Law and Gospel

Who You Follow Changes Everything Including How you Follow

2012-01-21T19:02:00.000-05:00

Whenever we hear about the fishermen, perhaps the biggest question always seems to be why? Why do they go? It makes no sense their leaving others who depended upon their skill and strength; who depended on a livelihood. They walk away from houses and from being bosses, becoming uprooted, with little idea what will come next. They go from the known to the unpredictable. It’s a total mind shift. And really, what would we think if we were out in a boat and on the shore was a man yelling “Follow me”? It’s all a little unsettling. “Follow you- who are you? Where are you going and what do you mean? It’s true Jesus was already in town proclaiming the good news, so maybe they recognized him, but it still seems like a radical thing happened. Yeah, he was a rabbi, people should want to learn from, but students asked the rabbi to follow him. No self-respecting rabbi went fishing for students. Besides, what’s the big hurry? “Follow you, as in NOW? Can’t you see we’re a little busy here?” Way too many questions to justify their immediate response to follow him. It would have to be something really compelling.

Then I think about what “following” means today. The hippest of people talk about who they follow on Twitter, seeing if others do too. Comparing how many people follow them. The funny thing about following someone on Twitter is that it’s about little random bursts of information followed by periods of time where you’re totally disconnected and free to do whatever else you want. Before all that, in another age, people used to follow shows on TV or before that even, on radio. We’d set aside everything at the appointed time to make sure we caught up with the latest, and couldn’t wait to see our friends and analyze it. When’s the last time that happened about something at church? Anyway, no matter which of these media speaks to you, or some other interest, it’s always about a world divided between followers like us and everyone else. We follow without many questions. Yet our devoted following of these crazes comes and goes. We can quickly decide to tune out or move on. And you know, even when it’s entertaining or riveting, none of it is really life altering. Yet we put everything on hold and call it important. It’s amazing how we’ll follow and let our lives be shaped by what isn’t life altering.

How does this shape how we follow Jesus? Is our cultural approach the filter through which we live out our connection to God? We are more likely to speak about being members of a congregation, than to say we are the followers of Jesus here. We have programs and fellow members we’re connected to. But as things and people come and go we move on. And we can decide on any given day, whether we come and connect, based upon balancing our other options. Even joining a congregation can seem like a singular event. If we look at today’s gospel from the perspective of our decision making and evaluate why the disciples responded as they did, we stay stuck in our world view. It isn’t really life altering. It has very little to do with Jesus at all or with what would compel us to walk away and into a different life led by Christ.

Our gospel opens with Jesus telling others to walk away- to repent from the world’s view and to believe in something new- the good news he brings. Then he demonstrates this by choosing people against popular expectation, and telling them to follow. He doesn’t ask if it’s OK today, or if they mind, or if they want to. He compels them not only to walk away from something but to walk into a sudden and new reality. That must have been powerful- An amazing power to stand in the presence of. It must have been enough to answer all of the “why” questions. When we say we believe in this Jesus Christ, and follow, do we grasp that kind of power? Can we sense a presence of “God drawn near” so compelling that whatever thoughts we have about what we’re leaving are eclipsed by who we’re turning to? In this season of Epiphany this is a revelation of Jesus to contemplate-a revelation of presence and power. The same power that ripped open the heavens and will go on to heal and to redeem. Turning toward and believing in that power and in this God is what we really should be thinking about.

In the face of our world, this kind of following is still radical. And it won’t be enough to respond one day and never think about it again. Truly following where Jesus leads takes more. It’s not about picking up and putting down being connected to God, or even a church, or picking and choosing whether we think people are in our group or not. If we really follow where Jesus leads this is exactly the life view that gets altered. We’ll be told to throw the net out wide. When we look at what Christ's net catches, it will be full of life, but will also be heavy and unwieldy and unpredictable. it will get torn and need mending. There will be risks and costs. We won’t always see the fruits of the labor. And there will be days we’ll feel like we’d rather cut bait than keep fishing. But still this is where Jesus is calling. To follow Jesus and to keep following as Jesus leads us to replacing our instinct with God’s vision. To believe and to keep on believing, that the power of God in Christ is bringing forth a new world. To be constantly connected.

Maybe that’s why what Jesus said to them and to us isn’t just “follow me,” it’s more like “stick with me. Don’t let me out of your sight. Focus all your life on me. Because again and again you’ll struggle with turning away from all that would distract you.” It’s the exact opposite of intermittent, random and free to do whatever else you want. To stay focused in this following to which God calls us we must continually journey with Christ in sight. In a total connection that shapes everything else we do. God chooses this connection with us, saying “Follow me-Focus it all on me. It will change you and it will change everything.”

Listen and You will See

2012-01-13T13:31:00.000-05:00

“Where have you seen God at work here in the last six months?” This was the opening question at our congregation council retreat. “Where have you seen God?” We broke into small groups and people began sharing. As I listened, it was kind of like listening to microwave popcorn. An idea would come forth but then there would be a pause, but little by little it took off with bunches of thoughts and people joining in energetically. Sharing where they’d seen God. Sometimes asking each other if what they were describing was really about God; being told by others how it was. And through them God spoke and we listened. And came to grasp that we’ve seen God: In new faces and new volunteers; in increased Sunday School participation; in our 100th anniversary; in re-energized committees; in increased worship attendance; in a new Prayer Circle group; in a re-vitalized Dove’s Nest program; in the commitment of Council to the work of the church; in God’s abundance that we’ve had the resources to carry out ministry; in a new Facebook page and the fact our Cub Scout pack is back with 17 boys. In the sound of our renovated organ; in our dedicated staff. In our renewed outreach in our neighborhood. And we’ve seen God in our worship and liturgy; in hands working together in our intergenerational event; in the visitation of our members and the chances we’ve had to reconnect. We’ve seen God in the listening and encouragement of change and in a renewed spirit of the people. It’s a pretty inspiring story! Told first in small conversations then gathered into larger ones as we helped each other see God. And I watched as smiles and a spark of light broke forth as people could see an even bigger revelation of God’s presence and work, active in our community. Maybe that’s what ears tingling in Samuel is about. The response really good news brings.

Then I asked the group- if someone told you six months ago, that you would be able to say you have seen all this, on a scale of 1-10 how likely would you have been to say it would look like this? “One” means almost impossible and “ten” means you were absolutely sure. Where would you be? Everyone around the room was a “One.” Six months ago, low expectations- That’s a pretty dark place.

In a very real way this mirrors the sense of darkness at the opening of our lesson from Samuel where “the word of the Lord was rare in those days and visions were not widespread.” Where for whatever reasons the ability to see God active or hear God’s voice had evaporated. Maybe it seemed easier to just lie down as the light of hope technically was still flickering but seemed likely to go out soon. Where any connection to the Lord seemed more driven by going through the motions than inspiration. It’s tragic, yet we in the church are sometimes the ones who least expect to see God revealed. And a real direct calling from God? One might wonder if THAT kind of revelation really exists.

We see the world as it is, finding it hard to be amazed, quite sure that nothing new or good can come. Yet one writer suggests this behavior is rooted in our way of being, not God’s. We become hard of hearing, hard of heart, believing that the word of the Lord is rare, and expecting nothing new. Not because the Lord has withdrawn from us, but because we can convince ourselves that we hear nothing and see nothing. It’s all too easy to get to such a place. Once we settle in there, though, to get back from it takes divine intervention.

In our midst God has been doing just that. And the greater things we will see are about grasping that our expectations will and must be surpassed by a greater vision.

Bernard of Clairvaux noted that “if you wish to see, listen. Listening is a step toward vision.” When we let our collective chatter prevail, we never really give space for God to speak or for our perception to be altered. Our council retreat provided that space for us, like for Samuel, a time when we stopped our daily routine, and could say, “Speak Lord, your servant is listening.” And through the words of those gathered even those who not so long ago couldn’t expect it, God spoke.

As we listened to each other, little by little we connected the stories and had an epiphany. Not only had God been at work in all of these moments, God had been at work in our hearts. As we shared we saw that hearts had moved, and then moved a little more. It is a thing to be amazed by, our seeing leading to insight and our listening leading to discernment of a greater vision. New possibility opened up because God had brought us together and was revealed to us together.

Yet as powerful as all the events we highlighted were, more powerful was the realization it happened not by our works. The one thing, the only thing that had brought this forth in us was the One whose hand called and gathered us that we might be enlightened: Jesus the Christ. Out of Christ’s work a new vision and connection to God have been made known. By God alone, hope and light have been revealed. And the lamp really isn't going out after all. It took being together for this revelation to develop. These stories were not about a private revelation. It took setting time aside, being together and listening to God in others. In greater and greater circles this vision emerged. In community, and centered in Christ. This is how God creates us to be, how God speaks and how God works. And this is the vision we serve, a vision not only about the “leaders” but all of us. God has called and gathered all of us to enlighten us, to hear of marvelous things and of the God who has brought them into being. And our expectations will continue to be surpassed, when we come together here, to be energized by the power of what God is doing here and to tell others: Come and see! Listen to God’s story in our lives! This is the vision that will shape our mission and ministry as God’s servants. A vision we believe is inspired because God is with us, a vision of light and hope speaking now. Listen…

But what if we did?

2012-01-07T11:18:00.000-05:00

"When the song of the angels is stilled, when the star in the sky is gone,

when the kings and princes are home,

when the shepherds are back with their flock, the work of Christmas begins:

to find the lost, to heal the broken, to feed the hungry,

to release the prisoner, to rebuild the nations, to bring peace among others…"- Howard Thurman

The writer of those words could also be speaking about what the work of baptism begins- what God does and brings forth in us. When I first read those words I chose to state them in a calming and peaceful way, but if we’re really serious about the power and meaning of God in our world, the Gospel of Mark would tell us it should be anything but calming. Because the heavens have been ripped open and they can’t be put back together as if it never happened.

Being lost, feeling broken, being hungry or imprisoned or torn apart by war and conflict- these are wild places. Places where we try to return from but we’re sure we’ll never be quite the same. Someone once pointed out that you can try to sew ripped fabric back up but you can always tell. It can’t be the same. That seems like bad news but today we hear in the baptism of Jesus- that things can’t be the same but through God’s power, things will be better. It’s the beginning of Jesus’ story and the power to make this so. Because the heavens have been ripped open and God is on the loose!

Today we not only commemorate the Baptism of our Lord, we’re celebrating the baptisms of Brandon and Ryan. Brandon is a baby and like most of us will not remember God’s work this day. Ryan, however is 8 and will be able to remember the moment he was baptized and tell about it. And for each of us every baptism is a chance to hear again and contemplate God’s words and promises. Powerful stuff. For an 8 yr old boy, conveniently our gospel lesson is from the Gospel of Mark. I say that because of the four gospels, Mark is the ‘action figure” version of the story of Jesus. Everything is BIG and things happen IMMEDIATELY and things get RIPPED APART AND THROWN AROUND and lots of other really great action words. The story explodes open, starting with Jesus’ baptism- the sky is ripped apart and the Holy Spirit comes down and possesses Jesus and God speaks. John the Baptist had said something big was coming and here it is! Cosmic power happening!

So we really should read those words about the lost and broken and people in need believing in that kind of power and believing that God is powerfully reclaiming all of the wilderness places.

It's not calm and domesticated, it’s disruptive! God’s moving into all the wild places, but God isn’t coming in Jesus and through the Spirit to just smooth it over and play nice. God is bringing spirit warfare. Ripping apart the things that have created separation, calling us back and calling us closer and calling us by name. And at the same time God is putting all the forces of evil on notice. Good news! Powerful stuff.

Jesus’ baptism confirms who he is and confirms the power that he has. Words not only for those who long for a savior. They are words to tell those who most fear one- that the game is on. And once the Holy Spirit possesses Jesus, the very next thing that will happen is that same Spirit will drive Jesus into the heart of the wild places to begin the work of bringing God’s will into being.

After this every other time we hear about spirits in Mark, it will be Spirit-possessed Jesus casting out and overpowering evil spirits, unclean spirits, demon spirits possessing others. Bringing life out of death. In events that are wild and disruptive. We too receive this Spirit in baptism.

I’m not sure we think of our baptism in this way. But what if we did?

Today we not only baptize two children, we're installing our congregation council members for the year. People who have responded to God’s calling, to living out of their baptism by serving as leaders of the ministry and mission we hope to carry out here. Work done for the sake of the good news we are hearing this day. To continue God’s work of claiming and restoring and calling people out of wild places and into life in Christ. Finding, bringing, healing, rebuilding, feeding and freeing.

Engaging in disruptive Spirit warfare for the sake of the gospel.
I’m not sure any of them really had that in mind when they agreed to serve as church leaders- disruptive Spirit warfare for the sake of the gospel? But what if we did?

All around us, there are wild places and rips and tears that need to be mended. When these are our places, we hear the God’s words as healing and comfort- "you are mine, you are my beloved." But we too are then driven and possessed by the Spirit and confronted by the rest of the world- and all those other wild places and torn apart people. To live as those empowered and possessed by the Spirit as followers of Christ.

The meaning of our baptism is a death to what causes separation, and a life where we're given a new identity and a new power- marked with the cross of Christ forever. As we each hear this, we know we are personal to God. Yet we’re also a people of God through this baptism. We’re not blessed, claimed and empowered to go off and do independent projects and just smooth it over and play nice in the midst of a hurting world. But to be a people of God who proclaim the new reality ushered in by Jesus is still breaking forth.

This may seem too wild and disruptive and frankly impossible. Indeed, there’s one final time in the Gospel of Mark when the word spirit appears- it’s when Jesus tells the disciples that the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. But here’s where we can recall that where the Spirit sent Jesus, he is tended to and cared for as he tends to and cares for creation. As he brings restoration and new life to the wild places. We are promised this same Spirit that is willing and that brings power to respond. To we who are too small and too weak on our own to respond, God calls us to entrust our weakness to God's cosmic power.

What if we lived as those who believed God really is as powerful as we say?

Just think how powerful a force that would be in our world.

What if we responded to our Lord and our baptism in this way?
What if we did?

Surely Goodness and Mercy

2012-01-06T15:21:00.003-05:00

Another whirlwind over the next couple of days and as happens more often than not big theological stuff gathers in piles as I prepare to baptize a baby and an eight year old, install our council members and lead a retreat to help us begin to shape and discern for our first full year together in ministry, and then the next day proclaim resurrection victory with the family of a spry 97 year old woman who until recently was a real spitfire by all accounts. If I only I had met her, but as it is I will stand at the graveside of a third woman whose life will remind me here was another great story I just missed.
She was born in 1915, and would go on to meet the world with determination and a sense of wonder and adventure who was a loving teacher immersing herself in history, nature, and travel. Immersing myself in the time in which she was born, it made me smile to see that someone who was so invested in Girl Scouting was born in the year Girl Scouts was founded. A woman with a zest for travel who was one of the earliest travelers to China, was born in the year of the Worlds Fair in San Francisco and the Pacific Exposition was all the rage. A woman who embraced new ideas and would not be held back, born the year another daring woman, Eleanora Sears was the first female equestrienne to ride astride and NOT sidesaddle at the National Horse Show.
The day after we celebrate the baptism of our Lord, in a no holds barred account of Jesus' ministry being unleashed by the power of the Spirit in the Gospel of Mark, I cannot help but envision Dorothy as a woman who fully charged forth to encounter God's world, and to live out her identity as a child of God in the fullest, not only for herself but for the sake of so many to whom she both taught and lived her faith.
When I asked if there were any particular passages of Scripture with which she was most connected, I was not told a passage to use, but a passage to NOT use. This piqued my curiosity- DO NOT USE PSALM 23 I was told!
But then I learned the back story- that a young girl in the 1920's and 1930's saw executions of criminals in the time of our history when such events were public spectacles. And Psalm 23 was always spoken at such times. In the face of executions she simply could not hear these words because how they were connected to imposed deaths.
I can't help but wonder whether God might not feel the same way.
But at the same time if ever there was a person who truly embodied a belief that God is always there to lead and guide us, who was determined to live in faith of the words "surely goodness and mercy" really following us each day, and seeking to share goodness and mercy and rejoicing at an overflowing cup of life, it was Dorothy. Now we miss her here but she has fully discovered that surely goodness and mercy is true and the rest of the promise is true as well- that the final destination on an incredible journey is that we dwell with God forever. Thanks be to God!

My first Wedding Sermon

2011-12-31T09:16:00.000-05:00

Carol and John, I have to be honest with you, I know I told you that you were my first wedding but actually there was a wedding before yours. I’ve walked another couple through their vows. But you are my first wedding as a pastor. But here’s what happened. Friends of ours were getting married and they had hired a district justice. They had chosen an unusual place to be married- in a green house. The flowers were amazing but we had to create the aisle by moving the Burpee seed displays. The district justice was supposed to come but he never appeared. A call to his house revealed he was on vacation. Now before I became a pastor, I was a lawyer so I asked them where the marriage license was. They told me that they had met with him and he had signed it and told them he’d put it in the mail on Friday so it would already be on the way. What that meant was they were already legally married. So anyone could walk them through the rest. So someone jumped on a moped and went to the groom’s house and printed off the vows, and there next to the Burpee seeds I helped them say their vows. So far today we’ve avoided that kind of chaos.

And I want to congratulate you for your wisdom in avoiding two other things that can potentially send any well planned wedding into chaos- using very small children or dogs in the wedding party. When my husband and I got married, we had his three year old niece and five year old nephew as our flower girl and ring bearer. We practiced everything with them, but in truth we had so little faith they would make it, we had fake rings sewed on the ring pillow, and we had my maid of honor walk in behind them so she could alternatively nudge, pull or walk alongside them to get them from point A to point B. Sure enough, part way through the flower girl pulled off her garland and threw the basket on the floor and announced she was DONE! She was NOT going on. And my best friend Janet faithfully picked everything up, put it together and schussed them down the aisle to the end. It was crazy but in pictures they were adorable.

I know you have a dog you love and we talked about a dog in the wedding, but If you look on the internet I am sure there are wedding blooper videos of what happens when someone decides to use Fluffy as a ring bearer, only to have the dog stop and scratch or lick, or try to eat the pillow, or run off leash and off course. You have wisely avoided this.

You also have the benefit of avoiding the inexperience of youth. I hope I am not offending anyone when I say that with the exception of your matron of honor, Althea, none of us can do bbetter than to claim we are “young at heart.” And you know what that means when we put it that way. When we’re young, our inexperience leads us places we later see differently. In one of my favorite movies, “Keeping the Faith,” the character who plays Ben Stiller’s mom is showing her wedding photos to someone who’s admiring how beautiful and hopeful they looked. His mom ecxclaims, “Oh my God- we were such idiots! It took us 10 years to figure it out! We were so young.” You are older and wiser. And you have wisely chosen each other.

So what wisdom can I offer to you this day? Long after the finish on your rings is no longer perfect, when the little scratches and nicks start to appear, the pattern of the jewelry you have chosen to exchange will not be the most important thing. The pattern of how you live out your relationship will be what matters most. Wear your rings with pride and joy, but know that wearing the loyalty and faithfulness we hear of in Proverbs and loving as Jesus teaches is how your marriage will succeed. In the Book of Proverbs we hear we should wear loyalty and faithfulness around our necks. Luckily it’s not like having them tattooed there, but it conjures up the image of wearing something around our necks as a way of being led. Not unlike our pets, perhaps it’s almost like a leash. Let’s not get too literal, but we know that a leash is how we shape our pet’s behavior. It may not sit well with us to think we need to be led, but we need to learn patterns of behavior so we can learn what to do in expected and unexpected situations. In marriage there will expected and unexpected things. And we’ll need to learn how to respond to what love will demand of us. Love will demand a lot. And there will be times we don’t wanna do or say or listen to what love will ask of us. So the question is HOW will we be able to live this out?

The Book of Proverbs is a collection of sayings intended as a guide for living. I’ve put together a few more updated words from myself and others as suggestions for your journey together:

Blessed are you when you have little stumbles, it might save you from a big fall. (Hallmark)
Whether you stumble or fall, in love be the one to pick the other up and help them on the way.

All you really need is love, but a little chocolate every once in a while never hurt. (Lucy, in “Peanuts”)
Be the one to offer a sweet or unexpected surprise.

As important as it is to know the right thing to say at the right time, it is even more important to leave unsaid the wrong thing at a tempting moment. (Ben Franklin)
You don’t always have to have the last word. And if you think you REALLY DO, consider whether that word should be “Sorry.”

God will use all kinds of circumstances to communicate in your relationship- humor, tears, a hug or a look. Knowing which of any of this to choose will require tending another relationship – the one you have with God. God has given you this love- in this relationship, and in your family and friends. And God has given an even greater love in his Son, Jesus Christ who gave us and shows us grace and mercy and forgiveness. Which by the way are all things we will need to give and receive in marriage. God has also given you faith and the tools to deepen faith. God will come to you in prayer, in Scripture and in a community of faith- all ways you can remember what you need and be met by those who can tell you- “I’ve been there too and here’s what worked for me.“ As you prepare to continue this new part of your journey together, know that whether it requires nudging, or pulling or walking alongside of you, everyone here is with you and more importantly, God is with you each step of the way. May each day be blessed. AMEN

Unsettling the World

2011-12-28T20:44:00.000-05:00

We all have our favorite ways to celebrate what this night is about. Favorite hymns, lighting candles, manger scenes. Some churches like to celebrate the Nativity of our Lord in the historically accurate way, with live outdoor nativity scenes giving us some idea of what that First Night was like. Meant to connect us to an event that happened long ago, But the people and animals have had the benefit of being cleaned up, just showing up for the gig. Not having labored to journey there on foot over weeks, or as a woman in her last weeks of pregnancy trudging along when all she really wants to do is put her feet up and relax. When Catherine was about 4 months old we got a phone call from the local Methodist church. They put on a drive-by living Nativity each year, but that year they were short on babies and they had heard that the Lutherans had 15 babies that year, and would we let them use our daughter for their production? They shared with me a schedule of available nights and times, and I selected a mutually convenient date for her two hour appearance there. But that day there was an ice storm. And being a good mother I assumed it would be expected that no baby should be out in that so we didn’t go. Well, I got an irate phone call the next day. The Nativity HAD gone on, being accurate and all. They had to use a baby doll for Jesus since I had not brought our daughter to play God’s Son. I had somehow ruined the “authentic” scene they were creating to the glory of God. Our enactments of the birth of Christ are places painstakingly planned, with expectations, and well publicized so we know when to come, making sure the people we want to be there have been told. Everything was planned and I unsettled it. It was all a little ironic.

The arrival of our Lord was so different. Born in a nowhere place, to an unknown girl, in circumstances that seemed frankly scandalous. Perhaps that’s why there was a birth on the road in the first place. Mary didn’t actually need to be counted in the census. She could’ve stayed with family. Yet it seems it was safer for her and her child to NOT be seen in Nazareth, even though this was an unsettling journey. And whether he was born in a barn, or a stable or a cave- none of those are the sanitized places we depict. They don’t provide the dignity we wish for. And it’s shocking that this birth, of little consequence in the world’s eyes, was seemingly randomly heralded to of all people, migrant workers in a field at night, against the sensibilities of the community. To top it all off, the One who will be the Almighty Messiah still has to “grow up.” I don’t really believe that Jesus was the perfect baby and every night was a silent night. He was nursed, bathed and changed by a first time parent who probably wasn’t all pulled together and serene. Living in a family just getting by in a world that was living in peace, but peace that came with a cost of submission. A fearful peace. Being born into this world would hardly be the way we wish it had been or would be today.

We want perfect, powerful and majestic but such interpretations of this night are miles away from reality. Why do we domesticate the humility, simplicity and servanthood of Christ’s Incarnation? I think it’s because we don’t want to confront our place in a world of pain, waste, blood, and tears. We of the ordered liturgy hope to avoid the chaotic. Don’t show us a world where later Jesus will be on a “Wanted” poster. It’s unsettling. We want it all ordered, but in truth, our humanity is unsettled, not domesticated. Our crèche and this space look pretty different from our own world. And even though the angels say,” Don’t be afraid” often we are. The birth of Christ began God’s unsettling of this world.

Our celebration is a chance to step away from our work, our worries and our world into this space of our inner hopes and dreams. Again this night, we gather here in a special place that we’ve planned and prepared for so that everything is “just so.” But as we pull in close to sing and hold onto the light and get teary eyed about a silent night where all is calm and bright and comfortable, we should remember God didn’t come to save us from this.

The good news is that it’s our real world that God enters. Living and breathing and moving with us as we long for a peace and justice that we cannot see, and for an abundance and comfort we wish we really knew. God comes into THIS WORLD knowing that beyond all of our trappings, we can’t clean it up and we really shouldn’t be favored. Yet unto US a child is born. God in a tiny vulnerable baby embraced who we really are. What a mystery it remains that Divine God stooped to become one of us, for no earthly reason, but only out of God’s love. To show that God chooses to redeem and save us. This is the story we can really connect to.

As we proclaim this wondrous event tonite, may we be unsettled from all of our efforts to manage our manger.

Remembering that God’s appearance came first as good news to the un-pulled together. So if you feel like you made it here tonite solely by the grace of God, hear this amazing good news! If you feel it’s an overwhelming struggle to hold it all together, know God’s power and mercy are all we need. And what we receive in Christ. The reason we can know silent nights or joy or peace or hope. This is the good news of Christ!

And it’s not just for some of us. The heavenly choir and response of the shepherds show this is such good news, it goes way beyond our carefully constructed lists. It’s good news to proclaim with abandon. Tell it far and wide, Come and See! Telling those who GOD favors and wants to hear. This is how we praise God’s glory and power and mercy over all the earth, a goodness that really is as wonderful as the gospel tells. Let’s unsettle the world with this glorious news! And authentically celebrate the coming of Christ by living as those who believe He is indeed the source of great joy for our world, and the One who makes real peace possible- for you, for me, forever. AMEN

A Declaration of Possibility

2011-12-23T10:28:00.000-05:00

Sometimes we fall into patterns of speaking for God. We’re sure weknow what God wants and what God needs, what God will and won’t do. This affectswho we hear popular Scripture verses- we’ve heard it before-we know. Mary’swords are well known. But today let’s slow down and let God speak anew, andhear them in the midst of the bigger story. In Samuel, we hear people are sureGod needs a special house, the best that money can buy, no expense to be sparedto make the place where God meets us perfect. This is the top priority. We needto make this happen for God to be here in the right way. But what do we hearfrom God?

“Who is that really about? YOU’RE GOING TO TELL ME KNOW WHAT ISNECESSARY FOR ME? TELL ME WHAT I NEED AND WHEN TO SHOW UP? I COMMAND THE VERYFORCES OF NATURE AND EVERYTHING YOU THINK YOU HAVE AT YOUR DISPOSAL. You livein MY shadow. Remember how this equation works.”

In a different way this happened for Zechariah, a priest who wassure he knew what God was about. His story happens just before Mary’s. He’s inthe temple, in the holy of holies, a place that MAYBE in their lifetime apriest would get one shot to being the one who enters there. Each year they drewlots for who could enter. This year, it was Zechariah. But If it’d been bypopular vote, it wouldn’t have been him. Because he and Elizabeth never had anychildren. Years passed, prayers seemed unanswered. What was wrong with them,people asked? They must be out of favor with God. So I wonder if it felt like oddfor him-go in and offer the usual worship in the usual way at the usual timewith the usual trappings. He knows how this goes, what’s expected. It’ssupposed to be most sacred space, but when you look around, it’s empty-justfading smoke of the incense and silence. No visible new possibilities. Andmaybe you’re not sure if God REALLY IS here. But then the angel Gabriel showsup. Now when you’re in THE place where you say God dwells, it shouldn’tsurprise you that God’s messenger appears. But when you’ve been going throughthe motions all these years, maybe that’s asking a lot. When Gabriel reveals thatFINALLY Elizabeth is going to have a child, chosen to receive God’s grace,Zechariah asks a question. HOW CAN I BE SURE THAT WHAT YOU’RE TELLING ME IS REAL?How will I know? After a lifetime of dedicated worship he has a crisis offaith. “If I can’t comprehend it, it must not be true.” Zechariah offers aproclamation of impossibility.

When we wrestle with our doubts, fears and questions, sometimes we too try topredetermine God’s plan and make God manageable. But as we try to make God beour size, it’s usually too small. And what we long for we never find. We’re surewe know and don’t expect God to throw us a curve ball. When what we want showsup in unexpected ways it can throw us. We wonder whether it’s real. How can webe sure? We need proof. Because we’ve got God figured out. And certain thingsare just NOT possible. Certain things seem too big to be changed. These are theplaces where we have a crisis of faith- where our proclamation of impossibilityovershadows us. Whatever is troubling you and giving you no peace, whatever isovershadowing you- don’t be afraid! Hear again the story of Mary.

Gabriel, God's angel of revelation was sent by God to a tiny,insignificant place to a young woman engaged to be married to a man namedJoseph. She was probably 12 or 13 years old and certainly too young to knowmuch- her name was Mary. Coming to her, the angel said- Greetings, gracifiedgirl! You’ve been chosen to receive God's grace. The Lord is with you!"

Mary was awfully confused, even troubled by his words and began towonder what kind of greeting this was. What did it mean? The angel said-"Listen! You will become pregnant and will give birth to a son and youwill name him Jesus. His name will mean "God saves!"This one, he willbe Great and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God willgive him the throne of his ancestor, David. And He will reign over the house ofJacob forever, and his kingdom will never end!" This will begin to happenNOW.

As hard as never expecting change is, THIS is radically lifealtering stuff. But Mary doesn’t ask, “How can I be sure that what you’resaying is true?” or how CAN this be? Mary said - How WILL this be?

She starts from a very different perspective.

And it’s not about whether it will happen but how. Her questionisn’t about whether she thinks it’s possible.

She focuses on God’s power.

The angel replied, "the Holy Spirit will come and the powerand glorious presence of God will overshadow you.”

God will overshadow you.

As I pondered these words, I’m struck by how small Mary is at thismoment.

And she grasps her smallness and its impossibility.

But she also grasps what the priests in Samuel don’t get until Godbellows and what Zechariah and older, wiser men dismiss.

She gets the equation. God is unfathomably large. And sheproclaims this greatness.

Her very life was threatened by this news but she proclaimed God’sgreatness in the face of confusion.

That’s more than accepting the words she hears, she’s trusting whoGod is and what God can and will do.

And she then hears of God’s rhema.

Rhema is a Greek word that can mean “word”, or “thing.” But it canalso mean enactment. None of God’s rhema will be impossible.

This is a proclamation of possibility. God’s possibility.

None of God's words, will be impossible.

None of the things promised will be unable to happen

None of what God enacts into being will fail.

These words move fear into hope and re-establish the equation. Godhas chosen to act with favor. Not because of who Mary or any of us are. We’refavored because God says so. This is God’s word for us too. And our responseshouldn’t be “how will we know?”

We called to live in faith and say-may what you will be so, Lord.Trusting in God’s power but also God’s reasons- that every action of the Godwho overshadows us is about grace. We too are “gracified.”

We receive this grace from a God who isn’t distant, but reachingout and acting toward us in love. Choosing to be more fully known in the centerof our world and struggles, and reminding us God’s power overshadows all ourfears and doubts. Giving us faith to believe it is so even when it looksdifferent than we expect.

This is what Jesus brings into all of our places of longing andwonder.

Peace and life, hope and joy to us.

Not just words, but God’ possibility happening TO US.

Let it be according to your will O Lord!

AMEN

Light I can scarcely hold

2011-12-15T20:47:00.000-05:00

I confess this is kind of an odd ramble as I am preparing for the overwhelming and breathtaking task of proclaiming the event and the meaning of the nativity of our Lord. I am in awe.

There are lots of things that take my breath away each day as I fathom the fact that I am an ordained pastor. I wonder at times how it can be that I, of all people, get to lead God's people in worship. That I, of all people, proclaim God's words of grace and mercy, forgiveness and love. That I, of all people, am given the task of reminding us of why God matters and how God matters, and how some things we think matter really aren't as important to God as we think.

But there are other places that take my breath away because I get to proclaim God as the light in the wilderness, in the darkness and in the storm. In visits and phone calls, in the hospital, at funerals, and in so many wilderness places. And each time I do so I remember my own places of wilderness and darkness and storm. And a light I can scarcely hold.

One of the experiences that I had way back in CPE was that people always wanted to show me their scars. I would come back and speak of this and be met with bewilderment from my team. You're not all seeing this? No- just you, they'd say somewhat gratefully. In the rest of my time as a chaplain and now in parish ministry this continues. Let me show you my scars, my wounds, my true self. I am never sure why I am trusted in this way, except that it feels beyond me. Like the way some people tell me my eyes are beautiful in these moments. Or that they are bright or piercing. And I know it is not me they see. It really is not me they see.

Last week I led a Blue Christmas service which was a new experience for our parish and though I have been to one before, a new experience for me. There was a time where people could come forward and light candles in the shadow of a less than perfect cross, or say or leave a paper with the name of a loved one. And then be anointed for healing, and wrapped in the embrace of a prayer shawl. Tears, hugs, words of grace and light.

I made an odd decision, for me. I decided after all of the thoughtful planning of the worship space and the worship itself, that I would not write a homily ahead of time. I would see who was there and speak by the Spirit from that moment. As people came, and more than I expected, I looked and saw those who had lost loved ones to cancer, perinatal loss, chronic conditions, and a family who recently began the scorched earth journey that accompanies a suicide. And I realized that hard as those experiences are, I had also been in each of those places. Places where we wonder what to pray for- comfort or release, places of no answers, only questions. Places where others' discomfort and questions leave us even more unsettled. Places where we want to pray but our words end up in piles on the floor. Places where we look for the light but in truth can't see it.
I remember part of what I said, but most of it was too ethereal an experience for me. I sat with all of my losses and all of the others. In the meditative spaces I felt in awe of the colossal task of naming losses and claiming the light of Christ.
But afterwards, in our fellowship time, I again heard about the beauty of the light of the space and about the piercing light in my eyes. It takes my breath away.

How it is that God uses me for this purpose is a mystery of faith that I feel too clumsy to hold.

Lately as one who wears a collar, the needs where I am are so profound. Too profound some days for me. But as I have dared to ask others for things they likely would not do or give, as I look people in the eyes, for the sake of the overburdened, the answers have been "yes." This too seems too precious a consequence for me to be handling and I can be afraid of it.

In the gospel of Luke all of the opening messages delivered from God begin with an angel saying- "Don't be afraid" or "fear not" depending upon your reading. Until the incarnation.
And then everywhere Jesus goes where people are unsettled, in the wildernesses and darkness, and storm- the words "fear not" can also be translated- "Stop fearing." And we can- because Jesus is here. This is the message I have the privilege of bearing. "You can stop fearing- Look! Jesus is here with us."

As we prepare to hear again a story that's thousands of years old and that we're sure we know by heart, maybe our heart needs to begin to grasp again just how profound this message is- in all those places that seem ready to overwhelm us. To see that the tears, the embraces, the anointing, the prayers, the words, the meal all bring this grace of "God with us" in a way perhaps we feel too clumsy to receive and to share, but where we're given the light to hold anyway. By the grace of God , we get the light to hold and to share.
Christ, be our light.

Fireweed stories

2011-12-14T22:20:00.000-05:00

I‘d like you to close your bulletins and look at the picture on the front cover. Years ago, driving through Canada, we saw acres of trees that had been ravaged by forest fire. A once proud and beautiful stand of evergreens, reduced to charred remains. It was hard to imagine it before the fire, in the reality of the present. It seemed lost forever. Then we came around the bend and interspersed in some of the skeletons of trees were flashes of pink. Exuberant spiky flowers defiantly poking their heads out from among the devastation. They’re called fireweed. It’s the first plant to show up in the aftermath of forest fires. Popping up in places where it seems nothing could grow. Here and there. When people see fireweed they can believe that the forest can still have life. It turns out that what fireweed does to the soil where it grows is to restore it so other things can grow too. I was sharing this story at the meeting of the Reading Lutheran Parish Bible study, a funny thing happened. As I talked about it, others started smiling and began sharing stories of seeing the flowers of fireweed in Montana, in Alaska, and other places. Hope in hard places. Stories that shared joy. You’ve gotta love a God that gives us fireweed, and stories of hope and restoration. This is the theme of our lessons this day. God’s promise of restoration and new life and reasons to rejoice! But these passages also speak to remembering that it hasn’t always been joyful. Our rejoicing is shaped by coming out of places of devastation, into God’s hope and restoration and promise. The power of God’s promises ,on any given day, can be easier or harder to see.

One way we hold onto believing in God’s promises is to share our stories of rejoicing, of seeing the fireweed, if you will. Since I’ve come here I’ve heard these stories in visiting our homebound. Of people being orphaned and sent away to a place for people like you. Of going off to serve your country in war and coming home with only half of one hand and another 70 plus years to live that way. Hard desolate places to recover from. These are a just couple stories of God’s people here, people who went on to lead lives that shared joy. People drawn here by the promise of restoration, new life, and a home. God’s promises gave them gladness instead of mourning, and they could wear that mantle of praise instead of a faint spirit. They connected with this message and each other. I’ve seen the pictures of these lives, heard these stories of rejoicing in God’s work!

But it’s different now, right? Here in the land of Act 47, where we hope to be delivered out of bankruptcy, but know we still come out to a mess. Rejoice?? We feel older and more tired, our health is failing, the money is gone, that life is a thing of the past. Rejoice? Like the people of Israel, it’s not how we hoped in this land. We’re not just poor in spirit, we’re staring at a physical reality that’s downright depressing some days. Rejoice? Easier said than done.

Maybe it’s hard to imagine restoration and re-building when it’s easier to see what looks more like wreckage than life. A world where we’re surrounded by a world of “instant” products that lead us to want a big event, but God gives us fireweed. Just little flashes. Real restoration takes time.

True, we know the good news of Jesus Christ- we know more than the people of Isaiah did. The one everyone was waiting for has come. He has a name: Jesus. But fuller restoration takes time. God’s revelation has begun in Jesus Christ, but it’s a story of ongoing transformation. Not always found in big obvious events. And yet perhaps we can remember the birth we’ll celebrate was like this too- In the middle of the darkness, to immigrants of little consequence in a backwater place where most did not see or know. John tells us, there’s one in our midst who we do not know. Perhaps like those in Bethlehem, our lack of knowledge comes because we’re not looking in the places where God’s signs show up.

Real restoration happens in lots of little ways. Our ‘fireweed stories” proclaim God’s promise and work in these ways in the meantime. Like God’s people of old, recalling God’s work seen encourages us to look for and expect to see this now. Not just in some ultimately glorious day, but in little flashes we should rejoice in now! God’s church didn’t grow in one big event. It was lots of little flashes of life. Sometimes bright but also sometimes faint. But ever present. And this is the how people here testified to each other, to you, about Christ. You helped each other believe there was life beyond the devastation of a World War world, and other dark places. Pastor Radcliffe was one who helped people see this possibility. He was an amazing servant of God. But he wasn’t the only one. The people of this place told the story too. And the world that emerged revolved not around them but around God at work in this place. As great as any of these people have been, the real message has never been about them. Their words and lives testified to the light and life of the One greater than all of us. This is the gospel for us.

We help each other see the life and light of Christ when we rejoice in stories of our history that help us believe that we can still see these unexpected flashes of God at work. So I come to testify to this light and life here. In the child who comes and wants to light the candles and prays she is tall enough, telling her friends to come and see brings rejoicing! The homebound person who stills calls others to brighten their day even when she can’t leave her apartment brings light! The person who delivered flowers to the hospital to a woman, but who never knew that that woman cried tears of joy because she remembered God hadn’t left her alone and forgotten, brought hope! The person who brings a man transitioning from prison to testify that there is life and a home here brings restoration! I could go on and on- everyday I see this. Glimpses of Christ. I see it and rejoice! It transforms me each day! Look around you, where have you seen God at work? Rejoice, be transformed and testify to the power of the One whose promise of light and life and restoration lives on. AMEN

Good News From the Wilderness

2011-12-04T18:37:00.001-05:00

It’s that time of year. Time for my favorite Christmas special -“Merry Christmas Charlie Brown.” Charlie Brown’s directing the school Christmas pageant, but no one’s listening. Everyone’s caught up in details, of their costumes, who got the bigger part, their naturally curly hair. They’re distracted. They don’t seem to get it’s really all about. Here in the neighborhood lots of houses remind me of the show’s depiction of Snoopy’s doghouse with the lights and the blowup Santas and the head bobbing lit reindeer. Mind you, I’m not being judgmental- I love the lights too. But as I listen to people in their decorating, I hear that we race to get out more and more decorations to cheer us up. And some people don’t put them all up at once so their neighbor can’t outdo them. It happens in church too- we need bigger and better stuff to get the party started, and it’s not enough, we need more. NOW. Charlie Brown’s high hopes leave him disillusioned and then we hear Linus’ simple speech on an empty stage that brings good news that another strand of Christmas lights can’t. He walks alone onto the empty stage, with his blanket, stands in a single spotlight, recounting the opening of the Gospel of Luke we’ve all come to know, in response to Charlie Brown’s question of “what’s the true meaning of Christmas?”

Like Charlie Brown I wonder- I wonder if we lose sight that we’re not focusing on what really matters. Even with the Christmas story. Even the other Gospels give us what we’ve come to expect about the story of Jesus in the buildup to Christmas. The Gospel of Mark is well… a little under-whelming. It’s not the “more” we need to “get us in the holiday mood.” You can’t decorate with the Gospel of Mark. There are no shepherds in the fields, or three kings from afar. No guiding star. No manger scene with cows and the donkey. No heavenly chorus in the skies. No little baby for us to cuddle. We get Jesus in his 30’s, beginning his ministry with an opening line so sparse we can simply rattle it off as the necessary intro to get the story moving: “The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, Son of God.” In the face of all of the buildup in commercial Christmas, and even the other gospels, when we hear the words in Mark it feels like someone suddenly pulled the plug on the lights and we’re left with a deflated blow up Santa in a heap on the ground. And at the end of commercial Christmas decoration season that’s all we’ll have when we pull the plug. There has to be something more.

“The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ” feels a little sparse. Maybe we could simply leap over these words, and at least get to John the Baptist in his funky camel hair outfit, and those locusts. What IF in this first of the gospels shared with the early believers, we don’t hear all the flashy stuff because it could distract us from THE thing?

The opening words are a statement of faith about God’s good news that shaped the whole Gospel of Mark. To force us to see that what it’s all about is that Jesus’ arrival is how God’s good news happens and Jesus is God’s good news happening. Good news! Mark talks about good news a lot. So today we’re going to learn a little Greek- euangelion. It means “good news!” This is the beginning word and it’s where words like “evangelism” and the “evangelical” come from. Something to think about when we get worried that people see “evangelical” in our name as the Evangelical Lutheran Church and wonder if we’re THOSE kind of Christians. Buried under all the other meanings- the real way the gospel means it, evangelical Christians are: followers of Christ who bear the good news.

Marks’ gospel says, “This is how the good news of what happened in Jesus started, before we even knew what was happening.” Then the people listening heard words of the prophets they knew well- including Isaiah- Remember what Isaiah said?” He said there’d be good news! 23 times. It must really be true.

Quoting Isaiah means that NOW is when hopes and dreams are being fulfilled. We’re not just telling a story again and longing. God’s bringing something more powerful NOW. Even John the Baptist’s clothing says this. Ever wonder why he’s the guy wearing the camel skin and belt? Early listeners would have known- He’s dressed like Elijah, one of THE prophets!” A little Bible trivia. The point is-God’s plan for salvation really IS breaking forth NOW. And it’s good news!

The good news is Jesus Christ. The REAL story is always about “the good news of Jesus Christ.” And we should really call Him “Jesus the Christ.” Because Christ isn’t just a name, Christ isn’t Jesus’ last name, it’s a title. it’s how Jesus carries out the good news. “Christ” means “anointed by God, chosen for this purpose-to free, redeem and save us. Jesus is this, but it won’t look like we expect. Because God loves us enough that we don’t just get another baby born, or another prophet, or another great man. We get God with skin. This is the story of how Jesus= the good news. Jesus embodies the same love God showed when God led Israel out of exile and wilderness to freedom and life. But better! Jesus=salvation.

And we need to be prepared for this new reality.

John the baptizer says make the way straight and we hear about repentance. What he’s saying is “radically reorient your focus around the truth of Jesus the Christ.” We don’t get tips for surviving in the wilderness, but how to be brought out of it and into life. Open up, prepare, clear out the distractions and make room for this good news to enter.

Wherever your wilderness places are, the ones you’re trying to feed in some other way, maybe even another strand of lights-hear the good news! God is near. Jesus says, “turn back and believe this good news!” “Respond to this good news, it gives life! “ And don’t just hold onto it. Jesus will tell all who listen and follow-“this good news must be preached to all nations, lived and proclaimed to the whole world!” And it’s just beginning!

We’re not just hearing a story, we’re in it! Part of God’s ongoing good news, as those baptized not only by water but the Holy Spirit. Called to channel our energy around God’s vision.

Last Sunday was one example. For those far from home, far from familiar faces, life can feel like a wilderness existence. God and community seem distant. When God’s love breaks through, it’s good news! God’s good news and love will come to those who receive the 45 bags we prepared last Sunday. We shared good news with the homebound, stressed out college kids and people serving in real wildernesses in military deployment. Those gifts will proclaim Christ-life, love, hope and “salvation from the wilderness.”

When we do these things, we’re getting a little evangelical. We really are THOSE kind of Christians- who speak and live the good news of Jesus the Christ. But we’re not focusing on what WE do, but what God in Christ has done and is doing. God doesn’t need us to spruce it up. Instead God wants to re-shape our lives around the only and ultimate fact we need. That in “the beginning of the good news, of Jesus, the Christ, the anointed and our Savior- God acted.”

And God is still acting. This is the real meaning of it all. And it’s the real power that brings us back from our wilderness places and the message we share with others in theirs. We’re caught up in the middle of God’s unending and loving plan for salvation. It’s a power that goes on and on. That’s not just good news, it’s the best news. AMEN

Finding the Story of Hope

2011-11-27T21:36:00.001-05:00

This past week, on Tuesday, a woman and her 8 yr old set up a tent in the parking lot of one of the Big stores. It was them against the world, waiting for the opening of Black Friday sales. The ad had a really great teaser price for a toy everyone wants but only a couple will get. Hundreds of people lined up in hope even though it’s dangerous to be first in line, with crowd stampedes in stores, or this year someone decided to pepper spray everyone who might get the toy first. Every year we hear about people actively committed, vigilant, waiting for the clerk to come and open the door, so they can get the thing they hope will make it all better, til the next fad. We all tell their stories. And every year we hear stories about nailing down the timeline for the fate of the world. I think it’s no surprise there are more predictions this year- we’re increasingly disheartened and nervous in the world. This week brought another Mayan calendar discovery. We anticipate these stories, sharing the news that at least will distract us from our lives. But our time isn’t unique. It was a troubled and confused world Jesus was born into. A world hoping that something or someone powerful would come make it better.

Today we begin the season of Advent which places us at odds with our world. While everyone’s hoping to get the right stuff that will bring happiness, we’re called to focus in a different way and to tell a different story. To light a candle and tell God’s story. Calling to God- Stir up your power and Come! This candle tells the story of hope. We remember the waiting- what happens that leads to Jesus’ birth. But also what happens after Jesus’ death. In the midst of the season of manufactured joy, today’s gospel speaks Jesus’ last words to the disciples before the cross- Stay awake and aware. Stay focused. But how can we? In an onslaught of ads telling us to buy happiness, and people telling us we should because all this God stuff is just a pipedream? Now more than ever maybe we identify not only with the gospel, but with the words of Isaiah – as people who feel alienated, stunned by their experience, who tell God-“Hey, no one is speaking your name. No one takes hold of you, Lord. Don’t be mad at us, it’s hard to be in this place.”

And this is the point of Jesus’ words to the disciples. They’re intended to be words of hope, because God knows the world we live in. But, lots of people look at today’s gospel and get frustrated. We still want hope in the form of a real timeline. Instead we get planets and weather and a fig tree. So people try to look for signs, or hidden meaning and then lump it together with Armageddon and power. Next thing you know it’s negative and frightening and judgmental. Words of hope become words of fear as we cringe and wonder about what we see. Then “Keep awake” sounds like we need a 5 Hour Energy Drink, and if we do fall asleep, it better be at the right time. But remember these words of Jesus to the disciples are words of hope. If we begin reading just two verses earlier, I think it helps us frame our perspective. Jesus tells them and tells us:

“There’ll be lots of fake prophets and fake saviors.” He’s preparing his followers for the world after the cross. People struggling to know the real truth about Jesus and God’s vision. Where so many things will be said and done in Jesus’ name we’d need help to clarify and preserve the truth. People will rise up against the powers that be, then claim this revolt would usher in the return of Christ- Lots of misunderstandings. So Jesus says “keep focused on what you can rely on- My words. Focus your belief and actions on what is real.” We all face those times when we say, “We’re looking for you, Jesus but we can’t see you. Where are you? Is our hope real? We’re surrounded by unbelieving, sinful people.” The generation we hear of, I think is made up of all the people living on earth til the return of Christ, of those who won’t believe, who will hurt others, and bring destruction. Who will sidetrack us with predictions of what we can’t know-use up our energy that could better be spent elsewhere. Or who tell us that none of that matters, so do what you feel ‘cause it’s all temporary. All of this can lead us away from our focus- what it means that Christ was born AND died AND has risen AND will return. This is what we as disciples have been given to preach and teach about as we make disciples. So Jesus reminds, “When I return it will be unmistakable. But you can’t know the time or compel it. Lots of people will tell you otherwise- But stay focused and resist this, and the fear it brings. Live in my hope.”

How do we live in this hope when we need something to hold onto? We tell God’s story in the birth of Jesus.

In Advent we remember and celebrate the birth, how God has acted in this promise that speaks hope. We remember the waiting and then the joy. But we also tell God’s story in the Cross. We aren’t just remembering “Baby Jesus,” but Christ of the Cross. God acted in this promise too, in waiting and then joy. We wait for the return of a Crucified and Risen Christ where there will then be joy. The ongoing story of God fulfilling promises, bringing hope. Telling this story we can live in hope that God is still at work. Then keeping awake isn’t about looking for predictions but proclaiming God’s power, focused on God’s Word for us. There will be times we confess, “Lord, we couldn’t see you and we stopped speaking your name, we stopped taking hold of you. “ But the stories remind us that then God really does take us and form us anew, we’re not forsaken. The distance from the resurrection to God’s ultimate promise is unknown but when we gather and tell the story, we share Christ with us, for ourselves and for other.

And so we tell the story again- We light the darkness and remember what God has already done and hold onto where God is going. Yes, Baby Jesus in the manger matters, but the real reason we have hope is also about everywhere Jesus goes after the manger- fulfilling God’s hope and salvation. While lots of other people and ideas will come and go, these are the words that are constant. That give us hope so can again call, “Stir up your power, Lord and COME! “ And believe.

AMEN

Meeting our Master in Neediness

2011-11-23T21:07:00.001-05:00

As the new girl in town I was blessed to preach the Thanksgiving Eve ecumenical service- what a blessing!

I’d like to start out by asking a question: How many of you are planning on flinging yourself on the ground, with your face in the dust as the way of saying thank you tomorrow at your Thanksgiving meal? Any takers? No, me either. It’s not exactly our way of giving thanks. It doesn’t seem like us. Yet in a lot of ways we’ve made being thankful fit our needs. From turning to Hallmark to find the right words for us to funding research to show being thankful is worth it. Studies show that being thankful improves our health, and relationships, and business success. So we can feel good. And Lord you know we’re busy,it’s hard to find time to be thankful. So we hope it’s OK to offer perfunctory words to a God who’s just pleased we say thanks, who just wants a minute of our time. Right?

The leper’s response is fundamentally different, profound and worshipful. Heartfelt. Many of us will say thanks tomorrow, many of us have a usual prayer. I confess I too am not agonizing over the prayer nearly as long as the preparations for the meal. We’ve been busy trying to outdo ourselves. Making sure we get it right. Have the meal at a time that allows me to go to yours AND the other side of the family too. To do the expected things. But we are hurrying to meet our schedule and of course, football. With the table groaning with the weight of the food and we remember Wait! Someone should say grace, but Hurry up while it’s all hot. Hurry before it conflicts with our scheduled lives. When I was gorwing up I remember years when grace sounded like this: “Blessusolordforthesethygiftswhichweareabouttoreceivethroughyour bountyinchristsnameamen.” 48 years of living have shown me a few Thanksgivings like that. Thanks that’s not too deep or needy.

The lepers were needy. That’s not a word we like. We don’t like to think about neediness. Their community was built on neediness. The disease they had in common drew them together. But all of the really important relationships had been cut off. Then they meet Jesus, who tells them it’s all changing and go and do what restores you. Seeing the priests would restore them to community and more importantly, from God’s perspective, to worship. But I wonder was their first thought was about being glad to worship in the temple or about their other rights and privileges-to eat and drink and socialize? I’m not sure, but for nine former lepers, they could now wake up and say the expected morning prayer of thanks they used to:” I give you thanks God, that I am not one of THEM!” I’m chosen.

For nine this works.

But for the tenth, the Samaritan, he’s one of those people the other nine will resume giving thanks they are NOT. Going back to this status quo doesn’t work. Going back to the way it was is still being left out. Going home meant picking up the same old labels, limits, violence and prejudice. It would after all, be expected. To stand with a different idea would take more than faith in the status quo. Yet, he’s been healed by a man who should never have had anything to do with him even if he weren’t a leper. So who would do this? And why? It must mean something more. Who is this man for whom distinctions don’t matter? It has to be about something more that liberates and restores in a larger way than the status quo. That’s not just healing that’s salvation. He ponders this I think because what Jesus does and brings forth is a game changer.

For most of us being able to gather together and eat tomorrow is expected, not a game changer. Most of us will thank God for blessings of loved ones and family and the mashed potatoes. I doubt we’ll sit down and speak of our neediness and of being saved from the status quo by Christ. I doubt we’ll sit down to dinner and think about THAT when we say the words of thanks we call “grace.”

That would be a real leap of faith. Our holiday of Thanksgiving began after a gut wrenching time in this country, nail-biting existence. A community galvanized by fundamental neediness who realized the status quo had not been enough. That was true in the later 1700’s and again in 1863 when Abraham Lincolnn issued the proclamation on our bulletins. But that’s all been co-opted in our world, both on the official day and in daily living. But turn on the news again today and see than in this world, this country and this city as we look at the collapse of the status quos and people’s general dis-ease today, perhaps we really are called to stop and ponder more deeply.

It really is about something more. What happens in the Gospel BEFORE this story of the ten lepers is that the disciples have asked Jesus to increase their faith. Not to give them faith, but to deepen it.

Jesus first asks them if a servant should be thanked for getting his master a meal. “Of course not!

The servant is just doing his job.” Doing what is expected. That’s not a deep concept.

This is when we hear of Jesus and the ten lepers. Nine saw they were healed and responded with what was expected. The tenth, responded with deeper faith, beyond his condition, with insight into a glimpse of the power of Christ. He wasn’t just healed, he was saved. Which is not about fixing our status quo, or keeping it. The key to understanding how Jesus is about more than this is the word the lepers call him- “Master.” Every time we hear it, something profound happens. Throughout the Gospel of Luke, when someone cries out Master, here is what happens:

When we’ve tried every strategy, used all of our energy, and all of our time, we’re exhausted and we think there is nothing more to be expected-. “Master!” And Jesus tells the skeptical – “try again. Put in the net the way I say” It defies our methods, but the result is beyond comprehension. When things seem dangerously choppy, and perilous, and we feel alone in the churning and uncertainty-“Master!” Out of chaos, Jesus stills the storm. When we think something is too big to be changed, too overwhelming to be reversed, and there is nothing we can do“ Master!” And Jesus brings healing. When we think we know how the world is structured-our Master brings reversal. None of these seem easy or possible and by our hand they are not. That’s right- they’re NOT. This is what the words from our reading from Deuteronomy tell us. No matter how much intellect, or desire or strength we have. Saying “Thank you for ourselves and our status quo” isn’t deepening faith. It’s about seeing ourselves in our neediness and where Jesus meets us. We are all needy.

It takes strength to see our neediness and to respond with more than complacency or civic gratitude. It’s a challenge to see God as Master and go beyond approaching God superficially. But this is where Jesus calls us go- deeper into our hearts. To seek greater understanding of who Jesus is. Jesus is the Master. This is blessing and it’s a challenge because this gospel, this good news, will call us to do more than decry the systems that cause oppression and pain. And calls us to do more than brag about how those problems don't happen in our neighborhood, or in our churches. To see that they do. And to turn to the Master for guidance to do something about it. This gospel calls us to worship and live lives of praise that respond in true recognition of the needs of all us and to respond in true gratitude for God’s power and reversal. It’s a distinct and new way of living. That begins with the realization that only in faith and through Jesus Christ can our world receive what we really need.

To hold in our hearts this profound truth-Our Master changes lives. This is worthy of our thanks and praise!

It’s a struggle to follow Christ in the face of a culture built upon industry and ingenuity as the source and where people tell us systems can’t be changed. Grasping the in-breaking of Christ allows us to proclaim that that there’s no chance for growth and new life if all we are about is token thanks and falling back on our systems. Instead to embrace and proclaim this we really will need the Master. Thanks be to God this is where Jesus meets us, in our need, just like the lepers. Tomorrow when you gather may your heartfelt thanks to the Master be a prayer rooted in this grace.

I close with a prayer for all of us from the Masai people in Tanzania. Let us pray:

For your blessing we thank you, God: faith in you.

Increase it we beg, so that we no longer doubt.

Drive out our miserliness, so that we do not refuse you anything.

Increase our faith, for the sake of those without faith.

Make us instruments of your faith, for those with only a little.

Fill our bodies with your faith, our bodies that work for you all our days.

Help us to avoid the enemies of our faith, or to overcome them.

You are with us in confrontations, this we believe.

In your hands we place ourselves and are secure.

Make haste to enter our hearts, make haste.

Amen.

“Make us Instruments of your Faith” from An African Prayer Book, by

Desmond Tutu, p. 94.

Words for Beginning Being Bound Together

2011-11-21T07:26:00.001-05:00

Another one of the September sermons- sorry they are out of order. This was the first sermon I preached as the newly called pastor on September 4, 2011. My goal was to connect this week's sermon to the followibg week which was September 11th. At the end of the two weeks, we incorporated the Litany for Healing and Forgiveness which allowed us to begin important work together while honoring emotions of the transition :

Here we are on our first “official” Sunday together in ministry. God has bound us together. This is exactly the sense of binding of the community that Matthew is speaking of. Both this week’s lesson and next week’s offer us teaching that fits together as we hear God’s words about living as a bound community of believers amongst ourselves and in the world. As we wrestle with the desire to have community, to be with others, we also know that community can be a funny thing. It seems so simple to say we’re all here because of the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I don’t really want to take my first Sunday with you to talk about “cutting loose.” But I know that in our collective lives together it doesn’t take long for us to be on different pages about what it means to be God’s people and how the community should act. Somewhere along the line, though God has brought us together, we will find ourselves at odds. Yet being those who follow Jesus’ words about fellowship challenges us to a new discipline of caring for each other even when we are injured or offended, and being trained to binding and loosing ourselves to repent and to forgive through Christ. Since our journey is just beginning I’m not aware of any tension between us. This may be the best time to talk about how we might respond- a time when we are not feeling tense.

In every community, there will be occasions for tension. Perhaps in times when God is challenging us in new ways that test our limits, or places where we have to wrestle with what faithful living will mean. Moments when we are asking ourselves. “What do we hold onto and what do we let go?” In these moments, there will be potential for conflict. Just saying that word can make us uncomfortable. In our lesson, Jesus speaks of those places we need to address sin, repentance, and reconciliation. Conflict is not sin. Conflict in and of itself is simply that co-existence of two ideas that are not in agreement. Conflict is not sin.

Our responses to conflict however often are. Today we hear Jesus’ teaching on the notion of how to resolve the pain that behaviors cause in the community. And the starting point to keep in mind is that everything each of us does affects our community. This is countercultural. Our world says “Have it your way.” Jesus calls us to consider that what we do and say is about more than our individual wills. Then we’re called to live out our life in relationships with God and each other in all of the messiness. And to always strive to reconcile. When someone feels wronged we’re encouraged to embrace a series of steps. But first, here is what we do not hear-

We do not hear, "when you are wronged, talk about it with others while excluding the person who has caused the hurt."

We do not hear, "ignore what has happened."

We do not hear, "try to solve it for someone else using the indirect model. "

None of these leads to reconciliation.

Reconciliation is about our collective and perpetual re-establishing of community as the Body of Christ. Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his book, Life Together, notes that being the Body of Christ means not only being with those whom we consider devout and earnest and worthy, but also with those who are decidedly the OTHER- those with whom we don’t want to be community. Reaching out, drawing back together and binding these as well. Walk toward that person, and if your own words do not bring reconciliation, take other believers to be there as the witness of what God desires. Even in the worst case scenario where we find ourselves unable to reconnect, the words we hear next have a different meaning and focus than our world would give. “Treat that person as a tax collector, or a Gentile.” These are negative labels. The world would interpret this to say,”cut that person loose. Kick them off of the island, walk away and don’t look back.” But Jesus says, this person is now your mission- you'll have to start over from scratch, confront him or her with the need for repentance, and offer again God's forgiving love" . As one of my seminary professors has said, this approach doesn't deny the reality of sin or minimize the differences we actually have, but it does remind us as Christians, that our core principle is unity based on God's love, not exclusion based on someone else's sin.

The three steps of Jesus teaching are about helping the person who feels wronged to be directly connected to a process of re-connecting, repentance and forgiveness. And while repentance is a necessary component, its goal is not about wanting to wield the hammer of divine law, but to open up the possibility of divine forgiveness to those who Jesus called the lost sheep worth going to the ends of the earth to restore. SO while in our life together we may at times need to let go of ideas, we are not asked to let go of people. We’re told to banish the strife, wounding and pain that lead to death, by naming it and then breaking open God’s grace in its place. We have been brought out of death into life through grace, to be God’s instruments of this grace for God’s ultimate purpose-proclaiming salvation and bringing love.

In all of our living together the center of our existence when we are gathered is not ourselves, but Christ. Christ redeemed us, delivered from our sin, and called us to faith and eternal life. Christ continues to be the center and the mediator of our lives. Christ is the only way we can live in peace. And centered in Christ is the only way we stay bound to each other in the life God intends. Christ is who we meet in prayer to be our guide for all our days.

When we gather in His name, in prayer and community, THERE is the power of God’s love for our lives and our world. When we can acknowledge that this love is what we have in common, it might not only be a good step for us in our life together a community of believers, it is indeed what we will need to work for a more peaceable and just world for all. AMEN

(seminary professor quote: Rick Carlson)

God's Vineyard is Not the Marketplace

2011-11-21T07:05:00.001-05:00

Playing a little catchup at this end of the Church year. Being the new Pastor, showing up on the eve of the stewardship time was a challenge. Rather than just talk about Money, which I think limits our view anyway, I talked about stewardship of relationships, of worship and how our discipleship journey informs the decisions we make on many levels.
here is the sermon from September 16, 2011 with the Workers in the Vineyard on the Sunday of the week that Reading was named the "Poorest City in the US."

Trinity Church on Wall Street, New York City hosts an annual conference “Trinity Institute,” where they bring together religious and economic leaders to talk about how the church and the world intersect. A recent topic was entitled,” Building an Ethical Economy.” Just hearing ethics and economics together is probably challenging, especially as we experience jobs going offshore, and those who have jobs being stretched farther and farther, and financial wrongdoing. One of the Institute speakers was Dr. Kathryn Tanner who talked about our behaviors in the marketplace- we want to get our fair share of money and resources. We carve out our turf quickly because there’s not enough to go around, and some of us deserve it more than others. She asked what would happen if we saw the money and resources of our marketplace the way we see grace. I can have God’s grace and so can you and you and you. And there’s still enough to go around the world and across time. We can relax, quit competing so hard and trust in God’s arrangement of grace and providing. When I first heard her, I thought “Wow, what a radical idea!” Yet there’s this problem. I’m not so sure we see God’s grace that way. In fact I think sometimes we drag our marketplace perspective into our churches. We start deciding who should have a share, or a say. Who’s been here longer, or worked harder. Who’s earned it. We decide how God should be generous. It’s hard to embrace new faces or ideas because we already know how we do things, who does things and who ought to be included like it’s a payroll.

I’d like to ask us to look at our parable today as the Parable of The Unchosen and contemplate those left behind workers in the marketplace as people not numbers. And see God’s actions from their perspective. Anyone who’s ever lost a job or wondered if they will find one knows this feeling. We stand and look around at others and find ourselves saying it’s just NOT FAIR that we’re left out or passed over. The marketplace is a place that decides who’s worth it and what they’re worth. It uses terms like “planned obsolescence,” “depreciation,” “Past their prime” and “downsizing.” All ways of saying things and people become un-chosen. We might hear the parable as workers left out who were just lazy, our own lives tell us otherwise. Especially here in Reading-many who were chosen are feeling unchosen- when they’re too old, when the company moves because other workers are cheaper. And we live with the label –DISTRESSED CITY. Perhaps sadly we know the sinking feeling that we don’t feel like the chosen ones. You’d think we’d be able to keep the marketplace mentality out of our churches. But at times we rely on our history, and past performance. We know who’re the deserving ones. Here are a couple examples of what this might look like:
A young woman joined a church and she wanted to be involved. She saw they needed teachers for Sunday School so she signed up to help. But no one called. Those in charge continued to ask for help so she called the person in charge and offered again. She was brushed off. “Thanks, we have people who handle this and we’ll let you know.” But they didn’t. The young woman persisted- “You need help and I am willing.” “Well, dear you don’t seem like the teacher type.” It’s not fair. Sometimes we don’t want to share with the newcomer. But for that woman it meant she was the UNCHOSEN, standing in the marketplace with those left behind workers. Idle and wondering -Will anyone pick me? Or will they pass me by?

A group of older adults had met for fifty years for mid-day worship, Bible study and lunch. They used to number over 150. Now there were 18. Some people thought that if only 18 were left, maybe the time had come to say it wasn’t worth it. Their time had passed. And people were ready to cast them back into that marketplace with the un-chosen. For some it’s unfair to dedicate resources to such an insignificant group. But the Bible study group felt the sting of being seen as UNCHOSEN and outdated. It’s unfair and it’s a shame. When we turn God’s grace into a commodity that some can have and others cannot, it causes pain.

Can we identify with these struggles? Of being ones who haven’t been picked, or passed by? In our neighborhood and here at Holy Spirit, I hear some wondering about the future-and on a bad day perhaps asking if we still have a purpose, or value, or whether it’s too late. To those who wonder-God has three things to share this day- we can’t tell God how to be generous, we don’t know what time it is in God’s plan, and none of us decides who God chooses.

Here at Holy Spirit, we’ve been chosen in this part of God’s vineyard. The vineyard is not and SHOULD not be the marketplace. The vineyard’s a place where there’s a different vision of work, and worth and where there is something to be shared. Jesus says it’s never too late and keeps seeking out our co-workers and there is enough for all. God’s not done with this place or with us. While at times this will challenge us to see that other ideas or new faces are a part of God’s workforce, they will also be ways God will bring life and generosity to all of us. We don’t have to compete to be chosen. Because no one has to be the UNCHOSEN. We don’t have to live in that mentality. God’s grace is abundant and surprising.

My ordination here yesterday is God’s bold proclamation that it’s not too late in the day, and no matter whether you are young or old, a life longer or a newcomer, God has need of each of us. God has room for each of us. And each of us is worth it to God. This is good news! So come! It will take all of our hands, and those of our neighbors, but God’s got work for all of us and the harvest will amaze us. Let’s join together in trust and by the grace of God, let’s show the world that God and not the marketplace has the last word. We are rich indeed! AMEN

From Stranger to Family

2011-11-20T06:17:00.001-05:00

"When you're here you're family" It’s ironic to me that this is what the Olive Garden restaurant advertizes on TV.Amazing food and happy people. Come! They encourage us to come because when you’re here, “you’re family.” But then if you go, you know the drill- give us one name, take a pager and they tell you a number- how long you have to wait to be “family.” If you’re like me you‘re known by a lot of numbers. Customer number, Social Security number, drivers license number, insurance number. Our news is about numbers too - the number of unemployed, uninsured, incarcerated, below the poverty line, over 65. Now some Super Committee is supposed to find the magic numbers that will save us.

Even in our ministry we talk in numbers- how many people who came, how many bags of food, how many tortilla chips to make a serving for one person. It’s disheartening to be seen as a number. Categorized, prioritized and sorted. This is how we read today’s words- it’s about sorting and labels and ultimate fate. How many will we be with Jesus? The saddest thing is that while we long for caring and connection, all our behaviors and numbers reinforce keeping each other strangers. So even when we approach Jesus’ commandments of love, fear of risk leads us to domesticate hospitality and caring to safe numbers. People we identify with we will care for. Blind to everyone else who’s still just a number or a label. We think all these numbers are a part of life, but their rule of over us brings the opposite. Suddenly we’re all strangers to someone. Good thing Jesus doesn’t tell us what we tell kids- “don’t’ talk to strangers.”

Our Ruler and Shepherd has a different vision. And it’s personal. Good news for all feeling swallowed up in the crowd. God took on flesh and challenged all our assumptions, seeking out lost, helpless, scattered and neglected. Through Christ, sheep were sought and restored. God is still seeking us out, bringing us back from scattered places, giving us the food and strength, healing and hope we really need. Drawing us into God’s family and into true life. Christ alone has the power to do this. Christ alone has the heart to shepherd us to this new place beyond numbers and strangers. This is what we celebrate again this day. Our worship and sacraments remind us of God’s power and love. They start with something different. We’re not sinner number 5437. We’re Jane, Michael, Nancy and Zach. The world wants to treat us as statistics, God speaks our name. Others say we’re ineligible or unqualified. God claims us. And makes us new family. Teaching a new way of being that worships Jesus and not our numbers brings salvation. And we’re called to praise and live Christ’s power and love in ways that are personal and continue challenge our assumptions. To go beyond statements about others that start with “I didn’t realize.”

To tell others beyond here, they’re family too.

This is what happened to a woman in Seattle. Her church decided to help host a homeless tent city. Seattle lacked enough shelter housing but required the homeless to move every few weeks. Churches took on the project of offering space. They signed up for doing their Christian duty.

But many worried and calculated the cost of water, trash, risk, inconvenience. They felt obligated to help “the least,” but their identity and the cost were uncomfortable. Numbers and labels. This is how the woman felt too, but after awhile, she decided to bake bread and take it out to them. She liked to bake. Her warm bread began conversations. She found she enjoyed talking to some of “them.” They liked her bread. She felt good. Then one day it happened- she recognized a familiar face- and realized this “homeless man” was a long lost cousin. His “issues” had scattered him away from family. Everything changed. He wasn’t some “needy poor soul”- he was family. It re-shaped her whole understanding. Her needs and his were healed. Transformed, she pursued offering worship, then Communion and real hospitality, then advocating for things she saw with new eyes.

Maybe that’s what the disciples mean when they say- when did we do what you asked Jesus? When she went out she knew she was trying to live faithfully, but she didn’t fully realize she was bearing Christ or that she would meet Christ. But it happened. Real love and hospitality happened in an unexpected, untamed way. Bringing restoration and community and life to many. A small gesture grew into an encounter with Christ’s embodiment of true hospitality. Beyond social obligation, needs, labels and numbers, seeing people with names and stories, all needing to hear and see again Christ’s life-changing power and love. When we embody this vision in our living and being, God brings an end to effects of “nameless and faceless.” It starts with feeding and clothing, visiting the sick and imprisoned, but they’re more than a list or a social obligation. They are brothers and sisters.

When we meet them, we can expect that in Christ and by Christ we and they will be shaped and transformed. Becoming more than a babysitting service or a meal plan, or a polite smile. More than just a social service agency handling our share of the numbers. Because while it starts with everyday things, what we proclaim with these things is the power and hope of Christ. We proclaim that through Christ we will all be transformed. Bags of food, Kleenex, note cards, microwave popcorn, Advil, budgets for spending and rooms in this building- reflect the power and hope we seek and find in Christ. Our living and being are the out-flowing of who we become in Christ. Bearers of the love of Christ who are taken to the places of others’ deepest needs where we’re reminded by Christ of our own needs. Then we realize others aren’t so strange after all. They are us. We’re family: Weak and vulnerable, with wants and fears as our common story. YET met by the true source of grace and power-Christ. Christ continues to shepherd us to cross that distance from “stranger” to kin, from death to life, reminding us that through Him we all hear- “Come, God has prepared this for you. You’re not a stranger. You’re family.” AMEN

Playing it Safe Isn't the Answer

2011-11-12T09:03:00.001-05:00

There are so many things going on in the life of the parish and in our world. It is our Harvest Home Sunday. People will bring and have been bringing pantry items. I am delighted they share. I am fascinated that most of what is offered is generic not branded items yet I know that in our homes we buy something better for ourselves. Yet how do we make ends meet?
I will also have my first baptism as a pastor :)
And certainly both the global economic news and the local news about what happens when people play it safe rather than risk their world is on minds with the events at Penn State and the Second Mile program which has had an event in Reading. So, quite a stew pot of items this week.

Mygrandmother lived through The Great Depression. So she saved everything and hidmoney in places like the freezer, and the underwear drawer. She was playing itsafe. We think we found it all after she died, but if it was in the garden,it’s probably still there. I used to think it was ridiculous to squirrel awaymoney like that, but as economies around the world teeter on the brink, it’stempting. Actually, in Jesus’ day, digging a hole in the ground and hidingmoney was the safe and virtuous thing to do. It was the one way you couldprotect money entrusted to you. Bury it for another day because banks were unreliable. Conventional wisdom said “Play ItSafe.” The man given one talent was doing just that. After all, he’d been givenmoney worth fifteen years of a working man’s wages. A modern equivalent of $450,000-$500,000.Lots of money. But the servant given 5 talents wasgiven more than a lifetime. He got a legacy. To risk such a thing was all butinsane. What could be so sure that you’d risk like that? “Play it safe.”Conventional wisdom offered a pretty good survival strategy. The one-talentservant’s description of his master was also conventional wisdom. Rich landowners of Galilee were generallycorrupt. They took what wasn’t theirs and took advantage of the market.Everybody in Jesus' audiences would have gotten that this. What if how theother servants acted isn’t the point? What if WHY they acted matters? Theyacted like the Master. They were sure they could fly in the face ofconventional wisdom because of what they believed about the Master. Then theexpectation of the guy who played it safe wasn’t justified. It was about morethan just holding on to it all. You’d have to really be sure to risk. But they trusted their Master morethan other voices.

And here we are. In a shaky economy,wondering how long we can hold on unless we hold on tight. We want to give andshare but our world jostles us back and forth between “invest in the market”and calls to live cautiously in the safety of established patterns. Both waysfeel unfulfilling. We haven’t found a formula for success, and we hope at leastfor a formula for avoiding failure. This is a pretty dim view about money andour world. So we think we need to play it safe and protect the legacy foranother day in case. What do WE make of the shocking reversal in the storywhere the master enacts that dim view and casts the poor guy into the outerdarkness? Is this level of anger and animosity what playing it safe deserves?Is this what will happen to us? Rather than making it literal , let’s see thislesson as a teaching tool designed to shock. So we grasp that in the kingdom ofGod, God doesn’t play by the world’s rule book.

This is a story to reveal God and to challengehow we see God. This imagery is used first to show the feeling God has when weview God like we view the men and women of our world. Remember that in thestory the servant tells the master how he thinks the master acts. The responsefrom the master is- you REALLY think that’s me? WHY the servant acted matters. It’sa question of attitude. Do we really think that God will be that way? What IF God lived up to our expectations? It’seasy to forget- the nature of God is different. Yetwhen we play it safe, we turn in on ourselves and away from God and others. Andpeople suffer. This is not the joy and the life God intends. When securitybecomes the overwhelming consideration, this is living death. (Randy Read).

Focusing on playing it safe actuallycreates a world of utmost insecurity. (Dag Hammerskjold). We don’t find growthor joy. Instead we create what we hopeto avoid. Lack of trust in God and failing to invest in this relationship and God’sgifts, can lead to loss. All we need to do is read the news to see. Those whocling to only their own devices, or who try hide and protect their world, findthat they create a world where even what they have will be taken away. The realplace of outer darkness is being buried in loneliness, isolation, and regret.This is true not only with money but with the ways we choose to act on behalfof others- the poor, the immigrant, the victims, the outcast.

The goal is not be found holding ontowhat is given but risking it for the sake of the Kingdom. The challenge for us day in and day out is toavoid becoming cynical, expecting nothing more from God than we do the chairmanof Bank of America or anyone else in power who fails us. We struggle to beconfident about God and all that life and abundance. But we shouldn’t let our attitudesabout our world color our understanding of God. Instead we are encouraged to respondto God’s kingdom by trusting God is ushering in something different. Becausewe believe our Master is different. While we wait for the full story, it’s hardto hold onto that in the face of the world where news of scarcity and fear isabundant. Let US again this day be taught:

We receive a lifetime of wealth thatstarts in our baptism, and the gifting of the Spirit. It’s a moment wecelebrate this day. God invites us to enter into the life, light and joy. We receivethe blessing of spiritual gifts- love, forgiveness, faith, hope, trust, andcompassion. We’re reminded that our fortunes are reversed. So we can risk theultimate reversal of behavior-throwing it all in- what the other two servantsdo. “Throw it all in” is God’s call to us to live out our identity. God wantsto call all God’s children to life and light and joy. To abandon conventionalwisdom in response to God’s faithful providing. To open ourselves to embracinga lifetime of loving God and God’s world with abandon. Daring to share.Believing we will be even more abundantly and unexpectedly blessed. Placing ourfaith in something and someone more than ourselves. Risking it all, because ofwho we trust that God is: The One who has faithfully provided a legacy and continuesto provide. Come and enter the kingdom, investit all for this vision. Jesus calls: Come and enter God’s joy!

It's about more than an Aisle

2011-11-10T20:19:00.001-05:00

A couple weeks ago, here at the church the phone rang and a young woman began a tale of being baptized in our church, how her brother had been married here and her family had gone here. HAD.

And how important it was to reconnect with this church. Oh, and she is engaged.

After listening politely I asked if either she or her beloved currently were a part of the congregation. They are not. I thoughtfully explained the wish of the congregation that one of them be a part of the congregation. (Lovely church that we are we don't just offer the loveliness for hire). I asked if she and her beloved were thinking of becoming a part of our church. "We could" she said. Not a ringing endorsement, but I offered to meet with the two of them face to face to talk about it all. Told her of the times for worship and encouraged her/them to come and be a part of worship here.

And that was all that transpired til today. They arrived and we all settled in. I asked again about their situation and learned the woman's Mom lives a few blocks away. "Have I met her?" I wondered. No, I was told, because she doesn't get out much and doesn't come here anymore. I renewed exploration of whether the couple was intending to be connected with this church. Well, there was the issue that they live about 25 minutes away. And he has mandatory Sundays at work. When I asked about her schedule, he offered she did not work Sundays. And she quickly corrected him that she could have to and sometimes she did. Hmmm.

While recognizing the sentimental connection to this church I wondered aloud if maybe another church closer to them might offer them a faith community they could connect with.
Silence. If it had been night time I might have heard crickets.

Well, then, can you tell me why having a wedding in a church is important? After all, marriages can happen anywhere and lots of people can officiate. And she blurted out:

WELL HOW ELSE CAN I GIVE MY DAD THAT CHANCE TO WALK ME DOWN THIS AISLE?

Well, there you have it.

I offered that there are many places which offer the chance to walk down an aisle. That the reason to be married in the church is that you believe that God is central to your life. That a religious ceremony offers- this is where the man chimes in- " God's blessing in your marriage." Exactly.

We really do offer more than an aisle or great pictures or a sentimental moment. We offer community. It starts when we meet for a few times and talk about the strengths of your relationship and the challenges you might face. And we offer people who will walk with you. And we offer help growing in what it means to be a follower of Christ and how that shapes our doing and being. It's not about being legalistic. It's about being centered in something and someone greater.

I can't make that be important to you. But I can tell you we believe it is important. So if you want to think about what's been said and discuss it, know that I am open to continuing to talk and explore all of these things but that takes getting together face to face because relationships deserve that.

SO she looks at him and says- "I don't know what do you think?" He defers and says that this is really her decision. "Oh fine, put it on me! That way when you don't like it, it was my idea!" OK. I encouraged them to take time and talk, when they can do it without me sitting there. Let me know. I am here.

I don't think we'll see each other again, but based upon my twenty minutes today, I really do hope they take their time. Because while I regret to inform them that we are about more than an aisle. So is marriage.

Can You Believe That You Are Blessed?

2011-11-05T10:27:00.001-04:00

Here in America's poorest city the flock and I are continuing to get settled in. As I visit our oldest living saints in the parish they share with me the stories of the departed, the history of their time in the parish and wonderful photos of big days and events for them and their loved ones. In a parish that recently celebrated its 100th anniversary, I know that my 94 year old homebound member who grew up here really is a living history of the life of the parish. And they tell me of the day when on Sunday morning the sidewalks were full of people walking to church, of the great confirmation class with 100 confirmands. And there was a building designed to handle it all with German precision.

Of course, time has changed and in the shadow of that experience, other things pale in comparison, and it's easy to become dis-spirited. This is the sense of being "poor in spirit" that Jesus speaks of. To mourn not only loved ones but a way of life.

In my first three months, we will have added six new members, a confirmand and baptized a baby. I count the "yes" not the "no." And we have had a lot of celebrating for these events and our anniversary. We have had opportunities to have breakfast together and lunches together, some of which are the crazy new pastor's idea- let's have a potluck after late service and invite people to come. Because we're all going to eat lunch anyway, because it's budget friendly and it's an easy open thing.

These potlucks look a little out of kilter from structured worship as a couple people off of the street come, or the neighbors whose lifestyle might bother some, join us. Or as an adult child caregiver sits down grateful to feed Mom lunch here. Or the widow knows she doesn't have to eat alone. It's not all precision and polished. We don't need tablecloths or fancy stuff. Or designated servers. Just ourselves, a munchie if we can share one and an appetite. It's OK that everyone doesn't come. It's fine that there is no signup sheet. We don't have to have enormous leftovers to complain about distributing. We just have to have enough. And maybe it means the early ones to eat need to not heap their plate. Or we end up sitting with someone we had no intention of being with. But they are lively get togethers. A moment of chaotic blessing. They look fun.

But recently one of the members told me that maybe we were having too many celebrations. TOO MANY CELEBRATIONS. We should celebrate -less? When I arrived the concern was that maybe they will not make it as a congregation- they fear they will die off. I think it is hard to celebrate an anniversary when you wonder if you really can live up to honoring the legacy of those departed saints.
We need to figure out how to live. But then again, maybe it involves being open-to allow God to bless us even if it looks different. So while this Sunday I will chant the Litany of the Saints and the 20 names for the past year, this sermon is about exploring our faith statement about God and the saints and being blessed not only in the "Great Beyond" but here and now.

As you all know we’ve had a lot of celebrations here sinceAugust. Anniversary, new members, confirmation, and on the horizon, baptism andmore new members. Lots to be excited by- God’s work in our midst. But someonerecently said perhaps we’ve had too many celebrations. Maybe we’re trained towait for the other shoe to drop. We shouldn’t think too much of ourselves. “Pridecomes before the fall.” And we all know that pride is not a saintly quality. Wewho feel charged with the responsibility of carrying on in the faith are toldto seek to live the godly life. To look to the saints. Some of them martyrs orapostles, but also those ordinary beloved we know. They too in death join thesaints. Today we remember and celebrate the lives of all those who have livedand died in the faith. I wonder if we don’t sometimes in memory make them moresaintly and less human. Forgetting that Saint Peter was quick to put his footin his mouth and Saint Paul had a wicked temper. That our aunts, uncles,parents, and other loved ones were not cleaned up angelic models, but weresaint and sinner all rolled into one when we knew them. Some of the bestmemories involve the times they were less saintly, in their shortcomings andflaws. The things that make us chuckle or shake our heads- the stories thatstart with- “remember the time when…?” Yet we this day proclaim in faith thatGod has blessed them anyway. The same thing happens in our churches- we lookupon the saints of days gone by and gloss over the very real struggles andmis-steps. They seemed to get it right, we tell ourselves. And maybe even findourselves saying- “if only they were here, it would be different.” And wearen’t so sure we can still be blessed.

And then we hear the Beautitudes- our lesson from Matthew. We’veheard more than our share about these sayings-what could be new? Yet In ourlongings and doubts, I wonder if we fall into the trap of seeing these sayingslike a contract with God-believing that Jesus is setting up the conditions ofblessing, rather than actually blessing his hearers. As one writer put it- “when I hear "Blessed are the pure in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom ofheaven," I tend to think, "Am I pure enough in spirit?" or"I should try to be more pure in spirit." Or, when I hear"blessed are the peacemakers...," I think, "Yes, I really shouldbe more committed to making peace." At least with "blessed are thosewho mourn, for they will be comforted," I have the assurance of knowingthat on those occasions when I am mourning I will be comforted. But, that'srelatively small comfort because the truth is I don't want to have additionalmourning to get added blessing.” Honestly, if this was the case, no matter howmuch we love our loved ones, who among us can stand up to the “blessed” test?

Fortunately Jesus doesn’t say, “If you do this- THEN thekingdom will be yours.” Instead, Jesus is acknowledging the reality of theearliest listeners and our world today. We find ourselves DIS-SPIRITED-poor in spirit with nothing left to give. Harboring other feelings in our hearts. Feelingunder attack; days we have no peace; facing losses that seem too large. Afraidto celebrate.

To all of these places in our lives, Jesus does not say- “waitfor the afterlife, and it’ll be better.” Jesus doesn’t tell us it would bebetter if we had more faith, if we were more saintly. Jesus doesn’t say- “somedaybut not today, the kingdom will be.” Jesus says “THE KINGDOM IS. AND BLESSEDARE YOU. THE KINGDOM IS UNDERWAY. LIVE AS THE BLESSED.” God wants to bless usnot just as saints in eternity but right now.

Are we as eager to be blessed as God is to bless us? Can webelieve God wants to bless us or are we still hanging on to our childhood imageof Old Testament God-as a stern, demanding law-giver?

Can we imagine God really intends to give thegrace we claim in our statements of faith? We all have faults and limitations, insecurities andfailings. Would God REALLY unconditionally bless this congregation- knowing whowe really are today, knowing that we can’t perfectly hold onto the vision ofour ancestors the way we thought?

Is it blessing if we didn’t plan it? Can it really be that Godwill bless us apart from anything we have done, earned, or deserve?

Can we still really expect celebrations?

David Lose says, “Jesus isn't setting up conditions butrather is just plain blessing people. All kinds of people. All kinds ofdown-and-out, extremely vulnerable, and at the bottom of the ladder people.Why? To proclaim that God regularly shows up in mercy and blessing just whereyou least expect God to be – with the poor not the rich, those who are sad notcelebrating, the meek and the peacemakers rather than the strong andvictorious. This isn’t how the world says it should be.

But because God showsup blessing the weak and the vulnerable, then God will be everywhere. Showeringall creation and its inhabitants with blessing. Unexpected, unsettling, nearlyinconceivable, BLESSING.”

This good news means all of those who have gone before, justas imperfect, really ARE saints because in the cross, God loves and adores.This is good news for you and I, fellow saints, because God is STILL blessingas the kingdom continues to unfold. God wants the best and calls us worthy ofblessing. Even when we have a hard timebelieving it.

Today we’ll name each of those saints who departed theirearthly life and proclaim them saints.

But now I’d like youto look at the people closest to you and tell them now- “You are a blessedsaint of God.”

YOU are blessed by God. Let’s open our ears and hearts tohear it, let it sink in. To be transformed for ourselves and our world. To beopen to receiving God’s surprising blessings, and to be God’s blessing.

This is how the kingdom unfolds. Then mercy is shown, thedowntrodden are uplifted, and peace breaks forth. Because the blessed begin tobelieve they really are.

This is the story ofGod’s will and work in all of the saints across time. This is where we can place our faith. Let usrejoice and be glad that God is a God who delights to create, bless, and redeem.

“Come you that areblessed by God, let’s dare to really live in the kingdom that IS.”

AMEN.

+ note: the picture is from my trip to Greece last year-I pray for all that that country is now facing. I found the work of Brian Stoffregen and David Lose to be great resources!

Living the Faith

2011-10-30T20:07:00.001-04:00

Today we lived in faith after a night of horrific weather. We held worship, where some had power and some not. Where some walked icy places to get there. And we had a confirmand who had brought her family from lots of places and called people who used to come to the church to COME! Come and celebrate this part of her journey. And they did. And we did. With moving worship, with youth helping at every point and with a potluck afterwards where we can sit and share and grow in our connections. I used the Reformation Day texts. Here is my sermon and my stole which was an illustration as we considered the texts and the day.

When I was baptized it didn’t happen in church. It took place in a gym because the church wasn’t built yet. And my godmother who flew in for it almost lost her job because right after the baptism the blizzard started and she got snowed in for two weeks. No one remembers other details but they all remember that story of how it started for me. We all have a story to tell that starts as God’s work in our baptism and continues in each of our lives as we follow Jesus. It starts with ordinary water and some words, but through them God does amazing things. The stole I’m wearing tells this story of God and me. Made of bits of neckties and scarves given to me by people connected to my journey of faith. A story told by bits of ordinary stuff drawn together by a few threads and the work of the Spirit. God used those little bits and those people to speak of what God has been up to and is still doing. It reminds me of God’s work in me, and of all the people whose faith has shaped mine. At the bottom are the blue parts- reminding me of baptism, when I was claimed as God’s child. The black parts remind me of times I was really scared or unsure. The bright ones remind me of love, laughter and joy. The dove reminds me that through the Holy Spirit God lives in me, giving me this faith and the gifts and strength to be who God created me to be. As it travels from one end to the other- I come back to baptism. In all of those times, I’ve learned more about what it means to say “I believe.” This is the story of each day and our whole lives. As we’re still learning on journeys made up of ordinary stuff that doesn’t seem like much but when you stand back and look, you see its become beautiful. Drawn together by a few threads and the work of the Spirit.

The threads are lessons in the faith like those we hear told today and the ones lived in the stories of people we meet who make it real. Like the person who said even though I’d made a really big mistake, I was forgiven by God. Or the person who said whenever he wasn’t sure what to do, he found the answer by coming to church, where God is our refuge and strength. I got picked up, dusted off and reminded not to get too caught up in what I do, not to be defined by my stuff and not to think I can have all the answers. Because we’re justified by God’s grace not our score sheet. People believed in God’s work in me when I had doubts. People prayed with me and studied with me, helping me really live in God’s word. They shared what it means to live faith. So I share too because this is what it means to affirm our faith. It happens on lots of other days besides “Confirmation Day.” Telling the stories makes the Word real. While each of you isn’t wearing a stole today, each of you is wearing the story of God’s work in your lives as the baptized, drawn together by a few threads and work of the Spirit. Stories that proclaim that only God’s grace, only God’s word and only the faith God gives provide us salvation and life. We have God’s promise that they do. This is true on big days and ordinary ones.

Today is a BIG day in the life of the Lutheran church. We Lutherans are sentimentally connected to this day when Martin Luther took a big step that brought about major change in the church. Today is also a big sentimental day for Courtney. She was baptized on this date and now today on her baptismal anniversary she’ll affirm the faith God began in her baptism. Big events. Times it is easy to proclaim our faith. But we know there are lots of other days, with ups and downs. Times we think now is not as good because it looks different or feels smaller. Times we feel overwhelmed. Times we see chaos in nature and in our world events and wonder if there really will be a brighter day. We question our church, our relationships and what we hold true. In these other times we can feel like someone came along and cut the threads. We feel dis-connected from God and each other.

This is when proclaiming faith to each other really matters. When it reminds us what we need to hear. As we continue to live in God’s word, we should return again and again to remember what it means to follow Jesus. To hear, learn, grow, practice and use what we learn so it becomes a habit. So we get used to responding to the events in our lives and the world around us in a certain way. In faith. In our baptism we share in what really matters-Christ claiming us, forgiving us and overcoming all in the work of the cross. This is what we can count on, the place we can see refuge and strength, our anchor in the storm. Each day we’re learning , because everyone we meet and everything we face means having to think about its relationship to what we have learned and are still learning about God and the work of Christ. We need to practice this life of faith. In telling again and again what it means, and in continually reaching out, to reconnect each other, to pull on the threads that draw us back. To reveal God who meets us in these places, honest and real, and who reminds us of our relationships, grace and good news. Living and remembering our stories together is how God gives us a different way of responding to threats in our lives so we can stop focusing on our worries and to-do lists, where we end up exhausted and tapped out. Living in faith is remembering God’s love for us, and receiving the power to live and to trust God. Reminding each other- Yes! This is what God has done, this is what I believe and this is what I proclaim!

We proclaim it this day as we add another part to Courtney’s story, ours and God’s. Today as we again speak our faith, may we give thanks to God for the ways we have in all times and places journeyed with God, held together by the threads of our faith and the work of the Spirit. And may we trust and follow Christ in all our journeys yet to be discovered. This is us living the faith. AMEN.

Love is the Whole Point

2011-10-29T11:35:00.000-04:00

When the kids were little, I’d tell them to do something, “Go brush your teeth.” And then I’d tell them again…and again. In between reminders, they’d come and keep asking things- “Mom, Mom…” followed by a question- “do I have to put water on the brush first, what if I don’t rinse? You said 2 minutes but I have homework..” Sorting out how much I REALLY meant what I asked. Trying to distract me from expecting it. Question after question. Sometimes they must’ve seen me cringe or hear my exasperation as I heard, “Mom, Mom…” and I said NOW WHAT? They’d reply, “I love you” and run off. So much energy used up avoiding what I asked. All I really wanted them to do was something that was good for them, because I loved them. Today we pick up the gospel when Jesus has already encountered the Pharisees, the Herodians, and the Sadducees all attempting to derail and discredit his teaching about what God means in the laws given to the people. Now they send in the EXPERT. He’s the guy who knows all 631 laws and everything the rabbis have said about them. Because somewhere between Mount Sinai and that day, all the questions led to new laws beyond the first Ten. Following every little detail would be impossible SO with 631 laws, “tell me which ones are the important ones, Teacher.” The EXPERT hoped to win on a technicality. But Jesus reorients it all. He says it’s all important, because it comes down to orienting our lives to God and each other in love. Way back when God liberated the people of Israel, God reminded them why, and then gave the commandments with these words- “Because I am holy, YOU are to be holy.” The law was a gift to guide us to live as we’re made. To be holy- to reflect God’s love. Because God desires that all people flourish and have abundant life because God loves us- it’s all about love. And we need to know how to love.

We question and we try going through the motions. Like a man who knew how much his beloved loved roses. When they’d dated, he bought her a dozen roses- a splurge, but she delighted in them and their love grew. So he kept it up week after week. Then he found a florist who had a deal- a dozen roses for three dollars- how could you go wrong? The roses were confiscated in drug raids. Distributors from Colombia would hide packets of cocaine in them. After the big drug bust, law enforcement could care less where the flowers ended up. Week after week, roses. She had no idea. When money got tight she told him that she adored the roses, but they were an extravagance she could forgo to meet their needs- hers and his. He made the mistake of blurting out-“BUT THEY ONLY COST THREE DOLLARS!” Oops. Now from her perspective they were no longer a loving gesture- but a throwaway. He wondered why she didn’t appreciate his effort however flawed. After all, hadn’t he mastered the “give your wife nice things” law? It’s easy to get love wrong.

We struggle with just how far God expects us to go and what’s good enough. Being holy is being distinct from our world, yet it’s hard to maintain this attitude when our culture tells us that there are people and things we can cross of the list. There have to be limits-ways we try to make God’s law fit ours. Times when saying “I love you” from a distance without offering more ought to count. It shows up in our questions: Should we really invest in a program if we don’t get anything back- if it doesn’t add to our membership rolls? Should we bother if people aren’t responsible enough, or don’t love us back in the way we want? When we’re asked to do more for ALL of our neighbors-How far do we really have to go, God? ALL feels too hard and we don’t wanna. We wrestle with questions and yet sometimes realize we’ve pushed the limit with the Holy One and hope saying “I love you” is enough. God is holy and we are different. This is our history.

It’s a good thing God is different. God’s role in the relationship shows God liberates Israel even while knowing there’s a golden calf just on the other side of that mountain. God redeems people who find any reason to try to turn off the voice of the prophets and Jesus himself. God forgives even when we walk away from the truth we find so different from us that calls us to eat less so others can eat, even “the lazy ones.” To care for people who are sick and disabled even when their condition is self-created. To reach out and love people who won’t show us the love, gratitude or affirmation of our actions we desire. To keep loving even when the world will despise or ridicule us for doing so. This is God’s love. That same love that tells us-You may think others are too different from you and unworthy. They may be different from you, but you are all the same kind of different from me. Yet I love you all.” The whole point of God’s framework for our lives is rooted in this love.

We can’t just memorize it or go through the motions of what looks good. That’s like a throwaway “I love you” or castaway roses- we know how we’d feel. And we can’t require an emotional connection in order to offer love. God’s love is cycle of being that says that “loving all of our neighbors is loving God” AND “loving God means ordering our lives in God’s arrangement so all of our neighbors are loved.” No matter what. This is Jesus’example. He endured the tedious questions and rejection of His message, and walked with the failed attempts of those wanting to follow who find they can’t. And in the midst of it all, embodies the real HOPE of the gospel- God’s love for us all is SO BIG it goes to the cross to promise forgiveness again and again. Forgiveness for those we think have fallen short, for us when we fail to see our limits, and for the times we suddenly grasp just how far off base we really are. Forgiveness: Christ’s body and blood- FOR ALL. That’s a whole lotta love. May we again see signs of God’s love, and stand in awe. Then be empowered to go forth and live God’s message in the world that LOVE really IS the whole point.

art by Liz Hicks http://blogerisms.blogspot.com/2010/10/love-is-whole-point.html

Living This Side of Trauma This Side of the Cross

2011-09-11T19:01:00.002-04:00

Last week we heard God’s words tell us that we should seek to bind ourselves to each other. To strive to restore the lost to the community even when we’d rather not. To be persistent in the work of repentance, reconciliation and forgiveness. Today we go deeper and struggle with the notion of just how far forgiveness really goes. After all, surely there are limits! It can’t really be right that we keep forgiving someone who perpetually harms others, or that we forgive when the harm is something really big. But we hear otherwise. We see Joseph weep and struggle with his brothers, and we hear Jesus tell Peter straight. There is no sugar coating it. We’re called to forgive. What if I can’t just forgive? What does that say about our faithfulness as Christians?
I have a confession. I don’t often speak about my life, but I can’t really call you to the journey of forgiveness without sharing my own struggle with it. I’ve been working on forgiveness over something for nineteen years. We went to the hospital for the birth of our first daughter. I was the model expectant mother- no caffeine, no alcohol, not even TUMS for endless heartburn or Tylenol for the sinus headache that lasted the first three months. I took my vitamins, went to the doctor, and planned every detail of the nursery. I read all the “what to expect” books, attended the childbirth classes and was as prepared as anyone could be. Prepared for everything except- what to do when it all goes wrong and you find yourself in the OR, your baby is blue, with two dislocated hips and possible brain injury because the doctor didn’t pay attention. Nothing prepared me for that. The blur of orthopedic visits, evaluations, and the shock that doors that might be closed, her life compromised by profound negligence. She wasn’t expected to live. By the grace of God she did, and we’ve navigated the consequences. She has overcome limitations in amazing ways that have taught me much. But for a long time I was hurt and frustrated-with no real effective consequence or place to go with my bitterness. In fact, I am not sure that even when I entered Seminary I could have preached this sermon. How do we live on the other side of traumatic things?

Our culture doesn’t really provide the tools for that- for the weight of the pain and gnawing awareness it can’t be erased. Hearing the words, “just forgive” when it sounds like a switch we can turn on and off, is a myth. Today many of us are recalling the shock of a large scale trauma in our nation, where the enormous task of forgiveness has a global perspective. While we are focused upon commemorating the people and events of that day, I’d like to suggest that we not overlook the other watershed moments in our daily lives where forgiveness is just as elusive: the loss of a job, the breakup of a relationship, the face of cancer. When a loved one is in jail, or our home is gone. There are lots of places where we struggle with blame and anger, estrangement and grief. Times when not only do we wonder how to make sense, we might wonder what it means if we can’t just flip that forgiveness switch. Am I a faithful Christian if I can’t just do that?

John Patton, wrote a book entitled, Is Human Forgiveness Possible? and says, "Forgiveness is not something we do; it is something we discover. I am able to forgive when I discover that I am in no position to forgive.” It’s where one pastor friend of mine speaks about being aware of the cross, but banging off of it again and again and not quite getting there. This meaning of the cross in the world and in my life, reminds me of this internal battle between my head and heart- between what I know I should be able to do, but what I can’t commit my emotions to doing easily. We can put a man on the moon but the distance from our head to our heart is somehow the longest and most difficult. And while we are called to continue to work at the work of forgiveness, it is OK to accept that it is a journey where we discover forgiving along the way.

We are not called to forget or condone, but to allow God to transform us in this process. I haven’t forgotten what happened, but somehow I got to the point where the real bitterness left, and to a point where I could consider forgiveness. But that’s just one event in my life. We all have lots of moments where we wrestle with offering forgiveness or longing for it. Which is part of why Jesus tells us there is essentially no limit to the number of times we have to face forgiving, over and over again. To the Jewish audience he addressed, the number seven times seventy isn’t just math.

It’s intended to represent the perfect and extravagant ability to forgive. This is what God shows us. Ironically, I also wonder if maybe it takes me trying to say “I forgive” about that many times to make the journey. Even then I know I will not have written God’s law of love permanently on my heart. The journey toward forgiveness is one where we can see that it is only with God and by God’s grace that we can travel toward that place where we might discover “grace fluttering into our hearts.” God’s desire for us to reach this place is both a desire for the person who has wronged us, and a desire that we reach the place where we are liberated from the pain and weight of sin as well. This is God’s desire for our own personal hurts and those of our larger world.

Even bigger than asking “what does it mean to live on the other side of pain,” is “what does it mean to live this side of the cross?” The cross reminds us of both our need and God’s work. The cross is where we begin in worship, with confession and hearing God’s forgiveness. The cross is where we end-our future lies in the work of Christ on the cross for the salvation of the world. And in all the moments in between, the cross is the place where we join together to remember who God is for us and what we need. God could easily be saying to each of us, “how many times do I have to forgive you?” But instead stays with us as we keep banging into that cross. While we try to limit and restrict the scope of forgiveness and our role in it, God’s love expressed in the cross really is astoundingly scandalous and extravagant. Today we have to opportunity to be marked with the sign of that cross for healing and forgiveness, as a tangible reminder of this love, where God meets us at all our places of need and pain and says, “I know that about you, and I still love and forgive.” Sisters and brothers- let us never tire of meeting in this place of hope and healing and then proclaiming it to the world.

Let us pray- Lord, we give thanks that you meet us at the cross. Forgive us for our inability to forgive as you do. Help us in our journey to give and accept forgiveness. By your cross, may we all be healed. Amen.

It's a New Day Dawning

2011-09-01T07:48:00.002-04:00

Today is my first "official" day as the newly called pastor. In the last two weeks I have preached a call sermon, bought a house, moved an office and a house and cleaned up after Hurricane Irene. Since then I have tried to find important things like the grocery store, my toothbrush and my laptop. I am blessed with truly amazing neighbors who have offered cookies, advice and a leaf bag and some pretty amazing hospitality. Even the sellers of the house helped us move and they patiently worked with me to help me master the security system and knowing which days are street cleaning, things that come with city life.

The church is preparing to celebrate its 100th anniversary but like many, the population is mainly older adults, many of whom no longer live in the shadow of the steeple. Funerals are a frequent event (in fact I conducted one the day before I was officially starting). They and many others worry what will be the future, or maybe better stated, if there is one. And the refrain is "we've tried so many things and and we're tired" but they hope today is a new day. For every person who can tell me their connections to the church here in the neighborhood, almost as many tell me it's a shame that they are struggling. I don't yet have a good read on all of the reasons people who left did so. Or a good read on where, if anywhere else they went.
Then again, unsolicited, lots of people have tracked me down as the new pastor to tell me they have been waiting to meet me and they speak about coming back. Too soon to know if this is what people think they should say.

But for now I want to focus on the notion of "we've tried it all."
And I am reminded of the Gospel of Luke when Jesus approaches Simon Peter and tells him to put the boat out into Lake Genessaret. It's morning. Which means they have already been out all night and though they've tried everything, they haven't caught much. They are already bone tired and frustrated.
But they go back out in the boat and put out the nets.

Notice that they don't do anything new-the focus is on the fact that they followed what Jesus said in hope.
Everything changed, and abundance broke forth new possibilities in places that would seem incapable of yielding anything new.
Not because of them, but because of Jesus.
A new day dawned.

Often we feel we have tried it all. But have we remembered to take Jesus with us? More importantly, do we REALLY believe that God is the God of possibilities?
This takes herculean faith when late in the game it seems like there is not enough time or energy or life left.

May God give us the inspiration to make the shift that Simon Peter made when he stops telling God what is possible, acts in hope and faith and just follows.

My Name Spells Gratitude- The RevGals Friday Five

2011-07-15T08:06:00.003-04:00

A wise person once told me to make an ABC list of things I am grateful for any time I feel sad or depressed. It is a good practice when one is feeling happier than that, too. So for this Friday Five, I suggest that you use your name or nickname of about five letters and express your gratitude about something that starts with each letter. Some people have longer names, so you decide how you will go about this! (Last names, middle names, and nicknames count!)

C is for Children. We have two beautiful and talented Lutheran Chicks. Our older daughter has flown the nest somewhat in that she has gone off to college. She will be a sophomore in the fall, majoring in Social Work and making beautiful music. Our younger daughter is away serving each week at a Lutheran summer camp and will be a high school senior so we're in the throes of College hunting. College could have been the C.

A is for Anticipation. I am eagerly anticipating a first call parish, and before that the next few weeks of preaching, meeting and greeting that God willing will culminate in beginning a new journey in ministry together. :)

R is for Relationships. My Beloved spouse of almost 22 yrs, my family, my seminary friends, my hospital buds, my Zumba and weightlifting homies, all of the people from my Seminary formation, the campground I served, Toby-our lovable family canine.. the list goes on- I am blessed with relationships.

O is for Outdoors. I love to be in my back yard, with the birds, the trees, the gardens, my new patio space, watching all of the activity in creation.

L is for Lounging. I have gotten to do a fair amount of it, living in the inbetween after Seminary. Amidst the angst, I have also gotten to do more reading, puttering and contemplating things I usually let blow right by. When I am up to my eyeballs in busy, I hope will remember the season of lounging fondly.

Y is for Y Not? I am grateful for the gift of curiosity and sense of adventure that God has given me-it has taken me to a lot of people,places and events I would never have experienced if I was adverse.

N is for Noshing. Dinner with family, trying new recipes or restaurants. Impromptu get togethers. Creating fun things with the amazing seasonal produce. N is also for "Num, Num!" What our daughters used to say when they were little and ate something tasty.

R.I.P "Busy Bird"

2011-07-08T09:16:00.003-04:00

As a followup to yesterday's post, I decided to go out and finally attempt to capture a picture of our favorite bird, which we've nicknamed "Busy Bird." Much to my sadness, however, I heard some bird activity and a cardinal swooping in for a reconnaissance mission by our patio steps. He then quickly left as I came around the bend. I noticed an army of ants heading up the steps and then I suddenly got it- there was a dead bird. Earlier in the morning I had heard a thwock against the picture window- it's somewhat common for clumsy bumblebees and occasional birds to bounce off of the glass. But unfortunately, the bird in question did not survive the error in flight path. That bird appears to be our yard sentry, "Busy Bird."

BB reminds me of a type of lovable and simultaneously irritating personality often seen in parishes. Self appointed, he would make the rounds on a quality control inspection- was the bird feeder full and safely in place? Thanks to BB we realized when squirrels had knocked it down.
Was the birdbath full and clean? Every day, twice a day he perched on the arching perch above the water to survey and then bathe or chirp if things were unsatisfactory.
Was there a clog in the gutter? On our screened porch one section of gutter was notorious for getting the peeling bark of the sycamore, the burrs of a linden and other detritus in it, which would congeal after a rain. We used to be able to sit on our screen porch and hear the slapping sound as BB would trawl through the gutter for bugs or perhaps nesting items, but in prime efficiency mode, fling out all obstacles to this quest onto the ground.
It took us a while to realize why there was always one place on the driveway with a pile of tree matter. But we always knew when there was a clog.
BB was almost possessed about defending turf. He was known to prance along behind my husband when he was mowing and I could never really tell if he was pointing out shoddy work or just peeved at the intrusion into HIS yard.
And when the trees were cut down and the patio garden created, he regularly followed me curtly tutting about my presence in HIS space, regularly preening the area and occasionally staking out an outpost for surveillance on the top of a tomato stake.
He also engaged in the radical practice of chasing away large birds like starlings who were menacing the smaller birds at the feeder and was once seen chastising a squirrel who finally gave up rather than deal with the onslaught.
But I have no picture of this dark gray and black bird who was hardly the showboat of the field but whose quirky yet loving presence made the yard remarkable.
RIP, feathered friend.

Small Wonders

2011-07-07T10:45:00.011-04:00

My good friend from LTSG has resurrected her blog as RevHarmonica which you can check out HERE. And it inspired me to try to get back to posting. So what have I been doing with my time?

Well, I graduated from Seminary in May and frankly full well expected to have their profile in hand before graduation. But then it took just a little longer (though the Bishop's Office has been amazing!). Then I thought that almost immediately after that I'd be interviewing with the Charming City Parish Not So Far Away. But it took a little longer. But it was a truly Spirit led meeting and I left with lots of positive inclinations for myself and from them. Next stop neutral site preaching! But then, that took more than a little while to find a date and a place, it being summer and people having schedules, etc.

So I found myself now looking at more than eight weeks after graduation just to get to preaching which is next Sunday. But I will be preaching in a familiar place which is good because for a clumsy person like me, learning the furniture is a challenge and just to make it more interesting I am getting trifocals tomorrow. (For this I blame Hebrew but it was worth it!)

Meanwhile, it may be as much as another six weeks til I might have met with their council and preached a call sermon. The good news is that under it all it sounds positive. The hard part is finding myself actually doing less in a church than I have ever done in my adult life while I am trapped between a home synod that will not be my home synod and a new synod that is not really yet my synod.
And no real job of any kind because I thought this was moving and I said no to hours I could have been working.

And we sadly said goodbye to two 80 year old trees so I found myself saying goodbye to old friends and faced with a whole new landscape that a year from now I may not be living in.
So what to do in all this in-betweeness?
Rejoice in small wonders. Literally.

I've been getting to do more reading and have been thoroughly enjoying the series of essays by Barbara Kingsolver called "Small Wonders." She is an exquisite detail writer who can make even the wing of a small insect something to marvel over. I have been able to follow more closely all of our bird friends, and our resident groundhog and rabbits, and recently aid six tiny bats make it outside. Not to mention all of the time for rubbing Toby's belly which he greatly desires.

And I have been puttering in a new container garden patio and rejoice that my pepper and tomatoes are bearing promise. Taking the time to stop at that roadside produce stand and get the most exquisite raspberries ever. (Sorry no pictures- they have been eaten).

Testing out new recipes-maybe more on that later.

Zumba-ing which is an excuse to shake what the good Lord gave me and get away with it and weightlifting in case benchpressing to resolve a council meeting might be
needed (not really).

Cleaning out the attic and basement because the day of moving really will come.

And being more intentional about my time with friends, new and old. Tomorrow I hope to visit a gentleman from my internship parish who will be 96 on Saturday who has been a faithful friend and theological sparring partner.

I've been watching our Lutheran Chicks in their jobs- LC#1 is working locally and LC#2 is working at a Lutheran camp with RevHarmonica's Lutheran Chick.

And getting back to using the Divine Hours which is an amazing way to keep a day in focus. After all, if Jesus could take time apart to pray, surely I can? It often seems to be just the right passages and prayers.

And I have refused to grouse too much when every invite to Party on the Patio has been rained out- the porch worked out great for wine drinking.

All things that I have said I would do "If only I had more time." I have the gift of time and to truly tarry and wait for the Lord. Maybe it will help me remember to tarry when I feel like I can't and to see all of the small wonders I miss when I feel like I have to quickly do the big flyover.

It isn't always easy to wonder about time and inertia, or to refrain from envy as most of my class is now called and/or ordained. But I have a much keener sense of what it means to eagerly rejoice in all things with my friends and await where the Spirit is blowing for me while I capture glimpses of small wonders.

You'll Never Walk Alone

2011-05-26T16:13:00.003-04:00

Every day as Kim Clark was getting ready to leave for elementary school, her Mom’s parting words to her as they were about to separate went like this:
“Remember who you are. All those people who worked and sacrificed for you to be where you are, when you walk out this door. You carry with you the mantle of responsibility-the good name of this family, the hopes and dreams of your Mom and Dad. Remember the promise that is yours, the opportunities that are in front of you and the hope that is in you for a better world.” I wonder if the next line would have been- and you better get it right because if you don’t remember, you don’t love us and it all depends on you. It’s possible to hear Jesus’ farewell words this way- “if you love me, you will keep my commandments.” Remember. It’s hard to remember this when we’re just getting through the day, but harder still when it’s getting through each day when they’re gone. How will we remember? What will it mean if we can’t keep all that you told us? Perhaps we think of this in our nation, this Memorial Day weekend, we’re remembering those who fought and sacrificed for us to be where we are as a nation, while struggling to remember that Memorial Day is not first and foremost about sales at the stores, or picnics, though we can do those things too because of the sacrifices of others. Some worry that we as a country no longer remember the wars of another time and what we learned from them. What if we aren’t good at keeping the memory alive?
Remembering is about more than ritual. It’s about what is in our hearts. It’s what each of us lives out when we try to hold on those we’ve loved who are now departed from this life. We hold them dear in different ways and times, hoping we’re not alone, that they’re somehow still with us. In my husband’s family, we hold dear my late father-in-law whose birthday is next week and whose favorite pastime was watching horse races, especially the Triple Crown races- the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont. All family events and meals were planned around when these races were televised. All conversation stopped when the horses were loaded into the gates. He always had some crazy way of picking who he thought would win. After studying the racing sheets, it usually was the name, or the jockey or some other inner voice that he relied on. Often he was right. Even now we find ourselves trying to imagine which horse he would have picked; which grandchild has said or done something that reminds us of him. We tell stories, and imagine what he might say about events in the family or the neighborhood. It’ll be eighteen years this fall that he died. Still each spring, his three children take turns putting flowers on his grave for the races- Red Roses for the Derby; Black Eyed Susans for the Preakness and White Carnations for the Belmont. Because he asked us to. Our race is the Preakness- black eyed susans, the Maryland state flower. The winner is draped with a blanket of them after the race. Every year I’ve struggled to find black eyed susans. I never do, so I end up trying to do something that’s as close as I can get. One year I couldn’t even find nice yellow daisies. I ended up getting silk ones and coloring in the centers with a black permanent marker, one by one. To honor his words. It was only much later that I learned that the blanket of flowers the Preakness uses really isn’t made of black eyed susans. They’re daisies with their centers painted because while everyone wants to honor the state flower, they can’t be ready in June. So much for keeping the letter of the law, but we try.
But no matter what we do, we can’t bring back a real sense of my father in law with us, just a memory. For my mother in law, who’s lost both parents and her spouse, it’s can be hard not to feel orphaned and alone, wondering why the world doesn’t see things the way you do. Keeping memories alive is hard.
But Jesus’ words to the disciples and to us remind us that Jesus isn’t only a memory, but a living presence. Although Jesus departs from the physical presence of the disciples, Jesus is not dead, but living. And we’re asked to do more than keep rules, but hold Christ alive in our hearts. It’s ultimately about more than ritual, it’s about ongoing living love, embracing God in our very being. It takes more than we can produce. Enter the Advocate.
The purpose of God sending the Advocate isn’t about demanding ritual, it’s about love. God sends the Advocate out of love for us, knowing it’s hard for us to remain faithful and stay true when we feel alone and at odds with the world. God sends the Advocate, literally as “one who walks beside” so that we continue to see what Jesus first revealed- God’s purposes, God’s power and God’s love. So that we can remember more than who we are, we can remember WHOSE we are. So we can begin to believe what that means for our lives. By the Spirit, we not only see Jesus, but Jesus dwells in our hearts. God’s love is sent to us by the power of that Advocate, to move our hearts to connect to God’s. The Advocate walking beside us brings this awareness of this blessing and this challenge.
Perhaps it is borne out of my own experience, but the best way I see the Advocate is like being the Mother of teenagers. I have two in my house right now. It’s hard to send them out to experience life, occasionally learning things the hard way. I hope that they remember the ways they were raised. Along the way, sometimes I’m there to comfort them, to offer guidance, stand up for them, listen when they need to vent, to talk to their Father when they have a need or a problem, to offer hugs. Other times I need to give them a push, set a limit, or tell them they are flat out wrong. I am both thrilled to see who they are becoming and sometimes really frustrated when I see how they treat each other or others they meet. I want to scream “Remember who you are!” But no matter what, out of love, they are mine. And it’s more important that they remember I’ve got their back, reminding them- you'll never walk alone.

God’s love made known to us is even better than this love on its best day. It’s an eterrnal love we receive and are empowered to share by the power of the Spirit. We can see it when we gather to worship, pray and fellowship, in all of the people the Spirit uses to draw us in, nurture and remind us whose we are. And it’s what moves us to share what Jesus promises each of us-By the power of the Spirit, and through the Spirit, we are claimed and forever connected to the Trinity. We hear “You will never be orphaned. You’ll NEVER walk alone.” We reminded that this promise is ours, as is the opportunity in front of us. This is the real source of hope for a better world. Hold this dear, remember it often and with the help of the Advocate, share your walk with God in your lives so no one walks alone.

Rejoice! It's a Bumper Crop!

2011-05-12T06:49:00.000-04:00

Rejoice with me and with my classmates at LTSG as we graduate tomorrow!!

If you've ever gardened, you know that when you plant seeds you don't know what will happen- some will grow, some won't and some will grow but they will not look like the picture. It's part of why it is tempting to just let someone else do that work and buy the already tended plant. But even so, someone had to do the growing. Even when you have the plants you don't know what the garden will look like. The picture above is from a field on the commute to LTSG- one year the farmer seeded the entire area in sunflowers. I honestly don't think even he expected such a bumper crop.

For 43 years people planted and tended the seed in me- I was a slow grower. For my classmates, the growing schedule is as varied as the day is long, but we each have a story that got us here. In May of 2007, I was getting ready to meet with my synod candidacy committee to learn if they would approve my entering seminary. Now here I am in May preparing to graduate four years later having been surrounded by some truly amazing people, and while I always dreamed it would turn out well, it has exceeded expectations. Our class has been that bumper crop!

Four years ago I became a “Blogging Lutheran” and met a fellow blogger in the blogosphere who said he was coming to seminary. Later that year we sat across a circle from each other sharing call stories. He later created the web page that kept us all connected on internship. We came from all over the country and right next door. One fellow student came from Alaska, but turned out she originally grew up down the road from my inlaws. and our lives have grown together in many ways. I've met people transformed by outdoor ministry, a few of whom will now work with my daughter this summer at a Lutheran camp. After years of supporting the church’s ministry in Tanzania, I can now say I know a seminarian who's been there and has a passion for that global ministry. And there are some who dared to make the long trek from places like Ethiopia to here to serve the church and open our eyes to new visions. With some of my classmates I have traveled halfway round the world to walk in the footsteps of Paul, literally. I have experienced beautiful music, Easter Peep dioramas, and worship in different languages, Luther Bowl, inspiring preaching, innovative teaching and stinkbugs (the last of these I would be glad to forget).

Some were engineers, social workers, bookstore managers, athletic directors, legal types, and many more were the truly risky ones- those who came straight from college. People from many traditions who have deepened our understandings in ways we could not have seen that first August. We all got here by the Spirit because of mentors and experiences that encouraged us to hear and dare to respond to God’s call. For most of us there has been some pruning and tending, and twists and turns but as I look back to four years ago, I can see that what looked like a group of possibilities has grown into a group of people whose sense of call has grown and flourished.

I've seen people blossom and come alive as they passionately share their experiences, hopes and dreams for young adult ministry, creation care, rural ministry, teaching, chaplaincy and much more. And I've been awed by people who have been transplanted over and over again, each time on the belief that God is calling. As a commuter I realize I only scratched the surface of life here but I have seen enough to know that the church is incredibly blessed to have my classmates entering various types of public ministry. And now we are about to join the grand procession of those who will enter to leave and to serve. Years ago the group Supersonic had a song “Closing Time”- the best line of which is this:
“Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end”

So it is for each of us. It is a new beginning for each person leaving here, as we go forth to plant and tend all over God's field.

But I hope also for a new beginning of sorts for the church.

On the horizon are more budget cuts which will decimate funding for some of the ministries that brought us here- talk to seminarians and many will tell you of how campus ministry, outdoor ministry and youth ministry were fundamental to their sense of call. Likewise funding of seminary education is always at risk while congregations long for leaders. Instead of throwing up our hands saying the scarcity is too large, let's not get discouraged. Cutting these areas is like destroying the seed corn (I heard those words from someone else) – we can’t grow from nothing.
While I would admit that God can, I am not sure that this is a test of God we should engage. The plants have to come from somewhere. They come from congregations and synods and the larger church. We all have a critical role together.

And if you need proof it's worth it, and you’re on the Ridge this week, or any other seminary, when you’re celebrating, look around and ask what the picture would look like if those seeds had never been planted. They are after all a pretty amazing group that God sprouted. And then together let’s dream of more bumper crops.

It Took a lot of People to Get Here

2011-05-08T09:10:00.003-04:00

Yesterday was our Senior Banquet, our way of celebrating the fact that (pending the fulfillment of all academic requirements) we really are going to graduate, but more importantly, saying thanks to all of the faculty, administration and staff who got us to this point. No matter how old we are we have all needed a few "mothering" moments along the way.

When I speak of "us" I think about how many children have come into the picture, babies born, little ones growing up. I think of my classmates who are exploring adoption and foster parenting and am amazed. I think of classmates who could not be at our meal because they needed to be with their family. I look around and see how many people have gotten engaged or married since they began seminary. And I think about how over four years we have grown more fully into our callings. And to get to that point it has taken a lot of parenting figures.

I give thanks for each person who in the name of Christ has at some time has been there- in the face of friends and in the face of everyone from the person who fixed a problem in the dorm, a billing or finanical aid snafu, server connection issues, course registration conundrums and a myriad of other things. They in addition to our professors have tolerated our confusion, affirmed our discoveries and occasionally dished out a little reality check. Through all of the things that have stretched and shaped us, there is a giant network of people, some very visible and some behind the scenes who have helped to make our "growing years" bear fruit.

Thanks be to God for you.

Stories from the Road

2011-05-06T09:03:00.003-04:00

Luke 24: 13-35
When Michael and I were married, we were given a piece of cross-stitch that exclaims- “The road is bright before us, as hand in hand we start, united in love forever, one mind, one soul, one heart.” So too at the Seminary, I remember those first days of Summer Greek when we were giddy about launching our paths toward ministry, in those first days before participles, group projects and many other things would challenge our sense of it all. I could tell you that the road of either of these journeys has always been bright and we have always been in solidarity about the journey.

Or I could be honest and share that inevitably, disappointments and anxiety about what’s next takes on a life of its own in community. “Some people saw… these people said… others discovered…” We're really quick to share those stories. When we’re on our walk, we can become so focused upon sorting it all out. Where’s God? We went looking, we thought we knew.

And now with social media, the concept of flash mob meets doubt in ways that quickly take on epic proportion as we click and comment in the frenetic pace of our need to analyze and know. As I prepare to end my time in seminary, I would love to be able to say that those of us intent on pursuing a closer walk with God were somehow more adept and remembering where to find the Lord. But we all have had those moments when we are sure it is all for naught, when we have no clue what will happen next and how we might as well accept that it is about to turn out badly. From the time we began, we have all had those crisis moments about coursework, or relationships, or when we find out that where we have been sent by God isn’t at all the road we sought out or expected. We have agonized over whether the economy will doom our chances, or whether the currents of dissent in our churches will. How will I survive teaching parish? I can’t take another day of CPE. I can't believe what that (professor, classmate, supervisor) said! Will there be an internship site and will it be what I hope for? Will a bishop choose me, or a congregation? What does it all mean? What if at the end of the road, it’s just the end of the road?

And I think maybe God lets us spin for awhile until we realize we are still fuzzy headed and empty handed, as we keep turning to what we think it ought to be. We get ourselves all tied up in knots, listening to those who are the self-proclaimed experts-I think there’s a reason in this age they are called Spin Doctors. Because all of the self-generated analysis leaves us spinning. How ironic then that the disciples turn to the man who later they will see is Jesus and in the midst of all of their lack of knowing tell him that only a fool would not know what is going on. Have you ever noticed that when you’re sure someone else is an idiot, a lot of times you later see things clearer and differently? You’d think we would grasp that more permanently, but alas, our nature is that we make only slight progress at best. We find that we both are the dishers-out and recipients of dashed expectations and terse words said in the moment. And each of us has had moments where we too exclaimed-“But I had such hopes.”

But as we kept walking and listening, across those miles, at some point, we took a break from our pace, and took a breath from all of our words. And in those moments, the ones where we sat a spell, Jesus showed up to us, giving us strength for the journey in the midst of the community. In small, but intimate ways. Fleeting ways. And then as soon as we blinked, it’s gone. But we know it has happened- and this is why we have still continued the journey.

Here in my house, as we’ve have been going through all of the things we’ve accumulated, in anticipation of perhaps moving in the next year, it takes longer than I’d like to think. Because we get sidetracked with each thing into all of the memories- Has really been that long since…? Remember how crazy that was? What a great day when…All of those memories, burning in our hearts. We cherish where God has been in all of the people who have touched us on the road so far. Because each time we were in doubt, somehow it all turned out. Places where forgiveness seemed impossible, made whole. Perhaps not when or where or how we envisioned, yet we could look back and see where Christ really was.

Mark Oldenburg once noted that “on the way to doing the ministry you think you are called to do, something or someone will cross your path and there, real ministry will happen.” That may not be verbatim- but close enough. Those words have always been with me here. I think Luke’s gospel offers a corollary: On the way to looking for Jesus in the places and the people where you are sure he will be found, Jesus will meet you somewhere else and real presence will happen in ways that change you forever.

Now we are all preparing to head out on the road to new places from LTSG. To my classmates, the faculty and the staff, to all of those in all of the contexts I have been blessed to experience-
I give thanks to God for all of the times and places where you brought the risen Christ into my awareness. These are the ways that now send me forth to tell others what I have seen and heard in the breaking of bread with you on the path of discernment. And to hopefully do so with eyes at least a little more open to meeting Christ on the journeys to come. I hope it has been so for you and pray it may continue to be so for you. Go forth and be eager to share these stories wherever the road takes you.

Are You Willing to be a Rebel for Resurrection Hope?

2011-05-04T20:44:00.003-04:00

Today I attended Spring Convocation at LTSG, which made a big splash having as key speaker, journalist and author, Chris Hedges, who has written extensively across media, including books such as The Empire of Illusion and The World as It Is. Hedges’ appearance was a part of the convocation theme, “We Tell to Love the Story,” a day which included an outstanding presentation on the scripts of Scripture by Rev. Dr. Marty Stevens and on story brokering by Rev. Kathy Vitalis Hoffman. I wish that the crowd in attendance for Hedges had been present for the other two presentations, because without it I suggest the story left an incomplete picture. And while much of what Hedges gives voice to resonates with my sensibilities and with the message across the canon of Scripture in prophetic witness, Hedges himself is not big on lifting up the life and work of the church. This is not only true because this isn’t his role (though he has an M.Div. from Harvard Divinity) but also in part of his own acerbic sentiment toward the church as institution born of his lived religious experience as the son of a Presbyterian pastor whose prophetic voice met with cataclysmic opposition over issues still on the horizon today- oppression, poverty, gay rights, the military-industrial complex. From my brief conversation with him, I understand opposition to his father’s witness culminated in drumming out of his father over his voice of resistance. I’m attempting to take in Hedges’ compelling words which at times one might suspect were intended to function as an emetic administered to the listener. I note that I am neither an acolyte nor a “hater.”
“I have walked through the barren remains of Babylon,” he began. No one can doubt the profound scope of what Hedges has witnessed in his global journeying as a journalist. Anyone who has read even some of his work quickly realizes the gravamen of the accretion of events he confronted as bystander to warfare and aggression, despoiling of environment and seeming callousness of those who are the perpetrators. Amidst the din of this, Hedges began his address with words of Percy Bysshe Shelly- about the feeling of standing amidst the ruin of Egyptian pharaohs: And on the pedestal these words appear: “My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!' Nothing beside remains. Round the decay of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away.” Akin to Ezekiel, Hedges launches into a full tilt assault on the “increasingly rapacious elite” and “a world where ideals no longer correspond to reality, where the frightened retreat into isolated compounds and enclaves of wealth and priviledge. Those in power extract wealth upward with greater ferocity until the hollowed out edifice collapses.” As was the fate of Rome, the Mayans, the Babylonians, so too we see the fate of those in the Middle East, Africa, Europe and ultimately here at home. I full well expected him to say, “Thus says the Lord YHWH.” As the canary in the coal mine protesting more wars, grander monuments, and increasing debts foisted on the backs of the poor, he continued lifting up historic parallels across time of “elitists who become extremists squeezing the last drops out of humanity before they ossify and die, destroying what they claim to be about.” As Hedges offered a summation of sorts for the notion that humans seem destined to be cursed to repeating the cycles of exploitation and collapse at the hands of ignorance and hubris, I found myself writing and underscoring a single word: SIN. I wish I could even remotely approach the skill of writing and oration Hedges possesses yet the word SIN never was uttered. Which is too bad, because he is spot on and that is what it is. We should name it as such. The world we claim to be ever more adept at controlling and engineering like all of those other refined civilizations is still captive to the force of sin. Hold that thought.
Hedges then turned his sights upon illuminating the failure of those who put themselves forth as proponents and indeed proclaimers of the Christian faith are often co-opted by those who not only are OK with systems of power, oppression and death, they would prefer them to remain in place. Hedges takes the framework of religious institutions and the liberal class to task for naively placating these forces, “inviting the wolf in” as he puts it. Not only that but he frames leaders of the “liberal” end of the political spectrum as only looking like liberals while selling their souls to the corporate world, turning the American dream into a cruel hoax. “Tolerating the intolerant leads to destruction of the tolerant.” Hedges sees the end result in this country (not only elsewhere) as reconfiguring our world into “neo-feudalism.”
But back to the church – Hedges tosses more fuel on the fire alleging that the church has forgotten that heretics exist, excoriating evangelicals (and others) for re-connecting with Newt Gingrich and others who “mock the core teachings of Christ” and who “stand by mutely as others betray and exploit the gospel of Christ with bigotry, hatred and greed.” As I was again thinking of Ezekiel taking on those who claimed to speak for YHWH that “all is well when all is not well” he moved in for the kill. “What was the point of ordination is you think you never have to fight for the message of the gospel?” It really doesn’t matter whether Hedges is speaking as one with or without faith, inside or outside the church- these words matter. We serving and aspiring leaders could ask ourselves- what will we risk for the sake of the gospel? I was reminded of the scene in the “Luther” movie when Luther is being cleaned up and prepared for his meeting with officials from Rome. He’s being counseled to back off and hold his tongue. With absolute clarity of purpose he pushes back against this with “when you so boldly sent me out to change the world, did you think there wouldn’t be a cost?” While there’s a point where Hedges’ polemic and I will part company, I cannot quibble with the claim that the longer we are tricked into investing faith in power systems we will be tricked into paths that lead to death-I think I heard this a time or two in Scripture. He speaks of what many would call “kingdom urgency” though never allowing such words to pass his lips. When do we decide we are too busy critiquing our critics or the process to actually take a stand on issues of peace, ecological destruction, injustice? They are in our own backyard. When he says we must be willing to accept the discomfort of action- was it not but a short time ago we wondered if we would deny Christ?
Where I ultimately believe Hedges’ vision is incomplete is that he seems to suggest that resistance, being a rebel and standing with the oppressed as a moral commitment are an end unto themselves. He quotes Augustine, the author of the notion that “hope has two beautiful daughters- anger at the way things are and courage to see that it doesn’t remain so.” He adjures that external reality around us cannot be a yardstick by which to measure life. As he ended his presentation he noted that the words we heard are not his, but his father’s – the Presbyterian pastor who stance ended his career- and noted:“And in Christian faith we call this resurrection.” These words brought tears to my eyes- but then I had to ask- what does the word “resurrection” mean? Redemption, vindication? Is this a buzzword for the God-people at LTSG or is it something more uttered by one scarred but still living that definition of “hope?” I don’t know- but this is why everyone who missed the talk before and the talk after- the ones who came for Hedges alone-missed the “rest of the story.”

Being a rebel means living and telling a story whose narrative is over against all of the other voices. Your strand might look different than mine but in the end the refrain is one that says for Christians that the voice we listen to (or endeavor to listen to) is the voice of a risen Christ. And it’s the voice of God who across time is not bound by the limited narratives of those who seek to co-opt. It’s still a story worth sharing in all the hurting places. It’s a story we cannot share but for a faith that takes more than we have to give. It’s a story we build with others-not as rebels alone. And it’s a story we tell to love because God’s word and not ours is the last and triumphant one that gives us strength to try again. I would never dream to suggest that everything that leads people to hurting places should be just smoothed over. Instead I would love to tell them about a God who offers and calls us to more because of the true and ultimate meaning of resurrection. To Hedges I would say that though nothing erases pain, the other word missing is GRACE- what we need, what we get, what we are called to tell and to live. Each of us.
As I got up to leave the chapel I noticed that off to the side was the large wooden cross that had featured writ large in Holy Week, now looking a little left behind- perhaps waiting to be put away. Maybe that’s the point-would we really tire if we looked at the rough hewn cross in the midst of the beautiful chapel, or would we prefer to not be reminded of the cost? Maybe even when we don’t intend to, this subtle actions of ours remind us we have much to contemplate even when it comes from voices beyond our place of sanctuary. Think of how much richer the story we share will be when we do. How Christ's narrative might speak louder than cacaphony of doom. It's risky- Are you willing to be a rebel for resurrection hope in our world?

Who is this King?

2011-04-22T09:09:00.007-04:00

Even when he was sitting astride the donkey, Jesus knew what the others did not- where the road would go after the parade. From excitement in the air, and people craning to see, asking,"Who is this?" To the same question asked over and over again, by the Jewish leaders, by Pilate, by soldiers, in the events of that week in Jerusalem.

Who is this "King of the Jews" anyway?

As the final drama begins to unfold, Matthew’s story inverts the notion of who this King is and how we treat him, leading to the cross on the outskirts of town.
After the betrayal has occurred, and the trial is over. After the onlookers and disciples are gone. We find ourselves, if we dare to stop here, in the moments after the sentencing and before the crucifixion. The Passion of our Lord.

“Passion” in this sense is “the condition of being acted upon”- of letting others do to you; and also the “endurance of suffering.” Any of these speak to what Jesus knew would and must come, even as He regally sat astride the donkey. And as he now stands seemingly at the mercy of the soldiers. This is a King? Hardly a figure of power!

Maybe the soldiers acted on orders, or maybe they got carried away. After all, what's a little excessive force when national security is involved? “They say this guy is the ‘King of the Jews’ – that militant on the list.”Everyone stands poised to play their roles as the players take the stage.

“Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor’s headquarters”- the curtain comes up on Jesus truly living out this “passion.” He apparently says nothing, and if he cries out it hasn't been recorded in what happens at the governor’s headquarters, located just beyond the temple wall, in the shadow of the Holy of holies.

From his birth, called the King of the Jews, by those who hope that he is not. His mere existence threatens the prescribed power struture. “You want to be a King? We have a way of dealing with Kings here.” And we need to because it's the Passover, and we need to keep an eye on this would-be king. Who does he think he is?

Can we imagine watching the spectacle unfold? This deadly dance exposed in the courtyard, not tucked away in some dark dungeon. Publicly, in the shadow of the sacred and holy spaces of the Temple. Mere feet away, yet we want to turn a blind eye and erect a wall of silence.

“They gathered all of the cohort over him.” Not a few men like we might imagine, but an entire military unit of as many as 600 men there to quell any potential uprising. As many as 600 men--- and one of Jesus. Can we picture that? Will we dare?

Tom Wright suggests many of the men may have seen buddies killed by these rebels. Tired of being away from home, and longer than they thought. Maybe a few begin, at first, but the number swells as people want to see what will happen with this potentially dangerous militant.

Once the energy emerges, group frenzy takes over. They're not just around Jesus, but over him, both physically and psychologically. The just-flogged Jesus perhaps crumpled and lying in a heap, dragged from one place to another...maybe on his knees before them.. powerless.

But, they say he is “dangerous.”
The next thing you know, they are “Stripping him.” This perverse and demented drama includes a costume change. Did they immediately put that cloak on him, or was it a part of the sport of it all and the humiliation of nakedness?

The king deserving a royal robe, ironically forced to wear a military robe in a battle where he's been drafted into service.

The king, forced to endure the taunts and jeers he knew there would be.
“Where’s your power now, King?”

“After twisting some thorns into a crown they put it on his head.” Anguishing mental cruelty carried out in a slow, protracted hell that seems to have no end in sight.

“And they placed a reed in his right hand.” Not a stick, or a sword, or even an object of substance. A flimsy, breakable reed, which will be bent to inflict the ultimate insult in Jesus’ day- slapping his face. What a great way to settle scores by those resentful of the hordes of the occupied who have shown disdain for the soldiers.

Well, who's in charge now?

"Kneeling before him they mocked him”, the one to whom kings once traveled, who was worshipped with gold, now reviled and ridiculed in this reversal of how it all began so long ago. Gifts of honor twisted by sick humor as soldiers pay a warped homage to their victim.
How long did it take to get the reed, and the crown of thorns?
How long as one by one each added his own tribute to the king?
“Hail! King of the Jews” A juvenile and cruel take on the honor shown to Caesar. Maybe they even forced him to process and receive their accolades.

This mockery, repeated mass mockery that one writer has suggested,offers us a commentary about words as instrument of torture. Maybe they threatened and taunted Jesus, about his appearance, his people, his religion, his family. Threats, lies. Warfare designed to make a man break, to finish the destruction of his soul.

Not one person, or one comment, but a swarm of angry, bullying men, each taking turns in this pageantry of destruction.
Hail!“Long live the King"- the one we are about to kill.

How long does it go on? Does Jesus begin praying for sweet death to just come?

They begin “ spitting upon him.” Once baptized and anointed, now passed from one person to another each inflicting pain, until he begins to be unrecognizable.

But now this drama is closing – the gifts are taken back-“They took the reed and struck his head."
“And when they have finished, they strip him of the cloak.
This performance will soon be done.

“They put his own clothes back on him.” He is led away to die.

Who is this King of the Jews? Rejected by those who insist “he is not our king!”
Refused by those who claim- “you cannot be king!”

Who can we see as the curtain falls in this sad and sordid drama?
So horrific yet we did not intervene. Watching the group, knowing it's wrong, but captivated anyway.

Have you ever seen someone being mistreated but decided it was none of your business, and turned away?
Walking away quickly, head averted?

We'd like to believe this kind of wicked brutality was limited to this story.
But whose face is it we see in the bullied, the misunderstood, the tortured, and the ridiculed in our world?
Who is this King of the Jews?
Do we see him today?

While those in charge will conveniently have no recollection of the events, will we remember?

"Who was the guilty? Who brought this upon Thee?
Alas, my treason, Jesus, hath undone Thee.
’Twas I, Lord, Jesus, I it was denied Thee!
I crucified Thee."

Thanks be to God it's not the final chapter

But, still we ask- Who is this King?

Your hands, Lord

2011-04-21T08:54:00.006-04:00

The washing of the feet
Ghislaine Howard (b.1953 ) Acrylic 2004 Methodist Collection of Modern Christian Art, No.40

John 13
Jesus knew what he had to do, what he would endure- and that it was in his hands. When things are in our hands, what do we choose? What would we have chosen if things had been in our hands? We probably would not have chosen to strip away the dirt and grime of others. To personally embrace all of those dirty, stinky, gnarled and calloused others. And to love them anyway.
As he went along he could no longer see his face in the reflection of the water, just all of the dirt churning.

We probably wouldn't choose to continue to be patient with those who were slow to get it, who were rude and insistent. We surely would not embrace the chronically irritating. We most definitely would not embrace those who would betray us behind our backs- who already had. And to love them anyway.
As he listened he could tell he could no longer be heard over all of their self-absorbed concerns.

And after he washed their feet, we do not hear that anyone washed his, or even that he cleaned himself up, getting rid of all that dirt. We hear only that he got up and put on his robe again. And kept serving- feeding, teaching, and loving anyway. All the way to the cross. Where they forgot all they had seen and heard.

Sacrificing everything-in love- though we like the disciples only seem to excell in taking...though we fail to grasp or embrace this vision...though we become callous toward not only others, but to our Lord...though we really don't want to get our hands dirty...though we would hate and kill and betray if everything was in our hands. Even though we wish to deny this truth. How can we love as you have? -Seemingly simple and profound, yet impossible in our hands without you.
It's clear just how dirty that water has become. And how your voice is lost in our babble.

Lord, wash away all that, and then wrap your love around us.
May we stop to ponder before we walk on.
Then by your power, may your call to love each other as you have loved emerge in us, but when it does may it always be you they see.

God changed him too

2011-04-12T09:00:00.002-04:00

1 Samuel 1:9-18 is the prompt for the day.
On the heels of this past Sunday's lectionary texts of the "dry bones" and Lazarus, today we see the story of Hannah, mocked and taunted by her rival, Penninah who has scores of offspring while Hannah is unblessed. Weeping at the temple she confronts the priest who seemingly speaks to her first to encourage her to get lost, but God has other things in store. I first began to wonder about all of those times that we would rather chase away those who remind us of barren places, losses, poverty, dark sides we prefer to place far away lest we confront our own fears. We see it in those we pass on the street and even in churches that have lost their way yet long for new life. And it is easy to see ourselves in the Hannah role, but what about the priest?

He must have been changed too.
The God-person who sits by the doorway of the holy place.
Face to face with desperate unending pleading, and weeping
His heart as barren as her womb-
Locked up yet holding the keys.
How easy to call her a spectacle
For embodying “pray without ceasing”
And daring to believe that maybe, just maybe…
God will again create something where it seems like uninterrupted nothing.
Bring joy out of a desert of anticipated loss.
He had to be changed as implored,
Look at me-see me!

She who dared to confront him with his own dried up faith!
Remember me!
While he prefers to side with those who mock.
“I have been talking all this time, yet you do not hear me,” she says.
“Barren doesn’t fit your model of growth and success,” she says.
How easy it is to bless those who are already blessed.
Give me more than your pity, or your leftovers.
Give me your heart, praying with mine that I may have abundance too.
He had to be changed as he spoke to her, spoke with her- O Lord, hear our prayer.
Maybe he too only mouthed the prayers,
Like we do when we are so worn out, unsure but praying anyway.
Saying “may” God grant
Leaving open the question
And the seeming impossibility
That birthed new life.
How could it be that SHE changed HIM?
Lord, open our eyes and ears to those who cry to you from barren places
In all of those moments when we too
Say in our hearts- Lord only knows how this can change
Create in us fertile ground that expects
You will indeed bring forth your surprise and joy.

Doing Ministry While Waiting for the Lord Even When We Don't Want To

2011-03-23T19:53:00.003-04:00

As usual the Wednesday Prayer Group starts with a fair amount of sharing about what is going on in our world. And by “world” I generally mean, our personal worlds as senior seminarians about to embark on the next journey beyond required reading, syllabi, projects and the like- the somewhat ominous and exciting “just beyond the horizon” world of the first call. Having been immersed in a process best described as “hurry up and wait” we have agonized, prayed and hoped our collective selves through the end of internships, the faculty approvals and candidacy committee approval processes which have culminated in more paperwork. And more “hurry up and wait” and more agonizing, hoping and praying about where in the country we would be sent by the Spirit within the ELCA. Hoping we were not last to be picked for the dance. Into this swirl, this year we added the fact that statistically not all of us can hope for a call within a year of graduation, that there may need to be a “Plan B” while balancing debt and families and moves. More agonizing and hoping and praying.
And each person’s process is different, so there is a comparison of where each of us may be on the time and space continuum. Some are juggling how to do call interviews and graduate and move on a very short timetable. Some are navigating long distance interviews, or long distance travel to find out if there will be interviews. Some have congregational paperwork to review. Some have a name but no paperwork yet. Some just hope their phone will ring and we all find ourselves challenged by the words “wait for the Lord.”
And oddly the more we know the more impatient we may find ourselves. “It’s been a week since I told them when I can meet, why haven’t I heard?” “It’s been two weeks since I said I was interested, why haven’t I heard?” “It’s been a month since they said they would be in touch, why haven’t I heard?” “If they know they want to see me, what is taking so long? If they know they want a pastor, what is taking so long? If they said they had something in mind, what’s taking so long?” “What does it all mean? Don’t they know I am on a timeline?” “Don’t worry, it will be OK” might be good words for you, but not for me, we might find ourselves thinking.
All of which reminded me how I was on the other end of this process not quite ten years ago. Actually a two pronged process. “What do you mean we have to complete all this paperwork and then it has to be reviewed and then it has to be voted on and then it has to be submitted and approved? What do you mean we need to think about who we really are a congregation, we can’t just get a pastor? What do you mean you don’t have a candidate yet? What do you mean the candidate does not want to meet us again? You mean we have to schedule a special meeting? You mean we have to do this by this date?” We as a congregation council and the call committee had to try to coordinate dates for not only all of us, but the bishop’s office and the candidate and at times it was like herding cats. Everyone wanted the same thing and everyone wanted it in the way that was most convenient for him or her.
We wanted a candidate with experience but also energy who was a good preacher and teacher, but honored what we already did well. Who could be a leader but affirmed us. And who could help us sort it out unless of course we already knew. And pastoral candidates wanted a congregation with vitality but not one with an iron will. With a well oiled structure but one that would be moldable to the creative desires of the pastor. And the perfect vision was whatever was perfect for each of us, individually.
Meanwhile our long time now retired pastor wanted to be able to rejoin three generations of his family worshipping with us which was forestalled by our process. And we all wanted to get it done as soon as possible so things could go back to the way they were.
And I remember him saying he wanted this process to be done as quickly as possible while a bishop was saying “slow down.” And I found myself saying we wanted it all to take only as long as it took for us to be faithful to where God was leading, because if we were not, ours would not be a place he would want to return to. I found myself asking for him to understand God’s timing.
And that was nine years ago this month as I now find myself saying – remember God’s timing and wait for the Lord. Remember we are all people with lives and schedules, who all want to be drawn together in great and wonderful ways. But that those ways take time for people to juggle lives and schedules, time to say what needs to be said in honesty so that we come as close to being candid as we can and to remember God is taking all of us on a journey, not taking us for a ride.
Wait for the Lord.
SO what can we do while we wait to begin our ministry?
1. Avoid call process envy- it’s not a competition. So rejoice with those who rejoice, pray with those who need intercession, and dispense comfort to those who are anxious. Ministry happens here.
2. Pray for the bishop and staff of the synod who is receiving you- for their guidance and discernment and for them to be fed and nourished in their ministry- all of it, not just your part of it. Plug into their websites and e-prayers for ways to begin to walk with them in your heart and mind. Ministry happens here too!
3. Pray for the congregation who is getting or has your name when you know it and are waiting- that they can set aside all that would distract them and prepare for holy conversations. Pray that you can do likewise. Need I say this is ministry?
4. Remember everyone on your journey with you- your friends and family would probably really love to spend time with you. Now is a good time. By now you get the point, right?
5. Take care of yourself- eat healthy, strengthen your body and renew your mind-you will need these things for the journey. Minister to yourself- take care of what God has given you-you!
6. Recall the craziest time on internship or elsewhere when you would have longed for a breather-God will be faithful which means those times will come again- so breathe now. Receive this as a gift.
7. Give thanks- it’s a good time to be intentional about thanking everyone who has pushed, pulled, carried and accompanied you- speak those words, the ones you need to share-ministry happens here!
8. Give your time- there are lots of organizations who need healers and helpers- if this gives you energy and perspective- ministry happens everywhere!
9. Walk with the word- not just for class. Meditate, journal and swim in God’s words for this time. Part of ministry is leading others in disciplines like this-but that means experiencing them for yourself.
10. Celebrate! Even the Israelites needed to look back and see how far they had come before the next part of the journey-remember all those places God has brought you through and all of the people God used to do it. Don’t take all you have already been through for granted! Celebrate that God continues to prosper the work begun in you- a person formed for ministry who is already doing ministry and receiving God’s blessings.
Waiting for the Lord is not easy, but lest we fall victim to being people who really mean “my will be done” may God give each of us the strength to trust God’s timing and providing.

John 3:17

2011-03-20T06:50:00.000-04:00

We already know this Gospel passage well. Most of us may even know part of it by heart. John 3:16. Most of us have probably seen the ever-present John 3:16 sign being held up at sporting events by the guy in rainbow hair. We already know it by heart- Say it with me- “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” It’s part of our scriptural memory. Likewise Nicodemus, a learned man of the law, could probably recite much of the Torah by heart. When we already know the words so well, perhaps we can ask-So what more can be said when we already know?
Yet this week as I re-read and prayed over these words, the world kept intruding. The word of “Water” and the wind and breath of the Spirit that we associate with baptism and new life were words that in the context of the tragedies of Japan have been words speaking death as we find we cannot even fathom the earthquake, the tsunami and now whether one can even breathe the air of radiation. What troubled me as much as the pervasive sadness was the voices of some followers of Christ, who, as they often say in other tragedies, are sure they know that God is speaking in these events- not speaking through the aid workers or our prayers, but God bringing this disaster to speak condemnation. Pointing to signs in our world where we have a steady diet of news and commentary designed to help us make sense of it all. Pronouncing that we can know and then control it all, with a generous side helping of death and hate.
It is into this world that Jesus calls us, just as he called Nicodemus to ponder what it means to be born “from above” or “born anew.” How do water and the Spirit cause us to be born into something different than the clamoring of our world? For one thing it means remembering our new birth is birth into a new community. Our first clue comes from the fact that both Nicodemus and Jesus are speaking in the language of “we”- we know, we speak, and of the plural “you.” Speaking not of an individual “my faith is between me and my God” moment, but being born into a kingdom of God. We see this language in our baptismal liturgy- “We welcome you into the Lord’s family. We receive you as a worker with us in the kingdom of God.” This is what we speak and what we claim we know and believe.
But as it is for Nicodemus, so it is for us- we called to something deeper happening here. Living out our baptism also includes words we say a little less loudly – we participate in Christ’s death in addition to new life. The death of the Son of Man lifted up. And we’re then challenged to take the words we speak and know and put our belief into action- to not be “secret Christians.” To instead step out of the darkness and bear the light of Christ in our community and in our world. Living out the kingdom of God in the example of the cross takes us to the point of death to those things we still cling to. All of those Nicodemus places.
David Rensburger says that “Nicodemus is to be found wherever one whose life is secure must face one whose life is insecure and decide to say ‘ I am one of them.’” We cannot know the meaning of our new lives without grounding it in the reality of Jesus’ story not just for us but for the world. This challenges us in all of the places beyond this sanctuary, in all of the places where we fear what it means to our public persona or position at risk to bear witness to the transformational message of the cross. All the times we would rather hang out on the edge in darkness. Jesus challenges where you and I are willing to go- will we break away from the pack, from our places of security and proclaim that God’s kingdom really transcends ours? There are times when my answer to that question is “I don’t know.”
But as I said this is not one moment or one person, but a larger journey- to know and believe takes our whole lives, and is one where God continues to reveal what our “new birth” really is all about- that though we desire differently, it is entirely beyond our control or manipulation and is entirely in the hands of God.
Which brings me back to where we started and to what can be said to those who claim to know what is done at the hand of God. We can ask- what exactly do the hands of our God look like? Let’s dust off John 3:16 and read it slowly-
For God so LOVED- this what we are asked to believe- God loves.
For God so loved the world- actually, God loves all that God created- all of it.
Loved all that was created so much that God gave the only Son- God gave it all.
So we might believe that this is who God is for us and live.
Why?
Because God says so.
Think about how radical that really is and how it challenges our decisions in our lives and in how we see the rest of the kingdom- God’s world. Though none of us will perfect this living, this is why the work of the cross and our baptism are such a proclamation of sheer grace. And we can hear with hope John 3:17-that lesser known next verse- perhaps the one as important to carry on signs at public events-God did not send the Son to condemn the world but in order that it might be saved through Him. God is not in the condemnation business! I hope you will stand in awe with me. God laid it all on the line so that we are able by the love of our God, by the power of the cross and the work of the Spirit to die – to die to sin and all that separates us from God’s kingdom vision, and to live. Christ is how much God loves the whole of creation. I invite you to ponder anew this simple but profound truth. And may the Spirit help you to bear this redeeming sign into all of the places in our world desperate to receive it.

God said what?

2011-03-15T16:14:00.003-04:00

Today's passage comes from Habukkuk 2:1-3
I will stand at my watchpost, and station myself on the rampart; I will keep watch to see what he will say to me, and what he will answer concerning my complaint.Then the Lord answered me and said: Write the vision; make it plain on tablets, so that a runner may read it. For there is still a vision for the appointed time; it speaks of the end, and does not lie. If it seems to tarry, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay. Look at the proud! Their spirit is not right in them, but the righteous live by their faith.

As I read these words the prayer prompt encouraged lifting up a current need for social justice and for visionaries to guide the way toward healing and change. But what keeps running through my head is Glenn Beck, whose latest screed to is claim that the devastating disaster in Japan is God speaking- not the aid workers, not the prayers so many of us are lifting, but the disaster itself is God speaking- against probably any multitude of perceived sins.

And yet at the same time I am working on a sermon for this Sunday on John 3:1-17 which includes the ubiquitous 3:16 that is at so many major events, plain for all to see. Perhaps so ubiquitous that we are numbed to the words "for God so loved the world that God gave the only Son."

And I wonder how it is that culturally people are drawn the incessant shrill pseudo-prophecy of people like Glenn Beck who lift up an image of a butt-kicking God, rather than the equally pervasive but not assaultive proclamation of God's ultimate show of love, the Son lifted up on the cross for all of humanity.

Not some, not the ones we decide, but all. Because the cosmos, is not just our view of the world, but is all of God's universe. We may not want to believe it, we may not see how it is possible, we may not even like it, but God loves each of us and all of us, because. As Martin Niemoller once put it, "It took me a long time to realize that not only did God not hate my enemies, he didn't even hate his enemies."

So while there are too many issues of social justice to lift up in one mediocre stab at poetry, the one on my mind today is inspired by what it would mean if we listened to what God had to say to all our laments and waited for what God has promised-Christ died and rose for us, so that we may not die but have eternal life, and we are called to proclaim that even when we don't get what happens in our world, we live by the faith of this. And instead of waiting for some other visionary to trumpet this, to each in our own faltering but faithful way- offer that little flicker of light in the darkness that says we will not succumb to hate-mongering.

Lord, help me to keep watch
not for the latest talking head
who cries out woe
and writes a vision of doom
claiming to speak for you.
Help me to remember that your words
are not brought forth in sound bites
but in the times of waiting
and watching.
We cry out don't tarry
yet help us to wait
to keep from deciding
that our words
are just as good if not better
because they are here.
Help us to remember that the true prophets
never ran to and embraced
their role with pride
but trembled to know.
Give us the courage
to stand in the maelstrom of hate
and offer the witness of the cross
of a love we could never give
of a love that changed the universe
that changes who we love
and challenges us to ask
before we curse,
just where did you hear me say THAT?

your word made flesh

2011-03-14T21:32:00.003-04:00

Since my last post I have traveled to Philadelphia Seminary and back on a journey to meet with bishops. A couple of weeks ago I learned that in our churchwide regional assignment process for graduating ELCA seminarians, I was assigned to Region 7 of the church. On Saturday my husband and I gathered with over two dozen other seminarians and loved ones, a chance to meet those who had also been called from across the country to the region of our church that spans Eastern Pennsylvania all the way north to Maine. And by across the country I literally mean people who came from all corners of the country, California, the Plains, the Midwest, South and the East. From all walks of life and experience but who will be knit together with all of the others serving the church, but particularly as those who will gather periodically from across Region 7 for education and fellowship. Each of us knew someone else, and then we learned all of the connections we had in common. And then to bond in this weekend in the common experience of interviewing, worshipping, fellowship and waiting to hear the name of a synod that was claiming us.
On Sunday my prayer prompt was from Ecclesiastes and encouraged me to talk about times I have felt the aches and pains of life, but really I would rather think of the seasons of all of our lives. And with all of the other praying going on, well, I skipped the writing of the day.
And after a wonderful day of sacred conversation, and hearing others hopes, dream and fears, and some of the best hymn singing ever, I really could not do that time justice.
At the end of our time together we each heard our name called, and then quickly huddled with the staff of the synod who was calling us, and then before long it was back on the road again, and calling, texting loved ones, friends to share our news. It was then I could see just how many people I needed to tell, and then I could really see between the phone, texting, Facebooking, emailing how many people have been keeping me and mine in prayer.
To share how blessed we felt, the joy of hearing someone tell you there is a place for you and to put real live faces with names and figures.
I know I am assigned to the Northeast Pennsylvania synod and in words I have learned that there is a hope for how I will begin ministry there.

Which is a long lead in to today's prompt of John 1:1-5 and the word made flesh and nothing really profound because I am tired, but it is a good sense of tired:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being. What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

Your Word
is more than words,
is more than ideas
though it all began with words.

Your life breathed into words,
breathed into existence
our very existence
and everything we know.

Your Word in others
brings words to life in the form of people
who call us from places where we struggle to know you
where we wonder about your purposes
and what is real.

Your Word reminds us that we are a people.
We are your people
Who come to life through others
When you call our name.
When we hear again your promises.
And in humbled awe we light up
and give thanks for the words and the Word you give.

God in the Stillness

2011-03-12T08:52:00.004-05:00

Today's prayer prompt comes from Psalm 46:10- Be still, and know that I am God.

As I prepared to begin my prayer time, my husband called me to the window by our birdfeeder with the incongruous phrase- "Come quick, there is something you want to see, but be still." There was a glimpse of the first goldfinch of the season and for a moment I remembered being in summer Greek three and half years ago and walking the battlefield with Greek flash cards intently practicing when I was disrupted by the most exuberant bird song and looked to see the flutterings of many goldfinches who had found the perfect patch of thistle and were calling out to each other and clearly rejoicing. I stood still, and just soaked in their thanksgiving and remembered that there is more than just the frenetic to-do list. Oh, to be a happy sated finch sitting on a clump of thistle with friends just riding the movement of a breeze!

So today's finch comes as I travel to Philadelphia Seminary later today to meet and interview with Region 7 bishops along with over twenty others, and it will conclude with learning which synod will be home and which bishop will be mine. All of us traveling from across the country, with directions, and itineraries and expectations and paperwork and questions.

I think it is not without purpose that this morning I saw a finch and read "Be still." Just as those August finches caught me off guard and made me recalibrate, today's unexpected finch has done the same, which was an excellent segue into the prayer time directive of "spend 10 minutes in silence...relax...let thoughts come and go...prayers for stillness and grounding."

Be still and know that I am God
Be still, be still, be still
Wait, that seems like my mantra of being still
Is thinly disguised "doing" not "being."

But then, as I slowly inhale and exhale
I hear you, as you place your hands on my shoulders
And comfort me with your words- Be Still
I am God
We who have been raised in a "Protestant work ethic"
Who can not fathom a "being ethic."
We of the "action/reflection" mindset
Who tirelessly explore knowing ourselves
yet are never quite sure
and never quite at peace with it.

You remind me how often all I hear is my own voice.

And it is when you remind me
or even disrupt me into stillness
that I stop hearing my voice
and can be awed by yours-
in the fluttering of the breeze
in the song of the bird
in the touch of a loved one
in the peace of the absence of the cacaphony
of all of the world's doing

Lord, remind me to be sated with every moment you provide
To turn off my busy-ness
and see your hands at work in all that surrounds me.
Only then can I listen for how you want me to live out my being
as your child.

Help me to remember that your greatest desire
is for my heart to beat with yours
for me to listen to see whether we are in sync
and to reflect on this first
Help me in all that I think, say and do
to then reflect not who I am
but who you are-
You are God.
You are.

Don't you know? Haven't you heard?

2011-03-11T07:39:00.003-05:00

Isaiah 40
Comfort for God’s People
1 Comfort, comfort my people,
says your God.
2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and proclaim to her
that her hard service has been completed,
that her sin has been paid for,
that she has received from the LORD’s hand
double for all her sins.
3 A voice of one calling:
“In the wilderness prepare
the way for the LORD[a];
make straight in the desert
a highway for our God.[b]
4 Every valley shall be raised up,
every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
the rugged places a plain.
5 And the glory of the LORD will be revealed,
and all people will see it together.
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”

6 A voice says, “Cry out.”
And I said, “What shall I cry?”

“All people are like grass,
and all their faithfulness is like the flowers of the field.
7 The grass withers and the flowers fall,
because the breath of the LORD blows on them.
Surely the people are grass.
8 The grass withers and the flowers fall,
but the word of our God endures forever.”

9 You who bring good news to Zion,
go up on a high mountain.
You who bring good news to Jerusalem,[c]
lift up your voice with a shout,
lift it up, do not be afraid;
say to the towns of Judah,
“Here is your God!”
10 See, the Sovereign LORD comes with power,
and he rules with a mighty arm.
See, his reward is with him,
and his recompense accompanies him.
11 He tends his flock like a shepherd:
He gathers the lambs in his arms
and carries them close to his heart;
he gently leads those that have young.

12 Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand,
or with the breadth of his hand marked off the heavens?
Who has held the dust of the earth in a basket,
or weighed the mountains on the scales
and the hills in a balance?
13 Who can fathom the Spirit[d] of the LORD,
or instruct the LORD as his counselor?
14 Whom did the LORD consult to enlighten him,
and who taught him the right way?
Who was it that taught him knowledge,
or showed him the path of understanding?

15 Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket;
they are regarded as dust on the scales;
he weighs the islands as though they were fine dust.
16 Lebanon is not sufficient for altar fires,
nor its animals enough for burnt offerings.
17 Before him all the nations are as nothing;
they are regarded by him as worthless
and less than nothing.

18 With whom, then, will you compare God?
To what image will you liken him?
19 As for an idol, a metalworker casts it,
and a goldsmith overlays it with gold
and fashions silver chains for it.
20 A person too poor to present such an offering
selects wood that will not rot;
they look for a skilled worker
to set up an idol that will not topple.

21 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood since the earth was founded?
22 He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth,
and its people are like grasshoppers.
He stretches out the heavens like a canopy,
and spreads them out like a tent to live in.
23 He brings princes to naught
and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing.
24 No sooner are they planted,
no sooner are they sown,
no sooner do they take root in the ground,
than he blows on them and they wither,
and a whirlwind sweeps them away like chaff.

25 “To whom will you compare me?
Or who is my equal?” says the Holy One.
26 Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens:
Who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one
and calls forth each of them by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength,
not one of them is missing.

27 Why do you complain, Jacob?
Why do you say, Israel,
“My way is hidden from the LORD;
my cause is disregarded by my God”?
28 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The LORD is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
29 He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
30 Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
31 but those who hope in the LORD
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

Our days are filled with news
snipppets and teasers
of factoids
and breaking stories
that blow across us
and we turn to others-
how quickly we cry out: "Did you know? Did you hear?"

Each story seems to captivate
and yet
our attention soon turns
leaving yesterday's tragedy
swept away like chaff
outdone
while we continue on
bragging of power,
yet powerless.

If we stopped to actually list
the whole of the immediate fate of your flock
we could scarely take it in,
and yet how quick we are
to speak for you, Lord
as if we can know your mind
or force your hand,
and when we find we cannot know
and cannot solve

it is then
that we can perhaps
grasp
that while we have been
paying homage to our
analyzing and planning
triaging and staging,
you have already been there
as you always are, saying,
"Don't you know?
None will be missing.
Hear me!"

And your voice
in our wilderness
calls us home
to you.

What I Need for this Day

2011-03-10T08:21:00.005-05:00

Ephesians 6:10-18
10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11 Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13 Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14 Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, 15 and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16 In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17 Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
18 And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.

What will this day demand?
In a world where conlict and competition blare-
Take a stand
stand your ground
stand up
stand firm

where at times over against those stands and demands you speak-

Take your stand
You will be able to stand your ground
You will be able to stand
Stand firm
Though not for the sake of the world as it is,
but the world that should be

Many people and events and things will tell you that you cannot,
you should not
or that you won’t.
Stand firm then- in those times.

Are there places in my life where I need to take a stand?

Just as likely places where I just need to be able TO stand.
So many processes swirling at once,
like the childhood game
of thrusting your arms out from your sides
and spinning, spinning, spinning
as fast as you can
til you’re dizzy
and you fall
down.
And everything you see is contorted until eventually it stops.
We laugh because we know it is temporary
Not the permanent picture.

But…
We don’t always choose
who starts our spinning.
We don’t always know
how the myriad things that assail us
will again be straight or chased away.
Til then it takes everything just to stand.

Your truth, Lord
is what holds my center of gravity
Your righteousness
dwells in my heart even when I forgot to prepare room
You will guide my feet into places of peace
When I want to take a stand but shouldn’t
When you tell me to walk by faith
and not by what I think I see,
or don’t see.

These are your words
Words for me
Words for all of us
Permanently.

How will I sort out your words
from all of the others?
By remembering to return to you,
You who proclaim that you give the gift
of conversation with you
where all of our questions
and all of requests
are heard by you
Where you remind us to stick around because
there are others too
whose questions and requests
are also worthy and heard by you.
who also long to just stand
How will we see and receive the armor we truly need for this day?

I guess it's a good thing you like to talk.Help me be a good listener.

Praying with my Pen- Can These Dry Bones Live?

2011-03-09T21:26:00.004-05:00

I am committing to engaging Rachel Hackenberg's "Writing to God- 40 days of Praying with my Pen" as a part of my Lenten discipline. Today's prompt comes from the words of Ezekiel 37:1-3
"The hand of the LORD was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones.He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. He asked me, “Son of man, can these bones live?”
I said, “Sovereign LORD, you alone know.”

The questions ask for one to consider where are the "dry bones" in our lives that need to have life and breath of God infused in them (my words as a paraphrase) and then to write to God for encouragement in these areas.

It's been challenging to write this day- I had things in mind that seemed really important, but while I was imagining what I would say, God, you sent me to the hospital to work yesterday where you placed me in the valley with a 13 year old whose path was multiple broken bones, a wrist, a rib, maybe more. He was hit riding his bike to school and his family wondered if the bleeding inside his skull was really bigger than it seemed. Where they let the chopper take him to a pediatric unit elsewhere.

Then you sent me to visit with a elderly woman whose latest fall broke a hip and who wondered whether she could continue to live alone or whether this is one more step into a sadness she wants to avoid. Where just as the brittleness was ending, you called me to another valley, but not before I could offer a glimmer of your healing

But then you sent me to a family whose father/fiance/uncle/brother died of a sudden cardiac arrest. Where his son had tried in vain to revive him, where the cruel snap of the shattering words "there was nothing more we could do" came in a valley where there were no broken bones but plenty of broken hearts and a profound wailing and rending that seemed to have no ceasing.

What felt like "dry bones" were the words I could give- words that if they were platitudes would simply shatter and fall to the floor. Words that had they been spoken would have been as lifeless as any dry bones. As life on this earth was done and loved ones contemplated instead, ashes.

But in the midst of those places you gave me living bones in arms that could hug, fingers that could dial a phone, hands that could hold another's, and could make the sign of the cross to proclaim that in the midst of all our dry bones, you offer life, of the everlasting kind.

You made my ribcage expand to give breath that could pray prayers even when we were numb, that could lift up what was hope- he is talking, your therapy was better today, God is in each person who is holding you and grieving with you. Ways we could acknowledge the irony of water which brings life is also water in tears at a death. And when a despondent woman's guttural proclamation was that the man she loved had saved her from herself, and she could not go on, she was tearfully and wordlessly embraced by those who will over time remind her that God used him and them to proclaim the real saving agent.

How will we go on when all around us all we see are dry bones? Only you know, Lord. But I thank you that you are willing to show what you know in all of the bones in the hands and the feet of those who come, who hold, who bless, who tend and the ribcages that power the breath of others who pray, who sigh, who encourage and support. Help us to open our eyes to how you have already breathed life to sustain us when we are not sure, and then empower us to be the same in other lands of dry bones where others cry out. Help us to hear, and when we can, to share the story of the God who really can make all of those dry bones live.
AMEN.

God and/or the Magic 8 Ball

2011-02-28T07:42:00.006-05:00

If you are like me at some point you have had the chance to toy with the Magic 8 Ball- to pick up what looks like the 8 ball of a pool table, but which in the bottom has a viewing screen through which a you can see a "white, plastic, icosahedral die floating in alcohol with dissolved dark blue dye." Each of the 20 faces of the die has an affirmative, negative, or non-committal statement printed on it in raised letters. To use the ball, it must be held with the window initially facing down. After "asking the ball" a yes-or-no question, the user then turns the ball so that the window faces up, setting in motion the liquid and die inside. When the die floats to the top and one of its faces is pressed against the window, the raised letters displace the blue liquid to reveal the message as white letters on a blue background. The manufacturer notes that contrary to popular belief, it is not necessary (or recommended) to shake or jostle the ball before turning it, as doing so can create air bubbles that may visually distort the answer to life-altering questions like:"Will the hot guy ask me out?" "Will I get into the school, or the job I want?" "Will there be pizza for lunch today?"

The 20 answers inside a Magic 8-Ball are:

● As I see it, yes
● It is certain
● It is decidedly so
● Most likely
● Outlook good
● Signs point to yes
● Without a doubt
● Yes
● Yes – definitely
● You may rely on it
● Reply hazy, try again
● Ask again later
● Better not tell you now
● Cannot predict now
● Concentrate and ask again
● Don't count on it
● My reply is no
● My sources say no
● Outlook not so good
● Very doubtful

In probability theory, it can be shown that it takes, on average, 72 questions of the Magic Eight Ball for all 20 of its answers to appear at least once.There are only so many answers but our questions are endless.

Yesterday's gospel reading from the Matthew 6:25 stands in pretty stark contrast to the theology of the Magic Eight Ball as we hear Jesus say: "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more (than these things)?

Boy do I need to hear these words. Why? Because I like many other ELCA seminarians am in my last semester in seminary which means hoping for a first call to ordained ministry, and yet it is a new day in the church- there are more of us than there are of them. We are waiting to hear from synods in the regions of the country to which we are being sent. As for myself I know that at some point we will be moving somewhere in Eastern PA- in two weeks I will know whether that will be Northeastern or Southeastern PA. Then we will wait for a bishop to tell us there may be a place where our gifts and a people's needs come together. All of this work of the Spirit however takes time and leaves very little in the "known" category." Many of us will be moving but we do not know where or when, or what we will do in the in-between.

For those of you in parishes, know that by the time we are serving in your communities when we preach on waiting, trusting and hope- we will know this very personally.The notion of possibly waiting a year or longer after graduation to do the thing you feel called to do is more than a little jarring. For those of us thinking about bills and moving and employment, "don't worry" is a little challenging- probably just as challenging as it is for many others who ponder healthcare, retirement (is it possible, is it forced upon me?)and the list goes on and on. And it is then tempting to turn to anything that will give some answer or assurance, maybe even a Magic Eight Ball.

After all in uncertain times perhaps we might even be convinced that the Eight Ball is seemingly no more random than real life. And don't we all just want to hear "it is certain" when we desire an affirmation that something is positive? And if you have ever used the Magic Eight Ball you know that you can just keep asking until you get the answer you want- that's how the probability theory serves us- if you ask about 72 times you are bound to get one of the 20 answers that you want. But think of how many minutes of your life that would take.

Of course while the manufacturer points out that shaking the Eight Ball actually works against us we can perhaps remember that using the Eight Ball is as distorted whether we shake it or not. And it not only does not know us, it has no power to grant what we seek or what we really need. No matter how many times we might use it we will never be able to show that the Eight Ball was active in our lives.

Yet I then wonder- how many of us would commit to praying to God 72 times about something we need or hope for? How many of us would listen to the advice- trying to shake God up distorts what we see, or don't see? How many of us can live in faith and trust that God really is Almighty? All questions I ask myself and lift up for you.

The disciples like many of us have been asked to leave it all behind to follow Jesus and to trust that the same God who provides for the rest of creation will provide for us. That we can trust in God's power and in God's love and care for us. It will all be good in the end. Yesterday in my home parish we sang "Praise to the Lord the Almighty" and I could hear the words in a whole new light: We hear why we should praise the Lord- ruler of creation, our health and salvation, one who gives shelter- and we're asked- "Have you not seen?" That what you desire has been granted in what God ordains- we are called to remember how God has been at work in all of the days and times before now.

We hear how God does and will prosper- will make to prosper the work we do and will be there attending us every day. What we have seen is what we will continue to see- God's goodness and mercy.

And we are asked to ponder anew what the Almighty can do. Ponder anew- not by asking the same question over and over until we hear what we want. Ponder anew how God might be working, not only in the ways we hope but in the ways where we truly will be sustained and sheltered and prospered. Maybe even ones that surprise us. Ponder anew that God is Almighty- bigger than all of the forces that are sure to try to dominate our lives.

Ponder anew that God is Lord- if we really ponder this, we can kick out all of the other things that try to be first in our minds, and praise God for this blessed relief.So that we can use the minutes and hours of our days living- really living. Remembering that what brought us here was the fact that we fell in love with God. The same God who still loves us back and reminds us- "I've got your back" this day and every day.

What's the State of Your Union?

2011-01-31T09:12:00.005-05:00

This past Sunday I was at Shepherd Of The Hills Lutheran a mission development church is Western Maryland to preach and provide a presentation on the world of Corinth in the time of Paul after my trip to Greece and Turkey- here is the sermon.

Grace and peace to you, my sisters and brothers in Christ in the name of the Triune + God. It’s a blessing to be with you this day. As you’ve heard, I’m a senior at Gettysburg Seminary, recently returned from 15 days in Greece and Turkey where I visited sites connected with the churches of Revelation and part of Paul’s missionary journeys. It seemed like an easy decision to commit to preaching on Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians- but of course there’s much Paul says that is more about challenge than about “wow it sure is great to see you!” We hear that the cross brings redemption, but are also reminded that we’re not called to pick up our old life but embrace a new one even though it seems foolish. Words for Corinth and for us.
I’m still trying to grasp that ten days ago I was literally walking the same streets and places where Paul is said to have appeared before Gallio, the governor, in Acts. Seeing the agora, the marketplace where Paul would’ve lived and worked with Priscilla and Aquila. Trying to imagine the former glory, while seeing it today in ruins, hearing little bits of terracotta from another age, crunch beneath my feet. Knowing Corinth was destroyed within a hundred years of Paul’s time there, and is now just a sleepy remnant of its former self. I’m sure no one then believed that possible amidst so much wealth and power and wisdom.

Corinth had just been rebuilt in the time of Paul. Corinth’s location on a strip of land offered not one, but two seaports-greater trade possibilities and strategic location. They hosted the Isthmian Games- kind of like the Olympics where thousands of people flocked bringing lots of tourist money. Imagine a city of brand new gleaming marble buildings and bronze statues. Corinth had developed a special way of crafting bronze producing a pinkish-gold metal that became a collector’s item. They were rolling in money. And to top it off, the philosopher Diogenes had come there seeking a larger audience for ideas, to create an intellectual center as well. Emperor Augustus launched a massive building campaign, with lots of investment to create a city to envy, offering land to soldiers and others. Offering those with no chance of upper class status the ability to become “self-made men.” This is what is challenging for those early Christians- who wouldn’t want a better life? It must have been almost overwhelming to be there in that time swimming in all that
prosperity.

If you were the right person. But the good life wasn’t for all, and not for tradesmen, like Paul- with a government imposed seven day work week- think about how to fit in worship much less relaxation. In a world with thousands of people per acre, with a raucous lifestyle perpetuated by the sailors and others. It may have been the first “city that never sleeps.” Many lived in extreme poverty, the kind we see in global slums and our inner cities today. How hard it would be not to do what it took to get ahead. These are the people to whom Paul said, “not many of you were wise by human standards, powerful, or of noble birth.” And while Paul’s trade allowed him a steady stream of conversation partners in the marketplace, tradesmen by their very occupation were reviled, the bottom of the food chain. It would be foolishness indeed that a church would be started by an upstart tradesman causing trouble in the name of a man who had been killed in the most degrading way. A newcomer who had the nerve to mock the higher ups in every way with “Where is the one who is wise? Where is the expert? Where is the debater of this age?”

But we in the here and now can still ask these questions and still hear that the message of Christianity is such foolishness to a status-driven, techno-savvy 24/7 world. Each year in this country, our elected leaders gather for the State of the Union address which happened again a few days ago. An occasion for leaders to boast about how our wisdom, power and strength will be our salvation. What if we as Christians pondered the state of our union- our union with the Christ of the cross? What would we find?

Our lessons in the season of Epiphany serve to reveal, to make known to us something of the nature of God in Christ Jesus, and of what it means to be in union with this Christ. Paul’s words today remind us again that no matter what the world suggests, the things generations prize- wisdom, strength, or power, things we find ourselves drawn to- are not the focus at all. AND that God knows that we cannot know God in these ways.

We can’t. Two words we don’t like to hear- “we can’t.” We too demand signs and desire wisdom, but in the face of this, God’s response still is instead to seek to re-shape our vision because the cross changes EVERYTHING. If we really intend to proclaim this new vision, our calling is to proclaim not the key to glory, but Christ crucified- in all its challenge and redemption. It’s a challenge because the effect of the cross, in reality, is still is a stumbling block. God’s power, wisdom and purposes don’t square with our expectations. After singing about the glory and joy of Christ’s birth, we now stand confronted with the fact that that our focus should be always on the cross- on God’s vision, not ours. And to commit ourselves to union with the work and meaning of this cross of Christ in the world, in all its liberation and foolishness.
It’s not about us. Can we really walk away from our efforts and boasting about our wisdom, strength and power, and admit that nothing we do can match the work of the cross? And if it’s not about us, what should we be about? Our response instead should be praise and thanksgiving embodied in those well known words of Micah we heard today that start with the prophet proclaiming it’s not about showing what we can bring or do that will be visible to others and bring glory to us. Rather what God deems good and desires is how we internally live our lives- to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with God as our leader.

Purposes in tension with the reality of our world and that call us to proclaim that the world’s way of doing business is flawed. That call us to abandon self interest for the interests of those standing in the shadow of that cross. This is how the lowly, the meek and poor in spirit are to be lifted up. To make real commitment to people whose lives and needs will require us to sacrifice something of ours in ways we might not want to imagine.

Martin Luther spoke of this way of the cross and discipleship-“Discipleship is not limited to what you can comprehend- it must transcend all comprehension…This is the way of the cross. You cannot find it yourself…It is not you, no (hu)man, no living creature but I myself (God says) who instruct you by word and my Spirit in the way you should go. Not the work that you choose, but the road that is clean contrary to all that you choose or contrive or desire- that is the road you must take. To that I call you.” This is the radical challenge of the cross.

Now might be a good time to remember I started out with the word “redemption.”The cross speaks redemption. God knows we’ll still want to rely upon our own capabilities and take charge. The good news is that nothing we do, or don’t do, is the basis for our salvation or redemption. It’s still about the cross. We don’t have to conjure up wisdom, power and strength to master the world. Because of that same cross of a crucified and humiliated Christ. We cannot live but for this cross- it’s always about the cross-our message and our mission. This week, take time to stand in humility and awe and praise for the grace of God’s vision and ask how God is calling you to deepen your union with Christ.

AMEN.

What Are You Waiting For?

2010-12-06T00:33:00.004-05:00

I realize I am a week behind but this is the sermon I preached last week in my my home parish for Advent 1- it is my hope that it is still appropriate for our time of waiting.

Grace and peace to you my sisters and brothers in Christ- it’s good to be in your midst after a year away on internship, and time serving as a supply preacher and a chaplain, all of which adds up to my only being here about five times in the last year and a half. I felt like I might never be in your midst again. When I was invited to preach I confess that waiting for this day has been the hardest part. But our lives are full of waiting. Some things have already happened, others are yet to come. We all dread those words “not yet.” We’re all waiting for something. So take a moment now and ask yourselves- What are YOU waiting for?

I’m going to go out on a limb and venture a guess on a couple possibilities. Particularly for the kids among us, perhaps you’re waiting to open Christmas presents. Thanksgiving has happened already. Christmas morning is “not yet.” Here in the congregation for some of you, maybe you’re waiting for the call process to be completed- the committee’s in place, the conclusion is “not yet.” Others of you may already be wishing this sermon over- to which I can say “NOT YET.”
“Already but not yet” also describes the season of Advent- we’re waiting to celebrate and remember the birth of Jesus which happened already. But we are also waiting for the return of Christ and God’s fulfillment which is “not yet.” I think we tend to focus on the “Baby Jesus” part. Is there anyone here who when I talked about what we are waiting for who thought first of waiting for the second coming of Christ?
It’s hard to wait for something when we’re told we can’t know the details. It’s hard to maintain that sense of “being ready” or “keeping awake” after all this time. It was probably just as hard as it was for the Israelites hearing the prophet Isaiah speak of a world that they couldn’t imagine. Or those in the time of Noah, doing all of the things we do in this season, eating, drinking, socializing. Or those who first heard our gospel. God’s people are used to waiting. SO, If you weren’t thinking about the return of Christ, you’re not alone. In fact, according to the Pew Research Center, almost 60% of American Christians don’t believe Christ will return in their lifetimes. But shockingly, another 21% don’t think Christ will ever come. American Christians.
Perhaps then it’s easy to see the images in the Gospel of the women grinding in the field as just mindlessly living out the same old same old in a world where we say “life goes on” as a way of saying we don’t really expect anything more.
Maybe we can identify with the words of popular song writer John Mayer in the song entitled, “Waiting for the World to Change” which speaks of not acting in response to current world conditions because until something changes it makes no difference, because we lack power. He says:
Now we see everything that's going wrong with the world and those who lead it
We just feel like we don't have the means to rise above and beat it
It's not that we don't care, we just know that the fight ain't fair
SO we keep waiting for the world to change.

It’s hard to not nod off after trying to staying awake too long; with all of the news in our world, it’s hard to not be numb to what’s happening in the here and now. Maybe it’s easier to conserve our effort for when it really matters, wishing we knew when it mattered because until then “life goes on.” Maybe we’re even a little angry to hear the image of our house being broken into, our world rocked, wondering what it means to be “left behind” and hearing “if only you had been paying attention!”
But these words get our attention. In fact that’s their primary purpose- not to keep us up at night wondering about who is left behind and what it means, but to get us to wake up from our waiting.
SO maybe we’re called to something more than waiting for the world to change.
Consider instead the words of another song writer- Philip Nicolai. Raise your hand if you’ve heard his latest hit. If you haven’t heard of him, it’s not surprising, but actually you’ve heard his words and sung them. Nicolai was a Lutheran pastor in the late 1500’s during religious wars in Europe. Several times he had to flee or go into hiding and minister to his congregations secretly. And to top it off, while he was pastor, the plague took 1300 of his parishioners, mostly in the latter half of 1597. The next time Pastor Domines thinks he has a lot to do , Pastor Nicolai buried 170 in one week! Yet, to comfort his parishioners, he wrote a series of meditations which he called Freudenspiegel- translated means Mirror of Joy! Mirror of Joy!
And he wrote two hymns to inspire his people in this time of gloom, waiting and longing for a better day. Today we’ll sing one of them- "Wake, awake, for night is flying," which proclaims belief in the triumph of God. Written in a time when it would’ve been easy to just sing about waiting for the world to change. Instead lifting up what our gospel tells us-
Be expecting something! Don’t let being hung up on the logistics lead you to doubt, or let time lead you to be complacent. Be ready! The readiness we hear in Nicolai’s hymn is not wondering if anything will ever be different or better, but waiting in a way that proclaims that the work of the Christ has already begun. To remember that while we live in a time of “not yet” we triumphantly proclaim the hope of “already.”That the promises of the Kingdom are true and already in motion. And for us to be in motion, demonstrating our belief in Christ for others to see as a sign of hope. Seeing our world with eyes wide open, but living as people who expect to see something more and who respond by participating in its arrival. Maybe that kind of waiting looks like this: When Catherine was little, one Xmas we decided to get her the Playmobil Enchanted Castle-what any little girl fascinated by princesses would long for- a beautiful castle with two spiral staircases, and a sparkling chandelier, and flags flying from the turrets, an elegant banquet hall and a throne room. Can you tell I loved it just as much?
I bought it at the toy store, brought it home and hid the boxes so she couldn’t find it. Fully assembled, it would be too large to hide, so I had to wait ‘til just before Christmas to put it together. Which I did after the late service on Christmas Eve, which is actually Christmas Day.
This is when I realized it had about 500 pieces. So I was up into the wee hours of the night, laboring. But what kept me going was the absolute joy I knew would be experienced in the morning! This kept me awake and motivated. That very real anticipation. It’s the same sense of wonder and excitement we teach our children and grandchildren about Christmas and Baby Jesus.
What would it mean for us to live our lives in that sense of expectation? To wake up not only ourselves but others to the reality that the world as we know it has already begun to change? To live in the belief that God’s truth is already victorious? To proclaim to a world that has no expectations that the birth we will remember is the source of hope, and joy and peace and the best is yet to come? Living in eager expectation is to not only long for but to work for the vision where swords of destruction become plows that grow life, of trusting the power Christ brings and sharing moments of the in-breaking of Christ already. So sisters and brothers- What are you waiting for? Christ has triumphed and will come again-
Wake awake!
AMEN.

Shepherding

2010-11-22T16:59:00.006-05:00

Earlier this fall in our Seminary chapel one of our New Testament professors provided a vivid description of having to return a scary and smelly sheep. This week I was preaching in Chapel on a "shepherd" text knowing that many of us had already been regaled with many sensory images of having to retrieve a scared sheep- you can use your imagination on that one. Below is my sermon on the text Ezekiel 34:11-24 ( our psalm for the day was Psalm 100:

For those of you who earlier this semester heard Dr Carlson’s vivid description of sheep, you may not appreciate me for this: Greetings, fellow sheep! It’s soon time to sit down and “tie the feed bag on” over Thanksgiving dinner, that annual celebration of consumption. Then groan and push ourselves away from the table to be ready for one of the biggest days of the year-Black Friday. That day kicking off our weeks of preparation, known to many not as Advent, but Christmas shopping days. I remember working at a discount department store and we dreaded opening the door on Black Friday- as the lock on the door clicks open, shoppers run amok, shoving and jostling on that quest to get more “good stuff cheap” than we need, get our fair share preferably before someone else can. You could tell the path of the herd by the trail of flung merchandise.

Some see it as progress that we being shopping even sooner now with “Black Friday leaks” of advance sales to get a head start. We’ll do that again this year while others will look on in ever growing need, shoved to the outer corners of our awareness. This is the state of our flock.

Around the world In China the flock faces profound water pollution and water shortage due to rising demands of the factories that feed our “wants.” New dams across rivers for hydroelectric power mean that as business prospers, those downstream suffer. Parched farm fields have developed cracks up to 33 feet deep making it too dangerous to farm. I can’t even fathom that. New dams mean relocating scores of villages, people scatter, forced to come to cities where they’re ill-prepared to survive. The flock farther downriver is stressed too- Bangladesh, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, India, Thailand and Vietnam all say China's aggressive dam-building is depriving their most needy of water, but they lack the money or political ability to build dams and reservoirs as quickly as China. They’ve been outmaneuvered. Yet those profiting from this boom ramp up their personal consumption, new gadgets and appliances, homes with gardens, cars that need washing, and more food, which needs growing, golf courses that need watering and ski resorts creating man-made snow while someone somewhere else, dies of thirst. This too is the state of the flock. In a word: SELF-ABSORBED. And I wonder as we prepare to celebrate a day that began as a way of remembering God’s providing survival how we have instead become a world that celebrates the winner of “Survivor?”
Truth is we’re a long way from the words of our Psalm, rejoicing in the sufficiency of our Lord’s providing, and arrangement. On National Public Radio’s blog, “Cosmos and Culture” I read a post by Ursula Goodenough, who teaches cell biology and molecular evolution. She also explores the religious potential of our scientific understandings of nature, in her book, The Sacred Depths of Nature. Considering our human predicament she says: all organisms, by definition, seek self interest, “Self-maintenance and self-protection are biological imperatives.” But social organisms –including us- can remain self-interested, yet also cooperate in activities like gathering food and predator protection. The mandate to flourish as individuals and in community can be seen from tiny bacteria to wolves in packs.

It’s “instinctive.” But we Primates are better than sheep- we’ve been given minds capable of keeping track of friendships, mastering changing social structures. The ability to enhance stability and the flourishing of even larger groups- and this is most developed in humans.
But the demands of self-interest versus group cooperation create conflicting impulses. Under stress we revert to the default behavior of all creatures-being self-absorbed. Sadly we often really are sheep after all.
SO WHERE ARE THE SHEPHERDS? WHERE IS THE JUSTICE? Seems like when we really need them, the shepherds in our midst disappear or engage in blame-storming of their own. The recurrent theme in our country is that it’s the shepherds’ fault- they let it all happen! They failed to protect us! Thank God that God will gather and restore and heal after judging those shepherds. But it’s in verses 17-19, the ones our lectionary omits we are faced with a message-“Not so fast, sheep!” The prophet turns and speak to us directly- we the flock- with an indictment we don’t want to hear.
As for you, my flock, thus says the Lord GOD: Isn’t it enough for you to feed on the good pasture? Must you trash the rest? When you drink of clear water, must you foul the rest? What about the other sheep? Must they suffer because you pushed with flank and shoulder, and butted at all the weak, scattering them far and wide? Words spoken to us. It’s not just about shepherds who fail. We have a capacity and a role in the bigger flock. And we have a role in the events I described earlier, in our celebrations of consumption.
“We’ll always be self-interested and want stuff…maybe it’s time we want what we already have more. What we’ve got is a splendid planet; what we need to want is that it and everyone on it flourish” (Goodenough). For that we need a better shepherd.
Thanks be to God we know that the promise of that Shepherd for us has been fulfilled. A Shepherd who is strong enough to be our ruler but gentle enough to be our Shepherd. A Shepherd who calls us to step away from herd mentality and to seek a path that leads to life and not death. To bring us back, heal us and strengthen us so we can rely on those other “Shepherd” words we know well- “The Lord is my shepherd I shall not want” and not only say them at funerals. To instead contemplate the ways we are cared for by God right now and how we can rest from our jostling and trampling. Our Shepherd who feeds us not just physically but with what we need to grow in awareness of our ways and their consequences. And more importantly, to grow in the emotions we are uniquely gifted with by God- fair-mindedness, respect, reverence and empathy.
Fellow sheep, Thanks be to God for our true shepherd who still proclaims “I will save- they shall no longer be ravaged.” Our God, whose steadfast love and faithfulness endures and outlasts our behaviors. Our Shepherd, who is still seeking us and who still promises “I will feed you” and “I will be your God.”
This year when we sit down at the feast perhaps our first prayer should be –
“Thank you Lord for being our Shepherd. Shepherd us still.”
AMEN

Where Do You Put Your Persistence?

2010-10-18T21:50:00.002-04:00

Last week we heard about faith and explored faith as being about more than what we can see-recognizing God’s presence and power to bring healing and wholeness. In faith we are made well-warm fuzzy thoughts of the leper healed and restored. But today it seems we see the opposite in the widow. Things are supposed to change, but when? By the time the Gospel of Luke was written, those hearing it expected Jesus to have returned and completed the fulfillment of the kingdom by now. We hear from Jesus that God’s kingdom is present in his life and in our lives this side of the cross. Yet at the same time we too wait for more to come at a time we do not know. How do we keep the faith when our sense of timing is not met and when so much of the news in our world makes us weary? What is God’s word while we wait and live in a world full of unjust judges and burdensome situations? It’s in this context Jesus speaks of prayer as a way to not lose heart, ultimately asking if when the Son of Man returns will he find faith on earth? Will we rely on turning to God in prayer? Easier said than done. What do we do when it’s not the way we expect?
One possible response comes from the show my daughters and I watch- “Glee” which recently tackled prayer and faith in crisis or injustice. One of the regular characters is Sue, a power hungry overbearing high school teacher and coach who regularly butts heads with everyone, particularly the students who sing in the Glee Club. When Kurt, one of the glee club students faces the sudden collapse of his father, now unresponsive in the ICU unit, teachers and students all respond in different ways. Some try to encourage Kurt to pray and have faith in God. But Sue is furious-public school students can’t do this at school. She’s clearly very passionate about opposing this. Then it’s revealed this has hit a nerve from her childhood. As a little girl, Sue idolized her older sister. But at some point Sue realized other people not only didn’t idolize her sister, they mocked her and picked on her. Sue’s older sister was “different”- she was a child with Downs’ Syndrome. Sue prayed to God to cure her sister, so she’d no longer suffer the injustices she faced. Nothing changed.
Sue decided she was just not persistent enough. Yet, years went by and her sister was still a person with Downs’ Syndrome whose life would never be like that of others. Sue concluded that no one was listening to her persistent prayers-God must be a cruel myth. Injustice was an unchanging cold hard reality and “survival of the fittest” was the key. This is the mindset of the judge in the gospel- who cares about this widow who hasn’t mastered the game of life? Yet she continues to turn to him, over and over. And we never hear that the widow prays. When wrestle with times of crisis or injustice, who or what do we turn to? It’s natural to turn to our systems of “survival of the fittest”-of law and medicine and research.
Have you ever noticed how we give incredible latitude to these systems? We need time for the medicine to work, time for research to find the answer, time for the case to come to court, time for the law to be passed. We might whine while we wait, but we’ll keep turning to these systems even when we, like people of every place and time can be tempted to lose heart-in times where we live with our question of WHEN?
When will this crisis I am facing end? When will what I long for happen? When will I know? When will a change of heart take place? WHEN? We continually turn to and pursue every earthly alternative even when we have no reason to know or believe those people or things deliver. When we know the systems are flawed and unjust.
Do we use that same level of persistence in prayer with God? Or do we expect immediate gratification? When we don’t receive what we seek or it doesn’t happen when we expected, do we lose heart and decide that it’s God who is unjust?
Another possible response came in the story of the rescued Chilean miners, trapped in a dark mine since August 5th. One of them, Mario Sepulveda, described the struggle of waiting. During the waiting and wondering he also pondered the injustice of a workplace that caused his plight. He battled losing heart- that sense that all of the injustices and shortcomings really will prevail. That sense of deciding that God really isn’t with us. Sepulveda said of his experience,” I was with God and with the devil (in the mine) and I reached out for God.” This is the heart of our gospel.
God knows that in all of the in-between times it is hard not to lose heart. The parable of the widow demonstrates a God of grace who understands who we are in these times and where we tend to put our trust. The point of the parable is not to simply identify our insufficiency, nor should we come to view God as the unjust judge who might, eventually, relent to some of our persistent petitions. Such a response leads us to believe that it’s just about wearing God down or proving a work of prayer righteousness.
Rather, because of the witness of how God is faithful, we can trust that what God has promised will come. And we should be as persistent as the widow in turning to God in prayer so that we can be sustained, and strengthened, and guided. And in the process maybe even shown new things. In the “Glee” episode, in the midst of uproar at school, Sue visits her sister who lives in an assisted living facility. Surely her sister will agree there’s no God!
But when Sue asks her sister whether she believes in God, she immediately smiles broadly, then asks Sue- Do YOU? Sue explains she doesn’t because she prayed God would stop what happened to her sister, but nothing changed. Her sister emphatically shakes her head and says basically- But I have faith in God and I am not a mistake. She’s able to live now and for the future on that. And she offers to pray for Sue.
Sue’s sister’s physical condition didn’t change, but her life did because of the depth of Sue’s love, care and advocacy for her. Now Sue could be sustained by the love, care and wisdom of her sister who allowed Sue to see things she might never have seen otherwise, including how she was bullying someone else.
When we face all our in-between times in prayer, we find strength when we’re overwhelmed and insight into our own actions. We are not always the poor widow. Sometimes we’re the ones acting unjustly. In continually turning to God first, by naming all of the people and places and situations on our hearts and minds we are shaped by God and not the world. We begin to grasp and trust in God’s different system of justice and timing. God deepens our faith in God’s greater purposes. And the “much more” we have not yet seen becomes God’s promise we work for, and pray for, and in which we can place our hope and trust here on earth.
While I preached this sermon I noticed two people in the campground congregation were visibly moved. Before our prayers of intercession I always ask for prayer concerns or thanksgivings. The man who’d been moved to tears offered that he was thankful because a year ago he was told he had less than six months to live. He went to the doctor with a bulging neck and neck pain. They told him, without testing, that he probably had muscle strain. Being poor he decided to ride it out. They told him to come back if it did not get better, but what does that mean? Until he had a lump and went back to find out that he had a stage 3 tumor on his neck. He could have been mad but instead it had encouraged him to faith because of the witness of people of the campground. He’d come back to celebrate and say thanks because it looks like he has actually beat the odds. And he brought his mom because the campers who told her about worship encouraged her to believe there was something worth experiencing.
Not a dry eye as I left the lectern and came to hug them and bless them before prayer. The best sermon was in his life. Don’t lose heart, have faith even when it seems too much. I am so blessed to have spent three months with them.

Connecting Names to Hunger

2010-09-27T08:52:00.006-04:00

In today’s gospel Jesus offers us a challenging story. I’d like to offer a story of my own. Years ago a successful businessman was abducted, drugged, beaten, robbed and thrown out of a moving car into the doorway of an office building in New York City. He lay barely conscious on the sidewalk, his clothes in tatters, bruised, bloody and dirty. In NYC, it’s not notable to be lying on the sidewalk in tattered clothes and bleeding- he could’ve been just another drunk, or bum. It’s because someone saw this man thrown from a moving vehicle that the police were called and he survived. The person who called was not one of the many in business suits, who walked around him, but the immigrant street vendor. Lots of other well to do people walked right by him and through that door into their skyscraper. Help was just on the other side of the door, if only he could get there. There are many victims of such events- this man was my Dad. Putting a name to a face changes everything. And every face has a story.
In Lazarus’s story, he didn’t place himself at the gate. Literally, he "had been thrown before it." Many don’t get to that place by their own power. They’re tossed there by others. Whether the gate is a good thing or not depends upon your perspective. If you want to be blind to the Lazaruses at the gate, want to pretend all is well in a personally controlled environment, a gate is good. It’s the phenomenon a resident of the Rescue Mission where I worked called “eyes front.” But if you’ve been thrown there, a gate might as well be that chasm we hear of later between the rich man and Lazarus. Some who have found themselves thrown at the gate were once on the other side of it. Just ask someone now dealing with foreclosure because they lost their job, or had a catastrophic medical condition. They know that feeling of being thrown at the gate. So too do the children of the poor who are powerless to change the equation.

On a larger scale, many in our world struggle with illness, hunger and the threat of death, victims of larger forces, yet seemingly invisible to others. Though then and now, good people want to believe they must have brought it upon themselves. But we don’t hear why Lazarus was in the state he was in-perhaps because it isn’t important. What IS important is that he’s hungry and in need.
But I’m still speaking in the abstract- let’s focus our vision a little closer. Take a moment and picture in your mind what a hungry person looks like… If it’s only the stereotypical image of a homeless person in the inner city or a child in a third world country, it’s time to expand your image of that face. Hungry people also live in rural and suburban areas. They hold down jobs, own homes, and try to raise families. They might live in your neighborhood or work in your building. The number of people in poverty in 2009 (43.6 million) is the largest number in the 51 years according to US Census Data. Hunger is on the rise in Pennsylvania. For African Americans and Hispanic persons 1 in 4 live in poverty. 18% of Pennsylvania children live in poverty.

Nearly 1.2 million Pennsylvanians, almost 10% of our population, live in households at risk for hunger. That’s enough people to fill Penn State University’s football stadium nearly 12 times.

We don’t have to look far beyond the gate to see these faces. But if we do look farther, we’ll see that while a family in poverty in the US is one living on less than $54 a day, half the world’s people live on less than $2 a day. Globalization changes everything. In our world today, there are 8 million Lazaruses at the gate. Eight million people suffering unto death from diseases intensified by poverty like malaria, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS, and water borne illness. And tens of millions more whose struggles with these illnesses won’t lead to death, but will result in lost income, heavy debt burdens due to health care costs, interrupted education, homelessness, and social stigma.
And every single face has a name. Names like Donna, Angelo, Ster, Abdul and names like yours. Why do I say this? Because names put a human face on a statistic. We may be tempted to generalize “the rich” or “the poor” since so few of us belong to that category. Whenever we generalize people we find it is easy to say that “they” need to fix it, need to work harder. “They made their bed and they can lie in it” or “God helps those who help themselves”- which by the way are words NOT in the Bible. But we always pay more attention to things that affect us directly, to names we know. When we “know” someone we see their plight, and feel their concern because they are a part of us. We find ourselves opening the gate if you will to let them into our world. We find ourselves contemplating the question author Shane Claiborne asks, “What if Jesus really meant all that stuff?” What if it was our name?
The rich man wasn’t condemned for being rich, but for his indifference and uncaring attitude towards poor Lazarus right outside his door. His greatest fault throughout the story was that he never recognizes the humanity of Lazarus. In the entire time Lazarus sat at the gate of the rich man, and after death in the demands the rich man made, we never see him recognize the existence of Lazarus as another human being created in the image of God. This problem persists today while people die every day because they’re too poor to live, as climate change brings rising coastal waters, droughts destroy crop production in the world's most insecure areas. For decades now humanity has had the means for global destruction or global possibility. Our ability to confront these challenges is one of the great pressing issues of justice in our world today. That’s some pretty heavy stuff.
How can we who are living as those blessed by God respond to this call? The name "Lazarus" may be significant. It means "Helped by God". In the parable, Lazarus is a man who can do nothing for himself, who can't even keep the wild dogs from licking his sores. Yet both our gospel and our Psalm today lift up that God helps those who are in need- those who put their faith not in “help yourself” but in God. Those who stop relying upon government, or gate building to protect their way of living. Who remember that rulers after all are busy making a name for themselves-gathering for themselves. We can’t place our trust there.
Instead, happy and blessed are those who help is the God of Jacob. We have a God who desires to be involved and to help us. A God who then calls us to adjust our vision and tear down our gates, to live as those who proclaim we are “helped by God” and are liberated from putting our ultimate faith in ourselves. In this way, one writer suggests, wealth ... is not the proper object of your devotion, but a convincing way to demonstrate and live out to whom your devotion is truly offered.
We live in the center of wealth in this world, as residents of the world’s wealthiest nation. And we live as those blessed to have as the center of our living a God who enables us to live gratefully and with justice. This justice of our God presents a fundamental and radical challenge that is simple yet hard to realize: to recognize our common humanity with all God's children of this world. To believe that all of the faces around us and around God’s world deserve to have their humanity honored, to be comforted, and to live in abundance as children of God. When we do this, faces with a story will be connected to God’s story, to a God who really means it.

Still Blessed are the Peacemakers

2010-09-11T11:22:00.003-04:00

Every year on my daughter's birthday I run the post below which has alwyas been entitled "Blessed are the Peacemakers." This year there are two additions at the end as we mark the 9th anniversary of a national event and the 16th anniversary of a personal family event:

This week people across the nation marked the sixth anniversary of the tragedies which unfolded on September 11, 2001. September 11th holds another importance to me- my younger daughter was born on September 11th and was an elementary school student in 2001 when the world seemed like it was falling apart.

It was, in the tradition of the school, her day to be the line leader and the snack person. And it all started out like any other great day. And it is almost always clear and sunny on her birthday, as it was that day.

She had been dropped off with her cupcakes and dressed in red, her favorite color. Her older sister was also at school and my husband and I were at work. The way it worked out, my secretary was on a family trip ( about a mile from where the plane went down in PA). So I had public radio on and I was vaguely listening as I waited for a client to come for an appointment.

As the appointment began there was a report that a plane had crashed into the Trade Center but the assumption was it was a small plane. Hmm. The client came and we met. When I finished, I called our lawfirm’s main office and people were frantic. Get to a TV, they cried.

So, still wondering, I walked down the street to the coffeehouse and on the TV, the now infamous plane clips that are etched into our collective memory were rolling. I got a coffee and as people were wandering in and sitting down to watch numbly, the first tower collapsed. I watched it as though it was a surreal vision, but it had really happened.

They announced that the last plane was unaccounted for, but was over Pennsylvania. I felt like Chicken Little; the sky was falling. I frantically called my husband, and found out his government office near the school was in lockdown.

The school called and I was on my way to pick up the kids. Driving on a sort of auto -pilot. As it seemed was everyone else. My kids got in the car and it was as I saw the tear-stained face of my young child, I realized that for her this was as much about her day as anything else.

How much do you share with 7 and 9 year olds? They had heard the whispers of a few things. We talked briefly about what I could say, planes had crashed and people were not sure what had happened but that it looked like someone made them crash on purpose.

When we came home, my birthday girl was wondering why anyone would do such a thing. At the time none of us knew who was behind the attacks or why. But it seemed to come from somewhere in the Middle East. I struggled to find a way to explain why any person would embrace death in this way.

I started by saying that people do not always agree about where other people should be able to live, or what religion they can believe, or what people can say and who is in charge. I used the playground as an analogy for who gets to pick the game, or who gets to be on the swings first, or who solves a problem when there is a fight. And I admit that even though grownups tell kids not to act out, and to get along and share, we do not always do what we tell them to do. And so we argue and we fight, even though we shouldn’t. And we try to settle things the way we want and we do not take turns. And we push and shove.

Heads are nodding and I think I have made a connection. Perhaps a little too well. Because then the birthday girl points out that the difference between kids on a playground and adults is that “ when adults fight, the way they settle things is to kill.”

My eyes welled up with tears as I heard the truth of what she so boldly said- yes, sometimes this IS what adults do. And now.. what to say? To my saddened, disappointed bitter child who at age 7 knows us as we can be?

I tell her she is right, and that when people do this, it is wrong, and that it makes God sad. She laments that this is how things are. And suddenly I find a moment of good news. I ask her to think about the fact she is not the only person born on this day. That there are too many to count. And that if she and every other person born on this day says, “ I have had enough!” They can become the peacemakers. They can help to bring the change our world needs. They can work for peace, not just because it is right, but because they know how awful not having peace is. And all around the world, change starts because one person stops saying “there is nothing I can do” and starts saying, “ I can do something.”

Post-script: For years I have said I hope that as the events of the past become further into history, the best hope we have of honoring memories is to work, pray and hope for peace. This past week's events with threats of burning Qu'rans are a sad reminder how far we have to go in understanding others and ourselves within God's world. LC#2 has indicated she wants to pursue a career in international affairs. Maybe she will be a peacemaker after all.

Finally, this past Thursday marked the beginning of the holiday of Rosh Hashanah, a part of time called the “Days of Awe” that begin with Rosh Hashanah (New Year’s) and for ten days, ending with Yom Kippur, the day of Atonement. It’s a time for faithful reflection and repentance and reconciliation, for drawing all back together if possible. In the world of Islam it is time to begin the month of Ramadan, during which Muslims ask forgiveness for past sins, pray for guidance and help in refraining from everyday evils, and to try to purify themselves through self-restraint and good deeds. How might we as Christians in this country also faithfully reflect and respond to God' call in our lives across many issues.I continue to pray that when we remember September 11th, just as it evokes sadness, we also remember that there is life and hope and God’s promise. Blessed are the peacemakers.

Blessed are the peacemakers.

The Daring Risk of Commitment

2010-09-04T15:07:00.002-04:00

If you’ve ever bought a house or a car or refinanced a debt you know there is a lot of paperwork. In that mountain of papers was a form called the “truth in lending” form. It’s required by law to tell you how much it REALLY costs over time to do what you’re doing. The form takes total dollars you borrowed and multiplies it by the interest rate across the number of months of the loan. Most of us just sign and try not to think about it. What really matters is getting the thing we need for ourselves and our families. But though we ignore it there is a staggering amount that represents the true cost of our commitment. That’s why a lot of times there is another form called the right of rescission- you have time to change your mind and back out if you think it is too foolish to commit.

Our willingness to just sign on the dotted line reflects how we’ve become immune to those numbers. Every day media analysts try to get us to think about the real costs of our decisions-the real cost of the war on terror, the real cost of the cleanup in the Gulf of Mexico, the real cost to us of our trade deficit with China, the real cost of the economic crisis in our country. But frankly, I can’t even wrap my head around numbers in the billions and trillions. Can you?

We proclaim that we are followers of Christ and we talk about helping the poor, being peacemakers, caring for creation and being committed to justice. We want to live these out, but our world quickly tells us this cost is too great.
Today we hear that people in growing numbers have been flocking to Jesus. By our standards he should realize capitalize upon this. Instead he speaks words that will thin the crowd. He tells people who say they believe to count the cost- read that fine print. Because to really be a disciple we must “hate our family,” stop building towers, stop being warriors and kings, and be ready to walk away from all we possess. Strong language that takes on our preference to put ourselves in the lead and that tells us there is a difference between saying “I believe” and “I commit.” It involves being willing to separate ourselves from following the usual people and forces that guide our choices and let get behind Jesus’ lead instead.

This change in vision involved hard words then and maybe even harder today for a consumer driven society like ours where the word “sacrifice” is not very popular. It’s Labor Day weekend, on a holiday initiated to focus on dignity of workers and fair trade that has become all about those towers and wars and consumption. While we think nothing of the costs of our world, rethinking our views about labor and trade and many other things in light of the cross will cost us. Maybe it’s too foolish to try. After all, our ways of doing business are complicated. Yet this is a part of our walk of discipleship- it really gets messy.

I was talking with a business consultant about how the store where we can get good stuff cheap regularly violates fair labor standards and immigration laws. We should stand against this. But while at church we can say this is injustice, that retailer is a client of the consultant and its store is the closest to home. It both pays for and provides for the needs of the consultant’s family. What is the right response as a disciple? Which path would you walk? Lest it seem like I am just judging another, I surveyed my own world in a given day. Starting with breakfast-cereal with some raisins and milk. The raisins came from California where a migrant worker who picked the grapes is paid substandard wages and may be here illegally. My milk comes in a plastic jug that takes that oil rig in the Gulf to be made. I discovered my bowl was made in China, where I’m sure no one is paying attention to fair labor and where industrial pollution has destroyed most of the rivers. The bowl was purchased at a store where most of the people employed are only given enough hours to be part time so the employer doesn’t have to offer health insurance. Getting dressed I looked at the labels in my clothes-nothing made in the USA though some fair trade. And it took me awhile to look at all those things because I have a lot.

When I looked at my world, I noticed how easy it becomes to focus upon building our own towers and empires and stockpiles. We are always looking to climb higher, looking beyond or looking inward, yet our eyes are not open to who is in front of us. We think about numbers not faces. I thought about how complicated it would be to change my lifestyle. I started counting the cost of living more faithfully, I realized would cost me a lot more money and take a lot more time. But maybe we’re too busy hanging onto what we have to have. So much so that our hands aren’t open to God’s possibility. I would have fewer choices if I changed my habits. In one way I would be renouncing possessions. But to really think about more permanent change is a challenge!

There’s the weight of that cross- just one example of the challenge in taking what we hear in here and building upon it out there. To stop letting our vision lead the way. If I really started living out a lifestyle that honored the dignity of others in fair trade and the care of creation it would be a struggle and some might even mock me. True discipleship involves being willing to sacrifice our wants and our self-esteem.It’s clear in so many ways that we can’t be those noble selfless disciples. As Martin Luther once said,” I believe I cannot by my own understanding or strength believe in Jesus Christ or come to Him.” We can’t make that commitment.

This is exactly where the good news steps in. Bearing the message of the cross into where we are, where we live and work, is not to show our leadership or to earn something, but as a sign that we follow the one who by the cross demonstrated God’s compassion and love. The other times besides our story today where we hear about foolishness and cost is the story of the cross and of the Jesus who is mocked because he saved others but can’t save himself. Our gracious God knows our limitations, but in compassion and love took on the cost of claiming us and then gave us task of discipleship anyway.

A disipleship that risks living out in words and actions God’s compassion and love even when it means standing with people in need, or devoting ourselves to God’s creation. Even when it means to standing over against the world of our family of co-workers, loved ones, employers and media that tell us it’s OK to do otherwise. Knowing we will struggle.

When we wonder how we might even begin to live a truer walk of discipleship, it is in prayer, in worship and in studying God’s word we are given guidance. In this way we are empowered by the Spirit. As we grow in faith, we will continue to find ourselves driven into the world despite our resistance and reluctance to serve others to share our gifts and talents and witness to God’s redeeming word. It is challenging to keep that long term commitment, but it is because we have a God who has not given up on us that we can live with a sense of daring we couldn’t manage on our own.

And They'll Know We are Christians

2010-08-29T20:17:00.003-04:00

Back in the 1970’s this was a popular church camp song. If you remember it too, feel free to join in as we sing.

We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord
We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord
And we pray that all unity may one day be restored
And they'll know we are Christians by our love, by our love
They will know we are Christians by our love
We will work with each other, we will work side by side
We will work with each other, we will work side by side
And we'll guard each one's dignity and save each one's pride
And they'll know we are Christians by our love, by our love
They will know we are Christians by our love

I learned this song was written in 1970 and I sang it in elementary school. Now you know something about me and based upon how many of you joined in I know something about you as well. But recently I asked people to fill in the end of the sentence “They’ll know we are Christians by our ________________.” The most popular answer was not “love” but “potlucks.” One person said she wasn’t sure if she should say they’ll know us by our love or potlucks but that they were both pretty much the same in her opinion. She’s right that how we interact at our church gatherings like potlucks says a lot about us. So what do our gatherings say?

We envision a communal experience that expresses our identity and demonstrates free and generous hospitality and if you are like me growing up in the Midwestern US, throw in a little pioneer spirit. But I would suggest we struggle to live out this vision, confronted with our own structures, just like the Pharisees.
• Raise your hand if your church has “kitchen ladies, and keep it up if you know this is not an open group”
• Raise your hand if when you have a potluck you tell people to sign up, keep it up if you ask them to tell you what kind of food they are bringing.
• Raise your hand if you know that someone will be looked down upon who comes to the potluck empty-handed or who did not sign up. If someone is not on the list and extra seats need to be set up, there is a sigh. I saw some head nods on a fair amount of these questions.

• These are some of the ways that we “domesticate” hospitality and rein in the welcome.

And if you observe our meals from the outside, there is the flurry of activity before the meal. People are bringing in their contribution. Some “up the game” by bringing it in a Longaberger basket, or with a cute label, promising to share the recipe with select people. Some people slyly move another person’s dish so theirs has pride of place. Meanwhile, others are dispatched to secure seats with friends, family and the question is “Did you get us our table?” It is pretty absorbing but, what is it like to be the stranger; the single person; the person with the bad leg who struggles to get to the basement only to find themselves on the edge? One elderly widower who struggled with mobility said he quit coming to potlucks because it was too humbling to have to ask someone to make room at their table much less help him get to the food. Right about now I am wondering if we CAN sing “they’ll know we are Christians by our potlucks?”

Communal meals among worshippers are nothing new. Jesus was invited to such meals, and today we hear he did some people-watching. All around him people are scurrying and jostling to get the best places, walking around “on display,” making sure their status was intact. People who were holy and proper. The two people who are on the edge at first are Jesus and the man with “dropsy”- today we would call it edema- filled with fluid, bloated and dying of thirst. Right in front of them-Impossible not to see him, yet ignored. Because while it was important to give charity to those in need, it was never on their radar to sit at the same table and eat and drink with such a man. No Pharisee would do that. In fact the word “Pharisee” means “separate”- to separate themselves from the world as a sign of being dedicated to God.
But at some point the separateness stopped being about God’s desires and started being about their desire for status. Here’s how far they took separateness in worship, in dining and in their understanding of who God would deem worthy. The following people were excluded:
no one paralyzed in the feet or hands- no arthritis, no one lame, no one blind, no one unable to speak clearly, no aged people who totter, no one who cannot stand still, no one with any visible blemish or impurity.

That’s a pretty long list- It’s a wonder anyone was even there. Add to that list women and children. I can safely say few of us would fit the bill- no hope for God’s favor. This is why the Pharisees were always so critical of Jesus and his dining habits. This is how blessed we must count ourselves that Christ has given us a seat at the table!

One author states, “all of our efforts to domesticate or rein in hospitality are like clouds blotting out the sun of God’s generosity. Jesus spent his whole life breaking through that cloud to bring fresh healing in the sun of God’s love.” Maybe we need to acknowledge our own lists that diminish our living hospitality toward others. The challenge of Christian hospitality reveals our struggles to reconcile different cultures, different beliefs, different abilities, lifestyles and needs.
God’s view of hospitality calls us to fundamentally reverse our views. Christian hospitality is different than just being nice. It is our reflecting God’s gracious hospitality toward us and re-enacting the feast as a foretaste of the feast to come. We are the invited who invite, but the invitation is not to our table, but to Christ’s table. We called to draw others not to ourselves but into the kingdom of God. We do this not because of what it earns us, power, status or indebtedness, but out of sheer gratitude for God’s grace and love toward us. This hospitality is about more than building a better potluck.

But thinking of our meals may be a good place to start. Think of the joy you feel when sharing a meal with those closest to you, to know you belong. Think of the wondrous grace of knowing Christ has made a spot for you. We hear the words “Blessed is anyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God.” Are you willing to bless ANYONE? This is what we are called to share- to tell others who are hungry for a welcome that there is room. That we will sit and share face- to-face, rubbing elbows, sacrificing our needs and lists and using God’s list instead. To bring healing and dignity and blessing and I think is why healing and breaking bread appear together so often in Luke as we hear a calling to more than just swapping lists of who is in and who is out.

We’re called to embrace a much larger view of the table, where we have been told we need to get out the leaf to make the table bigger, and bigger. And to not just gravitate toward people and places we know will bless us- that doesn’t place God at the center. Instead, to seek those people can’t give us anything. This kingdom living stretches us beyond our boundaries. It’s countercultural. But this is how we are invited to reclaim hospitality as a Christian practice. To constantly ask who is on the margins, including those who don’t take an invite for granted, and greeting them as “friend” and as equal. Living out the literal meaning of the word “hospitality”- showing the depth of love and affection we have for family toward those we see as strangers in a bigger and bigger table.

It ultimately takes us all the way to the cross to live Jesus’ command to love our enemies and to bless them as we break bread together. Blessing and challenge, but when we continue respond to God’s grace in this way, they really will know we are Christians by our love.

Sabbath Living

2010-08-23T23:12:00.000-04:00

A modern day story:
It was a typical Sunday, but then one of the ushers came to tell the pastor that there was a strange woman at the back of the church. The church was lovingly maintained by a dedicated crew whose work it was to ensure that all was as it should be, as it had been for centuries. The candles are the right height, the flowers in place- the stray petal that had fallen to the floor, removed. The beautifully gleaming altar properly set. The bulletins proofed and re-proofed were now in the hands of those who greeted and distributed greetings, smiles and handshakes to those expected, who were then handed off to those who would seat them in the usual spots. All was ready so that at the appointed time worship would occur in the time honored ways, quietly, respectfully and thoughtfully, where everyone knows when to sit, stand, sing and pray, in a dignified and orderly way with reverence. Because that’s how the typical SUNDAY is done.
The usher is clearly flustered by this woman. “Is she in any distress?” the pastor asks, putting on a robe and microphone. “Well, no, but we don’t know why she is here or what she wants. If she needs a voucher for groceries she can’t get that today, and we don’t have anything to give her. We wondered if maybe YOU knew her, or knew what’s going on because we’ve never seen her before.” The pastor peeks out and sees “Anne,” easily recognizable by the blue ski cap and long down coat she wears regardless of the season. It’s a lot of work being homeless, shuffling through downtown from sunup to sundown. Each day rising at the emergency shelter, trudging to the free breakfast with the Episcopalians, then to the public library until lunch with the Catholics, followed by hanging out around town until dinner somewhere else, then waiting for the shelter to open. Once a week the free meal is here at the pastor’s church. Anne has come weekly for years, longer than the pastor has been the pastor, towing a metal cart on wheels containing her possessions, tarped to protect her belongings. She walks head down, and often seems preoccupied and distant, slumped over her cart. Week after week she’s walked past these ushers to breakfast seemingly unnoticed by them as they were focusing upon their work. The pastor wonders what led Anne to change her routine and worship, but remembers the usher still standing waiting, and says, “Why, yes, that’s Anne!” The usher stares awkwardly, The pastor to ask if there is a problem. “Well, you see, it’s just that she has this cart full of who knows what with her.”
“Yes,” the pastor smiled, “she usually does.”
“Well, it’s in our entryway. We don’t know what to do and it’s in the way. Frankly, I don’t know how she hauls it all around in the first place. It’s not a good time for her to be here with all that stuff!
The pastor heads to where she is sitting, usher in tow. Anne’s tired face crinkles into a smile. She straightens up and it’s clear she is wearing bright pink lipstick- she has “dressed up” for church.
“Hey there, Anne! It’s good to see you came inside today!”
“You know this is such a beautiful, peaceful place,” she says. “I come here during the week when no one is here and just sit in the stillness, just me and God. Usually after breakfast I sit in your library and read a devotion book, but today I just needed to come.”
At this point, the usher points to his watch- it IS almost time for worship to start.
But the pastor sits down in the pew with Anne who keeps talking. “You know I’m not always sure about this whole church thing. It seems like there’s a difference between what Jesus says and how people in the church act sometimes. I can get pretty angry with how people treat me and look at me when I am walking around. And I’m not stupid. I know what they’re thinking. They try to pretend like they don’t see me or if they look at me it’s not friendly. It wears me down. But when I come in here, I know I God is here. I can put it all aside and we’ll talk, God and I, and somehow, things get straightened out and I can stop being bent out of shape.”
And each week after that day, Anne could be found in her “usual” spot, smiling, sometimes with a friend she had encouraged to come. And Jesus continues to teach and heal.
Maybe we can say that here at the campground we don’t wrestle with these issues as much. But what about when we go back home? Those whose existence is restored, whose lives are transformed, immediately go on to praise God and tell everyone- to teach with their lives. Every day the woman labored to walk by the place where people worshipped, for years unnoticed- until Jesus saw her. No one called out to her, or heard her. Are we ever people preoccupied with our work each Sabbath, observing all the formalities of worship so much that we hear God’s word taught, but are not living the Sabbath with others in need? Every healing is a moment used by Jesus to re-shape understanding.
Let’s start with how we see ourselves. You may not realize it but we are crippled too. When we are slaves to “our work” in life and forget to set it down, we don’t even realize the ways this distorts us and weighs each of us down. We become inflexible, and bent over our own “to-do” list. We may think that others are the downtrodden and crippled, but they are us. And even here today, each of us entered this space with the work we can’t put down that keeps us from really worshipping. Each of us, you and I, need an encounter with God to reshape us. Without it we’re unable to see eye to eye with our world around us. We need God to tell us we are free from what keeps us hunched over. Again this day Jesus calls to us to come and be in God’s presence this Sabbath day. Hear the good news that though we have again become crippled by sin, we’re again set free-by a God who steps into our midst and sees us when others don’t and who loves us when others won’t. By the power of God in Christ we are healed!
If you’re still with me, it’s time to think what it means to live as the healed. A few years ago, I visited the basilica of Sainte Anne de Beau Pré outside of Quebec. For hundreds of years, pilgrims have journeyed there believing it’s a site where God is especially present for healing. When you enter the enormous worship space, before you can even take in the stained glass, or the carvings, you are confronted by columns of crutches, leg braces, walkers, and canes that are strapped to the columns from floor to ceiling. Brought back immediately by those no longer crippled and offered as a witness to God’s healing in their lives because everyone needs to know. Today as you leave, leave your crutches and props behind. Walk out empowered to live as those whose lives have been transformed for Sabbath living, to tell everyone what God has done and there’s nothing typical about it!

Transition moments

2010-08-23T16:00:00.002-04:00

Sent LC #1 off to college with a very loud Big Ben-type alarm clock. She is immune to more polite alarms so a sturdy clanging double bells on the top type it was. Not electric, not digital, no remote, no encryption or password needed, just put in a battery and set the time and flick the little switch on the back to ON to set it and OFF when you get up. ON before you go to bed. How hard could this be? Six 18-19 years olds were mystified and could not get it to work and were calling her in the a.m. every five minutes to make sure she was up. Old school is so difficult!
LC#2 is adapting to the fact that she can no longer: steal her sisters clothes and shoes, leave a mess and claim it was not her. No one to yell at on a bad day and they manage to miss each other's schedules when texting. Thank God for Facebook!
And we had to buy another graphing calculator because the one they shared when they had math opposite semesters is now at college.
I just bought books for the first of the last two semesters (I hope) and had to wrack my brain for my Blackboard signin which I have not needed in a very long time. And I know I should start learning that Hebrew alphabet- but I am a little lacking in the inspiration department. Fortunately I am still trying to coordinate the high school, college and seminary schedules including two sets of football.
One way another may the three of us get where we need to be, do what we need to do.

Words in the World

2010-08-16T10:06:00.006-04:00

I have been thinking about the impact of words in the world. As a person who endeavors to bring the Word into the world, I am walking with a blog, and Facebook and multiple electronic ways of communication at hand. I am often glad for the people I have been able to be in touch with that otherwise might be out of reach. As a person who enjoys writing I am blessed to be able to stay connected with wonderful reflections and musings of others that have enriched my own process and hopefully even improved it(or at least I hope so). But for all of the wonderful aspects of rapid fire communication there is a rising trend that I wrestle with. For those of us who blog and serve in ministry there is the question of transparency- how revealing is too revealing? A question each person resolves for themselves. I resolved to err on the side of caution and grace.
But what about Facebook?
Years ago there was a commercial for a shampoo where the thrilled consumer told two friends about the product, and they told two friends, who told two friends, and so on and so on... Each time the telling happened the number of photos on the screen increased. Facebook is like that. Whatever I say is then in the feed of the people who are my "friends"- all 300 of them (thinking it's time for a purge but that is a separate consideration). But what it also means is that when I am on my friends' pages I see everything else that all of their friends, who may not be my friends, are saying.
Which leads me to my concern. Lately I have seen a real rise in carping about a congregation's practices or processes in Facebook which is a much broader forum than one person's friend list. Let's say that something is happening in a ministry setting to which you belong or which you are serving which has made you mad or frustrated, or you think is just plain wrong.
Do you post about it where many more than your intended audience will see and dissect it? Do you account for the difference between how face to face communication and electronic communication are perceived? Would we stand before said congregation in a room and say what is being said?
When we blow off steam in this way, what is the purpose? If a change is desired does anyone think public airing will aid or hinder such a path? What if we are wrong in our perceptions, if there is more to this than we know or meets the eye?
Luther's explanation of bearing false witness exhorts us to always place our neighbor in the most positive light- as we endeavor daily to live out our faith, there is an ever greater challenge to how our words impact our world and how our words affect our credibility to proclaim the Word.

We Don't Race Alone

2010-08-15T16:30:00.008-04:00

Another week leading worship at the campground and each week surprises- so far in addition to amazing people I had been surprised by a dog running in when I talked about the Holy Spirit and the bingo board lighting up during my sermon. Today as I was about to read the lessons twenty more people walked in, Mennonite and Amish families camping,adding about 14 extra children to the children's message time. And we gathered round our collective news of the week and ran the race together:

As I prepared for this week, I began thinking about Luke and the fire and by Wednesday found myself wondering about life after a fire. But then Wednesday we learned about the killing of 10 medical aid workers for Mennonite Central Committee in Afghanistan. And on Thursday morning the first parish I served while in seminary located in Dillsburg, was struck by lightning and burned to the ground. The cross on the belfry was struck and shattered and the pieces caught the building on fire some say. These events showed me about life after a fire but also about perseverance to continue to run the race we hear of in Hebrews this day.
Walter Elliot in his work, The Spiritual Life, claims “perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after another.” There’s truth in the notion that our lives are a series of beginnings when all seems bright and hopeful in our vision. I thought about that last week as we prayed for all those newlyweds. Somewhere after the beginning, amidst the blessings are those times when a painful reality bursts in, devastating times of our lives when it feels that all is stripped away. Some people believe that if you just have the right faith you will achieve prosperity and your life will be immeasurably blessed. I’m sure that some if not many of those early believers in Christianity imagined this to be true-a new and glorious day would come to fulfillment in their lifetimes. After all, throughout the Old Testament there are stories of faith that conquered kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions, quenched raging fire, escaped the edge of the sword, won strength out of weakness, became mighty in war and put foreign armies to flight.
But sometimes not. And sometimes not right away- those great stories of faith often are about “not right away.” Welcome to the reality check that feels like a bitter slap in Hebrews, a book that speaks of “faith” more than any other book of the New Testament- 24 times in the 11th chapter alone. I’m glad for its sting because who wants a faith that denies the gap between vision and reality here on the ground? Literally or figuratively we too know those feelings of being destitute, tormented- from emotional strain to those who this week gave their very lives to live faithfully. Times we find ourselves wondering and wandering in .places where we feel like those who live not fully seeing the promise, or worse, experiencing great pain and loss and suffering that take things away seem like they can’t be replaced. It can be overwhelming to conjure up the persistence needed amidst the shock, numbness and the dark shadows where once there was light, when we’re weighed down.
These past weeks in our prayer time and conversations many of you have shared these places in your lives and in the lives of those you love. Where we feel like we’re dying where we hear words like “inoperable,” “divorce” or “total loss.” We are flogged and torn amidst “final stages of cancer,” “hospice” “Parkinson’s. ” We can all add to this list. This was also the world of that first parish I served during seminary struck by lightning. Fire can suck the oxygen out of room. Hearing what happened took my breath away. A profound sadness settled in like the weight of all that water soaked ash. So many thoughts flooded my mind- the faces I know well; their new pastor who was just installed this past Sunday. Built in 1894, it’s a country parish still affectionately known as "Filey's Parish" though its formal name is Christ Lutheran Church, where I heard tales of when the church did not have indoor plumbing, and of the spring that runs through the basement of the house the next field over. Of generations of seminarians who have been trained there, perhaps some now part of the cloud of witnesses of the church. Where I learned important things about being a pastor, including no Easter Sunrise breakfast is complete without pickled tongue. I can reminisce how they patiently worked with me to teach me the right way to ring the bell, including how not to lose the rope up the belfry. What amusement I provided as I struggled to pull hard enough to ring without double ringing. Now that belfry is gone. But it was also the first pulpit I ever preached in with the nervous altar guild lady who plied me with water when I had bronchitis so I could get through the sermon. A place where you could tell the passage of time by the various styles of architecture in the sanctuary. The light up stained glass Jesus, and the giant cross that looked like a matchstick cross with the ends singed and the windows from the 1900’s all together, all lovingly given out of someone's vision of the promise.
I think of all of the baptisms, weddings, confirmations that filled the space where God laughed and rejoiced with them. And of the funerals where God cried with them. As lightning leveled their world, how the lectionary for this day and it's baptism of fire must sound. Could they even have the strength to be exhorted to faith much less to run?
But at their prayer vigil Thursday night, they are still teaching as they spoke of the gift and promise in the ashes-there is something about these experiences. The same thing I learned from a friend battling cancer who wrote me one day and told me her cancer was a gift. It brought clarity and brought her closer to God. When all else is stripped away, we can see what matters. That fire and cancer and all of the other trials and tribulations cannot destroy what endures- the faith and hope of the cross, the promise made sure in Christ. So it is for each of us. Still there is the promise, the reality of the cross of Christ that allows us to step out in courageous new ways. To live in the way song writer Andrew Peterson calls “dancing in the minefields.”
In a moment we’ll hear his song. I thought I would share some of the lyrics first.
We went dancin’ in the mine fields. We went sailin’ in the storms.
It’s harder than we dreamed but I believe that’s what the promise is for
Don’t give up. Don’t give up on me. Don’t give up.
So when I lose my way, find me. When I loose love’s chains, bind me.
At the end of all my faith, to the end of all my days, when I forget my name, remind me.
Cause we bear the light of the Son of Man, so there’s nothin’ left to fear.
So, I’ll walk with you in the shadow lands, ‘til the shadows disappear.
He promised not leave us and his promises are true,
So in the face of all this chaos, maybe I can dance with you.
So let’s go dancing in the minefields and kickin’ down the doors. This is harder than we dreamed but I believe that’s what the promise is for.
Someone once said, “The greatest oak was once a little nut who held its ground.” To the world around us we are a little nuts. People tell us to give up, that it’s not worth it, that our faith is a sham. The pastor of Filey’s was asked by the media if she thought the fire was an act of God against her church. We know that’s not our God talking, and that there is more to our lives than meets the eye. We’re following Christ who goes before us, who has secured the future. Our faith and perseverance come from knowing that God’s promises are sure and that God’s purposes won’t fail to be achieved even when everything or everyone around us speaks to the contrary. And we know we don’t race alone. We’re in the company of each other and that cloud of witnesses by our side, sometimes walking, sometimes running and sometimes even dancing, cheering us on in the joy and pain together, ever reminding us of God’s promise. AMEN.

Old Enough to Say "I Love You" Freely

2010-08-13T23:57:00.003-04:00

I have worked twice this week at the Big Hospital in Amish Country. Post-internship for me and for them means more work available to cover shifts. Post-internship I have been careful to avoid obvious places where boundaries of internship parish and my life would cross for the sake of myself, the parish and the new vicar. Earlier this week, I was only working four hours- so how much contact could there be? I came in to learn that one of the ladies from the Bible study I led was in and had a lovely visit with a fellow chaplain who indulged her in a lengthy time of life review. At 93 she is experiencing limits others reach far sooner and while normally there are a couple of us on board at any given time, for those four hours it was me and the hospital, come what may.
I set about the visits requested, and along the way encountered a family in the hall of one of the intensive care areas. While I was checking on them I hear this gradually louder voice calling my name- by the third time it was a downright bellowing yell, followed by "aren't you coming in here to see ME?" So much for boundaries. I entered, fully gowned and gloved for another visit if for no other reason than the strain she was causing herself in the yelling. We chatted as though only days had passed and she introduced me to her nephew with all of the pertinent facts. And I offered prayers and a blessing for her.
Upon which she looked up with absolute clarity and declared-"I Love YOU!"
While I declared my love in return I know that it was not with the absolute sincerity that a person whose very life is in the balance generates.
Tonite I was back at the hospital and meeting a woman I have never seen in my life who shared she was fine, followed by the but... for three days they have prepped her for a heart procedure and then it is delayed. Her husband is in tears from the stress. She is trying to be strong for him, she the one with the heart problem. We talk about how God does not turn a back on us even when we shake our fist. Seeing the copy of "Our Daily Bread" on the table I encourage conversation about her devotional life. When we pray I pray for the daily bread that has nothing to do with food and everything to do with sustenance. And as we finish this 83 year old looks up with tears and tells me she loves me.
While I believe it is really an expression of love for Christ, I wonder about our lives- those of us, myself included who do not see the precarious nature of it all. How often do we deny these declarations and how often do we thus deny ourselves and each other true sentiment?
It is said that little kids and old ladies speak the greatest truth- because they have no need to be afraid. Are we afraid to be so bold? Like the way we do not say in life the things we hear at funerals and memorials?
And the ways and times we fail if nothing else to acknowledge the Christ in each other?
Wondering who I have failed to say "I LOVE YOU" to.
I wonder if anyone else feels the same.
Believing that maybe we should lower the age on true expression.

Fire Can Suck the Oxygen from a Room But Not the Life From the Church

2010-08-12T13:31:00.017-04:00

Fire will suck the oxygen out of a room.

Hearing of a devastating fire at my former teaching parish had the same effect on me as a profound sadness settled in like the weight of all that water soaked ash.
So many thoughts flooded my mind as I imagined the faces of those I know well and of their new pastor who was just installed this past Sunday. Built in 1894, a country parish still affectionately known as "Filey's Parish" though its formal name is Christ Lutheran Church. I remember tales of when the church did not have indoor plumbing, and of the spring that runs through the basement of the house the next field over. Of generations of seminarians who have been trained there, perhaps some now part of the cloud of witnesses of the church. Of those I know who preceded me. I was the last teaching parish student.

Some years ago, the parish proudly had finished an addition of offices and class and gathering space. Sturdy. I ponder all of the records that now may be lost, and reminisce of how they patiently worked with me to teach me the right way to ring the bell, including how not to lose the rope up the belfry. What amusement I provided as I struggled to pull hard enough to ring without double ringing. The Easter Sunrise breakfast, complete with pickled tongue.

The first pulpit I ever preached in. The nervous graciousness of the altar guild lady who plied me with water when I had bronchitis so I could get through the sermon. The way you could tell the passage of time by the various styles of architecture in the sanctuary all lovingly given out of someone's vision of the promise.
I think of all of the baptisms, weddings, confirmations and funerals that filled the space where God laughed and cried and rejoiced with them. But on this day when lightning has leveled their world, how the lectionary for this coming Sunday and it's baptism of fire must sound. How the description of those who lived not fully seeing the promise, or worse, those who experienced great pain and loss and suffering must feel. How to imagine the persistence needed amidst the shock, the numbness and the dark shadows where once there was light.
And yet, in all of this, the fire cannot destroy the faith and hope of the cross, the promise made sure in Christ, and the cloud of witnesses and community in the here and now. So it is for each of us. Our lives are a series of beginnings when all seems bright and hopeful in our vision. But amidst the blessings are those times when a painful reality bursts in, in the devastating times of our lives when it feels that all is stripped away. Still there is the promise that is the reality of cross of Christ.

So tonite as I head to the prayer vigil, I am thinking of a new song I have heard by Andrew Peterson. Though the song is about marriage, the words ring true. As I reel with them in their loss, I am reminded that the building is not the church- Christ in our midst will triumph.

And we went dancin’ in the mine fields. We went sailin’ in the storms
And it was harder than we dreamed, but I believe that’s what the promise is for…
The only way to find your “life” is to lay your own “life” down and
I believe it’s an easy price for the life that we have found
We dancin’ in the minefields, and we’re sailin’ in the storms and
It’s harder than we dreamed but I believe that’s what the promise is for
Don’t give up. Don’t give up on me. Don’t give up.
So when I lose my way, find me
When I loose love’s chains, bind me
At the end of all my faith, to the end of all my days,
When I forget my name, remind me.
Cause we bear the light of the Son of Man, so there’s nothin’ left to fear.
So, I’ll walk with you in the shadow lands, ‘til the shadows disappear.
He promised not leave us and his promises are true,
So in the face of all this chaos, maybe I can dance with you.
So let’s go dancing in the minefields
Let’s go sailin’ in the storms
Let’s go dancin’ in the minefields and kickin’ down the doors. This is harder than we dreamed but I believe that’s what the promise is for.

Looking for God-incidences

2010-08-06T12:49:00.004-04:00

There’s a woman I know who uses a play on words to describe moments of great unexpected blessing. Instead of calling them coincidences, she calls them “God-incidences.” One of those happened this past week. As you know it’s getting to be that time of year where the start of school is coming. This affects three people in our house- high school, college and seminary all start on the same day this year. As the date gets closer we start looking for signs that confirm what’s on the horizon- ads for supplies, calendars of events. We check what we have and decide what we need to be prepared. And we don’t wonder IF school will start, we anticipate it. But while we anticipate the resumption of classes, we find ourselves less sure about what comes next- the challenges, the people, how it will all turn out are somewhat unclear. This can make us a little nervous. Which leads me to the “God-incidence” of the week. A couple days ago our older daughter, Catherine turned 18. She heads to college in a matter of days. A card came in the mail and the return address showed it was from her kindergarten teacher. Cat’s first year in public school was this teacher’s last as she had retired after a long career, so we have not seen her for 13 yrs. The card contained a personal note acknowledging Cat’s birthday and her graduation and offered encouragement to have faith as she continues her journey toward new places. Enclosed was a series of photographs of Cat and her kindergarten classmates, each one with handwritten documentation of what the picture was and who was in it, lovingly and painstakingly prepared. When kids start school, they and their parents have both hopes and fears. Over the years in between the beginning and the fulfillment, there are times when it seems like the future really is unsure. For us identifying, coming to terms with and addressing Cat’s learning disabilities were such a time. It was and sometimes is hard to live in the “already but not yet” time when sometimes you wonder if “not yet” means “not ever.”
This is where we discover the fine line between wondering if something will happen and anticipating it; between anxiety and expectancy. This is true in our faith lives as well. We often speak of the difference between fear and faith as though it is a switch we turn on or off. It is perhaps better seen as a journey from one to the other, with some trips back and forth along the way, places where we need to be reminded of what it all means. What helps us are those moments that break in, and people who live in expectancy with us. I’m overwhelmed by the teacher, who carefully kept track of these kids for 13 years, tending their memories, and waiting for this moment. Ready, prepared and eager. Always looking for the signs on their behalf. To finally offer the moment of “look at what is already true, how far you’ve come” in the dream becoming reality- now have faith as you move on to the next people and places. There is no dollar value on such moments- they are priceless.
We usually hear the “keep alert, get ready” message of today’s gospel during the weeks leading up to Christmas, when we expect to be anticipating “baby Jesus” and it feels real. To hear these words now in the heat of summer, in the endless season of what some call “Ordinary Time” in the church year catches us off-guard. Maybe we sometimes even take a break from looking. We hear that it is in the wee hours of pre-dawn that the master returns, just about when everyone has hit REM sleep. I wonder when we don’t see the realization of it all, can we really be always vigilant for an event that has been foretold for thousands of years? And as our culture moves beyond Christianity doesn’t it sometimes feel hard to keep up that level of enthusiasm? This is what leads some to say that what really matters is the eternal reward and not the here and now. It leads others to wonder if maybe this really is all there is. In our lives when things feel unsure or seem unresolved, we may even ask if there really is a promise after all.
It is into these places throughout Scripture God has spoken, “Let go of your fear” and it is in these times that we then see something revealed about God’s will and saving activity for us. Moments of the kingdom underway. We see this in the angel visiting Mary; in the calming of the storm where the disciples are sure they are doomed but where Jesus revealing something of divine power. We see it this day in Jesus reassuring the disciples that they really can shift from worrying about a worldly focus to a godly one and we see it at the empty tomb. Each time a word that speaks of the certainty not only of what has been but what will be. Moments where God’s gracious presence breaks in and we get a glimpse, a foretaste of the feast to come even as we also wonder how it is we can really get out of our comfort zone like God asks. SO where can we see this kingdom?
If we really want to see these moments, we need to be looking in where God shows up- in the unexpected times, people and places. Preparing our hearts and minds to be open to the times when we may receive or may be used through “God-incidences.” Those revelations we are given of God’s kingdom underway. One way to embrace this is at the end of each day to spend time reviewing the day, asking where we have seen God at work- in both the joys and the challenges. Reminding ourselves of those snapshots of what has been. This is one way of remembering that we expect to see God at work. But there is another component to being alert. This past spring at the Jesuit Center on retreat, my spiritual director encouraged me to not only look backwards, to also anticipate the coming day, and the things, people and places I expected to be a part of my journey. And to then spend time in prayer asking for God to be at work and revealed there as well. Not because God won’t show up unless I do something or pray, but for me to begin expecting God, looking for God, listening for God. Being on the alert and ready to respond. We hear that where our treasure is so is our heart. I think the opposite is also true. Where our heart is touched, we are inspired to give our whole selves.
By expecting God we begin to see people and situations in deeper ways; become more aware of their needs but also see God brought into our midst through them. These God-incidences happen everywhere. Phone calls that happen at the right time. Generosity that springs out of nowhere. A comforting word when it’s needed most. It begins to change how we approach our days in terms of time. To inspire us to think creatively and compel us to consider new things we never thought of to share with others. As we share these moments, and ask others where they have seen God, we are preparing each other, keeping each other alert. We find ourselves encouraging each other- have no fear. All ways God uses to bless us, strengthen our faith together and move us beyond our fears into kingdom living. This week I encourage you to look for the God-incidences in your world, they just might surprise you.

What Does it Mean to Be Rich?

2010-08-01T13:35:00.006-04:00

Sometimes life in the here and now is like a gospel lesson come alive. After I had a sermon all ready to go, sadly I learned of such a "contemporary parable." These last weeks our lessons have presented teaching and challenge on what kingdom living is all about. We find ourselves being stretched in ways that seem hard to live out. And it's hard to keep persepctive.

We hear warning and maybe reprimand, but I'd like to suggest that they are lessons from a God who knows just how challenging it is for us live faithfully. It is in that light that I share the struggle of an adorable couple in their 70’s, who met in later years after the death of their first spouses. Their earlier lives had been a mix of feast or famine, but they’d been blessed with abundance in this marriage. She adored him, and there was a twinkle in his eyes when he saw her. She worked hard to care for their beautifully decorated home in an upscale neighborhood, where everything was “just so.” She once said that because of the gift of her marriage to him, her life was the best it had ever been.

But then he was diagnosed with a progressive illneess that moved quickly. At first when things got rough, she wanted him at home to be with him, to provide the love only a spouse can. But over the last six months, as his needs advanced, there was not only the strain of caring for his physical needs, but worry about her future needs, after all his care was costly but she could live for years. Though many tried to assure her that she would be provided for, she began to be consumed by fears, insisting she needed to keep the enormous home that was too large for her to tend. She scrutinized accounts, and cobbled together a collection of in-home companions because if he went to a nursing home, she was sure she’d lose it all. How would she be able to eat, drink and be merry? Her obsessions increasingly distanced her from family and friends, and gave her no rest at night. Her only conversations were with herself. Terrified his children would take her to court and make her divide the assets, she spent large sums of money to protect large sums of money, spending what she was trying to preserve.

Finally, someone intervened and asked a judge to determine his needs. Her life which had already begun eroding was further taken away when they placed him in a nursing home. She couldn’t agree to a private facility, so he was placed on medical assistance. She soon discovered herself rattling around in that enormous house alone-with no one to help her and no one to talk to. Unable to drive, she had noone to take her places, so she rarely got to the nursing home- she rarely saw the love of her life. She is not alone- I spent two days in continuing education as a lawyer where the overriding concern was the cost of health care and the non-institutionalized spouse. But days ago, about a month after all the courthouse wrangling, she was tragically struck by an oncoming car and killed. The sad truth is that long before the accident, she had given up her life when she lost perspective.

Today's gospel is not an indictment of wealth and possessions, or our enjoyment of them. It’s OK to rest, eat, drink and be merry. We hear this in Ecclesiastes - Life is hard. Enjoy yourself when you can. God calls the landowner a "fool" not because he's enjoying himself, but because of his lack of perspective about wealth and possessions- the ways and times we stop looking at anything other than our abilities, refusing to trust God. The ways we allow stuff to be our God and master and the consequences. The landowner finally perfects his storage solution but finds out he’s going to die in just a few hours--"this night.” All that toiling forgetting all else, for naught. He’s forgotten his relationships with God and others. Starting with where the good fortune came from. It is the land that brought forth the abundance. The amazing harvest wasn’t the result of the landowner being a spectacular farmer, but because it was a good crop year. Weather being seen as a way referring to God’s activity not ours. Like the rich landowner, the woman lost perspective too. She had long since forgotten the source of her abundance-the result of God bringing her into a surprising gift of marriage and the blessings of wealth the man had been able to earn. The first warning is to be wary of the ways we disregard God’s activity in our lives. One way we fail to be rich toward God.

The second warning is about how disregarding others is also a way of failing to be rich toward God. The rich landowner forgot that not only did he not create the abundant harvest he didn’t reap it alone either. He needed and benefitted from the labor of others. Now, though, he’s become self-absorbed, forgetting about anyone else in the equation, thinking only of how he is set. He holds onto the harvest rather than selling now, to maximize profit, worried he might not have what he needs for his future. But here again he fails to see anyone else in the picture. Not only does he not share any of the abundance now with others, he robs them of their future as well. Ninety percent of the people around him lived at the level of bare subsistence, working for the landowner with a little plot to raise food for themselves. By tearing down the barn and building a bigger one, the man is taking land out of farming- fewer jobs for those workers. And he could have built a couple small barns, taking less space, but created one monstrous barn instead, surrounded by nothing. Taking away not only jobs, but guaranteeing that the land the barn sits on will never produce future crops. So out of touch, the owner fails to see this will ultimately affect him as well! He used his power to take away and driving others into poverty and homelessness, causing crisis all around, everyone is talking. Yet, the rich man talks only to himself, and thinks only of himself. So too the woman deaf to all others, finds herself disregarding her life partner to preserve the value of the house while her husband becomes ward of the state.
All that stockpiling shows a lack of trust that the abundant God will continue to be abundant. We all have times we find ourselves forgetting both the giver of the abundance and the limitation of their powers. Because for all the self-centered strategizing, we don't run our own lives after all. Our lives are finite and the stuff we think we own we can’t take with us, but we can allow our focus on stuff to take away our life. Think of all of the ways those I have mentioned could have been merry with others, including those they loved, enjoying the gift of the days they had together if it hadn’t taken so much time and energy and worry. And how merry can anyone be partying alone? It's not much of a life. If only they could have trusted God, been rich toward God, how abundant their lives could have really been. So too for us.

So, how do we avoid this fate? If I had the magic answer I would write a book, and of course share the profits with all of you. But seriously, both the landowner and the woman started out acting in ways that were prudent, planning for the future, being fiscally conservative. Somewhere along the way they got off track. Kingdom living is just as challenging for each of us- and rather than give answers Jesus leaves us with lots of questions. How can we be satisfied with the beauty of the abundance and relationships God gives? How can we trust God to provide “enough” when our needs and the needs of others clash- when we hear “you can’t always get what you want?” We too need to stop only talking to ourselves about numbers and stuff and worries, and to talk to God. God wants to provide abundance for us, but also for others. To sort out how to balance legitimate focus on ourselves and the concerns of our neighbors, our best guidance comes from our being rich toward our relationship with God- tending our relationship, in prayer, in study of Scripture and in dialogue with others. God gives us the treasure of these things.

Then we can hear the words of Jesus, as loving teacher who takes the time to remind us as children of an important life lesson, loves us enough to remind us to step outside our barns and back into the treasure of our world, reminding us of how God gives us abundance in relationships and how we are meant to be that abundance for each other. But when we get off track, to see we’re also given the grace of a God who knows our challenges and loves us even when we fail to keep perspective. Who promises each of us that long after the stuff is gone, we are claimed forever by a loving God who in Christ has given us the greatest treasure of all. In this we have life and we are truly rich.