Trinity Sunday Yr B May 30th 2021

Trinity Sunday Yr B May 30^th 2021

Isaiah 6:1-8, Romans 8:12-17, John 3:1-17, Psalm 29

 

We find ourselves at the time of our church year and our common life for that matter, when it seems like we are completing one thing and embarking upon another. The Sundays of Easter have come to a conclusion, we have celebrated the Day of Pentecost, although we call these days the Days after Pentecost, and we alight for just a moment on this, Trinity Sunday, our feast day, before we come to rest in the ordinary days.

 

That all sounds so linear, like we can finish up one thing and then begin the next. But you all know that I am not a linear thinker, and therefore in my mind, seasons have a tendency to overlap, or to extend, or to be hurried, but never to happily move in a straight line. That presents a bit of a challenge for me, a challenge to be fully present to the now. It’s good to look back and see where I’ve been, and to look forward to see what may be off on the horizon, but to let the anxiety of the past and the future be the present reality, robs the present of it’s grace. And this time around, that seems even harder. We’ve been through so much, and sometimes just want to get over with it all and get back to normal. 

 

But if we don’t pay attention in this moment, we’ll miss incarnation, and we’ll miss resurrection. In other words, being fully present to now, puts us in a position to see, hear, feel, God in our midst, the reality and the truth of God in you and me and in all of creation. Being fully present helps us to experience the wideness, the boldness, the tenderness, the compassion, of God. It is to be able to listen to God, and to subject ourselves to God’s authority. If our lives are a narrative, a story that we write with God, then God’s authority is as author, creator, maker. 

 

I do believe being fully present is a good way to experience this thing we call Trinity. The three in One, the One in three. Because Trinity is much more like a dance than a doctrine. Imagine, the God of the universe who creates, who authors, who makes, all that is, seen and unseen, who is love, exuberantly spilling over into what we call son and spirit. God being with creation, in the midst of creation, continuing to create, loving, healing, reconciling, speaking, writing the story. So how do we talk about Trinity?

 

Here is an example. I really love being a mother. And motherhood has changed for me these days. My children have grown up and are having their own children. I continue to love to watch Tom and Willie grow and deepen. Deepen in character, faith, expression and relationship. As their mother my heart breaks when they are in pain, and my heart soars when joy finds them. As their mother, I try to prepare them and support them both in their successes and their mistakes. My greatest hope is that they will grow into the full stature of Christ. And now being a mother has made me a grandmother. 

 

Even though my mom and dad have both been gone for years now, I’ll always be a daughter, and I’ll always miss my mom and dad. I’ll always hope that they would be happy for me. 

 

And then there’s being me. A woman who is creative, passionate, stubborn, compassionate, controlling, a woman who has good judgment sometimes not so good judgment once in a while, a priest, and now a widow. 

 

All of these, mother, daughter, widow, are always in relationship. Nothing I do, or think, or am, can be separated from the rest. I bring to this present moment all that I am, all that I have been, and all that I am becoming. It is the story that I write with God while responding to the joys and challenges life presents.

 

If that’s not Trinity, I don’t know what is. Trinity is at its essence relationship. It is relationship among what is, what was, and what shall be. It is relationship among creator, created, and community. Trinity is lover, beloved, and new creation.

 

I remember so very clearly the Sunday night youth group that the priest came to, to explain to us teenagers everything we ever wanted or didn’t want to know about the Trinity. I remember nothing else about that night, except that I left as confused as I had come.

 

Today I know that that is because understanding Trinity isn’t an exercise of the intellect. Nor is Trinity to be described adequately by our language, because Trinity does not dwell in the world of language. I think efforts to construct Trinity are woefully inadequate. Even the Nicene creed that we all recite by memory each week, which was compiled by men who tried desperately to describe what Trinity is not, is only a glimpse of what may be true. Because the real truth of Trinity lives in that part of us that is intuitive and relational. Trinity exists in the part of our humanity that yearns to be in relationship, that yearns to dance.

 

Theologians have written tomes about Trinity, I write only this. Trinity is the truth we find in the God who loves us so much to come into our lives as one of us, to be forever among us and forever before us. Trinity is the way in which our lives are lived in relationship, relationship that makes real the body of Christ. And Trinity is the life that is made absolutely new through our creator God.

 

Sharon Grover’s favorite hymns goes like this. “I bind unto myself today, the strong name of the trinity, by invocation of the same, the three in one and one in three. I bind this day to me forever, by power of faith, Christ’s incarnation…. I bind unto myself the power of the great love of cherubim…..I bind unto myself today the virtues of the starlit heaven… I bind unto myself today the power of God to hold and lead.” We call upon the authority of the one who is creator, the one who created, and the one who gives new life.

 

We must bind ourselves to the strong name of the Trinity. We must bind ourselves each and every day to the chance for new life given to us and written for us by our Creator. I wonder what Trinity means for us, at Trinity? What is the new story that is being written as we come out of this extraordinary time? 

 

We must bind ourselves to the strong name of the Trinity, to the authority that creates us, redeems us, and makes us new creations. We must be fully present to Trinity, to the relationship that enfolds us, empowers us, gives us new life, and calls us from darkness to light, brokenness to wholeness.

 

In the name of the one who is creator, who is redeemer, and who is sustainer of all life, in the name of the one who is father, son and spirit, in the name of the one who is mother, daughter and compassion, in the name of the one who is Earth-maker, Pain-bearer, Life-giver may we be present to the power that protects us, guides us, and gives us new life.

 

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, one God: Come let us adore him. 

Day of Pentecost Yr B May 23 2021

Day of Pentecost Yr B May 23 2021

Ezekiel 37:1-14, Acts 2:1-21, John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15, Psalm 104:25-35, 37

 

It is so good to be together isn’t it. After all our isolation and so much loneliness of this past year, here we are together. Here we are, this particular group of Jesus followers, in this beautiful garden, gathering in the presence of the Spirit. And as we listen to the word, sing spirit songs, and revel in this togetherness, I want you to wonder about the Presence of the Spirit not only on this day of Pentecost, but also in this season as we move into ordinary time. And I want you to wonder about what the Spirit is doing. 

 

So first of all some things we need to know. In the gospel of John, Jesus promises the disciples and us that the Spirit will accompany us. Advocate, Comforter, Intercessor, Companion, Guide, Teacher, Helper, are all translations of the word Paraclete in Acts and in John. I understand the Spirit in all these ways and as the one who walks alongside of us and breathes the breath of God into us. The image in Ezekiel is powerful, in verse 4 and 5 we hear Ezekiel prophesy to the dry bones and say, “I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live!” This breath causes new life for the dry bones of Israel. This breath causes new life for what was dead.

 

The breath of the Spirit reaches all the way to creation, where in Genesis chapter 2 the Lord God formed humans from the dust of the ground and breathed into the human’s nostrils the breath of life, and they became a living being. We hear the reverse of that in the Psalm today, in verse 30, when you turn your face from God, your breath ceases, and you return to the dust. The Spirit shows up like a violent wind in Acts, calling the followers of Jesus together into community, and it reaches all the way to the promise Jesus makes to the disciples and to us, that we will not be left alone, that the Advocate comes to accompany us on the way of Love. 

 

In Acts, the Spirit gathers the community from far and wide for the Jewish harvest festival called Pentecost. The people gathered were people who had been dispersed, who had been isolated and alienated, who had returned to town for the festival, and God breaks into this moment. The Holy Spirit saturates the gathered community, not to recapture whatever they had done before, but to gather the community and to launch what becomes the church in a whole new direction. 

 

And the good news in John is that the disciples are not left alone, we are not left alone. This is Jesus’ promise. The one who walks by our side, accompanies us, guides us, helps us, holds us, is here and breathes new life into our weary and broken bones. The one who protects us and guards us, is here with us and is the breeze we feel on our cheeks. The one who reconfigures the desert with a violent wind is here reshaping us and our church into something new, something unrecognizable. Rumi, the 13th-century Persian poet, says “stay in the spiritual fire, let it cook you.” Let it cook you, let it change you, let it bring new life to you.

 

We gather here on this day, for the first time we can actually look at each other. What is the Spirit doing? I wonder if we can we take our lead from Acts? Rather than recapturing what we have always done, what has always happened, can we let the Holy Spirit gather us and launch us in a new direction. What would that look like? What are the ways the Holy Spirit brings new life? What are the ways the dust of our isolation is regathered and animated in new ways? How do our bones come together with new sinews and new flesh? 

(solicit answers to these questions) Limitless possibility and dreaming.

 

What do you think the Spirit doing?

 

On this, the day of Pentecost, the birthday of the church, we gathered all the big symbols together to remind us of who we are to whom we belong. We have the water of baptism, in it we are born again and called to be co-conspirators with Christ in the spreading of love in all the places. I choose that word quite intentionally, what’s in the middle of it? Spirit! We have the Easter candle, we lit it again with the new fire of Easter just fifty days ago. We sang “the light of Christ, thanks be to God.” The advocate, the spirit comes by our sides as we go out into the world bearing the light of Christ. We have the cleansing fire, the cooking fire, the fire that helps us shed all that is not of the spirit and life-giving. We have the dove, that shows us the Holy Spirit. 

 

And then we have some not so big church symbols that help us have fun in the spirit. Pinwheels and red things on a stick, and our clothes, that help us to not take ourselves too seriously. 

 

Spirit is ever creating, ever inspiring, ever co-conspiring. Spirit is ever burning, ever reminding us who we are, God’s beloveds. The Spirit will not leave us alone. Thanks be to God.

7 Easter Yr B May 16 2021

7 Easter Yr B May 16 2021

Acts 1:15-17, 21-26, 1 John 5:9-13, John 17:6-19, Psalm 1

 

We shift just a little bit in John’s gospel today as we prepare for the Day of Pentecost, the coming of the Holy Spirit. Our Sunday readings have guided us as we have seen Jesus after death and resurrection. We heard the story of Ascension this past Thursday, and we will hear the story of the one who continues to abide with the disciples, the Holy Spirit, the Advocate, soon to come. Today we find ourselves with the disciples overhearing Jesus’ prayer to the father. Jesus has said what he needs to say throughout the farewell discourse, he has told all of his stories, and given all of his instructions, and has no more words left, just prayer. 

 

It is very special for us to overhear this prayer with the disciples. It is a prayer filled with joy and courage. In it Jesus prays for himself in what he knows are to be the last hours of his life. Jesus prays for the disciples who remain in the world while he has to go, and Jesus prays for future believers. Jesus gives us a picture that is not necessarily victorious, but instead a picture of love’s persistence and survival.  

 

In this prayer we learn about eternal life. Jesus prays for eternal life for all who have been given to him. It is right here that we know what eternal life is, the eternal life that John keeps writing about, and Jesus keeps talking about, “this is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” You see, eternal life is not about a reward at death, eternal life is about the relationship that God in Jesus yearns to have with each of us. Eternal life is about being in relationship with God who creates us, Jesus who walks with us and shows us the way of love, and Spirit who sustains, protects, and guides us. And yet we know that relationships are never fully expressed. If there is a relationship at all it is always growing, always seeking its fullness and completion. So, both of these are true. Eternal life is being in relationship with the God whose dream for us is love, now and yet to be. In this we have a glimpse of the glory that is, and the glory that will be. 

 

In this prayer Jesus prays that the disciples may be as closely related to God as he is, so they can be one heart and mind as they are one heart and mind. We have heard John over and over with the images that connect us to God, the vine and the branches, that God abides in us and we in God, and that culminates in this prayer, this prayer of unity with God. Jesus prays that the intimacy of his relationship with God is the same for us. 

 

Jesus entrusts the disciples and us to God’s care, God’s protection, and the joy of God’s embrace. Jesus asks that the disciples will not be left alone, and that you and I are not left alone. 

 

And lastly, Jesus prays for those who will believe because of the disciples, that is you and me as well. And Jesus prays a prayer of protection for all of us as we live in the world among all of the world’s chaos and challenge. Jesus prays that that the love with which the father loves him, may be in us. 

 

It’s enough to just overhear Jesus’ prayer. It is powerful, and wonderful. I am so moved that Jesus includes us in this prayer, we are those who believe because of the disciples, we are those who believe because of the witness to the way of love through the centuries. 

 

But I also think there is something more for us in Jesus’ prayer, and that is this. Like Jesus, when all the words are used up, when it seems we have no words left to say what we mean, we pray. That’s what Jesus has done here, used up all his words in instructing the disciples, and now he comes to this point of knowing what is to come, and he falls on his knees to pray. In this prayer, he doesn’t pray to be relieved of the death he is to die, he prays that he may be fully at one with his creator. He prays for those he leaves behind. And he prays for those who will come after him to spread the word of love, he prays for us to touch the world with love. And this is how we shall pray. 

 

Sometimes it seems so difficult to pray. Maybe because we think we have to do it in a particular way, or with a particular set of words, or about particular things. Sometimes it feels like we just can’t pray, when life has gotten the better of us, when the world just seems too painful, when it feels like we’ve lost all faith. 

 

It seems to me that Jesus was in that very same place, trying to teach his friends and followers some very important principles of life and they were incredibly slow to get any of it. Or knowing that pain and tragedy was inevitable. This is the point. Prayer isn’t about having it all together, prayer isn’t about saying the right words, prayer is about the relationship. Prayer is about opening ourselves up to the one who loves us no matter how stupid, or slow, or tired, or wonderful, we feel. Whether we can or can’t pray, whether we try to pray and fall asleep, whether we don’t have words or we have too many words, I believe God just wants us to communicate. 

 

And sometimes, when prayer seems absolutely impossible, we borrow from others. That’s right. We rely on others. That’s what being in this community of faith is all about. We pray for each other. Prayer puts us into relationship with each other. That very last part of Jesus’ prayer, as translated by Eugene Peterson in the message goes like this. 

“But I have known you, and these disciples know
That you sent me on this mission.
I have made your very being known to them—
Who you are and what you do—
And continue to make it known,
So that your love for me
Might be in them
Exactly as I am in them.”

 

Prayer makes God’s very being known to us, prayer makes us known to each other and the world. And that is knowing in the biblical sense. Intimate, relational, loving. Amen.

5 Easter Yr B May 2 2021

 5 Easter Yr B May 2 2021

Acts 8:26-40, 1 John 4:7-21, John 15:1-8, Psalm 22:24-30

 

What an amazing passage from John. This is filled with good news, promise, and such encouragement in difficult times. There is so much to consider, and all of it is based on the fundamental claim of the intimate relationship Jesus has with his followers, and the promise that we are intertwined, never left to wither. 

 

A branch cannot live by itself, apart from the vine. We cannot untwine ourselves from Jesus, there is no separateness, no vine apart from the branch. We are intertwined. The word that John uses is meno, a Greek word translated abide, or sometimes dwell. This is the primary designation of relationship in John’s gospel. This is the fundamental claim of the intimate relationship we have with Jesus. This is one of John’s themes. And it is the promise of what Jesus is leaving with the disciples, never severed, never to go away. 

 

This is a symbiotic relationship. The closest I can come to trying to understand, and remember all metaphors will fail eventually, is pregnancy. When I was pregnant with Tom, my firstborn, my doctor was telling me about eating. I must have been worried about something, now I don’t even remember what. He said, the baby is a parasite, it will take its nourishment from whatever I eat. I’m not sure I appreciated his using parasite, but I do appreciate the intimate relationship between mother and baby in the womb. 

 

What happens during this miraculous process? Science tells us that within the mother’s womb the placenta transfers oxygen and food from the blood of the mother to the blood of the embryo. Reversely, it transfers waste materials from the embryo to the mother. The fetus does not have to breathe or eat because the oxygen and food it needs is brought to it via the placenta. This new life uses the mother’s lungs, digestive organs and kidneys to sustain it during development.

 

As I think of how God devised such a beautiful and intimate connection, I realize that the message of the vine and the branches is also one of incomparable intimacy. It paints a picture of a symbiotic relationship. Symbiotic simply means life together—a life that Jesus wants to share with all of us, those who walk the way of love. Listen to the way Eugene Peterson in The Message translates this, I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you’re joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant.

 

Another really amazing phrase in this passage is the I am statement. We have heard I am statements in the Old Testament, when Moses asks God’s name, God’s response I AM. John uses a number of I AM statements, all followed by a predicate nominative, do you remember that from your high school grammar class? I am followed by the shepherd, the bread, the light, a path, a gate. But this one is different, Jesus adds another clause this time, and you are the branches. Not only do we hear another I am, the culmination of all the I am’s that precede it, but this time we hear who we are as well. You are the branches. The symbiotic relationship is complete, fulfilled, and aspirational. 

 

So first of all, being connected makes following Jesus, and the claim on our lives to love, conceivable and probable. Loving one another and loving our enemies is possible because of this symbiotic relationship. We are not alone, we don’t love alone, because of this relationship loving is possible. So what about the part that says “apart from me, you can do nothing.” Hear this as a statement of affirmation. This verse challenges our sense of being self-made men and women in the world. And yet… maybe after a year of pandemic and racial reckoning and political paralysis, maybe this is the year we can hear that affirmation more accurately and with fresh appreciation. Embedded in these words is a promise. It is precisely because everything we do depends on Jesus that we can count on doing something meaningful. Jesus’ words here remind us that it’s not up to us. It never was. It never will be. Thanks be to God. And Jesus’ words here remind us that it is the connectedness that supports, affirms, and empowers us to do the work that God calls us to do.

 

And secondly, it is this symbiotic relationship that makes it possible for the disciples to carry on after Jesus dies, is resurrected, and ascends. It is this symbiotic relationship that makes it possible for you and me to carry on after the trauma, the grief, the displacement, the chaos that is present in our lives most especially now, but really, always. This symbiotic relationship means that we do not wither, in fact, we may bear fruit, give birth.

 

Remember, by declaring their allegiance to Jesus by following him, Jesus’ followers have been thrown out of the synagogue, maybe even their families. They have been kicked to the curb, relegated to the margins. So this relationship that John describes, this intimate, intertwined and connected relationship, comes to Jesus’ followers as a promise in a very difficult time. Do not be afraid, connected to the vine you will have life. 

 

But what’s more, because you and I have read to the end of John’s gospel, we know that Jesus leaves another advocate, whom we call the Holy Spirit. This is grace upon grace, when Jesus leaves, the disciples will not be left alone. They are part of the vine, intimately related, having abundant life, bearing fruit. We are not left alone, and we are in this together.

 

Bearing fruit means engaging for ourselves as individuals and as the church in those activities and tasks that recognize and invest in the goodness of God’s love by spreading that love to the neighbor whom we are called to love. The specifics of bearing fruit, what that love actually looks like is varied. Sometimes it is taking part in already vibrant community ministries, sometimes it is creating something new, sometimes it is quiet and contemplative. But what is most important and what this symbiotic metaphor shows us is that we are not self-made. We are individuals, yes, but the reality of the Christian life is that all that we are and all that we have are as a result of the abiding grace of God. 

 

It is such a wonderful image, isn’t it? Being intertwined with Jesus in this way. And yet, it implies a claim, a moral imperative. Bearing fruit, co-conspiring with Jesus to love flows from this relationship. Go out and be love. It’s already possible, we don’t have to conjure something up, we have to go out and do the love that is already present. And that is Good News. Thanks be to God.