well as our words and minds. Some of you help to lead the service by reading or administering the chalice or singing in the choir.

This is not a show, not a performance; this is worship- your worship, and your work. The Episcopal Church is more like the Smithsonian rather than the performance model found in megachruches- it takes more effort, is perhaps less fun, but we learn more about ourselves and our world. So keep that in mind throughout this, and every, service. Worship is not something you come to watch, it is your work; you lead it as much as anyone else.

As many of you know, the Episcopal Church’s worship conforms to the 1979 Book of Common Prayer. It has a rich and interesting history which I won’t go into now, but I’d encourage you to learn more about it. On my blog I’ll have the text of this commentary along with a references section. What is useful to keep in mind is that the first Book of Common Prayer was written in 1549 and drew on many ancient resources. What is so tremendous about our liturgy is that it is so much bigger than any of us. The prayers that we pray have been prayed in the Book of Common Prayer for nearly 500 years, and are based on the most ancient prayers we know of. Furthermore, about 80% of the Prayer Book is either direct quotations or paraphrases of Scripture. Versions of the Prayer Book are used by 80 million Anglicans around the world every single day. The prayers we pray together are said by millions. And there is something beautiful and mystical in sharing those common words. This liturgy is real, not something that is here today and gone tomorrow. The Prayer Book unites us, not only to those present, but those past and future as well.

Much could also be said about vestments and architecture, but in the interest of time, I’ll leave these areas to be explored in the references list. But in a nutshell, both are reflections of the culture and are supposed to facilitate worship.

So as our service began, you’ll recall that we had an organ prelude. That is the beginning of the service, not the opening hymn. The prelude is a sort of call to worship, and invitation to stop the conversations with neighbors and prepare yourself for worship. There are some great prayers on page 833-4 of the Prayer Book that you might consider using.

We then have our opening hymn. We stand and sing together. Hymns have been a part of the entrance rite since the year 430. It was St. Augustine who said that “singing is praying twice.” Hymns truly are prayer, just sung. So as you sing them, pay attention to the words and prayerfully sing them. This opening hymn is walking music, in the sense that music is crucial for any good parade, but also it symbolizes our movement towards the altar in prayer. We’ve come from different places and circumstances, but we all come here to journey towards the altar under the sign of the cross.

So let us stand together and pray our opening hymn.

The Word of God (after hymn, before Blessed be God…)

The service continues with what is called the Liturgy of the Word, which balances with the Liturgy of Holy Communion later in the service. In the beginning of the service we focus on hearing God’s word.

The opening sentences, “blessed be God…” recall Jewish blessings and have very ancient roots.

We then move to the Collect for Purity, which confesses that God intimately and intricately knows us. It is also a prayer of preparation for worship, asking God to cleanse us from all the stress and anxiety of the world so that when we enter those church doors, we might focus on worship and being spiritually fed. This prayer has its roots as a private prayer of preparation said by priests in the 11^th century. It is based on Psalm 51 and the form we use today was composed in 1549.

What follows would normally be the gloria or song of praise. This element became common in the 11^th century and reminds us that our primary focus here is to praise God. Today we’ve omitted it and a few other musical settings to give us more time for commentary.

The priest then says “the Lord be with you.” Which is really a prayer, hearkening back to Boaz’s greeting in the book of Ruth. The people return the prayer by saying “and also with you.” We then move into a prayer called the Collect of the day. The Collect is a prayer designed to collect the spirit of the day. Collects often come from medieval sources, some were written by the author of the 1549 Prayer Book, Thomas Cranmer. Collects have a regular formula- address God, say something about God’s nature, petition or thank God, conclude with Trinitarian doxology.

At St. Francis we then dismiss the children to Children’s Chapel. We realize that hearing readings and a sermon targeted towards adults is not very entertaining for children. But beyond entertainment, it does not form or nourish their souls. We have crafted a Children’s Chapel service which mimics the order of our service, but is designed with children in mind. So while we hear the readings and the sermon, the children are engaging in worship as well. And they return at the Peace so that all may gather around God’s altar.

Let us now commence with the Liturgy of the Word.

Readings (after Collect and children have left)

We use the Revised Common Lectionary. The pre-established cycle of readings is a helpful tool for at least two reasons. The first is that it is intentionally laid out so that in a three-year cycle, so that most of the Bible will be heard in that period. Secondly, it makes sure that nothing is left out by the preacher. The lectionary allows the Holy Spirit to be more involved and also further unites us; it also requires the preacher to think in a more critical way. We can’t dodge the difficult issues, we must confront them, and that is a blessing of the lectionary. Many churches including the Lutherans, Presbyterians, many Methodists, Catholics and even some non-denominational churches use this same lectionary, so the lectionary is also unifying.

We read two selections from the Hebrew Bible, often called the Old Testament, one of which is a Psalm. The Psalm is sometimes called the Gradual because it was led by a cantor from the gradus or steps. The Psalter was the hymnal of ancient Israel, and as such was written to be sung, so we keep this custom here at St. Francis.

As we hear the readings, you are invited to hear them as Holy Scripture. As such, the reader concludes with “the Word of the Lord” and we respond by saying “thanks be to God” as a way to acknowledge the importance of what we just heard.

So now let us hear God’s word.

Gospel (after 2nd reading)

As we prepare for the Gospel reading, we should highlight the importance of this text. The Gospel is read from the midst of the people. The Gospel is the highlight of the Liturgy of the Word and symbolizes Christ’s presence with us, mirroring how Christ is also present in the Eucharist. The sequence hymn is walking music that allows us to again process and pray as we move. Often this hymn is a repeating Alleluia chorus, but we use hymns here at St. Francis.

At the proclamation of the Gospel, you will notice some people cross themselves on their forehead, their lips and their heart to pray: Lord be in my mind, on my lips, and in my heart. May God be in my understanding, in my speaking, and in my feeling.

We now sing our sequence hymn, King of Glory.

Sermon

Instead of offering a sermon today, we will have some more commentary. These are great readings today, I sort of wish I had the opportunity to preach on them. Ezekiel’s vision is wonderful. It contains that great line, “I will feed them with justice.” It preaches for itself. Then the Gospel is the wonderful passage where Jesus talks about the importance and mystery of serving God’s glory through glorifying our brothers and sisters.

The sermon is the chance to comment and expand upon the readings, but is not a piece of performance talk, a pep talk or a lecture. Instead, the sermon is the wonderful intersection of pastoral care, Biblical study, academic research, prophetic witness, prayerful contemplation, and homiletical craft. Sermons are serious business, as they should strive to break open the Word of God so we can feast on it. Sometimes that feeding will nourish us, sometimes it will give us indigestion, but it is food that we need. It has been required since the 1549 Prayer Book.

One area to explore in our discussion this morning that doesn’t fit is elsewhere is practices of piety, so let’s address that briefly here. Piety is yours and yours alone. Don’t do it for others or to fit in. There are several ways to show signs of piety. You can cross yourself, as a reminder of your Baptism, as an acknowledgement of the prayer, as a prayer for blessing, You can kneel, bow or genuflect to show reverence. Silence is important because it allows God to speak to us. Silence is not the chance to find the right place in your bulletin, nor is the time to check your watch, or phone or to think about your lunch plans- it is a time to be silent and commune with God. Finally, looking is important. Where you cast your eyes during the liturgy can be helpful, or distracting. Focusing on the cross might be helpful when reciting the Creed; looking at the Eucharistic elements during Communion is good; perhaps closing your eyes during the readings as well.

At the conclusion of the sermon, we stand with one voice and reaffirm our faith in the Nicene Creed. In the early church, there were struggles to define what was orthodox. The disagreements were about the nature and relationship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. It comes from the Council of Nicea in 325. So yes, it is dated, but it is still orthodox and has more history in it than you can shake a stick at. It has been common in liturgy since the 6^th century. The Creed is an expression of faith, not the basis for faith; it is not a litmus test, and like any product of human minds and hands, it is not perfect, but it is rich in history and meaning.

One important thing to note is that in the Creed, we say “we believe,” not “I believe.” Maybe you can’t buy into the Virgin Birth, but we, the Church, can. Maybe one Sunday the doubt is overshadowing faith, so we say the Creed on your behalf, just as you say it for others at other times. St. Paul in Romans 10:17 writes that “faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes from preaching Christ.” Gathering and reminding ourselves of what we are about is important.

The Prayers of the People follow and they are one of the most ancient parts of the liturgy, dating back to at least the 2^nd century. We pray for our world, for ourselves and for God’s Kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven. In periods of silence, you are invited and encouraged to remember aloud and in your minds those for whom you would like to offer prayer. The prayers are led by a lay person and allow us to share in Christ’s “eternal priesthood” by interceding on behalf of others to God.

In most seasons of the Church year, the Confession follows. This is another response to God’s Word and our prayers. This is a fairly new portion of the liturgy, being introduced only during the Reformation period. Silence is reserved before we pray so that we can call to mind those things we will confess, so that it isn’t just a rote prayer.

We confess of sins of commission and omission- things done and left undone. Again, the language is “we” and not “I.” We pray for forgiveness of our corporate sins, not individual ones. It is okay to think about your personal ones too, but this is a public prayer. It might surprise you to know that we do have individual Confession in the Episcopal Church; talk to the clergy if you’d like to explore this sacred and healthy tradition.

Confession has two parts- identifying the sin and the intention to address it. Confession before Eucharist not only makes sense, but is a Biblical mandate. We must examine ourselves before taking Communion. It also allows the community to more fully gather around the altar.

In the Anglican Church, the clergy pronounces that God has forgiven; this differs from the Roman Catholic Church where the priest actually grants the absolution. It wasn’t until the 1549 that an absolution was included, as it was assumed in taking Eucharist.

The Peace comes next. Though it seems like a meet and greet, it is not. It began with the kiss of peace, and has changed much since then. There is much debate over how far the peace extends. But one thing for certain, it is not meant as a time to say “your team had a rough game yesterday” or to finalize lunch plans. You are exchanging with your Christian brothers and sister the Peace of God- having heard God’s word, prayed together, confessed your sins, you are now in good standing with each other.

If we did the Peace properly, you’d leave the church, go find the people you fought with this week, your estranged family members, you’d tell them that you’re sorry, that you love them and you’d hug them and then come to gather around God’s table with them. What we do is a small symbol of that intent. The theology here comes from Matthew 5:23-24- “if you are offering your gift at the altar, and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go, first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.” Passing the peace is enacting this verse.

So now let us stand and reaffirm our faith in the words of the Nicene Creed.

Holy Communion (after offertory sentence, collection)

After the Welcome and Announcements, we transition to the second movement of the service, the Liturgy of the Table, or Holy Communion. The priest will say the Offertory sentence as an invitation to self-giving and table fellowship.

Again, there is work to do. Two things happen. The offertory plates are passed and you contribute financially to the church. This is important because it calls us all to give and helps us to go against materialism.

Secondly, we also bring forward the bread and wine, representing both ourselves and the earth. We don’t bring up grapes and wheat, but bread and wine- things not only coming from God’s creation, but also the products of human labor. We then say a doxology, giving God thanks for the many blessings bestowed upon us.

Also during this time, the clergy are preparing the table for Eucharist. Water is added to the wine to both reduce the strength of the wine, but also to symbolize the water that poured out of Jesus side at his crucifixion. This is the splendor of liturgy- it has both practical and theological elements. This is true in candles which provided light before electricity and the washing of the priest’s hand before Eucharist. These all of theological meanings, but their origins are in the practical matters of having clean hands and being able to see properly.

So now we offer to God ourselves and prepare for Communion.

Great Thanksgiving (after doxology, before sursum corda)

The Eucharist, or Great Thanksgiving, or Holy Communion then begins. Eucharist is a word which means “good thanks.” The Eucharist is the emphasis of the service.

There are four Eucharistic prayers in the Book of Common Prayer, and even more in the supplements. Prayer A tries to maintain as much of the original 1549 Cranmer language in a modern setting. Prayer B is based on the 3^rd century prayer of Apostolic Tradition by Hippolytus. Prayer C is a contemporary composition written for this prayer book. Prayer D is the most ecumenical, based on the 4^th century prayer by St. Basil, a major figure in Orthodox churches.

There are many ways to interpret what the Eucharist is-

· Table fellowship- the sharing of a meal as Jesus did with others.

· Grounding in Jesus’ ministry- as a way to remember the Gospel.

· Invocation of the Spirit- as a way to call and be aware of God’s presence.

· Blessing itself- something to nourish us.

· Foretaste of the heavenly banquet- getting a glimpse of what we look forward to.

· But it is NOT reenactment, the Last Supper happened once and for all. We might recall it to mind, but we’re not doing it again; this is not a play. In the Roman church the priest is seen as the alter Christus, not so for us- and thank God. I am not worthy to stand in for Christ, I am not taking his place in the Eucharist.

The Eucharist begins with what is called the sursum corda, which is Latin for lift up your hearts. We have evidence of this language being used as far back as the 2^nd century. It is also a dialogue, you all respond. The priest can’t do it alone, you can’t do this alone- we do it together. We talk about lifting up- we seeking to be brought into Christ’s presence, not to bring Christ to us. We are trying to transcend this world to reflect the divine liturgy going on in heaven.

We then say or sing the sanctus, which is the “holy, holy, holy.” Here, we really get the sense that this is bigger than us here at St. Francis as we join in the song of the angels, archangels and the faithful throughout the ages and around the world. The sanctus, which means holy, is a conflation of songs from Isaiah and Revelation.

So now let us stand as we begin the Eucharistic celebration.

Great Thanksgiving (after sanctus)

Since the Eucharist is the focus of our worship, the culmination of Word and Sacrament, we should spend some time reflecting on it.

There is a fourfold action in the Eucharist, inspired by Jesus’ actions at the Last Supper. Watch for the times during the prayer where these actions occur.

1. The bread is TAKEN

2. THANKS are given as the bread is blessed

3. The bread is BROKEN so that it can be shared

4. And finally, the bread it GIVEN so that it may feed others.

This fourfold action also symbolizes the story of the Passion of Jesus.

There are many things that happen in the prayer, and I’ll briefly point them out so that you can notice them during the prayer:

The prayers often begin with a salvation narrative, telling the story of God’s working since Creation.

We then have what is called the Words of Institution, which is the retelling of the Last Supper. This is an ancient part of the liturgy and reminds us of why we gather at the table, because of the command to “do this in remembrance of me.” This phrase calls us to remember, and is often called the anamnesis. It is the opposite of amnesia, where we forget. We call to mind and pray that Christ is present among us. These words were commonplace by the 4^th century.

There is the Memorial Acclamation, where the people respond faithfully by saying that Christ died, was risen, and will continue to come again.

In the Oblation, we offer our gifts to God. The wording today is “we offer you these gifts.”

Then comes the epiclesis, which is the calling of the Holy Spirit to bless the elements. This prayer is a function of ordination; priests have been set apart for this task. We don’t have magic hands; but we do have special duties and have been ordained for this task, just as you all have been called to serve God in your vocations. It is a prayer for the Father to send the Holy Spirit upon these gifts to enable the Son to interpenetrate them so that they are for us the body and blood of Christ. The epiclesis dates back at least to the year 215 and is likely oldest part of the Eucharistic liturgy. These gifts become a means for our own transformation.

Of course, there is the debate around substance- that is, how do we understand Christ’s presence. Rome espouses transubstantiation, that the elements literally, not symbolically, become flesh and blood. That is not the Episcopal position. Other theories are consubstantiation- that somehow the elements are body and blood, but within the substance of bread and wine. There is Pneumatic Presence, where it is a spiritual and symbolic change. There is Memorialism, which stresses that it’s about remembering Christ, but nothing magical happens. And there are the pragmatists that claim it’s just bread and wine, but that the true glory is in the people that gather together to share a meal together. But as I said, these are theories. Bottom line is that it’s a mystery and each interpretation likely has a bit of the truth in it.

We then conclude with the doxology, giving God glory, honor and thanksgiving.

What comes next is extremely important and is called the Great Amen. Amen means, “so be it” in Hebrew or “ditto” in colloquial speech. So when you say “amen,” you’re assenting to what has happened. This Amen is your work, not mine; I’ll never say it. I then bow, to both acknowledge Christ’s presence among us, and also to acknowledge your “Amen.” Early church theologians said that the Great Amen is of the utmost importance in the liturgy.

The Lord’s Prayer then follows the climax of the Amen, it binds us together as we pray these words that Jesus taught us.

We then have the Fraction, where we break the bread, symbolizing that Christ’s body was broken for us. But Christ was broken once, we are not re-breaking it. Language of the Passover is important here. We celebrate the Passover of the Exodus and Christ’s victory over the grave in our acclamation. Alleluia comes from the Hebrew word, pronounced the same way, and means “praise to God.” It is a superlative expression of simultaneous thanksgiving, joy, and triumph. It reminds us that there is victory and grace in being broken.

It is then time to receive communion. Communion is to be done prayerfully and intentionally. As our instructions on page 10 of the bulletin note, you can receive Communion in many ways. And for the curious, studies have shown that the higher alcohol content of the port wine we use, coupled with the use of a purificator to wipe the rim of the chalice are actually quite hygienic practices. When I distribute communion and say “the Body of Christ, the bread of Heaven,” I use those words to pray for you; I trust that you too are prayerfully and thankfully receiving the gift of the Eucharist.

Another debate around communion is around who gets to receive it. The Prayer Book is very clear that Communion is reserved only for baptized Christians, with no exceptions. Many Episcopal Churches though have chosen to not follow this rule. Both sides have very valid arguments regarding who Communion is open to and the Church will need to do some serious discernment to decide the best way forward.

It brings us to the larger point though of common prayer standing in the way of local customs which make sense. You might notice that the beginning of our service, we’ve changed it from “and blessed be his Kingdom” to “and bless be God’s Kingdom. The shift is subtle, but real. The decision that was made here, and at most Episcopal churches, is that in this case, there is no reason to use the gendered language when using the word God would suffice.

But the question remains, at what point does our commitment to common prayer lead us to do something uncommon, and what price are we willing to pay to make these changes? I have no answer; I think it depends largely in the context and that any changes to the common prayer need to be done intentionally, communally, and of course, with the Bishop’s permission. The debate over Open versus Closed Communion is the same. I can argue effectively for either position, and both positions are valid. At St. Francis, the decision has leaned towards open inclusivity; and there is a cost for that, but it is worth the price.

After receiving Eucharist, you return to your pew. You may pray, you may contemplate on the Eucharist, or you may join the choir in singing communion hymns, which again, is a great way to continue praying.

As we get ready to continue the Eucharist, we reverence God by kneeling for the duration of the Eucharist Prayer when it is seasonally appropriate. Kneeling, though, is a fairly recent addition to the liturgy. The ancient posture for prayer was standing, and still is in the Eastern Church. Standing was assumed in the 1549 Prayer Book. We kneel though as a sign of devotion symbolizing humility and penitence, which make sense in the Eucharistic narrative. Of course, if kneeling is painful for you, please feel free to sit.

So now let us kneel and continue the Great Thanksgiving.

Post-Communion Prayer (before sending of LEV)

After Communion, we sometimes commission parishioners to take Eucharist from this celebration to some of our parishioners who cannot be here with us due a variety of reasons. They go to peoples’ homes or hospital rooms to celebrate a service and visit with them. They receive Communion, being reminded of the community’s and God’s care and love for them.

We then will pray the Post-Communion Prayer. In the early church, you just left after Communion. But as church got bigger and more formal, it needed a real ending. So we summarize what has happened in the service and pray for God’s continual guidance and grace in our lives.

The priest then pronounces a blessing over the people. This practice started in Egypt around the 4^th century. It was intended to be like a laying on of hands to people. Some Eastern liturgies still maintain this by actually laying hands on each person before they leave. Again, the priest isn’t blessing you, but is asking God to do this. You can be a blessing to others that you encounter in the world as well, but only the priest pronounces the sacramental blessing.

We have a final hymn, as we began with one voice, we end with one voice and process out into the world, having glorified God and being nourished by and filled with God’s spirit for doing the work of the Gospel in our world.

Don’t leave too early, or you’ll miss the dismissal. This is the chance to be commissioned to go out into the world, to take the ideas of Peace and Eucharist with you in to the world.

After the dismissal we have a postlude, it another chance to sit and pray before leaving to face the perils of this world.

I hope that this Instructed Eucharist has been helpful and educational, and that it will allow us to more deeply engage in and do the work of liturgy. We will now conclude our service.

Resources:

Catechism in the 1979 Book of Common Prayer, page 845.

Liturgical Life Principles by Ian Markham, Morehouse Publishing, 2009.

Welcome To Sunday by Christopher Webber, Morehouse Publishing, 2002.

Praying Shapes Believing by Leonel Mitchell, Morehouse Publishing, 1991.

Academic Resources:

Commentary on the American Prayer Book by Marion Hatchett, HarperOne, 1995.

Celebrating the Eucharist by Patrick Malloy, Church Publishing, 2007.

Opening the Prayer Book by Jeffery Lee, Cowley Publications, 1999.

The Shape of Liturgy by Gregory Dix, Continuum, 1945.

Elements of Rite by Aidan Kavanagh, Pueblo Publishing, 1982.

Christ the King Sunday

2011-11-15T12:08:00.000-08:00

This Sunday we're doing something a bit different at St. Francis; we'll be doing an Instructed Eucharist. At various points during the service, I'll be making some comments about the service (what we're doing, why we're doing it, the history and theology of it, etc.). We'll be making the service shorter in some places (no music at parts) to give us more time. There also will not be a traditional sermon on Sunday, but instead more commentary.

So here, I thought it would be a good thing to explore the readings from Sunday that we'd normally read. This Sunday is the last of the liturgical year, and is called Christ the King Sunday. Take a look at the readings for the day and reflect on them. It's not as old of a tradition as you might suspect, not even 100 years. Some folks also call it Stir Up Sunday because of a historical prayer often said on that Sunday. In the Episcopal Church, that particular pray comes up on the Third Sunday of Advent. But think of the year 1925. The world had just finished the first World War, empires were beginning to rebuild, religion was being critiqued. So the Pope thought that we needed a reminder that we have only one king, one ruler, one lord, one leader- and that is Christ.

We have wonderful readings today, I sort of wish I was preaching a full sermon on them. The other two years of the lectionary cycle have readings from what we would call Good Friday- they are stories of Jesus' crucifixion. In those years, it is a way to remind us that the kingship of Christ is not what we expect.

This year, the readings are different. Instead of telling us how Jesus became the king, they tell us what sort of king Jesus is. The passage from Ezekiel is absolutely wonderful and would definitely provide wonderful sermon material. "I myself will search for my sheep, and will seek them out." "I will seek the lost, and I will bring back the strayed, and I will bind up the injured, and I will strengthen the weak, but the fat and the strong I will destroy. I will feed them with justice." I don't need to say anything, do I? Preaches for itself.

Then in Matthew, we encounter the well known "truly I tell you, as you did it to one of these you did it to me." Great passage that gets us thinking about the King who cares for his people, the King who is glorified in his people, the King who cares for his people as much as he cares for himself.

Would love to get your comments on this-

does our world appear to know that Christ is King?
does our church?
how do you proclaim Christ's kingship in your life?
how could you do so?
what do you think of Christ as King?
what do you think of the idea of having a Sunday set aside for this feast?

Greetings from Duke

2011-11-09T06:55:00.000-08:00

I'm at Duke this week doing continuing eduation through a Divinity School program called the Clergy Study Leave program. I'm here sitting in on classes, meeting with professors, catching up on reading and recharging my spiritual/physical/emotional batteries. I've completed an online course on pastoral care this week and will also be looking ahead to Thanksgiving Day's sermon, as well as my 11/27 and 12/11 Advent sermons.

This morning (and this week's blog post topic) I had the priveledge of meeting with Dr. Stanley Hauerwas. I must admit, I'm not one of his "followers." I don't disagree with the man, just haven't read much of his work. There are some people out there who would consider themselves "disciples" of his; I am not. But nonetheless, I wanted to take advantage of the opportunity to meet with one of the great theologians of our age.

I am interested in the topics he presents in books (which. I hav.e yet to read), namely "Working with Words" and especially "Resident Alien." Most observers of American Christianity will notice that cultural Christianity in America is no longer the religion of Moses, Jesus and Paul. Christianity has lost its edge, its eschatological tone, its place of primacy in our lives. Folks that live as true disciples of Jesus are strange and live in ways that differ from the majority, hence Hauerwas calls them the resident aliens. Ever since Constantine made Christianity legal and dominant, we have lost the counter-cultural witness which undergirds the message of Jesus.

How do we reclaim this? Hauerwas said that we need to stop using the word "we." He said that politicans say "we are fighting a war on terror." Who is the "we," he asks? Christians shouldn't be supporting war he would claim. Our culture and political system now speaks for us as people of faith. We also discussed what evangelism is about- namely witnessing to friends about the impact of faith in our lives.

Christianity is certainly changing. Hauerwas said that he thought that there would be fewer Christians, but that hopefully God is forming us to be "meaner and leaner," or more dedicated even if there are fewer of us.

Do you ever feel like a resident alien?
Do you feel the strain between true discipleship and American "Christianity?"
Have you witnessed by inviting a friend to church?
How do you think Christianity might change/thrive/struggle in the future?

Back to studies and reading, see you all on Sunday.

Richard Hooker

2011-11-01T11:42:00.000-07:00

This week, I'd like to focus on my sermon from the Wednesday Healing Eucharist, which is held every Wednesday at 12 noon. This is a short service of Holy Eucharist with the laying on hands for healing prayers for ourselves, our friends/family members in need of prayer, and our world. Try it out sometime!

At this service, I pick one of the saints of the church whose feast day is commemorated that week. This Thursday is one of my favorite such feast days- the Feast of Richard Hooker. You can read more about him here, but essentially Hooker is one of the "founders" of Anglican theology. Hooker did a lot for the Church of England, but is perhaps best remembered for two concepts (though he never spelled them out this succinctly)-

via media- which is Latin for the "middle way." Hooker lived in a church that was between the traditional Roman Catholic world and the new Protestant Reformation world. Hooker argued that truth was found in the middle, not in the poles. It's essentially bipartianship at it's best. Take healthcare reform for example, are the Republicans right? No. Are the Democrats right? No. But is the best healthcare option somewhere between the two sides? Probably. We don't know everything there is to know, especially about God. So by listening to all sides, hearing different revelations, and discerning where the real truth might lie, it is often found to be in the middle.
the "three-legged stool" of Anglicanism:

Scripture- this was primary for Hooker, it is the Bible, or the revealed word of God
Reason- reason is where science, philosophy, and our own experiences and thoughts come into play. We all can be theologians at this level.
Tradition- this is where the wisdom of history and the Church come into play.
Hooker says about all three of these are needed to do proper theology or to find the via media. We interpret Scripture through Reason and Tradition; reason is kept in check by being grounded in Scripture and vetted by the Tradition; and Tradition is reminded of it's Biblical roots in Scripture and kept relevant by Reason. It's sort of like a system of checks and balances on the Truth.

So today we give thanks for Richard Hooker and these contributions, and it's a good chance to ponder his contributions in our own lives.

Where are you on one of the poles and perhaps need to come toward the middle?
What voices do you ignore?
Does Scripture, Reason, or Tradition speak louder to you?

Have you ever found a situation where these seem to be in conflict?
How can you apply these to your daily life?

How have you seen these three legs of the stool abused?
What do you think of Hooker's theology?

October 30, 2011 - Proper 26A

2011-10-30T11:00:00.000-07:00

In the name of God- Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

As we go through autumn, we see the leaves falling and the colors changing. The yards have been aerated and seeded, the spring bulbs are in the ground, and we are reminded that in order to experience the new birth of the spring, things now must fall and return to the earth to bear new life. It’s a good setup for Jesus’ words this morning- “all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and all who humble themselves will be exalted.” Which is a direct insult to those who see themselves as the exalted ones. Right after our reading today ends, Jesus really plunges the dagger with a series of woes. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,” “woe to you blind guides,” and “woe to you…you snakes, you brood of vipers! How can you escape being sentenced to hell?” Jesus is pulling no punches.

And let us remind ourselves of what we learned in our Bible studies, that all of these things are happening in the Temple after the Palm Sunday procession. Jesus is in Jerusalem during what we call Holy Week, and he’s doing the best he can to challenge the status quo and upset the authorities of the day. And he attacks them with the thing that we all know hurts the most- he calls them hypocrites. Hypocrite is a Greek word that was used for actors in plays. They want you to think that they are something which, in truth, they are not. They claim to have power, to be spiritual, to be worthy of respect- and Jesus says that they are not.

None of us like to think of ourselves as hypocrites, but aren’t we all a bit? The easy thing to do here is to side with Jesus and say “yeah Jesus, you tell ‘em!” We don’t want to see ourselves as the Scribes and Pharisees, do we? I don’t want to speak for you all, but I know that I’m a hypocrite. I don’t write every letter to our representatives in Congress that should be written, I don’t do prison ministry or work at a soup kitchen as often as I think I should, sometimes I struggle to see the love of God in others whom I’m mad at. If we’re honest with ourselves, we will soon realize that none of us are perfect, none of us are sinless, none of us are innocent of hypocrisy from time to time. Hypocrisy is so attractive because, as Edmund Burke said, “hypocrisy can afford to be magnificent in its promises, for never intending to go beyond promise, it costs nothing.”

And unfortunately, hypocrisy is something known in the church all too well. In our reading from Micah we see the evils and results of hypocrisy run rampant. We Episcopalians don’t really celebrate it, but today is Reformation Sunday. It was wonderful to sing that opening hymn A Mighty Fortress, which is written by Martin Luther and often referred to as the “Battle Hymn of the Reformation.” You all know the story- Martin Luther, was a priest who saw the hypocrisy in Rome. On October 31, 1517 he wrote a letter to Archbishop Albrecht speaking out against the sale of indulgences. Earlier, the Pope needed money, well, not that he needed it, but he didn’t want to use his own wealth, so he wanted to get more money to do renovations to St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. The plan was to sell indulgences, or get-out-jail for you sins cards. And it worked. Albrecht was deep in debt, so he figured that selling indulgences in Germany would be a good idea as well. As the slogan went “as soon as the coin in the coffer rings, the soul from purgatory into heaven springs.”

Luther saw the hypocrisy in buying forgiveness, the hypocrisy in taxing the poor to pay for things that the rich could, so he wrote a letter that has come to be known as the “95 Theses” and he posted them on the church door. Luther never intended to leave the church, he just hoped to reform the hypocrisy. But the church wasn’t interested in change, and what came next is what historians call the Protestant Reformation. Luther’s motto was ecclesia semper reformands, semper reformanda or “the church is always reformed, always reforming.”

And it brings us to an interesting question about reformations in our own lives. Hypocrisy is all about contradictions. You say this, but you do that. There is another contradiction, a holy (h-o-l-y) contradiction in Jesus’ words- “all who humble themselves will be exalted.” Humble is a word that literally means to make low, to submit to, to be oppressed. In Isaiah, when the prophet talks about the mountains and hills being made low, this is the word he uses. And the word “exalt” literally means to raise- in the Bible it is used to say that Christ was lifted up on the cross, it means glorify, to raise children or in the Flood story, it is the world for the ark that rises on the waters. It is a holy contradiction.

How is it that the path to be lifted up goes through going down? This isn’t how things work in our culture. No one climbs the corporate ladder by taking steps down; football teams don’t get to the top of the rankings by losing games; presidential candidates don’t win the nomination by doing poorly in the polls. This doesn’t make much sense. But yet, Jesus says it and as Christians we acknowledge that Jesus speaks to the divine truths in our lives. It didn’t make sense for Luther either- speaking out against the church, having the Pope excommunicate him and the Emperor put out a bounty for his head, once you’re outside the institution it’s a lot harder to reform it. What allows us to be humbled? What allowed Christ to humble himself to the point of death on a cross? What allowed Luther to be cast out of the church? What allows us to embrace these contradictions?

In a word- trust. When we trust in God we are then able to live for God’s kingdom instead of the kingdoms of this world; we are able to be oppressed and rejected. Trust is really what the Reformation was all about. Martin Luther had this trust- it is what allowed him to write “a mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing.” He trusted that God was active in the world. And the question for us this morning is do you trust in God?

There is that wonderful passage in Isaiah where God says “behold, I am doing a new thing; do you perceive it?” For Luther, God was doing a new thing and he had to testify to it. In the Creed we all say “we believe in the Holy Spirit.” We acknowledge that God is somehow active in the world. But do we trust it? Do we live our lives as if it is true?

The questions is- do you believe in continuing revelation? Is there a word from the Lord? Did God finish Creation the book of Genesis and then leave us to run our course? Does God continue to speak to us, to push us, to call us, or not? I can tell you what I think, but that doesn’t matter. You have to answer that question for yourself.

If you say that that there is no continuing revelation, then the Bible contains all truths that we need to know. Everything about God is known as we simply have to follow the instructions. And if the Bible contains the full picture of everything, then we don’t need faith because we have all the data that we need. I think we would all acknowledge that in God, like other people, there are thoughts and dreams that are simply unknowable to the outside world.

The way that we get glimpses into those parts of God are through revelation- revelation in nature, revelation in prayer, revelation in the wisdom and discernment of the Church. Continuing revelation is something that we’ve always struggled with as a church. Do we ordain women, or not? Do we marry same-sex couples, or not? For centuries, the church answered “no” to both of those questions. But now, most of us, realize that God is continuing to give us revelation; revelations that have pushed to reconsider our answers to those questions.

Continuing revelation is a good thing. It means that God is with us, that God’s Spirit is still at work, that God is not done with us, that we can work with God to bring about the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven. It means there will be contradictions between what we thought was right and where God is calling us to go anew. And I think it makes sense- time is linear for a reason. If God wanted us to live in the past, then we’d live one endless moment in time where nothing new happens, where nothing changes, where nothing gets better. But time does move forward, and as it does we are called to live in each and every present moment listening, watching, feeling for the presence of God to continue to guide us in revelation. I invite you to consider- do you believe in continuing revelation? And if you do, what are you going to do about it?

Martin Luther certainly felt that continuing revelation was in God’s nature. And what we do with that trust in continuing revelation is important. Something has to change if we trust in God’s action in the world. If you have an encounter with God, if you think that God calling you to something and you don’t change, then I would suggest to you that it was not truly an experience of the divine. You cannot perceive a new thing that God is doing and walk away from it. A great preacher once took a line from Socrates- “the unexamined life is not worth living,” and adapted it to the language of faith and said “the uncommitted life is not worth living.” If you trust that God is active in your life, that God seeks to reform this world, then what will you do about it?

The trust that we have in God’s continuing presence with us makes us stewards of this trust, but also stewards of God’s world. St. Teresa of Avila wrote “Christ has no body but yours; no hands, no feet on earth but yours.” We are the vehicles of God’s grace, of God’s love, of God’s continuing revelation in our world. Another famous saint, this time Augustine, said “without God, we cannot; without us, God will not.” Luther got this, in his hymn he wrote “did we in our strength confide, our striving would be losing.” We can’t do it by ourselves, and God won’t do it without us. God continues to work in and amongst us.

In light of God’s continuing grace, continuing promise to be with us, continuing love, we must respond. Martin Luther, in the reformation movement had five things that he proclaimed as central to the reforming effort, one of which was soli Deo gloria, which means “glory to God alone”. Glory is our response to God’s continuing revelation, glory is our response in trust to God, glory is our response of being stewards of God’s bounty.

God is at the center of everything, in whom we live and move and have our being. Being a creature of God makes us part of God’s glory, and all that we do should reflect that glory, or as Jesus put it, that exaltation. Part of the problem we have in Washington is that people forget this. People are used to being called public officials, instead of the older and more accurate term, public servants. They forget that they are working for God’s glory and not their own. If we live in God’s glory we can awake each morning and say “this is the day that the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it.” It is in God’s glory that we can live for God. It is in God’s glory that we can continually seek God’s reformation for our world, for our lives, and for our souls. In God’s glory we can come to peace with the contradictions between our faith and our world. And it is in God’s glory that we can show forth our thanks.

But coming back to stewardship, and right now I’m focusing on financial stewardship, but there are other kinds. Living in God’s glory, trusting in God’s action in our lives, we have the opportunity to use our financial gifts for God’s glory- and that is the reason why we give. We don’t give for a tax write off, we don’t give to support the church’s budget, we don’t give to feel good about ourselves, we don’t give because our neighbors do; instead, we give to glorify God and what God is continuing to do in our world.

If you trust that God is active, then support God’s work through the church; participate in what God is doing. And I’ve said this before about money, but it is worth repeating. Money is a very powerful tool; but it is not good or bad, just a tool. And with this tool, there are two options- either you have power over your money or it has power over you. And if you want to find out which is true, try to give it away. If you cannot give your money away, then you have lost control of your money and it controls you. And I would encourage you all to give- don’t worry about the percentages, but give in a significant way. A good way to do it is to give 5% to the church and 5% to other charitable causes that you think are worthy. And if you don’t believe in the mission of St. Francis church, then don’t give here- but for God’s sake, and your own, give your money away. And here’s another holy contradiction- when you give to the glory of God, you too will be glorified, because in your giving you express the highest trust in God’s radical love. When you perceive that God is doing a new thing and participate in it, you participate in God’s glory. A good way to put all of this is- if you were put on trial for being a Christian, for trusting in God’s continuing revelation, for participating in God’s glory, would there be enough evidence to convict you?

Well, it’s a day of contradictions. The low being lifted up, giving and in turn receiving, and the eternal Creator working with us in new ways each and every day. This Reformation Sunday, let us give thanks for the witness of Martin Luther, let us thank God for God’s continuing revelation in our lives, and let us express our trust in God by giving to and participating in God’s ongoing glory. As Martin Luther concludes his great hymn- “the Spirit and the gifts are ours / through him who with us sideth // God's truth abideth still / his kingdom is forever.”

Amen.

Week of October 24

2011-10-26T13:06:00.000-07:00

Readings (Micah is Old Testament reading for the day)

Lots of ways a sermon could go this week-

The negatives of the establishment could be discussed in Micah
Relationships in the church could be explored using 1 Thessalonians
Word vs deed could be considered via Matthew
Public vs. private prayer in Matthew is a topic
Being students/disciples of Jesus (our only rabbi) in Matthew
Humbling and exalting in Matthew, what do these mean?

Which way will the sermon go? Use the Wordle (above) to take a guess.

Which of these readings/ideas speak to you?

October 23, 2011- Proper 25A

2011-10-23T11:00:00.000-07:00

As a Christian, you might ask “what’s love got to do with it?” And today’s readings respond with a resounding “everything!” In both Leviticus and Matthew, we heard about the importance of loving relationships. As Jesus says “on these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.” In essence, love is at the core of Christendom. So today, we’ll explore what this is love is.

But before I get going, let me put a rumor to rest. It is often said, such as in our gospel hymn today and by St. John, that “God is love.” That is simply not true. God is not love because God is God. To say that God is love is to over simplify God, it is to subvert other attributes of God. If God truly is love, then we might as well worship unicorns and rainbows, or some other overly simple and sentimental god. Now, we know through scripture and revelation that God is loving and is the source of love. But let us not confuse the object with the giver. And I realize that saying “God is love” is just often just shorthand for saying that God is the fountain of love, that God deeply loves all of Creation, but there is a danger when we become lax with this phrase and unintentionally water down our theology and God’s substance. So in our discussion of love, let us remember, we do not worship love, but instead, we worship God; a God from whom love emanates as light and warmth shine forth from the Sun.

So let’s answer three questions about love- what is love, how do we love, and why do we love?

What is love? Shakespeare had a lot to say about that, so did the Greek philosophers, as well as poets such as Pablo Neruda. I’m sure you all have your favorite authors who have wrote about love. But today I’m in the pulpit, so I get to pick my favorite author. CS Lewis wrote a book called The Four Loves. In it, he talks about storge, philia, eros, and agape love. So let’s briefly walk through those.

Storge is the Greek word for affection. Lewis says that this is often a sort of automatic love, the love we experience in families. I think it’s safe to say that some of the reasons why we love family members don’t really make sense. People we see only once a year, if that; people who might annoy us; people who we’d never spend time with if they weren’t family. Now this isn’t to talk down on family or familial love. This sort of affection is an important kind of love. It is a love of respect. It broadens our minds, as we come into contact with people whom we normally wouldn’t.

Next is philia, or friendship. It is a love of association, a love that we choose to enter into, but it’s a fairly weak love. It isn’t terribly binding, and it can change rapidly. An interesting question for us today is what does friendship mean? In the age of Facebook, who are my friends? According to Facebook, I have 440 friends. But do I love them? For the vast majority, the answer is no. Our culture is a transient one, people no longer die in the same towns that they were born in; people don’t retire from the company that hired them in their twenties. Loyalties are not what they once were. But that does not mean that the love of friendship is dead. Friendship is a place to start in our love for each other. Friendship, you might say, is the mustard seed that will grow into the greatest of all the bushes of love.

So we come to eros. Now normally, you would expect a preacher to bashfully say a few vague things and quickly move on; but let’s spend a little time here. Erotic or intimate or physical love, whatever you want to call it, is very important in our lives and our culture. I was at clergy conference recently and we were discussing young adults in the church. We watched a video where young adults spoke about their experience of the church, and a comment that was made more than once was that the church seemed irrelevant to their lives because the church didn’t talk about the things that really matter- sex, politics or money. And isn’t that the truth? We avoid those topics like the plague in church.

And this confuses me. Don’t we say that our faith is the most important thing in our lives, that it is our moral compass? And I don’t think I have to tell you how much attention we give to erotic love- just watch a television show, flip through a magazine or think about your dreams, and I think you’ll soon realize that this sort of love is important to many of us. And shouldn’t our faith guide our thoughts and actions on something so important? Shouldn’t the Church have something substantive to say about this?

What needs to be said is that intimacy is a neutral thing. By that I mean, it is neither good or bad, but it can be used for evil or for good. Erotic love is a wonderful way to express emotional love, it is a way to deepen your connection with someone whom you love and are committed to. But you and I both know that it is very easy for this love to be a negative force. Too many people are exploited, abused, sold into slavery, manipulated, and objectified by erotic love.

Another way that eros is used negatively has been in the Church. For centuries, the Church’s position, whether stated or assumed, as been that pre-marital relations are wrong and sinful. People will note that in the Bible, this is simply how things were. But what people forget is that for most of history, people have gotten married much younger than they do today. Now this isn’t a case of faith bending to culture, but if our faith cannot speak to our culture, then what good is it? And is isn’t to mention the fact that marriage is not something to which all people are called. Marriage is not the goal of life, and some people will never marry. So should they live a life without experiencing the good of this love?

Now I’m not going to tell you all what to think about this; I don’t want to prescribe to the Church how to handle this. But we need to start having this conversation. In our relationships of erotic love, how can we be just and true? How can we honor the divine love in our practice of erotic love? How can we honor and love each other in our intimate relationships?

And finally we come to the highest of the loves- agape. Theologians often say that this is the love of Christ for the world on the cross. Sometimes this love is called charity. St. Paul says that it is the greatest thing, even higher than faith or hope. It is the goal for all of our loves- for our loves of affection, friendship and eros, we seek to transform them into agape love. This sort of love is constant, true, and pure. It is thoughtful, not something that we fall into or take lightly. It is a sacrificial, forgiving, and unconditional love. Very few of us will ever be able to love like this, or experience love like this. This is the love of the Kingdom of God. As we work to make God’s kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven, we seek to love the way that God loves in heaven. The journey of getting to agape is as important as the destination.

And what we see in this epitome of love is that love begins not with us, but with God. We love because God has first loved us. We also see that this sort of love is not passive- it works, it accomplishes things, it is active. Love, in its truest sense, is not an emotion, but is action. Love is not something you feel, it is something you do. Love is an affair not of the heart or the mind, but of the will.

But our culture has monopolized love for capitalism. One theologian said “we are to use things and love people, but in our world we love things and use people.” We love our cars, we love our new phones, we love a good movie. It’s disgusting to use the same word to express our fondness of a book or website as we do for our relationship with our spouses, children or parents. Love has become just a catch phrase. And maybe that’s why so many marriages end in divorce, why so many families are estranged, why we have so many fights in Washington. We don’t know what love is anymore. We’ve been trained that you can love lots of things, and that when the new version comes out, you’ll love that one even more. Love is easy in our culture. And it’s no surprise people struggle with relationships; where agape love is required, too many folks are ill prepared, because they’ve never been exposed to this sort of love.

This is a good segue into how to love. The short and sweet answer is, to borrow from Nike, “just do it.” Put a bit more eloquently by CS Lewis- “do not waste time bothering whether you love your neighbor; act as if you did. And as soon as you do, you’ll discover the secret. When you are behaving as if you love someone, you will presently come to love them.”

The place to start is to realize and know that God loves everyone. One translation of Peter’s sermon in the book of Acts reads “God has no favorites.” And this is because we are all God’s favorites. If you are a Republican and you ask God, hey, how about that socialist president we have, God would say “he’s one of my favorites.” Obama supports might ask, “hey God, how about that crazy Bachmann, and God would say, she’s one of my favorites.” How about Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, “he’s one of my favorites.” How about my neighbors whose dog always uses my yard for a toilet, “they’re among my favorites.” And how about me God, what about me. Well, God would respond- “you’re one of my favorites too.”

If we can realize that God loves us all as if there is no one else to love and loves us as if we were all but one, then we can start to love others. There is a great story about Jesus that you won’t find the Bible, it’s an apocryphal story about Jesus found in some of the writings that didn’t make it into the Bible. One day Jesus is walking through a town with his disciples, and as he walks down the main road, people come out of their homes to spit on him, curse him, throw rocks and insults at him. And to each person that curses him, he turns and blesses them. When they get out of the town, one of the disciples immediately asks Jesus- “Lord, why is it that you blessed each of those people who cursed and spit upon you?” And Jesus responded “I can only pay out what I have in my purse.” If we know that God loves us, if we bask in this love daily, if we carry this love in our hearts, then it is that much easier to pay that love out to others.

You can pay this love out in a lot of ways- it might be in praying for others, it might be in filling you’re your pledge card in a honest and sincere way, it might be in calling a friend or family member who is going through a tough time, it might be in leading Children’s Chapel, it might be visiting someone in the hospital, it might be donating your time or money to a charity, it might be in adopting an animal from the shelter, it might be in standing up for justice. But whatever you do, don’t sit around and think about how you love someone, go out and love them.

And finally we come to why do we love? If we turn to our reading from Leviticus, which is echoed in Jesus’ words in Matthew, we come to a reason. If you were to sit down and read the 19^th chapter of Leviticus, one phrase would pop out at you- “I am the Lord.” That one phrase shows up 16 times in the chapter. This chapter is a series of comments: if this situation happens to you, then you should do this, because “I am the Lord.” An example is “you shall not strip your vineyard bare, or gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard; you shall leave them for the poor and the alien: I am the Lord.” Because God is God, we love others as ourselves. And don’t miss that point, you have to love yourself so that you can love others. So if you need to work on loving yourself, on seeing yourself as a wonderful person, then I encourage you, work on that. Visit with Michael or me, see a therapist, talk to family. Be sure to love yourself.

Early in our reading, God says to Moses “you shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.” Holy is a word which means “set apart or sacred.” Why do we love? Because God is Lord. Why do we love? Because God is holy. Why do we love? Because we are sacred. We are holy to God, we are set apart. Each of us is a unit of God’s grace, unrepeatable, unprecedented and irreplaceable. Why do we love? Because that is simply what we do as children of the loving Creator of all heaven and earth.

Now you might say, but Robert, look at the world, obviously, love does not triumph; clearly not everyone loves other people. I am reminded of the words of St. Augustine, “our hearts are restless, O Lord, until they rest in thee.” A lot of people have found other places for their hearts to rest; other places that might fulfill them. But as we all know, glory fades, wealth diminishes, property breaks or gets stolen, reputations tarnish, but love endures. Things can fill us, but only love can satisfy our deepest desires. We were created in love by God, and it is for love that we live: love of what God loves, which is everyone; love of God’s kingdom; love of God as Lord; love of self; and love of neighbor.

Much more could be said about love, but I’d never cover it all. Instead, let’s experience all the joys, all the blessings, all the graces of true agape love. Let us seek that highest form of love- a love which is true, just and seeks to love the way that God loves us. Let’s transform our loves of affection, friendship and erotic love into vehicles of God’s love in this world which desperately needs more love. Let us know that each and every person, including ourselves, in the beloved of God. Let us practice this love daily. And let us know that we are holy, and it is our sacred task to welcome this love, and to share it with all of Creation. My brothers and sisters- I love you. I know that you love me. Let us share this love and transform our world.

Amen.

Let's Keep It Going...

2011-10-18T07:21:00.000-07:00

So in an effort to keep the conversation going, I'm going to post new material each week. If I'm not preaching, perhaps it will be reflections on the readings for the upcoming Sunday, or maybe some thoughts from the homily at the 12:00 noon Healing Eucharist on Wednesdays. My vision is for this to be a place to dialogue, ask questions, and debate. Please feel free to post comments and share with others.

I was at clergy conference a few weeks ago, and one of the discussions that we were asked to have at our tables was about "preparing to preach." I hope that you all can tell from my sermons, but I immensely enjoy preaching. I enjoy opening myself to God's Spirit; I enjoy meditating on God's word for several days; I enjoy reading lots of resources and articles on the passages; I enjoy the outlining phase of the sermon writing when all the possible avenues the sermon might take begin to form into one road; I enjoy the writing process where I can play with the wonderful nuance of words and grammar; I enjoy creating the Wordle to see what a computer program says my main parts are; I enjoy practicing the sermon, finding my voice in it; I enjoy preaching it; and most of all- I enjoy the dialogue that comes from the sermon.

Whether it's on this blog, you thinking about the sermon, you discussing it with others, you sharing it with a friend, or you talking to me about it- the conversation is what matters most to me in sermon writing. Throughout the process, I try to have a conversation with myself and with God, I hope that the delivered sermon is a glimpse into that conversation and a place for you to have a conversation with me, with others and with God.

So at clergy conference I heard a lot about sermon writing. And I was disappointed to hear all of the complaining by my fellow clergy. Many said that they didn't enjoy the process, many said that they did it on Saturday and a few even admitted to acting like college students who crammed to finish their sermon by 3 am the Sunday they were supposed to preach. I remember what a seminary professor once said- "if you are in the habit of writing your sermons on the way to church on Sunday mornings, it would be better if a truck hit you and you died. You'd be okay, because you'd be with the Lord Jesus, and it would be better for your congregation so that they aren't subjected to your lack of preparation and abuse of the pulpit." And though those words are harsh, I think it he was right. Preaching and exploring the word of God is a solemn, joyful and important task. May we all take the time to be in conversation with Scripture, and enjoy a deeper sense of knowing God and God's love for all of Creation through our efforts.

September 25, 2011- Proper 21A

2011-09-21T06:15:00.000-07:00

Readings for the Day
What if? What if we heard these words from St. Paul in his letter to those in Philippi and heeded them? What if we didn’t act from selfish ambition or conceit? What if, in humility, we regarded others as better than ourselves? What if we looked to the interests of others before our own? What if the same mind of compassion and justice that was in Christ Jesus, was also in us? These are not rhetorical questions. Think about how the world would be different, how Greensboro would be different, how your workplace and home might be changed, even how your inner thoughts might be transformed? What if indeed.

Paul is writing this letter from prison because he has heard that there are divisions in the Philippian church. Though Paul wrote his letter nearly 2,000 years ago, to people that lived over 5,000 miles from here, much of the things that he said still need to be heard today. And that’s the beauty of Scripture, through the Holy Spirit, Paul wrote not only to those Philippians, but he was also writing to us in America, and to people all over the world throughout the ages. We too desperately need unity. We have deep divisions in our world, between Democrats and Republicans, between Israelis and Palestinians, between Catholics and Protestants, between Christians and Muslims, between the United States and China, between the rich and the poor, between races and generations.

And so Paul’s proposed way forward not only applies to those Philippians, but also to us. Paul urges us all to “let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus.” Christ is our pattern. And in Christ, Paul points to two specific ways that we can overcome our divisions and be united in God’s love- by placing emphasis on the community and by kenotic humility.

Paul begins this passage by talking about the importance of community. He urges people to act out humility instead of selfishness, to put others ahead of themselves. Paul realizes that the health of the church is related to the health of the community. If people only look after themselves, there will be no community, no mutual sharing in Christ. When Paul writes “let the same mind be in you,” he uses the plural; this isn’t about individuals. So a better translation might be “let the same mind be in y’all.”

I am called to have Christ in and on my mind, so are you. And the same goes for the homeless person on the street corner, the Mexican laborer who is undocumented, the gay couple; it goes for President Obama and for Speaker Boehner. Christ dwells within all of us; each of us strives to live a life worthy of being called Christ-like. Now to be fair, some do it better than others; but Paul’s point is that in a community, we need to recognize this in each other. The person you can’t stand at work is a vessel for Christ’s love, the family member you wish you never had to see again is deeply loved by God, that political figure who you think is a moron is also a child of God. Paul urges us to ask, what if? What if we recognized the God in these people? What if politicians in Washington didn’t put political party ahead of what is best for the American people? What if we got more involved in politics and told our representatives to do their job? What if the bickering could stop by putting more emphasis on people instead of political dogma? What if our interactions with others started with us focusing on the Christ in each other?

And this is not easy, especially in our individualistic and narcissistic culture. I know it’s not easy to go against the grain. When phones and computers have an “i” in front of their name, when commercials are all about you having the nicest things because you deserve it, when then church, mistakenly I might add, says that religion is about a personal relationship with Jesus, it’s easy to get confused. Your life isn’t about you; you didn’t create yourself, God did. This isn’t your world, it’s God’s. Having a happy life or being personally “saved” isn’t your goal, building the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven is. What if we looked not to our own interests, but to others? What if God wasn’t a private thing, but was something we did with others, something we talked about openly? What if we realized that God loved everyone else just as much as God loves you? What if our community was stronger?

Another important part of community and being in the same mind as Christ is being united in that mind. A huge threat to community in our culture is moral relativism and postmodernism. Too many, especially those labeled as “liberals,” have gone off the path by saying things such as “well, this is what I believe, but you have to find what is right for you,” or “religions are like paths to the same mountain top,” or “I think abortion, or gay marriage, or the death penalty is right or wrong, but you can think the opposite and we’ll just agree to disagree.” Let me tell you right now, that is hogwash. If there are no truths out there, then we’re wasting our time and religion is irrelevant.

Jesus is the Christ; not Moses, not Buddha, not Muhammad. Slavery is immoral, just like the death penalty. These are not matters of gray; some things are black and white. Now that’s not to say that only Christians go to heaven, that’s not to say that slave owners are all evil people, that isn’t to say that proponents of the death penalty aren’t Christian- but it is to say that they are wrong on those issues. Our sense of community has been eroded because there is no longer anything that binds us together; nothing unites us, nothing that we can all agree on.

And Episcopalians are especially notorious for this sort of indecisiveness. I am staunchly Anglican in my theology. I love Richard Hooker’s concept of the via media, or middle road; suggesting that the truth is not found on the poles, but in the middle. But this concept is too often abused and misunderstood as a tool to say that you’re right, but so am I. Whether they are on the left, the right, or the middle, there are real truths out there.

So Paul writes “be of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind.” And that mind should be the mind of Jesus Christ. We must avoid the temptation to think that peace means giving up what we believe in; interfaith dialogue does not mean saying that we’re all the same, it means testifying to the truth, and being willing to see glimmers of that truth in others. But if we are not willing to stand up and believe in anything, then how can we be in the same mind? How can we be united in Christ if we can’t say that Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life? What if we all united under the banner of the Prince of Peace against wars? What if we all stood up together with Christ to champion for the poor and worked to end global hunger? What if we took this great and life changing gift that we think is important enough to come to church about, and shared it with others so that they might also find the love of God and the compassion of God’s church? What if?

So the first thing that Paul does is talk about the importance of community, he then moves into what is called the Christ Hymn. Many scholars think that verses 6-11 are an older hymn that was known in the earliest Christian communities and Paul uses it here to advance his point about humility. Being in a community means that you need to make room for the other. So Paul talks about how Christ emptied himself, taking on human form. The theological word for this emptying is kenosis.

If we are to live a life dedicated to God, in a community with others, Paul knows that we can’t be self absorbed. He gives us the example of Christ in doing this. Though Christ was of the same form as God, he did not abuse that power or circumstance. He emptied himself so that he could fill himself with the things of the Kingdom of God. This is a good example for us. Being a Christian, or holding a college degree; having a respected job or position; being athletic or good-looking, these are not things that we should be prideful of- but rather these are things that can fill up our egos and make us unreceptive to the will of God or the cry of our neighbors.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his seminal work, The Cost of Discipleship, wrote that it is not that we are trying to copy Christ to rise through the ranks, but instead we copy his emptying so that Christ can fit in us. As Paul notes in our passage, “it is God who is at work in you.” If you are living a godly life, you shouldn’t go around and beat your chest saying “look at me, I give 15% to charity, I pray every day, I am a leader at my church.” That isn’t humility at all. Instead, God should get the credit, not us. And unless we empty ourselves, we can’t create space for the Holy Spirit to truly take root in our lives.

There is a great story about the Mullah Narudin, a Middle Eastern folk hero who is known for being a wise fool. As the story goes, Nasrudin was walking home from a trip to another country. Now where he is from, fruit is fruit and is always sweet and tasty. So in this foreign land, he caught a glimpse of a vendor on the side of the road who was selling something that he had never seen before. He walked up to the vendor, took a few coins out of his turban and said, “I’ll take a basket.” Now the vender didn’t say anything, because most people only buy a few, so if Nasrudin was willing to buy a whole basket, who was he to turn down such a large sale? So the vendor packed up for the day and left. Nasrudin sat down and started to eat this new, exotic fruit. He took a bite and within a few seconds, his mouth was on fire. Tears began to roll down his face. But he kept eating. A bit later, a passerby came by and Nasrudin called out “tell me friend, what despicable fruit is this? It must be grown at the very gates of Hell.” The passerby called out “you fool, that is not a fruit, but is a hot chili. Why do you keep eating them?” Nasrudin said, “I’m waiting until I find the sweet one.” So the passerby shrugged and left him. A few hours later, that same passerby came back down the road from the other direction and said “stop at once or you will die, don’t you realize that there are no sweet chilies?” Nasrudin responded, “I cannot stop until I have finished the whole basket. You see, I paid for the whole basket and I am no longer eating chilies; I am eating my money.”

Paul invites us to follow Christ in his kenotic humility of empting himself. This is our invitation to stop searching for the sweet chili, the chance to stop eating our money, our climbing the corporate ladder, our perfectionism which chokes us, our scars and bruises from the past. This is our chance to be liberated from the chilies which consume and burn us; our chance to be humble, to get out of the rat race; our chance to live simply, to live for other and God, and even yourself, as opposed to being told by society and culture how you should be living. What if you could be free? What if you could not worry so much about money and things that will pass away? What if when you receive your pledge card in the mail in the next few weeks, you made the most honest commitment that you could? What if the church didn’t have to run a flat budget and could expand our offerings to you all and the wider Greensboro community? What if you volunteered more at church and got involved with Sunday School, Outreach, Helping Hands or woke up a bit earlier and came to the forum? What if we focused more on faith, family and the things that really matter?

One spiritual writer said that he tries to frame his decisions in this context- “when I am at the end of my life, looking back, what would I wish that I would have done in this situation?” What if we lived like that? What if we could empty ourselves of all the things that we don’t need in our life, and instead fill ourselves with the mind of Christ? What if we let our egos decrease, so that the love and will of God could increase in us? What would our world look like if we all were little Christs?

Lots of “what ifs” today. I think you all know the answer to these questions- the world would be a better place, we would be happier, and so would others. Ganhdi, the great Hindu thinker, once said “I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.” What if we were in the same mind as Christ?

Our charge today is to consider what camp we’re going to fall into- will we be impersonators of Christ or will we be imitators of Christ? As you know, an impersonator is someone who tries to copy what another does; but they aren’t concerned with actually following them. Will Ferrell impersonated George W. Bush on Saturday Night Live, but he didn’t actually want to be him. And if we try to impersonate Jesus, then we are full of vanity and will certainly fail. Our task is not to walk and talk like Jesus, instead it is to love like Jesus did. Our call, according to Paul, is to imitate Christ.

What if the world had less Christian impersonators in it? What if more people were like the Son in today’s gospel who did the will of his father? What if when adversity came up in life, we had a spiritual foundation to support us? What if the Peace which we share in our liturgy transferred over to our relationships during the week? What if we saw the presence of Christ in others as they strove to imitate Christ? What if we united together in belief in a stronger sense of community? What if, like Christ, we strove to be humble, strove to empty ourselves so we could live for God? What if we lived for each other instead of ourselves? What if I told that doing these things could transform our world? What if I told you that we have the capability to eliminate extreme poverty, that we could end bullying in schools, that we could give justice to the widow, the orphan, and the immigrant? When we heed Paul’s words and are imitators of Christ, we no longer have to wonder what if, we can live it.

August 28, 2011 - Proper 16A

2011-08-29T12:29:00.000-07:00

Last week we talked the talk; now it’s time to walk the walk. For those of you that were here last Sunday, you know that this sermon is the second part of a two-part series. Last week our readings told the stories of Moses’ birth and Peter’s response to Jesus’ question “who do you say that I am?” We each must answer that question- “who do you say that I am?” and we do so in both word and deed. Through their actions, the women of Exodus answered that question with deeds of justice, trusting sacrifice, steadfast love and courageous openness. But actions are not enough of an answer; we must also use words to comment on who Jesus is. So Peter is an example for us of giving a bold and honest answer.

Last week was the theory, this week is the practice. In my sermon last week, I introduced a highly advanced theological word to you all- that word was “but.” And that word comes into play again this week. We looked at the ways we answer the question “who do you say that I am?,” BUT life happens. BUT how do we persevere in our answer to that question. Both Moses and Peter understand something about the power of God in their lives and they struggle to live faithfully. BUT the world doesn’t make that an easy task; nor does it for us. So today let’s move on from our answers about who God is to how we proclaim that answer over the noises and distractions of life.

The way that we do is to realize that we are called by God to a task. You see, the answer to the question “who do you say that I am?” isn’t nearly as important as what we do in response to our answer. If you say that God is love that’s fine and dandy, but if you show God’s love to the world then that is something beautiful. Having an answer to that question is what sets us up for our call to a task. And as you all know, when you have a task, it becomes much easier to endure and stay on track.

So first up is Moses in one of the most famous passages in the Bible. As the story begins, Moses takes his flock beyond the wilderness. That’s an interesting place to start a call narrative, beyond the wilderness. Beyond the hubbub of life, leaving the bad decision in the past, moving past our fears of what lies in the wilderness. And Moses had a lot of wilderness in his life. You’ll remember from your Sunday School days that Moses grows up in Pharaoh’s court, but one day kills an Egyptian who is abusing Hebrew slave and becomes a fugitive. Now perhaps none of us has committed murder, but we all have wilderness in our lives. The wildernesses of aging parents, growing children, a lost job, depression. Often we live on the edge of the wilderness and venture into it often.

So it is on the other side of the wilderness of his life that Moses sees the burning bush. After he has journeyed through the wilderness, Moses is found by God. And God says to him “take off your sandals, for you are standing on holy ground.” God takes Moses from the wilderness to the holy in a matter of seconds. And God can do the same for us. When we see those burning bushes in our lives, those moments where it seems that God is near, we can be rescued from the dangers of the wilderness and brought into the safety and bounty of being in God’s presence.

Now that God has Moses’ attention, God tells Moses that he must go to Pharaoh and tell him to “let my people go.” Moses then starts the excuses. Who me? No, I’m not the right guy. Um, God, let’s talk about this first, I’m not so sure about your plan. Hey, what’s your name anyway, I don’t even know who’s sending me. But why bother, they’ll just say no. Oh, okay God, but you see, I stutter, so as much as I’d love to do this, I’m just not the right person for the job. Send someone else.

Moses comes up with plenty of reasons why he shouldn’t be called by God. And here comes that word again, BUT, God addresses all of these concerns by saying “I will be with you.” Maybe you think that you can’t teach Sunday School because you’re not good with children; maybe you avoid reaching out an estranged family members because you’ve been hurt before; perhaps you don’t tithe because you are afraid of making that kind of commitment; you don’t proclaim your answer to “who do you say that I am?” because you don’t want to be labeled. BUT, God will be with you.

And God was with Moses. God was there to help Moses find the words to speak to Pharaoh. God was there to help Moses perform the signs that showed that he meant business. God was there when Moses rallied the Hebrew people. God was there in the plagues against Israel and in the parting of the Red Sea. God was there with Moses, just like God promised. Now this doesn’t mean that what Moses had to do was easy. Being wanted for murder, Moses still had to go into Pharaoh’s court and say “let your source of infinite and free slave labor go.” Moses still had to contend with the unruly Hebrews. Moses did not have an easy task. I’ve said it before, God offers us minimum protection, but maximum support. Having God be with us doesn’t meant that following our call will always be easy, BUT it does mean that it will be possible. What’s so great about this passage is that it is not God alone or Moses alone that saves the day, instead it is God acting in and through Moses that salvation comes to all. And the same in true in our lives and in our world. You are called by God, and God will be with you in that journey.

In Moses, we see that we are called and living in that call is one way to endure in our answer to last week’s question “who do you say that I am?” The other half of this enduring is in having a task. It is not just that God calls us by name, but that God presents us with a task. You’ll remember that last week, Jesus asked the disciples what other people were saying about him. And then he asked “BUT, who do you say that I am?” Peter spoke up and said “you are the Christ, son of the living God.” And ding, ding, ding, Peter answered correctly and his ego doubled in size.

Then in the next verses, where we pick it up today, Jesus begins to tell the disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and be killed. And Peter speaks up and says “Jesus, no, you don’t understand. I just said that you’re the Messiah, and we all know that Messiahs don’t get killed by the Romans.” Peter thought he had it figured out, but in the span of just 5 verses, Peter went from being the rock upon which the church will be built to being called Satan. And isn’t that how life is? From the mountain top to the valley in the blink of an eye.

So then Jesus rebukes Peter and gives him the task- “if any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” It’s hard to preach on a passage like this because you all have heard it before. You’ve heard it a thousand times; we’ve become desensitized to it. So instead of getting into what a cross is and how you bear it, instead I want to focus on our task as being countercultural. No one embraces the cross, no one says, I want to metaphorically or literally die for my beliefs. But that is exactly the task to which we are called.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a theologian who coined the term “costly grace.” He compares costly grace to cheap grace, which he defines as grace without discipleship or the cross. Costly grace he says is the treasure hidden in the field. This is the grace which must be worked for and sought after. It is costly because we must follow Christ, even to the cross. But it is grace because it leads us to follow Christ beyond the cross to the empty tomb. This sort of costly grace is the task we are given in following Christ.

This is not a task we want, often it is not a task we feel capable of handling. It is not a glamorous task, and it is a task that will lead us to the cross. What is important to remember is the while salvation or deliverance is certainly from something, BUT the more important direction is where that deliverance is towards. It was one thing that God delivered the Hebrew people from Egypt, BUT what is bigger is that God delivered them to the Promised Land. It’s one thing that Christ died to save us from sin and death, BUT it’s even grander that we are delivered to God’s eternal Kingdom.

For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for God’s sake will find it. The reason why the cross is so tough, why costly grace is such an oxymoron is that they go against our sense of what is rational. The calls and tasks which we are given are often countercultural. The last is never first in the business world; grace should be buy one-get one free in our consumerist minds. But this is exactly the sort of task to which we are called. We are called to an upside down vision of how the world works.

We are called to go to the Pharaoh’s of our day, whether that be a school board, Congress or your own addictions which enslave you and say “let my people go.” We are called to set our vision on what we are being delivered towards, not what we have been freed from. We no longer need to dwell on the chains that used to hold us back, but we are free to live for something new. Our task is to work hard for the costly grace found in denying ourselves and taking up the cross.

And I know this isn’t easy to do. I know it’s hard to live a godly life in this world. Whether it’s avoiding foul language, loving your enemy, giving part of your paycheck to charity, not sleeping in or going to a swim meet on Sunday morning, speaking up in a town hall meeting, writing an elected official, inviting a neighbor to church- these things are not things which we do comfortably. BUT, the only way to gain your life is to lose it. The only path to eternal life went through the cross. It’s not easy, BUT God is with us.

I hope that this past week you all took some time to ponder the question “who do you say that I am?” Having an answer is important; persevering in your answer is a challenge, just as it was for Moses and Peter. The way to move forward with our answer is to know that we have been called to a task.

Moses answered with everything he could think of to avoid his task. But at the end of the day, Moses was able to embrace and live in his call when he realized that God was with him at every step of the journey. And Peter, who went from rock to Satan, learned that we are called to a new reality- a world where up is down and down is up; a reality where we live for the Kingdom of God, not the kingdoms of this world.

As we each explore and discern how we might work to bring about God’s Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven, may we know in our hearts and our minds who we say that God is. May we know that we have been called and be able to know that God is with us. And may we see the world in a new way as we do our tasks as disciples.

Amen.