Tenth Sunday after Pentecost Yr B Proper 13 August 1 2021

Tenth Sunday after Pentecost Yr B Proper 13 August 1 2021

2 Samuel 11:26-12:13a, Psalm 51:1-13, Ephesians 4:1-16, John 6:24-35

 

The fragrant smell of fresh bread is one of my fondest memories from my childhood. When I would enter my house after walking home from school, my mom would have fresh bread ready for an after-school snack. We’d smother it in butter and eat a whole loaf. My memory of that is infused with love and abundance. A mother who was home when I got home from school, fresh bread, brothers and sisters, time to play outside. It was grace upon grace, it was absolute and abundant love. There was no question about my place in my family, even with eight kids I always knew I was loved. This remains one of my most grace filled memories. Today families are made up of all shapes and sizes, with constellations of people who care for children, grammas and grampas, other family members, day cares and clubs, all with the same ability to show children they are loved abundantly.

 

Beginning last week and for the next four weeks we will be reading through the Bread of Life Discourse in John’s gospel, the entire sixth chapter. In these seventy-one verses, John’s themes of grace upon grace, and God’s abundance are mixed in and rise to offer us the fragrant gift of eternal life. 

 

In these next few weeks, I encourage you to read all of John, and most especially this sixth chapter. And, I encourage you to attend Friday morning Bible Study. We’re recording the discussion, so you can listen to it with a click from our website. 

 

But even my experience of love and grace and abundance, pales in comparison to what John is doing in the gospel and in this sixth chapter specifically. John gives us Jesus, who offers the disciples, and you and I, an invitation into a deep, deep, relationship. Jesus reveals more and more of who he is, the bread of life. 

 

Today John offers us the bread of life that fills us, and sustains us, in Jesus whose relationship with us heals us. 

 

We wander around trying to fill up on that which cannot fill us, that which cannot sustain us, that which cannot seep into the cracks of our broken hearts. We look for something that we believe will make us happy and successful. And we come here, looking for something, maybe not quite sure what it is. What we get is Jesus. Jesus is the food that fills us, Jesus is the blood that seeps into the cracks of our hearts and souls and makes us whole. Come and I will feed you. Come, and you will never be hungry or thirsty again. When you eat this bread and drink this wine, you will be healed, you are a new creation, your hunger will be satisfied. That is what the gospel writer John means when he refers to eternal life.

 

The feeding of the five thousand, last week’s reading and the beginning of this Bread of Life discourse, was a massive picnic in the wilderness. Today we hear Jesus say to those who, I am the bread of life, whoever comes to me will never be hungry and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. Often, those who followed Jesus were confused, they misunderstood. They cannot see beyond the sign to Jesus, whom they have already received. Not only is the bread Jesus' body, but it is manna from heaven, the bread of angels. The wine is not just Jesus' blood, but the free-flowing drink at the messianic feast, the substance of joy. It will fill you up, like nothing else can.

 

A loaf of bread is as practical as it is mysterious. It will fill our hunger in so many ways. And as we partake of the bread we become the body, the body of Christ. We become a new creation, we are made whole. We become a community of faith. We are healed, we are put back together, we are re-membered.

 

As we take the bread into our bodies, and as we are healed, we are formed as followers of Jesus. We come here, finally again, and we take into our bodies the bread of life, we ingest the Word over and over again. Jesus seeps into our very being and fills the cracks and fissures. In this practice, we become the people of God, we become who God creates us to be, who God dreams we can be. Part of the mystery is that the loaf of bread teaches us who we are as well as transforms us into whom we may be. Our practice and prayer surround the loaf of bread with word and action.

 

As we take the bread into our bodies we become followers of Jesus, and as followers of Jesus we embody God's promise and reconciliation in the world. That is our mission. What does God call us to do? God calls us to embody healing and reconciliation in the world. We are a holy community, sanctified by the presence and Spirit of God, sharing the Lord's meal, and as a holy community, God works through us ordinary people, to do extraordinary things.

 

We are a witness to the world of an alternate way of living. We are followers of Jesus, we are the Jesus movement. In the world, the strongest wins, the one who has the most wins, in the Jesus movement, Love wins. In the world the powerful, the well-known, the stars, get the attention, in the Jesus movement, the first will be last, and the last will be first. Our identity as followers of Jesus is found in participating in God's life and love for the world, in creating Jesus' community wherever we find ourselves. We care for our own members, and we love our neighbors the same way God loves us in Jesus. We go into the world bearing a spirit of humility, compassion, and mercy, and we bring Jesus' healing wherever we go.

 

We also receive Jesus' healing from others, we receive Jesus' hospitality from others, and Jesus' body is completed by others, because we don't have all the answers, we don't know it all, we don't have the right way or the only way. There is so much we have yet to learn, so many ways we can be Jesus' body that we do not know yet.

 

It is I, do not be afraid. You will eat and be filled, you will eat and be healed, you will eat and be sent into the world to be Jesus' hands and feet. You don't need to be perfect because you are perfectly loved. It is this love relationship that is faith, that is belief, and that is eternal life. It is grace upon grace. Amen. 

Eighth Sunday after Pentecost Proper 11 Yr B July 18 2021

Eighth Sunday after Pentecost Proper 11 Yr B July 18 2021

2 Samuel 7:1-14a, Psalm 89:20-37, Ephesians 2:11-22, Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

 

Jesus said, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” And so they went.

 

I’ve described to you before the wonderful opportunity I had a few years ago, before I came to you, for a sabbatical. I took three months away from the congregation and did some traveling. The first couple of weeks Rick and I, and Tom and Amanda, who were newly married, and Willie, who was newly graduated from college, went to Norway. We saw family, we saw spectacular fjords and mountains, and we stayed in some mighty fine places. The kids flew home, and Rick and I were in London, and then we traveled through Europe ending in Paris. We were with a group of people who turned into friends, and we saw beautiful sights, ancient ruins, and ate really well. Rick flew home from Paris, and I had a month, by myself. The first two months were highly planned, and rightly so when you want to make sure you do and see some very particular things. But I purposefully did not plan out my month by myself. I went where the Spirit led. So the deserted place for me was the Scottish Island called Iona. Iona is a thin place, it is a place where the land and the sky meet. It is a place where prayer has been placed throughout time. It is a place where sacred and secular dance. And it is a place where there are not many people, mostly sheep.

 

Have you been to a deserted place? It doesn’t have to be far away. In fact, I believe we are called to deserted places that are not far from home. Sometimes it is in the deserted place, the quiet place, where we may listen and know we are God’s beloved. This last year of our lives has been something like that, a deserted place.

 

As you well know by now, Mark doesn’t waste any time getting down to business about Jesus, the Son of God, in fact those are his very first words. Jesus is then baptized by John in the Jordan, and we hear “You are my beloved Son, I am well pleased.” And in an instant, Jesus is in the wilderness. I believe that event, and this excursion to the deserted place, are related. Between these two desert place stories, Jesus calls the disciples and sets about healing and teaching. Jesus calls out unclean spirits, Jesus heals a paralytic, a woman who was bleeding, a man with a withered hand, and a little girl. Jesus teaches about the kingdom of God. Jesus feeds five thousand with five fish and two loaves of bread, and Jesus walks on water. The disciples are in all of this with Jesus, and they need to rest.  

 

We don’t hear the feeding story, with five fish and two loaves of bread, nor do we hear the walking on water story this morning, but we know they are there. After the feeding story, Jesus goes off by himself to pray. And when evening came, Jesus saw that the disciples were in trouble on the water, and goes out to help them. The disciples thought Jesus was a ghost and they were terrified. That’s also what is left out of what we hear this morning, and we pick it up again when they all get to the other side of the lake. At this point people recognize Jesus, and want to touch Jesus, or at least the fringe of the cloak, and be healed. Remember the woman who was bleeding, she reached out her hand to touch the fringe of Jesus’ cloak and was healed.

 

This is a good news, bad news story. People were recognizing Jesus, they knew what Jesus could do, and what Jesus could do for them. The trouble it seems is that Jesus was beginning to feel closed in, torn apart, mobbed. Expectations of Jesus were rising, this man could heal, and so many needed to be healed. The disciples were beginning to feel afraid of what might happen. Just like at the very beginning, Jesus goes to a deserted place, a lonely place, but this time, Jesus invites the disciples to come.

 

This past year might have been like a deserted place for some. I heard about so much creativity, artwork, reading, and making music, the fruit of silence and reflection. And yet at the same time we worked hard at staving off some fear, some loneliness and heartache. 

 

 

But this Good News from Mark assures us that the deserted place is a place of refreshment. Jesus said, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” And so they went. Jesus makes this very same invitation to us. Come away to a deserted place. And yet, the deserted places are often the places we avoid and yet know somewhere deep down they are necessary places, truthful places. They are not just “time to get away” places. They are not just “we all need a break” places. They force us to recognize what’s necessary. What’s absolutely needed. And who will truly be there when everyone else walks away. 

 

When I was away, on my own in Canterbury, Durham, Edinburgh, Iona, I listened. I found quiet places, sometimes deserted places, thin places, in the catacombs and the cathedrals, in the countryside and the seaside. And what spoke most loudly to me in the quiet, was this, “In the end only three things matter: how much you loved, how gently you lived, and how gracefully you let go of things not meant for you.”

 

And so Jesus takes the disciples to a deserted place not just for a well-deserved respite, but to teach them what was learned in the wilderness -- and what will be essential for them to remember when it comes to their role in bringing about the Kingdom of God. Deserted places change our perspective. In the quiet places we have a chance to meet Jesus again. I wonder what you have heard in the last year of quiet? In the quiet places we have a chance to hear Jesus’ claim on our lives and our hearts. We are followers of Jesus. We are invited into the quiet places with Jesus so that we may hear Jesus’ call to us. Jesus says to us, you are my beloved, you are my beloved, and together we may build this Kingdom of God. Amen. 

Seventh Sunday after Pentecost Proper 10 Yr B July 11 2021

Seventh Sunday after Pentecost Proper 10 Yr B July 11 2021

2 Samuel 6:1-5, 12b-19, Psalm 24, Ephesians 1:3-14, Mark 6:14-29

 

Once upon a time, there was a party that no one would ever forget. No sooner did glasses empty than they were filled. When the feast was finished, desserts that dazzled the eyes were set out. Every key player in the kingdom was in attendance, and the most beautiful women in the land danced to delight the king. This is our story today in Mark, but it may very well be indistinguishable from any one of a number of TV shows and movies we’ve seen recently, where this one is jealous of that one and has an affair with the other one and decides to behead the first one? None of them hold a candle to this bizarre story we read today in Mark.

 

John, being held in the king’s prison, being kept safe at the king’s command, heard the sounds of the party. John had captured the king’s curiosity and even his respect. Even though the king was often perplexed by what John had to say, he knew the man to be a man of God. So the king feared John, even though the king held him a captive.

 

But everything changed at the party. When King Herod had had too much to drink and was too excited to think clearly, all his fine promises of security to John the Baptist vanished before the movements of an exquisite belly dancer. The executioner burst into the prison cell and emerged with John’s head on a platter. Herod’s promises to John expired upon the enticements of beauty and the stupidity of drunken oaths. It’s a tale as old as time. But there continue to be Herods today, rulers that are hungry for power and will do anything to stay in power, politicians that twist and turn their words to make themselves look good.

 

Why does Mark tell this tale? Let’s look at where it is in Mark’s story. Right before it, what we read last time, is Jesus sending out the disciples two by two, along with instructions about who to stay with and how to respond if they are not welcomed into a community. These are Jesus’ instructions about the practical matters of discipleship. Jesus has given the disciples authority to heal and cast out demons. And by all accounts, the disciples are successful. 

 

After this story Jesus gathers the disciples to go off to a deserted place to pray. They had been working so hard, and in such a hurry to proclaim the kingdom, Jesus wanted to pull them away for a while. But what happened was that the crowds figured out where they were going, and they showed up on the beach, and Jesus had compassion for them and taught them many things. And then fed them with five loaves and two fish. 

 

Before and after we have these wonderful stories of discipleship, of following Jesus, and of healing and feeding happening. So why this story? I wonder if it’s Mark’s warning. Is Mark saying that following Jesus isn’t all fun and games, there is a cost to discipleship. 

 

One lesson the disciples simply do not want to learn is that, when they follow Jesus, the end of the road will more likely be a platter or a cross than a spotlight or a toast. There are people like Herod in this world, people like Herodias, people who are pumped up with their own importance. It is enticing to be on a first-name basis with a guy like Herod, but the results are almost always deadly. 

 

What does that mean for us? We claim to be followers of Jesus, like the disciples that first followed. But there is a cost. It may not be as horrific as losing your head, but there is a cost. Mark goes on to describe some other grizzly things, like chopping off your hand or poking out your eye. But what if this is less about dying a grizzly death, and more about living a true and authentic life? Maybe it’s a description of what happens to us when we get caught up into the kingdom of God. 

 

Remember way back to 1999 when we first watched the Matrix? Maybe the cost of following Jesus, rather than a taking away of life and limb, is more like being freed from the Matrix. Humans were unwittingly plugged into a computer organism and the characters that had been unplugged, who had been freed from the Matrix, were identifiable by a scar on the back of their necks. The back of the neck was where they had been shackled to the Matrix. And when they chose to have a real life and not be in bondage to the machine, they were unplugged from it. But it hurt to be unplugged. Maybe like having something cut off their body, it hurt to have the illusion pulled away. But in exchange they got life, real life, not an illusion, but live with real freedom and real purpose. 

 

Following Jesus is costly in ways that we can only begin to imagine. Following Jesus demands that we unplug from the Matrix, unplug from the stuff that keeps us from being free to love like Jesus loves. What are we so attached to that giving it up hurts? For some that is addiction to drugs or alcohol, for some that is food. For many these days it is screens. 

 

But I think that is what Mark is telling us. Being free to love like Jesus loves means unplugging from the machine. It is not easy, and its cost is dear. It means setting aside our pride, our grudges, our own efforts at perfection and pleasing others. It means that we forgive ourselves and our neighbors. And it most especially means that we accept and receive God’s grace, God’s word, God in the flesh. 

 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was known for his staunch resistance to the Nazi dictatorship, wrote the book, The Cost of Discipleship, in it he writes,

 

“Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a person must knock. Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a person their life, and it is grace because it gives a person the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son.”

 

Following Jesus is costly because it costs a person their life, and it is grace because it gives a person the only true life. You see, therein lies the rub. Following Jesus is about laying down that which is killing you, it’s like a part of you must die, in order for the new life, the true life, to grow. 

 

This is not the life our culture encourages. But it is the life of following Jesus. This is a life of love that demands our very best self. In a world where a very best self is about success and happiness, this love and grace calls us to work for the very best of the beloved. In a world where a very best self is about beauty and health, this love and grace calls us to be our very real self, which is beautiful. In a world where the very best self looks like a charade of bluster and lies, this love and grace calls us to live a truth of forgiveness and healing.

 

And, it is a promise. Jesus promises that when a part of ourselves dies, there will be resurrection, there will be new life, and there is always hope. Amen.

Sixth Sunday after Pentecost Proper 9 Yr B July 4 2021

Sixth Sunday after Pentecost Proper 9 Yr B July 4 2021

2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10, Psalm 48, 2 Corinthians 12:2-10, Mark 6:1-13

 

It seems like a rather harsh reaction. Jesus has gone home to preach, and first the people are somewhat surprised, and then they quickly turn to “who is this guy, isn’t he just Mary and Joseph’s son?” “Hasn’t he gotten a bit full of himself, too big for his britches?” Could this be a story about the hometown boy making good, and I wonder if they aren’t just a little bit jealous. And then Jesus’ friends and neighbors turn away and resist Jesus’ invitation into the grace and mercy that is offered, and Jesus just can’t believe it. 

 

But Mark’s reason for telling us this story isn’t just about that, I think it’s about something much deeper. Jesus invites those who were listening in the synagogue, and us who are hearing this 2000 years later, to partner in this ministry of love. Which means that each and every day we have before us the opportunity to be channels of grace and mercy to people and a world desperately in need of grace and mercy.

 

Mark continues to tell this tale of rejection. The people who are in the synagogue, Jesus’ hometown church, Jesus’ friends and neighbors, take offense and reject him. But in the quiet, the back rooms, the barns, Jesus and those who followed, continue to heal. But Jesus tells the followers, “If any place will not welcome you and they refuse to hear you, as you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them”. It makes me wonder what’s going on that makes Jesus and the disciples so unwelcome. 

 

Jesus instructs the disciples to go out into the villages and teach, taking nothing with them and accepting hospitality as it is offered, and if it is not offered, Jesus tells them to move on. But so many of their neighbors are trapped in their comparisons and complaints, they are not remotely interested in receiving Jesus’ blessing. Even Jesus cannot believe it.

 

In a world so desperate for grace and mercy, why does Mark tell this story, why will the people not accept Jesus’ offer. Why would people kick them all out?

 

What about now? Can we imagine ourselves as the ones in the pews when Jesus comes, are we the people who kick Jesus out of there? We would know Jesus, we would welcome Jesus, we would offer coffee and donuts and a bed to sleep on. And we would welcome Jesus’ disciples, wouldn’t we?

 

What’s going on here? Jesus offers grace and mercy, and that comes as a threat to the principalities and powers. Jesus’ message of love is a message that includes everyone. Jesus’ disciples are not the ones in power, Jesus’ disciples are not the well to do, Jesus’ disciples are fishermen. They stink like fish.

 

In our communities and our neighborhoods, we have a lot of trouble welcoming the ones that stink. We want them to be like us, well groomed, well fed, well moneyed. We want them to look like us and talk like us. We want to be able to know that their God is our God. And we really don’t want to be upset by any difference in belief, or culture.

 

In this world where there is so much fear, it’s really hard to offer hospitality to those who we don’t know, or those who don’t come with a good recommendation, or those who have nowhere else to go. We are the ones, you see, who close our doors to stinking fishermen.

 

The good news in this story is that Jesus invites the disciples to partner in the ministry of love. Jesus tells them to travel light and accept the hospitality that is offered. Jesus equips and commissions the disciples to carry on the ministry. They are now partners in ministry in a way they have not been up to this point in the story. And the instructions Jesus offers demonstrate the mutuality, even interdependence, of the disciples on those to and with whom they minister. They go out in pairs, because this work can’t be done alone. And they do not take their own provisions but rather depend on the hospitality of those they meet. And while some will receive them and be blessed, others will refuse their ministry and blessing.

 

And the good news in this story is that even in the face of rejection, even when the principalities and powers refuse the invitation to love, the invitation to grace and mercy that Jesus and the disciples offer, the offer continues to be made. Jesus does not recant, Jesus continues to bring love even when that love, and grace, and mercy, is rejected.

 

The good news for us is that Jesus invites us to partner in this ministry of love. Jesus invites us. And really, we are the stinky fishermen, and we are the well-groomed. We are the very imperfect humans that are created in God’s image. We are the ones who are really good at loving one another, and we are the ones who miss the mark mightily on many days. We are the ones who are broken, and we are the ones who are healed in the bread that is the body broken for us.

 

And the good news for us is that our actions matter. Not as works that earn God’s favor but as a response to God’s holy invitation. God has chosen us in Baptism, not only for salvation but also for purposeful, consequential lives here and now, and each day we have a choice between resisting God’s activity or partnering with God’s intent and action to bless and care for God’s world.

 

We are the ones who bear love, mercy, and grace into all the places we find ourselves: our homes, our work, our schools. We are the ones who break down the barriers between us and them. We are the ones who meet people in their places of brokenness or joy. We are the ones who seek out those who will listen to the words of God’s love for everyone, we are the ones who love compassionately and fail miserably in the short sightedness of our compassion.

 

Our love, mercy, and compassion matters. Even when it seems like no one listens. What we do matters. Every time you choose to love and not hate, every time you choose to cross the barriers to offer love, we come closer to the dream God dreams for us. Jesus invites us to partner in the ministry of love, and this beloved community equips us to be agents of love, of grace, and of mercy. Love does indeed, win. Amen.