2 Easter & Baptism of Mel Pey: Drenched in God’s love

Lectionary: Lectionary: Acts 5:27-32; Psalm 150; Revelation 1:4-8; John 20:19-31

St. Teresa of Avila, 16th-century Spanish mystic, wrote a prayer that I think is familiar to most of us: 

“Christ has no body now on earth but yours, no hands but yours, no feet but yours. Yours are the eyes through which to look out Christ's compassion to the world. Yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good. Yours are the hands with which he is to bless [people] now.”

This prayer speaks to us about how we witness our faith. Ours is an embodied faith, not a faith of thoughts or doctrines, but a living, breathing, acting faith.

Christians are, by definition, a community, the body of Christ. We are made in the image of God, who is also a community - The Trinity who lives in Unity.

In today’s gospel, Thomas is absent from his community when Jesus makes his first post-resurrection appearance to them. Thomas’ path is one that needs proof - so God provides it.

This story is important because it demonstrates three very important lessons for us: 

1) that God accepts us where we are and leads us to where we need to be; 

2) that there are many ways to come to faith and many ways to live faithfully;

3) that God is present in the gathered community.

Notice that Jesus didn’t get mad at Thomas for doubting. Instead, he came back and invited Thomas to come into his presence to confront his doubt - to go fully into it – not to deny it or avoid it or be ashamed of it. Come close, Jesus said. Touch me. Be with me.

And no one kicked Thomas out of the disciples club for not believing right. They preserved their friendship with him, keeping him part of the community, while God did the rest.

Whether or not we ever “see” Jesus will depend upon how accessible we make ourselves to God throughout our lives and how God wishes to work in us. Some will know about Jesus from earliest childhood. We often witness a deep, abiding faith in children.

Others will have resurrection experiences, like Theresa of Avila, who saw visions of Christ in his bodily form, or John Wesley, whose heart was strangely warmed when he encountered the presence of Jesus in prayer, much like those disciples who encountered Christ on the road to Damascus. Others will say they never experience the presence of God. They don’t “see” Jesus. To them, Jesus said, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

In writings discovered after her death, St. Teresa of Calcutta confessed living most of her life in a dark night – a state of feeling totally absent of the presence of God. She struggled to believe, yet never stopped serving because it’s what her faith demanded of her. And how well did she serve?!? She drew close to the poor and touched them, saying, “In the face of each of these I serve, I see the face of Jesus.” It seems to me she was in the presence of God in Christ - all the time.

In our Collect today, we asked God to help us “show forth in our lives what we profess in our faith.” So we must ask ourselves: what do we believe?... and do we truly believe what we profess in our faith? …and if we can’t believe it, do we live it?...

We have opportunities all the time. For example, what do we say when people ask us about the presidential election, or laws up for consideration by our legislators? I’m not going to talk politics, but I am going to ask: Do we witness to our Baptismal Covenant in response? Think about this as we renew our Baptismal Covenant today,

What about when we’re out in the world and we’re with someone who says they don’t believe in God? What do they learn about God by being with us… by watching us live our lives? How will what we do, what we say, and how we live influence Mel, who will be baptized today?

As witnesses, we are called to be the presence of Christ in the world. His presence in us empowers us to accept people where they are, and gently place them in the presence of God, who will lead them into all truth.

Today, we welcome young Mel Pey and his family to this gathered community at Emmanuel Episcopal Church. We know that Mel will have his own path of faith to learn and to live, and we commit to being with him as friends to support him along his way.

We commit to making opportunities for Mel to encounter the grace of God through Christian formation, children’s choir, and other ministries that strengthen his faith, so that when he doubts (and he will doubt), we can respond to Mel as tenderly as Jesus responds to Thomas, drawing near to him with assurance and steadfast love.

Together with Mel and his family, we at Emmanuel are Christ’s hands in the world today – hands that reach out to catch someone who is falling, even when that means sacrificing our own comfort for their sake.

We are Christ’s feet in the world today – feet that will go to those places where hope needs to be spoken and compassion needs to be given. Feet that will walk willingly into the darkness of someone’s nightmare, confident that we are bearers of the light of Christ.

We are the body of Christ in the world today, members of the communion of saints, and members of one another.

In the Episcopal Church, we talk about Christian Formation as being like a cup of tea. The more it steeps, the richer the flavor. In other words, bring the kiddos to church. They soak up more than we realize.

I close with this poem from the book “Episcopal Haiku” (p. 42): 

A little girl drops 

her wafer in the wine. She’s 

soaking up God’s grace. 

Let’s baptize Mel, then, so he can soak up the grace of God; and let’s drench ourselves in God’s love, so that we all can show forth in our lives what we believe. Amen.

Easter Day, 2025: The birth of faith

Lectionary: Acts 10:34-43; Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24; 1 Corinthians 15:19-26; John 20:1-18

 

Happy Day of Resurrection - the mystery that defines us as followers of Jesus. As Episcopalians, we don’t try to resolve this mystery; we simply enter it and let God do Their work in us. This is the benefit of our commitment to taking the Bible seriously, but not literally.

If we’re going to enter a mystery, the mystical writing of John is the go-to gospel. John uses so much symbolic language, quietly referencing the foundations of the faith of his listeners. For example, John’s story begins with: Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark… pointing to the creation story in Genesis, when on the first day the breath of God brought order to the chaos of the formless void saying, “Let there be light.” (1:1)

In John’s gospel, Mary Magdalene goes alone to the tomb and sees the stone rolled away. Her perception of what must be happening comes from an earthly perspective. A dead man’s body is missing from its tomb. Someone must have taken it.

Mary runs to tell Peter and another disciple. The identity of this second person isn’t known. What is known is that for testimony to have credibility in that time, there had to be two male witnesses, which John has included.

Upon hearing Mary’s fear that Jesus’ body had been taken, Peter and the other disciple ran to the tomb. John says Peter lagged behind the other disciple. While Peter entered the tomb first, it was the other disciple who saw the empty linens and believed. Peter’s time had not yet come.

Noting that the two men didn’t understand, John simply says they returned to their homes. This always seems like such a flat ending to an exciting moment, but I think it’s because what John is focusing on is how each of our paths to the birth of our faith is different.

What’s true for every path to God is that God provides us with what we need to get there - in God’s time.

The other disciple, the beloved one, believed upon seeing the linens. The word John uses there means self-surrender. When the other disciple let go of his own way of understanding, his faith was born.

John then skips past Peter, and moves to Mary Magdalene, who remained grieving at the tomb after the two men had gone home. Mary looks into the tomb, which she knows is empty, and sees two angels in white.

This detail is important because it isn’t about the color of their robes. The word John uses there means emitting light, brilliant, glittering. These aren’t earthly beings, and they point back to the cherubim at the mercy seat of the Ark of the Covenant in Exodus. (25:18) In John’s telling of this story, these glittering angels are what God provided Mary to lead her to the birth of her faith.

While she is speaking with these angels, Mary’s earthly eyes see a man. She sees but doesn’t comprehend until, by the utterance of a divine word (think Word of God and God speaking creation into being), Mary’s eyes are opened; and the word Jesus uses is her name. This points to Jesus’ previous teaching that he is the Good Shepherd: I know my own and my own know me. (Jn 10:14)

The next statement by John is remarkable: “She turned and said in Hebrew, Rabbouni.’ The word John uses for ‘turned’ means convert, or change oneself. Mary chose to be converted, to be changed.

We can almost share in her excitement and picture ourselves hugging Jesus in that joyful moment, but John doesn’t say Mary did that. He simply says that upon seeing her conversion, Jesus says to her: Don’t hold onto me… the words John uses mean, don’t put one thing to another, don’t connect with me as you remember me because I’m not finished. The Greek word here is talking about an event in progress.

Then Jesus tells Mary, “Go to my kin and tell them I am ascending to my nourisher, protector, and upholder, who is your nourisher, protector and upholder; to my source, my progenitor, who is your source, your progenitor.

By this, John has Jesus ordaining Mary as the first person sent to tell the Good News of his resurrection. She is the apostle, that is, one who is sent, to the apostles.

Our story today ends with Mary going to the others, telling them what Jesus told her. The Scripture then continues telling the story of the birth of faith for all of the disciples through the resurrection appearances and on into the Acts of the Apostles.

The birth of faith is different for all of us, and is accomplished in God’s way and in God’s time. Thomas, the Twin, can’t believe without proof, and he gets it. Peter, thank God for Peter, takes longer, as we see from the story in the reading from Acts, but God provides Peter what he needs when the time is right.

In the post-resurrection story in Acts, Peter is talking to the household of Cornelius, a Gentile and a Roman military officer. To put this in context, Cornelius has seen an angel who tells him that God wants him to send men to a nearby town called Joppa to find Peter and bring him to Cornelius. Cornelius obeys and Peter is found and brought to him.

In the meantime, Peter, who is praying, enters a trance and sees a vision of creatures of all kinds. Peter is told to eat, but that would violate Jewish kosher laws, so he resists. A divine voice says to him, ”What I have made clean you must not profane.” This event marks the birth of Peter’s faith.

When brought to Cornelius, this transformation in Peter is expressed in his sermon to Cornelius’ household: “"I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him…” and Peter goes on to tell the story of salvation in Jesus Christ. This marks the birth of their faith.

We are the descendants of this story and this process. Each of us is on a path to the birth of our faith or the living out of that faith. All of us are acceptable to God who provides us what we need - in God’s time - so we don’t judge. This isn’t a race.

Today, we celebrate that Jesus’ resurrection means death, what Paul calls the last enemy, has been defeated. God, who is Love, is the final word. God is our source, our nourisher, our protector, and upholder. There is, therefore, no person, no system, no event to fear, because we have been set free from the power of all who would disturb our connection with God. Not even death, can do that. As the Psalmist says, “I shall not die but live, and declare the works of the Lord.”

We are Jesus’ kin, current bearers of the breath of God meant to bring peace to the chaos of the world. God’s own light emanates through us into the darkness of the world. “On this day the Lord has acted”... we will rejoice and be glad in it.”

Amen.

The Great Vigil of Easter & Baptism of Hope Thalmann: Washed clean of all that was

Lectionary: Genesis 1:1-2:4a; Exodus 14:10-31; 15:20-21; Isaiah 55:1-11; Ezekiel 37:1-14; Romans 6:3-11; Luke 24:1-12 

Tonight, we gather to celebrate the gift of new life given to us by Jesus through his resurrection from the dead. The image of water is preeminent on this night from the story of Creation in Genesis, through the Baptism Hope will receive tonight.

We experience water in many ways - spiritually and actually. In the beginning of our love story with God, recorded in the Bible, we hear about the wind or breath of God, in Hebrew ruach, sweeping over the water as the formless void was being transformed into the complex beauty of life on earth. The waters described in Genesis were initially chaos-waters into which the breath of God brought order, peace, harmony, purpose, and unity of being.

That pretty well describes our lives, doesn’t it, both individually and communally? The breath of God calms the chaos of our inner and outer worlds - and always has, giving us peace, purpose, and unity of being with God and with one another.

Water is also where humanity actually begins - in the wombs of our mothers. This may be why the sound and sight of water is a primal experience for so many of us. Sitting on a beach, gazing at the ocean that extends to the horizon, hearing the rhythmic sound of waves rolling onto shore, our bodies settle into a deep calmness, and we know peace, awe, and wonder.

Living in WNC, I often hiked in the Bue Ridge Mountains and was inevitably drawn, almost magnetically, toward the many waterfalls. Standing there in the spray of water, hearing the steady rushing sound of it, being almost hypnotized as the water cascaded down to the river below, was somehow healing for my body and soul. Science says waterfalls offer a gift to our bodies - negative ions, that actually make us happy and more relaxed.

Water can also be humbling and destructive, reminding us how small and helpless we are. Ask anyone who has ever been caught in a rip tide or watched flood waters submerge their home or city. In those moments, we rely on the greatness of the Creator of the water to redeem the destruction and lead us to safety.

We also rely on our community connections, which I fear are in short supply lately. God, who is Trinity in Unity, is a community and created us to be in community. Those connections are life-giving to us and essential for our survival.

Water is also essential to our survival. Without water, we die - and it doesn’t take very long. Science says our bodies are about 65% water. We are literally made of water… water and the breath of God, who calmed the chaos waters and brought forth all of creation, including us, from God’s own breath, God’s own self.

We are made in the image of God. We are, every one of us, an icon of God, and as God said in Genesis about everything God had created, it is good. We are good. Very good - just as God made us.

Our love story with God repeats this theme of water and ruach in the cycles of birth, death, and rebirth from the stories of Moses and Noah in Genesis to Pentecost in Acts. God always leads us from death to new life. The beautiful thing is, it doesn’t matter to God how we found ourselves in chaos, whether the fault was ours or someone else’s. It only matters that God’s love is ever present and already redeeming. We matter that much.

That’s why we don’t fear death. Not the death of our bodies or of ideas, habits, or past identities. We are new every morning, washed clean in the living water of Christ.

In our Baptismal rite, we acknowledge that it is through water that we are reborn by the Holy Spirit, the ruach, the breath of God. Whatever defined Hope’s life before, and for whatever reason, Hope is being made new, reborn in the powerful love of God.

We who witness Hope’s rebirth are ourselves reborn as we promise to love Hope as family, to uphold her and walk with her in her Christian journey, which is our journey too because we are inextricably connected and unified in God.

As her family in Christ, we will notice when someone or something is disrupting her peace, which in consequence disturbs our peace, and we will stand firm with her against any threat. And together we will notice our neighbors who suffer the loss of freedom or dignity, or are ensared by unjust systems, and we will bear the powerful love of God to them, by being present with them, knowing God’s redeeming love will set them free. We may not know how God will redeem, or even when, but our faith assures us that God loves all God has created and that God is always redeeming all things, all the time.

Each age has a Promised Land to reach, a place where freedom, harmony, compassion, joy, and abundance are manifest on the earth. In the beginning, Moses led the people of God out of slavery in Egypt to the Promised Land in Canaan. In the 1960s, Dr. King led America toward racial freedom. In the 2000s, gay rights advocates led us to marriage equality.

Today… well, we clearly have plenty to do together to make the Promised Land manifest for all of us, don’t we? It helps to remember what anthropologist Margaret Mead once said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.”

That’s as true for us now as it was for the first small group of committed followers of Jesus. It’s in our spiritual DNA.

When Jesus stood up in the grave, shook loose his burial linens, and left that tomb empty, he made marching to the Promised Land a continual, communal pilgrimage - God with us - eternally Emmanuel, until the peace, harmony, and unity of God is manifest on earth as it is in heaven.

Today, we welcome a new member into the mystical body of Christ by the sacrament of Baptism, someone uniquely gifted to join this pilgrimage of love. May God grant Hope and us, the grace to live the new life being given to us, a life washed clean of all that went before; a life that promises peace, freedom, unity of being, and eternal, abundant joy. Amen.

Maundy Thursday, 2025-C: The privilege and purpose of our madate

Lectionary: Exodus 12:1-4, (5-10), 11-14; Psalm 116:1, 10-17; 1 Corinthians 11:23-26; John 13:1-17, 31b-35

En el nombre de Dios, nuestro santificadora, libertador, redentor, y nuestra esperanza. 

In the name of God, our sanctifier, deliverer, redeemer, and our hope. Amen. 

The revelation that we are God’s people and that our salvation is from God, came to us through our Jewish forebears. This revelation was always meant to reach all nations and all peoples, as Isaiah and other prophets proclaimed. Just as parents can love more than one child, God loves all of the branches on God’s family tree.

These forebears of our faith created a ritual, the Passover seder, designed to help the generations that followed remember God’s deliverance of the Israelites from slavery to freedom. This ritual is intimately connected with our Holy Communion. Each Sunday, when we bless and share our holy food of Communion, we are lifting up the third of the four cups, just as Jesus did with his disciples at his last seder supper. Allow me to put this into context.

The seder meal, (seder meaning order) is the origin of the Agape supper we shared tonight. It begins the Passover celebration, held in the Spring, as a sign of rebirth and renewal. The meal begins with the telling of the story (the Haggadah). The children are asked, “What makes this night different from all other nights?” The question is meant to spark their curiosity and they are encouraged to ask their own questions. This is how Jewish children are taught about their faith and their identity as children of God.

The meal consists of symbolic foods: roasted lamb symbolizing sacrifice, Matza, known as poor persons' bread, and parsley and other bitter herbs, symbolizing the bitterness of being enslaved. The parsley is dipped into salted water, symbolizing the tears of the people enslaved by the powers of the world.

During the meal, the people pause to drink four cups of wine. Each of the cups stands for how God has acted to save - taken from the book of Exodus (6:6-7).

The first cup is the cup of SANCTIFICATION. God says: “I will bring you out.” This cup symbolizes the promise that God will bring them out from their slavery so that they can serve God, not a human master.

The second cup is the cup of DELIVERANCE. Only God can save, and freedom from whatever or whoever holds us bound on earth is always a gift from God.

The third cup is the cup of REDEMPTION. God says, “I will redeem.” This is where our Holy Communion is intimately connected to the ritual meal of our Jewish forebears. In the Jewish tradition, the word redemption refers to a family member who acts to set their kin free from slavery, paying a great price for that freedom. The traditional image is of a father sacrificing his firstborn son for the freedom of his entire family. Because Jesus is fully God and fully human, he is the Father who pays the price, the Son who is the price, and the family for whom that price is paid.

While Jesus was at dinner with his friends, he took this third cup, blessed it, and gave it to his friends saying, "This cup is the New Covenant in my blood…" as often as you drink it, do this to remember me..

The fourth cup is the cup of HOPE. God says, “I will take you to me.” Since the Jewish people anticipated that the conclusion would be signaled by the return of Elijah, they kept an empty chair at the seder table. This cup also marked the end of the Seder supper.

The Christian narrative begins in the story of our Jewish forbears. For us, the fourth cup, our hope, has been fulfilled in Jesus, the Christ. Therefore, redemption is not something we await; it is our current reality, and Jesus made very clear how we should live this out - giving us a mandate at his last supper on earth: “Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."

As hard as it may be for some of us to participate in the ritual footwashing, it really matters. As Jesus said to Peter, who wanted to refuse, you don’t understand what’s happening now, but you will… and, “unless I wash you, you have no share with me." Then he knelt down and washed their feet.

Remembering Jesus’ words to us: “I have set you an example, that you also should do as I have done to you,” we sit and allow someone to be the presence of Christ for us and wash our feet. If we are physically able, we then kneel before someone else, as the presence of Christ for them, and wash their feet. In this way, we claim our share with Christ.

Just as Jesus prepared his disciples for what was about to happen, feeding them the holy food of his own body and blood, participation in this ritual as part of our Holy Communion prepares us for what is to come this Holy Week, beginning with the stripping of our altar at the end of this service.

As the body of Christ in the world today, it is our privilege and our purpose to live out Jesus’ mandate to love as he loved us. God grant us the will to put into action what we believe in our faith.

Let us pray... Fill us, most merciful God, with the power of your Holy Spirit, and free us from any bonds that continue to restrict our freedom to fully love you, one another, and ourselves. Enter our dreams each night this Holy Week and show us your will for us as your church’s servant leaders in this time and place. Loosen our tongues to speak your truth. Strengthen our hearts to birth your love into reality no matter the cost; and make each of us to shine with the celestial light that is the mark of your saints in heaven and on earth; for the love of your Son, our savior, Jesus, the Christ. Amen. (written by The Rev. Dr. Valori Mulvey Sherer)

Palm Sunday, 2025-C: Taking the first step

 Lectionary: Lectionary: Lk 19:28-40; then Isaiah 50:4-9; Psalm 39:1-16; Phil 2:5-11; John 12:12-16 

In my twenty years serving as a rector or priest in charge of a parish, the phrase I hear most often is probably: “We’ve always done it this way.” I learned, over the years, though, that “always” can mean many things, but rarely does it mean always.

One church I served had a tradition that I found disturbing and possibly illegal - at least canonically, but they insisted they’d always done it that way, so it must be OK. It turns out they had only been doing it for the three years prior to my arrival.

For most of us, Palm Sunday has “always” been combined with the Sunday of the Passion. This tradition was started in 1970 by the Roman Catholics - a long time ago, but certainly not “always.” The Procession of the Palms started for Episcopalians with the 1979 Prayer Book.

The reason Christian Churches combined these two events into one Sunday isn’t deeply theological - it was practical. People weren’t coming to the Good Friday liturgy, the one where the Passion Gospel is always read, so the passion gospel was added to the Palm Sunday service - meaning it’s read twice during Holy Week. The church leadership added the passion to a Sunday so more people would encounter it.

Their goal was well-intended. People tend to skip the hard stuff in Holy Week and jump straight to the joy of Easter, as evidenced by some area churches offering their Easter pageants two weeks ago. But followers of Christ are enjoined to take up our crosses and follow Jesus. This is that moment for us.

I’ve told this story before, but it bears re-telling. When COVID shut our churches down during Holy Week in 2020, we had to move our Holy Week services online quickly. Like so many other churches, the church I was serving didn’t yet have the proper equipment to do that. We had to use my phone and iPad to record the services. As you can imagine, my devices kept running out of memory - which kept happening during our recording of the Good Friday service.

On about the third try, our Deacon, who was emotionally exhausted from having to read the passion gospel over and over, said, “I hope this one takes. I don’t know if I can read this again!”

Good Friday - the arrest, trial, and execution of Jesus by the Romans as an insurrectionist - is a difficult reality for us followers of Christ to experience. The complicity of the Jewish religious leadership makes it that much harder. In fact, all of the Triduum of Holy Week can be difficult to experience.

But every step we take together in Holy Week leads us to “the rest of the story” as Paul Harvey used to say: resurrection on Easter. The thing is, most of us are very busy, and it can be hard to choose to take ourselves to church for what may be discomfiting worship experiences, but I want to urge us all to walk on in the discomfort - taking every step from Maundy Thursday to Good Friday and Holy Saturday - together. It is a powerful experience to share and one that truly prepares us for the brilliant, transforming resurrection experience of Easter, celebrated at the Great Vigil and Easter Sunday.

Our bishop, Deon Johnson, has recommended that we re-separate Palm Sunday from the Passion, returning to an older tradition, so today we focus on the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem just ahead of the Passover celebration. The passion gospel will not be read today. It will be read at our Good Friday service at 6:30 p.m.

We need to remember that this was a huge festival in that time and place. The Passover - the story of the redemption of the Jewish people by God through Moses, who led them out of slavery in Egypt to freedom in the Promised Land.

This celebration drew huge numbers of people to Jerusalem every year. It was like our PRIDE day in Miami. People joyfully celebrating their freedom from oppression.

As people gathered in the big city, news began to spread about Jesus, the country rabbi who did great miracles - even raising a guy named Lazarus from the dead! Jesus and Lazarus were coming to the festival and people were buzzing about getting to see them up close.

Remembering that the theme of the celebration was freedom from oppression, the people began to hope that if Jesus had the power to raise someone from the dead, then God must be with him. So, maybe if Jesus were to be made their king, God would be with him as God was with King David when he conquered Jerusalem in 1000 B.C.E.

As their leader, maybe Jesus could lead them to freedom and peace as Moses did when he led the people to the Promised Land in 1446 B.C.E. Maybe this Jesus was their salvation from their current Roman oppression.

When the people saw Jesus coming, they cried out, “Hosanna!” which means, “Save us!” Be the one God uses today to save the people of Israel - just as God has done before.

Take Jerusalem as King David did. "Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!”

As the Jewish people became penetrated with hope, the Jewish leadership got nervous. They knew that talk like this would bring a swift and violent response from the Romans. Calling out to Jesus, some Pharisees said, "Teacher, order your disciples to stop."

Knowing this salvation wasn’t about as small a thing as winning Jerusalem or leading the people out of their current oppression, but salvation for the whole world for all time, Jesus answered, "I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out." In other words, this is happening. All of creation is one with God as this redemptive moment is revealed.

They couldn’t imagine what was about to come. Who could have?

Well, Isaiah for one. Speaking for God in about 700 B.C.E., Isaiah said, “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.’ (49:6)

Walking with Jesus from this triumphant moment to the truth of salvation - the redemption of the whole world by God - is our commission this week. Today we take just the first step.

Reveling in the hope and joy of this day, the day Jesus arrived, ready to do what he came to do, we accept this spiritual high - even knowing the lows that will come as the world responds to Jesus - especially knowing the penultimate high that is Easter, just days away.

I want to paraphrase what we prayed today in our Collect, “Almighty and everliving God, in your tender love for the human race you sent your Son our Savior Jesus Christ to take upon him our nature, and to suffer death upon the cross, giving us the example of his great humility: Mercifully grant us to know that WHEN we walk in the way of his suffering, we also share in his resurrection.”

May our prayer be realized. Amen.

3 Lent, 2025-C: Eternally shared relationship

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

En el nombre del Dios: creador, redentor, y santificador. 

In the name of God: Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier. Amen.

Duncan Gray, III, retired bishop of the Diocese of Mississippi, once said: "Change is doing something differently. Transformation is becoming something more… Transformation takes place (he says) when we offer ourselves, our souls, our bodies – our dreams, our visions, our plans – to Almighty God. And as we make our offering we say, not, ‘here are our plans, bless them;’ but, rather, ‘here are our lives, use them.’”

What a beautiful way to approach Lent - offering God our lives. Since we were created by God to be in perfect communion with God and with all God created, to live in a harmony that resonates throughout eternity, when we are not experiencing this harmony, we know we need to repent, individually and collectively. 

Relationships require vulnerability, a willingness to open ourselves to another. Being open we can be hurt. We can also be transformed. We might do well to remember that in our relationship with God, there is mutual vulnerability. God opens Themself to us too, establishing a mutually vulnerable harmony of being, an eternally shared relationship.

Love is like that. When we love, we suffer when the ones we love suffer. When we love, we risk losing that love to death, and a piece of ourselves with it when that happens. God shares the same with us in this relationship of divine-human communion.

In the story from Exodus God demonstrates that we do not suffer alone. Moses is assured that God notices our suffering, and promises presence and redemption.

This is in direct contrast to the way leaders of the world, like Pilate, behave. Pilate was ruthless and despicable. He did horrible, shocking things, like mixing the blood of murdered Galileans with the blood of their temple sacrifice. That would be akin to someone murdering a person at our altar and mixing their blood with our sacramental wine.

In this gospel story, Jesus issues a warning to repent. This is not a threat, it’s counsel. Jesus reminds us over and over that there is only one source of life, and one path of life for us during our time on earth - the path of relationship with God: loving God with all our hearts, minds, souls, and strength, and our neighbors as ourselves. If we take any other path, we will not have life.

The poetry of Psalm 63 beautifully depicts the human experience of our harmoniously vulnerable relationship with God: “you are my God; eagerly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my flesh faints for you…” Likewise, God is steadfastly desirous in Their relationship with us.

In our humanness, we tend to either underestimate the powerful love of God for us and for all God has created, or we underestimate what God’s love can do in and through us. Either way, we sin.

Theologian Paul Tillich describes sin as a three-fold separation: from God, from each other, and from ourselves. I would add to Tillich’s description: separation from Creation. These separations distort all of our relationships. It is only by God’s grace and our willingness to repent, to return to God, that our relationships are restored and made right again.

As you often hear me say, sin isn’t what we do, it’s what’s behind what we do. The behaviors we see, what most people point to when they talk about sin, are simply the visible outcomes of our disrupted, distorted relationships.

So, when we repent, as we are called to do during the season of Lent, we intentionally notice these visible outcomes because they point us to the source of what has become distorted within us. Once we notice it, we can choose to address it; inviting God to redeem us, to transform us by Their love.

Jesus speaks plainly to us in the gospel on the issue of repentance, retelling a popular near-Eastern story from his time, the parable of the fig tree. In this parable, the owner of the vineyard sees a fig tree that hasn’t been producing fruit, judges it as useless, and orders it cut down.

We often hear this as a story of punishment - the poor fig tree couldn’t produce so it was condemned - but that isn’t what this parable is about. In this story, the gardener responds by asking for mercy, asking the owner to give him and the tree one more chance. The gardener changes the status quo and works to bring about fruitfulness. In order to live, this tree and the tree’s community (the gardener) must change how they’re living together… because the way they are currently living isn’t fruitful - isn't life-giving.

A fig tree is meant to produce figs. If there are no figs, cut it down.

Who can tell me what happens to a tree when you cut it down (if you don’t remove the stump)? It sprouts new life. In other words, when the way you’re living isn’t fruitful, stop it - “cut it down.” That death will lead to new life. Death always leads to new life for us - that’s the promise.

Our world has become a place where harmoniously vulnerable relationships are in short supply. The way we are living together is killing us –literally. And when I say us, I include the global human family.

Ruthless, despicable government leaders doing horrible, shocking things to the poor and vulnerable among us is not new - as our gospel shows us. Neither are racism, differences in beliefs and spiritual practices, inadequate access to healthcare, clean water, food, or education, and changes in climate which, by the way, disproportionately affect the poor. The world has a long history of disruptions to harmonious relationships.

Yet, Jesus loved this world and everyone in it. Everyone. And Jesus gave his life for this world, taking our sins to the cross and giving his life for us, for all of us, for all time - “once for all,” as St. Paul said. Then he told us to love one another as he loved us.

Looking around at the state of the world today, it appears we have some repenting to do. The way we’re living together currently is killing us and creation and we must repent. We must identify where the disruptions are in our relationships, then allow God to make the needed fundamental changes in us and our understanding to restore us to the harmonious relationships God intends.

How do we do that in the midst of so much chaos and disruption? One small step at a time. One relationship at a time.

At a small church I served in Western North Carolina, we held what we called, Abraham’s Table: a family reunion. We gathered with our Jewish and Muslim neighbors to learn and share what our faiths have in common. By our prayers, we intentionally invited God to restore us to harmonious relationship with each other. It was a transforming experience for all of us and friendships were built where none had been, friendships that could withstand the prejudice and violence happening at that time in the form of multiple hate-driven attacks on Muslims and Jews.

When we sin (and we will sin throughout our lives) we are invited by a merciful, loving God to repent, to be changed in our very being, which will result in real change in what we’re doing. We’re invited to trust that God loves us, knows our sufferings, and desires to restore us to the fullness of harmonious relationships - with God, one another, ourselves, and creation.

When we choose to repent, we will find ourselves transformed, and we become more than we had been - more open, more vulnerable, more harmonious, more loving, and more able to bring that to the world in which we live. It is by love that God's plan of love is fulfilled - a plan of transformation for the whole world. Amen.

Ash Wednesday, 2025: Tending to the soil of our souls

Lectionary: Ps 51; Joel 2:1-2,12-17; Ps 103:8-14; 2 Corinthians 5:20b-6:10; Luke 18:9-14

Note: To see this sermon delivered live, click HERE. The sermon is at 31 minutes, 30 seconds.

En el nombre de Dios, que nos ama eternamente, nos guía a vivir con compasión y espera pacientemente mientras hacemos espacio en nuestro corazón, mente y alma para Su presencia...

In the name of God who loves us eternally, leads us to live compassionately, and waits patiently while we make space in our hearts, minds, and souls for Their presence. 

Ash Wednesday marks the first day of Lent, which, as you know, is my favorite season! On this day, we gather in solemn assembly in response to God's continuing call to us to repent - to return to God, opening our hearts, minds, souls, and strength to Them.

We fast if we can today and mark the sign of our salvation - the cross of Christ – on our foreheads with the dust of ashes. These traditional symbols represent our repentance and humility - two things we will focus on during these next five weeks of Lent.

Lent is not a time for us to wallow in the misery of our wretchedness as hopeless sinners. Psalm 51 simply recognizes that we sometimes feel wrethched - and act wretchedly - but God does not hold us as wretched. 

And we don't fast in order to suffer or as punishment for sin. We fast to allow ourselves to experience emptiness. In the deep, dark center of ourselves, we willingly choose to make space for something new, something nourishing and life-giving that God will supply.

During Lent, we trust God and open our spiritual eyes as the God of all mercy raises up our faces toward Their loving countenance. Then we see and perceive God who is full of compassion, slow to anger, forgives our sins, and cares for us deeply, intimately, with a sacrificial love that knows no bounds.

Lent is also the time we get honest about ourselves and the walls we have put between God’s love and ourselves. We remember that we are all wonderfully made by our Creator, who does not hate any of us, who remains faithfully in love with all of us.

During Lent, we own that we do sin, and since the church focuses on sin and repentance during this season, let’s talk for a minute about what sin is and isn’t. Theologian Karl Barth talks about sin as a state of separation from God and from one another. It’s a state we can choose to hold onto or let go of according to our free will.

In that state of separation, we objectify God, our neighbor, and even creation, enabling us to erect walls in our relationships - walls of judgment, discrimination, disrespect, abuse, and exploitation. From behind those walls, sin happens easily, and justifications for those sins abound and catch on like a plague of moral irresponsibility.

In that state of separation, from behind those walls of sin, we do harm: telling a lie, pulling the trigger of an automatic weapon aimed at people, raping our land of minerals for profit, cheating on our spouse or partner, worshipping at the altar of money, beauty, youth, or power, or using God’s name for anything other than praise or worship.

Sin is not what we do. It’s what’s behind what we do.

Our sins result from a disrupted relationship with God. In the state of sin, we become the center of our universe. What we need or want takes precedence over what God or our neighbors need or want.

Every one of us will find ourselves, at times, lacking the will to be attentive to or compassionate about the needs of someone else, especially if it means we have to make some amount of sacrifice for them. There are times when we are not slow to anger, but we are slow to forgive or reconnect.

Our preoccupation with ourselves leads us to addictive behaviors, and we can be addicted to many things: being the center of attention, food, alcohol or drugs, work, the news, self-criticism, or power. We can even be addicted to “good” things like excessively exercising or taking vitamins, or serving others in order to affirm for ourselves that we are good or smart or important.

Lent is when we stop to notice what has captivated our attention lately, what has let us off our proverbial moral hooks, or allowed us to push others into the oblivion of our intentional blindness. Whatever that is and whatever has become the source of our comfort or truth in place of God is an idol, a stumbling block from which we need to repent.

The word "Lent" means “lengthening of days,” in other words, spring, and like the season of Spring, Lent is when we tend to the soil of our souls. Our Lenten practices are meant to soften and nourish the soil of our souls, inviting God to plant new seeds, new life in us.

The hard work of Lent is emptying ourselves of all that already fills us. As Americans, our most insidious sin is probably the expectation that we always deserve to be full and satisfied. Emptiness scares us. The nothingness of it feels like death, so we tend to avoid it.

That's why Lent matters. Knowing that by our baptism we have entered into Jesus' death and resurrection, we have no fear of death, not even the little ones like the death of a habit, or the death of an idea we hold about God, ourselves, our neighbors, or our future.

The traditional Lenten practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving are reliable ways we can respond to God's call to us to repent, to return to God. As always, we begin with prayer.

Prayer brings us into the presence of God…the same God who created us, knows our humanity, and loves us for it… the same God who gave up his life on the cross for the forgiveness of sin… the same God who dwells in us and invites us to receive the seeds of new life.

Fasting reminds us of our mortality. It also provides a way for us to be in solidarity with those who truly hunger. Fasting enables us to remember how real and compelling hunger is. It connects us to those who actually hunger and moves us to compassion, to “suffer with” them - which is what that word means, so that we can act to relieve their suffering.

Almsgiving enables us who have enough to do what we can, even sacrifically, to relieve the suffering of those who don’t have enough. This year our Lenten alms will go to the Food Pantry to relieve the suffering of our hungry neighbors.

Our Lenten practices are embodied soul exercises, but if you are diabetic, on medication, or for some other reason you can't fast from food – don't. Fasting from food isn’t the only way to experience the emptiness that connects us compassionately to the suffering.

There is so much we can fast from besides food. We can fast from criticizing ourselves or others. We can fast from complaining, judging others, or harsh words. We can fast from over-exposure to the endless news cycles on tv and from addictively checking out updates on social media. If an activity that is habitual for you distracts you from your Lenten self-emptying, fast from that.

We also have the option of taking up a new practice. We might be led to find a saint to companion us on our Lenten journey, or take up a new ministry, or cultivate a new attitude. We might practice being a voice of good news in the midst of uncertainty, or using our voices in letters or on social media to speak in support of those who are suffering or afraid.

Self-emptying. Taking up. Choosing the new life being offered by God. This is our Lenten journey.

Let us pray… Almighty God, you love all you have made. Show us how to empty ourselves of all that isn’t loving. We turn to you and open our hearts, minds, and souls to you. Plant your seeds of new life in us, for we desire to love as you have loved us in Christ Jesus. Amen.