All Saints November 1 2020

All Saints November 1 2020

Revelation 7:9-17, Psalm 34:1-10, 22, 1 John 3:1-3, Matthew 5:1-12

Struggling, striving, to be one too. I love this day, I feel so connected to the cloud of witnesses, the communion of saints. Why do I feel All Saints so deeply? I don’t think it’s because I want to be a saint, or I think I have any degree of perfection. It’s because I want to be among those who follow Jesus, I want to be among those who stand up for love, and compassion, and mercy, and I know I cannot do that alone. I listen to these names, names of the long dead and names of the recently dead, and I wonder, do I measure up? Do I act justly when the time comes, am I merciful in judgment, can I be compassionate when I with those with whom I passionately disagree?

This cloud of witnesses helps me along, holds me up, keeps me accountable, makes me want to do better. Each one of these in this cloud of witnesses changed their particular piece of the world, not necessarily by doing fabulous, extravagant things, but by stepping into the space in which they were needed, when called. By stepping up to love. By using their voice and being brave. Not heroic, but faithful.

Do you have saints in your life? Not perfect people, people perfectly loved. There’s a piece by Linda Hogan, an indigenous writer, who is currently the Chickasaw Nation's Writer in Residence. And at All Saints time it lands on me with all sorts of sense and wonder. She has written, “Suddenly all my ancestors are behind me. ‘Be still’ they say. ‘Watch and listen. You are the result of the love of thousands.’” 

That empowers me, emboldens me to put one foot in front of the other, each day, and speak love into dark and lonely spaces, and there have definitely been some dark and lonely spaces in these past months. It feels like my voice joins all the voices before me, and together we sing a song of the saints of God. Because being a saint is not about being superhuman. It may be about having a super power though. The super power of love, the super power of the love of all those who have gone before us to show us the way, and those who will come after us to carry on.

I wonder about the saints we named today, and so many others whom we did not name. I wonder if they knew they were a saint, or if all they knew was God’s love for them and for others. I think they didn’t know they were saints. I think they were just like you and me. I think they took seriously the call to love God, and to love one another. I think they woke up in the morning, just like you and me, and asked God to help them carry Jesus’ light into all the dark places of their lives.

Who are the saints you know, and have known? Not perfect people. But people putting one foot in front of the other and stepping into the space of love and bringing the light of Jesus with them. I think a lot about my mom who died nearly six years ago now. My mom wasn’t perfect, she was as ornery as an Irish woman comes. There was always room at my mother’s table. Even if she didn’t like you, you got fed. She prepared meals at church, and put on quite a spread for funeral luncheons. And for years she was in charge of the Loaves and Fishes meal once a month. Mom would never consider herself any more than a person that said yes to pitching in and helping. She never thought of herself as brave or courageous, or particularly compassionate. But she stepped up when she heard the call, often it was the call on the telephone… we need you to….bring a hotdish, we need you to… be in be president of the women’s club…we need you.

I think what’s really true is that the phone call, or these days the email, is much louder than God’s still, small voice. And stepping into the space of love and compassion, responding to God’s call, is much more like providing a meal, or wearing a mask, or sticking with your pod, than it is about saving the world.

If we are indeed the result of the love of thousands, which I believe we are, then what is the task we bear today? It’s not about heroics, but definitely the super powers of love and compassion. We are the saints of God; we are the ones who give rise to the thousands who come after us. Our task today is to follow Jesus. Our call is to Love God, love others, show it. Getting up every morning, giving thanks for the day, putting one foot in front of the other, and shining the Christ light into all of the dark places, makes a difference. We are joined together, we are joined with the cloud of witnesses, and our witness matters, our actions matter. They lived not only in ages past; there are hundreds of thousands still; the world is bright with the joyous saints who love to do Jesus’ will. You can meet them in school, or in lanes, or at sea, in church, or in trains, or in shops, or at tea; for the saints of God are just folk like me, and I mean to be one too. 

Twenty-First Sunday after Pentecost, Yr A, Proper 25 Oct 25 2020

 

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Twenty-First Sunday after Pentecost, Yr A, Proper 25 Oct 25 2020

Deuteronomy 34:1-12, Psalm 90:1-6, 13-17, 1 Thessalonians 2:1-8, Matthew 22:34-46

Which commandment in the law is the greatest? You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, this is the greatest and first commandment, and the second, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

The Pharisees, who had heard that Jesus had bested the Sadducees, continued to try to entrap him. Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees is straight out of the Hebrew scripture, not a book like we know it today, but stories told around tables and hearths and campfires. Jesus knows those scriptures well; he had them on his heart, and in his soul. Those scriptures are part of the very fiber of his being, so much so that they are his flesh and blood. Those scriptures were what each Hebrew boy and girl heard and recited every day of their lives. And they also knew the story of creation, they knew the story of Noah, of Moses, of Exodus and Exile, of David, the Prophets, they knew the story about the angel passing over their homes when they put the blood of the lamb on their doorposts; they knew the stories of their ancestors. They even knew who was related to whom, the genealogy that opens the gospel of Matthew.

Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees was not a recitation of the law, the law that he knew well. Jesus’ answer was love, Jesus’ answer was to show forth a pattern of love, the activity of love. Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees was relationship. Love the Lord your God, and love your neighbor. 

Remember last week when I said that maybe what Jesus might be doing is inviting us to declare our allegiance. I suggested that perhaps the key question isn’t whose image is on the coin, but rather whose image is on us. We indeed are made in God's image and marked as God's own forever. It’s hard for us to know that, it’s hard for us to believe that, it’s hard for us to follow Jesus if we don’t know the story of love.

Knowing our story, knowing our bible, is knowing where we came from, knowing to whom we belong. Knowing this story helps us to identify our value and worth. Our story teaches us, shows us, tells us that we are created in God's image. And this story is ultimately important because being created in God’s image is where love is located. We see God’s love for us in the pattern of action that is our sacred story.

And that story is about creation and blessing, it is of being separated from God, and it is of repentance, reconciliation, and resurrection. In this story, God who is the creator of the universe, comes to be one of us, Jesus, and lives, loves, suffers and dies, and is raised from the dead. It is the story that calls us to love God with all our heart, and all our soul, and all our mind, and to love our neighbor as ourselves. It is about God’s relationship with us, God’s beloveds.

But from our point of view it's hard to see the wholeness of the story. We see only pieces, we catch glimpses. When we are engulfed in darkness it's very hard to trust that there is light. It’s hard to see anything at all. And it’s hard to love ourselves, much less our neighbor. But it is when we come out of suffering and sadness with hope and joy that we really can experience the love and the light, and the new life that God has for us. And we remember, we remember God's love for us and for all of creation. Sometimes, when we listen carefully, we can actually hear God’s love for us in the voices of the people whom we encounter, especially at times of deepest sorrow or quiet joy.

And yet, love in the bible really has very little to do with how we feel. Love in the first-century Mediterranean world was not a vague warm feeling toward someone, but a pattern of action - attachment to a person backed up with behavior, attachment to this man Jesus, who is willing to stand up to the power brokers of his day. The two commandments Jesus gives demand nothing less than heart, soul, and mind -- in other words, every part of a person capable of valuing something – and that those capacities be devoted to God and to every neighbor.

And there is no one exempt from the category of neighbor; the Parable of the Good Samaritan shows us that. So what we read today is a continuation of what we read last week. Last week we heard that everything comes from and belongs to God. Everything. This continuation of that reading demands nothing less than everything, heart, soul and mind. Jesus' call will compel each one of his followers to take the fullest extent of God's love to the furthest reach of that love, to every person whom God makes. As God has first loved us, we will love others.

As God has first loved us, we will love others. So then, why is there so much hate in our world? Why do people rise up against those whose ancestry, or skin color is different from their own? Why do we hurt one another? Why? I wonder if it is because we are filled with the fear of loss. People are afraid of losing themselves, or their history, or their tradition. People are afraid of losing their power, or their possessions. We are afraid that our world will never return to normal. We are afraid the wrong people will get elected. We are afraid. And fear usually ends up as hate. 

We forget, they forget, in whose image we are made. It is God’s image on that coin, it is God’s image on our hearts. We are made for love; we are made for relationship. We are made to love our neighbor.

And this is Jesus’ call to us and claim on us. Everything comes from God and belongs to God, and that demands a pattern of action, love God with everything you are, and love your neighbor; remembering that love is not how we feel, but a decision we make, a pattern of action. Love is a pattern of action. This is how we are to love our neighbors, and our neighbors are everyone, the outcasts and the sinners, you and me. Following Jesus, begin a Christian, is about a pattern of love, and no one is excluded from that love. That love, that relationship with God through Jesus is transforming love. And that love sends us out into the world to serve God and serve one another.

The original question the Pharisees ask Jesus is, which commandment in the law is the greatest? Jesus answers not with law, but with the pattern of action that is love. You shall love the lord your God with all your heart, and with all you soul, and with all your mind, and you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does indeed win.

Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost Yr A Proper 24 Oct 18 2020

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Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost Yr A Proper 24 Oct 18 2020

Exodus 33:12-23, Psalm 99, 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10, Matthew 22:15-22

Money, politics, and religion, the only missing ingredient for impolite conversation is sex. So why is it we're not supposed to talk about these things? Maybe because these things are felt to be too personal to discuss in public, and too divisive. People feel very strongly about these things and don't want to be told what to think. Unless, of course, you are in some churches, that tell you exactly what to think about just about everything. Maybe, if we talked more freely about money, sex, power, and religion, we’d have a better grasp on what Jesus calls us to. I'm not going to tell you what to think about any of these things, but scripture and our commitment to follow Jesus definitely informs us on these things, and today's reading from Matthew is all about these things, so, let’s talk.

Money, give to the emperor what is the emperors’.

Politics, everyone has to pay taxes.

Religion, give to God the things that are God's.

But as we well know, it's never easy, or clear, or straightforward. So what's really going on here? What is the kingdom of God like? 

What we have is actually one of the oldest tricks in the book. Entrapment. That’s what the Pharisees are about in this story, pure and simple. They know very well the Jewish law against creating images. We read all about that last week in Exodus. The Israelites took all the gold from their ears, their sons’ ears, and their daughters’ ears, melted it down and made an idol out of it. Not making and worshiping idols is the commandment second only to loving God. 

The Pharisees know what they ask of Jesus creates what we today call cognitive dissonance, the state of having inconsistent thoughts, beliefs, or attitudes, especially as relating to behavioral decisions and attitude change. it’s the slippery slope. We do it all the time. It’s about rationalizing our behavior, for good or for ill. Simply put, should I eat that doughnut because it is good, or should I eat that apple because I know it is good for me? I want the doughnut because I believe it will make me feel good, because I like it, because I deserve it, because it’s fun… But I eat the apple because I believe it’s good for me, because it tastes good, because I need the vitamins, because it will help me in the long run. 

But of course, what we are dealing with is much more complex than that. How we act has to do with the priorities we choose for our lives. You and I are followers of Jesus, we follow the way of love, and that guides us all of the time. We are very clear with Jesus’ commandment to love God and to love our neighbor, it’s how that gets worked out in our day to day lives that gets complicated. And how we act has to do with our baptismal promises to follow Jesus, and to seek and serve Christ in everyone we encounter.

The Pharisees are trying to entrap Jesus, if Jesus says we don’t pay taxes to the emperor he’s guilty of sedition, but if Jesus says we use these coins with an image on them to pay taxes to the emperor, he’s guilty of breaking the commandment. Caesar or God? This is not just a slippery slope; it is a no-win situation. But Jesus’ answer to the Pharisees' question, as is his answer each time they ask him questions about wealth is really simple. Jesus’ answer is it’s all God’s. It’s all God’s. There is no hierarchy, there is no priority list, and there are no top ten things that belong to God. The question is pointless. It is all God’s. You see, there is nothing that belongs to the emperor. We live in this world as God's beloved, we are God's image, we do not live in the image that the world will make us.

So what Jesus is doing here is showing that wealth is not ours. All wealth comes from God. And wealth includes so much more than money. There are some ramifications of this for us today. All wealth comes from God, and we live in a land in which order is kept by a mutual agreement that everyone shares in the responsibility of government and infrastructure and protection. At least that is the social contract I believe we make as citizens of this country. Therefore, we pay our share and it’s called taxes. But all we have still comes from God. 

Jesus is inviting us to declare our allegiance. Perhaps the key question in this passage isn’t, after all, whose image is on the coin, but rather whose image is on us. We indeed are made in God's image and marked as God's own forever. And that’s what always seems to get lost in conversations about money and politics. For while we may feel strongly about our political loyalties, before we are Democrat, Republican, or Independent, we are God's beloveds, and we are called to love God and love our neighbor. Jesus calls us to feed hungry people, and to liberate captives. 

And while we may be confident that how we spend our money is our business and no one else’s, yet if we forget in whose image we have been made we may succumb to the temptation to believe that we are no more than the sum total of our possessions and that our bank accounts tell a true story about our worth and value.

So, there are no easy answers here. There are elements of our lives that are, indeed, part of the world order and should be “rendered to Caesar.” But our deepest self belongs to God, and if we remember that, all of life takes on greater focus and meaning. And our identity as God's beloveds, will, in turn, shape our behavior, and our decisions, urging and aiding us to be the persons we have been called to be.

And I hope this is not a burden, but rather an empowering reminder of your identity as a child of God, something no amount of spending or saving could change. Maybe it will help to actively reflect on how your faith shapes your daily life and particularly your economic life. God wants more from us, in the end, than polite conversation. God wants for us abundant life. God wants us to know that we are enough. Because while Benjamin Franklin may have once said that death and taxes are the only two certainties of this life, our lives declare that the one who was raised from death shows us that God’s love is more certain than anything else.

Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Yr A, Proper 23, Oct 11 2020

Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost, Yr A, Proper 23, Oct 11 2020

Exodus 32:1-14, Psalm 106:1-6, 19-23, Philippians 4:1-9, Matthew 22:1-14

In the gospel of Matthew we have been reading the stories of Jesus' journey to Jerusalem, Jesus' final entry into Jerusalem, and Jesus working incredibly hard to teach the disciples everything that he thinks is essential for them to know when he is gone. Jesus seems to be tired and impatient as he finishes this task of imparting knowledge in the form of parables. And, the parables we have been hearing from Matthew have been terribly troublesome. 

In this parable, as with the one we preached last week, we are catching a glimpse of the low point in an intense family feud. I want to emphasize the word “family” here because Matthew and his community are caught up in a struggle with their Israelite kin about how to be faithful to the God of Abraham and Sarah and, in particular, whether Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah Israel’s prophets had promised. This is not a Jewish-Christian dispute – though in the centuries that follow Christians will use this passage to further their anti-Semitism (which is one of the things that makes this passage dangerous) – but rather it represents the pain of a community sundered from its family and trying to figure itself out.

So, maybe this parable really asks the question, what happens when people we love, our brothers and sisters, our friends and family, believe differently than we do, or disagree with us, or do not believe at all? We all come from families or friendship groups just like this, and especially right now, in these days, we have much disagreement.

What does the kingdom of God look like in this case? Matthew answers this intra-family dispute by telling a story about a king who resolves this difficult matter in a very dark and violent way. We have seen in our own culture, and in the diverse cultures and religions of the 21st century, we have seen the same kind of violence in disagreement. If you believe differently than we do, we have every right to capture you and kill you, which is the extreme, a bit less extreme but as violent, is that we have the right to condemn you and hate you.

For those who follow Jesus, that is not the answer. The answer is that in the kingdom of God there is love enough for all of the characters in this story.

Weddings these days are fascinating. In the last few years I have attended weddings as a family member, as mother of the groom, and I have been the presider at a few. Weddings are varied, they can be in the church, at the lake or in the park. And, we've witnessed amazingly varied wedding wear on the diverse people that have been gathered for these weddings. The most interesting wedding wear was at the wedding of my nephew the actor who lived in New York, there were many New Yorkers there, young like him, 30ish, very well tattooed and pierced. The wedding attire ran the gamut from amazingly dressy to jeans and t-shirts, there didn’t seem to be any expectation of any particular appropriate dress.

And in my life, an invitation to a party is an exciting thing. Part of the fun of a party is the expectation, the anticipation. Part of the fun of a party is being included, belonging.

Unlike the response of the people in our story from Matthew today, who made light of the invitation, and even killed the messengers who delivered the invitation. 

The king may have shrugged and said, well then, if the chosen are not interested in the wedding celebration, then go and invite any one you want, they went to the outer reaches of the kingdom, they went to the margins, and those who eventually came to the celebration were honored to be there. The God of abundance has made a great offer, come to the feast. The God of abundance has set the table and has prepared a wonderful banquet.

The thing about an invitation is that we can choose to come, or not. The thing about this relationship with God is that we can choose to be in it or not, we are never compelled. As all these people arrived, people from all over the kingdom, people who were honored to be there; the ones who were tattooed and pierced, the ones who were curious and doubtful, the ones who were questionable and the ones who were upstanding, the ones who loved and hated, but all people who respected the king and the occasion for which they gathered, these people received a wedding garment, a robe. The people gathered for this wedding banquet mostly were the people gathered from the margins, they were the people who responded yes to the great offer made to them. The wedding garment was provided for them, and they put on the wedding garment with honor and respect to the King.  

Except the one in our story. He won’t put on the wedding garment. Not putting on the wedding garment is the very same thing as saying no to this relationship into which he was being invited. So in this case, the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, is of his own choosing. Putting on the wedding garment, putting on the robe, reveals a willingness to respond to the abundant banquet that is available to us now, and available to us at the fulfillment of time. When I reread this story, I was reminded of the garment each of us puts on at baptism, figuratively and literally. The baptismal garment re-presents to us that new creation we become when Jesus calls us over the tumult of our life’s wild restless sea, day by day his clear voice sounds, saying “Christian, follow me.” We are dressed as one ready, ready to follow, ready to be a voice in the cacophony, ready to dive into the relationship that is offered to us by the one who prepares the banquet of abundance, the one whose heart's desire is to be in relationship with us. 

When we put on the wedding garment, or the baptismal garment, it does not signify that we are finished, that we have arrived, or that we are perfected or done, because we are only beginning. We are saying yes to the abundant and amazing love that waits for us. We are saying yes to the journey of life and yes to the knowledge that the journey is not by ourselves, but with the one who creates us, the one who reconciles us, the one who revives us. Life is not a journey that should be taken by oneself; it is a hard and treacherous journey, as well as a joyful and exciting journey. It is a journey of love and forgiveness; it is a journey of grace and mercy. And it is a journey that our creator God desperately wants to accompany us on.

So much so, that God came into this time and space, to be just like you, just like me, with all the joys and hopes, all the pain and the suffering, that human life has to offer. And so much love, that Jesus was willing to put himself in our place, to offer himself to suffering and death, so that you and I are not condemned to pain and sadness and tragedy for ever. This abundant banquet is there for the taking. Nothing is held over our heads, no strings attached. The love that provides the banquet flows in and through and among us, and we have the opportunity to respond. We have the opportunity to pay that love forward. We have the opportunity to show forth the love that has been offered to us, and to be people of love and forgiveness ourselves. The response to this abundance that God offers to us through God’s son Jesus, is to offer that same love and forgiveness to others. It is not to hoard; it is not to keep to ourselves. It is to offer ourselves, as Jesus offers his life to us, we offer this love to others.

The hard part is that Jesus offers this love to everyone, sinners included. Thank God for that, because that means you and I have a place in this amazing kingdom too. But that was the sticking point for the gospel writer Matthew when Matthew first heard this story and then interpreted it in his own way. And equally exciting is the abundant banquet that is in store for us at the fulfillment of time. We get a foretaste of that banquet in the bread and the wine that we share together. We get glimpses of grace, and those glimpses are powerful.

So one of those glimpses of grace is that everyone is included. You and I are included, the liar and the cheat are included, the tax collector and the sinner are included. I think what is hard for us is that we come to believe that abundance is the reward for right behavior, so that those whose behavior is not up to a particular standard can’t be part of the banquet. But that’s not the way it works. It’s the invitation that changes us. It’s the abundance that transforms us. It’s the anticipation and the expectation of seeing our friends and our loved ones that causes us great joy.

Once we put on that wedding garment, or that baptismal garment, we are not the same. We are made new, God’s love, God’s power, God’s abundance changes us. We can love others; we can forgive others. We no longer live for ourselves, or for greed, or for power. We move toward compassion, mercy, justice, kindness, and the kingdom of God comes near.

Thanks be to God.

Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost Yr A Proper 22 October 4 2020

 

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Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost Yr A Proper 22 October 4 2020

Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20, Psalm 19, Philippians 3:4b-14, Matthew 21:33-46

This is not a pretty parable. Matthew is talking mighty tough. A landlord purchases land, makes some improvements, and then leaves. After an undetermined amount of time, he sends his representatives to collect what is owed him. Instead of the tenants handing over what is owed, they beat and kill the landlord’s representative, not just one, but two, and then they kill his son. How can this parable even begin to reveal the kingdom of God?

This absent landlord, who knows how long he’s been away, finally sends in some of his people to check on the place. Maybe the tenants thought he’d permanently gone away, maybe they thought he’d just never return; maybe they thought he was dead. You’d think that after the first murder, the landlord would quit. Well, that landlord is just crazy. And, what’s even crazier is this landlord sending his own son, after all this violence, as if something about that is going to change. As if people who have been beating and killing are just going to stop being violent because they just decided they don’t want to do that anymore.

Crazy indeed, crazy love. It’s not just crazy; it’s crazy love. The kind of love that brooks no reason, that will listen to no counter argument, and that will never, ever give up, risking even violence, rejection, and death in order to testify to God’s commitment to these tenants…and to us.

It sounds to me a lot like us, as tenants I mean. Such violence, such injustice, such foolishness. And yet God’s crazy love for us never, ever, ends. Makes me want to cry really, and I believe God weeps every time we, God’s children, turn to violence to solve our problems or to exert power. How can we go on being so violent, when we have a God whose love for us, for all creation is so amazing, so abundant. How can God continue to love us, when we keep on falling down, when we keep on blaming, mistreating, and hurting one another?

Because we really are just like these tenants. The tenants carry on the work of the vineyard in the landowner’s absence. It’s not fair is it? To do all the work and the landowner gets all the profits. The tenants are entitled to a piece of the pie, the tenants are entitled to some of the profit, so in some twisted way the tenants decide justice would be served by killing the messengers, even the landowner’s son to get the inheritance. This parable highlights our own human sense of justice and righteousness and even entitlement. We are the tenants. But in this parable, that is not the landowner’s, God’s, sense of justice and righteousness.

We hear this story all the time. About how unfair this life is. It’s that transaction with God again. If you work hard, and do everything right, your reward should be wealth and happiness and blessings from God, we think that’s what’s fair. But that’s not the truth. The truth is that many of us work hard, and still, pain, and suffering, and tragedy is present in our lives. But we are not entitled to success, or happiness, or even blessedness. We sometimes even talk about what we deserve or don’t deserve. We work hard, we deserve a good life, we deserve recognition. We deserve a life free from pain, free from heartache. But that’s not the way God works, it’s not the way scripture shows us and it’s not the way our lives show us. We experience pain and heartache, and we experience happiness and fullness of life.

Maybe Matthew tells this kind of a violent story because we cannot hear, truly hear, the stories that show us God’s compassion, God’s mercy and justice. Maybe Matthew tells this kind of a violent story because Matthew knows we are a violent people. But you know what? I don’t want to be that way. I don’t want us to be a people who don’t pay attention to God, to Spirit, to Love. I don’t want us to be an entitled people, an exceptional people. I don’t want us to be a violent people. I don’t want us to go on and on watching people getting killed, and to accept that as normal. I don’t want to see it anymore.

I want us to be a compassionate people. A merciful people. A just people. I want us to be people who love one another and care for each other, whether or not someone deserves love and care. I want us to follow Jesus, the one who shows us how love, the one who shows us how forgiveness and healing work. The one who gave everything, so that we may have life. So that we may have life, not wealth, not happiness, but life.

So how do we do that? How do we be a community of compassion, and of mercy, and of justice? Do not be afraid. Indeed, it is fear that gives rise to violence. Fear of the ones who are different from us, fear of losing what we have, fear of losing our loved ones and fear of losing our very lives.

You see, we are all broken, and it is that very brokenness that makes us compassionate, or hateful. 

There’s a story in Bryan Stevenson’s book, Just Mercy, that I want to tell you about. In the book are many stories of incarceration, and many times I cried as I listened to the stories of people whose lives have turned for the worst, and yet who continue to have faith, hope, and compassion. This story in particular though illustrates our brokenness, and the compassion or hatefulness that results.

Bryan Stevenson tells the reader about a guard at the prison where he is visiting a client. The client, Avery, is there because after a life of foster care filled with emotional and sexual abuse, he hears the demons in his head and that results in stabbing a man and killing him. Mr. Stevenson regularly visits the prison as the legal counsel, he reports to the warden and then is signed in, all according to the proper procedure. The first time Mr. Stevenson encounters this particular prison guard, he is questioned extensively, bullied, and then subjected to a strip search, all against the law. Mr. Stevenson had seen a truck in the parking lot, a truck with confederate flag stickers plastered all over it. The prison guard makes sure Mr. Stevenson knows that is his truck. Mr. Stevenson listens to Avery, but the only thing Avery wants is a chocolate milk shake. Each time Mr. Stevenson sees Avery in prison, Avery asks for a chocolate milk shake, and Mr. Stevenson replies that he cannot get a milk shake into the prison. After many visits and much work, a court date is set for an appeal of Avery’s conviction, with the evidence of Avery’s upbringing in the foster care system. That same prison guard is the one who brings Avery to court each time, and he listened to the proceedings. When Mr. Stevenson encounters that guard again at the prison, he approaches with trepidation, but the guard is a changed man. He tells Mr. Stevenson of his own abuse in the foster care system. He says he thought he was the only one who had been treated that way, and realized Avery was treated even more poorly and violently than he. The guard learned compassion as he looked into the eyes of the one he had judged a loser. He learned to respect the Bryan Stevenson, the lawyer who was helping so many on death row. He even stopped at a Wendy’s on the way back to the prison after court one day, to buy Avery a chocolate milk shake.

We are all broken by something. We have all hurt someone and have been hurt. And we are witnessing over and over again in these days the reality of our brokenness. But it is in that place of our brokenness, that makes us compassionate or hateful. Our brokenness is the source of our common humanity. We have a choice, to be compassionate or to be hateful. Embracing our brokenness leads to mercy. Jesus comes into that place of brokenness and says, let go of the hate, let go of the bitterness. Do not take revenge or retribution. Instead, know that we are all in this together, you have been dealt a life that is yours, filled with good fortune or bad, filled with love or abuse. You are capable of extreme compassion, you are capable of forgiveness.

Jesus’ love is the love that is unreasonable, it is the love that will never, ever give up, risking the violence showered upon him, the rejection of his friends, and death on a cross. And on that cross, Jesus loved, saying, forgive them, they don’t know what they are doing.

We know that love takes a decision. We know that compassion means doing something. Look into the eyes of the ones you are afraid of and be transformed. And then, get to work. Work to relieve the suffering and pain of another, and your problems will begin to feel small. Work to change laws that are unjust, systems that continue to oppress, work so that our community is compassionate. And bring a chocolate milk shake to someone this week. Amen.

Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost Yr A Proper 20 September 20 2020

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Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost Yr A Proper 20 September 20 2020

Exodus 16:2-15, Psalm 105:1-6, 37-45, Philippians 1:21-30, Matthew 20:1-16

So your teenager walks into the house after school, or in the olden days, after football practice, or band rehearsal, or just takes a break from homework, or even about an hour after dinner, and looks through the cupboards, opens the refrigerator door, and says, "Mom! There's nothin to eat."

I love this story. We are all just like the Israelites in this part of the Exodus. Whining, whining, whining, "God, we have nothing to eat, and what’s more, we don't like what you’ve given us to eat." I do think that if I were wandering in the wilderness with Moses and Aaron for 40 years, I might be a little whinny too. “God, we’re tired, we’re hungry, we may as well have stayed in Egypt for all this gets us.” And they are reminded that in Egypt they were slaves, at least in the desert they are free.

This is a great story. In the verses that follow these we just heard, God instructs them to gather up what they need for themselves and their families. Each family gets just what they need, no more, no less. Then Moses instructs them not to save any of it, don’t leave any until morning he tells them. Well, some didn’t listen to Moses, and hoarded the food that God had provided for them, they put it in their pockets and their backpacks, and it got wormy and smelled bad. So not only do they not seem to want or like what God provides for them, they go ahead and eat it anyway, and then save some up for later, only for it to go bad on them. Lord, lord, lord, give us something to eat, give us something better to eat, we don’t like what you’ve given us, but even though we don’t like it we’ll save it for later and risk losing what is right here in front of us.

God provides, God provides enough. Even when it doesn’t look good. It’s all God’s anyway. Matthew’s gospel is paired with this story from Exodus and it carries the theme even farther. Matthew’s story always seems so topsy-turvy, so inside-out. The day laborers that show up at the end of the day get paid the same as those who showed up early to work, and work or no work, everyone gets paid the same. What is God’s kingdom like? God’s kingdom is not business as usual. Remember, kingdom parables serve to show us that God is doing this absolutely new thing, there is no business as usual. In this kingdom everything is re-ordered. It’s not even as simple as the last will be first, and the first shall be last. God coming into our midst, living, loving, suffering, dying, and being raised from the dead creates life in a way it has never been before.

So this kingdom parable doesn’t sit well with those who heard it centuries ago, and it doesn’t sit well with people who hear it today, because we are trained to believe there is a reward. The simplest statement of that is if we live a good life, we’ll get our reward in heaven. This parable refutes that conventional wisdom. Our wages are paid at the baptismal font, not at the grave. The new life that God has affected is available from the beginning. We live our whole lives loved by God, the delight of God’s life.

Following Jesus is not about earning our wage or getting our reward in heaven. Following Jesus is about responding to God’s amazing and abundant love, about being bathed in God’s grace, right here, right now. Following Jesus is about the fruits of our baptism; following Jesus is about responding to the joys and challenges of our lives in ways that show forth the grace that God has given us. Following Jesus is not easy nor is it clear, it is not about finding Jesus, it’s about being found by God’s love. Following Jesus is about grace and forgiveness, the grace and forgiveness that God offers us, and the grace and forgiveness that we offer one another as we love our neighbors as ourselves.

So when did we get so greedy? When did we begin to hoard what we have? These stories we hear today remind us or maybe even teach us that we’ve got all we need, and there’s enough for everyone. Let me repeat that, we’ve got all we need, and there’s enough for everyone. 

One of the seminal stories about who we are and to whom we are related is the story of Moses and the Israelites wandering in the wilderness. Moses relayed the ten commandments to the Hebrews as they wandered. Moses said to the people, “God spoke all these words: I am God, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of a life of slavery. No other gods, only me.” No other gods, only me, the Hebrew people, like us, had so much trouble accepting God’s gift of enough. 

God asks us for our undivided attention, and God gives us all we need. Those wandering in the wilderness have so much trouble accepting God’s gift of enough, and instead made their own god out of the gold they had found. They got greedy. We get greedy, and we are encouraged in our greediness by a culture that constantly encourages us to buy more, and bigger, regardless of our ability to do so, regardless of need. Now, as much as the Hebrew people needed to hear “no other gods, only me,” and as much as the Jews of the first century needed to hear the inbreaking of God’s kingdom re-orders all that they knew to be true, we, in the 21st century need to hear this message that we are sought and we are found, that God loves us abundantly and claims us. Our wages are paid at the baptismal font, we are new creations.

This is good news indeed. Good news in a world that needs good news. Good news that this life isn’t just about you, but it is about how you, and me, and every one of us is loved, regardless of wealth, social status, color of skin, ability, or so many other categories we place people into. And it is about how you in turn love one another. It is about how you are the delight of God’s life, and about how you pay that forward. 

This is good news indeed. Good news in the midst of what feels like chaos. Good news in the midst of death. God’s gift of enough. And, we are called to be a part of systems in which God’s gift of grace, God’s gift of mercy and compassion, is evident to all God’s beloveds. It is about how God transforms the world with the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, and how God continues to transform us and the world as each of us goes out into the world to do the work we are called to do, to love and serve God as faithful witnesses of Christ our Lord. Amen

 

Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost Yr A Proper 19 Sept 13 2020

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Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost Yr A Proper 19 Sept 13 2020

Exodus 14:19-31, Psalm 114, Romans 14:1-12, Matthew 18:21-35

Today we have the second installment of Matthew's gospel on forgiveness. Last week I said to you that forgiveness is about the heart, and not forgiving will kill you from the inside out. Forgiveness changes us. Forgiveness covers us with it's grace. Forgiveness can even rewrite the narrative of our lives. And, just as importantly, we are forgiven. In all of our impetuous imperfection, in all of our risky races, in all of our messy murkiness, we continue to be the delight of God's life, we continue to be loved perfectly, and forgiven abundantly. God continues to come to us in love, God comes to us in the unreasonable incarnation, God comes to us in Jesus, in the bread, in the wine, in each other, and God says to us, there is nothing, absolutely nothing you can do that will separate me from you. God says, I forgive you now, and I will forgive you forever. 

How many times should I forgive my sibling in Christ who sins against me? As many as seven times? Jesus says, as many as seventy-seven times. Really? Seventy-seven times? Hyperbole? Exaggeration? Or truth? Forgiveness is to be given without limit—an abundance of forgiveness. The gospel writer Matthew uses the "perfect" number 7 in this story, which represents fullness and spiritual perfection. So how many times is enough?

Not enough or just enough or even good enough is not the measure here. Forgiveness is the attitude, the posture, that a follower of Jesus takes in all relationship. There are books written on forgiveness. There's "forgiveness Friday" on Facebook. Why does forgiveness remain so hard for us? We look at forgiveness as a transaction, if I forgive you, you will change, you will show remorse, you will stop doing that dastardly thing that you do. Or, we cannot forgive, because the thing that was done was heinous, and the doer a monster. But the forgiveness that is shown to us in this passage is none of that. It is the kind of forgiveness that is not a transaction, it is not a single act, but a matter of constant practice. Which proves that forgiving and forgetting is a lie, you never forget, but you can forgive.

Sometimes, often in fact, forgiveness does not happen once and for all. That is one reason why forgiveness is so hard. Sometimes, the hurt and the pain are so big, and so deep, and maybe even so horrible, that forgiveness needs to happen daily, maybe even more often, it indeed becomes a constant practice. We see and hear when violence has been inflicted on someone, that the loved ones look for revenge, for retribution even. We ask how can there be forgiveness when the wrong is so horrible? We ask is there a time when forgiveness cannot or should not happen? But without forgiveness the heart hardens, the soul withers, and death occurs from the inside out. Forgiveness is a constant practice, and sometimes forgiveness takes a lifetime.

Forgiveness wraps us in grace, and in love. Forgiveness does not take away hurt or anger, but forgiveness keeps the heart supple, so that it does not wither and die. We can forgive, because we have been forgiven. To be human is to miss the mark, to be human is to hurt and be hurt, to be human is to be broken, to fragment. We are created as these wonderful, beautiful, brutal, passionate beings. Our very beings long for joy, for meaning, for excitement, for wonder, for speed, and for peace and quiet. But life breaks us. We seek after so much that is good for us, and that which is harmful to us. In our seeking, we often hurt ourselves and others. 

But Jesus heals us. The pieces of our lives are put back together again, our lives will look and feel different, but we will be whole. That is forgiveness, forgiveness that brings healing, forgiveness that breaks our hearts. You see, when our hearts break, and then our hearts are healed, that leaves scars. And it is those scars that help us to forgive. It is those scars that give us the grace to see the beauty and the brutality in ourselves, in those we love, and those we cannot love, yet. It is those scars that create the space in our hearts and our lives and give us the capacity to forgive. 

That is what's in Matthew today. Forgiveness happened, forgiveness of a debt, a debt that kept this man a slave, a debt that held his life in peril. That debt was forgiven. That man was graced by forgiveness. And yet he did not let that forgiveness permeate his being, he did not let that forgiveness transform him, he did not pay that love and healing forward.

We have been forgiven, so we may also forgive. And this is the depth of what Matthew shows us in these passages. Forgiveness is to be our posture in the world. So sometimes we find it incredibly difficult to forgive, and sometimes we find it incredibly difficult to accept forgiveness. When you have done wrong, when you have hurt, when you have dealt harshly with the ones you love, and you are offered the grace of forgiveness, how do you accept that? Do you think to yourself, I am not worthy. Do you think to yourself, I don't deserve such grace. The effect is the same as not forgiving. When you can't or don't or won't accept forgiveness your heart hardens, there is no space for love. Accepting forgiveness, accepting you are forgiven, accepting grace, opens your heart and your life to the possibility of transformation, the reality of resurrection. Accepting forgiveness profoundly changes the way we are in relationship with one another. 

"I'm sorry" - "no problem." "I forgive you" - "oh nothing to forgive" are just words without meaning. "I'll never forgive you for what you did to me" or "I can never be forgiven for what I did to you" are words carried on weapons of destruction. As a culture we seem to either use the platitudes or be at the other extreme where there is no forgiveness possible. But what if instead, we practice forgiveness constantly, what if we carry ourselves with a posture of forgiveness. Forgiveness that conveys grace, forgiveness that heals. God's forgiveness, puts us back together again, binds us and makes us whole and mends our wounds but leaves us scarred. God's forgiveness gives us compassion. God's forgiveness offers us hope. 

I forgive you - you are forgiven is the reality in which God's relationship with us abides, and our relationship with others must live. Forgive them, they do not know what they do, are the words we hear from the cross. Forgive them, forgive us, forgive me, Jesus, fill us with your grace so that love overflows. Amen.