3 Easter Yr A April 23 2023

3 Easter Yr A April 23 2023

Acts 2:14a,36-41, 1 Peter 1:17-23, Luke 24:13-35, Psalm 116:1-3, 10-17

 

Risen Lord, be known to us in the breaking of the bread. From the moment my journey in the Episcopal church began, this is the scripture, the prayer, the action, that made the presence of Jesus Christ real for me. There is nothing about church, about community, about family, about faith, about compassion and justice, about baptismal promises, about a passion for the gospel of Jesus Christ, that is not contained in this little collection of words, if only we can recognize. Risen Lord, be known to us in the breaking of the bread.

 

As a child, I lived in a community of people. I am five of eight. There were most always people around, and the liveliest times of the day were our dinner meal. We would scrunch around our kitchen table, someone would have to sit on a stool at the counter, actually, the bread board, remember bread boards? in order to get us all in. I wonder if then I recognized the wonder in all that chaos. When my extended family would gather for holidays, there were 23 of us grandchildren. We would enjoy a meal together, but not much quiet. Often many of us little ones would end up staying the night wherever we were, eating breakfast and lunch together the next day, and playing of course. I think the seeds of understanding Jesus’ real presence were planted in those gatherings.

 

In the summer of 2013, Rick and I, and Tom and Amanda, and Willie went on an incredible journey, and among many amazing things we did, we met some of our Norwegian relatives. They were as happy to meet us as we were to meet them. A cousin, Jan, took us to see the land on which our ancestors farmed. We were profoundly moved as we stood on that land, and felt the timeless connection to those who came before us, and those who will follow us. We recognized that connection, that story that joins us all together. At Jan's home, we ate a wonderful meal of Norwegian porridge, and pork, and cheese, and bread, of course. The next day we gathered with my cousins Kjell and MaryAnn and had heart shaped waffles with cloudberries.

 

Risen Lord, be known to us in the breaking of the bread.

 

It makes so much sense, as we journey together through this life, that breaking bread together is the central activity for us, we come from farmers after all. The most radical activity that Jesus engaged in was to invite people to a meal. And everyone got that invitation. Not only were there religious leaders, there were tax collectors, there were women, single women at that, women who were protected by no one. At table Jesus taught about the kingdom of God. At table Jesus disrupted the social order. At table, Jesus nourished not only the body, but the spirit and the soul as well.

 

When we gather at the communion table we come from home and work and school; we come from far away and down the street, we come and we tell our story, and we tell the story of God’s activity in our lives; we tell the story of creation, blessing, turning away, God loving us back into relationship, repentance, reconciliation and restoration. We tell the story of life, death, and resurrection. We tell the truth.

 

The story that we know and we tell, is about how God saved God's people from the flood waters, and God freed God's people from slavery in Egypt. God brought God's people out of exile back into their land and God came to live and die as one of us, Jesus is in our midst.

 

We read and we study and tell these stories. We listen and talk about what God did and continues to do in this world. We tell these stories to our children. And we do because they help us remember who we are. We remember who we are and we recognize one another and we are recognized in the breaking of bread and the prayers. We give thanks for our blessings; we ask for healing for ourselves and others, we eat together.

 

That is what happened with the two in our story today, who were walking away from Jerusalem, dejected, alone, afraid. Wondering what it was all about, wondering how it all went so very wrong. And the One who told the story of Moses and all the prophets, who told them the story of Jesus, joined them. They invited him to stay, he did, they ate together, and they recognized him.

 

We recognize Jesus in the people with whom we gather to share and tell our stories, and the stories of our faith; we recognize Jesus in the breaking of bread, we see Jesus in the hands, and in the eyes, and in the faces of the people who are at our table.

 

But we also recognize Jesus in the stranger, and the alien, and the immigrant. We see and hear Jesus in those who are out there, those who continue to live in isolation, in loneliness, in hurt, in this broken world. We recognize the freedom, the peace, the community that can be theirs as well.

 

Risen Lord, be known to us in the breaking of the bread. But it's not just in the baking of the bread, or in the breaking of the bread, the bread broken for you and for me. Our wholeness comes from brokenness, our healing rises up out of broken hearts that are mended by God’s love. Humanity is made whole once more by the real presence of Jesus in our midst, in our lives, in our brokenness, the broken bread.

 

Risen Lord, be known to us in the breaking of the bread. Help us to recognize you in word and sacrament, in story and in food, help us to see you in the midst of community. Help us to be agents of your new creation, standing on the ground that you have already won in your resurrection.

 

It is in the bread, broken for us and for all, that we recognize the Love that wins. Amen. 

Easter Vigil 2023

Easter Vigil 2023

Matthew 28:1-10

 

After the sabbath, as the first day of the week was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. And suddenly there was a great earthquake; for an angel of the Lord, descending from heaven, came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. For fear of him the guards shook and became like dead men. But the angel said to the women, "Do not be afraid; I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples, `He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.' This is my message for you." So they left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. Suddenly Jesus met them and said, "Greetings!" And they came to him, took hold of his feet, and worshiped him. Then Jesus said to them, "Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me."

 

 

Mary Magdalene and the other Mary heard the angel of the Lord, Do not be afraid, Jesus is not here, he has been raised as he said, go and tell everyone.

 

We have had quite a journey to get to this place, on this night. We followers of Jesus, along with all of the characters who populate this amazing story of love, Mary, Joanna, Peter, have accompanied Jesus into Jerusalem with the shouting of Hosannas. We have watched with horror as the events turned violent. We have been implicated in the apathy that allowed Jesus to be condemned and killed. We sat in the silence and waited as we believed with those very first followers, that Jesus, the one who stood for love, the one who healed others, was dead. That was the end. It looked like failure. It looked like the light went out. It looked like evil won.

 

This evening began with the affirmation that indeed the light did not go out. There was flame enough to kindle the new fire, and together we sang it back into a roaring flame. We took solace and strength in hearing stories of salvation history. Reminding ourselves of God's creativity, reminding ourselves of God's liberation, reminding ourselves that God puts us back together again after we have fallen apart. Baptizing Milo and Eleanor, and remembering our own baptism, when Jesus claimed us as God's own forever, and we were marked as God's beloveds. And here we proclaim the Alleluias. The Alleluias that fill our hearts and our minds with the love of God and each other, the alleluias that ring through eternity, and that shimmer in our own breath and blood. 

 

With the words, He has been raised from the dead! Mary, and the other Mary knew what until that moment, they had only hoped to believe . They knew that this man that they had known in life, defeated death. They knew that this man they had loved, was all that had been promised. The temple would be destroyed and raised in three days, on the third day rise again. They knew what it meant. Jesus was where the God they had worshipped since they were children, lived now. Jesus was where God walked, and loved and healed. Jesus whose body was broken on that cross, now is the one who puts our brokenness back together again. The women realized that death does not have the final word. They knew that it is in dying that there is new life.

 

Our sadness and grief of Holy Week, our brokenness in life, is put back together in this Easter hope. We are Easter people. And like Mary Magdalen and the other Mary, Jesus’ mother, on that first Easter morning, our lives sing with the love that created us, the love that calls us into being, the love that puts us back together when we break apart, when we miss the mark, the love that changes our very hearts and souls into a new creation. And on our hearts, with the cursive of the healed scars, is inscribed the words, you are loved, broken, healed, love one another.

 

As Easter people we don't ignore the reality of our lives, in all of the happiness and hurtfulness, in all of the care and chaos, in all of the tenderness and terror. It is never one way or the other, it is always a dance of pain and joy. But we do live this life fully embraced and empowered by this Easter reality, your life matters, it matters now. The reality of the cross and the resurrection shows us that our relationships matter, that dignity and respect matter.

 

As Easter people we live in the reality that changed the way we are related to one another. Power doesn't win, love wins. Darkness does not prevail, light shines through. Brokenness doesn't end our lives, it only creates the fissures into which God's love can seep.

 

And as Easter people, as people who have been named by Jesus, we are marked and claimed as God's own. Our hearts and our lives are claimed by the love that heals us, the love that puts us back together, the love that wins. And from that love flows the ministry that God calls us to, love one another.

 

Now, Jesus dwells with us, and together we are about the business of kingdom building, as Jesus did and does. It is a kingdom in which all are loved, a kingdom in which all are fed. A kingdom in which mercy and compassion rule. A kingdom in which a broken body makes us whole, a kingdom in which the body of Christ makes us a body of Christ.

 

As we walk out of the doors of this church this evening, our work begins. The body of Christ is at work with God's mission of healing and reconciliation in the world. It is our work of bearing God's love to those who, like us are broken, it is our work of bearing God's love in all places and all times. It is our work of feeding those who are hungry, because we have been hungry. It is our work of mercy and compassion, because we know what it is like to miss the mark.

 

We are Easter people. We walk this journey of life knowing the amazement of resurrection, and the pain and suffering that precedes it, and like the women at the tomb on that first Easter morning, with fear and great joy, and run to tell the others.

 

We are Easter people. We are nourished by the bread and the body that is broken for us. We are Easter people, made whole by the love that wins. Alleluia, Christ is risen.

 

Good Friday April 8 2023

Good Friday April 8 2023

I think Good Friday is such a confusing day. Is it a day of mourning, or a day of rejoicing? Is it a day to be sad, or is it a day of forgiveness, love, and compassion? It is all of that. It is time out of time, it is unexpected, in it the system is broken, Jesus is broken, we are broken. What is good about Good Friday? 

 

I think what is good about Good Friday is that it shows us the true story about death. That there isn't just one death that each of us must die, but there are many. Over and over we must die to that which is killing us, over and over, to truly be ourselves, we must lay down all that gets in our way of the loving relationship that God desires with us. And that is good, and very different than what the world tells us is good. And it is different for each of us, the stuff that gets in our way, the idols we worship, the dependency on ourselves, security and safety. God says, lay that down, and don't pick it up again. Walk with me, depend on me.

 

We live this day, and many days, in the reality of this cross. The cross that reminds you of God's love for you, the cross that reminds you that it is through death, and for Jesus, death on that cross, that you receive full and new life. The cross that reminds us of Jesus' brokenness, of our brokenness.

 

Good Friday shows us that something must die before the green and growing thing can take root and bear new life. Good Friday shows us that forgiveness is about pruning that which is dead anyway, so that God can affect in us the new life that God promises. Good Friday shows us that the work Jesus does on the cross matters, that God's love for humanity, and the healing that love affects, saves us. 

 

Jesus’ prayer in the garden of Gethsemane is Lord, not my will but yours be done. Giving up our will is not a bad thing. In our culture that is all about you, all about what you want and when you want it, obedience becomes a bad word. But it is being who God wants us to be that is a good thing, and that requires that we die to whatever it is that holds us hostage, whatever it is that is killing us.

 

Good Friday shows us holy dying, it is not easy, but it is a part of life. You see, the truth is that being human means being born to die. Again, none of us gets out of here alive. Jesus’ life, and suffering and death on a Roman cross not only show us how to do it, but Jesus, on that Roman cross, takes our place. On this night we remember all this. We enter into the story of the passion.  We hear the story in the voices of those who were with Jesus that terrible night. We do so not to glorify Jesus’ death or any other death, we do it so that we may be healed, we may be reconciled, that we may have the absolutely new and abundant life that God offers in the life, suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

 

The people who populate this story, and the events of this passion, the betrayal, the lies, the apathy, the bad luck, allow each of us to enter the story. You and I are these people, we are people who have betrayed and been betrayed, we are people who have lied and who have been lied to, we are people who have shown apathy, and we are people who experience just darn bad luck. We are people who have experienced sadness and pain, we are people who feel isolated and alienated at times. We are human beings who live in the muck and mess of this life. What we do together this evening, and even the joyous resurrection we will celebrate together on Sunday, doesn’t take away the reality of the muck and mess in which we live. We carry our crosses, they are part of who we are.

 

So what does happen when we walk the way of the cross with Jesus, when we enter into the events of this holy week and this holy day? Why do we all show up all these evenings to walk the way of the cross with Jesus? We grow toward Holy Dying and transformation happens. I surely hope we are changed by our encounter with the people on the way, the people in the stories, and by the amazing love that God has for us that we know because God is willing to be one of us. Because only a God who is willing to be one of us, a God who has such faith in us, is a God in which I can place my love, my loyalty, my attention.

What changes? Jesus does not fight violence with violence, hatred, or revenge. Love wins. Jesus takes on all of our betrayal, all of our lies, our apathy, all of our pain, sadness, loneliness and isolation, and Jesus defeats it, not by resisting it with the sort of violence that was visited upon him, but by absorbing it and removing it through the power of love. 

 

And Jesus’ dying on the cross looks to the world like failure. Jesus suffered, Jesus died. But Jesus did not fail. Jesus redefined death and life. Death does not have the final word; death does not have the victory. The Word of God has the final word.

 

What Jesus did on the cross was to make it possible for us to have new life, a life that our words cannot begin to describe, a life that our minds cannot begin to imagine. What Jesus did and does is to make it possible for us to be make whole, to be put back together again, to be loved wholly and completely. 

 

Winning and losing have no meaning in Jesus’ Kingdom; love and forgiveness are gifts. Success and failure have no meaning in Jesus’ Kingdom; sharing and walking together are gifts. Even isolation, and have felt isolation deeply, has no meaning in Jesus’ Kingdom; relationship and connection are gifts, even through zoom and live streaming.

 

Death is real and grief hurts and sometimes we just have to sit in the silence and cry and wait. Can we do that? Can we sit in the pain and loneliness with those who suffer? That is what this Good Friday is about. In these past days, and weeks, and months, we have more experience than we would wish, in this. It is very like when we sit with our loved ones in hospital, or at home, waiting, quite unsure of what to do or what to think, silence and sadness and tears, are our only activity. 

 

Too many Christians want to go straight from the garden of Gethsemane to the garden of the empty tomb without going by way of the hill of crucifixion and the stone-cold body. It seems too painful to sit in silence, waiting and grieving. And yet nothing of the reality of Christ’s victory over evil on the cross, or our faith in the resurrection to come soon, must be allowed to shield us from the awful brute fact that Jesus died. And that death, that brokenness, makes us whole.

 

We have come through so much, heartache, sadness, and we look forward to joy, hope, love. For now, we wait.

 

Tonight, we sit in the tension, of life, death, and new life. Watch, and wait. 

 

Fifth Sunday in Lent Yr A March 26 2023

Fifth Sunday in Lent Yr A March 26 2023

Ezekiel 37:1-14, Romans 8:6-11, John 11:1-45, Psalm 130

 

God gives God’s beloved’s a second chance, new life, and resurrection. It is only through love and connection, and the One who calls us into integration, wholeness, and healing, that we can be saved from ourselves and the beasts without and within. It is love that makes us human and it is love that connects us to God. Hope is where God reaches out to humanity to lift us out of our disintegration into wholeness with God and healing with one another. In Ezekiel’s vision that we read today, The Valley of Dry Bones, is demonstrated how God, THE powerful integrating force in the universe, will always bring the beloved back from oblivion, even if the beloved is the one responsible for running headlong into oblivion in the first place.

 

God raises new life out of what looks like death. Both in the Ezekiel story and the gospel story God brings new life out of death. And that new life comes from God in our midst, God who stoops into our reality. Jesus calls us to community, and connection. Jesus calls us to belonging and that belonging gives us our identity, as God’s beloveds. God can raise the dead, God can put us back together again so that we may be reconfigured as the body of Christ. In a political climate of division, and a cultural climate of hate, God calls us to be raised to new life. May it be so. 

 

The gospel story we have before us today pulls many threads together, of what we have been hearing all through Lent. This is a healing story, a miracle story, a story that shows us who Jesus is.

 

I think of Mary and Martha as good friends of mine. Mary and Martha are women who cook and clean and read, 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, Jesus broke the rules about always coming to the funeral, he missed his friend Lazarus’ 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, 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…

 

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 proves that being a follower of 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. Good people die, and much too soon. 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. 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, good people die at a young age. But God defends the widow and the orphan, and will not leave those God loves bereft. And God loves everyone of us, God's love wins.

 

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, Jesus doesn’t take the pain away from us, but Jesus stands by our side, right in the very midst of us, and feels the pain and the sorrow along with us. This is a God in whom I can place my faith, my trust, just like my friends Martha and Mary. 

 

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 it if 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, and where contingency and transaction are prioritized above authenticity and integrity.

 

Our cries to God do not go unheard. It is into this muck and mess that Jesus has come. This is the very place where Jesus comes to prove that we were created in God’s image, we are marked and chosen, we are claimed as God's own, we are the delight of God’s life. 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, you belong to me, and I am here in those who surround you to show you the way. 

 

But, 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. But the gospel writer John always points to God, and this story is no different. It is for the glory of God that Jesus calls Lazarus, who is deader than dead, 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. God’s love for you is abundant, just like the perfume Mary poured out on Jesus is abundant and extravagant. Just like the time to come when Jesus washes the disciples’ feet. 

 

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, beyond the reach of infinite love and abundant life, and belonging. You are God’s beloved disciple, and God's love wins, all the time. Amen.

16 Pentecost Yr C Proper 21 Sept 28 2022

16 Pentecost Yr C Proper 21 Sept 28 2022

Amos 6:1a,4-7, Psalm 146, 1 Timothy 6:6-19, Luke 16:19-31

 

Luke just doesn't let up on us, at all, ever. One parable more difficult and confusing than the last. The kingdom of God is like... layers of meaning, what it seems like on first blush may not be what it really is about. There was a certain rich man, who feasted luxuriously every day, and at his gate lay a certain poor man named Lazarus, all Lazarus wanted was to eat the crumbs the rich man dropped. Remember one of the themes of Luke's gospel is wealth, so is this parable about wealth, and its proper use?

 

Well, Lazarus died, and was carried by angels to Abraham's side, Abraham, the father of Israel. The rich man died and was tormented in the place of the dead. This is clearly a judgement about the proper use of wealth, and the rich man gets it in the end, right? There's more to prove that, Lazarus is being comforted, and the rich man is in great pain, the crevasse between is unbridgeable. There is a chasm between good and bad, rich and poor, it is all clear and easy to understand. Well now, that would not be a parable, would it?

 

So the rich man does not want his five brothers to come to this place of agony, and he wants Lazarus to warn his brothers to repent. It must be about repentance. Is it about wealth, judgement, repentance? It is about all of these things, it is a parable after all.

 

But in the end, is it about resurrection? In the end, is it about how life is to be lived while living? Abraham said, "If they don't listen to Moses and the Prophets, then neither will they be persuaded if someone rises from the dead." In the end, it is really about living. It is not about the reward at the end, it is about the life that Jesus inaugurated on the cross and in the resurrection. It is about the whole new life and the whole new world that Jesus makes real for us, for God's creation. It is about the amazing and abundant love now, in this life, that causes us to be workers for justice, for peace, for healing, for compassion. And it is about Luke's counsel and concern regarding wealth.

 

It is about our riches, our wealth. A priest in the Diocese of Utah, Lyn, told me this story, it's a story about incarnation. It's a story about showing up with and for people. It's a story about the real presence of Jesus. It's a story about an embarrassment of riches, and it's a story of gratitude. Lyn says, one day she answered the phone at her church, and there was an unfamiliar voice at the other end. He said he needed some help. Now, in this business, when you get a phone call like that, you stop listening and wait for the ask. Sometimes you want to stop the speaker and just say, how much money do you need? Lyn listened, and was surprised that what the caller wanted was prayer. He had just seen a doctor and was afraid of what the doctor might tell him, he had a young daughter, but no one else. He just wanted someone to pray with and for him. Lyn did, she prayed with him. He told her he would let her know how it all turned out.

 

Rich and poor don't always look like what we think they should look like. We are rich. We are rich in our community. Any one of you comes right here, to this place, and asks for prayer. And we, your community, envelope you in love, in prayer, in support. We accompany you on your healing journey. You have family, you have friends, you are rich. After your diagnosis, or after your surgery, you have a list of people to call to tell about how it's going. A whole list. This man, who asked for Lyn to pray with him, had one phone call to make after the doctor gave him the news, one phone call, to Lyn. And the news he delivered was good. Lyn could celebrate with him.

 

This is what incarnation looks like. It looks like showing up with and for others. It is bearing God's love and God's hope and God's dream for the world in our very beings. It is bringing healing into brokenness, and it is bringing love to bear when hate is all around.

 

It is seeing, really seeing. The rich man in our story never paid heed to Lazarus in life, never. Seeing is a very big deal. And the rich man's eyes are blind to Lazarus. Before you can have compassion for people, you have to see them, look into their eyes, and see, acknowledge their presence, their needs, and gifts, and above all their status as a beloved and blessed child of God.

 

So I think this is Luke's point, Luke urges us to gratitude, and thankfulness for the abundant life that comes through Jesus' resurrection, the new life that Jesus makes real. And that brings us to seeing, really seeing those around us and around our neighborhoods and around our schools, and around the world as God's beloved children deserving our care, attention, and friendship. And Luke says to us give, give out of your richness, whatever that richness looks like.

 

Luke says to us that this reality that we celebrate each time we gather for a meal, each time we come to this table, each time we say together, Risen Lord, be known to us in the breaking of the bread, we, crumb by crumb, drop by drop, live into the new creation Jesus makes us into. We see, we experience, the fullness of life God intends and offers, and we embrace the people God has set in our path.

 

Luke tells us in this parable that through the gift of Jesus, the gift of incarnation, the gift of resurrection, God with us in the flesh, God with us in the spirit, we are made new creations, and the character and quality of our lives today matter. Not because we do good things to earn a reward, but because first and foremost we are loved. Eternal life is not a distant reality, it starts now. It starts with Jesus’ relationship with us. Eternal life is life in its fullness now, given to us through God who loves us.

 

And we respond to that gift by giving from our richness, from our abundance. We respond to that gift by really seeing the people around us. Jesus is in our midst.

 

Always remembering, if it isn’t about love, it isn’t about God. Amen.

Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost Yr B Proper 15 Aug 15 2021

Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost Yr B Proper 15 Aug 15 2021

1 Kings 2:10-12; 3:3-14, Psalm 111, Ephesians 5:15-20, John 6:51-58

 

When my mom died, we spent some time going through her things of course, and I went through her recipe box. I looked at and read many of her recipes, some I remembered with fondness, others were forgettable. I took pictures of some, the ones in her handwriting, and places where she had taken notes about changes to the recipe. I have her pie crust recipe, with the corners and the edges of the paper all folded and ripped. It's a little like talking to her about it. Kathy, if the air is dry you need a little more flour, or for the lefse recipe, if the potatoes are a little moist, just throw in a little extra flour. A recipe is not just a recipe, it's a story, a story of how it used to be, or a story of scarcity that proves to be abundance. My mom was the queen at being able to make a pound of ground beef feed a family of ten. Isn’t that the way it usually happens, you go looking for a good recipe, and in return you get wisdom, maybe it also happens the other way around too, you share a good recipe, and you share a bit of wisdom as well. 

 

We have the same pairing in our readings today, wisdom and good food; maybe there is not one without the other. Wisdom in scripture is not just about being wise, as opposed to being foolish; God has built wisdom into the fabric of the cosmos. And we learn from wisdom that there are certain ways of living in which people thrive, and other ways of living which lead people to death. Ordering your life to wisdom is what we read about in these scripture passages today. We've been reading through the story of David, from shepherd to king, from young boy to powerful and maybe foolish man. The story is continued today in Kings. King David’s son Solomon is now on the throne, at the ripe old age of 12. You and I know that Solomon is famous for being wise, and it is already evidenced at this young age in his prayer to God, give your servant an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil. In Ephesians we hear about wisdom as right living, be careful then how you live, not as unwise people but as wise. Do not be foolish, but understand what the will, which also may be translated desire, understand what the desire of the Lord is. Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, giving thanks to God the father at all times and for everything in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

 

One of the marks of following Jesus is intentionality and spiritual practice. A mistake is made when people, Christians and others, think morality is the marker. It is not. I believe that intentionality, spiritual practice and our prayer together, or common prayer, forms us into the people who God desires us to be, who God dreams we can be. Not a perfect people, but a wise people, a people who can love one another. Paul’s words for the Ephesians are about wisdom as right living, and that God’s desire for us, God’s people, is to live wisely.

 

In John’s gospel, the wisdom tradition is applied to Jesus; Jesus now is the embodiment of wisdom. We continue to hear about the living bread, the bread that is Jesus. John is making a claim about the radical presence of God in Jesus, essentially John is saying that in Jesus, God provides everything; God’s abundance is made real in Jesus. We are invited to be present in God’s bounty. We are invited to feast on wisdom; we are invited to eternal life, all contained in this loaf of bread. 

 

God has built wisdom into the fabric of the cosmos. Ordering our lives to wisdom brings abundant and bountiful life. Jesus is the embodiment of wisdom, and therefore not only do we feast on wisdom we feast on Jesus. Ordinary bread and our ordinary lives are made extraordinary by God’s abundant love.

 

I am reminded of the movie Chocolat. The story is about a young mother who with her young daughter blow into a rural French village on the first Sunday of Lent. She opens a chocolate shop and prepares amazing confections that seem to transform those who eat them. She has opposition however by those in the town who live by a certain set of rules, a morality, that doesn’t allow for the ordinary pleasure of chocolate, most especially during Lent. 

 

Our main character in the movie dispenses wisdom along with chocolate and other confections. Entering her chocolate shop through the ordinary front door results in extraordinary nourishment. And yet, there remain those who will not cross the threshold for fear of what may happen and how they may be changed. 

 

We are changed by the ordinary bread, into an extraordinary community. We are changed by the wisdom feast into the body of Christ teeming with extraordinary life. We are changed as we abide in the flesh and blood of Jesus. This is as clear as Jesus can possibly get, whoever eats me will live. Wise or foolish, that is the reality. And that reality is scary to some, some will not cross the threshold into love because it changes them. 

 

The call to follow Jesus is a call to a foolish life of love. To follow Jesus is to believe that ordinary bread is made extraordinary, that it can fill you up and heal your heart. To follow Jesus is to practice the intentionality of love, even when you don't feel like it. To follow Jesus is to buck the conventional wisdom that the first will be first and the last will be last, it is to be fools for Christ and witness that the first will be last, and the last will be first. To follow Jesus is to let the truth that loves wins, take hold of your heart and your mind.

 

Following Jesus takes practice, it takes foolishness and wisdom, it takes brokenness and healing, it takes listening to our mistakes, like King David had to listen to Nathan, and it takes forgiveness. Following Jesus is hard in this world where money and power seem to matter more than wisdom and love. Following Jesus means walking the road together, and sharing some bread along the way, oh, and some chocolate too. 

 

Following Jesus is to take into ourselves the very foolishness of flesh and blood, following Jesus is to practice loving our neighbor with intentionality and wisdom, following Jesus means that we will be changed. Following Jesus means receiving grace upon grace.

Thanks be to God!

22 Pentecost Proper 27 Yr C Nov 10 2019

Audio  22 Pentecost Proper 27 Yr C Nov 10 2019

Job 19:23-27a, Psalm 17:1-9, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17, Luke 20:27-38

Oh Luke, what were you hoping to accomplish by including this passage in your gospel? Confusion? Heartache? Polygamy? Just what is it? What does this show us about God and God's relationship with God's people? Because scripture is really a divine love story about God and God's relationship with us. 

The Sadducees pose this question to Jesus, in the resurrection, whose wife is this woman, who has married seven brothers and remained childless? And yet those same Sadducees say there is no resurrection, so what are they doing posing this question in the first place? From the get-go we know the Sadducees are really just trying to trip Jesus up, they are not bad people, but they have no intention of listening to any good news Jesus may have for them. It's not about this woman at all, it's not about marriage at all, it's about something else entirely. 

The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God who created the heavens and the earth, the God who is seen and unseen, the God of the Universe, the God who is here in the flesh, is the God not of the dead, but of the living. That is the Good News, the rest is description. The rest gives us glimpses, opens windows, illustrates, the reality that God is the God of the living. The rest shows us what it is to live this life fully alive, fully engaged, fully loved.

NT Wright, theologian, writer, and former Bishop of Durham, writes in his book Surprised by Hope, that resurrection is life after life after death. The work that God does in Jesus is to defeat death, not by resisting it, but by absorbing it and redeeming it. Resurrection living is living that truth today. Resurrection is life after life after death and resurrection is living presently without fear of death, because God has transformed death and therefore life. Resurrection is the promise of a future self-animated by God's breath of new life.

All history is equally present in the moment, this is the way God sees things. In the gospel of Luke, Jesus teaches again and again that the good news is about a death that leads to life. It's a pattern, a truth, a reality that comes from losing your life and finding it. Dying the death that must be, so as to be raised, changed, transformed. 

And how do we know what that looks like? It has something to do with love that embraces the terribly difficult life that we are so fortunate to live.

Dorothy Day, an avid preacher of a social justice gospel, said "'Every time I'm tempted to give up on my messy self or a messy person or a messy group of people - I say this to myself: "Love is a harsh and dreadful thing to ask of us but it is the only answer.'" And in response to this, a very favorite blogger of mine, writes, " Love is NOT fluffy or perfect or easy or pretty or common. Real love is jagged and lurching and heavy and unattractive and HARD. If it wasn't so much harder than war- more people would choose it. The good news is - You can do hard things." (Glennon Melton)

Resurrection is what this love looks like. Resurrection is this harsh and dreadful love that God has for God's people. Resurrection demands that we let go of our preoccupations, our idols, our obsessions and our compulsions, our addictions, so that the love that gave up everything on the cross, can embrace us and make us new, and equip us to love ourselves and others. 

Each one of you knows about death. You know that your heart breaks at the death of your spouse, or your parent, or your friend. You know that your heart breaks when someone you love and care for leaves you. There are all sorts of other kinds of deaths as well. When your health dies, and you must live with disease. When your self dies a little each day with harsh words that are spoken. When your dreams die and you must live with a reality you never even imagined. When your livelihood dies, and your life is not the the same. Deaths that are out of our hands, out of our control. And sometimes, even though it breaks our heart, death is necessary, because it is only then that new life, resurrection, can begin to take hold. But it is in all of these moments where God's love seeps into us and makes us new, heals us, changes us, transforms us.

And it is this hard kind of love that God calls us to in our lives, and our families, and our neighborhoods, and our church and our world. It is this hard kind of love that speaks the truth of life, in all it's messiness and chaos. 

The Sadducees could not imagine resurrection, maybe because they could not imagine a love that would give itself away for the life of the other. But Jesus would not have it. Jesus proclaims the God of resurrection, the God of life, the God of love, the God whose scent permeates all of life.  

Love is hard, and you can do hard things.