Promise in the Dust

Today, as a part of beginning this Lenten season, I took a picture. Each day in Lent, I will be taking a picture that coincides with a word from Scripture during the Lenten season and then contemplate where that picture takes you in connection with the story of Scripture and our lives. Everyday taking a picture and posting it to #lent2015. Appropriately enough, today’s prompt was “dust” and as you might imagine most of the pictures I saw posted to Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram were of the ashes we’re wearing tonight. I decided to take a picture that was not the expected. I could just take a picture of the dust of the ashes, but I was looking for something more connected to me than that. Something that spoke of our daily existence and what it comes down to. I ended up instead, taking a picture of dryer lint.

And you know, if you stop and think about it, dryer lint tells a story- it not only tells what you were wearing and using, but where we have been. It tells of our living, reacting and responding. Look closely enough and it tells our struggles and failures, frustrations and heartaches. And it tells our joys and hopes and dreams pursued.

And especially with children, that dust came complete with the occasional partial Kleenex, candy wrapper, loose change or ticket stub interspersed. Each representing the sadnesses, celebrations, losses and triumphs of a life.

Perhaps that little label “Clean after each cycle” reminds us that dustiness is our reality but God longs for us to start anew. Dustiness is what we all share.

Young and old, at the end of the day, what is left, is our dust, and frankly, scientifically, we also carry the dust of others. And if you’ve ever gone to the laundromat, and had the dryer someone else forgot to clean, you know the moment- having to clean up someone else’s dust. It’s hard enough dealing with our own. In any event, at the end of the day, the week, a life, what we see is what we leave- dust.

Today we are reminded of our dust.

And as we look around the world, we see it on a larger scale- the giant swirls of trash in the ocean, those piles now sometimes given names, which breaks my heart; the belching of factories taking life up and downstream and people can’t breathe from all the dust; and the unquenchable thirst for violence reducing people and places to dust in ways the prophet Joel couldn’t even fathom. As we ponder how on earth we can possibly overcome these forces that seem to inevitably point to destruction, what we see is our limitation, and our frailty.

Today we are reminded we are but dust. The ashes more vividly remind us of our dust, our ashness.

Years ago, as we took our children to church for Ash Wednesday , it was the day most feared. And it all started when Catherine was very young. We carried her forward for ashes as a preschooler, at an age just old enough to be aware. Our pastor at the time had a booming voice and a particularly large thumb. There was our girl, confronted by this seemingly enormous black thumb approaching her, too close, and the voice thundered “Remember you are dust. And to dust you shall return!”

And perhaps in the truest response to such a pronouncement, she responded perhaps as we all might, or might want to. In a high pitched lament, she cried out, “Noooooooo!” And burst into tears. While at first we laugh, if we stop and think about it, perhaps she expressed what if we allowed ourselves to think it, was our response.

If we allow ourselves to think it, we can see our mortality. Today we are reminded we will be dust. Today we are reminded of our dust.

And that is for me the thing about Ash Wednesday- that cross we bear breaks into our world and tells us what we try not to hear, or contemplate. It breaks in and speaks intimately, too close.

Yet, as soon as we say return to the Lord, we are already feeling that “too close.” And amidst the ashes of our lives are, as Walter Brueggeman writes, “burdened with the tasks of the day, (and) we are already halfway home, halfway back to committees and memos, halfway back to calls and appointments, halfway on to next Sunday, halfway back, halfway frazzled, half expectant, half turned toward you, half rather not.”

Please don’t make us confront our ashness. The consequences of our living, the limitations of our control and our frailty. How totally opposite that cross is to our world which attempts to minimize and sanitize, or to dominate and isolate any experience of what real life and death involve. We would rather insulate ourselves.

We’d rather not hear the prophet pleading-consider your ashes, and consider how far you’ve strayed. We’d just as soon not look at how many layers insulate us from reality. That black thumb my daughter feared, you see, truly represented our reality. And while we have over the years made receiving ashes a once a year act-saying “we got ashes.” There is the truth- we’ve always got ashes.

Brueggeman writes in his poem “Marked by Ashes”

“All our Wednesdays are marked by ashes- we begin this day with that taste of ash in our mouth; of failed hope and broken promises, of forgotten children and frightened women, we ourselves are ashes to ashes, dust to dust; we can taste our mortality as we roll the ash around on our tongues.”

And what is the response to this? Today at Bible study we talked about someone’s experience in worship on Ash Wednesday of a garment being torn- rending a garment is no small act. And act of mourning, or of contrition. The ripping open of what seems to be woven and fused together. And comparing that to our hearts. As God, our God calls to us to rend, to break open our hearts and return. Break through those layers of ash and insulation so we not only see the reality of our ashes, we see the reality of our Lord,

It’s not too late- come back to me. Fast from your ashness-from the ashes we bear each day. The ones we bring to this place each week. To come and experience changed hearts.

Come back to the God who is YOUR God. Who is not just saying, but begging, pleading, longing. God’s heart is torn by our absence. God longs to restore us and take our ashes. And make us new.

Richard Lischer writes, “it is only in Jesus that (our ashes) are gathered together in the shape of a cross. Time and time again we bring them to him, and then return to our mortal lives with something far better.”

The God who formed us out of chaos and ashes, gives us new form in Christ. Out of these ashes.

As Marcia Shultz writes, there is promise in the ashes

“No! I thought.

No black cross

Not on my forehead

No revealing mark

Of failure

Of grief

Of death

No.

But yes,

Take up your cross

Be marked

Perishable

Fragile

Blessedly alive

Human.

God’s best work

Marked as acceptable

Wounded

Broken

Acceptable to God

Not by my will

But Christ alone

Bearing the Cross

Wearing the Cross

In hope

The sign of the promise

Humanity lived

Fulfilled

Redeemed

By Christ alone.

This is the journey we enter and we pray to our God who promises that dustiness may be our reality but not our destiny.

Reflections on Ashes

This year we should be feeling blessed by a “late” Lent and Easter season. Instead we have been surrounded by so much cold and damage and dirt of a season that has assaulted us that we are surely ready for the ashes of it to blow away with the next strong gust. So the new life of spring can start.

While different times in the church year can signify endings and beginnings, for me perhaps Lent is my favorite. Today we receive ashes made from the palms of last year’s Hosannas, and they are also ashes of everywhere the journey took us after Palm Sunday. A whole year of places of love, truth, patience and kindness. And places of affliction, hardship, sleepless nights and hunger.

All of it burned away to dust.

What starts out like a giant leafy palm, becomes the small amount of dust in this dish. There are actually a few palms that became our ashes. But even if we had all the palms we waived last year, there would be room in that dish.

I think it’s a concrete way of seeing that we cannot store up the praise or the glory we think we’ve achieved. We cannot hold onto that dust.

But are also reminded not to hold onto the pain of the times that we really messed up or where someone really hurt us.

Let that dust blow away.

This is my third year to work with our dust. And at a fundamental level my comfortableness with the ashes reminds me of how it all comes to this dust. You see, they don’t teach us how to make ashes in seminary.

My first year, I had little idea how to make the right ashes and I got lots of unhelpful advice like what my internship supervisor said- let the sexton do it. I fussed and fussed to get it right- not to crumbly, not too oily. I made a huge mess and ended up with far more ashes than we needed.  Enough for decades of Ash Wednesdays.

But once mixed with oil, they don’t keep. Last year’s oil is pretty nasty. In spite of all the fretting, if you do not remember those ashes, that is a grace. If you do, sorry.

My second year, there were so many things going on that I waited until the last minute. I was so preoccupied and as a result, they were not fully set- too spare for the early service. Barely a cross maker at all. If you don’t remember that, that also is a grace. And if you do, let it go.

This year, I put a little oil in the dish and dumped in the ashes and walked away. When I came back later, a couple stirs and they were ready. Which probably means there should be a whole lot less of me, and all the things I hold onto. And a whole lot more of God and God’s timing. After all, God is used to making things from dust. And making something from what feels like chaos.

These ashes remind us where we’ve been and yet invite us into a season that’s about working through the chaos. To get to what’s essential. What is not essential is burned up or blows away. Jan Richardson writes that Lent challenges us to reflect upon what we have filled our days and lives with. To see what habits and practices, possessions or ways of being have accumulated, or taken over. Where is a pattern of chaos threatening to block our seeing the presence of God?

Each scripture passage today invites us to ponder what our practices are and which ones we have given ourselves over to. And which ones God calls us to- individually and as a community. To pay close attention to the rhythms of our lives to see which practices draw us closer to God and which pull us away.

We ask God to create in us a clean heart. Lent asks- What is the state of your heart?

What has taken up residence there?

Are there habits or ways of being that you are so invested in or attached to that it is difficult to see new places God might be inviting you to move into?

Out of the good and the bad and even the ugly of a year, God is creating a new path that takes those ashes and makes a new path marked by a cross. Making beautiful things from the dust.

On this day and throughout this season may see more clearly what is treasure and may our hearts be open to the unexpected life that only God in Christ can bring. That cross-it’s the only thing that we truly need.

And because of our loving God it’s the one promise we can be sure of.

Entering the Larger Life of God

Today the Sadducees are getting a bad rap in the gospel. It’s the first thing we hear-they don’t believe in the resurrection! But I got to wondering, how about us?

What do WE mean when we say we believe in resurrection? I asked a lot of people this week.

One friend says it simply means God promises life after death. Another said-life never ends, even if it seems like it from a human viewpoint. God's life-giving power will always be more powerful than death and destruction. The crucified and risen Christ is the ultimate promise of redemption and new life for all of creation.

Someone else said-It means that the fundamental character of God is to bring life from death. We receive that promise through Christ and we can depend on it throughout our life and beyond. It doesn't mean that life doesn't pass away. It means that we can depend on God's character to bring life from death…and it's a promise that all can trust in. As a Christian it means that I've been given the Spirit in order to participate in God's action.

Another friend shared-God is constantly creating and recreating. Now. And in the future. We see new life everywhere. Isn’t that resurrection?

Then I talked to our afterschool kids who told me that God's new life comes in how God gives us blessings in this life and promises more to come. Probably with lots of gold and fluffy clouds. "After all Pastor, the Bible says there's a lot of gold!"

And others told me about pets in the afterlife, and I starting imagining My Little Pony. But who’s to say?

I was struck though-all of the answers I got focused upon Life more than death. While many adults focused on the life to come, our kids whose lives are just as complicated think it matters where God is giving life now, even as some of them are still actively mourning the killing in our neighborhood of their friend Wilberto a few months ago.

My seminary President chimed in on Facebook and shared that he has a friend who is an Episcopal priest who always announced a death saying, "Jane/John has moved on into the larger life of God." I love that image! But I would expand it- it’s not only about the great hereafter. We gather here and say that gathered in the name of Christ we can experience this earthy and earthly life as a foretaste of the feast to come. Moments where the larger life of God come to us now. Resurrection starts now and resurrection extends beyond our horizon. But you know, I am also struck by the notion in the gospel today that as much as God desires us to live in this altered reality, God is not making us believe in resurrection. The Sadducees weren’t buying it.

On Wednesday night when we talked about this week’s gospel and right away the question was-just who were those Sadducees?  They were a small group within Judaism in Jesus’ day who had a particular view. Just like lots of people claim to be Christians but the message can be different, so too in Jesus’ day there were different viewpoints in Judaism. The Sadducees believed that even though there were more scrolls others considered to to the Hebrew Scripture, for them,only the first five books mattered- Genesis, Exodus, Deuteronomy, Numbers and Leviticus. That’s it. Most others felt God had more to say; they did not. The rest of the words on the scrolls were helping many develop a belief in life after death by the power of God-resurrection. But not the Sadducees. They also only believed that God was in the one temple in Jerusalem- and that’s where they were, so much so it kind of felt like “their” house. So when Jesus has come to Jerusalem and gone straight to the temple and set up shop day after day, it’s like he has occupied “Their” house. They’re miffed. So they come and ask him the question we hear today about an idea they don’t even believe in-resurrection. They can’t imagine even if there is more after this life, that it will look any different than their expectation. Instread they think the way you live on is that your name is carried on by your children- literally your seed lives. That’s why all those barren women matter. People are only children of our earthly creators. Even if there was an afterlife, for that poor woman, afterlife would mean continuing to try to produce that child-hardly paradise. Then Jesus shakes them up by quoting about Moses back to them- God is bringing life out of what seems like death, and the barrenness of the childless but it’s a whole different world. Larger than their vision.

It’s larger but we don’t know much. What will resurrection of the body and that next life be like? Over time this has generated tons of questions. During the Crusades and times of war when people lost hands or feet or heads and whole bodies could not be returned, people worried about how their body would be resurrected if not all of it had been buried. Some people literally went around worried about fingernails! Others worried about what if the ashes blew away, how would that work? How could God fix that? In our data gathering world, if we can’t have proof, we aren’t so sure. Perhaps a modern day version of what we will accept versus not. It’s why books about what heaven will be like are popular. It’s only natural we want to know. And for those missing dear departed saints we just named last week, it’s fresh. How will we know them? What will we look like? Us, only better? Or what it will look like- our favorite time? Who will be there? What about people we don’t want there, who we don’t want to see? We hope Jesus knows how to arrange our next house when he says that there are many dwelling places. When we say we believe in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting week after week what do we know? Whatever the concern, we all worry how God will do it, or sometimes wonder if God even can.

Kind of like the Sadducees- we can fall victim to relying only on our vision, not trusting in the larger life of God. The God who says- you see all this? I created it. You can trust in what seems beyond your full vision. For the Sadducees, life came to a dramatic halt when their temple was destroyed 70 AD- since that was the only place God was, and it was gone, they just couldn’t go on. If, like the Sadducees, we limit our vision to imagine God’s love or power, that smaller view will not bring life for us either. It’s true we don’t know much, but we know God is powerful, God keeps promises and we will be with Jesus.

Now I come back again to what words people shared about resurrection- here’s what I see-all those responses were not so much about death but life. Life! That’s the mysterious good news. God who gave us life, gives life. And the promise that more lies beyond this life.  And in the meantime, we live in this life, and we should live! And it’s life with God! God who is in our beginnings and endings is in all of the in between as well, both the glorious and the frightening. Inviting us to live as those given promises, and power-resurrection now. This is the larger life of God. Where is it found? In all those new life moments-when we remember we are already God’s children claimed in baptism at this font. When we hear that we are freed from our failures and struggles to live anew each Sunday to start worship. When we hear that Jesus Christ is love and food and healing for us each time we gather at this table. When we get that second chance in relationships, or that new lease on life in some part of our lives. Moments of peace we didn’t expect that helps us carry on-resurrection. Given by a God who even more than life is love. That’s this cross for us. God loving us into life after all the kinds of death we experience.

In the end, this is what all the words we say when we gather remind us of-  In Christ, this life and love proclaim we are children of God forever. Children again this day invited even deeper into the larger life of God.

Amen

It's like Play Doh- got you thinking? Reformation Sunday

Just as we sat down for the sermon, I saw two girls sitting in the back behind the glass doors. Girls from the Doves Nest. I invited them to come in, and offhandedly I said, “Come on in, you don’t have to do a thing.” Which really is kind of the point. Nothing is required of us to experience God’s grace. But that is hard to imagine.

When she was little, our daughter Alex was painting an egg in art class, laboring to get it just right, putting colors exactly where they needed to be to complete the vision she had in mind. But paint can drip unexpectedly and just as she was almost done, it happened. Some-thing dripped in the wrong place. In her mind it was life and death-all was lost. It was failure beyond fixing. Heartbroken, she smashed the egg.

That can be how we think of God. We hear in scripture of God, heartbroken, and imagine unforgiving, punishing. Instead of freeing, forgiving, renewing.

That’s what people were debating about 600 years ago when the church was teaching people they could be lost as far as God was concerned. Failure beyond fixing. Whether people would go to heaven or to hell when they died mattered because disease would wipe out entire towns and people didn’t expect to live long. Whether you could be right with God mattered. People thought they had to earn salvation, buying prayers and doing so many things- trying to keep themselves out of hell.

Along came Martin Luther who said it’s time to reform, or

re-shape our thinking.

Because the Bible does tell us we will all sin and fail, but we are all justified-put in a right relationship-with God. We are as Jesus says, “Freed.” But this doesn’t happen by our laboring to be perfect. It’s possible only by God’s promise fulfilled in the gift of grace for us in the cross of Christ. God doing for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Salvation isn’t made possible by what we do or how well we do it. It is ours because God’s grace reaches out-forgiving, reshaping and restoring.

So instead working on a perfect masterpiece, our relationship is more like playing with Play-Doh.

With Play Doh I can make anything, one shape, then another. I can add more. If I make mistakes, it can simply be restored  back to how it started. PlayDoh is forgiving that way. And lots of things are possible. That’s how God’s love is for us.

That's grace. Today we’re celebrating this history, but what about our lives today?  Well, people still hand me flyers warning me I'm going to hell, and maybe some people are worried about that, but I think we’re even more worried about what shape our church is taking, and keeping our identity.

And then I wonder if we like continual love, forgiveness and reshaping for ourselves, but lose sight of it sometimes as the church.

Life or death might be about other challenging things we’re sure cannot be.

Yet, across history God enters into these very places in our lives of faith. That is our strength to rely upon. Even in changing times that is the constant. That too is like Play Doh. No matter how many ways I try to use it, there is something that stays the same-it’s always Play Doh.

In the church, there may be many ways ministry is expressed, and people added but something stays the same. That constant isn’t our desire for “the way we’ve always done it.” It’s the love and grace and power of the cross through which God claims and redeems us all.

Today our music I hope is one way to see this diversity and strength of faith. Our opening song was Scandinavian, "built on a rock the church will stand” and we’ll end with a classic German song Luther wrote. “A Mighty Fortress is our God.” A song some of us know by heart that brings tears to our eyes. Both songs will talk about the strength of the church but there was a time Germans and Scandinavians worshipped separately.

We’ll also sing two newer songs. One from Tanzania, where the African church is growing rapidly, a song reminding us to listen because God is calling. A word for us today. During communion liturgy we’ll sing music by a Latino artist "Santo Santo Santo Santo es nuestro Dios"- Holy Holy is our God. About God’s liberation today.
Signs of God continually re-forming and re-shaping across time. No matter what language or culture or tradition, the vision is still the same. God’s church in every age strengthened and loved and being reshaped. New life and power always centered in the cross.

Sometimes that truth is scary- we want things fixed. In sin, we end up focusing on our efforts as the key. But the constant truth is our loving God meets us when we end up trapped and frees us again. And again. Today we remember again that freeing constant truth-God’s grace, the gift of faith and strength of the word that starts in our baptism-where that cross is made on our foreheads.

Baptism also is not a single moment fixed in time, but a journey for the rest of our lives. Today we celebrate as Victoria and Eddie enter and as Heather, Sean and Megan continue in this life, our life together as God’s people. Through them and us God will continue to work, bringing new life and reshaping. It’s worth celebrating! Let’s celebrate together that we’re freed, forgiven and renewed by this creative, redeeming and powerful love and continue the journey into God’s vision together.

Lost and Found Angels

After my sermon,

she came to see me to tell me-

All my angels have been sold or lost- beautiful angels.

I had so many.

There was the Abuse, but I have stayed sober.

But there is the addiction and the shame.

But today I realized that no one can take away the real angels

No one can take away those angels that sit on each shoulder

But I forget and the devil gets me-
I hear voices, sometimes and the doubts…

I get scared

I wish there was something that would help me remember.

She clutched and stroked a new cross necklace.

She had found it lying on the ground, lost.

And I remembered a man we would say had great faith,

Writhing on the ground, with those demons and doubts

Clutching onto a cross

I am yours, save me! I am yours save me!

another story of lost and found.

 We held onto that cross and said it together.

And we prayed for help to find again-

 that God is with us, in Jesus and in those angels

In us.

You are not alone. Not lost lying on the ground unclaimed.
You are
mine.

And she asked as she often does, for me to anoint her

With that cross that will cling to her.

And that slight but persistent fragrance in the air that lingers and remains

That somehow seems far greater

 than the smoke of dashed dreams and regrets
 of lost and stolen things

Speak to us of hope and protection,

love and healing

 no one can take away.

That's How Much I Love You

This Sunday two years ago I stood in this pulpit the first time to preach my call sermon and I am really glad it was not three years ago because these would have been the lessons. They are full of challenge, but also good news. To get at that I’d like to start by telling you about our 21 year old. When Catherine was little she watched a lot of a show called Barney where a large purple dinosaur sang a syrupy song- “I love you, you love me, we’re a happy family with a great big hug and a kiss from me to you, Won’t you say you love me too?” I think that perhaps that’s what we really want to hear on Sundays.  Not today’s lessons.

Catherine could sing with Barney over and over. But she’d fall victim to what I call the “Barney Effect” which was whenever she needed to grow as a person- taking on a new chore or deepening responsibility, she’d whine and complain that we didn’t “love” her. We could see it was time for new growth but she just wanted to have everything stay peacefully, comfortably the same. Oddly enough, usually the much maligned new thing was actually something that would open up new life. I can remember it going all the way back to when she was learning to crawl and walk. That late great saint, her grandfather tried everything to get her to move, buying different toys, getting down on his hands and knees. He got to see her crawl but not walk before he died. But he persevered because he knew it was good for her even though she wasn’t buying it.

Today in lots of people I meet I hear the adult variation of that complaint “Can’t you just love me the way I am?” or “meet me where I am?” If the answer is no, what follows is what one person I know calls “catastrophizing.” Everything is blown out of proportion. Our desire for pleasant news and our fear of what we are sure is unpleasant are exaggerated. There are catastrophes for some, like we hear of in Hebrews, especially for people like our Christian brothers and sisters in Egypt this week. I watched with heartache and horror the images and stories of Christians attacked for their faith.  Most of us only face catastrophes of our own emotions. We assume the worst, allow the race to seem too big, or the time to not seem right or act like no one is with us or has ever faced such times as a way to not act.

If Jesus spoke today, he’d probably compare our incessant focus upon the catastrophizing of the Weather Channel or even reality TV while avoiding the real world around us seeing it for what it is. Our gospel seems scary, even catastrophic. But Delmer Chilton says that when we read it, we usually assume that all the talk about fire and rain is Jesus’ referring to a dark omen of evil times. But that’s not necessarily the case.  After all, many times rain is good news, and fire is the process the molds or shapes something beautiful and new.

Jesus says nothing about looking out for evil times; he merely suggests we should pay more attention to what God is up to than the clouds. And frankly, I’m not so sure we’re afraid God is coming to unleash some huge punishment. I think it’s that “good news” that makes us uncomfortable.

Jesus is not always “pleasant news.” And it’s often the duty of the church of “the good news” to speak about things that are neither gentle nor welcome. For us or others. It disturbs our priorities and comfort. That’s what all that family division stuff is getting at.

What Catherine meant when she said “you don’t love me” in those change moments was- if you loved me I wouldn’t have to change. In the midst of the uncertainty or even misery we want to be told that God is love and forgives us and nothing needs to change. But God’s love moves, and God means that all those things God says about widows, aliens, prisoners and marginalized people. And relationships that honor these things matter. Jesus’ message and mission are love, but that kind of love that can be jarring. While God loves us as we are, God also loves us too much to let us stay that way. And that’s disruptive.

Yet, the opposite of love isn’t hate, or anger. The opposite of love is not caring. Keeping things peaceful but distant. God’s love is noisy and nosy and involved. It won’t let us slip away unchallenged into failure. This message disturbed because it called upon people to get beyond roles and to get into relationships; real, messy, involved relationships; that kind of love is disruptive, breaking what isn’t working in order to create a new family, a new community of truth and love. God loves us enough to continue to refine and reshape and reform us to become more and more who God created us to be. People who more and more live out in flesh God’s love for the whole world. God will always seek to change and transform us  from sinners into saints, out of love. For God’s sake and ours. And in this process sometimes we have to let go or move on. We do not wish to be told this but it’s true. And that’s what is scary. But at the same time it is joyful and life giving.

Perhaps this was most evident as our denomination, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America gathered this past week at our national assembly. Lutherans from all across the country gathered, and were visited by religious leaders from around God’s world under the theme “Always Being Made New.” And some important things happened. Our church elected a new bishop. The Rev. Elizabeth A. Eaton, bishop of the Northeastern Ohio Synod, is our first female presiding bishop. I am delighted that as someone who was once told that women do not do this, to see such a day, but that is not the most important thing. In the 1970's, the church approved women to become ordained pastors. For some it was joyful good news; for others they were perhaps sure it was a catastrophe in the making. But God’s reshaping over the last 40 years has now led something new but I believe life-giving that is more important. And Bishop Eaton is more importantly a strong evangelist, even inviting someone who interviewed her for the Huffington Post to church, and saying we should “welcome the gifts of those who come from different places-that is a conversation we need to have as a church.”  Amen!

Our church also adopted a written statement about the Criminal Justice system in this country out of concern for the “massive levels of incarceration in the United States.” Pastor Fred Opalinski has been a part of this project that affirms positive aspects of the system, but speaks dissatisfaction with what is urgently in need of reform as building and running prisons has become corporate big business and we rank in the top 3 countries in the world in percentage of people under control of a criminal justice system -- one out of 31 adults and, for people of color, as high as one out of 11. Fundamental principles such as due process of law and the presumption of legal innocence are sound. Overly harsh sentencing and persistent inequalities based on race and class need to change. God is calling us to ministry and compassion- to hear the cries of those affected, and walk with all-victims, prisoners, parolees, law enforcement, and their families, welcoming and advocating and putting new lives together. It is challenging but God is calling us to something new.

We also voted to advocate adoption of comprehensive immigration reform legislation supporting an earned pathway to lawful permanent residency and eventual citizenship; to ensure humane and just enforcement of immigration laws; protect families from separation; provide resources and protections to refugees, U.S. citizens and migrant workers. To welcome and pray and educate about immigration. We must hold Scripture and the times together even when they challenge our views. God is calling.

We voted to undertake a five-year campaign, to increase this church’s capacity to renew and start new congregations, educate and develop leaders, bolster global mission efforts and expand the impact of relief and development work. Stepping forward boldly to reach more communities with the good news of Jesus Christ, training missionaries, pastors and lay leaders. Working to alleviate hunger and poverty. More money? More money? These are tough times. Life is already difficult. We cannot do more. Yes, we can.

If we say that the Word is a word for our lives, in faith we are called upon to trust Jesus to lead us in the midst of the unknown in all these times. And when in doubt to remember we are not the first or last to wonder about the future or even predict catastrophe but to persevere. Our new bishop said something else I think is helpful as we ponder how on earth we can be the church that lives into the places God is calling. She said that many people look for THE thing that is the FUTURE of the church. Many think the answer is youth.

Interestingly 1 in 8 voting delegates at the Assembly were under 25. Even more under 40. Good news! And initiatives we feel stretch us come in part from God’s voice in them. But Bishop Eaton said that while many believe youth are the future of the church they are not.

“Jesus Christ is the future of the church.” That's how much God loves us. Yes, this is the disrupting and beautiful and loving truth for us all. God in Christ loves us yet is leading and perfecting. May God continue to enable us to see our world and meaningfully respond. May we look to Jesus on the way to the cross, becoming ever more the people God intends as we reach farther into God’s future. May it be so!


note- Delmer Chilton had some fine words at Two Bubbas and a Bible, aka Lectionary Lab

Life Together-Community

This week I have been re-reading Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer in as I ponder the direction of the church post-CWA. In listening, one word I have heard talked about is "unity." Bonhoeffer's first chapter, entitled "Community" opens with the 1st verse of Psalm 133, which exclaims "Behold,how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell in unity!" Bonhoeffer observes that Christians take for granted the priviledge of living among other Christians, while Christ, in whose path we profess to follow, lived in the " midst of enemies." We live, Bonhoeffer asserts, as that people scattered of whom Zechariah speaks, among others who do not believe as we do, as seed of the Kingdom of God. We live as a people scattered who are held together "solely in Jesus Christ" in the already, but not yet time.
Yet, not all of us are blessed to be in fellowship- there are those who know the absence of this fellowship- the lonely, the sick, those who are persecuted around the world. These know most keenly the blessing they live without. They see the companionship of a fellow Christian,the face of Christ and the grace of moments we sometimes take for granted. Bonhoeffer indicts the rest of us for "trodding under foot" the gift we have each day. Sometimes our sense of entitlement blinds us to what is in our midst already.
What we have can be taken from us, this fellowship can be interrupted or disrupted. How do we respond to the notion that there are limitations? Do we chafe against these limitations as being a life that is insufficient to our desires? Can we live in the grace of a moment for its own sake? Can we live in the reality of relationships that are not all we seek? Do we live in the world at the foot of the cross or the world we prefer? Do we search for an ideal world, or Christ's reality?
Can we give thanks for the present without constantly searching for that better future we have so assuredly determined should be ours?
"If we do not give thanks for that daily Christian fellowship in which we have been placed, even where there is no great experience, no discoverable riches, but much weakness, small faith and difficulty; if on the contrary, we only keep complaining to God that everything is so paltry and petty, so far from what we expected, then we hinder God from letting our fellowship grow according to the measure and riches which are there for us all in Jesus Christ."
Bonhoeffer claims that "Christian brotherhood is not an ideal which we must realize; it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate."
It is because of this reality established by the cross that we enter community, not as demanders but as thankful recipients, as people who can go on living through sin and need under the blessing of grace- a divine gift even on the most distressing day. Even in the darkest hour of disillusionment, may we remember "neither of us can ever live by our own words and deeds, but only by that one Word and Deed that binds us- forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ who alone is our unity.
In all of the tensions and dissatisfactions, hurt feelings and misplaced perceptions, may we start by remembering not what separates us, but what we share in common in the eyes of Christ. May we each use this view not only to support ourselves in our own hurts, but first use this view to see the other.

Friday Five- He Didn't Die for Nothing

Rev HRod writes: As a child the designation "good" for today confused me. How could we call such a somber day, good? Holy, yes. Blessed, yes. But, good?

As an adult I understand the meaning of good for this day. It is a solemn day of remembrance but it is also a time for us to stop and recall the great gift of love that we received this day. And that is most certainly good.

Our worship today will differ from place to place. Some services will focus on the great litany of prayers. Others will use the seven last words of Jesus. Some of us will walk the stations of the cross. Others will participate in a Tennebrae service of shadows and light.

I hope that this Friday Five will be a meaningful part of your Good Friday. God's blessings to you on your journey.

Our prayer concerns are as varied as we are this day. For whom would you like us to pray?
For all in the world who are the "Blesseds" in the Beautitudes.

Are there things you have done or will do today to help the young ones understand this important day in our lives?
I am not sure I have done as much as I could. In truth, we struggle as adults to face this message. It is a challenge to impress upon kids that which makes us cringe. One small way is to take the palm from Palm Sunday and weave it into a cross- to show that this is the path Jesus took to save us.

Music plays an important part in sharing the story of this day. Is there a hymn or piece of music that you have found particularly meaningful to your celebrations of Good Friday?

"Ah Holy Jesus" "O Sacred Head Now Wounded" - the idea that I crucified thee- none of us can claim to be better than those who actually carried it out.

As you hear the passion narrative, is there a character that you particularly resonate with?

As a parent I wonder what Mary the mother of Jesus must have experienced. And wonder when she knew how it would be? So often we focus on the prominent figures in the story, but there in the shadows was Mary.

Where have you seen the gracious God of love at work lately?

In the faces of all of those who see Christ in others, particularly those who work to help the homeless, the mentally ill, and the oppressed, often in ways that go unnoticed by the mainstream. Like the church that hold a service under an underpass in California for the homeless and migrants who "live" there.
Today's video post by Jars of Clay says it- "You didn't die for nothing."
Blessed Holy Week and Easter to all. Pax Christe.

"I want it to be Easter or Spring or something"

I cannot change the weather, or the fact everyone is still passing around nasty illnesses. I cannot change the fact I want to be in my garden and can't, or the fact that I am tired of sweaters. I don't want to run the heat anymore- I want to open the windows. I want to fire up the grill not the soup pot.
I can start my seedlings and eagerly await their little green shoots in the starter tray ( I still get a smile when they first poke their heads up out of the potting mix ( this summer they will hopefully be tomatoes and peppers!) I can change my blog template to at least reflect that spring green is one of my favorite colors. Such a simple thing, like moving a chair to a different place in the room. But today - a new outlook! I am tired of the wind and more than a little dismayed that this will undoubtedly be the weather for the 6 AM Easter sunrise service in the cemetery at the country parish on top of the hill.

This past Sunday I practiced with the "Ladies ( and now 2 Guys) Who Sing" - the Easter music. They also practiced music for this Sunday. The song is cheerful, and in the third line the "Alleluias" start, and are pretty much throughout. For Passion Sunday- not so good. After a kind and patient discussion, it is agreed to change the "Alleluias" to " Hosannas." And everyone is pretty much OK, but the truth is- they really just want to get to Easter. If only we could just run by all of the cross and suffering stuff and get to the happy ending. After all, one person said, "Aren't we an Easter people?" And what difference does it make really?

It is a little ironic to me that as a culture we have become obsessed with death, real time news, HDTV graphics, and knowing everything we can about people's lives. But the one story we fear to face, the most important story, we would just as soon not. Luther's affinity for theology of the cross not withstanding, many of those who today worship in the church that bears his moniker would just like an extra helping of grace, thank you very much.

So I talked with the Ladies and 2 Guys and explained what this Sunday is about. Not just Hosanna and kids waving palms. Not just knowing who has what lines in the narrative reading. But that this Sunday we focus on the Passion, the selflessness, the suffering and ultimate love of God on the cross. Do we really want to sing "Alleluia" as a word of praise for the mocking, or the suffering or the humiliation, or the killing of Christ?

We can hear the endless drone of sad statistics about the dead in a senseless war, the dying who cannot get food or medical care or clean water, and we are numb to it. But ask us to imagine the nails, the thorns and the cross. Not so much.

This week I am reading The Crucified God by Jurgen Moltmann for my systematic theology class. Somehow, just in time. May we be brave enough to linger in the tension of Lent, and then as Easter people, be bold enough to proclaim the mission of the church to and for the oppressed, the afflicted and those who desperately need this Christ.