3 Advent Yr B December 13 2020

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3 Advent Yr B December 13 2020

Isaiah 61:1-4, 8-11, 1 Thessalonians 5:16-24, John 1:6-8,19-28, Psalm 126 or Canticle 15

 

Every time I hear these verses from John, I hear The Who singing “Who are you”. That ages me I suppose. Who are you, I really want to know, tell me, who are you, the verses in that song continue on in a search for identity, who are you? A long time before that recording, the priests and Levites ask Who are you, and John the baptizer confesses, or witnesses, or testifies, all the same word, exactly to who he is not, he is not the Messiah. Who he is, his identity, is the voice of one crying in the wilderness, make straight the way of the Lord. 

 

This third week of Advent, we, like John the Baptist, are called to know who we are, God’s beloveds, and to witness to the light, so that all may believe. Today I want you to consider three things that John the Baptist is doing to witness to the light. 

 

First, it is rare and refreshing, John has zero-interest in making this about himself. We are so used to this character John the Baptist, that I think we don’t feel the extent to which he puts himself aside for Jesus. John has his own posse, his own band of followers. And here comes this upstart Jesus, preaching a new way. From the constant self-expression and self-aggrandizement encouraged, promoted, and even demanded by social media to the posturing of too many political candidates as the only person who can do the job, we are living during a distinctly ego-centric, if not full-on narcissistic, time in our culture. We experience it everywhere. From not listening to the experts in science because you think you know better, to demanding the right to do whatever you darn well please in public, this is not about you at all. John shows us that. John sets himself aside and points to Jesus and witnesses to the light that is coming into the world. 

 

Second, in this way, John stands as a model and example of what life lived in response to God’s call looks like. And what does that look like? You are God’s beloved, you are enough, you are what God made you to be. So many could be disappointed and frustrated with John not taking power and opposing Jesus. John is very clear in himself that he is the voice in the wilderness, the one that points to Jesus, but is not the long expected Messiah.

 

As we consider John as a model and example of what life lived in response to God’s call looks like, we must also consider Mary, whose Magnificat we read together. The song of Mary that we sing each Sunday of Advent, is the oldest Advent hymn. It is also the most passionate, the wildest, and one might almost say the most revolutionary Advent hymn that has ever been sung. This is not the gentle, tender, dreamy Mary as we often see her portrayed in paintings. The Mary who is speaking here is passionate, carried away, proud, enthusiastic. There is none of the sweet, wistful, or even playful tone of many of our Christmas carols, but instead a hard, strong, relentless hymn about the toppling of the thrones and the humiliation of the lords of this world, about the power of God and the powerlessness of humankind. This is the sound of the prophetic women of the Old Testament—Deborah, Judith, Miriam—coming to life in the mouth of Mary. Mary, who was seized by the power of the Holy Spirit, and who speaks, by the power of this same Spirit, about God’s coming into the world, about the Advent of Jesus Christ. Like John, Mary puts aside her own self interest for this glorious impossible. 

 

She, of course, knows better than anyone else what it means to wait for Christ’s coming. Her waiting is different from that of any other human being. She expects Jesus as his mother. Jesus is closer to her than to anyone else. She knows the secret of his coming, knows about the Spirit, who has a part in it, about the Almighty God, who has performed this miracle. In her own body she is experiencing the wonderful ways of God with humankind: that God does not arrange matters to suit our opinions and views, does not follow the path that humans would like to prescribe. God’s path is free and original beyond all our ability to understand or to prove.

 

There, where our understanding is outraged, where our nature rebels, where our piety anxiously keeps its distance—that is exactly where God loves to be. There, though it confounds the understanding of sensible people, though it irritates our nature and our piety, God wills to be, and none of us can forbid it. Only the humble believe and rejoice that God is so gloriously free, performing miracles where humanity despairs and glorifying that which is lowly and of no account. For just this is the miracle of all miracles, that God loves the lowly. God “has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.” God in the midst of lowliness—that is the revolutionary, passionate word of Advent. *

*– Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945), ‘Collected Sermons of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’

 

And thirdly, John the gospel writer invites us to an acceptance of our identity as God’s beloveds. Rather than striving for the affirmation of others we are free to make the sacrifices required that deepen our sense of calling, purpose, and meaning. 

 

And in that light, because I am and we are God’s beloveds, and part of our call is to set ourselves aside and point to Jesus, I am choosing to receive this Advent during Covidtide as a gift, maybe you will too. Advent, and preparation for Christmas, has often been a time of stress, a time of expectation that cannot be met. But this time, we have the opportunity to name it all, and do it quite differently. Rather than hiding sadness and grief and loss from the world and from our friends, the gift is that we are all in it together. Rather than working ourselves into a frenetic ball of nerves about not getting it all done, we let go of our perceptions of control and affirm our call as god-bearers, and like Mary we receive the gift of new birth. And as those of you who have given birth know, it’s scary and joyful all at the same time. And with Mary and John at our side, we claim our voice to call out God is here, Love wins. 

John 10:1-10, First week of DMin

On hot summer nights, when every kid in the entire neighborhood was out playing kick the can, my mom would yell out the back door, Kathy! and I’d come running. I heard my mother’s voice, and recognized that I wanted to come running into her wide and wonderful and protective embrace. Jesus is like that in this passage we have from John. Jesus calls our names, and we come a runnin. And Jesus is not just holding the door open for us, but Jesus is the door through which we find love and life. 

We’ve just heard the story about the man born blind, how long was he blind? Blind from birth, a long, long, time. The man, blind from birth, hears the voice of Jesus, recognizes who Jesus is, and is healed. Jesus asks the man who was formerly blind, “Do you believe in the Son of Man?” And the no longer blind man answers, “And who is he, sir?” Jesus responds, “You have seen him, and the one speaking to you is he.” The formerly blind man proclaims, “Lord, I believe.”

Lord, I believe. This man, blind from birth, and no longer blind, has a whole new life, he can see, the world before him and around him is opened up, the landscape of his life is completely changed. No longer does he sit on the margins, he can see, no longer does he beg, he can see. His life is completely transformed, this is new life indeed.

And immediately we hear another story, really a continuing story, that the abundant life the no longer blind man received, is available to us as well.

Jesus the shepherd, calling my name, calling your name. What is that like, hearing Jesus, the shepherd calling our names? How do we recognize that voice? Kathy, I love you, come to me, let me embrace you, let me give you all you need, let me fill that hole in your heart with life, with love. Come, come with me, walk with me into this amazing place, run into my arms, into my embrace, this place of love, this place of life.

I am the door, come through this door, here is a place of protection, of nurture, of sustenance, this is a place created for you. And when our eyes are opened, when we hear and recognize the voice of the one who creates us, and comes to be with us, and loves us, we run through that door.

And what’s more, is that Jesus does this again, and again, Jesus calls his followers by name, but not just you and me, Lazarus as well. You remember, Lazarus had been dead for four days. Jesus arrived at the tomb of his friend, and Jesus wept, and Jesus called to Lazarus, Lazarus, come out! In hearing his name, Lazarus came out, and was unbound, set free. Lazarus, the one who was dead, is now alive.

But not even just you and me and Lazarus, Mary as well. Mary stood weeping at Jesus’ tomb. She bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white, sitting where Jesus should have been. She did not know where Jesus had been taken.

She turned around and Jesus was standing there, but she didn’t know him, she thought he was the gardener. Until he spoke to her, until he called her name, Mary! She turned and saw him, teacher! Mary went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord!” I have seen the Lord!

The abundance of the life Jesus invites us into is shown to us by the healing of the man blind from birth. Being blind from birth is being blind for-ever, and this man can see! He recognizes Jesus. This is an abundance that is immense, over the top. The man who was blind, now is saved from darkness. The man who was blind is brought from the margins of the community, into the community. The man who was blind, has new and abundant life.

Lazarus lives!

Mary proclaims.

We hear Jesus call our name, we recognize Jesus is the door through which we too can see God’s presence with us, making us into a beloved being. Giving us sight that enables us to see Jesus in our midst, in ourselves, in one another. Giving us sight that enables us to proclaim, like Mary, I have seen the Lord!

And what’s more, what’s even more over the top, more abundant, more amazing, is that Jesus, the door into God’s embrace, God’s love, is not exclusive or judging. This not about keeping people out, this is Jesus inviting people into new life, abundant life. “I am the door” is to invite people in, to recognize God in the flesh that is Jesus’ new and abundant life. To hear the voice of the shepherd, to walk through the door that is open, is to follow Jesus into Life, abundant life. Life in the here and now and life eternal in the resurrection. Life in the here and now and life even when Jesus leaves us. You are enough, see Jesus, recognize Jesus is God with us, walk through the door, and receive life, abundant life.

3 Advent Yr C Dec 16 2012

John, the unlikely bearer of good news, the one who from the wilderness, not the seats of power, announces the coming of the kingdom. Prepare, the world is about to change. You are about to change. The repentance that John calls us to is not feeling a certain way about ourselves; like bad or good or even shame, repentance is a change of direction in mind and action. Remember, waiting is not doing nothing. Waiting is about preparing for the surprise, waiting is about participating in the reality of God's kingdom, waiting is about the not yet that already is. Waiting is about being who God calls you to be.

As you know, there's a lot of chatter about wishing folks a Merry Christmas at this time of the year. The problem with that conversation is that it misses the point. The point being that we are not there yet. I prefer to wish people a Blessed Advent. We are not at Christmas. The problem is that when it finally is Christmas, and it's time to wish one another Merry Christmas, many are already tired of the whole thing.

So why bother with the whole thing. Why bother with the waiting, the preparation, the anticipation? We are not really "merry" at this time anyway. We are hopeful, expectant, and joyful, but not really "merry." Diana Butler Bass, a well known contemporary writer on the church in society, wrote in the Huffington Post, "Christians recollect God's ancient promise to Israel for a kingdom where lion and lamb will lie down together. The ministers preach from stark biblical texts about the poor and oppressed being lifted up while the rich and powerful are cast down, about society being leveled and oppression ceasing. Christians remember the Hebrew prophets and long for a Jewish Messiah to be born. The Sunday readings extol social and economic justice, and sermons are preached about the cruelty of ancient Rome and political repression. Hymns anticipate world peace and universal harmony." Not really very "merry" at all.

We bother with Advent because we human beings need to spend time waiting and preparing for this event that turns the world, this event that brings light into the darkness, this event that makes the first last and the last first. We can't just jump into it. We can't just jump from Halloween to Christmas without some time to be immersed in the mystery of incarnation; this mystery that we struggle so to understand, this mystery that seems unreasonable, this mystery that takes leaps with our imaginations. In Advent, we get glimpses of it, but it takes time for that mystery to grow in our hearts, and in our souls, and in our lives. It takes space for God who is with us, to sit down next to us and teach us that Love wins. It takes quiet to hear the voice of the one crying in the wilderness, and to hear the voice that calls us to transformation.

And it is not easy. We want desperately to make it easy, and romantic, and nostalgic. We want it to be about feeling good. Indeed, some of that is part of what Christmas is, but that is not what this story is about. John calls us to a change of direction in mind and action. John calls us to Advent transformation. John calls us to be ready for the one who is coming, the one who has come, the one who turns the world. God in our midst, Emmanuel, the baby born in a barn, the one who shows us that Love wins, calls us to deepen our commitment to loving one another, calls us to deepen our commitment to compassion and to mercy.

These winter days are dark. They are short, the light is with us for only a few hours. These winter days are dark, there is much violence and sadness that may lead us to believe that the light really has gone out of the world. But Advent reminds us that the Light is never extinguished. Advent reminds us that even if it seems dark, the Light is there, and the Light will brighten even the darkest corners of our lives. Advent reminds us that God walks with us, God does not take away our sadness and our pain, but God walks with us through the sadness and the pain.

We live in this in-between time, in this time of the already but not yet. We live in this time where we tell the story of Jesus birth, we await Jesus birth, and we imagine the end, God's fulfillment of all time. There is where our hope is. It is in the already but not yet. We know what God has done in creation, we await what God will do in creation, and we live our lives in God's grace. There's no guarantee of happiness, there's no guarantee that pain and sadness will not visit us, there's no guarantee of prosperity. But there is love, there is hope, there is joy.

So what do we do in this dark time, what do we do as we wait for the Light to fill the room? We don't do nothing. Waiting is not doing nothing. We love one another as God has loved us. We hold one another, we listen to each other, we bring light into each other's lives, we do not wait alone. We are God's household, you, and me, and all of us. We bear God's light and love into every corner of our lives. We bring healing and wholeness to those whose lives are torn apart. We bear the Good News that Love wins.

O come, thou Dayspring, come and cheer
our spirits by thine advent here;
disperse the gloomy clouds of night,
and death’s dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice!
Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.

Christ the King, Yr B, Nov 25 2012

The description of Christ the King is probably one of the most loud and subtle oxymorons of all time. Christ the King. Just listen to it, Christ the King. Jesus, the baby born in a barn to parents of no status or honor, who spent his life with no roof over his head, always on the road, foraging for his next meal. Whose message is consistently, love one another. Jesus, whose friends were never quite sure of him, and whose reputation was suspect as far as those who had power were concerned, the scribes and pharisees and others who ranked high at the temple. Jesus, whose life ended hung on a Roman cross, the most degrading, torturous death imaginable. Jesus, the King.

For me a helpful image to illustrate this oxymoron is in a movie, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. That's the one where Indiana Jones goes to seek the Holy Grail, the cup that Jesus drank from. Remember, Indy and his dad and the bad guys found the ancient knight guarding the cup, Indy had to find his way through the maze that could kill him. When he got there, there were many choices, gold cups, platinum, silver, terra cotta and wood. The knight says "you must choose, but choose wisely, for as the real grail brings eternal life, the false grail brings death". The bad guy comes in and chooses a glittering golden cup. "Truly the cup of a king", he says and drinks from it. Shortly later, with several horrific transformations, he deteriorates and turns to dust. The knight looks at them and simply says "He choose poorly". Indy selects a wooden cup "The cup of a Gallilean carpenter" he says, and with much fear, having seen the results before, drinks from it. "You choose wisely" says the knight.

The cup of a King, or the cup of a Gallilean carpenter. There is the rub, there is the oxymoron, there is the paradox, Christ the King, servant to all. As the parables in scripture show us, all is not as it seems. History shows us Kingship, and Kingship throughout history has had it's megalomaniacs. Most of the kings that make our history books are Kings that have grabbed power. Kings that have subdued the people. Jesus shows us an entirely different kind of Kingship. Jesus shows us a Kingship that doesn't take power, but that empowers. Jesus shows us a Kingship that doesn't take life, but gives new life. Jesus shows us a Kingship that is not about being first in battle, but about being first in Love. Jesus shows us a Kingship where laying down his life creates life for all. Jesus shows us a Kingship where might does not win, but where Love wins.

The cup of a King, or the cup of a Gallilean carpenter. Throughout history we've wanted so desperately to make Jesus into a cultural King. Pilate asked him, "So you are a king?" Jesus answered, "You say that I am a king." And then Jesus continues, "for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice." We want Jesus to sit on a throne and judge. Often, we want Jesus to sit on a throne and judge others deemed not worthy of life in Jesus' kingdom. Especially those who we think do not deserve the kind of Love Jesus offers us. Love, unconditionally, no matter what, unless, of course you disagree with me, or are different from me. Unless of course you've done something dastardly. Unless of course you love someone of the same gender. Unless of course you believe in a different God I believe in, or don't believe in God at all.

Kings and thrones, judgement and justice, forgiveness, mercy and compassion. What is the truth that we hear from the voice of Jesus? Love the Lord your God with all your heart and your mind and your soul, and love your neighbor as yourself. Feed my sheep, clothe those who have nothing to wear, visit the imprisoned. The Good News is that no matter what or who we want Jesus to be, Jesus loves, and Love wins. Kingship, for Jesus, is about being a king that serves, that sacrifices, and that loves radically. A king that looks the complete opposite of virtually any king any of us has ever read about.
Jesus, whose example is humble, not glorified; generous, not treacherous; hospitable, not exclusionary. The cup of a king, or the cup of a Gallilean carpenter?

Kingship, or something like it, was all the people knew about ruling a people. It was either a King, an Emperor or some such ruler who lorded over the people, or it was chaos and anarchy. The God the Jews knew brought order out of chaos, this Jesus who was said to be God's son, therefore was King. But the Kingdom is of mercy and compassion, the Kingdom is of peace and reconciliation, the King knows each by name.

So it is this oxymoron, this paradox that we must somehow reconcile in our own lives. The cup of a King, or the cup of a Galliliean carpenter. Choose wisely my friend. But I think the wisest choice is not one over the other, but it is the Episcopalian way, the via media, it is somewhere in between. We must hold both realities in tension. Christ the King, whose throne is a cross, and when we do, we see a fuller picture. We bandy about that image, Christ the King, on a throne, the seat of judgment. But do we really have any idea what it means? Jesus indeed sets out a standard of judgment, an expectation if you will, but this King shows us the way, this King doesn't leave us alone to figure it out ourselves, and it is right here that our lives our transformed.

Because Jesus, the one who comes to show us the way to God, Jesus, the one who is King of all creation, is at the very same time the one who lived life just like you and me, who loved his friends and family, who suffered and died, just like you and me. For what good is a God who sits back and watches, what good is a God who rules from afar, what good is a God who holds power over people. Jesus is the one who loves, the criminal who hangs next to him, the mother who cries below him, the friends who betray him.

In the beginning, and the middle, and the end, the Alpha and the Omega, Kingship for Jesus is giving himself totally and absolutely for the love of his people. It is this love that you and I must respond to. It is this love that is transforming love. It is this love that reconciles and redeems. It is this love that gives us hope. Jesus' love changes us, and we are to choose wisely.

We are changed through the realization that each one of us is loved completely and absolutely, that is the truth of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection. We are changed through the realization that when we fall short of the kind of love Jesus demonstrates for us, and we will fall short, that is part of being human, we are forgiven. Just like Peter, who denied Jesus three times. Forgiveness not just once, but time and time again. Not even just until we get it right, because it's not about getting it right. Only trying to get it right just makes us into self-righteous snobs and misses the point of Jesus' kingship entirely. It's about responding to hate with love, it's about seeking reconciliation not revenge, and when we don't, because we won't, it's about asking for forgiveness, again. We are changed through the realization that Love wins, every time.

7 Easter Yr B

These readings we have before us in these days, the story of the resurrection, the story of the road to Emmaus, the story of the Ascension, the story of the birth of the church at Pentecost, are all stories that challenge our perspective, stories that challenge us to remove the limits we have put on our own humanity. As I challenge you to change your perspective, I offer this about a young woman I know. Today I challenge you to see life, death and resurrection from a new perspective, and to do so, I want to tell you about Pam. I know Pam from my days of coaching swimming at the Blaisdell YMCA. Pam was in high school when she swam for the team. She was one of those who showed up for practice, who worked very hard, who had some good times but wasn't a first place swimmer, and who had a lot of fun. I remember Pam most clearly as one of four on the relays. In those days she was all about supporting her teammates, swimming her very best, having a great attitude, and helping out when and where she could. Pam actually reminds me of myself. Rick and I were married during one of those swimming seasons, and Pam, with all the other girls in her relay, were at our wedding, we have pictures of all of them at the wedding, the whole team in fact. Pam's children, two little girls, swim for the Blaisdell YMCA swim team. Now my sister, Mary, who coordinates aquatics there, knows Pam and her husband and their children well. About six months ago, Pam was diagnosed with a brain tumor. After a little radiation, it was clear there was nothing to be done. I have kept up with Pam's dieing by way of the Caring Bridge website. Her sisters write about once a week, they write about their sister, they write about their nieces mother, they write about their brother-in-law's wife, and as I read what they write I am reminded of the young woman I knew so many years earlier. Today she is a sister who is supportive and present, a mom who is filled with joy at the live's of her children, and a wife who is attentive to her loving husband. And the story they are telling about life and death is heartbreaking, honest, and grace-filled. Pam lives in a thin place, the door to her new life is open wide, and soon she will step through it. Her sisters also tell a story of perspective. Pam has lost so much, she has lost the ability to run and play, and yet every smile and laugh and hug are treasured. The gap between Pam's life and death is minuscule, really non-exsistent. It really is no different for us. I share this story with you today to illustrate perspective. The value of our lives and our relationships all depend on where we stand and what we see. We perceive a time and space gap between us and God. We perceive a chasm that stretches from here to eternity. But, you see, the gap between this life and the resurrected life only seems big and wide and deep from our perspective. I am pretty sure from God's perspective, the gap between new life, the resurrected life, is not so big. From Pam's perspective, there is no gap, that place is thin and holy. With Jesus' life, death, resurrection and ascension, and the gift of the holy spirit, the gap has been closed. Why can't we live in those thin places, where God's love and grace are so very close. We get so hung up in that perceived gap. We get so concerned with time and space that we can't even seem to function. We ask questions that miss the point. We wonder how much time we have before we must or are forced to turn around and pay attention to God. We ask about what happens to us after death. Some people focus so desperately on right and wrong behavior. And we wonder why, why do good people, young people, get brain tumors and die. But all of that misses the mark. The life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus show us that God's love is operative right now. God's love was, is, and will be forever. God's love is available to all, no exceptions. There is no gap between God and us. God is with us in love, God is with us in the gift of the spirit, God is with us in one another. Our job is to respond to that love, not at some later date, not once and for all, but now, and again, and again, and again. Our response to God's love looks a lot like the fruits of the spirit; love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Our response to God's love looks a lot like how we live our lives, and how we die our deaths. Our response to God's love changes our perspective. And the story of the ascension shows us that Jesus is with us always. I don't quite understand how that works, it's the gap thing all over again, but that is the wrong perspective. The ascension shows us that somehow in this Good News that love wins, God's love is made available to every one at every time, when life is good and joyful, and when life is hard or broken. At some time and in some space, Jesus physically walked this same road we are on. But one of the limitations of embodied humanity, Jesus' embodied humanity, your embodied humanity, is that we occupy physical time and physical space. Another limitation of embodied humanity is that we stop occupying physical time and physical space. What changes with Jesus is that God shows us that God loves everyone, no exceptions, at all times and in all places. What changes with Jesus is the gift of the Holy Spirit. What changes with Jesus is that the gap is closed between God and creation, God and us. Our response to God's love changes our perspective. The story from John we have before us today is actually a Jesus prayer, it's the other Lord's prayer. In it, Jesus asks God for joy and protection for us, for all of us who occupy this life. With the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus, the gap is closed. Our response to God's love changes our perspective. The cracks in our hearts are filled with God's healing love. The cracks in our relationships are filled with God's forgiving love. The cracks in our perfection are filled with God's perfect love. The space between God and us is thin, the gap is closed, Jesus does that for us. From God's perspective, we are already enveloped, engulfed, we are already one. Our job is to respond to God's love with mercy and compassion. As we respond with mercy and compassion, as we respond with the fruits of the spirit, as we respond with joy and grace, our perspective changes. We are transformed, and Love wins. As we respond to God's love with joy and grace, the situations in which we find ourselves are transformed. We become the peacemakers, the graceful ones. We become the bridge between God and those whose hearts have been hardened, and their perspective changes. The space between God and us is thin, the gap is closed. Love wins. Amen.

2 Epiphany Yr B

It had been raining for days and days, and a terrible flood had come over the land. The waters rose so high that one man was forced to climb onto the roof of his house. As the waters rose higher and higher, a man in a rowboat appeared, and told him to get in. "No," replied the man on the roof. "I have faith in the Lord; the Lord will save me." So the man in the rowboat went away. The man on the roof prayed for God to save him. The waters rose higher and higher, and suddenly a speedboat appeared. "Climb in!" shouted a man in the boat. "No," replied the man on the roof. "I have faith in the Lord; the Lord will save me." So the man in the speedboat went away. The man on the roof prayed for God to save him. The waters continued to rise. A helicopter appeared and over the loudspeaker, the pilot announced he would lower a rope to the man on the roof. "No," replied the man on the roof. "I have faith in the Lord; the Lord will save me." So the helicopter went away. The man on the roof prayed for God to save him. The waters rose higher and higher, and eventually they rose so high that the man on the roof was washed away, and alas, the poor man drowned. Upon arriving in heaven, the man marched straight over to God. "Heavenly Father," he said, "I had faith in you, I prayed to you to save me, and yet you did nothing. Why?" God gave him a puzzled look, and replied "I sent you two boats and a helicopter, what more did you expect?"

I begin with this joke today because it's funny, but it also illustrates the very funny story we have in the Old Testament from 1st Samuel. Poor old Eli was trying to get some sleep, and that Samuel runs into his room three times with "I heard you calling me, what do you want." Finally Eli realizes who is calling Samuel, and it's not him, it's God. It's a good thing Eli finally figured this out, who knows how long this would have gone on if he hadn't. And as Samuel grew up, the Lord was with him and let none of his words fall to the ground.

This persistent calling of Samuel story is paired with the calling of Nathanael in John and Psalm 139, which happens to be my very favorite Psalm. O Lord you have searched me and known me, even before a word is on my tongue Lord, you know it, you knit me together in my mother's womb, I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Years of psychoanalysis will not get me to know myself like God knows me, and in all of that, God still loves me. This is truly amazing. God loves me, God loves you, not because of who we are or what we've done or not done. God loves. Love wins. God knows and God still loves.

The Gospel from John seems hard to break open. Is it a story about Philip, to whom Jesus said, follow me. It is a story about Nathanael, who seems to know whom Jesus is, the Son of God.
 
Our Epiphany stories have all been stories that show and tell us what incarnation looks like, they are stories that show and tell us about how incarnation changes everything, and how then we must go home by another way. I think the collection of stories we hear today follow the same theme, they are all stories that illustrate how different the story of God is from the story that the world in which we live tells us, whether that world is hundreds of years before Christ, whether that world is first century Israel, or whether that world is 2012 years after Christ.

Samuel was a trustworthy prophet of the Lord. The job of a prophet was to tell people what they least wanted to hear. That they need to shape up, change their ways, and turn to God. What we hear in these stories is the invitation to live another way, not the way of the world. To take seriously the amazing and abundant love that God has for us. The story in Corinthians is a story about belonging. We belong to God. The author of Corinthians wonders, don't you know that you are not your own. You belong to God. And in John,
we hear clearly the invitation to live by a different way, to be a part of the story of God, who is here in our midst.
 
What is so powerful in this set of stories today is that we hear about God's activity in the lives of God’s people in and through history. And at the same time, we are invited to be part of God’s mission.
Today, we are invited to be a part of what God is up to now. Unfortunately, sometimes we are like Samuel, who couldn't figure out it was God calling, and sometimes we are like Philip and Nathanael,
wondering how and where Jesus gets to know us so intimately, although we know God knows us intimately because of Psalm 139. Each one of us is invited to step into the unknown, and live this radical life in relationship with God, without knowing really what to expect, except that we are called to be faithful.
 
When we say yes to God’s call we don’t know what that will bring. Like Samuel with Eli's encouragement before us, it is our turn to respond to God with here I am, here we are. It is our turn to respond to Jesus who says, follow me. What does our response look like, our response as an individual and our response as a church? We must imagine that, we must begin to see the possibilities. Come and see, Philip says. Maybe we need to picture the people populating these pews. Who will they be? Maybe they are young families. Maybe they are Episcopalians, but probably they are not. Maybe they are people disaffected from other denominations for various reasons, maybe they are just people looking for love and acceptance in a house of God. Maybe they are people seeking Christ; maybe they are people seeking meaning. I’m hoping they are people finding Christ and finding meaning here, finding love and acceptance at this table, and in this body. Maybe they are people who want to understand who they are and who they are called to be, they are people who want to seek and serve Christ in all persons, here behind these walls, and out there, in the community. Maybe they are people who will challenge you to grow and develop in your own spiritual journey, because you will accompany them on their journeys and be changed by them.
 
But on some level they are people who want to be a part of the story, and not bystanders. The story we tell about how God created humanity, how God blesses the creation, how God promises to always be God. This is the story about how we turned away from God, about how we worship so many things other than God, and it is the story about how God calls us back, calls us back, about how God will not let us go. It is the story about how God loves us so much, that God came as one of us, as Jesus, and lived and died as one of us, and brought us back into relationship. We can belong to God, because we know God is right here, right now, in the midst of us, in ways that are evident, and in ways we can only imagine and dream about. This is our story; this is the story that makes us a people.
 
What does your response to Jesus’ call, follow me, look like? It is timely that we hear this call of Samuel, and of Andrew and Peter, Philip and Nathanael, on this day, so close to the anniversary of the birth of Dr Martin Luther King, Jr. A man who answered a call, and risked everything to respond to Jesus’ call of equality in the new covenant. Sometimes we make the mistake of thinking that responding to Jesus’ call has to be in some particular way, but that is not true. Responding to Jesus’ call is to live out loving God and loving your neighbor in every aspect of your life. Responding to Jesus’ call, follow me, is to live out your baptismal promises in your work, in your school, in your play, in your family, and in your business dealings.
 
These stories we hear today are a challenge to you to live out Jesus’ invitation to follow. How will you respond to that invitation?

Alleluia. The Lord has shown forth his glory: Come let us adore him. Alleluia.

7 Easter Yr A

I have a very fond memory of teaching at Ascension School in North Minneapolis, on the Feast of the Ascension, which is 40 days after Easter, and usually fell near the last Thursday of the school year. We celebrated the Ascension just this past Thursday. We would spend the whole day playing games inside and outside, concluding the day with mass, and then releasing piles of red balloons. It was a glorious day for everyone, and although it was a day free from the rigors of school, we pointed the children to the glory of God seen and experienced in play and in one another. It was an opportunity to look through the ordinary to see the extraordinary.

Looking through the ordinary to the extraordinary, to the glory of God, is what an icon is. An icon is a picture, image, or representation through which we may gain a glimpse of the holy, the glory of God. However, icon is used is popular parlance in ways that defy this traditional meaning of the word. Sports figures are called icons, I remember Princess Diana being called an icon, and the word is thrown around in the world of advertising quite a bit. Ronald McDonald, The Green Giant, Betty Crocker, The Energizer Bunny, Aunt Jemima, Tony the Tiger, and my favorite, The Pillsbury Doughboy are all icons in the advertising world. Although they may be memorable, even cute and fun, I'm not convinced they are that through which we may see a glimpse of the holy. However, I suppose that depends on your take on the holy.

The story of the ascension, this story we have before us today, help us to glimpse the glory of God, like icons help us to glimpse the holy. And these stories bring the Incarnation full circle. God gave up all power and came into this world in the flesh, as one of us, fully human. That is the incarnation. That is God with us. Jesus lived, and loved, as you and I live and love. Jesus died, as you and I die, however the circumstances of Jesus’ death are certainly different than the circumstances of our deaths, most of us are not put to death because of the way we live our lives. The stories we have heard this Eastertide are stories that attest to the resurrection of Jesus, the absolutely new life that God accomplished and continues to accomplish in Jesus. This story of the ascension tells us that Jesus returned to God to glorify God, and so that we may know God, and in knowing God, we may have eternal life, life right here and right now that is absolutely new and different and life with God that is new and different than the life that we experience now.

This is the reality of what God did, and continues to do in Jesus. God came to us to be known, and to know God transforms us and introduces us to a different quality of living. It is this that our gospel in John shows us today.

In a wonderful little book called Plan B, Further thoughts on faith, by Anne Lamott is a series of essays, reflections really, on faith and family and politics. There is one essay in it called holding on, in which Anne tells the story about insisting that her teenage son attend church with her. She writes, “why do I make him go? Because I want him to… We live in bewildering, drastic times, and a little spiritual guidance never killed anyone. I want him to see the people who love me when I felt most unlovable… I want him to see their faces…” She continues, “there are worse things for kids than to have to spend time with people who love God. Teenagers who do not go to church are adored by God, but they don’t get to meet some of the people who love God back. Learning to love back is the hardest part of being alive.”

God came to us to be known, and to know God transforms us. See, God loves us whether or not we love God back. God adores us whether or not we care. But God wants us to know about that, God wants us to know how much we are loved, so God came to show us, that we may be transformed by that love. How do we know God? How are we transformed? How is God glorified? By learning to love back.

In the midst of our own disappointments, we are transformed by loving back. In the midst of our own pain, we are transformed by loving back. In the midst of our own stubbornness, we are transformed by loving back. When we hurt others, we are transformed by loving back. When we overuse, when we overconsume, we are transformed by loving back.

When it feels like we are defeated, when it feels like we have nothing left, God continues to love us, and we are transformed by loving back. When it feels like no one likes us, when it feels like we don’t fit in, when it feels like everyone else is going a different direction, God continues to love us, and we are transformed by loving back.

When we love God back, we witness to the fact that it isn’t about any one of us anyway. It’s about God, and it is about God’s relationship with us, and our relationship with one another. That’s the point that Anne Lamott makes in her essay about making her son go to church, she wants him to be a part of a group of people who love God back, who show that in their worship, in their music, in their Sunday school, and in the way they treat each other and in the way they treat people who are not members of their church. In how they feed the hungry, how they clothe the naked, how they put the last first, and the first last.

Loving God back is not necessarily about any one of us individually, although we can love God back as individuals. Loving God back is really a community endeavor. The God who loves and adores each and every one of us is a very personal God, we know that because God came to be one of us. But our response to God is not private, it is communal and therefore public. Contributing money to feeding the hungry is very important, and yet when we work together to eliminate poverty we are able to transform our lives together. Giving our second and third jackets to Coats for Kids is very important, and yet working together protect the most vulnerable among us will transform our lives and the system we live within.

The gospel of John not only is about this circle of incarnation, life, death and resurrection, and ascension, it is also about unity. Jesus’ desire is that we may be one as Jesus and God are one. Living a life in Christ is not an individual endeavor. Responding to God’s amazing love for us is not an individual endeavor. It is a community project, in it we are one body, and by it we are made one body. Unity is not the same as agreement, unity is about the body of Christ. As people of the body of Christ, we come from diverse backgrounds we come from different places, we arrive together with a whole different plate from which to eat, and, we are transformed into a living breathing organism that takes care of the least of these, that works for justice, that works for peace.

We are transformed into a living breathing organism that is greater than any one of us by ourselves, and capable of living out God’s love for this world. God came to be one of us to show us the way, Jesus lived and died, rose into new life and joined his father to show us the way. Jesus left with us a gift …. Ah but that’s next week.

God loves and adores you, Thanks be to God. Amen

5 Lent Yr A 2011

I think of Mary and Martha as good friends of mine. Mary and Martha are women who cook and clean and maybe even listen to good stories, and they are women who are committed to Jesus. I think the reason they seem like good friends of mine is that we do the same things, it seems like we share the same interests and concerns. Martha is concerned about the perfume that Mary used to anoint Jesus’ feet, she wonders if that wasn’t a bit extravagant. Martha also is concerned that Mary tends to act more like a disciple of Jesus, than the single girl that she is. Martha seems practical that way, Mary a bit more excessive, a bit overgenerous. Sometimes I wish I were a bit more like my friend Mary, and a bit less like my friend Martha.

So the sadness that Martha and Mary have experienced at the death of their brother Lazarus, seems passionate and powerful. Especially since they called on their friend Jesus to come and heal their brother, and Jesus didn’t come. He didn’t come when their brother lay dying, and he didn’t come to his funeral, Jesus broke my number one rule, always go to the funeral. Finally, four days after Lazarus has been laid in the tomb, Jesus comes.

Martha runs out to him in the depths of her grief and anger, screaming and hollering, maybe even pounding Jesus’ chest, “why weren’t you here earlier? You could have done something about this, now Lazarus lies rotting in that tomb. Why, did he have to die? Why didn’t you come? Why…”

These may be questions we all ask at the death of a friend, at the death of a loved one. The sorrow and grief of our friends becomes our sorrow and grief too. This story of Mary and Martha shows us that being faithful to Jesus is in no way a guarantee against pain and tragedy. There is no one on earth whose righteousness, wisdom, hard work, or good planning will preserve her from seeing the depths that Martha sees. Good people become widows and orphans. It’s a fact, and no less of a fact for Jesus’ coming.

But there is something else. We can cry to God from the depths, as we hear in the psalm. There is no depth, no loss, no tragedy, no disease or death, nothing on heaven or on earth or under the earth that can place the world or anyone in it beyond God’s redemption. Good people become widows and orphans, good people are killed in accidents, good people die from disease, and good people die at a young age. But God defends the widow and the orphan, and will not leave those God loves bereft.

God will not leave us filled with a sense of loss, God will not leave us. You see, that’s what was, is, and will be accomplished in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. God loves us, God loves all creation. And God, master of the universe, creator of all that is seen and unseen, gave up all power and came into this world as one of us, just like you and me. Jesus. God in our midst. And Jesus stood with our friends Mary and Martha, and wept at the death of his friend, Lazarus. Jesus didn’t take the pain away from our friends, but Jesus stood side by side, right in the very midst of them, and felt the pain and the sorrow along with them. This is a God in whom I can place my faith, my trust, just like my friends Martha and Mary did.

And this is the place we find ourselves today, the last Sunday before Jesus’ journey takes him to Jerusalem, the city in which he will be put to death for his radical ideas of love and inclusion. We find ourselves in this place of sadness, loss, pain and sorrow. A place of isolation, and of alienation. It is a place where we will spend much of our time until the day of resurrection.

When we are in a place of sadness, of loneliness, or a place of alienation it seems as if it will never come to a conclusion, the isolation, the sadness, the loneliness, will never end. But that is what our heart desires, conclusion, and reconciliation. Being once again brought back into the web of relationship in which the yearning of our heart is fulfilled; a place of solace and of strength, a place of pardon and renewal.

You may be in that place of loneliness and alienation right now. Some of you may be isolated in your relationships, some of you may be experiencing broken relationships. Some of you may feel alienated from the people around you, people at school or at work.

Good and true relationships are so very hard in this world where perceived perfection can be accomplished through surgery, implants, and pills. Good and true relationships are so very hard in this world when recreational sex is splayed all over our TV sets and pop culture magazines.

Our cries to God do not go unheard. It is into this mess that Jesus comes. This is the very place where Jesus comes to show us that we were created in God’s image and are wonderfully made. It is into this place of loneliness and alienation that Jesus comes and says you are not alone, you are never alone, I am with you, and I am here in those who surround you to show you the way.

This story of reconciliation, of restoration and new life is an ancient story that reaches as far back as the prophet Ezekiel, and it reaches as far forward as God can imagine. From Ezekiel we hear from the Lord, “I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people: and I will bring you back to the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am the Lord. I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live. “

And this story doesn’t end there. This story goes on. Jesus calls Lazarus out of his tomb, against the better judgment of our friends Mary and Martha, who know full well that after four days in the tomb this will not be pleasant.

John the gospel writer always points us to God, and this story is no different. It is for the glory of God that Jesus calls Lazarus out of the tomb. It is to show Mary and Martha, you and I, all who were gathered there that day, and all who hear this story over the millennia, that it is through God that creation has new life, that creation is brought back into right relationship with its creator. It is through God that we no longer live in isolation, we no longer are alienated from God and from one another, death does not separate us from God or from one another.

And yet, after we have become convinced that all is lost, when we are ready to concede to death, Jesus demonstrates that there is no loss, no death, no tragedy, no depth, no power in heaven or on earth or under the earth that can place a person, a situation, or a world beyond God’s redemption, and beyond the reach of infinite love and abundant life.

The Lord is full of compassion and mercy: Come let us adore him.

2 Lent Yr A

What is this being Christian really about? Why do we bother, every Sunday, every Wednesday, coming here, to this place to worship a God we cannot see. It would be so much easier to be out with the others, drinking good coffee at Starbucks, or some other coffee establishment, reading our newspaper, eating a wonderful confection for breakfast. Or sleeping in late, or reading a good book, or hanging out with kids and partner after a long and grueling week. And yet we are here. I don’t think it’s because I compel you to be here, I have thought about preaching hell and damnation if you don’t come, hoping to increase our numbers, but I don’t, I can’t. I can’t honestly do that, because I don’t think it’s right or true. Coming here on Sunday mornings, being together, participating in good music, prayers, bread and wine, body and blood, is not about hell and damnation, it’s not about life after death, it’s all about life in the here and now. It is about the eternal life that Jesus talks about with Nicodemus in our story this morning.

Eternal life is not about heaven. Remember on the Last Sunday before Lent, a couple of weeks ago, I said something about kairos and chronos. I talked about time and measuring time and the experience of time. We live in chronological time, we are conceived, we are born in to the world, we grow, we age, and we die. The story we hear from the gospel of John today seems to, and all the other stories as well seem to show a time that is not chronos. The stories in the bible speak about God’s time, they show us kairos, not chronos. The word eternal in today’s gospel doesn’t mean forever. It isn’t a uniform measurement of time like days and years marching endlessly into some unknown or even known future. That’s a category or concept that we really don’t even find in the bible. Eternal as in whoever believes in him may have eternal life, doesn’t mean the literal passing of time, it means transcending time, or kairos, it means belonging to another realm or reign altogether. It means belonging to God’s realm. That is where heaven comes in. When Jesus talked about heaven, he was talking about our present, eternal, intense, real experiences of joy, peace, and love in this life, this side of death and in whatever is to come. Heaven for Jesus wasn’t just someday; it was and is a present reality. Jesus blurs the lines, inviting Nicodemus, and us, into the merging of heaven and earth, the future and the present, here and now.
That is how you can be born again, because eternal life is less about a kind of time that starts when we die, and more about a quality and vitality of life lived now in connection to God. Eternal life doesn’t start when we die; it starts now. It’s not about a life that begins at death; it’s about experiencing the kind of life now that can endure and even survive death.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Why do we come here each Sunday morning to sing songs of praise, to worship, to encounter God’s word, to be with each other, to be fed by God’s body and blood? Because new life in Christ demands it. Because the response to God’s amazing creation, God’s amazing love and grace is to give thanks, because the response to God’s amazing gift of life and love is to raise up in prayer and song, and to fall on our knees in awe. And because it’s not about any one of us individually, it’s about us together.

Some Christians have co-opted this language of being born again and have made it into a one time and exclusive deal. If you say a particular set of words you have access to some sort of life after death that means you will spend eternity in heaven, as opposed to hell. That really doesn’t seem to be what Jesus talks about or is concerned about however. Jesus seems to be much more interested in the here and now, and the new life that is available to everyone, but especially people who are suffering, in pain, and on the margins. Jesus gave his life for this new life; Jesus walked a road of pain and suffering, for what? So that some people could have comfort in an afterlife, and so that most people who don’t have access will spend life after death in a place called hell?

God’s amazing and abundant love is available to all, that’s what Jesus’ life, suffering, death and resurrection makes real. There is no exclusivity to it; all of scripture shows us that. That’s why I come here, Sunday after Sunday after Sunday. Not because it’s an exclusive club, but because together we give thanks for this amazing gift, because together we recognize our need for forgiveness so that we can realize fully the love that God has for us, and because together we are fed and nourished so that we may feed and nourish others.

We are born again. In the midst of the pain and tragedy of this life, and we have observed and experienced some of the most horrific pain and tragedy recently, Jesus walks with us. In the midst of the pain and suffering of our lives, Jesus walks with us. Jesus doesn’t take that pain and suffering away, often we wish he would, Jesus carries the burden with us. The work that Jesus does in life and death, and resurrection, is to absorb all that pain and suffering, violence and hatred, and defeat it with the power of God’s amazing and abundant love.

You and I have access to that new life, to that amazing love, right here and right now. We are born again and again and again. It’s not about a one-time deal; it’s not one moment in time. It’s a process and it keeps happening, with cycles of acceptance and resistance, epiphany and doubt. We keep coming to church and we keep being fed and nourished because this journey is messy and unclear. We glimpse the new life that is right in front of it at one moment, and then we miss it, again we miss the mark, we loose the trail, we wander in the wilderness, and we come back to be fed and nourished and find our way again.

And as we are fed and nourished, we go out and feed and nourish others. And in the end, and in the beginning, and in the middle, that is what Christian discipleship is about, that is what this journey is about. It is about responding to the amazing love that God has for each and every one of us and for all of us, it is about the new life, the eternal life, the life of here and now, that is available to all of us. In the messiness of our lives, in the good and bad choices we make, in the pain and tragedy of human action and in the pain and tragedy of natural disaster, God’s amazing and abundant love is available to Abraham who lived in a land that worshiped gods who were not the One God, it is available to Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews, it is available to the Samaritan woman at the well, it is available to the man born blind, it is available to Lazarus and Martha and Mary, all outsiders, all people on the margins, all who never said the words, I accept Jesus as my personal lord and savior. And this same amazing and abundant love is available to you, and to me and to all of us.

The Lord is full of compassion and mercy: Come let us adore him.

2 Epiphany Yr A

We hear this morning from Paul that God is faithful and we are called into the fellowship of Jesus. We hear in Isaiah that God is faithful and that we are chosen, it echoes what we heard last week from Matthew and Isaiah and what we heard in Jesus’ baptism and what we hear in our own baptism. And in John’s gospel, as two disciples ask Jesus where he is staying, we hear an invitation, Jesus responds to the disciples with Come and see. Come and see.

Imagine yourself as one of those people who hear or sees Jesus, imagine yourself following Jesus as he invites the two disciples to come and see. What did people expect, what do you expect, of this long awaited Messiah, this Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world? Many people of Jesus’ time expected the Messiah to come in power and glory. As you followed Jesus would you expect to see a palace? At least a mansion or maybe a tastefully appointed home, at least a colorful tent with a cot to sleep on. But instead, there really is not much to see, Jesus doesn’t have a colorful tent and a caravan to show off, in fact he has nothing to show off. Come and see the stone for his pillow, come and see the dirt on which he lays. This is nothing like what was expected, and it is not about what we get when we respond to Jesus’ invitation and God’s faithfulness. This is not about what’s in our wallets, it is not about getting what we deserve, or living in prosperity. This is not about getting our needs met. Responding to the invitation to come and see is about relationship.

A relationship with Jesus, who is Emmanuel, God in our midst, Jesus is the one who walks with us, through the scary places, by the deep and dangerous water, by the peaceful and still water, to show us the way. For it is only a God who is willing to live this life with us, a God who is willing to give up all power to be like the powerless, who is a God in whom I can put my faith.

It is because Jesus is Emmanuel, God with us, the God-Revealer, the Lamb of God that it is worth the cost to follow. Jesus invited Andrew and Simon to come and see, and they recognized him for who he is, Rabbi, teacher, God with us. And they followed. They gave up their lives as fishermen, and followed Jesus, it cost them everything, for this relationship, they were disciples. Immediately following this part of the story we heard this morning is the calling of Philip and Nathanael, who also recognized Jesus and followed.

Why do Andrew and Simon, Philip and Nathanael, give up everything to follow Jesus? Not because of who they are, but because of who Jesus is. It’s not about them, it’s not about us, it’s about Jesus. In the gospel of John, Jesus is God’s word spoken into human form, God’s word clothed in arms and legs, hands and feet, God’s word entering human history.

Jesus speaks the word and it happens: forgiveness and judgment, healing and illumination, mercy and grace, joy and love, freedom and resurrection. Everything broken and fallen, sinful and diseased, is called into salvation by God’s spoken word, by Jesus the God-Revealer.

Eugene Peterson, who wrote The Message, writes in his introduction to the gospel of John, Jesus doesn’t impose salvation as a solution, he narrates salvation into being through leisurely conversation, intimate personal relationships, compassionate responses, passionate prayer, and his suffering and death. You and I cannot casually walk away from words like that; we cannot walk away from Jesus without making some sort of response. The response that Andrew and Simon, Philip and Nathanael made was to follow. You and I have that same choice, to follow, or not to follow.

Tomorrow we celebrate the life of one of Jesus’ modern day followers, Martin Luther King Jr. Much has been said and much has been written about Martin Luther King Jr., and my purpose today is not to reiterate all of that, but to talk about discipleship as a response to who Jesus is, and Martin Luther King Jr. embodied that discipleship. Martin Luther King Jr. was a great man, and a flawed man, much like many of us. But about himself what he wanted people to remember was that he fed the hungry, clothed the naked, and loved and served humanity.

What is our response to Jesus, the God-Revealer? To feed the hungry? Clothe the naked? Love and serve humanity? Martin Luther King Jr., Andrew, Simon, Philip, Nathanael, and each one of you is a disciple. Today is a day about discipleship; today is a day about our response to Jesus, the God-Revealer. Last week we heard the words spoken to Jesus, spoken to each one of us, this is my child, chosen and marked by my love, delight of my life. Today is about responding to these words.

Discipleship is simply our response to the awesome and amazing love that God reveals to us in the person of Jesus Christ. But discipleship is costly, as Andrew, Simon, Philip, Nathanael, Martin Luther King Jr., and all the others know dearly. Discipleship is costly. Our culture tends to not consider the cost of leaving behind something when we follow Jesus, instead it asks what do I get? And as Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the prominent German theologian wrote in 1937, when the rise of the Nazi regime was underway in Germany, "costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart. It is costly because it compels a man to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says: "My yoke is easy and my burden is light." The cost of discipleship is being forgiven, it is being made whole, and being in relationship.

My hope for each one of us is to respond to God’s gracious Word, with mercy and compassion, to respond by feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, serving humanity. You and I are called to be Jesus’ followers, to be Jesus’ disciples today as much as any day in history, and maybe more urgently than ever.

Come and see the One who loves you unconditionally, absolutely , and abundantly.

Alleluia. The Lord has shown forth his glory: Come let us adore him. Alleluia.

1st Sunday after Christmas Yr A

From Isaiah we hear, I will rejoice greatly in the Lord, my whole being shall exult in my God, for God has clothed me with the garments of salvation, God has covered me with the robe of righteousness. And in Galatians the Good News is that we are children of God.

We read this same set of readings each Sunday after Christmas, and each time I am overwhelmed by the awesomeness of God and of our human inability to speak of that. These readings challenge our understanding of God, and yet I’m not convinced we even understand God’s nature in an intellectual or a cognitive way. I think we understand it in a much more organic way, a way that touches the very truth of our being, and the very core of our limitedness.

Our humanness is tied directly to language. We really are formed and shaped by language, however adequate or inadequate it is. How we understand God, our relationship with God, how we understand Jesus human and divine, how we understand the presence of the Holy Spirit, is often about the words that we employ to describe that experience, that relationship. For example, those who say they are atheists are not necessarily people who do not believe in God, rather they may be people who cannot assent to a particular way of describing God, because our language is just not adequate to describe the totality and the mystery of that relationship.

Throughout history people have tried desperately to describe God, we have tried desperately to describe the reality in which we live. Today, postmodern thought suggests that what is real is only what we put language too. In many ways I am a postmodern thinker, but in this case what I think is real is God and our relationship with God. What that means is that God exists whether or not we have the language to describe God, and therefore a relationship exists whether or not we have the language to describe it. The challenge is to find the words and the symbols and the actions to describe God’s relationship with us and our relationship with God.

The first chapter of the gospel of John, In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the Word was God I hear as an absolutely beautiful and poetic song helping us to not only understand, but to feel and to see and to hear how we are related to God, and who Jesus is in that relationship. It is not coincidental that In the beginning is the Word invokes in us a notion of the spoken language, but language is so much more than the spoken word.

Every time I read these words from John I hear the language of music. Sometimes for me the language of music speaks more clearly than words. When I hear this passage from John, I am encircled, enveloped, swaddled, if you will, in the awesome and abundant love of our creator. When I hear these words I hear a symphony.

I hear the bass, the tuba, the tympani and the baritone, beating as the heart of creation. I hear the bass clarinets, and the bassoons, and the saxophones joining in the building of the harmonies. I hear the flutes and the clarinets with the melody of love and hope. And I hear the trumpets and the French horns with the blast of the proclamation that God has created the world and come into it as one of us. And I hear the sadness of the oboes, with the news that some do not choose to listen to and be transformed by the music.

Music is organic; as is the love of God. It is in the fiber of creation, the stones shout it out, the wind hums the word, the rain keeps the beat, the grace and truth of Christ is made real in the dance of the spheres.

In A Wind in the Door, the second book in a series of books by Madeleine L’engle, the first being A Wrinkle in Time, the author writes that for growth to happen there is a necessary death. The passage I quote this morning is a passage late in the book, when Meg O’Keefe, the main character, and her friend Calvin are really beginning to understand the interconnectedness of all things, and they are beginning to understand, birth, death, and resurrection. The reason I quote from this story and from this passage is that it hearkens to the first chapter of John. It goes like this. “We are the song of the universe. We sing with the angelic host. We are the musicians. The stars are the singers. Our song orders the rhythm of creation. Calvin asked, ‘How can you sing with the stars?’ There was surprise at the question: it is the song. We sing it together. That is our joy. And our Being.”

The Light has come, is come, and will continue to come into the world. That is what Christmas attests too. Light overcomes darkness, darkness will not prevail. The Word is with us, the Word is in our midst, and the Word creates the song.

I am also aware that the first words of John, and the first words of Genesis, are very similar. In the beginning was the Word, In the beginning God created. This incarnation, God breaking into our world, God interrupting our lives, God in our midst, the Word made flesh, the song that sings light into the darkness, are words that attempt to describe God’s awesome activity.

Listen again to these words from the Gospel of John, from The Message. The Word was first, the Word present to God God present to the Word. The Word was God, in readiness for God from day one. Everything was created through him, nothing—not one thing! —came into being without him. What came into existence was Life, and the Life was light to live by. The Life-Light blazed out of the darkness, the darkness couldn’t put it out.

Alleluia. To us a child is born: Come let us adore him. Alleluia.

3 Easter Yr C

Myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, singing with full voice, worthy is the lamb. Singing and worship are central to Revelation; a fact often overlooked by people who see the book only as a system of end time predictions. In Revelation we sing our way into God’s new vision for our world. We worship the God who gave us life. And wherever we go, to school, to work, or shopping, everywhere in the world, the lamb is with us, leading us into a new way of life. And that new way of life is forgiveness and reconciliation and is brought about by the power of vulnerable love to bring healing.

Chapters two and three are not in our lectionary to read, they are John’s vision for the seven churches that are in Asia. They show us that John’s Revelation is not a private ecstasy, just as the Gospel is not for private consumption. The Good News is personal, but it is never merely individual. The Good News is always revealed in a family, a tribe, a nation, a church. The gospel pulls us into community. Sin fragments us, separates us, and sentences us to solitary confinement. At the completion of each of John’s visions for the seven churches, are the words, Let anyone who has an ear listen to what the Spirit is saying to the churches.

And that brings us to Revelation four and five, these chapters that point us to worship. In chapter four we hear about the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and inside. Day and night without ceasing they sing, Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God the Almighty, who was and is and is to come. And continuing, You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created. Words you may be familiar with from hearing each Sunday worship service in our Eucharistic Prayer. Chapters four and five are all about worshipping the God who sits on the throne and the Lamb.

Christians worship with a conviction that they are in the presence of God. Worship is an act of attention to the living God who rules, speaks and reveals, creates and redeems, orders and blesses. According to Eugene Peterson, author of Reversed Thunder, The Revelation of John and the Praying Imagination, outsiders, observing these acts of worship, see nothing like that. They see a few people singing unpopular songs, sometimes off-key, someone reading from an old book and making remarks that may or may not interest the listeners, and then eating and drinking small portions of bread and wine that are supposed to give nourishment to their eternal souls in the same way that beef and potatoes sustain their mortal flesh. The question Peterson asks is, who is right? Is worship an actual meeting called to order at God’s initiative in which persons of faith are blessed by his presence and respond to his salvation? Or is it a pathetic and sometimes desperate charade in which people attempt to get God to pay attention to them and do something for them? Jesus stands at the door and knocks. What happens when we open the door? Peterson goes on to write, In worship God gathers God’s people to himself as center. Worship is a meeting at the center so that our lives are centered in God and not lived eccentrically. We worship so that we live in response to and from this center, the living God. Failure to worship consigns us to a life of spasms and jerks, at the mercy of every advertisement, every seduction, every siren. Without worship we live manipulated and manipulating lives.

Revelation calls us to worship God, and to respond to God’s presence. Many have legitimately asked the question, why go to church? Why worship God? Some people will say, I believe in God, I’m just not religious, or I’m spiritual, I just don’t believe in organized religion, or, I worship alone, by myself, out in nature. But I agree with Peterson, worship is a meeting called to order at God’s initiative and we are all blessed by God’s presence and respond to God’s salvation. Revelation shows us the way. And here’s a spoiler alert, near the end of the story, in Revelation 21, we hear that the home of God is among mortals, God will dwell with us, we will be God’s people, and God will wipe every tear from our eyes, death will be no more, and the one who was seated on the throne says, see, I am making all things new. This is why I find Revelation so exciting. God is doing these things now. Not at some future date, God is making all things new now, that is what happens in Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection. This is why we are Easter people, because God is making all things new, God is making you and I new, God is renewing the face of the earth. And the fulfillment that God promises is that God dwells with us. I believe this is what heaven is, God dwelling with us.

This exciting and Good News calls us to worship, calls us to be blessed by God’s presence and to respond to God. It also means that we have agency in the new creation. We have the power to be co-creators with God and with Jesus in this new creation; we have the power to do something significant as citizens of God’s kingdom. Our Presiding Bishop has been quoted, “We claim a faith that has a vision of what civilization ought to look like, called the reign of God, or the kingdom of God. When current reality is dramatically divergent from that vision, most of us feel it's our responsibility to advocate for a different vision.” What is our vision of this kingdom on earth? What is it that our worship creates in us, in our church, in our world?

Our worship forms a vision of hospitality. We recognize the risen Christ in our midst by the offer of “come and eat,” we recognize our true selves in the meal Christ offers. In Jesus’ life, all were welcome, even if that wasn’t so true in the culture in which he lived. At Jesus’ table, all were welcome. The impetuous Peter, naked in the boat who dressed before he jumped into the water, who denied Jesus three times before the cock crowed, and who repeated three times “Yes Lord, you know that I love you.” Thomas, not the doubter, but the one who needs to ask the questions. John, who always refers to himself as the one Jesus loved best. Matthew, the tax collector. Judas, the betrayer. Mary, who loved Jesus enough to sit at his feet and be still, Martha, who loved Jesus so much she would leave her kitchen to come and be with him. Zaccheus, the one who had to climb the tree to see Jesus, who was also a tax collector. Saul the persecutor, who became Paul, the bold and courageous. All whose lives, whose relationships, were broken, all who were welcome to come and eat. All who recognized Jesus and were loved, and fed, and who were restored to wholeness.

We are invited to come and eat. In the midst of the mess of this world, in the midst of tragedy we are called to the hope of transformation. We are invited to the meal, and no one is left behind or left out. We are invited to worship God who is the center of our lives, personally and collectively. We are invited to forget about ourselves, our problems, our needs, and are to be concerned about the other. We are invited to feed each other. And in the feeding, we become who we are created to be.

The vision of the new kingdom, the kingdom that we are active in creating is a vision of hospitality. At God’s table, all have enough to eat. All are healed of brokenness, of alienation, of separation. Everyone sits down at the picnic table together to feast on fish and bread. The lives that are changed by this meal are our lives. We are invited to eat, and in the eating God seeps into our very being. We offer our brokenness, we offer our true selves, and we are accepted and loved and empowered. Jesus’ hospitality empowers us to respond in worship in feeding others as we have been fed. We are empowered to offer dignity where there is none.

And this vision of hospitality is about the now and the not yet. The charcoal is laid, and we are invited to eat. Now, this very moment. It is also a vision of what will be. Revelation calls us to wake up and change, Revelation calls us to transformation, Revelation calls us to the supper of the Lamb. The vision in Revelation is invitation to the supper it is of new and transformed life and it is about being in the world as an empowered and nourished agent of change.

Alleluia, The Lord is risen: Come let us adore him. Alleluia!