Epiphany Last - Transfiguration Sunday sermon by The Rev Dcn Pam Bright: The 'Possible' of God'

Lectionary: Exodus 24:12-18; Psalm 99; 2 Peter 1:16-21; Matthew 17:1-9
Preacher: The Rev Dcn Pam Bright



As I sat in my living room yesterday, listening to beautiful piano music and looking out the bay window, pondering what God would have me to say to you today, I was filled with a deep and profound sense of gratitude that I had a sermon to prepare.

It wasn't that I felt I was being given something amazing and profound to say. It wasn't the excitement I feel, and sometimes share with you, when I get to preach on a lectionary that is new to me. No, it was happiness that came with the realization that it was one of the rare times I've been able to be still and quiet and just be, for more than a few exhausted mindless minutes at the end of a long day.

See, last week was a week, one of those weeks, in a month that has been made up of those weeks...I know most people assume my work in Child Protective Services is never particularly easy but recently it has been especially difficult. Too many complex cases with seemingly no good solutions, negative media attention, a plethora of complaints from clients and their families, touchy personnel issues...it's all a bit of a blur in my memory as my staff and I have run, sometimes quite literally, from one thing to another in an attempt to keep up, while striving to be responsive to a multitude of demands and to make the best possible decisions with limited time and sometimes little information.

Clearly, I need some time away! I need some time off! I need a mountain top!

Mountain top experiences, moving, amazing, transformative experiences of the Divine such as we hear described in today's Gospel, are something we all desire and seek, especially when we are tired and drained. This lesson, the Transfiguration, is always the Gospel reading for the last Sunday of Epiphany, and some think its placement in the lectionary is intentional-to give us one last high, one last glimpse of glory, one more mountain top moment, before we enter Lent.

But the story of the Transfiguration is about more than one last mountain top before we begin our journey with Jesus to Jerusalem and the cross. Epiphany is about the revelation of who Jesus is, and of what his coming among us means. The lesson for the first Sunday after Epiphany is always the baptism of Jesus and as I said earlier, the Transfiguration is always the last. These two, combined with all the lessons we hear in between challenge us to answer for ourselves; just who is Jesus and what does his coming mean?

What have we heard in the last few weeks? What has Jesus said that gives us insight into who he is?

We've been told if we follow, we will be taught how to fish for people, how to reach others and help them remember they too are children of God.

We've been told we're God's light and God's salt, offered to a world in great need of the illumination and flavor of God's love.

We've been told that it isn't enough to just change our actions but we must allow God to change our hearts and our minds as well.

We've been told as God's children, we are to love like God loves, with agape love, loving those who do not love us and even loving our enemies.

And today, Jesus stands on a high mountain, with Moses and Elijah, his appearance changed so much that his face shines like the sun and his clothes are dazzling white. A voice from a bright cloud says 'This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased; listen to him.'

This is my Beloved; listen to him.

The voice terrifies the disciples, they are overcome with fear, but Jesus comes to them, touches them, and tells them to get up, and to not be afraid.

Perhaps fear is some of what we feel. Maybe hearing-and actually listening - to what God in Jesus tells us we are to be and how we are to live as children of God - is a daunting, frightening thought for us, of an impossible task, a way of being we fear we can never achieve.

Maybe it is the listening itself that we find hard and scary. Like Peter, busy in his desire to build booths, like me with my crazy, non-stop life -to stop and be still and listen, to be still and know - means we might discover our true selves and our true calling in God.

Regardless, Jesus tells us to not be afraid. Wherever we are in our understanding of who Jesus is, of what his coming means to us, and how that changes us, he touches us and tells us to not be afraid.

Don't be afraid of the life I planted in you and of what I am calling you to do. Don't be afraid of the journey, and of what is to come.

Don't be afraid. I am transfiguring you, changing you, the transforming power of the Holy Spirit is working in and through you. As you experience my presence in the high points and in the low, in your ordinary moments, and in your dark nights, you are being formed more and more into the person I created you to be. Don't be afraid.

Transfiguration, transformation, becomes our way of life as we learn to see and experience God with and within us, as well as with and within others, present at all times, at work in and through every situation and circumstance. We are God's beloved and don't need to be afraid.

But our transfiguration, our transformation, our changing, doesn't ensure a life without difficulty or trouble or struggle. When Jesus and the three disciples came off the mountain, they are met by a man whose son needs healing. And we know that after the Transfiguration Jesus goes to Jerusalem where he is betrayed, tried, beaten and executed. Even the Beloved is not immune from the pain and hardships of life.

What it does mean is that every moment contains the potential for change, for redemption, for grace, for love, if we allow it, because God is present in every moment of our lives, creating the possibility for outcomes we cannot even imagine. Who could have imagined Easter morning standing at the foot of the cross? God. God did.

So while my exhaustion won't magically go away, while I am still in need of a mountain top and some time away, God is present with me during this time and is calling me to allow the Spirit to use it all, all of it, to bring about change within me and in my world.

I'd like to share a prayer by Angela Ashwin in closing that has helped me these last few weeks. Let us pray.

"Lord, you put twenty-four hours in a day and gave me a body which gets tired and can only do so much. Show me which tasks you want me to do and help me to live prayerfully as I do them. Sharpen my senses, that I may truly see what I am looking at, taste what I am eating, listen to what I am hearing, face what I am suffering, celebrate the ways I am loved, and offer to you whatever I am doing so that the water of the present moment may be turned into wine." AMEN.

Pentecost 12-C, 2013: Because we believe

Lectionary:Genesis 15:1-6; Psalm 33:12-22; Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16; Luke 12:32-40
Preacher: The Very Rev Dr Valori Mulvey Sherer, Rector



En el nombre del Dios: Padre, Hijo, y Espiritu Santo. Amen.

As people of God there is one thing of which we can be certain: we can trust in the promises of God. And God has promised to redeem the whole world and all people.

In the story from the book of Genesis, Abraham, chosen by God to be a father in the faith, has no heir. In his time, an heir was extremely important. A

man’s legacy, the value of the footprint of his life, was in his heir. Abraham and his wife, Sarah, were in their 80’s and still had no son, no heir. Yet, God had promised Abram descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky. And Abraham believed.

Even when God does deliver on the promise to him, Abraham was given only one son with Sarah. How could he have descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky when he was given only one son? Still, Abraham believed.

From where we stand today, we can see the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham. The descendants of Abraham continue to grow as Christians, Jews, and Muslims (all the children of Abraham) now number about 3.5 billion in the world. (Source: wikianswers.com)

That’s a lot of stars in the sky.

And Abraham’s faith is a perfect example of what the author of the letter to the Hebrews is talking about when he describes faith as: “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

God always keeps God’s promises.

When we look at the arc of the big picture of the story of God’s relationship to us, a perspective we have this many years into the narrative, we can see that. God promised the people of Israel a Redeemer. Many of them didn’t live to see the coming of Jesus, the Christ. As the author of Hebrews says, they “died in faith without having received the promises” but they believed, and God delivered. And in the truth of life eternal, all who died with faith in the promise were able to see and welcome it.

The letter to the Hebrews was written to Jewish Christians who knew the stories of the faith of their ancestors. They could see the arc of the big picture, the connection of themselves, as people of the resurrection, to the promises in the stories of their forebears in the faith.

On the other hand, the Gospel of Luke was written about 60-70 years after the resurrection to a group of mostly Gentile Christians who were new to these stories and promises. This group of converts to the faith was being persecuted and the second coming that was promised seemed not to be coming at all.

Fear and doubt were creeping in and without a strong historical tether to the stories of the faith, the people were becoming frightened. We can imagine then, how very comforting Jesus’ words were: “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”

As modern day listeners, this is a good place for us to pause and consider what this says. The word “kingdom’ is one of those ‘religion words’ that we hear so often, but we rarely stop to consider exactly what it means.

The Greek word is, βασιλεία, and it translates as God’s dominion, sovereignty, and control. βασιλεία also means the time when God’s will is being done on earth as it is in heaven. So Jesus is saying, ‘Do not be afraid beloved disciples, for it is God’s pleasure to deliver to you the promised reality of God’s sovereign control, the time when God’s will is being done on earth as it is in heaven.’

As we look around at our world today we see rampant war, hunger, poverty, violence, oppression. It doesn’t look much like God’s βασιλεία yet. But we can remember, that neither did Abraham’s one son look like descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky – yet. It is in the arc of the big picture revealed to us over time, that the fulfillment of this promise will evident.

You’ve heard me mention before that we live in a time of what’s called the “already, but not yet.” Jesus has already redeemed all creation, but until the second coming, the process of redemption will not be complete. It has already happened, but is not yet complete.

Until it is completed in the second coming of the Christ, we are partners with God in this process and we have work to do. Each of us has been created by God and gifted for our part in that work – in that purpose. In order to fulfill our purpose, we must be perfected, that is, we must open our eyes to see our gifts, then nurture and develop them so that God can use them to bring about βασιλεία.

And Jesus offers us four (4) bits of advice on how we should go about doing that…

1. Sell what you own. Jesus advises us to be unattached to anything that gives us security or identity on the earth. Instead, be rich in God as we heard last week.

2. Give to the poor. Money = power. Jesus calls us to give up our power, just as he gave up his own power and chose to live among us on earth, so that all may become one in him; so that no one is over anyone else, so that no one is better than anyone else. Be forewarned, though, taking Jesus’ advice won’t win you any friends because the world doesn’t respect those who give up power. It panders to those who accumulate it.

3. Jesus said, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” This, Jesus tells us, is the test. It’s how we will know where we really are in our relationship with God, other, and self. What kind of wealth do we spend our time, attention, and gifts storing up? Again, storing up heavenly wealth won’t win us any respect from the world, because the world values material wealth and those who have lots of it.

4. Jesus’ last bit of advice is a familiar Biblical theme: Be awake. Be ready. God is coming to you and it won’t be anything like you’re thinking it will. To illustrate the point, Jesus tells the story of the master and the slaves, turning everyone’s expectations upside-down. It isn’t the servant in this story who serves the master. It is the master who serves the slave! Be ready, Jesus says, because God will come to you, sit you down to eat, and serve you.

I can’t think of a better description of our Holy Communion. Can you?

God chooses each one of us and calls us into community where God sets the table and serves us holy food – God’s own self – to nourish us, strengthen us, and embolden us to be co-builders of the βασιλεία of God.

It’s a beautiful and comforting thing to know that Almighty God serves us so that we can serve God by serving God’s people. It’s like breathing. We breathe God into ourselves, then breathe God out into the world.

It’s a dangerous and costly business, though, being church in this way. Breathing the transforming love of God into the world means going where it isn’t. It means going where the vulnerable need protecting, where the oppressed need liberating, and where the poor need justice. It means calling down the powerful from their thrones and lifting up the lowly.

As Deitrich Bonhoeffer says, “Jesus Christ lived in the midst of his enemies… So the Christian, too, belongs not in the seclusion of a cloistered life but in the thick of foes. There is his commission, his work.” (~Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community)
The church must be real, visible, and engaged in the world. As theologians Kelly and Burton said, commenting on Bonhoeffer’s spirituality, “…the church is not called to be a safe haven from worldly turmoil. [Rather,] like Jesus himself, it has to be a visible presence in the midst of the world… even though this way of understanding its mission could propel the church into controversial areas of conflict with government.” (G. Kelly, F. Burton, The Cost of Moral Leadership, The Spirituality of Deitrich Bonhoeffer, Eerdmans Publishing Co, 2003, 147).

That’s why we go to rallies like Moral Monday. Because we believe.

It’s why we stand with our LGBTQ sisters and brothers as they seek equality in church and under the law. Because we believe.

It’s why we willingly sacrifice our own comfort and reputation to offer food and friendship to our Shepherd’s Table guests each week. Because we believe.

Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to deliver to you the βασιλεία of God.

CLOSING PRAYER

For your love for us, compassionate and patient,
which has carried us through our pain,
wept beside us in our sin,
and waited with us in our confusion.
We give you thanks.

For your love for us, strong and challenging,
which has called us to risk for you,
asked for the best in us,
and shown us how to serve.
We give you thanks.

O God we come to celebrate
that your Holy Spirit is present deep within us,
and at the heart of all life.
Forgive us when we forget your gift of love
made known to us in our brother, Jesus,
and draw us into your presence.

Amen.

Pentecost 8, 2013: Sermon by Michele Wiltfong, Aspirant for Holy Orders

Lectionary: Deuteronomy 30:9-14; Psalm 25:1-9; Colossians 1:1-14; Luke 10:25-37
Preacher: Michele Wiltfong, Aspirant for Holy Orders



May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.

Being the youngest of three children, I held an interesting place in my biological family. I always thought my sister was the prettiest of us and my brother was the most caring. I was always kind of the black sheep of the family because I never really acted like my siblings and certainly did not do what my parents expected me to do. I would go about my life studying and I started working at the age of thirteen. We were a regular middle class family with a roof over our heads and clothes on out backs, but they were certainly not name brands.

As different as we are, all three of up learned one of the legacies that my father left behind when he passed away - the desire to advocate for those less fortunate than we are. A popular quote going around Facebook right now is "I don't give because I have in abundance. I give because I know what it is like to have nothing." My father would often speak to local farmers who were paid to not harvest their fruit or who let the less than perfect fruits and vegetables fall to the ground that would not bring as much money. He would ask them if he could pick up the rejected produce and donate it to the local food bank or needy individuals. Often the response from the farmer was "Whatever as long as I am not expected to help you gather it or deliver it." My father would then gather all he could in the bed of his pickup truck. Sometimes some of the hired hands around the farm would help him gather because he would bring them warm clothes for the winter. He would then make the stops to those people he knew needed these items just to put another meal on the table for their children.

I started my working life as a cook and dishwasher at a neighborhood golf course. We would cater weddings for hundreds of guests each weekend. I would watch as the serving line ended and clean-up began. The plates would come back to be washed and the leftover food would get thrown in the trash. Trays and pans and platters of perfectly good food went out in the garbage. I was horrified, but I did not know what could be done about it. The owners of the course did not care because the food was already paid for. I asked if there was a better system for finding a use for the food instead of throwing it away. I was basically told to mind my own business and do my job. I knew, from that point on, what I would do to try to make a difference in the lives of those who could have benefitted from that pan of green beans or that platter of cheesecake.

In today's Gospel, we hear Jesus being tested by the lawyer who wanted to trip him up by asking him the question, "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" Jesus answered that question with a question, "What is written in the law?" The young lawyer then answered with the great commandments written in the Bible. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind and love your neighbor as yourself." People often get into debates about "Who is my neighbor?" Being a good teacher, Jesus tells us who our neighbors are by telling the parable of the Good Samaritan. Two religious leaders see the man beaten on one side of the street and intentionally cross the street to avoid him. Perhaps it was so that they would not become ritually unclean by touching a man who is bleeding or so near death. Perhaps they feared they too would succumb to the same punishment if they walked down the street passed this man. None of that mattered to the Samaritan. He didn't ask, "Did he deserve this or will I get sued for helping him? " No, he just went about helping him to heal by pouring wine and oil on his wounds and bandaging them before taking him to an inn for respite and recovery. He told the innkeeper he would be back to take care of whatever other expenses he might incur. The Good Samaritan did not just drop the man off and forget about him. He said he would return to see what else was needed.

Brian Konkol, Lutheran Pastor in Wisconsin, writes, "While the parable of the Good Samaritan provides a wonderful lesson in response to a specific question (who is my neighbor), we are often left wondering how to advance life-giving communities alongside our neighbors. For example, while people of faith are often spectacular at providing relief in times of crisis, we often fail at long-term work that is necessary for lasting social justice." He asks, "What if the parable continued and the Good Samaritan paid similar expenses day after day for victims?" So often we get involved in helping someone until it becomes a burden on time or finances, then we say, "They need to stand on their own now. I've done my share. Do they even appreciate my help?" The short term effort would be focused on relief from the current symptom, but the long term solution would be to try and prevent people from being victims in the first place.

Showing mercy and justice are not just about providing food to the hungry or clothes to the naked one time. It's about hearing God's call on our lives and living into the people God is calling us to be. It's about living in faithful obedience, as a community, to be merciful. This often flies in the face of our individualistic thinking and acting society, but if we listen and "get ourselves out of the way", we can hear where God is calling us to make a difference - no matter how large or small.

Jesus asked the lawyer who presented him with these questions meant to trick him, "Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?" The lawyer could not bring himself to say the Samaritan, but said, "The one who showed mercy." Jesus said, "Go and do likewise." That can seem like a hard instruction, but if we love others with all their human imperfections as God loves us, it should not be so hard after all.

There was a poem by an unknown author titled The Other Side of the Desk I was given when I began working at DSS. It helps me remember the dignity of the person on the other side of the desk and I would like to share those poignant words with you.

Have you ever thought just a wee little bit
of how it would seem to be a misfit,
And how you would feel if you had to sit
on the other side of the desk?
Have you ever looked at the man who seemed a bum,
as he sat before you, nervous -- dumb --
And thought of the courage it took him to come
to the other side of the desk?
Have you thought of his dreams that went astray,
of the hard, real facts of his every day,
Of the things in his life that make him stay
on the other side of the desk?
Did you make him feel that he was full of greed,
make him ashamed of his race or his creed,
Or did you reach out to him in his need
to the other side of the desk?
May God give us wisdom and lots of it,
and much compassion
and plenty of grit,
So that we may be kinder to those who sit
on - the - other - side - of - the - desk.

What would we want to happen if the tables were turned and we were lying in the ditch, beaten and left for dead? Where is God calling us to be the Samaritans of our time? Where is God calling us to ask more questions in our own lives and receive more questions in return? Where does God want to break us open and use us for the social justice that is so desperately needed in society today? Jesus defied all convention. Where and to whom in our lives are we called to do the same thing?

"I do not give because I have in abundance. I give because I know what it is like to have nothing."

Amen!

Pentecost 2013 sermon by Deacon Pam: Saying Yes

Lectionary: Acts 2:1-21; Psalm 104:25-35, 37; Romans 8:14-17; John 14:8-17, (25-27)
Preacher: The Rev. Deacon Pam Bright




As most of you may know, my day job is serving as Social Work Program Manager for Child Protective Services at the Department of Social Services here in Cleveland County. I have also supervised foster care at different points in my career, so I have had the joy of helping adoptions happen.

What you may not know is I have personal knowledge of the power of adoption; my father was adopted when he was 7 years old.

My dad was the second oldest in a family of five. When he was 6, his mother died from pneumonia shortly after giving birth to her youngest, the only girl, whom she named Lucille. My grandfather, known for being an alcoholic and a batterer, was serving an extended jail sentence at the time.

This happened during the Depression, and none of the relatives could afford to take all five in, so they split the children up among themselves, some going to members of the Bright clan, others to the Peaces, my grandmother’s side of the family.

Being good folks I suppose, they all took the children to see their father in jail on a Sunday afternoon after church. My grandfather told the family that he would see the children “dead and in hell” before he would let them raise them, and subsequently signed them over to a state orphanage.

The oldest, my uncle James, ran away, and the youngest three, Pierce, Ernest and Lucille, who were 3, 2 and a newborn, were quickly adopted, leaving my father there alone without his siblings.

Daddy said he played everyday on the split rail fence along the road in front of the orphanage, and many days, a peach farmer named Andrew MacAbee would stop and talk to him on the way to take produce and other wares to market. One day, Mr. MacAbee told my father he had been talking to his wife about him and he asked my father if he wanted to go home with him and be their little boy. Daddy agreed to his offer, with one stipulation - he asked that they not change his name, in case his brothers ever tried to find him. The MacAbees agreed, and my father soon had a new home with them.

Pentecost and adoption? Yes-the very heart of the Pentecost story is our adoption as children of God.

On Pentecost, we focus on the Holy Spirit, and we are used to talking about the Holy Spirit in spectacular and extraordinary ways, such as we hear about today in our reading from Acts: the sound of a mighty, rushing wind; tongues, like fire descending, or as we hear about in Gospel accounts of Jesus’ baptism, the Spirit descending like a dove, accompanied by a voice from heaven.

Those are powerful stories, critically important stories that help us understand some of the ways God works in the world. But it seems equally important to talk about how, through the Spirit of God, we are included in God’s family.

Consider, for a minute, our epistle reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans:

“All who are led by the Spirit are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry “Abba, Father!” it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ-if, in fact we suffer with him, so that we may also be glorified with him.”

So today, on Pentecost, as we remember and celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit to those first believers, we are also celebrating our adoption as children of God through the gift of the Spirit dwelling within us. The Spirit makes us children of God and so connects us with God that we can approach God as a parent, crying out to God as a child would to their father or mother.

And notice in our reading from Acts what Luke doesn’t say about the wind-or the tongues of fire-or the indwelling of the Spirit-or the proclamation of the Good News in different languages. He never mentions any kind of exclusion. God called them all, all of them, as God still calls us all-into God’s kingdom, into God’s family. The differences in culture and language and ethnicity and gender and theology and education and economic status that separated one person from another crumbled, broken apart by the power of the wind and the Gospel and the Spirit.

In his article Adoption as God’s Children Andrew Marr says “...God is the most prodigal of adoptive parents there is. God just doesn’t just adopt a child here and another child there. God adopts everybody. We are, all of us, adopted children of God. God chooses us. The emphasis is on intentionality. God’s love for us is not some vague instinct that happens automatically... Rather, God invites each and every one of us individually to become God’s chosen child because God has already chosen us.”

My father had a stipulation on being adopted, but he said yes to the MacAbees. He was no longer an orphan. With his yes came the joys and as well as the responsibilities of being part of a family-meeting his new siblings, learning their rules and customs, helping to do the things that needed done to keep the family together. My father was influenced and shaped and loved by my Grandma and Grandpa MacAbee.

As children of God, the Spirit of God dwells within us, is alive within us. We are led, we are influenced, we are shaped, we are changed and loved by that Spirit if we allow it, if we say yes, if we allow the Spirit to fill us and work in and through us.

Remember what that same Spirit did on that first Christian Pentecost.

That was the day when the timid and afraid - think Peter here - became bold and courageous...

The day when looking inward became far less important than looking outward...

The day when concern for one’s self was replaced with an overwhelming passion and desire to tell others how they might find healing and salvation, health and wholeness in and through Jesus Christ...

That same amazing powerful Spirit that dwells in each of us; the question becomes what are we doing about it? Are we being true to the Spirit we have been given as children of God? Are we saying yes, are we allowing ourselves to be lead by the Spirit?

Some contemporary theologians were asked to blog about how the Holy Spirit moves today, how is the Holy Spirit at work in the world today, in 100 words or less. Monica A. Coleman, professor of Constructive Theology and African American Religions at Claremont School of Theology responded with the following:

“when we put the gospel
to hip hop
and host U2charists,
when we share the church building
with the Korean congregation,
when we preach against homophobia
when we break bread
with jews and muslims
when the teenagers lead worship
on a regular Sunday (not just youth day)
when we invoke the ancestors
and learn from their lives,
when we live at the borders
offering water to those in the desert
harbor to those in danger
and community when we don’t fit in...
it is then that we speak in tongues.”

May we indeed speak in tongues...may we say yes to God, and may the fire and the wind that changed the first followers and made them and all who come after the children of God transform us so that our lives reflect just whose children we are.

Amen.

Lent 3, 2013 sermon by Deacon Pam: Good News

Lectionary: Exodus 3:1-15; Psalm 63:1-8; 1 Corinthians 10:1-13; Luke 13:1-9



When people learn that I am preaching on an upcoming Sunday, they typically ask two questions: what’s the Gospel lesson, and what are you going to say about it.

When I have told people about this week’s Gospel, about Pilate mixing the blood of Galileans with sacrifices offered to Roman gods, and the tower of Siloam falling and killing eighteen people, I have gotten: laughter, eye rolls and head shakes; comments like “Better you than me” and “Good luck with that one”, and some suggestions like “Can’t you pick a different lesson?” or “Call in sick Sunday, make Valori do this one!”

My friend and fellow deacon Jerry Beschta likes to say, when confronted with more difficult lessons such as this one, that “The Gospel is always good, but it isn’t always easy.” His saying applies well to this lesson, which, I promise, once we unpack it a bit, is indeed very good news.

If we back up some, to set the lesson in context, Jesus has been teaching a large crowd of people gathered around him. Some in the crowd tell Jesus about Pilate mixing the blood of Galileans with sacrifices to be offered to Roman gods. Their deeper thoughts and concerns about this incident are unspoken, but certainly picked up on by Jesus, and so he asks them - do you think this happened to them because of the degree of their sinfulness?
No, he tells them, then he shares another example that might beg the same question; the eighteen people killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them, were they worse sinners than anyone else living in Jerusalem?

No -that’s not why it happened. It was not a divine punishment, exacted upon them because of their sinfulness.

In saying that, Jesus directly confronts a commonly held belief - then as well as now, if we are honest about it - that bad things happen to people as punishment for their actions. There are other passages in the Gospels where Jesus confronts this same belief, challenging the thought that calamity, disaster, illness and tragedy are the God’s punishment, God’s consequences for our sins.

We still tend to believe that way, to greater and lesser degrees. There are religious leaders who are quick to publicly declare, after most tragedies, the sinners who brought this punishment upon both the innocent and the guilty. Katrina - all those sexual deviants in New Orleans; 9/11 - the ACLU, the pagans, the abortionists, the feminists, the gays and the lesbians; New Town - the atheists forcing God out of public schools. We tend to dismiss these folks and their theology, usually with a mixture of anger, humor and hopefully compassion for what their world must be like, but we can fail to see how often we do the same thing on a smaller scale.

I am asked, and I suspect most ministers are, on a fairly regular basis - “Why did this happen to me? I’m a good person. I try to do what God wants me to do. I’m not nearly as bad as some other people are and nothing like this happens to them. Why is God punishing me?”

And our deep belief in some kind of divine retribution is reflected not just in asking why unfortunate things happens -unjustly in our opinion - to us or to someone we love; we show it in our validation of, and sometimes glee at what we perceive to be punishment for those we feel deserve it. “They got what was coming to them, didn’t they? What goes around, comes around. I knew they’d end up paying and paying dearly for what they’ve done.”

But Jesus makes it very clear that it was not the sinfulness of the victims that caused their suffering. They were no better - or worse - than anyone else; all are sinners. What happened to them was not God’s punishment, God’s wrath, some divine accounting for misdeeds. Don’t blame - or thank God. That’s just not how God works.

The rest of Jesus’ answer makes it clear from where these tragedies originate. Note what he says, both times: ‘unless you repent, you will all perish as they did.” Now, at first reading, sounds like Jesus is contradicting himself. They weren’t being punished for their sins, but, unless you repent, you will perish in the same way - still sounds like punishment for sins, doesn’t it?

To get to clarity on Jesus’ answer, we need to take a minute and consider the stories themselves, and the definition of the word repent.
While these exact stories-the mixing the blood of Galileans with the sacrifices and those killed by a falling tower at Siloam-aren’t recorded in accounts of the region during that time period, historians consistently state it it likely they were actual events because they are consistent with other events during that same time.

It was common for Pilate to torture those who were perceived in any way to be a threat to Roman authority, and offering the blood of his victims to the Roman gods was a common form of torture. The tower at Siloam is thought to be associated with the aqua duct the Romans were building at the time, and because the duct was being constructed very close to the Jewish temple, Zionists carried out acts of terrorism, attempting to disrupt construction, kill Romans and their labor force and destroy the structure. Both stories involve humans harming and killing other humans. Both could also be taken from our news today - acts of torture and terrorism are no less common now, perhaps more so. We haven’t really changed much-our methods have just improved, growing steadily more powerful and deadly.

And that speaks to why Jesus tells us to repent, or we will die in the same way. Repent means to change one’s mind, to change one’s heart, to amend how one lives one’s life. We tend to hear it as being sorry for something we have done that is not in line with God’s plans, and there is an element of that, but to repent means “I am going to do things differently from here on, I am going to be different, I am not going to act in the same ways. I am going to change my life.”

Jesus is saying unless we change how we act and think and behave, how we see the world, how we treat others, unless we change our hearts and our minds, unless and until we allow God to live in and through us, then we are going to continue to do bad things to one another. We are going to continue to suffer the consequences of our actions toward one another. We will continue to wound one another, withhold blessing from each other, actively seek to harm others and succeed in doing so, unless we repent, unless we have the change of heart and mind and action that can only come through relationship with God.

God does not cause the bad things that happen to us. They are not God’s punishment for our sinfulness. But they are the results of our unrepentant lives, of our hard hearts, our fears, our hatreds, our prejudices, our judgment, our pride, our ego.

Jesus then tells them a parable that reiterates his teaching and points clearly to the nature of God and God’s unfailing desire for us to repent, to change and God’s willingness to help us do so. Jesus tells the story of a land owner who wants to cut down a fig tree because it has not produced fruit for three years. The gardner intervenes, begging the owner to let him work on the tree, to fertilize it and aerate its roots before cutting it down.

We tend to think the owner is God, in our mixed up way of seeing God - you better hurry up and do something, you better act right, or God is going to get you!

But the owner isn’t God: the owner is culture, the world, society. Cut it down! It’s not behaving like it’s supposed to behave, it’s not productive, it’s not doing what I want, so get rid of it! How like our world! How like us! Quick to destroy, to do away with, to dismiss, anything we don’t see as important or useful or consistent with our wants or needs or ideas.

No, the owner isn’t God; the gardner is God. It is God who asks for more time, who wants the tree to have a chance to grow and be what it was created to be; it is God who offers to continue to work with the tree and to tenderly tend it, it is God who desires to give it every opportunity. Our God just isn’t the God of a second chance; it’s a second and a third and a fourth...our God is the God of infinite chances. And that is exactly how God is, with each and every one of us.

As we enter the last few weeks of Lent, may we allow God to tend our soil, to help us grow, to change our hearts and our minds and actions, bringing forth amazing new life in us, so that we in turn can help God bring about amazing change in our world.

Amen

Pentecost 19B sermon by Deacon Pam: How hard is your heart?

Proper 22 Lectionary: Genesis 2:18-24; Psalm 8; Hebrews 1:1-4; 2:5-12; Mark 10:2-16

When Mother Valori asked me to switch Sundays with her, I thought "Yeah!I've won the lectionary roulette! I won't have to preach on 'cut off your hand, cut off your foot'...Then I realized "Divorce! I got divorce!"

As I prepared for today, as I read through commentaries and lectionary discussions and sermon helps, I was struck by how many of them advised that I run, not walk, away from this lectionary, saying things like:

"Most will try to avoid preaching on this Gospel lesson, and who can blame them; we know you don't want to talk about this lesson from Mark, talking about this teaching on divorce is fraught with difficulties and the potential for misunderstanding." But at the same time some of those same folks said "but you must, you must, especially if the lessons are read aloud in your church-you must."

So what's with these seemingly divergent thoughts?

I think in part the writers felt it had to be addressed because it's difficult to put something like that out there and not say something about it. It's similar to part of the Gospel from last week that I've already mentioned-the part about cutting off your foot or your hand - it's not a lesson you can ignore or skip over. Whether you like it or not, you going to have to deal with it.

I think the writers were also thinking about the typical church family. Think about Redeemer for a second.

Some of us are married, some are divorced and some are divorced and re-married. Some of us are single and long to be married. Some of us, because of sexual orientation, can't get legally married-or divorced-in most states, yet have the same relationship issues as any married couple. Some of us dealt with it in our families of origin as children when our parents decided to divorce. It would be hard to find someone that doesn't have some relatable experience, whether in one's own life or that of a friend or family member.

And it is important to talk about it because of how this passage has been used by the church to judge those who have gotten divorced. I have certainly thought a great deal about people I am familiar with, people I know and care about, who have been wounded, have been marginalized, often in God's name, because of divorce.

Divorce was an issue in Jesus' day as well. Keep in mind that marriage, and divorce, have changed a great deal and looked much different then than now. Some religious leaders taught it was legal for a man to divorce his wife only in cases of infidelity; others felt is was lawful for almost any reason. While we don't know definitely if it was what they believed or if they just wanted to 'set him up' so to speak, the Pharisees who approached Jesus to test him were referencing the latter teaching.

They were referring to a passage in the 24th chapter of Deuteronomy that states if a woman does not please her husband, if he finds something objectionable about her, he could write a certificate of divorce and send her away. Notice the man can divorce his wife; women were not allowed to divorce their husbands under Mosaic law.

It is thought by some scholars that when Jesus mentions women divorcing their husbands in his later discussion with the disciples, he was either referencing Roman law or, the explanation I prefer, he was upending culture and law and making women equal with men.

Divorce in Jesus' time was devastating for women; at best, as this law demonstrates, women were treated as second class citizens and at worst, as something less than a human. They were treated like possessions, acquired by their husbands through the legal contract of marriage. They were powerless and they were always the victims of divorce. Because women were largely dependent on their husbands, divorce left them with almost no economic options.

Jesus' answer back to the Pharisees is less about the legality of divorce and much more about the attitude and state of their heart. He points out that while they are correct about the letter of the law, the law is not reflective of the will and heart of God but is rather a concession by Moses to human failings and human desires.

Jesus' teaching was designed to protect the "least of these" in a system where they were dismissed for the slightest provocation and to point to the real problem - hardness of the human heart. If their hearts weren't hard, Jesus is saying, there would be no need for a law permitting them to send their wives away when they became too old or sick or feeble.

And while we can be quick to feel righteous and think how terrible this practice was, we can be guilty of the same thing - in our intimate relationships, in our families, with our friends and with those in the world about us. How many people have we dismissed - perhaps in our hearts and minds, perhaps overtly - because we found in them something we didn't like, something we found objectionable, something we found displeasing. Hardness of heart wasn't just a problem in Jesus' day and isn't an issue only in marital relationships!

Think about all the things that are reflections of our own hardness of heart...

Are we insensitive to the needs of others? Do we justify not helping because we feel we've given enough and it's time for them to do it themselves or turn to someone else?

Do we fail to love and show hospitality out of prejudice and fear toward those who are different from us?

Are we carrying around resentments and anger that are killing us, poisoning our relationships and eroding our trust because we refuse to forgive someone who has hurt or disappointed us?

Have we turned a deaf ear and closed our hearts to the thoughts and ideas of those who have a different point of view? Have we allowed them voice and a place at the table with us?

Have we narrowed our vision of what God asks of us? Do we refuse to open our hearts and minds, to step into the fuller life and deeper love to which we are called? Do we criticize and find fault with the ministries of others, perhaps out of fear God might be calling us to do more as well?

It is easy to pass judgment, isn't it? And it's so easy, so tempting, to let our hardness of heart, and that of those around us, go unchallenged.

Judging the decisions others have made and especially using those decisions against them, whether we are talking about divorce or something else, is not what God calls us to do.

Jesus stood with and for those on the margins - women, children, the sick, the mentally ill, the poor, the hungry, the other, the alien. As his followers, that is our call as well - to soften our hard hearts and to show through our words and our actions that we believe the kingdom of God belongs to all.

Let us pray.

O God,
take away our hardness of heart,
our disappointment, our despair, our greed, our aloofness, our loneliness,
our hatred and our fear.
Help us to see our own errors
and not to judge those around us.
Open our eyes which are often blind to the needs of others.
Strengthen us and fill us with your love;
teach us
to use our power with care.
Bring new life where we are worn and tired and
forgiveness where we are are wounded.
May your thoughts become our thoughts,
and your ways become our ways.
Amen

Pentecost 3B, 2012: Sermon by Kheresa Harmon

Lectionary for Proper 6: Ezekiel 17:22-24; Psalm 92:1-4, 11-14; 2 Corinthians 5:6-10, (11-13), 14-17; Mark 4:26-34




A Tree Grows in Lower Manhattan

When the nose of the first jet punched the face of the North tower, the inhabitants of the Bradford pear tree spread their wings and flew – far, far away.

Only the insatiably busy worms, grubs, and insects remained sheltered under the velvety green canopy that separated them from the world of steel and glass. A pungent organic odor filled the air as the leaves and limbs of the sheltering tree were scorched by balls of fire. Large shards of glass and chunks of falling cement severed limbs. Layers of thick, choking ash soon blanketed the charred remains of the skeletal stump of the tree.

Weeks passed. Workers who were sifting through the remains of the twin towers unearthed the seemingly lifeless 8 foot stump of a tree. From the looks of it, there was little hope for life.

The 17th chapter of Ezekiel drops us knee-deep into the miserable muck of the exiled Jewish community. The fledgling kingdom of Judah had rebelled against Babylon. King Nebuchadnezzar responded by deporting King Jechoiachin, the aristocratic religious leaders – including the young priest Ezekiel, and most of the residents of the kingdom. To make matters worse, Zedekiah had become a Babylonian vassal, and he had begun conspiring with Egypt to break the grip of Nebuchadnezzar. Gone were the days of the Davidic monarchy. The exilic community now found itself struggling to eke out some semblance of a life – as prisoners of war. From the looks of it, there was little hope for a real life.

The exilic community was mired down in miserable muck, but muck is more than it seems. It is rich with nutrients – the stuff that nourishes new life.

God was moving quietly within the muck of misery to create a new life for God’s people. God revealed God’s plans for God’s people to Ezekiel, “I myself will take a sprig from the lofty top of a cedar; I will set it out. I will break off a tender one from the topmost of its young twigs; I myself will plant it on a high and lofty mountain. On the mountain height of Israel I will plant it, in order that it may produce boughs and bear fruit, and become a noble cedar. Under it every kind of bird will live; in the shade of its branches will nest the winged creatures of every kind. All the trees of the field shall know that I am the Lord. I bring low the high tree; I dry up the green tree and make the dry tree flourish. I the LORD have spoken; I will accomplish it.” Salvation was beginning in the muck of exile.

Jesus was well-versed in the Hebrew Scriptures, and it is likely that he had this passage from Ezekiel in mind as he taught his disciples and the crowds by the sea. When we encounter Jesus in the fourth chapter of Mark, we discover that the locus of Jesus’ teaching ministry has changed. After healing the man with a withered hand in the synagogue on the Sabbath, Jesus departs from the institution and begins teaching in the open – on hillsides, on houses, wherever the crowds congregate. The face of Jesus’ audience has changed, too. The crowds that congregate around him are no longer limited to his disciples and other Jews. The time is right for Jesus’ message to be shared in the open with anyone who has ears to hear.

In the tradition of the rabbis, Jesus sat down, this time on a boat, and began to teach his followers that God was doing something new in the midst of them.

Jesus employs a series of three seed parables, or picture puzzles (as defined by Dr. Robert Funk), to teach his followers that Kingdom of God has come near. But, the new kingdom would not be what they might expect.

Jesus’ audience would have understood the concept of a kingdom as the area ruled by a king, by the scope of the area ruled, by the number of years ruled by a king, and by the wealth and military force of the king. The Kingdom of God proclaimed by Jesus was the antithesis to this. It was the reign of God. It was where God is at work in the world. It was in Jesus himself. Jesus’ listeners, including his inner circle of the Twelve, did not understand him and could not see the Kingdom of God easily.

Jesus’ response to the misunderstanding was a promise in the form of two parables, the parable of the seed and the parable of the mustard seed. Take heart, he seems to say. God is at work in your midst right now. God is present in me. If you do not see that, do not fret. Think of the seed.

The farmer sows seed. The farmer lives his life from night to day. The farmer will work alongside the seed, but the seed itself will grow as God created it to grow. The soil will seem to yield nothing, yet the seed that has been planted is growing underground. Suddenly, when the time is right, a green shoot will push up through the soil, and the ground will be blanketed with new green growth. The growth will be abundant, and one day the harvest will be ready. New creation will come about.

The scorched stump of the Bradford pear tree seemed dead. To the workers who unearthed it, the stump was the only hope that life might begin again. The wounded 8 foot stump was removed and transported to the Arthur Ross Nursery in the Bronx, where it was painstakingly pruned and fertilized. Waiting began. From the looks of it, there was little hope for life.

Something new has happened, and it is happening. The new age began with the birth of Jesus Christ. The new age continues. As persons who have been reconciled by God and to God, we are participants with God in bringing about the Kingdom of God in our world today.

Our epistle reading is a powerful reassurance that, as person redeemed and transformed by the blood of Jesus Christ, we are already experiencing the fullness of life. When we look through resurrection lenses, we see the new creation that God has begun. And, we are invited to participate in it. As persons who are in Jesus Christ, we have been given the privilege and responsibility of participating in the growth of the Kingdom of God on earth.

Grow shall the Kingdom of God! Jesus compared it to the growth of the mustard seed. The mustard seed appears in Jewish folklore as the tiniest, most fragile of all the seeds. When cultivated properly, it can grow up to 12 feet in height. Under its canopy could animals seek refuge from the wilderness sun. On its branches could birds build nests and bring forth new life. From the medicinal properties of its leaves could women and men seek healing from physical illness.

When Jesus compared the Kingdom of God to the growth of mustard seed, he must have remembered the image of the tree in Ezekiel—the new tree of life created by God from a sprig that would grow large enough to provide shelter and shade to every living creature.

It is an image of the living Kingdom of God, and we have been invited to participate in it. When we do, we can fully experience the righteousness of God, the justice of God, the mercy of God, and the peace of God. When do participate in the reign of God on earth, we can experience the healing of our minds, our bodies, and our relationships. When we do participate in the reign of God on earth, we can truly sit at God’s table. When we participate in the reign of God on earth, we can taste real reconciliation—the kind of reconciliation that is rooted in God’s love, that springs forth from God’s forgiveness, and that can happen only in community.

On June 8, 1972, canisters of napalm pelted southern Vietnam. The ferocious flames fed voraciously on a tiny village, vaporizing straw huts, chickens, women, and children. Kim Phuc was nine years old, and napalm’s burn temperature of 1200 degrees Celsius incinerated her clothes. The napalm should have burned her skin off her body; instead it charred her flesh. Kim’s face was untouched. As the hungry inferno devoured the village, Nick Ut pulled out his camera. The image he captured on film was that of nine year old Kim, running, burned and naked, through the burning village.

Kim should have died. Three days later Kim’s parents found her in the hospital morgue – alive. Seventeen surgeries mended some of visible wounds, but hatred and bitterness seethed inside her. When Kim was 19 years old, she became a Christian. Her relationship with Christ began to change her life, and Kim learned that she must learn to forgive . . . and to seek reconciliation.

A glass of coffee helped Kim learn how to forgive the men who nearly killed her. One day Kim filled a glass with black coffee, which represented her anger, hatred, bitterness, pain, and loss. She poured a little out every day. One day there was no coffee left to pour. She filled the glass with water. Every day, with intentional patience, she wrote down all of the names of people who caused her suffering and she began to pray. “The more I prayed,” she wrote, “the softer my heart became.”

Kim forgave, and Kim has dedicated her life to promoting peace and reconciliation around the world. In 1997 she founded the Kim International Foundation, a non-profit organization that assists the most innocent victims of war, the children. The Kim International Foundation provides medical and psychological assistance to millions of children around the world. And, Kim has intentionally worked to seek reconciliation with persons who nearly killed her. She is now friends with John Plummer, a pastor in Virginia, who was instrumental in coordinating the airstrike on her village. Kim participates in the reign of God on earth.

The Bradford pear tree had been ripped of its leaves and limbs. It had been scorched and reduced to a stump. But, the roots of the tree remained untouched. Life was there, and it fought to live. That’s what God designed it to do. By the spring of 2002, tiny green shoots emerged from the old wounds on the trunk of the Bradford pear tree. In December 2010 it was returned to Manhattan. It is now 30 feet tall, and its foliage canopies a portion of the memorial pool.

We must let our roots of faith run deep into resurrection soil, for the deepest roots receive the most nourishment and thrive. May it be so through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Easter 6B, 2012: Abide, Know, Love

Lectionary:



(Note: this was an extemporaneous sermon. Below are a few sermon notes. Turner White's prayer is embedded as a photo at the end)


Mother’s Day & Rogation Sunday

Jesus said to his disciples, "As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. (Jn)

Abide = to dwell, to live, to wait, to rest… We let God act to redeem all things.

Jesus said, “I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.”

Joy = chara (Gk) … charism (gift, extraordinary power) Fruit that lasts.

"This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends.”

Love is inconvenient, costly. Who are we called to love?

God’s shows a lack of restraint… God shows a generosity in giving love, and asks us to do the same. But mostly we don’t. “the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard the word.” ALL

Peter, etc. were “astounded that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles.” …the Negroes, …the gays

“Then Peter said, "Can anyone withhold the water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?"

Baptism is full initiation into the body of Christ the Church. BCP, 298. Preparation for Baptism. Criteria = desire for it. Choice to learn and grow in abiding in love.

Children often teach us best how to do that.

Pregnancy – life abiding in my body. Birthing that life. Living a shared life with that other human being.

God = the great womb of the universe. Abiding in the love of God – the invisible bond.

For every one of us there is the motherly love of God. And for everyone of us here at Redeemer there is the motherly womb of this church that births us into that abiding over and over again.

I give thanks for our children who show us the way to go.

Close with prayer by Turner White (age 10), his journaling from his labyrinth walk (during Lent). This is what purity of heart looks like - faithfulness that is victorious in the world.

Imagine if our whole church could abide in this way. Amen