Crazy Love

How many of you are familiar with Albert Einstein’s definition of “insanity?” Einstein defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results. Our first dog helped us experience this. Every day when the postal carrier would come to deliver mail, the dog would go nuts, and bark her head off, and sounded like given the chance would have attacked the person just delivering messages through the mail slot. From the dog’s perspective she was a success- every day some stranger came and tried to put stuff in our door and she barked and the person left. That’s not insanity.

Insanity was what we did. Every day we would chastise the dog for that behavior and tell her not to do it. And it never changed. You’d think that since we provided her a safe and comfortable home and good food, and she always cornered the best spot in a nice fluffy bed. You would think that she’d listen. But every day, the postal carrier would appear, and the dog had the same response. Because to our dog, “This is MY HOUSE!” And she was in charge.

Our dog was not exhibiting insanity- we were. For thinking that on a different day or with a different person the result would be different. And we could have given up on the dog but we didn’t. Because we loved the dog. And thankfully she never “got” that person who came and shoved mail through the slot in our front door.

But insanity, that act of doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result is perhaps the best way I know to describe what we see in the vineyard lessons today. Stories of wild grapes and tenants run amok, and the actions of the owner of the vineyard. (Thanks David Lose!)

The owner has labored to create a vineyard, tilling soil, planting lovingly, setting everything in order for the best and most abundantly possible harvest, and then gives the care of the vineyard over to other. In Isaiah we hear that it all goes wild from there and the temptation is tear it all down. But in the gospel, we hear about the tenants in a different way. And as far as we know in most respects they have been good tenants and have cared for the place. They’ve been given a place to live and a job to do- bring in the harvest. And presumably they’ve been given a promise that some of the harvest will be theirs as their pay, but of course the rest goes to the one who owned the land and who created the vineyard. And the harvest has come!

But now they look around and they see that harvest and they just don’t want to share. They’ve worked hard day after day for an owner who isn’t really around. They’ve put themselves into it and it doesn’t seem right that most of this goes to someone else.

So when the landowner sends servants to collect, they don’t receive grapes of joy in the harvest. Instead, to borrow the phrase from John Steinbeck, they meet with grapes of wrath. In wrath and anger those poor servants are abused or killed. Because the tenants have decided that this is MY PLACE!

Here’s where the insanity starts.

The owner could do as we would at this point, send in police or soldiers and take this by force. But instead, the owner sends more servants! Who sadly meet the same result. And that’s crazy! Why would the owner put so much at stake to risk a different result? More grapes of wrath. And frankly now the tenants are feeling the battle surge.

So then it really gets crazy, because the owner says, “I’ll send my son. They’ll listen to him. They’ll show respect, and recognize his authority, after all they have had a job and a place and are getting cared for.”

And we know how it ends. More wrath and killing.

The question isn’t really so much why did the tenants act that way- we sadly expect it. The stories in our world and our lives tell us this.

The question is, “why did the owner act that way??”

Why would anyone try to live in the framework of a relationship over and over when it is clear that it’s so one-sided?

That’s just crazy.

Today’s parable was told by Jesus to the leaders of the temple to show them who they were- those who rejected over and over the messengers of God. And while it’s a story about them and about how they would go on to reject even the Son, none of us should be under the impression we would be any different.

When so often we find in our own lives, ways we reject God’s call upon us to care for the vineyard, for those who show up in it, or to listen to God. When it is easy to respond to others not with love but with wrath. To call upon force rather than tend relationships.

Our news and our own stories tell us this is true. And in the end so much of what we’re given we are sure is OURS, because we’ve been tending it, we hardly think at all about who else might have a stake.

We can do a fine job of serving up grapes of wrath. That’s not the gospel.

Sometimes we have to work harder to see what the good news is.

The bigger and more important part of the parable however is what we know of God. It’s the story of one who lovingly arranged a place for us to live and to work and to grow, and who despite all our rejections and possessiveness, and even our violence and spite, continues to send not only messengers but to send the Son.

This side of the cross we know just how crazy this love God has for us really is. Christ on the cross is the ultimate message, that takes our wrath and made of it, our salvation.

If God responded towards any of us as we deserve, there would be wrath and destruction indeed. How unexpectedly graciously instead,

God persists over and over in a relationship with us, however one-sided, and while it is indeed the height of insanity, it is the best demonstration of crazy love we’ll ever see.

The grapes in the end are not grapes of wrath, they are grapes of mercy and forgiveness and love.

And this day again we will taste them. We’ll come because God invites us and we’ll receive the body and blood of Christ who died at our hand, but for us. So today, maybe, we’ll taste these grapes and maybe linger over it, and savor that taste that for us is the taste of love and mercy for each of us and for all of us.

And then maybe remember that of all the things we clamor to possess, or to know, the sweetest and best is God’s crazy love for us all.

 Amen.

 

** thanks to David Lose, and Sharron Blezard for the inspiration

 

 

The Star is the Light

Earlier tonite we had over a hundred people here for our Family Service, and one of the features of it is that the kids of our congregation and our afterschool program, the Doves Nest, help us tell the nativity story in real life. I found costumes and even animals, this year including sheep and cow hand puppets. This year as we were planning for the Family Service and our acting out of the story of the birth of Jesus, one of our youth insisted he did not want a role in any way. Which was kind of understandable because he is a high school student surrounded by little kids. I pondered for a moment as he and his family were there-what to do for someone who doesn’t feel part of this if he doesn’t want to be a shepherd, or a wise man or really anything. But yet he came to practice. And then, Shazam!

“You can be the star!”  I exclaimed excitedly, which of course got the most confused, skeptical, even irritated look.  After all he had just said he did NOT want a role. “The star,” I said again, gesturing and holding my hands above my head to demonstrate. “We need someone to hold the star over the holy family.”  This received a crinkly but growing and even grateful smile. And after a moment kind of a look of pride that he could as the tallest, and seemingly awkwardest one have a place in the story after all.

At home, my daughter and I set about trying to make a star, and after a lot of cutting and glue and glitter and hope, turned some discarded cardboard into a mighty fine but not audacious star. And I imagined him standing there in this unexpected joy that had replaced his expectation of disappointment.

That star led me to the focus I want to share tonight-The star is the Light.

Not just literally because stars, glowing orbs fiery gas shine in our night sky. More to the point- in the face of all our striving to make Christmas perfect to overcome our disappointments. In our longing to be stars for a just a moment-

into this world of ours, comes the real star-The Light. The star of this night and our whole lives is the Word- Jesus Christ who brings light to the world.

As we look around we can see just how much we all long for the light. In today’s paper on the front page were two stories of this side by side. The one on the left is about a man who has been working since mid-October to string 60,000 lights and synchronized music. Competing in a national TV contest to win $50,000. And he won! The quote in the paper from his wife is that since he was never athletic she was glad he could finally say he won something. Wow.

The second story was of a woman whose mental health and financial troubles led to her electricity being turned off in October, and until members of her church found out she had no light, no heat, nothing. One person is immersing himself in lights and another wondering if she really would just be in the darkness. And there it is.

I wonder if our profusion of lights and inflatables and the escalation of getting more, faster, suggests we long for the chance to overcome he dark places we know all too well. Then imagine that first night when the star was the light. There was no display of fine things. It was not beautiful. Or even light. And perhaps Mary like poor women still in the world, gave birth in the dark, perhaps without any light at all. Lonely and scared just hoping it would be OK. Yet-this is how and where God chose to enter. Not to encourage us to ignore the dark, to meet us in it and help us walk into the light.

This night we came here to step out of dark places and into the light. Each with our own stories, to Christmas- knowing we all strive to create those star moments. Perhaps ones where we hope the light will hide our lives so we can be our best selves, if just for a moment. Maybe it’s the first Christmas without a loved one, or another week without a job. Or Mom’s dementia is worse, or the medication isn’t working. Or you walk with a secret or wonder where everyone has gone.

The poet Wendell Berry says that “it gets darker and darker and darker-

and then Jesus comes.”

Jesus has come. Somehow the light comes. It is quiet but wondrous news that God comes to remind us again that we don’t have to be stars. We don’t have to be stars to receive Christ.  

We the people who walk in darkness are shown the light. It’s not overwhelming, or domineering. It’s also not artificial or temporary. It just IS. Light for us.

It’s what I think moves us to tears when we sing Silent Night in the candlelight. That flickering yet hopeful moment. It almost seems fragile. Yet we realize how powerful God is in the stillness with the light and the birth of a baby.

We silence the noise, as God shows us the holy and reminds us that we all really do have a place after all. In the light.

To grasp that who we are for real is exactly who God seeks out to love and to save. And that is wondrous news! It’s not about us and how we Christmas.

God’s life dwelling among us invites us to see the real star and to point to that light. God in Christ with us-not only in this night but in all the days to come. We don’t know how, but it is so.

I close with words of blessing from Jan Richardson:

I cannot tell you how the light comes.

What I know is that it is more ancient than imagining.

That it travels across an astounding expanse to reach us.

That it loves searching out

What is hidden, What is lost, What is forgotten Or in peril or in pain.

That it has a fondness for the body

For finding its way toward the flesh

For tracing the edges of form

For shining forth through the eye, the hand, the heart.

I cannot tell you how the light comes, but that it does.

That it will.

That it works its way into the deepest dark that enfolds you

Though it may seem long ages in coming

Or arrive in a shape you did not foresee.

And so may we this (night) turn toward it.

May we lift our faces to let it find us.

May we bend our bodies To follow the arc it makes.

May we open

And open more

And open still

                                 To the blessed light that comes

 

Sisters and brothers-Rejoice in the light! And may the light of Christ born for us shine in our hearts and in our lives! Amen

Where We See Exit, God Enters

“If you think God does that, get out!”  That seems to be the theme of most of the talking heads on TV and the internet- there’s the War on Christmas, arguments over whether Jesus must be white, and the recent words now under attack by one of the personalities from Duck Dynasty about who God is rejecting. I suspect people have spent more time analyzing all of these words than any actual words from Scripture. Everyone poised to win the argument. At the same time this week as the frenzy over who won Powerball began, everyone in our national media began to obsess about what it took to win.  At one point, a reporter, who had nothing concrete to say blurted out-“This is what the winning ticket looks like!” And he held up a generic lottery ticket. As though by seeing that ticket people could be believe there was a winner. Like it was a sign. That in the midst of statistical improbability, we’d get a piece of something that made those words be real. Show us something that will help us believe what seems impossible- what winning looks like. And so I kind of wonder in such as world as ours, what people would make of the family tree of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew that is made up of prostitutes and drunkards and lots of other people many would call offensive or even losers. Come to the adult discussion class to hear more. Not to mention the scandal surrounding Joseph and Mary. Today we hear about God’s improbability in the face of our certainty.  Where we see EXIT, God enters to be GOD WITH US and show what winning really looks like.

In Isaiah, for instance, we see Ahaz, King of Jerusalem meeting the prophet. Syria and Israel have come to attack Jerusalem. Ahaz is certain this attack will end badly, probably pondering an exit strategy. Isaiah instead says-though odds look pretty overwhelming, this will end and your world will not fall. The end of your distress will happen soon.  Because Emmanuel comes. Emmanuel- GOD WITH US- in this and where you see fear and war, there will be peace. I would want a sign. What’s amazing is Ahaz should ask for a sign- that’s what you do with a prophet. But he does not. And by not asking it seems that Isaiah wonders if Ahaz really believes what God will do.

I can’t decide whether Ahaz can’t see beyond himself or whether he knew he might ask for the wrong sign. Because when you’re under attack what you want is a fellow warrior, power in the form of some kind of weaponized sidekick. And time would pass in a nanosecond. God will use a baby? And it will be awhile? That’s your idea?

When you’re in the middle of conflict, you want it to end. You want to know where you stand. It was so unimaginable.  Even though Ahaz is skeptical, God determines to give a sign and to act. And the promise came true for Ahaz. Even though he fumbled with how to receive it. Where Ahaz saw EXIT, God entered to be GOD WITH US and show what winning really looks like. Then, Isaiah’s words became words so powerful, people believed they could come true again. They wrote them down and held onto them. Because however improbable, they might not just be once and done. And God’s story went on.

Fast forward to Joseph and Mary. Today’s reality TV has nothing on the back story of the birth of Christ. In Matthew, it’s not all graceful pondering-it’s fear and drama. Because Mary is pregnant, and the scandal is deep and her alibi is shaky. As we glimpse Joseph behind the scenes it isn’t pretty. He isn’t looking for a sign, unless it says “Exit.” He’s trying to take charge and manage his righteous image. And frankly anything other than getting out means he has to live in this dysfunctional life. But where Joseph sees EXIT God entered to show what GOD WITH US looks like. Where you see confusion and pain, there will be love and healing. What seems impossible is not. Signs and wonders even though Joseph fumbled with how to receive the power and presence of God. And God’s story went on.

And so too for us. “The Lord God will give you a sign” are words still for us- even when we give up looking for any signs beyond those we can make ourselves. When we wait for a Warrior God to fix our world full of people who we’re sure are wrong or who need to be defeated. GOD WITH US in all the places we fall into the trap of believing God should be like us, only bigger. And in the times we envision God as vengeful in a world obsessed with getting even. Where we point to the EXIT sign, God enters with the still unexpected vision of winning. God enters to be God WITH US.

This is the sign- A baby born to the scared and confused, in a messed up and fighting world. To people who continue to fumble the God we receive. Jesus, Emmanuel enters still to remind us that in all our fears, longings and needs, God’s love wins.And these words live. This is the sign.

One writer says, “Unless we see the sign of the child it is all too easy to turn “Immanuel, God-with-us” into a call to defeat our enemies.  God’s sign of a child surprised a king and an unwed father named Joseph. This sign matters in a world that continues to worship a vengeful God who can crush our enemies. Seeing the child as sign of God-with-us paints a different picture, (one our world needs far more than our battle to be right): The Word comes as a child who can be received and cannot hurt us; a Word that does not make us afraid. What is so amazing is that when God does come among us, whatever God’s hurt or indignation, God comes not with violence, but as a child, vulnerable to our further hurt that we might receive rather than fear him.”  It’s an odd way of winning, but it is salvation for all of us. On this last Sunday of Advent, as we ponder the improbable reality of Emmanuel, Jesus born to save all people and to be God with Us, I share with you these words Barbara Lundblad used to write a new verse of “O Come, O Come, Immanuel” :

O come, dear child of Mary, come,

God’s Word made flesh within our earthly home;

Love stir within the womb of night,

Revenge and hatred put to flight.

Rejoice, rejoice! Take heart and do not fear,

God’s chosen one, Immanuel, draws near.

Tell Me Again

At home I was told- “look it’s 10 days to Christmas, just tell good news.” Which is kind of ironic since earlier this week at our pastor’s Bible study we were talking about this week and what we were preaching and a couple of us talked about how this year we had committed to preaching Isaiah. And one person kind of lamented that decision, saying that this week’s reading is pretty much just a repeat of last week. Peaceable kingdom, things growing where once things were barren, hope and peace for God’s children. BLAH, BLAH, BLAH. Won’t that sound kind of cliché and repetitive?

Which got me to thinking. That the real irony is that we’ll listen to the same bad news- death, violence, destruction, anxiety and hopelessness-over and over and over again. And seemingly never tire of it. Two weeks in a row of good news?

Well then the news of the week happened- and again I stand before you to proclaim good news in a world that cannot fathom yet another school shooting, much less frankly the rest of the news of violence and despair. We think we are living in an ever changing advancing world, but we are actually just doing variations on the same unholy theme.

Why do we just keep singing the same old song? Aren’t we finding it kind of lifeless?

Tell me again, why do we do that?

Tell me again.

If you’ve ever watched TV shows or movies, there is a dramatic move called “tell me again.” Like when two people are shown in a car headed somewhere and the passenger turns to the driver and says something like, “tell me again why we’re doing this?” As they drive into the storm. It functions for the character to say out loud what everyone else is thinking- and helps the audience know where the story is going.

Tell me again. This is what John the Baptist is asking. Some people think this is about John wanting to make sure he’s not wasting his time. But John is in prison and he knows his life is likely to be at risk. He’s asking Jesus to tell him again to be reassured. Tell me again- are you really the ONE? Tell me you’ve got this.

That was what was on my mind this week- and maybe yours too. As I am frankly impatient with God. I have a holy longing. Today again we light that pink candle and share words of rejoicing, knowing they are dulled by violence and darkness, we talk of being cared for but are nursing a hunger in moments of doubt and desolation. Tell me again, Jesus.

And so I imagine John there in prison- it’s dark, and foreboding, and he’s separated from the energy of the movement he helped prepare. And he’s said all those prophetic words, but had to be weighed down with disillusionment over the world as it was, and his state. Stuck waiting, not really living and facing death. Will it really be as you say, Jesus?

And Jesus tells him the prophecy is being made true. And I imagine all the imagery of Isaiah dancing in his head perhaps- that suddenly a parched desert will be watered and life on hold will burst forth. And what seems treacherous will be made safe. That the way that has been prepared is being further prepared- healing and wholeness are beginning.

Many of us know that when we have doubts and sorrows, we find it almost impossible to believe there will again be joy, that sorrow will be followed again by gladness. Just like when the seasons bring dormant times, it can seem like they will never change. And if you stand in the desert when it is dry and parched, unless you saw pictures and heard stories of the blanket of riotous flowers you’d never believe it would happen. But it does.

Especially in the desert where it seems God knows that cacti need to have not just a flower, but a riot of color to prove it. That after months of nothing, it seems it suddenly blooms. Just like my mother-in-law’s Christmas cactus. After months of tending it, she’ll invariably say- tell me again why I tend this thing?  Wondering but one day you walk in and there’s the first hot pink bloom. And then within days- a shower of flowers spill forth. Sometimes not even for Christmas at all, but in November or March. Proof that you never know when, you just know to look for it. And that one time of blooming may not be enough. Truth is we never tire of it no matter how often it breaks forth.

It’s like God’s good news for us. Breaking forth in the word and meal to reassure us, and meet us in our waiting and longing. Where we find ourselves saying- tell me again. And God is found in our stories of where healing happens, when rejoicing comes, and how new life emerges. God present as we remind ourselves of the places we can only explain by saying God has been at work on the way. You are the one we wait for, O God. And it’s happening even though we do not see it in its fullness. Help us keep with you on the holy way, knowing you’ve got  this. That’s why we keep telling the same good news. To be met by Christ who knows we struggle to rejoice and believe but meets us with words of hope and good news. And so we look and we work and we pray- Tell us again and help us find your way. Amen.

 

Onward Christian Soldiers

When I was talking with the girls, one of the things they immediately told me when we were planning the service was the fact we had to sing “Onward Christian Soldiers” because it was Donald’s favorite. As I looked at the many accomplishments in Donald’s life I could see that pattern of always moving vigorously forward the way the music suggests by its very beat. Always onward. Throughout his life’s work, and his commitment to conservancy, evidenced this day, his commitment to local government. And vigorous describes his commitment to this place, where it was well known and understood that unless you were sick, you were here! Onward! And in his life in the military and many years beyond he also lived in that overarching theme of victory. But then I thought about this day.


A day where we are here to celebrate the life and witness of a man who touched lives and lived fully and also here to proclaim resurrection victory through Christ in the face of his death. And in our loss we sang “Onward Christian Soldiers.” No matter how strong or weak we feel this day, joining that same voice across time. Yet words that sound different as the cross is not leading a throng of mighty men, but a single casket. “Like a mighty army moves the church of God, walking where saints have trod.” We join the song across the ages of the many who now are the saints. And it is at this moment made clear-these are words we can only sing in faith. Grasping in faith that improbable kingdom of God where our only weapons are faith and the Spirit. Reminded that our hope comes from reliance on more than the promises and protection we can muster, but what comes only from the power of God.

As I read Donald’s obituary he seemed larger than life, he was a giant. Not in a self-proud way, but simply a man who used well the gifts he was given by the Creator. I only knew him in this past year- in a very different time. And he was aware of its difference. He had suffered significant chronic health concerns though, in spite of them, in later years, he marveled in the year 2000 that he never expected to see the turn of the century yet through the power of prayers God brought him moments of unexpected healing and another 12 years after that century mark. All the way to 85, sharing yet again that birthdate he and Donna have in common. I believe in these fading years Donald grasped not so much a feeling of marching by one’s own strength, but a feeling of being carried by God.

Our Scripture readings this day all point to the fact- that no matter how accomplished we were in our lives, no matter whether you can trace your family back to the 1700’s, it all comes down to what God gives us- new life in Christ, and faith and the Holy Spirit to believe. In the words of Isaiah, and the words of our Psalm- we hear we can look to God for comfort, and strength, believing that we will receive them and have peace. That God is our helper. Certainly in these last days for Donald and for his family God has provided what only God could give- helping hands, moments of serendipity and the ability to be together with him at the critical time. In these waning times, there have been many such tender moments to sustain.

In later years as Lillian and Donald were separated in two different units for care, Lori was able to arrange to take them to a Hampton Inn overnight so that they could have a meal together and stay together and share in times of closeness that feed our souls. A great act of love shared made even greater by the fact that the Hampton Inn chose to not charge Lori for the room- an act of love and kindness. And there are many of these stories- of God placing people and blessings at just the right time. Right down to the loving care of the folks at St Joe’s who were able to let the family know it was a critical time. They say that the last of our senses to fade is hearing and I believe it brought peace and comfort that he could hear his family in that moment God gave them together. They could gather like that small but mighty army, to surround him with love that greatest of gifts- To be able to be there to complete an earthly circle. As someone said, he was there for our first breath and we were able to be there for his last.

These are the moments when we truly hang upon Jesus’ promise in the gospel- I am the resurrection and the life as an earthly life ends. This is the moment when we have to believe that it is more than living this life excellently. We are here to speak and sing that resurrection and to say-I believe. Over and over again Jesus uses this word in the Gospel of John often. Believe, believe believe…It’s actually best translated “keep on believing, keep on living into belief.” Over and over again. Said by a God who knows we need to be reminded and offering up for us to hear-Jesus words as we read them, and as we share them with one another. Sharing faith in the cycle of places we travel- not only in places of joy or victory or birth, but in places of fear, and death and doubt. Keep Speaking, keep believing.

Words for us this day. These words of Jesus day came as Martha meets Jesus to tell him that her brother is dead and to chide him- “if only you had been here.” This day we instead give thanks not only for Donald’s life but for eternal life he has now received through the power of the cross of Christ. And to this we say- Lord we thank you that you are here!

And that because of you, death does not have the last word

Because ultimate victory is yours in Jesus the Christ. A victory you give to us to share. This is what pushes us onward- your power alone. And this is how you carry us- as we await the day when we’re gathered with Donald and all your army of saints

In peace and for eternity. Amen.



POSTSCRIPT: Because the deceased was a former Fish and Game Commissioner, there was an honor guard in uniform who stood watch at the casket and who served as pallbearers. Because he was a military veteran of distinction there were military honors at graveside. As we arrived at the cemetery, there was a dove that came and sat in the tree above my head. (A little worried about how that would turn out for me) After the committal, and the salute and taps were played, the dove flew away. As it happened the Fish and Game officers caught notice as did I. When we shared this with his daughters, one said that when he father helped her work on her house, every day there was a dove that came and sat there while they worked on her porch. It gave her comfort to think of her father checking one last time before flying off.