John the Baptist, prophet

Advent 2 Year B

December 9, 2017

    You can tell that the season of Advent is upon us because we get to hear from everyone’s favorite camel hair wearing, bug eating prophet, John the Baptist.  John was not popular with the establishment, especially King Herod.  He was a thorn in the side of most, trying to spread a message of repentance to prepare the way of the Lord.  John was herald of things to come, and the people in charge were starting to worry… what would you say if suddenly some crazy looking prophet came out of the desert and started proclaiming it was time to prepare the way of the Lord?

    At the very least, you might start asking some questions, like, “What on earth is he talking about???  What is this baptizing with the Holy Spirit??”  In his book, Celebrating Abundance, Meditations for Advent, Walter Brueggemann says “ The whole tenor of Advent is that God may act in us, through us, beyond us, more than we imagined, because newness is on its way among us.”  Listen to that again; “ The whole tenor of Advent is that God may act in us, through us, beyond us, more than we imagined, because newness is on its way among us.”   That is, at least in part, what baptism is, isn’t it?  That God might act in us and through us and Lord help us, beyond us by way of the Holy Spirit… when we receive that incredible gift, we are empowered to to be in the world as God’s ambassadors to bring about the kingdom of God.  John was certainly the prophet, perhaps the last of the great prophets that stands between the Old and the New… he was the last of the Old, proclaiming the New … the New that would come as Jesus; and so he brings the message that has been heard before from the wilderness, to prepare the way of the Lord…

    And here we are, Jesus has indeed come, and now we his disciples wait for him to come again.  That is the great promise, that he would send the Holy Spirit until he came again… and the message of John the Baptist is just as important to us as it was to those who first heard it… Prepare the way of the Lord… but how shall we prepare?

    That’s where our baptism and the Holy Spirit come in.  We prepare by doing the things that we have promised to do.  We love our neighbor, not just with words, but with actions; we feed those who are hungry, we visit those who are alone or who are sick; we believe in the Holy and blessed Trinity, we continue in the fellowship of the apostles, we break bread, we repent when we have done evil, we pray, we proclaim Jesus as the Good News to those in need, we seek and serve all persons because they are created in the image of God, we strive for justice and peace for all, demanding that their dignity be preserved, affording them the respect that all God’s children deserve.  That’s how we prepare… even in the midst of parties, and shopping, and preparing to spend time with family and friends, we must also reach beyond ourselves and our own desires to be as St. Francis said, “the only gospel someone might experience”.  

    Our preparation for the coming of Jesus isn’t about busyness for the sake of busyness.  Sometimes our preparation might be to be still and quiet, listening for the voice of God… maybe part of what we need to do to prepare is to do some difficult inner spiritual work so that we will truly be ready to celebrate his coming with true joy, knowing that we too are created in the image of a loving God.

    Preparing the way of the Lord, making a way in the desert, is the kind of work that we should always be doing.  We all have a desert that exists within us, that might make our prayers seem dry or lifeless… the desert is both a beautiful and dangerous place; the  desert in our soul can be a place of renewal if we take the time to nourish the blossoms that we can barely feel.  It can also be quite dangerous to our spiritual well being if we don’t; and the same can be said for the other ways that we prepare, by doing the work that the Holy Spirit has asked us and prompted us to do.  Sometimes the way out of the spiritual and emotional desert is once again, to reach beyond ourselves.  The gifts that we receive in serving others cannot be measured; but that are absolutely necessary for our relationship to God and to others.  Seems to me I have heard love God and love your neighbor before…

    While we focus our thoughts on the preparation for the coming of Jesus now at this time of year, we know that this is our life’s work.   We are always in a state of Advent, of waiting for him to come; but it is good for us to focus our time and attention, especially when the world around us tries to tell us that our joy and happiness lie in the commercialism that has taken over our holy feast days…

    So, be comforted, beloved of God.  The judgement of God has already come as a tiny infant who has depended on us to care for him.  Now we prepare for him to come again, to fulfill the promises of the prophets that the Glory of God shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together; heaven and earth shall become one; the kingdom of God will at last be fulfilled.  So beloved, prepare a way for the Lord.  Prepare with great joy and with great hope.  We don’t know when, and for us, it doesn’t matter when.  We prepare with the ordinary, daily kingdom work of living into the gospel and being good news to a world stuck in it’s own materialistic and self centered being.  We know another way… a way of love, of joy, and hope, that proclaims that Jesus is the saviour of the world, because God so loved the world… so now we prepare by loving God and loving God’s world.  Come Lord Jesus.

Multiplying our talents

Proper 28 Year A

November 19, 2017

    Three years ago, when I preached on these texts I said that I was uninspired by them and that I really didn’t like the parable of the talents.   Well, in three years, guess what?   I still don’t like that parable.

    What I comfort myself with when I have trouble with scripture, and especially with parables, is that at least in a case like today, Jesus has a gift for going overboard with language so that he can make a point.  I am sure that some of his hearers might have not gotten the point or at least A point if he didn’t engage in a bit of exaggeration.  

    As I think about the parable this year, I find myself thinking about gifts and maybe even the Holy Spirit.  If we take the baptismal covenant seriously, and we truly believe that the Holy Spirit is Jesus’ gift to us to help us to continue his work in the world, then I think it makes sense to say that our gifts are meant to be used.  And, while the parable is talking about money, I think it can mean any gift.

    Realizing that we have gifts to give back to God can sometimes be a tough sell.  For some of us, the daily grind of work or just life in general can feel like it saps us of anything we might have had left to give, and if there is something, it’s likely that someone else is going to demand it from us, whether it’s our time, our skills or our money.

    And yet, look what happens to the servants in the parable who take what the master has given them and actually use it… the money multiplies.  The servants who use the money seem to do so without fear and without second guessing what they are doing.   They appear to trust that the money will somehow grow and become even more useful.  As I think about the servant that buried the money obviously didn’t do so well.  He seemed to forget or at least be afraid to take a risk; he was given a responsibility to use the money to make more and he chose not to.  As I contemplate his response to the master, I wonder if the servant somehow took credit for the sowing and scattering, and then criticizes the master who collects the fruits of the work that others have done.  What the servant is forgetting, is that the master is in charge; the servant scatters seed and does all of this work so that the master can benefit; that’s what it means to be the master; and, as we see with the other servants, when the master prospers by their work, they too prosper.  Those that brought back more than they were originally given, were trusted with even more responsibility because they had the master’s best interests in mind.  They realized, that they were not separate from the master, and that the money wasn’t theirs to waste.

    Maybe there are some good lessons here for us too.  It’s important for us to realize that we aren’t doing all this Christian stuff alone.  The kingdom doesn’t belong only to us and while we have been given all the freedoms that are possible, kingdom work is God’s work.  It’s work that isn’t self centered or self promoting, but rather has God’s ideals and intentions at heart.  For us, it also means that no gift is too small or unimportant.  Recently, some of my franciscan friends have been trying to engage our older community members, our “Older Saints” if you will.  The message that we are trying to get to them is that just because they are older, and for some of them not even living independently, doesn’t mean, that they cannot be contributing members of our community.  One member gathers and sends out a list of prayer requests each week; others are writing articles on aging for our newsletter; others are involved in telephone ministries of reaching out to others, some have taken the ministry of contemplative prayer seriously; and we are hoping not only to hear about more ministries, but also to encourage those who may have thought they didn’t matter to the community anymore, to find their rightful place as an older saint in our community.  The lesson here, is that it ALL matters.  No gift given in love is too small or insignificant because if WE all matter, then all that we DO matters, and not only does it matter, but it is needed.  God never refuses a gift that we give to God in love… because here’s a secret… the gift is God’s anyway.  It came from God and was given to us.  Each of us has the responsibility to use whatever God has given to us is such a way that we not only give the gift back, but we give it back in abundance without fear and without reservation.

    I think one of the things we learn from the parable of the talents, is that the servant who buried the master’s money was afraid, and he didn’t want to change or grow, he wanted things to be safe and stay the same.  The kingdom isn’t safe; it is full of risk, just like trying to make more money from what the master has given;  using the gifts we have been given, whether they are gifts of time, money or talent, are only ours to borrow, they are not ours to hide or to keep to ourselves, they are meant to be shared, they are meant to be used; they are meant to be used for the master’s pleasure and purposes… and that means we need to be open to the master, open to God’s desires for how our gifts are used… We are created by God, the master of all there is.  Everything, our time, talent and money belongs to God.  He is asking you to multiply your gifts;  what will you choose to do?

   

   

To whom do we belong?

Proper 24 Year A

October 22, 2017

There are so many ways that we identify ourselves, aren’t there?  I can remember as a kid being really impressed with labels.  You could always tell whose family was wealthy and whose family was not based on the clothing they wore.  Labels told us who was in and who was out.  I remember when Gloria Vanderbuilt  and Jordache jeans were popular.  There were not my father’s work clothes… and if you weren’t wearing them, at least where I lived, you certainly heard about it.  Junior high and high school were often places where a kid was either in or out; I spent most, if not all of my time, “out”.  Bet you couldn’t tell that… my taste in clothes hasn’t changed much either.  I can remember wanting to fit in, wanting desperately to belong and to wear the symbols and signs of other kids my age, but it wasn’t going to happen.  We were a blue collar family, and once my dad died, money was even tighter.  So, no fancy, in crowd jeans for me…

But even as adults, we like to have symbols that identify us in some way.  Tattoos have become quite mainstream in the last several years; if you’ve never had a chance to look at Bill’s arms, he has quite a few, and they are beautifully done, all by the same artist.  You can tell by his tattoos that he is a religious man who listens to punk rock, at least if you get the reference of one of his… I have one, and am contemplating 2 more; the reason I had this one done first was because it was simple; the other 2 are going to require some thinking; but this symbol, a monogram for the Virgin Mary means a great deal to me; it means, “Auspice Maria”, that is, “under the protection of Mary”.  As someone who has had difficult relationship with their own mother, and who has had a love and devotion to the Mother of Jesus, it seemed like a natural thing to do.  

We are inundated with symbols every day of our lives.  Even my son can recognize the Braums logo when we are driving and pipes up about his favorite dairy treat from there when he sees it.

Symbols are incredibly powerful, and in our gospel today, Jesus is well aware of their power.  The Pharasees are trying to trap him once again so that they can turn him in for insurrection or some other crime against the emperor.  And so, they ask him about paying taxes to the emperor.  They knew that Jesus was no fan of the emperor Tiberius, or of the Roman empire, not to mention not a huge fan of laws that kept people poor under the thumbs of those in power.  And so, they ask him about paying taxes.   Once again, he outsmarts them by asking them whose face and title was on the coin used for taxes, and of course, they respond, “the emperor’s” .  Then Jesus answers them, rather brilliantly, I think, “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”   Basically, if it has his face on it, it belongs to him… who cares?  The coin they show Jesus will become worthless when there’s a new emperor… so it’s worth is temporary.  Jesus is hoping to claim God’s people, not the emperor’s money.  The branding of God’s people is not something that loses value or goes away…. It’s permanent.  In Jesus, God has made the ultimate covenant with God’s people; only those in power don’t quite understand that yet, if they ever do.

You and I have a marking, don’t we?  When we are baptized, we are “Sealed by the Holy Spirit, and marked as Christ’s own, forever”.  When the priest says those words, we are marked with a cross on our forehead, a cross of oil that symbolizes the grace that we receive in baptism; a grace that says, above all things, we belong to Jesus… no matter what else may happen in our lives, that can never change because we are “marked as Christ’s own forever”.  That, dear ones, is how much “God so loved the world”.  God loves the world so much that we can never be separated from the love that is ours through the Holy Trinity.  And here’s something else… no matter where we have never belonged before, we belong to God… we belong here in God’s church and in God’s kingdom.  That cross of oil is the most important mark we have… more important than expensive jeans, more enduring even than tattoos, as cool as those are.  Our cross of oil is a cross that cannot be seen… and yet it is the most important mark we wear... it is a mark, a branding, that identifies who we are and to whom we belong; we might even say, it is a mark of Jesus’ likeness on us, so that like the coin that bears the emperor’s likeness, we might bear Jesus likeness, and so, if it is his likeness that we bear, it is to him we belong.

The more I tried to belong when I was a teenager, the worse my sense of not belonging  got… it was only through the mark of baptism that I was able to find the sense of belonging that my heart and my soul desired.  “Marked as Christ’s own forever” have been words that have been the most amazing words ever said to me,  as well as the most frightening words in my life; when I needed a community, a place to belong, it was the church that showed me that I could be loved no matter what I was wearing, or  what job I held or didn’t hold at some points; but the church has been for me more than just a place to feel good and belong; the church has been the place where I have learned what it means to be a disciple; and I will say, being a disciple is not something I do very well; it requires me to act; it requires me to risk; it requires me to be confronted by my own complacency and by others who are much better at this whole disciple thing than I am; being marked as Christ’s own forever might also mean that even though people might not see the cross of oil on my head, they might know to whom I belong; at least I hope that I bear Jesus’  likeness enough that others may know to whom I belong…

    The church is where we learn to be more like Jesus; it is the place where we come to bear his likeness by embracing the stories that others have told about him and by realizing where our own stories begin to look like his story; church is supposed to be the place where we experience our own transformation as we take Jesus into ourselves in the Eucharist; it is the place where we see him in each other…

    My hope for all of us, is that we are for each other, a community that bears a resemblance to Jesus whom we profess to follow; I pray that our actions are the actions of disciples; I pray that when others look at us, they might begin to know something about Jesus; I pray, that we all find ourselves being comforted and being accepted for who we really are…Beloved… here is where we belong, no matter where we have been excluded from before.   When we are marked as Christ’s own forever, that love and acceptance flows from us to others who need to belong somewhere, because all people, everywhere, belong in God’s kingdom…

    So… what are the marks that we bear?  Whose likeness is in our minds and hearts?  Can others really see to whom we belong?

Dangerous hearts

Proper 21 Year A 2017

October 1, 2017

    A little bit of context for today’s reading from Matthew; Jesus has entered Jerusalem on a donkey to shouts of “hosanna to the son of David!”.. And after he entered Jerusalem, he went into the temple and turned over tables, and drove out the money changers.  To say that Jesus was making an entrance, would be understating it.  He was ready for a fight with the authorities, and they were angry enough for one.  Jesus was causing all sorts of chaos, and people were questioning what they had always done; they were questioning their leaders and they were questioning what it actually meant to be part of the kingdom of God.

    In that time and place, those who had power made the rules, and they were the ones who believed that they were closest to God.  They did everything right; they followed the purity codes and the law; they gave what they were supposed to to support the temple and their mission; they observed all the fasts, all the festivals… if they were questioned the could point to the law and claim themselves to be righteous.  And, typically, they weren’t questioned all that often, and there was some sort of peace that agreed on people’s status and where they fit into the grand scheme…

    That is, until Jesus showed up.  He was everything they were not;  he had relationships with prostitutes, beggars and thieves; he didn’t always follow the law, and if fact, sometimes downright disregarded it for what he believed was a greater good; he wasn’t wealthy; he didn’t care about aligning himself with the empire; he was always questioning authority; he was always telling people that they were loved by God, something that many of them had never heard before; he healed people and restored them to community;  in short, Jesus was trouble, and once he showed up in Jerusalem, with shouts of joy that might have alluded that he was the true king of Jerusalem, well, it was game on.

    And, Jesus only makes his own situation worse by continuing to take digs at the chief priests and elders.  They wanted to know who had given him authority to do and say these things, and Jesus knew he had them… John’s life was already given because he was the herald and prophet that paved the way… nothing that the elders could’ve said about John’s baptism would’ve helped them… either they were going to show themselves to be the hypocrites they truly were, or the crowd was going to be enraged by their disbelief in John’s baptism.  They were stuck; and they knew it, and Jesus certainly knew it.  And so, while they are weakened, he tells yet another parable about the kingdom of God that shows just how merciful God is; just like last week’s lesson about the vineyard and the workers who come at the last hour, God has more than enough mercy for everyone and, the added dig is of course, that those who believe themselves to be righteous in their own eyes, may not be in God’s eyes.  Ouch.  Nothing about Jesus’ message that day is subtle or soft peddled, and it made him dangerous, at least as far as the current leadership was concerned.  If this donkey riding rabble rouser wasn’t silenced, everything they had built, all of their power, would be gone.  So, now, not only was Jesus dangerous, but now he was in deep, deep danger, and he knew exactly what he was doing.  He didn’t really care about their power games; he wasn’t interested in serving the empire… he was interested in serving God… and some days Ceasar and God were confused in the eyes of some… and certainly in Rome, Ceasar was a god… Jesus had no such confusions, and he was more than willing to point out those who did.

    And, I am sure, that as certain as Jesus was of his need to point out the discrepancies he saw in what following God ought to look like, I bet there were moments of fear for him… but it wasn’t the fear that the elders had; their fear was about losing status; his was about his life and the life of the people he loved; he knew his actions were also putting them in danger.  Soon enough, he would learn just how afraid they were, and how their fear would cause them to deny him… but for now, Jesus was focused on bringing good news to prostitutes, tax collectors and all who lived on the outer margins of society… and the more he focused on good news the more dangerous he became.

    Beloved, Jesus didn’t die because he was a nice guy… he died because he was willing to confront injustice when he saw it, he was willing to love those no one else loves, no matter what the institutions around him said.  Often those confrontations meant that things didn’t look the way others had assumed… he meant all that last shall be first stuff… gold and fine robes and adherence to the purity codes were not what were going to get you a place in the kingdom; loving God and loving your neighbor, now that might be the golden ticket that got you in…   the elders didn’t really seem to care about their neighbors… they only cared about what was in it for them…

    Our calling as disciples is not primarily to be nice,,, that’s a good thing as far as it goes, but sometimes we have to overturn some tables and point out the grave injustices around us.  Christianity has lost its sense of danger… most of us have forgotten that we need to challenge the empire, and that living in the kingdom means that we might have to hang out with some folks that don’t look like we do.  Our society needs to be challenged now just as much as it did then.  Loving God by loving our neighbor is the mandate… loving even when we are afraid, loving those no one else loves, loving instead of grasping power… and all of us in this room have more power than the people who come here in search of a meal or a bus pass… how can we turn away from that power and extend a hand of love?  How deep is our discipleship, is it the kind where we attend church and do all the right things, or is it the kind that we live even when we aren’t here, so that our words and deeds are good news to the poor and hungry?

    I suspect for most of us it’s a little of both… May we love, and learn and grow to be the children who do God’s will, even if we haven’t done a great job of it so far.  There is always time… What danger might God be calling us into today?

Abundant grace

Proper 20 Year A

September 24, 2017

    We have heard several parables over the last weeks that point to God’s less than perfect farming skills.  Seeds are scattered with little or no regard to what kind of soil they are scattered on;  or letting weeds grow with the good wheat, letting the weeds be weeds, and even letting the weeds take nourishment meant for the wheat.  None of these are particularly wise farming skills.  Today, it seems that God is also a foolish boss as well.

    Who in their right mind pays the day wage for the last only  hour of work?  The laborers who have endured the heat of the day are furious, and who can blame them?  It doesn’t seem fair or just… it doesn’t make sense… not to mention, it’s not good business sense.  

    But obviously the parable, like the story of Jonah from the Old Testament is trying to tell us that God doesn’t think about these things the way that the rest of us do.  We should view these stories as good news… but sometimes that’s hard to do…

    One of the lessons we get to learn today is that God’s sense of justice isn’t quite what we would have in mind… we tend to think about justice in terms of equal resources and getting paid for our work in ways that make sense…. in today’s parable, the wealthy land owner seems more concerned with the day laborers earning enough rather than how long they have worked… a pretty good deal if you came in later in the day…

    The thing is, our God is always extending a pretty good deal.  There is always enough love to spare no matter when we arrive; always more than enough for us and for anyone else who shows up… always… and so the anger that the laborer feel while it seems justified by our standards, isn’t justified by God’s standards…Grace is God’s gift to scatter as God sees fit… parables of grace are hard to hear and to understand because we don’t usually love and extend grace the same way that God does.  and we may never understand just how loving and incredible an action it really is, until WE are the ones arriving at the last minutes of the work day and are surprised to find that our share equals everyone else’s.

    The question that strikes me here, is why do the laborers act the way they do?  Perhaps a more important question, is why do WE act the way we do in the face such love and generosity?  

    We certainly see this theme repeated over and over again in scripture… from the story of Adam and Eve, to our own stories, it seems that we are always trying to get more, trying to get God to give us even more than God already has…  It seems to be part of our nature to be overly concerned with what others are given rather than doing the best we can with what we’ve been given…  What God does with God’s grace and love is really God’s business, not ours.  Whomever God decides to lavish grace upon, does not affect our share, not ever.  Why do we care so much?

    One of the best definitions I have heard of what the church is, is that the church is the place and the people, who bring hope to the hopeless…  What if, in response to God’s blessings and love, we turned around and gave hope to the hopeless?  

    The only response to what we have been given by God, is to give to others.  It’s the only way to really love God in return.  God has not just given enough; God has given more than enough… to quote a much overused phrase, our cup runneth over, and in response, we must reach toward others and give them the hope that life in the kingdom offers…not just in the next world but in this one as well.

    What stood out for me as I read the story this time, is that the land owner tells the laborers to go into the vineyard and he will pay them whatever is right…  and of course, by the end of the story, whatever is right, is much different than we or the workers expect…no matter who the worker is, not matter when they get to the vineyard, they get what they need…

    Abundance is the status quo in God’s kingdom.  There is enough for everyone… it seems that no one has more than anyone else, and no one has to want for anything… it’s a radical equality based on kingdom values, rather than on human values.

    The hope for us and for others, is that God always has more than enough grace, mercy, love, and forgiveness…. for all of us, no matter who we are; even when we live our lives as non believers, or live our lives without giving God a thought; over and over again, grace is offered, whether we accept it or not…

    So… hope, mercy, love,  are all gifts that we can give, because there’s plenty of them to go around… doesn’t always seem like it when we look around, but we are the church, the people responsible for bringing hope… in God’s kingdom, hope multiplies; grace, mercy and love, all multiply… and the more we give, the more there is… isn’t that part of the miracle of living in the kingdom?

    As workers in the vineyard, workers in God’s kingdom of abundance, we need to get the message of God’s unimaginable generosity out there… and part of getting the message out there, is living as though we know the message is true.

    I pray that we can live in the overwhelming joy that God’s grace brings into our lives; I pray that we can each treat our fellow children of God in ways that aren’t based in the fear and jealousy that lives inside us when we live in a culture of scarcity.  The kingdom has no scarcity; only abundance.  It’s an abundance that knows no limits or boundaries.  May we all be the kind of vineyard keepers that God is.

Jesus forgives...so should we

Proper 19 Year A

September 17, 2017

    Today’s readings all point to one of those ideals of the spiritual life that makes at least some of us squirm in discomfort at the mere mention of it… of course, I am talking about forgiveness.

    Forgiving another is really, really hard work.  Sometimes, the act of forgiving takes our whole life to accomplish, if we are lucky… sometimes there are things that we carry that are so painful, we might never get there…

    I have told you this story from my own spiritual life before, but I am going to tell it again, because for me, what happened was a lesson, and an experience that has helped me in know something about Jesus that I hadn’t realized before… That knowledge has helped me many times since the experience happened.

    I was in my early 20’s, and I was a part time college student at San Diego State.  I was involved in the college and young adult ministry of the diocese, and was a relatively new Episcopalian.  I’m sure I must have been in therapy, and if I wasn’t, I probably should have been.  I was working through some difficult stuff that was both spiritually and emotionally difficult, and it had a lot to do with my anger at my parents for a whole variety of things, none of which is terribly important right now, but it was serious business that day.  The young adult ministry was at worship together, and we were at a point in the service where we were in quiet prayer.  I remember being quite upset, and in my prayers, said something like, “Jesus, how can you forgive me, when I can’t forgive them? “  I heard the answer as if Jesus was sitting there right next to me…  “because” he said, “My forgiveness comes first.”

    I cannot tell you the times I have thought about that moment, and prayed that moment over in my heart and mind… “My forgiveness comes first…”  Now, mind you, this amazing declaration of love did not let me off the hook in any way, but it did help me to not rush into something I wasn’t ready for.  In my experience, forgiving before we are ready, is kind of like cheap grace; it doesn’t go very deep, and it doesn’t mean very much.  Anything that has worth in the spiritual life is going to take some work; not that Jesus loves us any more or less, but like any relationship, our relationship with Jesus takes time, energy and work… and, like other relationships, it isn’t always pleasant or fun…

    In our gospel, Jesus tells Peter that he is to forgive not as many as seven times, but seventy seven times.  And as Tex reminded us last week, it’s not like we stop forgiving on time 78… Jesus is using a large number, a number with mystical significance to a Jewish audience to say that forgiving another is a holy task, and one that overflows with God’s mercy and love, so much so that its value cannot be measured.

    No question, forgiving another can be really hard work; harder certainly than offending, don’t you think?  And before I say anything else, I want to say 2 things; the first is, if you have been wronged by another in a death dealing kind of way, please know that you don’t have to forgive until you are ready; the other piece of that, is that forgiving is about us, the ones who are doing the forgiving, not the offender.  We forgive because is sets us free, not because it helps the offender.  When we hold on to our anger, or to our desire for revenge, we are damaging our own souls.  I think that was part of what happened in my answer to my prayer that day; the kind of anger I was holding inside of me, was likely going to hurt me in some way; I was newly sober, and having unresolved anger is not a good way to stay sober.  Having said that, all of those feelings, all of the anger and sadness had to have it’s time to be expressed; all of us, no matter who we are, have a deep desire to be heard, especially when it comes to the really deep stuff.  The good news, is that Jesus does hear us.  All of those prayers that come unbidden in dark and lonely places, or the ones that come as tears…. Jesus hears those, even if we don’t speak them.  Jesus’ love for us is deeply connected to his ability to have mercy on us…  His love, his mercy has no limits; we all know that ours does have limits most days.  I believe that is at least part of the point of the parable that Jesus tells about the slave and the king.  Let’s remember, that the amount of money that the slave owed the king was an astronomical amount of money; so much so, that no king in their right mind would loan a slave that much money.    What the slave was owed by his fellow slaves, was no where near that amount that he owed;.  The king forgave the overwhelming debt… so, in a sense the king showed mercy twice; by loaning the money in the first place and then by forgiving the debt.  The one who was now free from his debt, would not extend the same mercy to his fellow slaves.  His own greed, his own self centeredness, got him in a heap of trouble.  How on earth, was he going to repay the king, who because of his awful behavior, now demanded his money?  He was in prison; and wasn’t going to be allowed out of prison until he paid.  He was now in a situation that he could not possibly get out of alive.  He would die in prison, not really because of the money he owed, but because he withheld mercy from those who genuinely needed it, even though he himself was afforded the gift of even more mercy.

    How much does our own inability to forgive others keep us in prison?  There is so much going on today in our society that would have us be selfish with our mercy, our forgiveness and our love.  The empire is only interested in its own well being; and if we fight among ourselves and refuse to see Jesus in everyone else, then we can be used for the empire’s advantage… our anger, our hurt, our fear… all of it becomes weapons against another; and we know that when we are divided, we cannot help each other… all we can see are our own needs and no one else’s matter.  That, my friends, sounds like a prison to me; a prison that it is going to be very difficult to be released from if we don’t start to love and forgive as Jesus has forgiven every one of us.  There is more than enough to go around.  Our soul’s freedom depends on our ability to let go of the chains that we sometimes let bind us.  

    I know that day at worship with my friends was life changing for me.  I began to see the depth of Jesus’ love for me, and the depth of his love for those who had harmed me.  LIke the king in the parable,  Jesus let me know that I was loved enough to be forgiven.   I can’t say that I have gotten it right, even now, but that day I became willing to believe in the possibility of my own transformation, from someone who was frozen in their anger, to someone who could at least believe I wouldn’t be angry forever.  

    Sometimes the first step is to pray for the willingness to be open to the possibility.  It’s not easy… it doesn’t come without risk; but we can live in the certainty that Jesus has already forgiven us and THEM.  We can grow into that place and take as long as we need to, so long as we don’t get lazy and use it as an excuse.  We love because Jesus has first loved… We forgive, because Jesus has first forgiven.  I pray that we can all be set free, knowing that his forgiveness comes first.

Be a living gift to God

Proper 16 Year A

August 27, 2017

    It is a fairly well known fact among my family members that I am a fan of receiving presents.  They don’t even have to be expensive or flashy presents either; what I really enjoy is seeing what people think I might like.  I also really enjoy getting gifts for the people in my life because I like seeing how they react to what I believe will bring them joy; there have certainly been a few times when I completely messed it up, and a few family stories that seem to get told every so often with my missteps seeming to get bigger every time the tales are told…

    Gift giving is a way for us to tell each other that they matter to us; when we give someone a gift that brings them joy, we are saying that they matter to us; that we want to do something nice for them; that we care about our relationship… which is why some of the best gifts aren’t the ones we purchase, but the ones we make, ones that have some of us in them to give to the people we love, gifts that can create memories.

    In our readings for today,  I found myself struck by the words from Paul’s letter to the Romans.  Paul is asking us to present our bodies as a living sacrifice to God, holy and acceptable to God.  Sacrifice is definitely the language of worship, and it is also the language of gift.  In the Old Testament, there are numerous passages especially in the book of Leviticus that discuss animal sacrifices being given to God; animals, either first born or the most perfect of the flock were ritually slaughtered upon the altar, and blood was poured or used to mark specific places on the altar.  There were all kinds of rules about what parts of the animals could be eaten and by whom; and then of course, rules about which parts would be burned up for God, so that the smoke from burning the animal would rise to God and cause an “odor pleasing to God’s sight.”  Whenever I read those parts of the bible, I always give thanks that I am a priest now, and not then.

    When you and I come together to celebrate the Eucharist, we are coming together to give thanks; that’s what Eucharist means;  to give thanks to God for all that God has done in creating, and loving us and the world.

    Part of giving thanks, is giving back to God, gifts that God has given us from God’s creation; we place fine linen, silks, silver, brass, candles, our money, and of course bread and wine and water, on the altar, much as priests used to place animals to be given to God.  We don’t place these gifts here as a way to erase our sinfulness because only God can do that; but we give these gifts to God as a way of showing our gratitude and our love for God; we give these gifts so that we can celebrate our relationship to God; we create memories with each other, we become part of the great cloud of witnesses that has come before, all of us celebrating our love for God and each other.

    Sometimes I forget that the most important thing that you and I bring to this altar as an offering, as a sacrifice, is ourselves.  All the fine linen, silver, and money aren’t going to really mean anything, if our bodies, our hearts and our minds aren’t also offered up to God as gift.   We offer ourselves as gift because God desires to be in relationship with us and desires us to be in relationship with each other.  And unlike the perfect offerings from the flock, we know that we are far from perfect; our blemishes may not show on the outside, but we know and God knows what is on our hearts.  Rather than come to offer ourselves thinking we are spotless, perhaps for us, coming forward fully aware of our shortcomings, is what God desires;  I have spoken a lot about truth telling lately and I believe that when we come to this table with our hands outstretched, asking for Jesus to enter into our bodies and souls, that might be as truthful as we can ever be; when we acknowledge that is it only God who can heal us from ourselves, then maybe we can be ready to receive the healing and wholeness God wants us to have.  Unlike other gifts we might give, the gifts of ourselves is one that is risky for us to give, because it means that we have to be willing to be vulnerable; we have to be willing to change, we have to be willing to actually be the image of God in the world; we give ourselves to God.. and then we are given back to the world as changed people; not conformed to the world, as Paul says, but transformed because we have taken the holiest of gifts from God, and have been changed by the gift…

    What gifts are you bringing to the altar today?  Are you bringing your best, your most vulnerable, your true self most needing to be changed and loved by God?  I urge us all to pay attention; to truly offer ourselves upon God’s altar with hearts longing for love and longing to be changed into hearts that desire what God desires.  Be a living gift, always.

Lies defile our hearts

Proper 15 Year A 2017

August 20, 2017

    My mom used to say that only drunks tell the truth; I’m pretty sure she meant that if someone were drunk, then they were more likely to tell the truth.  Not really sure why she believed that because I didn’t really know her as much of a truth teller whether she was drunk or sober; the level of alcohol in her body didn’t really seem to correlate to her ability to tell the truth, and if anything, it may have made bad things worse.  Many years later when I had to deal with my own relationship to alcohol and it’s affect on my relationship to truth, I decided a couple of things.  First,  I was going to change my relationship to alcohol, and, I was going to, as much as I could, live my life in truth and integrity.  There were so many lies that were part of my family’s being, that I’m pretty sure that the lies were believed, at least by those that told them.  What I am certain of, is that the lies hurt people who certainly deserved better.

The truth is, don’t we all deserve better?  It took me a while to figure out that I deserved better; when you live with people who don’t tell the truth, especially when it comes to what they say about you, it can become difficult to believe the truth about who you are.  

Teresa of Avila is one of my favorite saints;  she died in 1582 and was a major figure in the counter reformation in the Catholic church.  One of the things I admire about her, is that she was always in trouble.  She taught that people could have a personal even mystical relationship with God, and could pray to God without an intermediary, such as a priest.  The common teaching at the time was that people needed their priest to pray and to communicate with God on their behalf; even when people went to church, the mass was celebrated in a language that wasn’t the language of the people.  So, you would sit in church, and if you were lucky you would respond with the customary responses, and you might not understand what was being said.  Certainly, if you weren’t educated, you might be even further removed from understanding.  So, imagine that the church tells you that basically you can’t communicate directly with God because you weren’t educated enough, or important enough; and it’s probably more complicated that that, but that’s the basic premise… then suddenly, someone comes along and tells you that what you have been made to  believe about yourself is wrong; that you matter to God just the way you are, and that God desires a personal, intimate relationship with you, and that you don’t need someone else to talk to God for you?  It changes everthing, right?  Suddenly, you see begin to see yourself as a much beloved child of God who has been freed to pray and worship God in ways that you were kept from for really, no good reason.  When we see ourselves as children of God, when we see the truth about who we really are, we can begin to question and change the systems around us that have been used in false, oppressive ways.   In the gospel of John, we are told that the truth shall set us free; and it is indeed so.  Knowing that we are all created in God’s holy image, indeed sets all of us free from the oppression that others try to force upon us.

“Jesus called the crowd to him and said to them, “Listen and understand: it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles.”  He later on explains that what comes out of the mouth originates in the heart, which is why it defiles.  When things come from the heart, they are more permanent, and are also capable of inflicting great pain upon others.

    When truth comes from our hearts and out our mouths, it may not always be pretty, but it is good, and honest; it teaches us things we need to know, and can help move us toward spiritual and emotional health.  Truth is a gift that is given when there is mutual respect between people.  When we say that we are Christian people, we are making the statement that we believe that Jesus is the embodiment of truth and love; Jesus reveals God the Father to us; in Jesus we are set free to be God’s children, equals in God’s kingdom.  As Christians, we believe in respecting the dignity of others because we believe that all of humanity is created in God’s image, and to speak about another with lies and hatred is a sin against the image of God…

    At least I hope we believe that; I hope I believe it.   There have been so many photographs and stories on the news over the last week that are disturbing, not to mention the deaths and injuries that have also occurred.  It can be easy for us to sit at our kitchen tables, coffee in hand, and think, “well, I would never do anything like that; I’m not a member of ISIS”, or, “I’m not a member of the KKK; I would never kill anyone…” Ok, fair enough.  I am certain that we are all good people who try to do the right things; except when we don’t.  If you and I continue to say that we “aren’t like those people”, without truly examining what is in our hearts and minds, we are part of the problem.  Maybe, we aren’t marching with torches or burning crosses, but maybe we tell racist jokes to our friends; maybe, we have been heard to use language that degrades another person’s being; maybe, we have perpetuated the stereotypes that cause people pain and suffering… maybe we believe some of those stereotypes… anytime we use language that degrades another, we are telling lies; things like using derogatory language for parts of a woman’s body to insult someone is never ok, and in my opinion, further demeans women; the color of someone’s skin doesn’t dictate their intelligence, their abilities or their worth; all people, and I do mean ALL people, are of infinite and equal worth in the eyes of God… that, is the truth; that is the truth that the kingdom of God is built upon, and it is what should be filling our hearts and falling out of our mouths… not to mention, it should be the truth that guides our actions… if we have drunk the poison of the empire, and all of us have to some degree, then we are at least a little drunk with the empire’s lies and distortions of the truth.  The more attached we are to the values of society and empire, the more we think we need to defend ourselves against others, the more distorted our relationship to the truth becomes.  Sometimes, we get so distracted by stuff and what we think our rightful place is, we start to lose sight of who Jesus is, and what we are called to do as members of the kingdom.

Beloved, what we say and what we do, matters.  We cannot continue to believe that what’s going on isn’t our problem; if one of God’s children is being hurt, or oppressed, it affects all of us.  All of us must look inside ourselves and honestly assess what is defiling us by making our hearts act in ways that are contrary to love.  Jesus is the very embodiment of God’s love; as heirs to his kingdom, we are called to breathe, speak, and do God’s love, to continue Jesus’ work in the world.  Anything less, anything that degrades another defiles us, defiles creation, and can encourage all sorts of hate.

As a Franciscan friend of mine said earlier this week, “Let’s love the hate out of each other,”  I pray that we can.  God so loved the world; now it’s our turn.

   

Transfiguration

Feast of the Transfiguration

August 6, 2017

    One of the great jokes about Facebook and other social media platforms, is that it’s a good place to watch cat videos.  Seeing as how the Carroll family has six cats (5 boys and one girl, because we’re crazy),  cat videos are one of my favorite things, and given some of the other craziness that’s on social media, I am all about more cat videos.  Anyway, my daughter sent me a cat video a few weeks ago that I loved so much I actually posted it on my facebook wall.  The video was of an old Tom cat.  You know the type, large, striped, a bit feral, kind of mean; I think he had been adopted or was part of a larger foster home…. He was not friendly, didn’t like to play or cuddle… then one day the unthinkable happened…. Kittens.  A small group of the cutest tiny kittens came to live with this grumpy old Tom.  If you have ever been around little kittens, you know that they are cute, fearless, and annoying.   Well, these adorable little demons would not leave this old cat alone.  They climbed on him, chased his tail, ran into him…. All sorts of kitty shenanigans.  The old Tom cat became a different cat.  Suddenly he began to play, he groomed the babies, taught them how to be cats, slept with them lying all over him…. And he even accepted some human love too.  Poor old cat had never experienced love before.  He most certainly transformed into a completely different cat, because some kittens showed him how to live.

    Today we celebrate the Feast of the Transfiguration, a feast day of our Lord.  We hear these readings every year on the Last Sunday of the Epiphany, but this year, we also have the Feast day fall on a Sunday.  We know the story well; Jesus and the three disciples that were the inner circle go up on a mountain to to pray.   While they are there, the disciples have a vision of Jesus in shining white clothing, speaking with Elijah and Moses, which ties Jesus to the law and to the prophecies.   The disciples hear a voice from heaven that tells them who Jesus is, and that they should listen to him.  The disciples want to capture the experience by building dwelling places for all three of these holy men; I am sure the disciples also want to stay on the mountain.  But, they can’t.  Listening to Jesus, means coming down off the mountain and getting about the business of the kingdom.  It also means hearing and living through some very difficult events.  Just a few verses after the story of Jesus’ transfiguration, he tells the disciples that he is going to be betrayed and killed.  Listening to him, in that context could not have been easy for the disciples who were on the mountain with him… following him in that way could not have been part of their plans…

    Being transfigured, means to have one’s appearance changed, especially changed to a beautiful and more spiritual state.  Certainly, in the gospel for today, we see that Jesus’s appearance was changed in that way; his outer appearance reflected his inner state.  I always wonder when I read this story about the disciples; I wonder if their inner state was changed, transfigured on that mountain.

    I think, that their inner beings were changed; perhaps slowly, just like the rest of us.  Encountering Jesus, is something that is life changing; what it the proper response to knowing that Jesus is God’s son?  How do the disciples respond to Jesus?  How are we changed by encountering God’s love in Jesus?

    I hope that we are changed, and that like that old Tom cat, I hope that we look and act like different people.  Encountering Jesus in the Eucharist gives us the ability to climb the holy mountain and see and experience Jesus; each time you and I come to the table, we encounter the living Christ whose love for us changes us.  We do not come to the table easily or lightly, especially if we allow ourselves to truly recognize Jesus in the breaking of the bread.  As Annie Dillard says in an essay of hers I read years ago, if we were paying attention to what happens at church we wouldn’t wear our Sunday best, we would wear crash helmets.

    When we come to the table, bread and wine are transfigured  into the body and blood of Jesus, and he reveals himself to us as he did to the disciples so long ago on the mountain; and like Peter and the rest, it can be really tempting to stay on the mountain, or to keep our experience of Jesus to ourselves.  But that’s not how it works, and when we search our hearts, and remember the vows that we took at our baptism, we know that we too must listen to him.  We must go out of this place, our place of safety and knowledge and go into our community and do his work.  When Deacon Tex dismisses us at the end of the service, it’s not a dismissal of “hey we’re done, good for us!”  It’s a continuation of what we have done at the table; it is a mandate to go forth, in the name of Jesus as transfigured, changed people who now will go out and change the world.  Like the disciples, sometimes that sounds really difficult.  Being a Christian these days isn’t always easy, and our identity has been co-opted by some folks I would rather not associate with; but when we are changed by our encounter with Jesus, we ought to look and act different; listening to him means that we heal the sick, feed the hungry, visit the lonely; just for starters.  We do Jesus’s work because when his Spirit lives in us, others see him in us… and we see him in each other.  The only response to perfect love, is to love.

    Peter, James. and John didn’t tell others about what happened on the mountain, at least not at first.  It took them some time to see and experience who Jesus was, and it wasn’t easy for them even after Easter morning.  As Easter people, it isn’t always easy for us, and I hope that we are still learning and experiencing Jesus, and as we do that, I hope that we are continuing to change and become the people of love that God has created us to be.  Love that is truly felt and experienced, will change us.  For us, to love as Jesus loves, is to live.  May we go forth from this place today, as transfigured people.  May we encounter the living Christ at this table, and may his love fill our hearts so that we may be bearers of that love in all that we do.  May we listen to him with our whole being so that the noise and chatter of the empire fades away, and we can truly be people of his kingdom.

Prayers the size of mustard seeds

Proper 12 Year A

July 30, 2017

8th Sunday after Pentecost

    As you might imagine, I get asked a lot about prayer; how to pray, when to pray, why pray… all sorts of interesting questions that we all desire answers to.  If you’re like me, sometimes those questions come from a place of wanting to get it right; I like knowing what I am doing, and the more experience I get in life, it seems the less I know.  Parenting is one of the world’s most humbling experiences near as I can tell, and I know that I often feel like I’m making it up as I go along; priesthood is similarly humbling many days… there’s just no way to “know” in any kind of way that makes sense how to parent, or how to be in any kind of close relationship with people; you just have to do it; and some days are going to be ok, and others, not so much… but hopefully we learn from our experiences… prayer is very much like that, I find.   Our Catechism defines prayer as “ responding to God, by thoughts and by deeds, with or without words”.

    Sounds like other relationships we have, doesn’t it?  Our lives are a series of responses to other people, and of course the more invested we are in the relationship the deeper the response.

    So, how invested are in our relationship to God?  Are our responses to God the deep longing for God of our souls, or just merely responses that we give out of a sense of duty?

    Prayer, is our life’s work.  Whether our prayers are part of corporate worship or the private groanings that we would never share with anyone, prayer is what we were created to do.  The goal for Christians is to “pray without ceasing”, that is, our lives are to be a constant, unending response to God.  Sounds a bit daunting, right?  There are so many distractions, so many things that demand our attention, that it seems impossible to respond to God all the time.

    Paul tell us thing morning, “The Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”  I have talked before about the Spirit praying within us, and it’s obviously a concept and image that means a lot to me.  Not sure I have ever mentioned it so many times in one year, but for whatever reason, I think it bears some repeated reflecting on.  If I look at some of the parables in today’s gospel, prayer is how we access the kingdom of God.  Prayer is sometimes that mustard seed that is so small, and seems so insignificant, at least compared to whatever else has our attention; maybe we just give God a passing thought as we go on to the next thing.

    Yet, the Spirit still uses that small seed of our prayer.  The Spirit can can help our prayer to grow so that it’s not just a passing thought or something that we do because we think we should.  Our prayers, even when they seem small and insignificant, can still help us to respond in ways that God asks us to respond.  Even if we start small, prayer is important.   I always tell people that if they want to build a relationship with God, there isn’t a wrong way to pray.  What we need to do, is show up to worship, just start talking.  Our prayer book includes so many wonderful prayers, including all of the biblical psalms, if we need some help or ideas.  But we can also just start talking.  There is so much in our lives that we need to talk about… the joys, the stuff that’s hard, the stuff we love, the things we need help with, our fears… it all matters to God, and when we can talk to God honestly, when we can let God’s Spirit move and pray within us, the journey to pray without ceasing has begun, and when you and I can pray without ceasing, our spiritual lives become rich; we live closer to God as the Spirit prays within us.  When we pray without ceasing, we no longer cans stand by while God’s people are in need; our prayers, our connection to God, helps us to respond to God and to God’s people.  Prayer, remember, isn’t just about what we say (or don’t say) but it’s about what we do.  When we pray without ceasing, when the mustard seed of our prayers grow, we are able to be the great shrub that provides for those who need it.

    How is the Spirit calling each of us to listen to the stirrings in our soul?  What might those stirrings be asking of us?  I pray that even if we think our prayers aren’t enough, we will pray them anyway, and let the Spirit help them to grow our relationship to God may deepen, and we can continue the work Jesus has begun.

Abba

Proper 11 year A

July 23, 2017

7th Sunday after Pentecost

    Anyone who has ever had small children in their lives, knows how sweet and wonderful it is to have a small child raise their arms toward you so that you can pick them up.  The look of longing and desire that comes across their faces is so real, especially if they are in pain or in need; sometimes it’s an occasion of pure joy for the child and for the one who is being reached for.  Those are certainly some of the best moments life has to offer.

    The image of a child reaching for a beloved adult or older child ran through my mind as I read our reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans.  Paul speaks of our being adopted as children of God, and as children our spirits join with Jesus’ Holy Spirit as we cry out to God, “Abba, Father”.  As children of God, our cry of Abba is one of deep love and intimacy.  We are not reaching toward a cold, impersonal God who knows nothing about us, but rather, as a small child reaches towards someone they love, we too, reach toward the One who loves us more than we can ever imagine; Our God knows each of us deeply, and intimately, and takes great joy in reaching towards us to embrace us as cherished, beloved children.

    The Spirit of God lives within each of us; and it is that Spirit that helps us to move in God’s world to do God’s work.  There was much in Paul’s world that caused pain and suffering; Paul speaks of the earth’s birth pangs, and that the earth would be made free from its bondage to decay… what a powerful image that is; there is so much in our lives and in society and the world that leads us to decay; the search for happiness in things that do not matter… money, power, sex, addiction… any of those whether on a personal level or a national level, lead down a path of absolute destruction for us and for those around us…

    But we don’t have to be ruled by those things; we are adopted children of God, heirs of the kingdom of God… we have been given the gift of the Holy Spirit so that our search for happiness is simple; we know that it is God alone that fills those places of emptiness that we all have in our hearts… but if we put aside our pride and greed and whatever else stands in the way, when we reach for God, our desires and needs are fulfilled beyond what we thought was possible.

    So, we are adopted children of God… adopted into the very life of God through Jesus… and in us, God’s Spirit dwell… so, now what?

    It’s get to work time my friends.  The world will continue to head towards decay unless you and I let the Spirit within us do it’s work.  You and I have to listen, we have to put our trust in the hope that God will indeed act; but we also have to hope that we will be inspired to act;  this life and this world were gifts from a God who loves without limit; that kind of love extended towards us is what propels us into the world to act on behalf of the world that God loves.   If we are paying attention when we worship, when we pray, when we read scripture, then God’s Spirit should stir within us prompting us toward some action to lessen the pain around us.  And here’s the thing; the Spirit dwells in all of us; doesn’t matter what our political views are, what we look like, what our favorite color is;  God’s Holy Spirit is delighted to dwell in each of us, and we don’t have to agree on anything that the world might try to divide us with; all we have to do is agree to follow the Spirit’s leading, follow the example of Jesus by loving all whom we come in contact with, and those things that divide us will no longer be important.   And who knows, as we work together, side by side, maybe we will learn something about each other; maybe we will understand what divides us and search for ways to lessen the divide.  It’s hard to focus on issues that divide us when we are working together on a common cause to help further the kingdom.

    May we all rejoice in our adoption as children of God; may we find joy in reaching towards God who is Abba, the One who loves us and knows us more than we can love or know ourselves or each other… may our hearts, souls and minds be on fire for the work that the Spirit is leading us towards as individuals and as a community; may we always celebrate the world that God loves and may we love all God’s people…in the words of Presiding Bishop, Michael Curry, “All means all”.  Love is our inspiration, and love is our work… so let’s get inspired, let’s get to work...

   

God's a lousy farmer

Proper 10 Year A

July 16, 2017

6th Sunday after Pentecost

    As most of you know, I am not much of a gardener.  I really don’t enjoy playing in the dirt, but I do admire people who do.  My dad, loved to garden.  He would spend hours outside tending to his tomato patch making sure that everything was just right.  What I did enjoy, was going with him to the garden center to get his supplies.  He always made sure that he had everything he needed to ensure a good tomato crop; and, he also was willing to share  his crop with our neighbors.

    I was in conversation this week with a friend of mine, who since his retirement has taken up cattle farming.  He lives in a farming community in New York State.  There are several small farms in the area and it sounds to me like there might be different kinds of farms, so that the community can have much of what it might need to feed local families by the cooperation of the local farmers.

    The story of the sower from today’s gospel is one we have certainly heard before, and I am certain that I have said on more than one occasion that God is a lousy farmer, at least by typical farming standards.  It seems to me that according to the story, seed is plentiful, and it is scattered rather haphazardly all over the place.  No one, who desires a decent crop would scatter seed that way; certainly when my dad was growing plants from seed, he would’ve never have just thrown the seed everywhere… plants that don’t grow and produce don’t do anyone any good, do they?  And, it just creates a huge mess, and more work…

    But here’s the thing; it seems to me, that God doesn’t much care.  As I was looking at our lesson from Isaiah, and as I was driving around town this week, I had a thought… sometimes haphazard seed scattering is really quite lovely.  I was thinking about wildflowers and even some flowering weeds…. Now, the gardeners in the group, don’t yell at me; but I can remember the absolute joy of several small children near and dear to my heart, in picking dandelion flowers, and when the cool fuzzy seed puffs sprouted, how they enjoyed blowing them away… anyone who has ever received the gift of a dandelion bouquet knows just how special they are to the child picking them; and I love wild flowers; the colors, the crazy places they grow, how pretty they can make even a junk yard look. There’s a lot to be said for seeds that just kind of land where they will, and where the wind blows them.  Maybe God has the right idea…

    If we think about the spiritual life in terms of the parable of the sower, don’t you think it feels like that sometimes?  Sometimes we hear the Word of God and it motivates us for a while, and maybe it’s only temporary, or maybe something really strikes us, and so like the somewhat more careful gardener, we try to do what we think needs to happen so that scripture might take root in us in a deeper way, in a way that leads to us being more responsive to the world around us.  Having “ears to hear” for us is not simply about hearing, but about doing… when we truly hear the Word of God, when we truly listen to the life and ministry of Jesus, we aren’t merely hearing with our ears, but we are hearing with our hearts and minds and we are doing… we cannot possibly be considered disciples of Jesus without being moved to action when our lives intersect with his; and, as disciples, we also become sowers… but maybe the way that we become sowers is a bit different; for us I think it’s often a matter of someone seeing Jesus in us that helps to sow seeds in them; at least I hope so; but I also think that maybe we need to scatter the seeds that God gives us a little more haphazardly; God provides all the necessary care… prayer, worship, relationship, sacrament… all of those things help the seeds of God’s Word to not only take root in us, but to help us tend to the spiritual gardens that God has given us to take care of… and honestly, it’s none of our business to really know what kind of seeds we are given; maybe it’s tomatoes… but maybe it’s wildflowers… whatever soil is in another’s hearts to receive the seeds, isn’t our business… and lest we think that dandelions are a disappointment, I shall remind you that guinea pigs love dandelions… and, I had neighbor who used to harvest dandelion greens from her yard and ours because she knew we didn’t use weedkiller.  Dandelion salad can be pretty tasty…

    All that to say, some days our spiritual lives produce amazing things, and sometimes it seems like it’s just weeds but I find that God can use all of it.  No one is at the top of their spiritual game all the time, and I think that even the wildflowers of our hearts are beautiful and can bring joy to us, to God and to others… and in those relationships, fed by God’s love and the prayers of the holy Spirit welling up inside us, even dandelions can be useful and grow into other and perhaps more useful things…

    I hope we will all spend some time feeding the gardens of our souls, listening with the ears of our hearts to God’s Word and to God’s voice… I pray that we will let God’s extravagant, careless even whimsical farming transform us into something that blooms and brings spiritual joy and nutrition to ourselves and to those we meet along the path.

The faith revealed to infants

Proper 9 Year A

5th Sunday after Pentecost

July 9, 2017

    Last week, I told you about the emerging theme from my time with other Third Order Franciscans.  We went back to basics, remembering that Br. Francis’ vision was that the Friars minor, (and all Franciscans, regardless of which order they were in) were to simply live the Gospel.  Francis himself, as he turned religious life upside down, gave up a life of status and relative wealth to live the simplest life possible.  Denying himself possessions helped him to focus on relationships and on people.  He was known to say, that if we had possessions, we would have a reason to defend them.  Being someone who desired radical peace, it made sense to him that the simplest life possible would keep him from being distracted from his true purpose, which was to “simply live the gospel”.

    It seems to me, that simply living the gospel means that we have to be paying attention to relationships.  I can remember when my daughter was in grade school, and there was a collection going on for Hurricane Katrina victims.  She emptied her beloved piggy bank and all of it’s treasures that she had saved up into a ziplock bag and said she was bringing it to school for the collection and asked if we wanted to help too.  She was in the first grade, and I remember how determined she was to help…. Years later, when tornadoes hit Shawnee and Moore and other areas, a friend of ours was collecting some toys that a family with young children had lost… Rachel read the request and proceeded to go tearing through boxes in our basement.  She emerged a few minutes later with several stuffed care bears and some other things that were on the list and let the person know we had those items.  I remember her saying how she hoped that having some of their toys replaced would help the children feel less afraid…

    Jesus said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.”  Simply living the gospel isn’t always easy, but all of us, not matter who we are, are capable of doing it… children, I think are especially good at it because they pay attention to relationships.  They aren’t as distracted as adults are by responsibilities, the need to make a living, etc.  Adulthood, for many of us was a trap… we were told we would granted more freedoms, but really, wasn’t it much simpler when our biggest responsibility was how large to make the sand castle?

    I think to live the gospel life, sometimes we all need to return to the basics.  We need to remember who Jesus is… we need to remember that he is the center of our lives and the one whom we follow.  That relationship is the most important relationship that any of us are in; and it is our relationship with Jesus that helps us to live into our other relationships as well.  The yoke of Christ which may not always seem easy, is light because it is simple.  St. Francis knew this, and his life, while difficult in so many ways, was joyous because he knew that simplicity made it far easier for him to follow Jesus.  When he came upon the Lepers, who previously had been a source of disgust for him, he realized that they were also loved by God and that as a result, should be loved and cared for by him…

    Maybe that sounds extreme to us… and perhaps it is, but it is what we are to do as disciples.  The joy my child showed in giving away her money and some toys to others was a beautiful thing to witness… and she never got to see the response on the other side, but it didn’t matter.  It was the right thing to do, especially because she had so much in comparison to those who had lost everything.  Francis became poor, not to glamourize poverty, but because by being poor he could be free and he could be generous with what he was given by others.  He  didn’t have to live with the complications of ownership or greed; poverty allowed him to see the poorest of the poor as children of God; his own poverty allowed him to give everything to others… it allowed him to be closer to God who gave up everything to become human in Jesus…  I think it’s fair to say, that Francis believed that the more people had, the cloudier their perceptions of God and the world God loved were…

    The Gospel life was revealed to infants, to those who were not rich and worldly, so that the simplicity of the Gospel life could be readily seen… all through Jesus’ ministry, it seems that there is a tension between simplicity and wealth; and Jesus is constantly calling on those around him to see more clearly what God is asking of them; and we know, that sometimes those who see the clearest are those who are blind, until they encounter Jesus and allow their lives to be changed.

    There will always be tension for us between living the Gospel and living as society would ask us to live; that tension between God’s kingdom and the empire of national wealth and pride that constantly surrounds us.  And believe me, God loves this world… creation, at least as Francis understood scripture, is good… very good.  And humanity is the most beautiful and beloved of God’s creatures… And that means all of humanity; the lepers, the poor, those displaced by hurricanes and tornadoes… and it means that you and I have to pay attention to relationships above our own fears for our comfort… sometimes we just have to let Jesus take the burden and we have to take the risk that it will all be ok… and not just ok, but that we might actually become better people because we dared to love and we dared to live the gospel life…

    In the time of Francis, lepers wore bells so that people could hear them coming and get out of the way… can you imagine how lonely an existence that must have been?  What about the poor, unshaven guy on the corner with the old dog, both of whom are needing some food?  What about the Muslim woman who is wearing a hijab at the grocery store who is afraid to ask someone for help because of how her family has been treated in the past?

    There are modern day lepers for us?  Who are those people we are afraid to engage with because they challenge our feelings of security?  Today, we aren’t called to overthink our commitment to Jesus… like children we are called to be in relationship and to give what we have, extravagantly and with joy; we are called to see the poverty whether it is spiritual, physical, financial, and alleviate it as best we can, even if it’s only for one person… and certainly for more if we can.  God gave up everything for us so that he could be as close to us as possible, allowing us to become part of God’s very life.  Today, we are asked to throw off all of the attitudes that we hide behind in the name of pride and self importance, and take on the vision of children so that we might see more clearly the people that God loves, and see who our own modern day lepers are, and embrace them with love and joy.

A cup of cold water...

Proper 8 Year A

July 2, 2017

It’s good to see you all today!  I had an amazing time in Cincinnati with other Franciscans.  We stayed in what was once a convent for the Sisters of Divine Providence; it was a beautiful place; and as is usually the case at these sorts of gatherings, the worship and the fellowship between members of the community is life giving.  I was finally able to meet some members of my community that I have corresponded with by email or facebook in person; what a wonderful gift!   The staff at the facility we were staying in were so kind and wonderful to us.  I watched staff members help older community members or those who had mobility issues; at every meal they were there to help, always smiling, always asking what ways they could make us more comfortable… it helped make little inconveniences like slow elevators and the occasional cold shower even littler.   I could tell by everything they did, that they considered their work at St. Anne’s a ministry of hospitality and they were very good at it.  It was also a joy to watch members of my community from all over the Americas be together.

    One of the themes that emerged from our time together, was something that St. Francis said about the Friars with whom he lived and worked;  he said that the rule of the Friars Minor, was to simply live the Gospel.

    It sounds so incredibly easy at first listen, doesn’t it ?  In this long church season, we will hear stories from Matthew’s gospel about the ministry of Jesus… As we already know, these stories will challenge us to figure out how to “simply live the Gospel.”

    In today’s gospel Jesus speaks about giving a cup of cold water to one of these little ones… it’s hard for me not to read that gospel and not remember a very moving scene from the movie, “Schindler’s List”.  If you have never seen this movie, or even if it’s been a long time, please see it.  Oskar Schindler is a member of the Nazi party and a businessman who hopes to make his fortune in Poland as WW2 is underway.  He has hired a Jewish accountant and many other Jews from the Krakow ghetto to work in his factory, because the labor was cheap.  While walking through one of the concentration camps, he sees a little Jewish girl in a red coat, and later on recognizes her coat and her body on the top of a pile of corpses that are being moved through the camp.  He is changed… and he begins a journey that will take him places I am certain he didn’t want to go.  The scene in the movie that has always reminded me of today’s gospel, is a scene where Schindler is talking to one of the SS soldiers on a train platform.  The train that is there is filled with Jewish people, men, women and children who are literally stuffed into the train cars, unable to sit, unable to rest, hot, tired, and I am certain extremely thirsty.  They are being transported to somewhere else, probably to their deaths.  Schindler, complete with his Nazi Party pin on his lapel, grabs a hose, and sprays water into the train cars, and if I remember right, it’s under the pretense of making the occupants uncomfortable… but his real plan was to make them cool and give them something to drink,,, and we see people opening their mouths to catch the water as it pours down from the top of the cars; people are crying in gratitude for this small kindness shown to them by this German man…

    It’s an incredibly moving scene.  It is a moment in the life of a man who was definitely changed by the circumstances around him and I imagine he was also changed by his own Christian faith which recognizes that all people are created in the image and likeness of God.  Toward the end of the movie, as the War ended, Schindler has lost most if not all of his wealth by using it to bribe various Nazi’s so that he could save the 1,200 Jewish workers in his factory… the workers in Schindler’s factory decide to give him a gift.  It is a ring, and on the inside of the ring is engraved a saying from the Talmud,  a collection of Rabbinic writings;  The engraving says, “whoever saves one life, saves the world entire”.  Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire.  

    Every person matters to God and when one of us is suffering we all suffer… When one of us delights, we all delight, because we are all connected through God and through creation.  Every person matters equally regardless of who they are.  God created humanity because life is perhaps the greatest gift that can be given by a God who loves the whole world…  and if God loves the whole world, than we as God’s beloved must also love the whole world… not just the parts we like.  Giving some water to one who thirsts is a life saving act; we cannot live without water, and Jesus even refers to himself in various gospels as living water, water that will never leave us thirsty… you and I might have to settle for plain old water… but if you and I are to simply live the Gospel, then we are to do what Jesus does.  

    There are many who thirst among us; those who literally thirst for water, and those who thirst for justice and basic human needs.  To simply live the Gospel means that we who have water must share it; we who have social status must help those who do not… you and I are in the business of saving lives, even if it is one life at a time; “whoever saves one life, saves the world entire”.   What water do we have to share with others?  Who is Jesus asking us to save?  I pray for each of us, that we won’t need the sign of a dead child in a red coat to change our lives, but that coming to this place, hearing the gospel and taking the body and blood of Jesus into ourselves will help us to see those in our midst who are desperate for a drink, for a word of hope, for a meal or some kindness.  Even if all we can do is help one person, it’s one person who has seen Jesus today, for “Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire”.

Trinity Sunday 2017

Trinity Sunday 2017A

June 11, 2017

    Today we celebrate the feast of the Holy Trinity, a feast that has driven many a seminarian and new priest to their knees in hopes that they won’t draw the short straw and have to preach it; and I admit to a bit of fear myself; preparing sermons on the Trinity have often been used as jokes among friends as a test to see if the preacher was orthodox or not, sometimes with those listening to the sermon counting the number of times the preacher wandered into a heretical territory…

    The good or the bad news, depending on one’s perspective is that I am fairly awful at both math and history; so, all the language that has been used over the centuries to describe the Trinity, doesn’t really tie me up in knots as it sometimes does others.  Honestly, when I start reading things about three persons and one nature, I get a bit of a headache… Trying to explain any of that for me, kind of misses the point, at least for modern congregations.  It just doesn’t really help me get through my day.

    What strikes me as I read these readings, is relationship… Paul’s blessing at the end of his letter to the Corinthian church is simple and yet very powerful.  “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.”  Grace, love, communion… what do you think about when you hear those three words…. Grace, love, communion… Certainly, I think about God… particularly, I think about Jesus, but let’s get a little more abstract for a minute… as I reflect on those three things, it occurs to me that those are three things that we all really need; we all need grace… that wonderful gift from God that helps us know we are loved and forgiven even when we really mess up; we all need and desire love in our life, to be appreciated for who we are; and of course, we need communion, we need to be in relationship to God and each other.  God created us to be in relationship… and for me, perhaps that is the key… the great mystery of the Trinity is at least, in part, about relationship…

    It seem to me that it isn’t really possible to have grace, love and communion in a vacuum.  No one can live into those ideals without others… as people created by a God of love, our every desire is to be in relationship with others.  God created out of love because love leads us into relationship with God, and I’d like to think that perhaps God desired to be in relationship with us as well.  God lives in community in God’s very being in the Trinity and has thrown open wide God’s very life for you and I to participate in that holy community built on grace, love and communion…

    You and I, as disciples who are members of the kingdom of God, also invite others to participate in God’s life as well.  As the church, we baptize in the name of the Trinity, bringing the newly baptized into the community of the church, so that they may always know that they too are God’s beloved and our brothers and sisters in the kingdom… it is perhaps one of the most important ministries that we share in, together with celebrating the Eucharist together.  All of our ministry and work as the church is born from those two great sacraments.  It is there that we are invited to participate with God in the work of the kingdom, and also where we discover whose image we are made in.

    Can we truly understand the Trinity?  Can we really understand who God is?  It seems to me that the moment we think we understand, we should perhaps realize that we can’t.  But honestly, anything worth loving is worth spending our entire life learning about, and trying to understand.  All the definitions in the world will never help us understand what or who the Trinity is, as much as being in relationship with God will.   So, that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.  Experience and relationship are important… and as those who are created in God’s image, the image of grace, love and communion, it is also our calling to bring those kingdom values to others, who may have forgotten in whose image they are created.

    So now that we have experienced the hope of Easter and the comfort of the gift of the Holy Spirit, it’s time to get to work.  Nothing can stop us.  Jesus is with us every step of the way, even to the end of the age.

Jesus prays for us: Easter 7 year A

7 Easter Year A

May 28, 2017

    “I am asking on their behalf; I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those whom you gave me, because they are yours. All mine are yours, and yours are mine; and I have been glorified in them. And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.”  

    These are beautiful words of Jesus in his prayer for his disciples as he faces his own death at the hands of the empire.  It’s a prayer that is filled with love for the disciples; but there is something else too; Jesus says that he disciples, his followers, which includes you and I, are one; we are one with each other, and we are  one with God the Father, and God the Son in Jesus…

    I spoke last week about our prayer as the Holy Spirit praying within us… that when we pray, when we truly give ourselves over to prayer, it is the Spirit working within each of us to bring about God’s kingdom here on earth… and now today, we have Jesus praying for us… what does it mean for each of us to have Jesus praying for us?  This is the great shepherd who knows each of us by name, who now brings us into the Father’s presence and love through his prayers…

    It’s a wonderful though as we have just celebrated the Feast of the Ascension in the church, which our reading from Acts makes reference to.   The miracle of Jesus’ ascension, at least for me, is that a human body with a human nature, is brought into the presence of God and is now seated with God at God’s right hand… and for us, that is good news.  It opens life after our death in a new way; Easter morning and now the ascension are God’s gift to say that death shall not, cannot have the last word in our lives.  The kingdom of God, as it is in heaven, has been established and is waiting for us…  and that is good news.

    But the kingdom is not just about the kingdom as it is in heaven… there is that part of the prayer, “ON EARTH as it is in heaven”... and that, I think is where today’s gospel comes in.   

    Jesus is praying for his disciples because he knows what is coming; he knows the fear that they will go through as they watch him go to his death; he knows that they will need courage and hope… fortunately, they don’t have all that long to wait; while I am sure it was the longest three days some of them had lived through, knowing that God’s truth and hope rolled away the stone, and knowing that Jesus had conquered death, had to be an incredible thing for them to witness.  

    And now, even though we are separated from Jesus’ words by many years, the words of Jesus’ prayer is still his prayer for us… he prays for us to be one with him and the Father… and also, that we might be one with each other, as he and the Father are one…

    Unity, the kind of unity that Jesus is talking about is so much more than having a group of people who get along.  Getting along is ok, as far as it goes, but it can sometimes require that the relationship is based on lies.  Oppressed people “get along with” their oppressors as long as they don’t cause trouble; that’s not relationship, that’s abusive.  People who work together can often “get along” because they share a common task or goal; once the time clock is punched, the relationship is over until the next work day…

    The unity that Jesus is speaking of is based on God’s love.  It’s a unity that really has no conditions; it’s a unity that exists simply because one is loved by God; just as Jesus loves and is loved by God the Father, so too, are we loved by each person of the Trinity.  It’s a relationship that is closer than any other relationship that we have because it is based in God’s love; and because Jesus ascended into heaven bodily, all that it means to be human is now closer to God than we can even imagine…

    So, what does it mean for us to be prayed for by Jesus?   I think it means that everything that you and I are is brought before God; I think that maybe when the Spirit prays in us, that it might be a response to having Jesus pray for us… that somehow our prayers and Jesus’ prayers somehow come together to form prayers that create more wholeness…

    If Jesus prays for us, if unity is what Jesus prays for, then we all have some work to do, don’t we?  The unity that Jesus prays for means that no matter what we think or believe, we are all one in Jesus; the petty fights that engage in, the arguments, and perhaps even the hatred and fear that we might engage in are things that we put in the way of the unity that Jesus desires for us, and for all of humanity.  Our unity as people is grounded in God’s love for us and in Jesus’ life as one of us… that’s it.  We don’t have to agree about much of anything, except that we are each loved by God; and if we are loved by God, that should mean something to each of us;  it should mean something about ourselves and about every human being that we come in contact with… Every. Single. One.   Oppression, prejudice, hatred, even the petty anger and annoyance that we have with others really has no place in our relationships especially when we realize that everyone we meet is the object of Jesus’ prayers… Just think about that… everyone we meet is loved and prayed for by Jesus - that alone gives them and us an infinite about of worth and beauty…

    Unity, the kind of unity that Jesus prays for, is a goal of the kingdom here on earth; we know there are plenty of places where it doesn’t exist; I encourage all of us here today to search those darker places in our hearts to work on ridding ourselves of the attitudes that keep us from true kingdom unity with each other… and I would ask us  to remember who it is who prays FOR us… and whose prayers live within us…  we all desire closeness and unity… it’s what we were created for.  Perhaps we can live as kingdom people who are working to bring the kingdom here on earth, so that we might be one, as Jesus and the Father are one...