Pentecost 2020

The Day of Pentecost

May 31, 2020

    I remember when Bill and I were preparing to get married.  One of the things we did as a young couple was go to our favorite department store and complete a bridal registry.   We didn’t have a large registry, but I remember how much fun it was to pick out some of the things that our friends and family would purchase to help us get started on our lives.   As I was telling one of my best friends about the dishes and pots and pans and things, she looked at me and said, “but Trace, who’s going to use all that stuff?” Obviously, my friend Susan knew me well, and knew that I was not much of a cook.  

The wonderful gifts from friends and family were meant to celebrate us as a couple, and they were also meant to help us to succeed, especially in our early life as a couple.  And, as wonderful as those gifts are, the successes that they bring are mostly superficial. Over time, our dishes have chipped, our glasses broken, towels fade… all of these bring a joy that is temporary.  The true gifts that a couple needs to succeed, are the kinds of things that cannot be measured; they are the kinds of things that help a couple get through things like raising children, job loss, critical illness, autistic children… then a couple needs the kinds of gifts that only God can give; commitment, deep and abiding love that goes beyond the physical, spiritual health and growth, community… these are the deeper gifts that cannot be measured; these are the gifts that help a marriage get through life, not just a dinner party, as fun as those are.

Let’s face it; life has been really difficult lately for many, many people, and we will continue to see some of this difficulty long after COVID 19 is a distant, awful memory.  And, it’s not just this virus that is taking up spiritual and emotional real estate for us. Watching the news lately has become one awful story after another. Our black brothers and sisters are being killed by white police and in the case of Aubry Amhad, by white citizens who thought they had the right to shoot someone whom they determined didn’t belong in the neighborhood.  Photographs of armed men protesting the directive to wear protective masks were scary enough; then to see videos of an officer of the law kneel on George Floyd’s neck when Floyd was handcuffed and unarmed…. Well, there are no words to describe that. Protests have turned into riots in some cities with massive destruction of property, perhaps because words have not worked; our black brothers and sisters are angry; I cannot even imagine what it feels like to be a parent of a young black man.  Black lives matter, beloved, because for so long we have said that they don’t. You don’t have to hate cops to believe that black lives matter; that’s not how community works. We can support good, brave, police officers AND the black members of our community; they aren’t mutually exclusive, as some groups might claim.

So, what might all of this have to do with Pentecost?  It has everything to do with Pentecost. As the church, we celebrate the gifts that we have been given that help our community function.  Gifts of time, talent and money are incredibly important and I thank God for this community that works so hard to help St. Michael’s be the church God has called it to be.  But, time, talent, and money, while important are much like the registry gifts for the young couple. They are necessary; but as the Church, each of us must go deeper to truly understand the gifts that the Holy Spirit has bestowed on each of us.  We will shortly renew our baptismal covenant; this covenant helps us to see what we might need to do in order to truly see the gifts that the Holy Spirit has bestowed upon us; THESE gifts, gifts of knowledge, wisdom, discernment, spiritual growth, love...these are the gifts that will help us to bring the Kingdom of God to earth; these are the deep gifts that will help us to get through those difficult parts of life where we must speak out against injustice, and do everything we can so that all of God’s children can be free.  Sins such as racism have no place in God’s Kingdom. The baptismal covenant asks us to pray, to follow the apostle’s teaching; it asks us to believe in God the Father, Jesus the Son, and God the Holy Spirit; it asks us if we will proclaim by word and example the good news of Jesus Christ… it asks us if we will resist evil, and when we sin, will we repent… will we turn our lives around and turn back to Jesus Christ? We will do all these things with God’s help. Beloved, we must look into the deeper gifts of the Holy Spirit in order for the Kingdom to be realized; we have to use those gifts especially when it’s hard, so that all of God’s beloved children, regardless of the color of their skin, will be able to live in the light of the good news of Christ.  So beloved, pray, read your bible, read books that might frighten you because the truth of racism is frightening.  The kingdom started with Jesus… it continues with us who have been given the Holy Spirit.  May we realize that the gifts of the Spirit are deep and difficult; may we use those gifts, gifts like wisdom, knowledge, faith, and prophecy, to search our own souls to root out sin, and help us to be the light of Christ is a hurting world.  Come Holy Spirit, come.

2 Christmas/annual Meeting

January 5, 2020

    While the Feast of the Epiphany isn’t until tomorrow, our lectionary gives us the option of using the gospel lesson for tomorrow, today.  We don’t get to have a second Sunday after Christmas every year, so it’s a treat to sing about Christmas for one more Sunday while we also celebrate the arrival of the wise men.

    The arrival of the wise men lets us remember that Christmas isn’t any safer than any other day or season of the Christian life.  We cannot just sit and rest in comfort with the animals and gaze upon the beautiful infant Jesus with Mary and Joseph. Things do not remain “tender and mild” for very long… as the wise men enter the scene there is fear and evil in the air.  Herod hears about the birth of the Messiah, the King who is going to save the people of Jerusalem; any “King” is going to be a threat to Herod’s power and also a threat to the Emperor in Rome; no other King must rise up, and so, Herod tries to trick the wisemen into telling him where this child is; as we read further in Matthew, we know that Herod decides to kill children under the age of 2 so that his throne and his position of power will not be threatened.  

It seems so awful to think that infants could be threatening to such a powerful person.  It brings the question of what power actually is, doesn't it? Perhaps that is part of the point of our Christmas celebration… to show us that what we believe is powerful really is just fear overblown to unbelievable proportions.

Another reason that the Christmas and Epiphany story is important, is that when these three wise men, who aren't Jews, recognize that the infant Jesus is a King to whom they owe homage, they become a symbol that Jesus has come not just for the Jews, but for everyone.  The Kingdom of God has begun on earth in the birth of Jesus, and it those outside of the covenants made with Abraham and with Moses, are now brought into the kingdom. That beloved means you and me, people of non Jewish background. We have been adopted by God, added to the ranks of the chosen people...a gift given to us by God who loves all that has been created…

These implications of the Christmas/Epiphany story are as important for us today as they were then.  This story of God entering into human history should compel each of us to live our lives differently than the world might dictate.  We are children and bearers of the Kingdom; we are not to be manipulated by the Empire; Herod allowed himself to be a herald of a false kingdom and it led him to perform unspeakable acts of violence against innocent children because he believed he was the rightful king.  He feared he would lose his wealth and his position, so he did everything he could to resist losing his throne. Fear is a powerful motivator, and Herod used his own fear to manipulate, frighten and control those he was in power over.  

It doesn't work like that in the kingdom of God.  

    In God’s kingdom, there is no fear or manipulation, because we know that Jesus is the one true King.  Our loyalties are not given to the empire, but to God; and so, we live as if we believe that the Kingdom of God, that the will of God, is ‘here on earth as it is in heaven’.  Kingdom people aren’t jealous or fearful of each other, because our biggest currency is love; and, we know that God has more than enough love to go around. God will never love us less than another, because it’s love that isn’t earned, but is freely given in abundance.  Status, wealth, earthly power, cannot motivate us because we have what we need; when we have more than enough, we give it to others who are in need, because we recognize the gift that God has given us, and so we give what we can to others. The wise men gave lavish gifts to the infant Jesus to show just a fraction of what his birth meant to them, to the Jews, and to the world; gifts fit for a true King.

    I said earlier, that the visit of the Magi, also represents the gift of Jesus to those outside the Old Testament covenants between God and Abraham, and God and Moses.  So all of us have been brought into those covenants to become children of God… it’s important for us to remember that our status in God’s eyes isn’t above others, or especially favored over others.  Just recently during the feast days of Hanukkah, violence was committed against our Jewish brothers and sisters in different communities; as children of God, who are loved by God, it’s our duty to speak against such attacks;  every person who has lived and continues to live on this fragile planet, are loved by God, and are loved equally… we as Kingdom people, are to love as our God loves, without jealousy and without fear; God’s kingdom has no room for violence against another.  Our world seems to be running counter to the kingdom. Humans seem to be more motivated by fear and a false sense of power, than they are by love; and perhaps that is our nature as people. Christmas, the great feast of the Incarnation, of God becoming human in Jesus, demands that we live counter to that nature.  Self preservation isn’t our guiding principle; loving others, no matter who they are or how different they are, is our guiding principle; living as people of the Kingdom of God, rather than as citizens of the empire is another guiding principle. War, prejudice, racism… nothing that devalues the life of another is part of the Kingdom of God, and nothing that devalues another has any place in our speech, our actions or our lives.

    And so St. Michael’s, today we will celebrate the Great Thanksgiving at the Lord’s table, and we will go from here to our annual meeting.  While the annual meeting is something that is required of us by the greater church, it is also an opportunity for us to celebrate who we are as a congregation, as well as to dream about our future.  A wise former bishop of mine used to say that a budget is a statement of mission; that we put our money in those places that are important to us as a church. And so I ask you to dream… it is a time for us of a new beginning together.  It is time for us to dream about how we as St. Michael’s Longview, will proclaim by word and deed, the Kingdom of God. It is time for us to show the love of God, freely given, to those whom God has given us. The fear and anxiety and yes, even the hatred in the world is palpable now; lots and lots of people are being REactive rather than active… it’s our time to shine… it’s our time to show those around us a better way… it’s our time to show the world what it’s like to live in the Kingdom of God, rather than the Empire… it’s time to show the Herod’s of the world what a true King looks like.  May everything we do today be pleasing to God and may the things we do this day give us knowledge of God’s love, and the strength to do God’s will in the world.

O God, who wonderfully created, and yet more wonderfully restored, the dignity of human nature: Grant that we may share the divine life of him who humbled himself to share our humanity, your Son Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.