Pentecost 20, 2017: Stewardship, St.Thomas, Burnsville

I have had the privilege of serving St. Thomas, Burnsville, NC as a consultant for the last year as part of The Partnership for Renewal. This is my stewardship sermon for this amazing congregation!



If the above player doesn't work on your device, click HERE.

Lectionary: Exodus 33:12-23; Psalm 99; 1 Thessalonians 1:1-10; Matthew 22:15-22

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

A popular discussion online and in the news nowadays is the line between religion and politics. Should religion be involved in politics and vice versa…? It’s an issue with a long history and varied outcomes.

In the gospel reading today, some Pharisees, that is, members of a sect who practiced strict adherence to traditional and written law, kind of the religious alt-right of their time, joined up with some unlikely allies, Herodians, who were presumably members of a political party supporting the Roman occupiers. Their purpose in this unholy alliance, which continued through Jesus’ capture and trial, was to entrap and discredit Jesus; in this instance, using the issue of paying the Roman poll tax.

Here are some complications that are helpful to know.

1) The Roman poll tax was an annual head tax. Basically, this was Caesar taking money on a per-person basis and in return, he didn’t hurt or kill them. It was rather like a mob payoff.

2) It was required that the tax be paid with the denarius a Roman coin with a value akin to a day’s pay, about $100 today – not an exorbitant amount for each person, but cumulatively it generated a healthy haul for Caesar.

3) Jews held the coin to be a graven image, and therefore, idolatrous. They also held the inscription on the coin to be blasphemous. Since it was also the currency of the land, many Jews used the denarius anyway. A few, like the alt-right Pharisees, refused to use them at all, which put them in a bind: break the law of God and use an idolatrous, blasphemous coin or break the law of the land and get punished by the Roman occupiers.

This is the conundrum they brought to Jesus. Would he advise them to break God’s law or Caesar’s? Either way, he would be toast.

But this is Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, the Messiah. He knows what they’re up to and he tells them so.

Bring a coin, he says. Whose face is on it? The emperor’s, they reply. Then Jesus gives his answer and it’s theological and political genius: “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”

Give Caesar the coin, he says. He thinks it’s his. That’s the political genius: Know the truth of your moment in history.

Here’s the theological genius: Jesus is the 2nd person of the Trinity. As we proclaim in our Creed, he is the one through whom all things are made. ALL THINGS. What things, then, are not God’s? All things, all people, all time, all activities, all of creation, all resources – everything belongs to God. Genius!

Recognizing this and living accordingly, that is, faithfully, is the very definition of stewardship. If all people belong to God, then who can we allow to be hungry, or homeless, or un-shoed in winter?

Whose physical and mental health needs can be overlooked or underfunded? If all people are God’s, who is our enemy?

We can only exclude today those whom Jesus excluded as he died on the cross – oh right, he died once for ALL as St. Paul said (Ro 6.10), so we can exclude no one.

If all time belongs to God, then isn’t it important for us to establish a harmony of rhythms of our time at work, with family, and with God in prayer?

Do our activities speak love? Are they serving the welfare of God’s people, including ourselves, and thereby bringing God glory? Do we hold the precious gifts of our earth in trust for future generations?

What about our finances? Ah, that’s the sticky one, as we saw in our gospel today. Do we hold our wealth as a gift given to us for the accomplishment of God’s purposes or do we, like Caesar, think it belongs to us for our own purposes? Jesus made the answer pretty clear, I think.

The world is a difficult place and life is so hard for so many. We don’t have to look far to find someone who is hungry, unwell physically or mentally, lonely, unemployed, or trapped in fear or anger.

We have Good News to share and the privilege and responsibility to share it – by our words and our actions. The world is desperate for the Good News of salvation in Jesus Christ. Just listen to the news (only a little – it’ll make you crazy!)

Presiding Bishop Michael Curry said, Episcopalians need to get busy “committing to making a practical, tangible difference…helping the world look more like God’s dream and less like our nightmare… It’s sacred work” he said.

To do that, he recommends we make these five things a priority:

1) Formation: ++Michael asks, how do we form disciples? That is our work.

2) Evangelism: that “E –word” Episcopalians cherish. ++Michael suggests that we practice a kind of evangelism “that is as much listening as sharing…an invitation, a welcome” to the church where persons can discover and develop a relationship with God and one another.

3) Witnessing: but don’t take your Bibles and go hit anybody on the head with them. We don’t do it that way. ++Michael says we need to “get out in the public sphere [and] be a voice for those who have no voice.” That’s our witness.

4) Relationship: ++Michael points to ecumenical relationships – all faiths participating in ways that bring about God’s dream; he also talks about relationships within the worldwide Anglican Communion. I would add that we need to consider our relationships within our particular church and within our diocese. Those are also vital to this.

5) ++Michael says (you’re gonna love this) we need to create structures that serve our mission. He’s talking here about institutional structures that help the church be “vessels of the Jesus movement.” (Source: The Rt. Rev. Michael Curry on Vimeo)

The reason I said you’d love that one: isn’t that exactly what you’ve done here with the Abbey? It’s important, faithful work you do here – sacred work.

The resurrection you have known within your community is already leaking out into the world through the Abbey at St. Thomas, and thank God for that! I look forward to the leak becoming a river of living waters.

The Church has traditionally supported its sacred work through an annual stewardship campaign calling on people to ‘give sacrificially’ like Jesus did for us. Over time, this has come to feel more like a Roman poll tax than a joyful offering, so let’s faithfully re-frame it.

Jesus said, “Give… to God the things that are God’s.” It’s pretty simple: we are God’s. Our bodies, our relationships, our activities, our finances, our resources, our church, our prayer – all God’s!

So don’t give sacrificially – Jesus already did that – once for all! Give until it feels really good! Give joyfully, generously, faithfully, knowing that each of you was chosen by God to be here in this time and this place, to activate resources entrusted to you to make the world here more like the dream of God.

Annual campaigns remain important. Each church needs the financial resources to fulfill its divine purpose. As you bring your annual campaign to its conclusion, Nov 1, All Saints Day, hear what St. Paul says to the Corinthians about stewardship: “it is appropriate for you who began last year… [to] finish… For if the eagerness is there, the gift is acceptable… I do not mean that there should be relief for others and pressure on you, but it is a question of a fair balance between your present abundance and their need...” (2Cor 8. 9, 11, 13-14)

We are called to participate in making a tangible difference in our world. We who have enough to eat are called to share food with those who are hungry. We who are accepted according to societal preferences of skin color, gender, sexual orientation and identity, educational or economic standing are called to build bridges of friendship and inclusion with those who are marginalized – modeling Jesus who visited with Gentiles, dined with tax collectors and women, healed the sick, the unclean, the insane, and all those judged to be unworthy.

Those who have financial means are called to take up their responsibility and support the church’s mission and ministries so that St Thomas can fulfill its divine purpose: being a living, activating vessel of the Jesus movement.

You are already witnessing how very important your sacred work is here. As St. Paul said, “the word of the Lord has sounded forth from you…” You are living proof that there is no nightmare that the dream of God isn’t already overcoming and the people in your area are seeing the truth of that embodied in this parish.

There is much you are being entrusted to do and Good News you are called to share. Give to St. Thomas generously as God has given to you. Give until it feels really good! For all things, all people, all time, all activities, all of creation, all resources – everything belongs to God.

Amen.

Risky freedom

Good morning, friends. Just a few thoughts from my morning meditation to share...

As individuals and as a Christian community we are called to live being guided by the Spirit of God. This is true freedom, and it’s risky, because it means letting go of all the safety and certainty the law and the world seem to provide and steadfastly refusing to be divided again by gender, race, class, sexual orientation or any other worldly and ‘lawful’ distinction.

Living a life of faith means trusting that Almighty God, who is always faithful, can and will act to redeem and restore “shalom” the way things ought to be. It means working to learn how to hear God who is still speaking to us; not only in our hearts, minds, and bodies, but also in and through our varied and diverse communities.

Living in the freedom of our faith requires that we remember how we all came to have salvation. We are saved because God acted to save us, and God acted to save us because God loves us. Our salvation is a gift freely given by our loving Lord, Jesus Christ. The only thing we can actually do is respond to that gift in faith and humble gratitude, living the life of freedom we were given and opening the way for all people to do the same.

While it can be tempting to spend our lives chasing after spiritual law-breakers,” that isn’t our purpose. We aren’t called to judge. We’re called to manifest the love of God in the world. As Mother Theresa of Calcutta once said, “When you know how much God is in love with you then you can only live your life radiating that love.”

Radiate some love. It’s transforming.

Shalom. Valori+

Pentecost 18-A, 2017: Sign-posts of faith

Lectionary: Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20; Psalm 19; Philippians 3:4b-14; Matthew 21:33-46



Note: If the above player doesn't work on your device, click HERE for an mp4 audio file.

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

We began our worship time together saying this: “Almighty and everlasting God, you are always more ready to hear than we to pray, and to give more than we either desire or deserve…”

These words from our Collect are so very comforting… especially now. We live in a world where we are terrorized here at home and abroad the world. In the US alone, we’ve had 275 mass shootings so far in 2017 in places like airports, nursing homes, supermarkets, and concerts. (Source: http://www.shootingtracker.com/) That’s almost one every day.

The latest shooting in Las Vegas left 58 dead and 527 injured… and the shooter was an American; one of our own. Each of those 58 people who were killed had family and friends who are deeply mourning the loss of their loved ones. That is what sin does – it disrupts relationships.

Theologian Karl Barth talks about sin as a state of separation from God and from one another. It is a state we can choose or let go at any time according to our free will. “…whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” (Mt 18:18)

In that state of separation, we objectify God, our neighbor, even creation, enabling us to erect walls between them and us; walls of judgement, discrimination, and disrespect. From behind those walls, sin happens readily, easily, and justifications for those sins abound.

In that state of separation, behind those walls of sin, we do harm, the kind discussed in our reading from Exodus: telling a lie about someone, pulling the trigger of an automatic weapon aimed at people, cheating with someone else’s spouse, scamming vulnerable populations like the elderly out of their money, worshipping at the altar of money, beauty, youth, or power, using God’s name for anything other than praise or worship.

When God gave the law to Moses to give to the people of Israel, it wasn’t meant as a checklist for behavior, but rather as a sign-post that sin has created a wall, relationships are being disrupted, and some effort will be required of God’s people toward reconciliation.

When I heard the news of the shooting in Las Vegas, I was deflated by sadness and frustration, then I got angry. I wanted to be mad at someone, to blame them for this. Yes, there is a shooter (or shooters) to hold accountable, but he is one of us, a member of our culture, our story, our humanity.

So, what do I do with my feelings then? How do I respond as a follower of Christ…as a child of God?

For me, the answer is always to go to prayer. When faced with problems as big as this we need to know that God is big enough, loving enough, and involved enough to help us through it. Praying to God for comfort and guidance is a right and good thing to do, even knowing that God already knows our need and is answering our prayer even as we pray it.

The true benefit of prayer, the reason it is always the answer, is that prayer re-sets our minds and our hearts by bringing us into the presence and peace of God and aligning us to God’s will. It is in prayer that we experience God who created the universe and all that is in it. It is in prayer that we feel the strength of God that covers our weakness. It is in prayer that we realize we are all one, all children of the same family.

When life happens, especially when the sign-posts of sin are so apparent, we can sometimes respond with fear or confusion. Then we might bargain with God. See if any of this sounds familiar: ‘If we behave and follow all the rules, if we’re really good children and do everything just right, will you look upon us favorably and spare us from this trial, Lord?’ It’s a tempting but fruitless endeavor.

We don’t buy God’s love and mercy with our good behavior or pious living. God’s love and mercy are already ours – as promised over and over again in Holy Scripture and proven beyond all doubt in Jesus Christ, our Savior, who redeemed us by the forgiveness of our sins.

Right behavior is not the way to faithfulness; it is the fruit of it – a sign-post of faith. As Mother Theresa of Calcutta once said, “If you know how much God is in love with you, you can’t help but live your life radiating that love.”

In today’s gospel, Jesus tells the parable of the wicked tenants; a story which leaves no doubt about the sinfulness of the religious leadership and Jesus’ own people, but it also shows them the way through. So, in this parable, the absent landowner is God. The vineyard is a common metaphor for the nation of Israel. The slaves represent the prophets (whom, as you know, the Jews tended to kill) and the tenants are the people of Israel and their religious leaders, who kill even the landowner’s son – the Messiah.

What should this landlord do with these terrible tenants? Jesus asks. ‘They should suffer a miserable death,’ the leadership replies, ‘and the land should be leased to someone else – someone who will give the owner the fruits of the harvest.’ Jesus has led the religious leadership to declare judgment on themselves – and when they realized it, boy were they mad!

There are three things I want to hold up about this parable today. First, in the continuing revelation of Jesus as the Messiah, Jesus has, by this parable, identified himself as the son of the landowner, God’s son, and predicted his death at the hands of his own people.

Secondly, Jesus identifies himself as the cornerstone. Quoting from Psalm 118, which the religious leadership knew very well, Jesus points to the amazing things God is about to do through him, namely: open the gates of righteousness, overcome death, and bring salvation to the whole world.

Finally, this parable is inclusive. Jesus doesn’t condemn the wicked tenants to exclusion from the kingdom of God, but he does take from them their privilege of tending the vineyard and gives it to another people - the Greek word here is ‘nation’ – and would have meant ‘Gentiles’ to Jesus’ listeners. It’s important to remember that the people of Israel had stereotyped all Gentiles to be sinful, unclean, and unworthy of redemption.

But in this parable, Jesus claims that this new people, these Gentiles, will produce fruit for the harvest – and this is how he shows the way through. Notice that no one is booted out of the kingdom, and in God’s plan of salvation, those stereotyped as sinful and unworthy are not only welcomed into the kingdom, but they’re honored, given responsibility for the care of the kingdom.

Now before we get all confident about our status as this new people, we might take a look at how well we are doing. How much fruit are we producing for God’s harvest? How many souls, who are hated by culture, have we welcomed into our house, into the family of God? What are the sign-posts of our faith?

This is the challenge churches face today. We love our church. We love our church family. We love the way we do things… but when we work to create or maintain a church that fits our design, our plan, then we are just like the chief priests and the Pharisees in Jesus’ time and we can expect the same results.

God is the owner of this vineyard, not us, and if we want to know how to be fruitful servants, we can look to St. Paul who says, “I want to know Christ…” (Phil 3:10) and “forgetting what lies behind” or as we might say it today, we’ve always done it this way…’ so forgetting that “and straining forward to what lies ahead, [we] press on toward the goal…” (3:13-14) trusting that “Jesus Christ has made [us] his own…” (4:12)

We come to know Christ by praying, individually and in community asking for what we need, but more importantly, aligning our wills to God’s will. And leaving the past behind us, we move forward by allowing God to make the changes God needs made in us, individually and as a community, so that we, radiating God’s love, can press on with our work: making sign-post after sign-post of faith a visible reality in our corner of God’s kingdom.

So, let’s close by intentionally aligning our wills to God’s will, and honoring St. Francis whose feast day was a few days ago, praying together the prayer attributed to him found on page 833, in the Book of Common Prayer:

Lord, make us instruments of your peace. Where there is hatred, let us sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, union; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that we may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.

Pentecost 16A, 2017: The fairness nerve

Lectionary: Exodus 16:2-15; Psalm 105:1-6, 37-45; Philippians 1:21-30; Matthew 20:1-16



Note: if the above player doesn't work on your device, click HERE.

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

“Is thine eye evil because I am good?” That’s the KJV of that 2nd last sentence of our gospel. God asks: Is my goodness to someone else making you sad, causing you pain, or annoying you?

Why? Because they didn’t earn it?

This parable touches a nerve most of us have. I call it the fairness nerve. If a person works a full day, they should get a full day’s pay, but if they work only an hour or two, their pay should be pro-rated to the number of hours worked. It’s only fair.

Perhaps that’s true in earthly matters, but this parable from Jesus makes it clear that it is definitely not true in the kingdom of God. There are two important points here: 1) grace is God’s to give to whomever God chooses in whatever measure God chooses; and 2) grace is a gift; not something we earn.

That can be an irritating rub. Deathbed conversions, for example, really bother us. Why should someone get to misbehave their whole lives, repent at the last minute, and still get into heaven? Because isn’t it everyone’s goal to misbehave and get away with it? No. That isn’t the rub. The rub is that they don’t have to work for the kingdom ahead of entering it... like we do.

In today’s parlance: why should someone who doesn’t have a job get welfare, or citizenship, or healthcare? It isn’t fair.

Perhaps we who are Christians might look at all of this differently – from the heavenly perspective given to us in Scripture. St. Paul says, “To me, living is Christ… [Note: what the word ‘Christ’ means is ‘anointed’ to serve the people of God on behalf of God.] …If I am to live in the flesh, that means fruitful labor for me…” In other words, while I live, I desire to live as if I’m chosen and gifted by God (Christ) to serve God’s people.

It isn’t about getting away with anything, and it isn’t about getting something for nothing. It’s about being able to use our gifts, individually and corporately, and every minute of our lives to work to make the kingdom of God a reality on the earth.

How do we do that? The answer is in Jesus’ parable: A landowner (God) goes out to the marketplace in order to find people who have no job. He goes out early in the morning, then again at 9am, then again at noon, again at 3 pm, and finally at 5 pm. To this last group, the ones who have done no work all day, God asks, “Why are you standing idle all day?” They respond: “Because no one has hired us.” In other words, we have gifts to offer but no one will offer us an opportunity use them.

Opportunity on earth is not always fairly or evenly doled out. Neither are rewards. So for Christians, our work is to live so that God’s will is “done on earth as it is in heaven.” Isn’t that what we say each time we pray the prayer our Lord taught us?

And God’s will, according to Jesus in this parable, is to open up opportunities for each life to matter; for everyone’s gifts to be used in the kingdom of God. The landowner went out over and over again seeking those people who had no work, not because the vineyard needed more laborers, but because the laborers needed the opportunity to work…to matter… to be part of a community… to use their gifts.

People needed and God provided –as God always does.

Isn’t that what today’s story in Exodus is all about? God’s people are out in the wilderness grumbling at Moses complaining that they’re hungry. God hears them and provides for them: meat (a real luxury under all circumstances!) and manna – a staple for their survival and a leader to help them recognize this new means of their provision. These flakes were not known to them. Moses had to tell them what it was.

People needed and God provided. It’s what God does.

The provision isn’t always what we think it’ll be though. The manna God rained down on them was new and strange, and it was constituted so that they couldn’t hoard it. They ate eat as much as they needed, then stopped. They didn’t – in fact, they couldn’t – save it or store it up for later use. God provided for their need each day and their journey gave them opportunity to learn to trust that. Our journey does the same for us. See if this is familiar: “Give us this day our daily bread…”

Do you think someone witnessing this Exodus scenario would have complained that the Israelites hadn’t labored for that manna and therefore shouldn’t have been able to eat it? That’s precisely what Jesus is teaching us in this parable. People do complain just like that. They always have… and they still are.

But God is still God, providing as generously as God always does and to whom God chooses. And God chooses those who need – whether they need food, employment, love, community (aka citizenship), forgiveness, or healthcare.

People need; and God provides. And God chooses us to be instruments of that provision today.

We are God’s partners in the work of reconciliation (see the Catechism in BCP) which is why St. Paul instructs the people of the church in Philippi:, “…live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ… standing firm in one spirit, striving side by side with one mind…” That’s what church is, and what church does. Church is an unique gift from God, it’s a mystical body that binds us one to another in faith and love. It unites our spirits and provides each of us the opportunity to labor in God’s vineyard – for living is Christ, and living means fruitful labor.

I commend to you a letter our Episcopal bishops sent three days ago asking President Trump and Congress not to end DACA (The Dreamers Act). This is the church in action.

Before you cringe and complain about my preaching politics, hear what Bp. Provenzano, the author of the letter, says: “At times, the teaching and preaching of the gospel can look like it’s making a political statement when it’s really about following the teachings of Jesus. This is what bishops are supposed to do. This is nuts and bolts,” Provenzano said. “It’s not a debatable issue. The kind of protectionism being promulgated in this country is contrary to the gospel.”

As Paul says: “live your live(s) in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ."

Jesus says very clearly – in today’s parable and elsewhere in our gospels - that those who are last in the world’s estimation are first in heaven’s priority; and therefore must be first in ours. Jesus uses today’s parable to teach his followers (us) that our labor must look like the landowner’s: going out over and over, all day long, seeking out those who have need and welcoming them in.

For our God is generous and provides for those who need.

If God desires to provide for those who need, and we desire to be in sync in the will of God, then we must desire as God does. Then living truly is Christ, as St. Paul said. For we have been anointed in our Baptism; chosen and gifted by God to serve in exactly this way.

We are God’s instruments of reconciliation in the world today. We seek out the people who need, welcome them in, and God provides for them.

I have found that in the realm of God everyone wins, so living as Christ benefits us as well. Here’s how: shifting our perspective from an earthly one to a heavenly one as we’ve discussed here today, relieves us of our anxiety about earthly things. Trusting in God to provide the meat and manna to satisfy the world’s needs today, we can focus on our labor, standing side by side, in unity of spirit, working to make the kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven.

We labor in peace and joy and those whom we serve receive the grace of God through the labor of our hands and hearts. It is to that, as our Collect says (quoting St. Paul), that we hold fast and endure through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Pentecost 15A, 2017: The gift of being forgiving

I had the privilege today of supplying at Ascension Episcopal Church in Hickory, NC. What a deeply faithful and joyful community of faith they are!

Lectionary: Exodus 14:19-31, Psalm 114 , Romans 14:1-12, Matthew 18:21-35



Note: If the above player doesn't work on your device, click HERE.

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

When I was a teenager, I was on a swim team with my younger sister. We used to practice in roped off lanes between

the docks on our lake. During one swim practice, my sister got a cramp and began to go under. When I jumped in to help her, she – like many other people who fear they are drowning – began to fight me.

I was trained as a lifeguard and she was an experienced swimmer, but the problem wasn’t about swimming. I knew my sister could die if I didn’t connect with her just then; and surprising even myself, I called out to her: “Sissy, do you trust me?”

The question caught her attention and she stopped flailing for just a moment. I used that pause in her panic to grab her into the save hold. Once in the save hold, her head was near mine, so I could speak assurances to her as we headed for shore.

In our story from Exodus God tells Moses to stretch out his hand. When I hear this I hear God saying this to Moses: Do you trust me? Will you go where I lead you, even if it’s into the sea where you might drown? I have promised to lead my people to the Promised Land, God says. Do you trust me? Take my people with you. Some are going to fight you. They’re just afraid. Hold onto them anyway.

Isn’t that the challenge facing every church community now? Within each faith community are people in various places on their spiritual journey. St. Paul refers to them as strong and weak in faith – which I think is a teeny bit judgmental, given his later advice, but…

As the early church struggled to evolve from being exclusively Jewish to being inclusively Christian, St. Paul cautions the people to refrain from passing judgment on one another, and from despising one another, reminding them that God has welcomed them all. But then, as now, people do pass judgment; and they fight, sometimes to the point of despising one another – yes, even in church! I know it’s probably never happened here, but it does happen – trust me.

Thankfully, our gospel reading addresses this issue directly. Peter asks Jesus, “if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? ...seven times?” Seven being a solid Biblical number. Jesus answers, “Not seven… but seventy-seven times.” In other words, as many times as it takes to free yourselves from the sin that interrupts your relationship.

We all sin.

Most of us talk about sin as those things we do that are wrong or harmful. That’s partly right. Theologian Karl Barth talks about sin as a state of separation – separation from God and separation from one another. It is in that state of separation that we do those things that are wrong and harmful.

So, it’s kind of like the disease versus the symptoms. We know there is a disease by the presence of the symptoms. We can treat the symptoms, but unless we cure the disease, we are not healed. That’s why Jesus brought us redemption by the forgiveness of sin, by bringing down all barriers that separate us from God and from one another.

Jesus didn’t just treat the symptoms, he cured the disease. In his most miserable moment, his most painful, humiliating moment as a human, Jesus prayed, and his prayer takes our breath away: “Father, forgive them…”

At our most miserable moments, when we are being unfairly treated, when those with power over us are acting corruptly, is this our prayer?

Years ago I visited a place in England called the Cathedral at Coventry. The city of Coventry was bombed into near oblivion during WWII and the cathedral was destroyed. When you go to the cathedral now, you will see that they didn’t clear away the rubble from the bombing. They simply built the new cathedral and attached it to the bombed out shell with a walkway.

The very first thing you see as you walk into the narthex of the new cathedral, built into the tile in the floor, are these the words: “Father forgive.” And every day they offer Noonday Prayer in the bombed out shell. They do not forget, but they do forgive.

We all sin. We all need to be forgiven. And we all need to be forgiving.

Jesus makes this very plain in the story of the wicked slave in the gospel. The slave-owner (God) forgives the slave who begs for mercy on the debt he can’t pay. Then that same slave goes out and cruelly and violently punishes those who owe him. When the slave-owner learns about this, he becomes enraged: You wicked slave! he says. I forgave you all your debt ... Shouldn’t you also have forgiven? For your lack of forgiveness, you are condemned to the punishment of eternal pain.

The lesson here is: when we refuse to forgive, we, like that wicked slave, are the ones who suffer.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu once said: “Forgiveness is a choice we make, and the ability to forgive others comes from the recognition that we are all flawed and all human. We have all made mistakes and harmed someone. We will again… Each of us has the capacity to commit the wrongs against others that were committed against us.”

And so we work to forgive those who have hurt us, harmed us, betrayed us, angered us, ignored us, demeaned us, made us feel ugly or worthless or embarrassed. We work to forgive those who shut their eyes and cover their ears to the truth – to our truth – whether it’s because they can’t hear it or because they won’t hear it. We work to forgive those who should have known better, who should have loved us better, but didn’t – or couldn’t.

To forgive is to trust that God will bring about divine justice, reconciliation, and wholeness from every experience of brokenness on earth. When we try to do this ourselves, it’s like trying to save ourselves from drowning. We can’t.

Each of us will need to be forgiven at some point in our lives, and each of us will need to forgive someone else – from the heart, as Jesus said. As Episcopalians we have the unique gift of the Rite of Reconciliation of a Penitent to help us get there. (BCP, 447) I highly recommend this rite. It’s what used to be called Confession.

I often hear the penitent, say that upon hearing the words of absolution spoken, they have an experience of release and freedom that is surprisingly intense – and transforming. I know that’s my experience as a penitent.

Forgiveness is a spiritual muscle we need to develop, and that’s what we do each Sunday together at our celebration of Holy Eucharist. We need one another, and we need to share in the nourishment of Word and Sacrament regularly together because that what strengthens us and unite us. We need to eat together, pray together, and play together. We even need to disagree together.

Church is where we learn and practice forgiveness so that we can take it out into the world, because as you know, our world remains sorely divided and enslaved by sin.

I close today with a poem from Mpho Tutu, Desmond Tutu’s daughter. It’s called “I will forgive”

“I will forgive you.
The words are so small, but there’s a universe hidden in them.

When I forgive you, all those cords of resentment, pain, and sadness
that had wrapped themselves around my heart
will be gone.

When I forgive you, you will no longer define me.
You measured me, and assessed me,
and decided that you could hurt me,
that I didn’t count.

But I will forgive you because I do count.
I do matter.
I am bigger than the image you have of me.

I am stronger. I am more beautiful.
I am infinitely more precious than you thought me.
I will forgive you.

My forgiveness is not a gift that I am giving to you.
When I forgive you,
my forgiveness will be a gift that gives itself to me.”

Amen.

Pentecost 11, 2017: Audacious faith

I was privileged to celebrate and preach at a LUTHERAN service with the good people at Church of Our Savior in Newland, NC - a Lutheran AND Episcopal Church. I preached extemporaneously, so please find the audio below.

Lectionary: Isaiah 56:1,6-8; Psalm 67
Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32; Matthew 15: (10-20), 21-28



If the above player doesn't work on your device, you can listen HERE also (mp4 file).

Transfiguration, 2017: Transfiguration, transformation, and the Christian life

This sermon was preached by the Partnership for ReNEWal team, Mr. Martin Darby and myself, at St. Thomas Episcopal Church as part of the continuing consultation/facilitation relationship we share with them.

Lectionary: Exodus 34:29-35; Psalm 99; 2 Peter 1:13-21; Luke 9:28-36



If the above player doesn't work on your device, click HERE.