Flashes, Sparks and Lights :Dec. 31, 2017

1 Christmas Year B                                                    
John 1: 1-18                                                                

            When my grandparents were still alive, they lived in a condo on the beach in Florida. They were high up and they had this gorgeous view of the ocean.  Every evening my grandfather would sit on the porch and watch the sunset.  He was waiting for the green flash. The green flash is a rare optical phenomenon. It generally occurs at sunset or sunrise and is usually seen over the ocean.  The flash is created by a refraction of light in the atmosphere.[1] On these rare occasions, when the sun is just about to disappear, there is a sudden flash of light.  It is so quick, that if you blink, you will miss it.  Most people have never seen it. It requires diligence, patience, and being in the right place at the right time. It also requires a little faith; to patiently wait for something that you have never seen and most people do not even know exists. 

            For the duration of Advent, we talked about waiting, anticipating, and preparing, for the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.  For those of you who were here Christmas Eve, you were rewarded with the lovely story of Jesus’ birth.  You heard about the shepherds and the angels.  Finally the time of waiting was over, and the time of celebration had arrived. Today (one week after Christmas Eve) we hear the familiar, yet mysterious, words of John 1. 

Unlike Matthew and Luke, there is no traditional birth story, in that there is no Mary and no baby Jesus.  But Jesus becomes incarnate in this story.  Jesus becomes human, and that is a birth story in a sense.  Perhaps it would be more aptly described as a story of becoming.

            “What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.  The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.” John uses a great deal of light and darkness imagery in his Gospel.  As you can see from this passage the light represents both life and Jesus Christ.  There are many theories about what darkness is and in this passage it is not clear. For our purposes, we will say that darkness represents death, or life apart from Jesus Christ.  It also represents hopelessness.

            Jesus became human and lived among us so that we could actually see and know God.  Before the birth of Jesus, people had faith.  Many had a great deal of faith. They believed in God.  But for many people God represented laws and rules.  God was inaccessible; the name of God could not even be spoken.  People could not communicate directly with God.   For many, God had become a religion, but not life.  So Jesus Christ came into the world to be God for us.  God was no longer an unpronounceable word, God was a living, breathing, being. 

            The Gospel reading ends with: “No one had ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known.”  It’s true, before Jesus was born, no one had ever seen God.  God had spoken to people.  God appeared in dreams.  But God was always a little elusive, a little out of reach.  With Jesus, this all changed. In a flash of light, he was here and he lived among us.  In a flash he was gone again. 

In the context of the history of the world, Jesus’ life on earth was so very brief.  If you blinked, you would miss it.   Consequently, some people did not believe.  Many still do not believe. If you look at the research, fewer and fewer people believe every year.  Yet there are those of us, who refuse to let go of the light. The light is oxygen…we cannot live without it.  We cannot imagine what life would look like without the light of Christ.

Despite that belief and that need, the darkness can be overwhelming at times.  Well, if I am honest, it can be overwhelming much of the time.  When that darkness is so prevalent, it makes it harder to seek the light.

It is as if we spend all our time staring into the darkness looking for signs of God’s light and love.  We grow weary.  Our eyes are strained, and sometimes we give up.  My grandfather only saw the green flash a couple of times, even after watching hundreds and hundreds of sunsets. That was enough for him.  Two seconds of brilliance was all he needed. 

            Jesus was with us for such a short time.  What he gave us was more than we needed. He gave us a fire that would never go out, a love that would always burn strong.  We could keep looking for God, keep hoping we will see God.  But God is more than a flash of light. God does not only come to us in miracles or answered prayers. You don’t have to look hard, you just have to change what you are looking for.  Not only do you have to change what you are looking for, when the darkness is all consuming, we must look at ourselves for the light.  We must be the light. Our opening prayer reads: Grant that this light, enkindled in our hearts, may shine forth in our lives.  We do not have to look outside of ourselves for the light.  It is in us.  Our job is to release the light.

My grandfather only saw that flash a couple of times, but he saw the most amazing sunsets hundreds of times.   I never saw the green flash, but I saw something in my grandfather, that spark of light and love, that faith in a divine spark.  I see that in each of you as well.  That is so much better than a flash.  It is a light that lasts. A light that lasts forever.

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[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_flash

God's Big Risk: Christmas Eve 2017

Christmas Eve, Year B                                                                       
Luke 2:1-20                                                                            

 

Deli meat, fish, soft cheeses, unpasteurized milk, caffeine and alcohol.   These are some of the things that pregnant women are supposed to avoid eating. Of course, there are also the daily pre-natal vitamins. It’s best to avoid stress.   Generally traveling in the last few weeks of your pregnancy is discouraged. 

While Mary probably avoided deli meat and caffeine, she did not avoid stress or travelling.  The journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem was 90 miles, much of it over hills.  Mary and Joseph travelled by foot and donkey.  It probably took them over a week to make that trip.  At that time of year it would have been 30 degrees during the day and colder at night.  They slept on the ground.  They lived on bread and water, because that was all they could easily carry.  It was a perilous journey for anyone, but especially a woman about to give birth.  When they arrived at their destination, the best place they could find was a stable.   This wasn’t a sterile environment, not the cleanest place to give birth.   

It makes me wonder a little about God’s judgment.  There are lots of ways he could have sent his son to earth to bring his message of love and salvation.  He could have sent him fully grown.  He could have sent him to a family with money and power. He could have waited a couple thousand years and sent him to a developed country where the baby Jesus would have been much safer. It’s baffling to me that God would take that kind of risk, that he would take a chance on this young powerless couple.  I personally think that all children should be wrapped in bubble wrap to ensure their safety. There was no bubble wrap! There was hay in a feeding trough. 

God had already tried many ways to reach God’s people.  He sent the prophets who shared his words and wisdom.  Some of them displayed acts of power.  He sent a great flood so the world could start fresh.  He spoke through kings and warriors.  While some of the words of the prophets and kings got people’s attention, it never made the lasting impact that was intended. 

It seems that God then took a break.  There is about a 500 year gap between the end of the Old Testament and the birth of Jesus.  500 years where it seems that God wasn’t communicating much, at least not in the big ways he had before. 

We can’t know what was going on with God in those 500 years.  But I like to think that he was pondering, maybe even convincing himself of what had to come next.  He realized that he had to take a risk, make himself—God—vulnerable like he never had before. 

Because God never does anything half way, he made himself as vulnerable as possible. He came not just as a baby, but as a fetus in the womb of a young woman who had no husband and no way to support herself.   There is no greater vulnerability.  For 9 months and then at least a year after, Jesus (God incarnate) depended on Mary for his sustenance.  God’s life was dependent on this one woman.  The future of humanity in the hands of one young woman.

Surely, God was still watching and protecting Mary and the baby Jesus.  One of the first things that the Angel Gabriel told Mary was, “The Lord is with you.”  The angel promised that through this all, God would be with her….not only in the literal sense as she was carrying the Son of God, but also that God the Father was providing strength and assurance.

As Christians, we talk a lot about trusting God and what that means.  It’s challenging to trust God, perhaps one of the greatest challenges that we as Christians face. What we sometimes forget is that God trusts us as well. He displayed that by allowing his son to come to earth in the form of a baby, a helpless baby.  One of the things that distinguished Jesus from other religious leaders, and certainly from anyone considered a god, was that he never asked people to do anything that he was not willing to do. 

We as Christians, put our lives in his hands.  Technically we do.  Let’s face it, it’s usually more figurative than literal. We put our future life in God’s hands in that we believe that if we follow God in this world, then we will live eternally. It’s a lot harder to put our day to day needs and concerns in the hands of God.  Jesus put his life in our hands.  He was completely dependent on human parents to provide for his needs.  He did not come out of the womb as a fully grown man; he was a tiny baby. 

If you look at Medieval art, the baby Jesus always looks kind of weird.  He usually has the face of a man, or maybe even the body of a man, but miniature. Obviously medieval painters knew what babies looked like.  But they could not imagine God in the flesh in that helpless state.  While we have gotten better at depicting baby Jesus in art, I am not sure we truly appreciate the kind of trust and love that God showed in sending his only son to earth.  How could we?

We have romanticized the story of Jesus’ birth and painted it in gentle and vibrant hues.  We have made it sweet and sentimental.  But if you look at the facts of the story, it was a very strange way to introduce God to this world. The crazy thing is, that it worked.  Because God wasn’t just telling people what to believe, he was showing them how he loved us.  For millennia, God had amazed and terrified people with his awesome power.  But with Jesus, people learned what it was to know God and be known by God. 

You might think, well that is all fine and good, but that was thousands of years ago. What do we do when we don’t have God in the flesh here with us? How can we learn to trust and love a God who we don’t know? That’s a tough one.  The best way to trust God is to enter into a relationship with God.  We can do this by reading the Bible, which is full of stories like the one we heard tonight.  We can embrace the traditions of the church, many of which are 100s, maybe even 1000 years old.  We have the Christian religion and the Episcopal Church, that while imperfect, have done a great deal of good in the world.  We have community worship, an opportunity to come and sit with a community of believers and worship God through music and prayers.  We have prayer and meditation.   Some people think that these are the things we do after we learn to trust God.  That certainly is true.  But these are also the practices we use to get to know God. 

People sometimes worry about coming to church when their faith is on perilous ground, or because they are doubting or perhaps even teetering on the cusp of disbelief.  This is exactly where we belong when we are in those situations.  Someone once said that the church is not a museum for saints, it is a hospital for the broken sinners.  I am convinced, that in a room full of broken people, we can find wholeness. We can create a mosaic of faith and trust.  It will not be perfect, but no relationship ever is.  The story of Jesus’ birth and life, is messy and disjointed. That is what makes it real. 

Jesus’ life on earth began with a 90 mile journey in the womb of a young woman.  This 90 mile journey was just the beginning of a wonderful, but difficult life; a life where Jesus loved and was loved, a life where trust was created and trust was broken.   As a result, God understands our journey.  While we are not carrying the baby Jesus in our womb (if you are, we need to talk), we are carrying a promise, a promise of God’s love, a promise that God will be with us now and until the end.    

(Quote from Abigail Van Buren.  It is assumed that she was quoting St. Augustine.)

Don't quench the Spirit: December 17, 2017

1 Thessalonians 5:16-24                                                
Yea B, Advent 3                                                                      

            One of the things I have enjoyed about being the parent of a toddler is imagining all of the things that he might become.  When he jumped off the couch and landed on his feet I thought, he is going to be a famous gymnast.  When he said his first full sentence, I decided he was most certainly going to be a Rhodes Scholar. When he played something on the piano that kind of sounded like something resembling a song, I reminded myself to look up when Mozart started playing the piano because there was a chance that Joshua could be a savant.  It’s fun thinking of all of these possibilities.  At some point, he might tell me he hates the piano and I will cross “next Mozart” off the list.  But right now, he could be anything. 

I remember a time when I was absolutely convinced I would be a senator.  There was no doubt in my mind that I could accomplish whatever I wanted.  And I hope that most of us have some memory like that, a time when anything was possible.  While I was thinking about all of this, I tried to remember the moment when I realized that not everything was possible…or that some or many of my dreams would not be realized.  I don’t think it was any one moment.  It was just a jumble of realizations, some of them painful, some of them enlightening.  I think part of what forms us, what makes us who we are is how we deal with the failures and rejections in life. 

It’s like we are born with a flame.  At first there is a flicker/a spark.  It grows and provides light and a little heat.  Then a couple of things can happen. 

1.      It continues to burn, but goes through different phases. Sometimes it flickers and seems like it is about to extinguish. Sometimes it grows so big it seems like it will burn the whole place down.  It never dies, but sometimes it may seem like it will.

2.      Or it could be a flame that stays sheltered.  It is steady and unchanging, but can only grow so much. 

3.      Or, it is a flame that rises to a certain height and then appears to be smothered, until all you see is embers.

We are these flames. Either we experience success and failure and keep burning through it all.  Or, we stay safe and controlled, not taking much risk.  Or we burn and then something or someone quenches our fire.  The flame ends in ash. The dream dies.  The Spirit is quenched.

            That line from Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians captured me when I was initially reading these texts.  I keep coming back to it, “Do not quench the Spirit.” Paul was talking to new Christians.  This letter to the Thessalonians is the oldest books in the New Testament.  It was written before the Gospels, less than 20 years after Jesus ascended to heaven.  As you came imagine, there was a great deal of fervor in the new community.  There was passion for Jesus and all that he had taught.  They believed in this new movement despite the fear of persecution.   They knew that they could be stoned for worshipping Jesus. This fledgling Christian community was surrounded by people who thought this Jesus thing was just a passing fad, another little cult that would end with that generation. 

In addition to this fervor and passion, these new Christians experienced doubt and fear as well. They had expected that Jesus would return in their lifetime. As people in their community died, they got worried.  What happened if Jesus didn’t come back?  Even Paul had expected Jesus to come back in his lifetime. Thus as the years went by and Jesus did not return, the fervor and the passion that had carried these new Christians wavered.  It was a scary place to be….this in-between place. Despite the fear and the doubt, they held on.  Paul continued to support them and reassure them.  They lived in hopeful expectation. But the longer they waited the less hopeful they were. 

            While we cannot be sure what was happening, it is evident from this letter that Paul was concerned for them.  Otherwise he would not have felt that he had to remind them not to quench the Spirit.  We assume that Paul was talking about the Holy Spirit, but I think it was more than that---at least more than how we perceive as the Holy Spirit.  For most of us, we see the Holy Spirit as something outside of us.  On our good days we see it as something that may inspire and guide us. Other days, we forget about the Holy Spirit entirely. 

But let’s assume for a minute that for the early Christians, the Holy Spirit was part of them.  It was the flame that I spoke of in the beginning of my sermon.  It was the flame that drove them through life. When it was quenched, when it was extinguished, then everything was quenched.  Without it, they were walking in the dark with no light to guide them.  Therefore, it was critical that the Holy Spirit not be quenched.

While we tend to relegate the Holy Spirit to Pentecost and ordinations, the Holy Spirit is part of us.  It is no coincidence that there is a preponderance of candles in churches.  They are not just for aesthetic purposes. The flames serve as reminders of the presence of the Holy Spirit.  They also represent the light of Christ.  The Holy Spirit is what sustains that light within each of us.  We do not have to worry when Jesus will come again, because we have this guiding light at all times.  We have a light that not only shines outwardly, but one that burns within each of us.

Here is the thing about the light of Christ or the flame of the Spirit.  No matter how hard we try to quench it, we can’t.  We can cover it up.  We can try to hide it.  We can ignore it.  But we cannot extinguish it.  Despite that, wouldn’t it be better if we fanned the flames instead of quenching them? Wouldn’t it be better if we tended to the flame in each one of us and one another? 

Much of Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians is about how to be a Christian community. “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances…” All of our hopes and dreams might not be realized.  Some of us, many of us, will have moments when the flame within us will feel more like ash than flame…which is why we have one another to fan the flames.  We are here to be inspired and to inspire.  After Christmas, we will move the Advent wreaths back into our closets or attics, but that doesn’t mean that the light is gone; it just comes in different forms.  When the darkness seems like it will overcome us, try to imagine the light within you.  If that is too hard, find a candle to remind you that there is always light—the Spirit cannot be quenched. 

Don't make me come down there: Dec. 3

Year B, Advent 1                                                                    
Isaiah 64:1-9                                                                          

            Have any of you seen the billboards on the side of the highway with messages from God?  They have a black background and white letters.  They say things like:

 “That ‘love thy neighbor thing’---I meant it.” 

   Or “My way is the highway.”
  Or, one of my favorites: “I don’t question your existence.”

         While these are fairly light hearted, there are some that seem a little threatening. “You think it’s hot here?”  or “Don’t make me come down there.”  That 2^nd one is a little perplexing to me.  It alludes to the threat of an angry parent warning rowdy children that if they have to come down there, things will get ugly.  That seems like a strange way to envision God’s 2^nd coming.   Should we be afraid of God coming?  I always thought that we should look forward to the coming of God.  Isn’t that what we do during Advent…we anticipate the arrival of Jesus.

            If we look around us in our culture at this time of year we see bright lights, decorated trees and houses.  We smell homemade cookies and cinnamon.  We feel the warmth of a fire or a comfy blanket.  Our world is telling us that this time before Christmas is a time of joy and comfort.  It is a time to celebrate and enjoy the sweeter things in life. It’s a time to indulge. The Bible readings are telling us that this is a time to get serious because judgment is coming.  It’s quite a juxtaposition.

            Our Gospel reading is talking about the darkening sun and stars falling from the sky.  It’s essentially talking about the end of the world.  It ends with a slightly foreboding warning: “Keep awake.” The Old Testament reading (Isaiah) is a lament of desperate people begging God to tear the heavens apart.  It’s not exactly the kind of stuff that puts you in the holiday spirit.  Instead of talking about Mark’s vision of the end of the world, I thought I would focus on Isaiah’s depiction of present suffering.  Isaiah was one of the great prophets.  He is the prophet most quoted in the New Testament. The Book of Isaiah is also one of the longest books in the Bible.

Because it is such a long book and covers several decades, scholars typically break it into three sections.  The first third tells of Isaiah warning the people of imminent destruction if they do not change their ways.  The 2^nd third talks about the Hebrew people living in exile because they were attacked and forced to leave their home (because they did not listen to Isaiah).  The final third is supposed to be the happy ending.  It’s the time when the Hebrew people return to the land that they have been singing, praying, and dreaming about.  They are finally home.  But now it is in ruins and they have to rebuild.  This was not the happy ending they were expecting. 

I bet many of us have had that experience.  We have been in a difficult period in our life. Then we think, we just need to get through this period and all will be well. Then our prayers are answered and we make it through the hard time, but our problems are still there at the other side of the darkness.  Things are better, but there is still work to be done and by now, we are tired.  So it was with the Israelites. They were weary.  They had been through so much.  They did not have the energy or the will to start over. 

            In our reading for today, the first line is: “O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains will quake at your presence---as when a fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil.” The Hebrew people were facing the ruins of their former life and the land that they loved.  In desperation, they were asking for God to make his presence known.  Typically, when we think of God’s presence, we think of something warm of comforting.  Yet the Hebrew people were under no such illusion.  They knew what it was to be in the presence of God and it was not comforting.  It was quite the opposite.

This picture of the heavens being torn open and quaking mountains is most likely an allusion to the story of Moses and the 10 commandments.  In that story, Moses had led the people out of slavery and after about 3 months of wandering and complaining, Moses brought the people to the edge of a mountain to meet God.  A great cloud shrouded the mountain. There was thunder and lightning.  The people trembled.  They were terrified.  They asked Moses to climb the mountain so that they would not have to. They did not want to be any closer to God than they already were.  Thus, in our reading for today, when they asked God to tear open the heavens, they knew what they were asking. They knew that God’s presence would be holy and sacred, but it would be a challenge as well. But they also knew what it was to be without God.  They had experienced that.  They chose a holy fear, rather than an apathetic and numb existence. 

            In our reading for today, after begging God to come down, the people repented.  They admitted that they had been worthless.  They had sinned. Not only did they confess their sins, but they acknowledged that they were powerless to improve their situation. They said, “There is no one who calls on your name, or attempts to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have delivered us into the hand of our inequity.”   That admittance of powerlessness was probably one of the hardest things for them to say.  It’s something that most of us struggle with, our inability to control things, even though we try so hard. 

            Yet…yet.  That is the where the tone changes.  The narrative moves from the past to the present.  The Hebrew people were no longer talking about what was in the past.  With this simple word: “yet” they moved to something entirely different.  “Yet, O LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.”  Yet.  They were saying: Whatever has happened in the past,  whatever way we sinned, You are our father…now.  You created us.  Even in our flawed and incomplete state, we are still yours. So you can’t be angry forever because we are all your people. 

            In the church, we often contrast the season of Advent with what is going on in the world around us.  Advent tells us to slow down.  The world tells us to overcompensate. Yet that slowing down isn’t a spiritual vacation, it’s a time to examine our lives, where we have succeeded, but also where we have fallen short---especially in regards to our faith journey.  It is a time of preparation not just for the sweet baby Jesus, but for a God who can tear the heavens apart and light up the sky…for a God who expects greatness from us because we are created in his image. 

While I would never want people to be afraid of God, I do think that we need to spend more time in awe of God…perhaps even tremble before his majesty.  It is one thing to confess our sins to God---it is an entirely different thing to throw ourselves at the mercy of our creator. In doing so, we are not only admitting our past sins, we are admitting that we will sin again.  We cannot save ourselves.  While God can be quite intimidating at times…in the end, he made us.  We are his children.  God will never forget that.  The question is, are we willing to live into that kind of vulnerability and trust---to be the children of God. Not only to be the children of God, but children who are willing to be molded and changed by God’s loving hands.  It is not enough to be created by God. We also need to be changed by God.

Unexpected Heroes: Nov. 19 2017

Year A, Pentecost 24                                      
Judges 4:1-7                                                           

 

            A couple of years ago I purchased an audio version of the entire Bible.  I thought that it would give me something peaceful and calming to listen to at the end of the day, perhaps before sleep.  When I came to the Book of Judges, I had to skip major chunks.  There was so much war and violence.  It was neither calming nor soothing.  Therefore, it will probably not surprise you that I have never preached on this book.   In my defense, this is the only time we have a reading from Judges in our 3 year lectionary cycle.  It’s also short, has complicated names, and makes no sense if you only read only the part that we heard today.

            Instead of skipping it entirely, I am going to provide a little context. The Book of Judges picks up where the Book of Joshua ends.  Moses had appointed Joshua to be his successor and Joshua had ruled the Hebrew people successfully for decades.  As you can imagine, following leaders like Moses and Joshua would be quite an undertaking.  When Moses died, he appointed Joshua to be his successor.  Joshua did not appoint a successor.  This lack of leadership was difficult for the people of Israel.  The first line of our reading is: “The Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord…”  Again. 

The Israelites had a pattern in how they related to God.  Take yourself back to high school or college for a minute. You remember the couple.  They would be in love, then there would be a fight and they would break up. Then one person would decide that they could not live without the other. They would get back together and be happy for a time.  Then things would get difficult and they would break up again.  This is a loose analogy for what happened with the Israelites and God.  However, in this case, there was always one party who was at fault, and it was not God. 

            We do not know why God didn’t appoint a leader after Joshua died.  It would be many years before David would become King.  In the interim, there were leaders called judges.  These judges were primarily military leaders who helped Israel defend itself from various enemies.  There would be peace and a good judge.  Then the judge would die and there would be chaos. The people would turn to other gods.  They would then be attacked by an army and realize that they could not survive without the one true God.  They would beg God to deliver them and God would send another judge.  Then the process would start all over again. 

            When we get to the point in today’s story the Israelites are in trouble again. They have been controlled by the Canaanites for 20 years.  They wanted to overthrow their oppressors, but they could only do so with God on their side.   The Canaanite army was led by a man named Sisera and had 900 chariots of iron.  When we hear chariots, we don’t think of something scary and deadly.  However, at the time, iron chariots were the top of the line military equipment. It would be like trying to fight 900 tanks with people armed with pistols…not a fair fight. 

            The judge who led the Israelites in this epic battle was an unexpected leader. She was a judge named Deborah.  As far as we know, Deborah was the only female judge living in a time when women had no authority.  She did.  What made her a strong leader was that she knew that her authority came from God.  She was also a good delegator.  She went to a man named Barak and told him that he would lead the army to defeat the Canaanites. 

This is where our reading for today ends, but this is also where it gets more interesting.  Barak told Deborah that he would only go if she came with him. This is almost unbelievable—a man of that time telling a woman that he would only go into battle with her at his side.  Her response was: “I will surely go with you; nevertheless, the road on which you are going will not lead to your glory, for the Lord will sell Sisera into the hand of a woman.”  In other words, sure, I will come, but you are not getting any glory because God is giving the glory to a woman instead.  When we read this, we assume that it is Deborah who will receive the glory, which does not make her look very humble.  It isn’t.  God had another plan.  The Israelites fought hard and won great battles sending the general, Sisera, into hiding with an ally, the King of Hazor.  Sisera thought he was safe, but he wasn’t.  While he was sleeping the wife of the king killed him with a tent stake and then found Barak and showed him where the body was, which meant the Israeli people were victorious.       

            While this makes for a scintillating narrative, it is challenging to preach.  It is hard to find the good news in a story where there is so much violence.  Therefore, we have to look past the violence and focus on the people.  In Book of Judges and most of the Bible, we have a community of fickle people who continually turn away from God.  We might be able to identify with people who have trouble following God.  I know I can.  What we also have, are unlikely heroes.  We have a woman who should never have had the authority she had, not according to the norms of that time and place.  We have Barak, a man who refused to go to battle without the support of a woman. Then we have the wife of a King who wasn’t even an Israelite who showed great courage and cunning.  She should have had no part in this fight.  What those leaders had in common was humility and faith. They knew that they were instruments of God’s will.   They knew what so many have chosen to forget, that we owe everything we have to God.  There is no battle that we can win without the help of God. 

            One of our Eucharistic prayers  (which is what the priest reads before we all take communion) says: You made us the rulers of creation. But we turned against you, and betrayed your trust; and we turned against one another. As Christians, it is important to acknowledge that we too have had those moments when we have turned away from God. Sometimes we know that we are doing it. Sometimes we don’t because we can’t see past our own self-interest.  But then when we need God, we come back to him and he always takes us back. 

The story of the Jewish and the Christian community is complicated and beautiful.  It is full of twists and turns.  It is full of moments of betrayal and moments of desperation.  But what makes our story compelling, what makes our story one that does not end with the words of the Bible, is the unexpected heroes that permeate our faith stories.  Yes, we need to admit our sins and our moments when we turn away from God and one another.  I hope that we can also see those opportunities when we can be the unexpected heroes, the instruments of God’s love, grace and authority. The Christian story is unfinished. It is up to each one of us to decide what role we have in the story.   We do not have to be great warriors to be the heroes of this story.  We just have to be commit ourselves to following the will of God wherever it may lead us.

Taxes, Money and Giving: October 21, 2017

Year A Pentecost 20                                                         

 

            I have never liked talking about money.  I know very few clergy who do, but there are some who are better than others. I am not one of them.  This is why I don’t talk about pledging very often. Last week was our Celebration Sunday, which is when we celebrate what God has given us by giving back. To put it more bluntly, it is when we ask people to turn in their pledges.  It seems that I talked about it so little, some people had no idea what was going on.  This was a lesson for me.  It was more of a reminder, because I know better.  First of all, preaching about money and giving is a good and necessary thing.  It is a huge part of life.  It is what God asks of us.  God asks us to be joyful givers.  Jesus talked more about money than he did about the poor or loving your neighbor. So I know that I need to talk about money. But then I thought, oh well, celebration Sunday was last Sunday, I can talk about it next year. Then I saw the Gospel for today.  Taxes, money, giving.  This is proof that God has a sense of humor.

            It is a clear from the very first verse of this passage what is going on.  “The Pharisees went and plotted to entrap Jesus in what he said.”  Over the last few weeks, we have heard several parables that Jesus shared.  In most of these parables, the Pharisees were not portrayed well.  They came across as hypocritical, narrow minded and just plain wrong.  The Pharisees could not let these teachings continue, so they came up with a plan.  They devised the perfect question to entrap Jesus and then recruited Herodians to be with them when they asked the question. 

While we do not know a lot about the Herodians, we know that they were associated with King Herod.  They were Jewish, but were perceived to be closely allied with the Romans who had appointed Herod to be the king of the Jews.  This was especially offensive to most Jews because only God could appoint a king of the Jewish people.  The Pharisees and the Herodians did not usually get along. Thus to have these two groups working together implied that Jesus had upset not just the Pharisees and Chief Priests, but the Roman leadership as well.

            In this nation, we are divided on taxes.  How much should they be? Where should the income from the taxes go? In Jesus time, the Jewish people were extremely burdened by taxes.  Scholars estimate that there were 3-4 different taxes and most of the income from those taxes went to the Romans.  The Jewish tax money was helping pay for their imprisonment. I think we can all agree that would not be something we would support in this country.  The question was, “Is it lawful to pay taxes to the emperor, or not?” If Jesus answered the question by saying that it was lawful to pay taxes to the Romans, he would have upset the Jews.  He would have lost many of his followers.  If he said that it was not lawful, he would have most likely been arrested by the Romans.  There was absolutely no good way to answer this question.   Jesus took another tactic.

            He told them, “Show me the coin used for the tax.”  In asking for a coin, he was first of all admitting that he did not have any coins.  Someone from the group who was trying to trap him with this tricky question handed him a denarius.  A denarius is a Roman coin.  It would have had a picture of Caesar with the words, “Tiberius Caesar, Son of the Divine Augustus Pontifex Maximus.”  This coin had  an engraved image of a Roman god, an idol.  Just having this coin would have technically meant that any Jew holding it would be breaking the first two commandments. 

            In some ways, the question about whether it was ok for Jews to pay taxes to the Roman was a fair question.  Yet the fact that the Jews asking the questions were the ones holding the coin indicates their hypocrisy.  They were asking if it was ok for them to participate in a system that they were already participating in.  That is why Jesus called them hypocrites.  Jesus really did not like hypocrites.  Remember, Jesus did not have the coin.  He had to ask for it.

            When he had it, he asked them whose image was on the coin.   It was the Emperor’s image.  Jesus then provided his now famous answer, “Give therefore to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” In other words, if it has the emperor’s face on it, give it back to him.  A lot of people have used this response to help explain the divide between church and state or sacred and secular; as if Jesus was drawing a line between what was God’s and what was Caesar’s.  That was not the case.

            Jesus asked whose image is on the coin.  Whose image.  Think about the first chapter of Genesis. Genesis takes us through all of God’s creation.  After creating earth, water, plants, animals, God created male and female in his image.  We are made in the image of God.  Therefore when Jesus tells them to give the coin to Caesar because that is whose image is on the coin…well that is a very small thing compared to what and who bears the image to God.  We give coins to the leaders of this earth, but we give ourselves to God.  There is no divide between the sacred and the secular because every part of creation is sacred. 

            The reason talking about stewardship and pledges is difficult is not just because clergy don’t like to talk about money; it’s that talking about what stewardship really means is far too daunting.  Everything belongs to God.  We earn nothing because all we have is a gift from God.  That is a difficult thing to wrap your mind around especially when you have worked very hard for what you have.  But it also explains why giving of ourselves is part of what we do in church. 

In my last church, we had a very outgoing stewardship chair.  He had a deep southern accent and was a little pushy at times, but always charming.  He loved the church.  Once I saw him sidle up to someone in the hall before the service.  It was not someone I saw regularly, not someone I would have expected to pledge.  He put his hand on the man’s shoulder and said, “Dan, do we have your commitment.” Dan looked a little confused.  The stewardship chair stopped so Dan would have to look at him.  “Your commitment.  Are you committed to this church?” He was so earnest.  It even made me uncomfortable.  Yet it made me think of what it would be like to be cornered by Jesus.  What would it be like to have Jesus pull you aside, look into your eyes and say, “Do I have your commitment?”   That is what he asks each one of us every minute of every day.  Are we committed to him? Only you know that answer.    

Violence ≠ Norm : October 8, 2017

Year A, Pentecost 18                                              
Matthew 21:33-46                                                                             

            This has never been one of my favorite Gospel readings.  I am not sure I know anyone who likes this reading.  For me, it’s the violence.  We all know that there is violence in the Bible, but most of us assume that the violence is limited to the Old Testament.  But as we know far too well, violence is part of our world. That does not mean it is a good part of our world, but it is there—now-- just as it was 2000 years ago.  Jesus was never one to shy away from uncomfortable topics. 

            In preaching we are told never to allegorize the parables.  In other words, we should not simplify them by turning them into morality stories where everything symbolizes somethings else.  Usually it is not that cut and dry.  However for this parable, it is a little more cut and dry because the story is a reference to the words of Isaiah where he talked about a vineyard and said: “For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel…”  The land owner in the story is God and the land that others are caring for is not just the land of Israel, but the people of Israel, the people of God.  That is the only part of the parable that is defined in Isaiah, but that is a pretty big part.  Most people have inferred that the tenants who treated the owner’s servants poorly represented the religious leaders of the time.  People have assumed this because of the way that the Pharisees and the Chief Priests reacted.  The text says that they realized it was about them and wanted to arrest Jesus because of that.  But Jesus never says that directly.[1] 

            One of confusing things about this parable is the actions of the owner.  The beginning of the story makes sense.  He prepares the land and equips it with everything that is needed for a good harvest.  It was not uncommon for a business man to own land and lease it to someone else. The expectation was that in exchange for allowing the people to harvest his land, they would give him a percentage of either the profit or the harvest itself.  In this case, the owner was collecting a portion of the produce.   To do so, he sent servants out to collect the produce.  So far, everything is making sense.  Then the tenants kill one servant and injure the two others.  This is a violent reaction, but not unprecedented.  These tenants were clearly abusing the owner and his servants by doing this. 

One would expect the owner to react just as severely.  He could take a chance and send more servants, but this time send them heavily armed.  More likely it would have been wise to send members of the army to arrest those corrupt tenants.  He did neither of those things.  He sent more people assuming that the tenants would have gotten over their violent tendencies.  However, this new group of servants were treated the same way as the first group. By now, several of his servants were dead and the rest were injured. It seems like this would be the time to send in the big guns…the cavalry.  These tenants were clearly not going to have a change of heart.  Yet this is where things get a little crazy.  The owner sends his son.  His son. One person. He assumes that by putting trust in these tenants, they would see what a caring owner he is. They would repent and treat the son better than the others he sent.   But they don’t. They kill the son. 

            At this point in the story, Jesus turns to the crowd and he asks them what they think the owner will do next.  They respond in the most practical and reasonable way.  The owner will kill those horrible wretches and give someone else the land.  In responding this way, the people in the crowd showed their limitations.  Their response was violence because that was all they knew.  If someone kills someone, they get killed.  That is fair and just. But that is not how the owner operates.  That is not how God operates.  God gave humans everything we could possibly need. When God asked something in return (obedience, love and loyalty) humans refused.  So God sent the prophets, people of wisdom, strength and faith. Most were killed and all were treated with cruelty.  Then God sent his son hoping that people would learn from his son, come to understand God in a new way.  Some did, but the vast majority did not.  God’s son was beaten and killed. 

How did God respond to this ultimate betrayal?  Did he avenge the death of his son? Did he strike down all the people who had rejected him, accused him, ignored him, beaten him and ultimately killed him? That would have been the fair thing to do. That would have been the just thing to do.  He didn’t.  He raised Jesus from the dead and he sent him back to the same people who rejected him. 

While we know the end of this story, let’s assume for a minute that we do not know the end.  Sending Jesus back again seems like a really bad idea to me.  God had already given the people many chances.  He had been more than fair.  Why send his son back?  Because it was about more than being fair. It’s about how God loves God’s people—how God loves us.  God does not love us in the ways that make any sense. He gives us countless chances to reform, countless chances to respond to cruelty and hate not with violence, but with forgiveness and love. 

            It’s true that it made a huge difference when God sent Jesus back from the dead.  For those who had believed, their faith was renewed.  For those who doubted, they came to believe.   No one tried to kill Jesus again, at least not that we know of.  Thus, it would seem that this final desperate attempt was successful.  Or was it?  Yes, a church was created.  Christianity was spread across the world and continues to thrive in many places. Yet, Christians continue to be persecuted in some places. People doing the work of God are still killed.  The problem is even more complex and pervasive than that.  Even as Christians, as followers of Christ, we continue to turn from him again and again.  We don’t kill the son, but it seems at times like we try. 

            God gave his son.  While Jesus ascended, we still have him. We have that gift that God foolishly bestowed on us so many years ago.  We have the gift of a love that has no limit.  With that gift comes a responsibility, like discovering ways to respond to injustice without resorting to violence.  I cannot tell you exactly how to do it. I have some ideas, but I am not sure of anything.  What I know is that what we are doing is not working. The crowd responded to Jesus in the only way they knew-- violence.[2]  That was not Jesus’ response.  As Christians, we have been taught something different. The norm can no longer be death and destruction.

 By the time a child turns 18, they will have seen an average of 16,000 murders on television and over 200,000 acts of violence. It’s the default. It’s the norm. Many people have said that when they heard about the shooting in Las Vegas, they felt numb.  Oh, another shooting.  We have gone numb.  That is not what Jesus wanted.  That I know for sure.

            Perhaps what we can do, what we can start to do, is shift our thinking so that violence does not have to be the default.  We can look at creative options.  I know that sometimes violence has to happen.  I am not a pacifist.  I know that I live in a country that is safer than most partly because we have the strength to respond to violence.   But that does not have to be the only way.  As I considered how we could shift our thinking, our baseline, I looked at the first reading.  It’s the 10 commandments.  If we followed those 10 commandments, there would be peace in this world.  Take your bulletin home.  Read those commandments every day this week, even before you look at the news.  Start imagining what the world would look like if we actually followed God’s guidance.  If we can spend more time thinking and praying on those things, then that will be our default.  Let God’s love and grace be the way we start our day. We can change the norm.

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[1] This is mostly likely what Matthew was saying, but this was partially due to the fact that the church was facing persecution from the Jews at the time.  Unfortunately texts like this have fueled anti-Semitism over the last 2000 years.

[2] I am not saying Jews only knew violence.  With the Roman occupation, and some of the laws of the Torah, violence was often uses as a form of punishment.  Jesus taught something different.