Ash Wednesday 2023

Ash Wednesday 2023

Isaiah 58:1-12, 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10, 

Matthew 6:1-6,16-21, Psalm 103

 

Just as Advent is the beginning of the New Year, Ash Wednesday and Lent are the beginning of our new life. I think we have a deep desire to start over, to begin again, to turn to God and take a deep, refreshing breath of new life, and to say, here I am Lord, I have heard you calling in the night. Today we are marked with the ashes that remind us of who we are, and whose we are. We are God’s beloved, at our baptism we are marked and claimed as God’s own children, forever. Today we retrace that indelible mark with these ashes, this dust. We are reminded that we don’t get out of this live alive, we are dust, and to dust we shall return. These ashes remind us that God is God, and we are not. These ashes remind us that we are chosen and marked by God’s love, delight of God’s life.

 

This is an opportunity and our call. We present ourselves to God, just as we are, confident in the promise of starting over and confident that we belong to God. Ash Wednesday, and all of Lent are an opportunity. An opportunity to put all our attention toward the Gospel call to love as Christ loves. Ash Wednesday and Lent are an opportunity to examine ourselves and find where we miss the mark of that love. Ash Wednesday particularly is an opportunity to come to our senses, to be reminded of who and whose we are, to start over, to loosen our heart’s grip on the things that separate us from the love of God and from our siblings. Ash Wednesday is an opportunity to do that which is described in our gospel reading, to give alms, to pray, and to fast.

 

Far from being a sad story, this is a story filled with hope. It is a story filled with forgiveness. It is a reminder that forgiveness isn’t a one-time deal, forgiveness is every day. This kind of forgiveness doesn’t assign shame or hold a grudge. This kind of forgiveness holds our souls in compassion, this kind of forgiveness heals us and frees us. 

 

Forgiveness is not a single act, but a matter of constant practice. Turning away from all that distracts us from God and God’s love for us, takes constant practice also. We often fall off the shoulder of the road and into the ditch on this journey, and in that ditch, life seems much darker. But we have been marked as Christ’s own forever, we belong to God.

 

On this day, we recognize our tendency to sin. We recognize our wretchedness, a word that is hard to hear about ourselves, but a word that describes our tendency to fall in the muck and the mess of live, and sometimes even wallow in it. But we are not left there to fend for ourselves. We come to this place of dust again and again. We come because this is the beginning and the end. We come because this is creation, and this is love. We come because we belong to God and to one another. We come because our memories are so short, aren’t they? We so quickly forget about the love that brings us to this day of dust. The love of God in creation, the love that gives up everything for us.

 

Lent is an opportunity. This journey we begin today shows us what true love looks like. It shows us that God’s heart’s desire is to be with us not only when times are rosy, but also and maybe especially when it seems like our brokenness and vulnerably will get the best of us. God’s love creates us and blesses us and puts us back together when we have disintegrated into the dust. When it seems like we will fall apart into the dust of which we are made, God is there to raise us up, and make us anew. 

 

I encourage you to take this lent opportunity and be intentional. Lent is traditionally a time of prayer and fasting. How can you be intentional about your prayer? There are many ways here at the church. Come to bible study, or come to Wednesday night soup suppers, or come after church on Sundays for coffee and conversation. Each of these is an opportunity to be in prayer with one another. And be intentional about your prayer at home. 

 

Especially in these chaotic times, find a place for quiet, open your prayer book, or the app on your phone, or join us at 10 each day, and pray morning prayer, “O Lord open our lips, and our mouth shall proclaim your praise.” Or evening prayer or compline, “guide us waking o lord, and guard us sleeping, that awake we may watch with Christ, and asleep we may rest in peace.” Make space in your heart, and your mind, and your soul, for Jesus to show up.

 

How can you be intentional about fasting? When I was a little catholic girl, like many of you, Friday fasting during lent was an ordeal. Today I would like for you to consider what it is that you may need or want to fast from. What is it that is making you anxious? or annoyed? mad? sad? Do you want to put your phone down for an hour each day, and fast from the news? Do you want to fast from the cacophony of noise and sit in the silence for some time each day? Do you want to fast from food that consumes you, and give some away for another to consume? 

 

And that brings us to hope, this day is a day of hope. This dust that we mark our foreheads with today is the burnt palms of Palm Sunday, the palms we wave in triumph as Jesus enters the city of Jerusalem. This dust gives us hope. The story we stake our lives on is the story of resurrection, and resurrection is always preceded by pain, and suffering, and death. Soon enough we will be walking with Jesus to the cross, soon enough. God loves us so very much, that God puts Godself in our place, wraps us in love, and gives us new life, life that we cannot even begin to imagine. Hope is God’s dream for us, that we may walk a journey on this earth, of intention. Love, compassion, prayer, forgiveness, we are given this opportunity of Lent to practice these intentions. 

 

How will you practice love this Lent?

How will you practice compassion this Lent?

How will you practice prayer this Lent?

How will you practice forgiveness this Lent?

Last Epiphany Yr A February 19 2023

Last Epiphany Yr A February 19 2023

Exodus 24:12-18, 2 Peter 1:16-21, Matthew 17:1-9, Psalm 99

 

Today marks our departure from the Sermon on the mount, or the teaching on hillside, whichever you prefer. We dive into this mysterious story, this story that can’t be explained, that just needs to be watched and heard; Jesus’ face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Each year at the conclusion of the Sundays after the Epiphany and as we launch into Lent we hear this story. As I hear the story of Jesus' changing appearance this time, this transfiguration, I see in my mind's eye a trailer for a new movie. This is the stuff of pyrotechnic extravaganza. Our main character calls his friends to gather around him, and all of a sudden he dazzles before our eyes. Blazing and shooting and appearing with him are Moses and Elijah. There is so much happening in this trailer we hope it is not all the best stuff of the movie itself. The computer generated affects are big and loud and wild. The significance of the ancestors appearing is not lost on those in the audience watching. The appearance of Moses and Elijah bring us soaring in on that place where time is transcended, and those who came before us are side by side with us in the present and our attention is pointed to the future, but what kind of future will that be. If this is the trailer, what's the rest of the movie like? Wow, dazzling, amazing. 

 

There is a story already told, one of my favorites, Anakin Skywalker, Yoda, and Obi-Wan appear amid the fireworks of celebration as Luke Skywalker looks on and wonders, hmm, this is important, this means something.

 

Well, this is important. This does mean something, but what is it, I wonder. What does this story of transfiguration have to say to us 21st century people? In the midst of this pyrotechnic extravaganza, with Moses and Elijah in attendance, I think it means that freeing people from slavery and wandering in the wilderness, is still God's mission. Healing and reconciliation, wholeness and forgiveness, is still God's mission. God's victory over death doesn't mean we don't die, Moses and Elijah indeed have died, Anakin and Obi-Wan indeed have died, but God does something more. God’s love never fails, God's love wins. God picks up the fragments of our lives and makes us whole. God loves our dark side and our light side, and puts us back together.

 

This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased. These are the very words we hear at Jesus' baptism, these are the words we hear on this mountaintop. Jesus has gathered his friends, Peter and James and John, and they hear these words, they are witnesses to this statement, this claim, that God's love is transforming, that God's love is transfiguring. So beside being an amazing story, we hear it on this last Sunday before Lent, because it points us in the right direction. Lent is really a baptismal journey. We begin on Ash Wednesday with the ashes that highlight the cross that has been traced on our forehead at baptism when we were marked as Christ's own forever. The journey of Lent calls us to the wilderness, the journey of Lent calls us to die to that which is killing us, so that we may be raised to new life with Jesus, so that we may be transformed and transfigured by God's amazing and abundant love and grace. So that we may live fully and completely the life we are given as God's delight.

 

A part of this story I love, is that Peter wants to make the experience last forever by erecting three tents. Peter is one of my favorite people, probably because I am so much like him. When something wonderful happens, don't we want it to last longer? Don't we want the next time to be as wonderful as the first time? Don't we want to pack it all up so that we can do it exactly the same way the next time? I think this is where the expression "mountaintop experience" first came from. But you and I know that's not the way of life. You and I know that you can't stay in that place of pyrotechnic extravaganza, and in the end, Peter realizes it too. And that's where God meets us, in the midst of our humanity, in the midst of who we really are, where we believe we cannot be loved, but are loved, because God's love wins.

 

And maybe that's what is so important about this story. Amid the fullness of our humanity, on the mountaintop, as well as in the depth of our pain, and when we miss the mark, and in all the places in between, God comes to us and claims us. God's claim on us, God's love for us, sets us free. God's claim on us, God's love for us, transforms us, not into perfect people, but into people whose imperfections make us compassionate. God's love remembers our brokenness and makes us merciful. God's love seeps into the cracks of our hearts and we are forgiven.

 

Jesus touched them saying, "get up and do not be afraid." God's love for us transforms us and makes us fearless, so that we can go out and be about God's mission. Continuing in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in the prayers; persevering in resisting evil, and, whenever falling into sin, repenting and returning to the Lord; proclaiming by word and example the Good News of God in Christ; seeking and serving Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors as ourselves; and striving for justice and peace among all people, and respecting the dignity of every human being. These are our baptismal promises, this is the discipline by which we live our lives and follow Jesus.

 

On that mountaintop, during that pyrotechnic extravaganza, our ancestors Moses and Elijah remind us that we are a part of the timelessness of God's amazing and abundant love for us in particular, as well as for all of humanity. Peter and James and John show us the truth of our humanity, both our desire to possess the glitz and glitter of a mountaintop experience, as well as our tendency to be afraid of the vulnerability of being known by God. They show us that we need not be afraid of the dark. Jesus shows us that we are beloved, God's delight.

 

Listen to Jesus, get up, and do not be afraid. These are words that are not bound to that mountaintop experience but animate our lives today. Following Jesus in this culture of fear today is hard. What do we do? What do we say? There is so much around us that causes us to want to put our heads in the sand. But we know better. In a world torn apart by anger, hatred, conflict, and violence, we have the privilege of being living signs of a love that can bridge all divisions and heal all wounds. We began our Epiphany season with “do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly.” We end our Epiphany season with “listen to Jesus, get up, do not be afraid.”

 

These are important words, for times such as these. You are God’s beloved, with you God is well pleased. Amen.

6 Epiphany Yr A Feb 12 202

Mount of the Beatitudes 

Deuteronomy 30:15-20, 1 Corinthians 3:1-9. Matthew 5:21-37, Psalm 119:1-8

 

Our relationships matter to God. At this point of the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew really is providing commentary on what Jesus said as he began with the blesseds, the beatitudes. Our relationships matter to God. Our healthy relationships, our broken relationships, all matter to God. God delights in you and loves you unconditionally and desires the best for you in and through your relationships. So this passage is about how we treat each other in relationship. 

 

You will recognize what Matthew is saying as an extension of the ten commandants. The ten commandments are about how God loves us and is in relationship with us, how we love God and how we treat each other. These words can help us create health and healing in our relationships. There is no hierarchy of sin here, breaking relationship is always painful and often tragic. These words remind us that all our relationships are possible only with God's help.

 

To claim that our relationships matter to God is to claim two things. First, that this God creates all that is seen and unseen, and is truly the God who not only is God in our midst but is also God who lived and loved and suffered and died, and who rose from the dead. This God is the God that is not only transcendent, the God who creates the heavens and the earth and all the universe, but also who is deeply and completely immanent, the God whose heart's desire is to be in relationship with us. Secondly, because it is God's heart's desire to be in relationship with God's people, you and me, God is doing something new in this incarnation. God is doing something new with the law and commandments. We hear that in this passage. No longer is it enough just to refrain from murder, or adultery, or lying, or idolatry, or any of the other sins that make up the Ten Commandments. No longer is it enough to not do it, God is calling us to go beyond the law, and to be deeply and completely in relationship with God who is love.

 

The effects of turning away from God, the effects of our sin, the effects of missing the mark, are broken relationships, and broken relationships will kill us. Broken relationships and broken hearts kill us from the inside out. The effect of broken relationships are hearts that are hardened and no longer capable of love, compassion, mercy, justice. They are hearts no longer capable of beating. Well, you might as well cut out your eye, or lop off your hand for as much as your body is good for anything anymore. Do you see what's happening here? God's relationship with us, and our relationship with others is so important in this life that without them and the means to heal them, we may as well be dead, in effect, we have lost life.

 

That’s what this passage is about. Murder, broken relationship, adultery, divorce, broken promises. It’s all here. I am not judging broken relationship; God is not judging broken relationship. I am saying that this passage is about relationship, and this passage calls us to integrity and healing, and asks us, do your insides match your outsides?

 

And this has everything to do with how we respect the dignity of every human being with whom we come in contact. Surely first and foremost the human beings we live with, our partners in life, our children, our siblings, and all the people we encounter day by day. It also has everything to do with how we respect the dignity of those we know only by our common humanity. Those we read about in the newspaper, those we see on our screens in faraway places, those who are in our own communities but must hide because of who they are.

 

So I'd like you to call to mind one of the relationships in your life that is most important to you. One that is healthy and whole and good and sustains you regularly. Picture that person, that relationship. Think about what makes that a good relationship, why is it so important. Give God thanks for that person and the relationship you share. Now, call to mind another relationship that has suffered some damage. Don’t try to figure out who was to blame for the hurt, but rather hold that person and relationship in prayer. Offer that broken relationship to God as an offering and as an arena of God’s help and healing. Think about what action you can take to move that relationship to greater health. Do you need to ask forgiveness? Do you need to extend forgiveness. And now pray with me, Lord God of healing and wholeness, we offer this broken relationship to your care. Show us how to heal and be healed in this broken relationship, give us the words, show us the way, so that your love shows forth, our hearts may be healed, and the world may be a better place. Amen.

 

In these days when people sling outrageous accusations and conjectures into the atmosphere, I am reminded of those who have gone before us, those who have spent their lives being loved by God, and loving others, those who have spent their lives not in fear of showing God's love to the world but proclaiming God's love for all to the world. Those whose hearts could have been hardened because to continue to love was not only difficult but dangerous. I am reminded today of the first black Episcopal priest, Absalom Jones, whose life we celebrate each year on February 13th. Absalom Jones bought his wife's freedom, and went on to buy his own freedom, and became a priest at the African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas. Absalom Jones was known for his abolitionist preaching, in God's kingdom, there is no owning another human, there is no prejudice, there is no bigotry.

 

But of course, I'm preaching to the choir. You know these things; you do your best. You ask for forgiveness. Today I want to encourage you. I want to encourage you to take this love that wins even farther. Take it to people whose hearts have been hardened, and show them that it is love that wins, not hate, not prejudice or bigotry. Show them that Jesus took all that fear into his own body and replaced it with his love. Show them what eternal life looks like, it's not some reward after we're dead, it's the life God gives us, life fully lived before we're dead, it's a heart that is living and breathing and loving, not cold and hard. Show them that you will not live your life in fear of those who are different from you, but you live your life loud and proud for God's love. Show them that you are a person of integrity, your insides match your outsides. Show them what it looks like to follow Jesus.

 

You see, Jesus walked this journey not to uphold the status quo, but to show us that in God's kingdom, everything is different. Jesus goes to the margins to show us that the first will be last, and the last will be first. Jesus protects those who are vulnerable to show us that all relationships matter, respect and dignity matter. Forgiveness matters. Words matter, and the Word matters. Amen.

5 Epiphany Yr A February 5 2023

5 Epiphany Yr A February 5 2023

Isaiah 58:1-9a, [9b-12], 1 Corinthians 2:1-12, [13-16], Matthew 5:13-20, Psalm 112:1-9, (10)

 

Y’all know I went to seminary in Texas. I had to learn a whole new language and way of pronouncing words. Reading scripture story… laughing at the way I pronounced Lord – just after Fargo had come out….

 

So, in this passage, which is the continuation of the sermon on the mount that we began last week, you is y’all, or all y’all, it means all of you. The important difference this makes is that this is not just about you as an individual person, this is about all of you, all of us. This is a communal call; it is a communal claim to action. We do not do this alone. For the sake of community, for the sake of the world. 

 

So what is the this that we do not do alone? Concerning the beatitudes, or the blessings, it means that those blessings are not for any one individual, but for the community of disciples that follow Jesus. That’s all of us. It means that what we read today is for all of us. This is Jesus’ version of an “I have a dream speech.” Martin Luther King Jr. laid out an aspirational vision for society. That is what Jesus is doing; Jesus is laying out a vision for society, an alternate reality. Additionally, Jesus is identifying our role in this vision, this alternate reality. 

 

So let’s take a look at what Jesus continues to say to us. The first example is salt. Salt is salt, it’s job is to be salt, it can’t be pepper, for example. The second example is illumination. The purpose of a lamp is to shed light, that it’s job. It could be as simple as, you have a purpose, now get out there and do it. 

 

You are the light of the world. You are the light that shines in the darkness. This is an amazing declaration. Not only is God in our midst, God in the flesh, the light in the world, but that light, God in the flesh, God in our midst, is in us, shines through us, and as we bear that light into the world, darkness cannot overcome. That's not nothing, that's something. God's love, the love that wins, gets communicated to the world through you, through all y’all. Martin Luther King Jr. said "Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that." And, something even more amazing, you are the light of the world, that is who you are, that is your job, you are a child of God. This is not about what you must do, it is about who you are, you can't help but be the light and drive out darkness.

 

Well, with that Good News, how does the love of God get communicated in the world through you? You are commissioned to be God's light in the world. As I use communicate in this context, I mean the fullness of that word, not just words. Some of the synonyms of communicate are connect, interface, make known, network, and relate. For me the ultimate meaning of communicate is in communion, "be known to us Lord Jesus, in the breaking of the bread." God's love gets communicated in the world through you, through y’all and the light that you bear. What does that look like?

 

These words lead me to picture God's communication through you as a light in the world like a web of relationship. You shine in your workplace, and God is present. You shine in your school, and God is present. You light up the darkness, and God's love is communicated and all of that is connected. 

 

The question is, what does it look like for you to be God's light in the world? What does it look like for your light to be the only light shining, what does it look like for your light to join with and be joined with others to create a brighter light? Again, it is not what we do, but who we are, God's beloved, that shines. But for others to see the light, sometimes it is what we do. So many of you are lights in the world. Your lights shine when you give a compassionate word at work, your lights shine when you give an encouraging word at the check out counter at the store, your lights shine when you shovel your neighbors walk. These light shining moments are so important and they are compounded in community. 

And your lights, your voices matter in a world that seems to have left compassion and justice behind. You are indeed, a light in the building of the kingdom. But what about when we join our lights in the web of relationship, when we join our lights in a community of light? 

 

When we do that, when lights shine in the darkness of injustice, when lights shine in the darkness of the disregard for human dignity, when lights shine in the darkness of the lack of access to education, we begin to see the building of God's kingdom. During this month that is designated Black History, we are reminded of the witness of this kind of light, in the persons and the web of community of the people who sat on buses and wouldn't give up their seats; the people who sat at lunch counters and endured the indignity of insults and attacks; the people who knocked on doors to register others to vote; the people who worked day in and day out at their jobs, so they might provide education for their children.

 

And why is being God's light in the world so important? It important because God's love is what brings us back together, puts the fragments of our lives back together. It is God's love, borne by your light, that can bring healing and wholeness to our broken world. Indeed, it is God's mission to heal our world, and it is our mission to co-conspire with God in that healing. 

 

Darkness has no power to extinguish even the faintest of lights, but we can fan a single flame into a roaring fire. We can spread this light by embracing it, by becoming lights ourselves: the lights of the world. It is our job, just like being salty is salt’s job, and just like being bright is the light’s job, it is our job as followers of Jesus to reflect and enhance God’s light in the world. It is our job to participate in what God is doing, to get on board with God’s creativity in the world. It is our job to string our lights together and show the way to the love that wins. Amen.