2 Corinthians 5:14-21 14For the love of Christ urges us on, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died. 15And he died for all, so that those who live might live no longer for themselves, but for him who died and was raised for them.
16From now on, therefore, we regard no one from a human point of view; even though we once knew Christ from a human point of view, we know him no longer in that way. 17So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! 18All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; 19that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us. 20So we are ambassadors for Christ, since God is making his appeal through us; we entreat you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
The Green Bible has a study guide that I’ve been using in this sermon series “Creation Care as Justice.” This week I enjoyed the questions in that study guide enough that I wanted to share them with you.
What assumptions do you make that hold you back from acts of justice and mercy?
We could probably start with assumptions about people being valued differently. We know that some corporations seem to believe people are valued lower than profits. We’ve heard stories, for example, about people who die when insurance companies won’t approve treatment because it isn’t cost effective. And about corporate officers who lay off thousands of employees to cut costs while they receive large bonuses. We know about people being valued as less than because of their station in life. Maybe we’ve watched a TV cop shows where a particularly insensitive patrol officer is chastised for characterizing a crime against a prostitute or drug addict or gang member as NHI, no humans involved. We may have seen that poor neighborhoods are the last to get any kind of repairs or city services. All of these assumptions about the relative values of humans can and does get in the way of justice.
How can the idea that we are all part of God’s creation help overcome those assumptions?
According to Paul, as followers of Christ we no longer regard anyone from a human point of view. Now we look at others as God does, loving one another as Christ commanded us to do. In Christ, our prejudices against each other fall away. And perhaps not just our prejudices about people.
Bill Cosby is a very funny fellow, right. Long before he did the voices for the Fat Albert cartoon shows, or starred in any of several TV series, that line was the title of the first of a young stand-up comedian’s record albums, released in 1963. I loved his comedy and I got all of his records. I could recite long bits of his routines, and I still use Cosby-isms sometimes. There’s one routine that has been coming to mind this week, and I don’t quite remember the whole thing, but it had something to do with his girlfriend getting upset when he didn’t swerve to miss a cat in the road and he responded “What? You want me to wreck a $2,500 car for a 25c cat?” (Remember, back then the average cost of a new car was $2,600.) In the 1960s I thought that was really funny. Today, the idea that a car is more valuable than a living creature . . . not as funny as it used to be. I keep remembering that God told us to take care of the earth and everything on it.
Albert Schweitzer is known as one of the great philanthropists of the 20th century. His philosophy was called Reverence for Life and believed all God’s creatures should be equally valued, human and non-human alike. He let ants eat at his dinner table and hand fed his pet pelican Parcival with fish caught especially for that purpose. He treated all who came to his hospital no matter who they were or how much they could pay. He believed that all were equally worthy of care. Like most European men of his time, he held invalid assumptions about the capabilities of women and persons of color which kept him from believing they could be his equals, from true reconciliation. Still his philosophy, his Reverence for Life, has helped many embrace the knowledge that humans are only part of God’s creation and that we are responsible for all of the world.
How might caring for creation be seen as an act of love for our fellow human beings?
Ronald L. Farmer, Dean of the All Faiths Chapel at Chapman University, recently published his first novel, Awakening. An important part of the story is the main character’s first hand education about factory farms. He has inherited the family farm in Oklahoma and travels there from Claremont to decide what to do with the property. He discovers that many of the farms and homesteads around his family’s farm have been purchased by a giant corporation, where everything needed to raise a pig from conception to market is supplied. The big farms have meant an increase in employment, more shopping centers, housing and construction. It all sounds ok until he begins to learn what that means for the pigs and for the people of the community.
I’ve raised pigs and I don’t have any problem eating pork – or at least, I didn’t before I read this book. In my experience, pigs are smart and friendly and clean and live well in community with each other. Mother pigs love their babies. Pig farmers care about their pigs and work to make sure they live in a healthy environment. Healthy pig, healthy people eating that pig.
But the life cycle of the factory pig, as Farmer describes it so graphically, is such that I am seriously considering shopping for non-factory pork. Breeding sows are kept in tiny cages, are kept constantly pregnant or nursing, and the babies are weaned much earlier than nature intends. Once baby pigs are weaned they are kept in overcrowded cages standing on wire mesh above their own waste for their entire lives, which are sadly very short. They are fed hormones and antibiotics to help them grow big enough to butcher faster – which is really unhealthy for people. The work is so nasty that turnover is very high, illness and accident accounting for much of it. Factory housing is set up on a “company store” basis and wages are kept so low the workers can’t get ahead or move away. The stench that comes from the farms fills the air for miles and miles around the farms, and the tanks of pig waste that are being processed for fertilizer leak, within ‘acceptable’ parameters, into the ground water, also not healthy for humans. There’s much more in the novel, and in the back of the novel are recommended source materials if you want to study this more.
This goes way beyond swerving to miss a cat, or hand feeding a pelican. I don’t have any doubt at all but that caring for this part of creation, the pigs and cattle and chickens raised for our consumption on these factory farms, is certainly an act of love for humanity. For the workers who work in horrible conditions for little pay and no medical care. For the people living nearby whose air and water are being polluted. For the people who eat the meat saturated with growth hormones and other chemicals. Once again we see a situation where profit is considered to be more important than people, and much more important than animals or the environment.
Mind you, I don’t reject profit or capitalism. I do reject the notion that profit is more important than humans or animals or the state of our environment.
How does this tie into the ministry of reconciliation?
17So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! 18All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; 19that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us.
One of our greatest trespasses against God has been our disregard for the earth and the creatures sharing it with us. The very first job God gave us was to care for the earth, to be stewards of creation. In Christ, in this new creation, God entrusts the message of reconciliation to us. Even after all we have done, or allowed through our inaction to be done, even then, God doesn’t count our past against us, but reconciles us to him through Christ. Having been forgiven we now must go out and continue the work of carrying the message to reconcile all in the world to each other and to God. As the earth and all its creatures are healed, so too will the people be healed. As the people of the earth are reconciled to each other and to God, they will also be reconciled to all the creatures of the earth.
The call of all Christians is to love one another. Christ frees us from our prejudices and the tendency to see the worst in others, so that we can care for each other as God cares for us. I believe there is good in everyone, that there is a God-spark in everyone, because in creating us God breathed the Spirit of life into us. I believe all people are capable of change, and that even the most hardened sinner, even the most unloving of all God’s children, can be loved until he or she learns how to love. Let us go out from this place today to carry the message of reconciliation, so that all persons might know each other as beloved children of God. Let us go out asking God to help us accept each other, as Christ accepted us.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Sunday, July 12, 2009
The water of charity
Isaiah 58: 9-12
9Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer; you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am. If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, 10if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday.
11The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. 12Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.
It’s the summer for general church assemblies and conferences. The United Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Episcopalians and United Church of Christ, just to name a few, have already gathered in solemn assembly to discuss the giant issues of our time. I’ve been following the news from various conferences just to see if there are any real surprises. Not so much. As usual a lot of us are talking about a lot of the same things. How to grow our churches in income and membership. How to handle issues of sexuality. What to recommend to the federal government about health care and care for the earth. The biggest news has been how news has gotten out. Some folks were sending out messages on Twitter, Facebook and their blogs continuously throughout the events, so anyone who was interested could know what was going on as it happened. This has been very cool, as it has meant I didn’t have to wait for the magazines to come out a couple of weeks after each event to know what happened. You may be sure that Disciples, including me, will be doing the same things during our Assembly a few weeks from now. But aside from that, no really new news. But there were a couple of very significant statements made just this week.
Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori surprised everyone at the Episcopalian General Convention in Anaheim when rather than speaking to the issues of gay bishops and other matters of sexuality she talked about individual salvation. “She . . . names the sin of rampant individualism as the cause of most of the world’s problems, from environmental disasters to economic meltdown.” 1
When God spoke to Israel through Isaiah and the other prophets, God spoke to Israel as a people, not as individuals. He spoke in particular to the leaders, who represented the people and whose decisions about national policy were binding upon the people. Jesus too rarely spoke to just one person saying “this is what you must do” but to groups. And even when he did seem to address himself to one person it was easy to see that the instructions were meant for all to follow. Like Isaiah and the other prophets, it was the leadership who bore the brunt of his wrath for not putting God and the wellbeing of God’s people ahead of rules and traditions and greed and lust for power.
Anyone who was greedy, who pointed fingers blaming others for their mistakes, who spoke evil of any who opposed them should of course seek to change their behavior in order to be as God wants us to be. But leaders who behaved in this way led all the people into slavery – metaphorically, slavery to sin, and literally, slavery in Babylon. Leaders who behaved unjustly and without mercy brought evil upon the whole of the nation, not just upon themselves.
We know this to be true. In the eyes of some, the German people are still living in the shadow of evil events perpetrated by their national leaders a lifetime ago. There are many today who blame all Americans for the decisions of our leaders, even though according to polls the majority of Americans disagree with some of those decisions. The actions of the leaders always reflect upon the people. The people are blessed or punished depending upon the actions of the leaders. When the leaders of Israel behaved justly, caring for the poor and keeping the greed of the wealthy and powerful in check, the people also prospered. And when they didn’t, the people suffered. This had been seen again and again in the history of the people of Israel. And yet – here they were again, doing all the things the prophets and judges had told them not to do.
We understand these words as individuals, of course We have to, really. It’s kind of hard to take direction of this kind as a group. Remove the yoke. Stop pointing fingers and speaking evil. Offer your food to the hungry. Satisfy the needs of the afflicted. Individually, we do what we can. We support agencies who do what they can with what they are given. We offer our money to Church World Service so that people who’ve lived without may enjoy fresh water, and our labor to Habitat for Humanity so families with little hope may have a home. We rarely speak the word “Charity” these days even though that is what we’re engaged in. I’m not sure why.
Pope Benedict XVI released a statement this week that focuses in part on charity. He said “Charity is love received and given. It is grace. . . Charity goes beyond justice, because to love is to give, to offer what is “mine” to the other; but it never lacks justice, which prompts us to give the other what is “his”, what is due to him by reason of his being or his acting. I cannot “give” what is mine to the other, without first giving him what pertains to him in justice. . . [regarding the common good he said] To love someone is to desire that person's good and to take effective steps to secure it. … To desire the common good and strive towards it is a requirement of justice and charity.. . The more we strive to secure a common good corresponding to the real needs of our neighbours, the more effectively we love them.”
The Pope went to on to say that charity is required of all Christians, but also that the first responsibility of all governments is to care for its people in this way. To feed the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted. To care for the earth on which their nation is placed. It shouldn’t be any surprise that the leader of the largest Christian church should agree with Jesus and the prophets and hold the leaders of the world responsible to care for their land in every way. For Jesus said “34I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. 35By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’ (John 13:34-35)
And if you do these things, Isaiah says, , then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. 11The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. 12Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.
What does all this charity talk have to do with caring for creation? That is the sermon series, after all, “Creation Care as Justice.” There was a little piece in Pope Benedict’s encyclical that I read as meaning when we give to another, we are not giving something that belongs to us, but rather sharing with him something that God intended for all of us to have. I keep going back in my mind to Genesis where Adam and Eve are told to care for all the earth and its creatures. When we help Church World Service dig a new well so people in an African village can more easily raise crops, we are helping bring life back into earth that has been parched. When we buy seeds or baby chicks through the Heifer Project for a family in South America, we are helping them be self sustaining so they may continue to live on and care for the land where they live. And of course, when any part of the earth is restored to health, that’s good for all the earth.
Even more, moving out of self, ceasing to put ourselves first, becoming aware of ourselves not as individuals but as part of something much bigger than we are, we more fully become part of the body of Christ. When we realize that who we are and what we are is no more or less than one small and critically important piece of the body, then our own desires stop being as important as making sure the entire body is well. Isaiah tells us, and Jesus tells us, that when we act in these ways – feeding the hungry, caring for the afflicted, loving the neighbor – then our light will shine. And everyone will know us by the love that we have for each other, and for all the creatures of the earth.
So let’s do what Isaiah said and Jesus taught us. Let’s listen to Bishop Jefferts Shori and Pope Benedict. Remove the yoke of sin, of being unloving and selfish and self centered. Stop blaming others for the ills of the world. And give of ourselves that water might flow in the desert, and the land everywhere become green and life filled once more. Let us offer ourselves to God, so that everything we are and everything we have might be dedicated to the care of all creation.
1(http://www.religiondispatches.org/blog Candace Chellew Hodge)
ENCYCLICAL LETTER CARITAS IN VERITATE Benedict XVI
9Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer; you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am. If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, 10if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday.
11The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. 12Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.
It’s the summer for general church assemblies and conferences. The United Methodists, Presbyterians, Lutherans, Episcopalians and United Church of Christ, just to name a few, have already gathered in solemn assembly to discuss the giant issues of our time. I’ve been following the news from various conferences just to see if there are any real surprises. Not so much. As usual a lot of us are talking about a lot of the same things. How to grow our churches in income and membership. How to handle issues of sexuality. What to recommend to the federal government about health care and care for the earth. The biggest news has been how news has gotten out. Some folks were sending out messages on Twitter, Facebook and their blogs continuously throughout the events, so anyone who was interested could know what was going on as it happened. This has been very cool, as it has meant I didn’t have to wait for the magazines to come out a couple of weeks after each event to know what happened. You may be sure that Disciples, including me, will be doing the same things during our Assembly a few weeks from now. But aside from that, no really new news. But there were a couple of very significant statements made just this week.
Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori surprised everyone at the Episcopalian General Convention in Anaheim when rather than speaking to the issues of gay bishops and other matters of sexuality she talked about individual salvation. “She . . . names the sin of rampant individualism as the cause of most of the world’s problems, from environmental disasters to economic meltdown.” 1
When God spoke to Israel through Isaiah and the other prophets, God spoke to Israel as a people, not as individuals. He spoke in particular to the leaders, who represented the people and whose decisions about national policy were binding upon the people. Jesus too rarely spoke to just one person saying “this is what you must do” but to groups. And even when he did seem to address himself to one person it was easy to see that the instructions were meant for all to follow. Like Isaiah and the other prophets, it was the leadership who bore the brunt of his wrath for not putting God and the wellbeing of God’s people ahead of rules and traditions and greed and lust for power.
Anyone who was greedy, who pointed fingers blaming others for their mistakes, who spoke evil of any who opposed them should of course seek to change their behavior in order to be as God wants us to be. But leaders who behaved in this way led all the people into slavery – metaphorically, slavery to sin, and literally, slavery in Babylon. Leaders who behaved unjustly and without mercy brought evil upon the whole of the nation, not just upon themselves.
We know this to be true. In the eyes of some, the German people are still living in the shadow of evil events perpetrated by their national leaders a lifetime ago. There are many today who blame all Americans for the decisions of our leaders, even though according to polls the majority of Americans disagree with some of those decisions. The actions of the leaders always reflect upon the people. The people are blessed or punished depending upon the actions of the leaders. When the leaders of Israel behaved justly, caring for the poor and keeping the greed of the wealthy and powerful in check, the people also prospered. And when they didn’t, the people suffered. This had been seen again and again in the history of the people of Israel. And yet – here they were again, doing all the things the prophets and judges had told them not to do.
We understand these words as individuals, of course We have to, really. It’s kind of hard to take direction of this kind as a group. Remove the yoke. Stop pointing fingers and speaking evil. Offer your food to the hungry. Satisfy the needs of the afflicted. Individually, we do what we can. We support agencies who do what they can with what they are given. We offer our money to Church World Service so that people who’ve lived without may enjoy fresh water, and our labor to Habitat for Humanity so families with little hope may have a home. We rarely speak the word “Charity” these days even though that is what we’re engaged in. I’m not sure why.
Pope Benedict XVI released a statement this week that focuses in part on charity. He said “Charity is love received and given. It is grace. . . Charity goes beyond justice, because to love is to give, to offer what is “mine” to the other; but it never lacks justice, which prompts us to give the other what is “his”, what is due to him by reason of his being or his acting. I cannot “give” what is mine to the other, without first giving him what pertains to him in justice. . . [regarding the common good he said] To love someone is to desire that person's good and to take effective steps to secure it. … To desire the common good and strive towards it is a requirement of justice and charity.. . The more we strive to secure a common good corresponding to the real needs of our neighbours, the more effectively we love them.”
The Pope went to on to say that charity is required of all Christians, but also that the first responsibility of all governments is to care for its people in this way. To feed the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted. To care for the earth on which their nation is placed. It shouldn’t be any surprise that the leader of the largest Christian church should agree with Jesus and the prophets and hold the leaders of the world responsible to care for their land in every way. For Jesus said “34I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. 35By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.’ (John 13:34-35)
And if you do these things, Isaiah says, , then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. 11The Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your needs in parched places, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters never fail. 12Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in.
What does all this charity talk have to do with caring for creation? That is the sermon series, after all, “Creation Care as Justice.” There was a little piece in Pope Benedict’s encyclical that I read as meaning when we give to another, we are not giving something that belongs to us, but rather sharing with him something that God intended for all of us to have. I keep going back in my mind to Genesis where Adam and Eve are told to care for all the earth and its creatures. When we help Church World Service dig a new well so people in an African village can more easily raise crops, we are helping bring life back into earth that has been parched. When we buy seeds or baby chicks through the Heifer Project for a family in South America, we are helping them be self sustaining so they may continue to live on and care for the land where they live. And of course, when any part of the earth is restored to health, that’s good for all the earth.
Even more, moving out of self, ceasing to put ourselves first, becoming aware of ourselves not as individuals but as part of something much bigger than we are, we more fully become part of the body of Christ. When we realize that who we are and what we are is no more or less than one small and critically important piece of the body, then our own desires stop being as important as making sure the entire body is well. Isaiah tells us, and Jesus tells us, that when we act in these ways – feeding the hungry, caring for the afflicted, loving the neighbor – then our light will shine. And everyone will know us by the love that we have for each other, and for all the creatures of the earth.
So let’s do what Isaiah said and Jesus taught us. Let’s listen to Bishop Jefferts Shori and Pope Benedict. Remove the yoke of sin, of being unloving and selfish and self centered. Stop blaming others for the ills of the world. And give of ourselves that water might flow in the desert, and the land everywhere become green and life filled once more. Let us offer ourselves to God, so that everything we are and everything we have might be dedicated to the care of all creation.
1(http://www.religiondispatches.org/blog Candace Chellew Hodge)
ENCYCLICAL LETTER CARITAS IN VERITATE Benedict XVI
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
Is all that social media chatter TMI?
Have you seen the TV commercial about search overload? You know, the one where someone mentions a word and everyone in the vicinity goes into free association mode, babbling everything they have ever heard or read that relates even vaguely to that word. The implication is that the currently available search engines are too general in scope to be really helpful and that everyone should immediately sign up for whatever the newest thing is.
I can kind of relate to that commercial because sometimes it feels like I am constantly inundated with TMI (too much information). On Facebook and Twitter I follow the moment by moment activities of hundreds of my closest friends. Much of that info is kind of random, in the "I don't know what to cook for dinner" category. Some of it is really specific, replies to some specific event that I don't know anything about and thus confuses me. Some is in response to important local and national and global events. There are blogs posted, links added, photos shared, and celebrations lifted up. There is also great pain posted - words and images of tragic personal loss. Just this morning I learned that one friend's cancer returned and another has lost a nephew.
Meanwhile I am writing. I'm writing about what's going on with me and responding to what's going on with my friends. I'm writing newsletter articles and website updates and sermons and notes to parishioners. I'm trying to remember to post blog entries, and trying to figure out if I can maybe find one place to post an entry that will automatically update everyplace. I feel overwhelmed and sometimes I wonder if all this information is really serving anyone.
But y'know, I find that I really don't mind hearing the minutia of people's lives because in between all the "what should I have for dinner" and "I just bought a new pair of red shoes" posts are writings that tell me what is happening in the depths of the soul. Cries of pain and shouts of joy. Commentary that helps me see another perspective. Opinions from people I never would have heard, because my group of friends overlaps with your group of friends which overlaps with someone else's group of friends, and I see all those comments from people I'd have never "met" otherwise.
I have learned over time that I see God most clearly in other peoples' eyes and lives. The more people I connect with and learn about, the more I learn about God. The more I participate in relationship with other people, the more I participate in my relationship with God because God lives within each of us.
Is all that social media chatter TMI? I think not. I think it helps bring me closer to you and him and her and God. And that can only be a good thing.
I can kind of relate to that commercial because sometimes it feels like I am constantly inundated with TMI (too much information). On Facebook and Twitter I follow the moment by moment activities of hundreds of my closest friends. Much of that info is kind of random, in the "I don't know what to cook for dinner" category. Some of it is really specific, replies to some specific event that I don't know anything about and thus confuses me. Some is in response to important local and national and global events. There are blogs posted, links added, photos shared, and celebrations lifted up. There is also great pain posted - words and images of tragic personal loss. Just this morning I learned that one friend's cancer returned and another has lost a nephew.
Meanwhile I am writing. I'm writing about what's going on with me and responding to what's going on with my friends. I'm writing newsletter articles and website updates and sermons and notes to parishioners. I'm trying to remember to post blog entries, and trying to figure out if I can maybe find one place to post an entry that will automatically update everyplace. I feel overwhelmed and sometimes I wonder if all this information is really serving anyone.
But y'know, I find that I really don't mind hearing the minutia of people's lives because in between all the "what should I have for dinner" and "I just bought a new pair of red shoes" posts are writings that tell me what is happening in the depths of the soul. Cries of pain and shouts of joy. Commentary that helps me see another perspective. Opinions from people I never would have heard, because my group of friends overlaps with your group of friends which overlaps with someone else's group of friends, and I see all those comments from people I'd have never "met" otherwise.
I have learned over time that I see God most clearly in other peoples' eyes and lives. The more people I connect with and learn about, the more I learn about God. The more I participate in relationship with other people, the more I participate in my relationship with God because God lives within each of us.
Is all that social media chatter TMI? I think not. I think it helps bring me closer to you and him and her and God. And that can only be a good thing.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Why are you afraid? Mark 4:35-41
35On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.” 36And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. 37A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. 38But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” 39He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. 40He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” 41And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”
“Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” I can hear the disciples thinking, “Well hello. Giant storm. We could die. And how exactly were we supposed to know you could make it stop?” Really, what had Jesus done so far that would make the disciples think he could stop a storm?
According to Mark, up to this time, Jesus had shown himself to be an exceptionally talented healer and preacher. After his baptism and temptation he began to select his disciples, and those men had seen him cast out an unclean demon, heal Peter’s mother-in-law and lots of other sick and demon infested people at Peter’s house, cleanse a leper, heal a paralytic, heal a man’s withered hand. So many were coming to him with unclean spirits that he finally gave the Twelve authority to cast out demons. After establishing his bona fides with all this healing, he began to preach God’s healing forgiveness, telling many parables. He was undoubtedly a great preacher and a powerful healer.
In the history of Israel there had been many healers, many who had the God given power to cast out demons and lay healing hands on the sick. But this - power over the wind and the sea – this was way beyond the expectations of even those who followed him most closely. Moses and Elijah could do these things, but the disciples really didn’t know yet just who they were dealing with.
So when Jesus asked, “Why are you afraid?” the Disciples really had no reason to understand why he was asking this. And they were, I think, justified in their fear of the storm. Many of them were fishermen, and knew what the Sea of Galilee was capable of. These were brave men, accustomed to risking their lives as part of their daily work. I suspect the fishermen among them felt a bit superior to the landsmen – the ones who never risked themselves to the storms on the sea, but rather crawled around the edges where it was “safe.” Their fear in the storm was justified and really to be expected. Has anyone here ever been on a fishing boat on a really big body of water? Or been on a deep sea fishing trip and had the weather turn suddenly? Then you’ll know what I mean.
Friday night we went to see the new Star Trek movie. It is supposed to be the story of how James Kirk, Spock, Bones and all the other characters we know so well from the original TV series started out serving on the Enterprise. It’s an exciting movie, and as I watched I began to see some parallels between a well known Star Fleet Academy training exercise and this storm on the sea of Galilee.
In this training exercise, a civilian freighter named the Kobayashi Maru, is badly damaged and has sent out a Mayday. Unfortunately it is sitting in the middle of the Neutral Zone (No Mans Land) and any ship attempting to rescue it will immediately be surrounded by many enemy vessels with significantly greater firepower than the rescuer. To pass the test, the captain must get past the enemy without damage to his/her own vessel and complete the rescue. It was designed to be un-winnable. Its purpose was to cause the cadets to "experience fear in the face of certain death", and to learn to remain in control of themselves and their ship despite that fear.
No one had ever passed this test until Cadet James T. Kirk. He took the test three times, failing as he was intended to by the inflexible rules governing the encounter until he finally changed the rules. He reprogrammed the computer. Simply put, he cheated. Mind you, Kirk agreed that learning to continue despite one’s fear was an admirable and necessary lesson. He simply didn’t believe that there was such a thing as a no-win scenario. So the third time he took the test he sat in the captain’s chair calmly eating an apple while all around him the crew was watching as the danger continued to increase. They knew how the test had to turn out and couldn’t understand his disregard of the danger. But he knew the rules were different this time and was simply waiting for the right time to make his move. When that time came he calmly gave his commands.
Jesus calmly slept in the fishing boat while his disciples became more and more convinced this storm would be the end of them. When the moment was right he awoke and commanded the storm to be still. He was able ask his disciples, "Why are you afraid?" because he knew that the storm was no danger. The rules had changed. Indeed, the usual rules didn't even apply to him. With Jesus in the boat there was no danger.
With Jesus in the boat/our lives we don't have to let fear paralyze us because we know that the rules we are used to don't bind God. Whatever happens, we know we will be ok. As long as we have faith, we can get through whatever danger or turmoil or fears we have in our lives.
There may be those who think that if God will take care of everything as long as we have faith, then we don’t have to do anything to help ourselves. We can just wait until God rescues us, calms the storm, changes the rules for us. After all, the rules don’t really apply to God, do they?
I should point out here that believing “as long as we have faith, whatever happens we will be ok”, is not exactly the same thing as believing that “if we wait, God will step in and make everything turn out the way we want it to be.” Returning to Star Trek imagery for a moment, at one point in the movie Kirk is marooned on an ice planet. His escape pod tells him there is a Federation outpost some 14 kilometers away but that it is dangerous to walk there and he should stay in the escape waiting to be rescued. Those who know the Star Trek stores will be aware that James Kirk is not very good at waiting to be rescued. He got out of the escape pod, climbed up out of the big hole in the ice it had created, and headed across the ice and snow in the right direction. On the way he was chased by a big animal which was then eaten by another big animal, and was finally saved by a much older Spock who had just returned to his past through a black hole. Kirk and Older Spock made their way safely to the outpost, Kirk returned to the Enterprise and the universe was saved – naturally. It would not have turned out that way, however, if Kirk had simply waited in his escape pod. He wouldn’t have had to face all the danger and fear and difficulty if he’d just waited in his nice safe escape pod for rescue to come, but the outcome would have been very different.
Being a Christian is not about staying safe. It’s not about simply showing up once a week to worship and sing pray and donate money to important causes and have some fellowship time. Being a Christian is much more than being able to recite a list of things we believe about God. Being a Christian is a way of life. It’s a decision made daily to do the right things. To follow Jesus instructions to help the helpless, comfort the comfortless, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, heal the sick, and visit the prisoner. To step forward on the side of God’s justice and mercy so that the last may be first, even in the face of danger. It’s a decision to do what is right, even if that means we might face ridicule or outright persecution. Being a Christian is a refusal to stay in that nice safe escape pod and walk across snow and ice, through wild animals if need be, so that we can do what is necessary to save the universe.
I know. It sounds so dramatic, doesn’t it? June’s over there asking herself, “How am I going to save the universe? I have trouble just getting around the house.” We save the universe by doing what the Lord requires of us, doing justice, loving kindness and walking humbly with God. We don’t go all James Kirk on the world, running roughshod over rules, regulations and people. We act in love. And sometimes acting in love will send us out to participate in demonstrations or to do ministry in gang territories. It will send some of us out to do dangerous things. But mostly it will be in doing things we can do – writing notes, supporting just causes, speaking out against injustice among our friends, teaching our children how to be loving and caring global citizens. God’s love will also send us on interior journeys, seeking out the places in our hearts and souls that are not so loving – pride, greed, ego, fear, anger, hatred and a whole array of other defects in our characters – and rooting them out so God’s love has a bigger place to grow. And that might be the most frightening place of all that God’s love can send us. But if we have faith that whatever happens, we will be ok if we are with Jesus, why then would we be afraid?
When we go from this place today, Let us go out to live as Christians, to live in Christ Jesus, to live without fear, for we know that we belong to God.
“Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” I can hear the disciples thinking, “Well hello. Giant storm. We could die. And how exactly were we supposed to know you could make it stop?” Really, what had Jesus done so far that would make the disciples think he could stop a storm?
According to Mark, up to this time, Jesus had shown himself to be an exceptionally talented healer and preacher. After his baptism and temptation he began to select his disciples, and those men had seen him cast out an unclean demon, heal Peter’s mother-in-law and lots of other sick and demon infested people at Peter’s house, cleanse a leper, heal a paralytic, heal a man’s withered hand. So many were coming to him with unclean spirits that he finally gave the Twelve authority to cast out demons. After establishing his bona fides with all this healing, he began to preach God’s healing forgiveness, telling many parables. He was undoubtedly a great preacher and a powerful healer.
In the history of Israel there had been many healers, many who had the God given power to cast out demons and lay healing hands on the sick. But this - power over the wind and the sea – this was way beyond the expectations of even those who followed him most closely. Moses and Elijah could do these things, but the disciples really didn’t know yet just who they were dealing with.
So when Jesus asked, “Why are you afraid?” the Disciples really had no reason to understand why he was asking this. And they were, I think, justified in their fear of the storm. Many of them were fishermen, and knew what the Sea of Galilee was capable of. These were brave men, accustomed to risking their lives as part of their daily work. I suspect the fishermen among them felt a bit superior to the landsmen – the ones who never risked themselves to the storms on the sea, but rather crawled around the edges where it was “safe.” Their fear in the storm was justified and really to be expected. Has anyone here ever been on a fishing boat on a really big body of water? Or been on a deep sea fishing trip and had the weather turn suddenly? Then you’ll know what I mean.
Friday night we went to see the new Star Trek movie. It is supposed to be the story of how James Kirk, Spock, Bones and all the other characters we know so well from the original TV series started out serving on the Enterprise. It’s an exciting movie, and as I watched I began to see some parallels between a well known Star Fleet Academy training exercise and this storm on the sea of Galilee.
In this training exercise, a civilian freighter named the Kobayashi Maru, is badly damaged and has sent out a Mayday. Unfortunately it is sitting in the middle of the Neutral Zone (No Mans Land) and any ship attempting to rescue it will immediately be surrounded by many enemy vessels with significantly greater firepower than the rescuer. To pass the test, the captain must get past the enemy without damage to his/her own vessel and complete the rescue. It was designed to be un-winnable. Its purpose was to cause the cadets to "experience fear in the face of certain death", and to learn to remain in control of themselves and their ship despite that fear.
No one had ever passed this test until Cadet James T. Kirk. He took the test three times, failing as he was intended to by the inflexible rules governing the encounter until he finally changed the rules. He reprogrammed the computer. Simply put, he cheated. Mind you, Kirk agreed that learning to continue despite one’s fear was an admirable and necessary lesson. He simply didn’t believe that there was such a thing as a no-win scenario. So the third time he took the test he sat in the captain’s chair calmly eating an apple while all around him the crew was watching as the danger continued to increase. They knew how the test had to turn out and couldn’t understand his disregard of the danger. But he knew the rules were different this time and was simply waiting for the right time to make his move. When that time came he calmly gave his commands.
Jesus calmly slept in the fishing boat while his disciples became more and more convinced this storm would be the end of them. When the moment was right he awoke and commanded the storm to be still. He was able ask his disciples, "Why are you afraid?" because he knew that the storm was no danger. The rules had changed. Indeed, the usual rules didn't even apply to him. With Jesus in the boat there was no danger.
With Jesus in the boat/our lives we don't have to let fear paralyze us because we know that the rules we are used to don't bind God. Whatever happens, we know we will be ok. As long as we have faith, we can get through whatever danger or turmoil or fears we have in our lives.
There may be those who think that if God will take care of everything as long as we have faith, then we don’t have to do anything to help ourselves. We can just wait until God rescues us, calms the storm, changes the rules for us. After all, the rules don’t really apply to God, do they?
I should point out here that believing “as long as we have faith, whatever happens we will be ok”, is not exactly the same thing as believing that “if we wait, God will step in and make everything turn out the way we want it to be.” Returning to Star Trek imagery for a moment, at one point in the movie Kirk is marooned on an ice planet. His escape pod tells him there is a Federation outpost some 14 kilometers away but that it is dangerous to walk there and he should stay in the escape waiting to be rescued. Those who know the Star Trek stores will be aware that James Kirk is not very good at waiting to be rescued. He got out of the escape pod, climbed up out of the big hole in the ice it had created, and headed across the ice and snow in the right direction. On the way he was chased by a big animal which was then eaten by another big animal, and was finally saved by a much older Spock who had just returned to his past through a black hole. Kirk and Older Spock made their way safely to the outpost, Kirk returned to the Enterprise and the universe was saved – naturally. It would not have turned out that way, however, if Kirk had simply waited in his escape pod. He wouldn’t have had to face all the danger and fear and difficulty if he’d just waited in his nice safe escape pod for rescue to come, but the outcome would have been very different.
Being a Christian is not about staying safe. It’s not about simply showing up once a week to worship and sing pray and donate money to important causes and have some fellowship time. Being a Christian is much more than being able to recite a list of things we believe about God. Being a Christian is a way of life. It’s a decision made daily to do the right things. To follow Jesus instructions to help the helpless, comfort the comfortless, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, heal the sick, and visit the prisoner. To step forward on the side of God’s justice and mercy so that the last may be first, even in the face of danger. It’s a decision to do what is right, even if that means we might face ridicule or outright persecution. Being a Christian is a refusal to stay in that nice safe escape pod and walk across snow and ice, through wild animals if need be, so that we can do what is necessary to save the universe.
I know. It sounds so dramatic, doesn’t it? June’s over there asking herself, “How am I going to save the universe? I have trouble just getting around the house.” We save the universe by doing what the Lord requires of us, doing justice, loving kindness and walking humbly with God. We don’t go all James Kirk on the world, running roughshod over rules, regulations and people. We act in love. And sometimes acting in love will send us out to participate in demonstrations or to do ministry in gang territories. It will send some of us out to do dangerous things. But mostly it will be in doing things we can do – writing notes, supporting just causes, speaking out against injustice among our friends, teaching our children how to be loving and caring global citizens. God’s love will also send us on interior journeys, seeking out the places in our hearts and souls that are not so loving – pride, greed, ego, fear, anger, hatred and a whole array of other defects in our characters – and rooting them out so God’s love has a bigger place to grow. And that might be the most frightening place of all that God’s love can send us. But if we have faith that whatever happens, we will be ok if we are with Jesus, why then would we be afraid?
When we go from this place today, Let us go out to live as Christians, to live in Christ Jesus, to live without fear, for we know that we belong to God.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
One person can change a congregation
As a Disciple minister I was taught to baptize by immersion, in keeping with the Biblical tradition. Typically the candidates for baptism are in junior high or high school and have been part of the congregation since they were born. My biggest "problem" had been in dealing with candidates taller than me in a very shallow baptistry.
Every now and then, however, a situation comes up that requires something different. This particular event was brought to mind recently when @beachtweet asked if we had ever considered the elderly as a mission field. (And BTW @beachtweet, if you are reading this, the lady in the photo was 77 at the time, not 72 as I told you previously.)
Jo had been unchurched for over 40 years when she started attending Sunday worship. But she was looking for something - she'd been attending Unity church, reading the Daily Word and having theological discussions with a nephew who was an ordained minister when she came to an Alternative Christmas event at our church one Sunday. After that first visit she kept coming back because, she said "I was so impressed with how much good the church does for other people. Then the warmth and love from all the people there. . " After a while she asked about joining the church and when I learned she had never been baptized we began meeting to prepare her for this great event which would take place on Easter Sunday.
I knew right away that there would be some physical issues I hadn't had to deal with before. Jo was 77, legally blind and wheelchair bound. To get be baptized by immersion she would have to maneuver through a narrow hallway to change into a robe, go up a steep flight of stairs to get to the baptistry, down three steps into the water - then reverse the process, change out of wet clothes . . . . clearly that wasn't going to work. Equally clearly I could not say 'Oh sorry. If you can't get into the water I can't welcome you into the body of Christ." Love was going to have to trump tradition. Luckily some UMC and UCC friends were able to help me plan a baptism by sprinkling that could take place in the center of the congregation.
Jo wasn't part of our life together for very long - she passed the following August. But she will always be in our hearts and memories. Because Jo's attendance and baptism led to changes in the way we do church here. Jo wouldn't sit in the back where there is room provided for wheelchairs. She sat in her wheelchair in the center aisle about midway down on the "gospel side" of the santuary. And y'know, other wheelchair bound folks followed her example and started parking their chairs where ever they were most comfortable in worship. (We just ask that they leave room for the deacons to get past them during communion and offering time.) Thanks to Jo we realize much more clearly that compliance with ADA isn't enough. Just as I had learned that love was more important than tradition, our congregation learned that although supplying a place where wheelchairs fit is all we need to do be obey the law of the land, it isn't obedient to the Law of God - to love our neighbor as we love ourselves.
Thanks, @beachtweet, for bringing this to mind so clearly this week.
Sunday, June 07, 2009
Here Am I.
Isaiah 6:1-8
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. 2Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. 3And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” 4The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke.
5And I said: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” 6Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. 7The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” 8Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I;
This is Trinity Sunday, when in many churches around the world preachers are doing their best to define and discuss the Holy Trinity. It’s an intimidating task, and every year when it comes around I flash back to a day in my first student minister position. I was working in a retirement community and spent a good deal of time ministering to the staff. One day one of the housekeepers asked me to join her on coffee break, and then asked if I could please explain exactly how God could be three different people at the same time before she had to go back to work. Well, I knew there was no way in the world I could do this – theologians have been writing books on the subject since about the year 400 and they haven’t been able to make it clear yet. We’re not even really supposed to understand it. As Thomas Acquinas said “We know that God is, not what God is.” Her coffee break lasted just about the same amount of time that a sermon does, and I am no better able to explain this great mystery in 15 minutes now than I was then.
One thing I think I understand about the different persons of God is that we hear God in different ways. God chooses different means to break into our lives, to get our attention, and the way we hear it has something to do with the way each of us understands God.
Look at Isaiah, for example. His focus in life was God, creator and sustainer, law giver and judge, Lord and bridegroom of Israel. So when he heard God speak, he heard from the Lord of the Universe, mighty Yahweh on the throne of heaven, surrounded by the heavenly host.
Isaiah wasn’t always a prophet. He was a priest in Jerusalem. His job was to make sure worship went the way it was supposed to, to preside over the various rituals in the temple, to make sacrifices in the proper way, to make sure the offerings were distributed among the poor fairly – in a lot of ways his job was pretty much like my job.
His job was also to take care that only the worthy came close to God – to protect the Holy of the Holies from anyone who wasn’t supposed to be in there. Only the priests were allowed behind the curtain to the place where the Ark of the Covenant was kept and then only after rigorous cleansing rituals to make sure they were acceptable. It wasn’t that they believed God lived in the temple, exactly, any more than we believe that God lives in this building. The Holy of the Holies within the temple was more like the place God rested his feet while sitting on the heavenly throne – but even getting near the place where God’s feet touched the earth was too wonderful and holy for ordinary people. Isaiah no doubt expected that his life would keep on going the way it had been, and then, he had this vision. He found himself in the presence of God. He was in God’s actual presence within the temple, surrounded by wonderful beings and heavenly music and the most marvelous incense. And of course he panicked. “I’m not worthy. What am I doing here?” No doubt he thought he was going to die immediately, for scripture told him no one can see the glory of God and live. Even Moses only got a glimpse of the back of God, and that while he was hiding behind a rock. And Isaiah certainly wasn’t Moses. He was just a priest and he knew that he was no better than the people he served. He knew that no matter how many cleansing rituals he went through, the bottom line was that he was just as impure as any other person. But a seraph brought a live coal from the altar, which cleansed his lips and his soul, so that he could not just hear God’s word, but so he would be able to speak it to others. And when God said “Who will go to our people?” Isaiah said “I’m here. I’ll go.”
I wonder if Isaiah would be so anxious to volunteer if he realized just how hard it was going to be to get anyone to listen to him, if he realized how much pain this new job was going to bring into his life. Because what happened here is that Isaiah’s job changed. Isaiah was now a prophet. From now on, instead of making sure everything kept going the nice comfortable way it had been going, he was supposed to bring people to change. He was supposed to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted. He was supposed to shake people out of complacency and teach them how to change their world, to shape it according to God’s will rather than according to their own desires. He was supposed to bring God’s word to the people and bring the needs of the people to God. He was to be the conduit between God and Israel. From now on he would fight against the status quo instead of working to maintain it.
I don’t know what Isaiah normally felt walking into the temple before this momentous. Did he see it as “the office” or was it always a special place? I don’t know if he found leading the worship services exhilarating or whether it was just a job. Or whether his response was like mine – varied according to a whole host of causes. Sometimes when I come in on Sunday morning I am just so focused on making sure the sound system is turned on, and checking to see that everything is where it’s supposed to be, and discovering broken things that it just doesn’t feel very worshipful in here. And sometimes, when I wander over in the middle of the week for no particular reason it is as if God is here waiting for me. Sometimes when I pray I’m just kind of going through the motions and sometimes it is an overwhelming experience. Very often during worship I feel like a stage manager, trying to make sure things happen in a timely manner, in the proper order and in such a way that the congregation feels like they have been in worship. And sometimes the prayers and hymns and readings get to me the way I would hope they get to everyone else. And you know that sometimes the sermons take on a life of their own, when the Spirit decides to say what I don’t know how to.
On this occasion, however, Isaiah knew he was in the presence of God. He felt the power, heard the voices, smelled the smoke – all of it was overpowering. He was overwhelmed with awe, realizing that he was in the presence of the Creator and Sustainer of the universe. He was filled with humility. He was no longer the high-ranking priest of the Temple. In God’s presence he was just a man with all the same failings other people had. And he became willing to offer himself in service, to carry God’s word to God’s children, to do whatever God asked him to do and go where ever God asked him to go. It wouldn’t be for quite some time that God would say to Isaiah ‘Behold, I am about to do a new thing.” But clearly, God was doing a new thing in Isaiah’s life on this day, because from this day forward Isaiah will be an entirely different person.
The thing about God is that we never really know what to expect. God has a way of breaking through, of coming into our lives in amazing ways, unexpected ways. We find ourselves going about our lives in the same old way, expecting to find God in the same old places and suddenly it’s not like that at all. Suddenly God’s presence is real and different and frightening, and we find ourselves compelled to change in ways we would never have considered before. We find ourselves doing things we never would have considered.
God has a way of changing the things that make us most comfortable, and then waiting to see how long it takes us to move on with a new thing. Isaiah was comfortable as a priest. He knew what to do next, he knew all the rituals and the methods of sacrifice and to divide up the lambs and such between the temple and the poor. He figured he’d spend his life doing the same old, same old, just like his father and his father before him.
Yesterday I got a phone call from someone who said, “God’s not there! What do I do?” Just the day before she had told me that God was like a big pillow that she hugged close to herself at night to keep her safe and comfortable. But yesterday when she reached for that pillow it wasn’t there. I know that God didn’t go away, but I think maybe God is letting her know that it’s time for her to give up that safe, comfortable pillow and let God lead her into a new way of being. For many, church is that comfortable pillow. We’re used to things going in a particular way on Sunday mornings. We’re used to the bills getting paid and the office being open and repairs getting done. And when that changes, or looks like it might change, it gets scary. One local congregation had a meeting this week to talk about what to do now that they had lost a substantial portion of their income. Some panicked and said, “God’s not there. Our pillow has disappeared.” And others said “Have faith. God will do a new thing in us. We just don’t know what it is yet.”
We really don’t know what God will ask of us next. We can be fairly certain it will be outside our comfort zone. Isaiah didn’t expect to find himself in God’s actual presence. And he didn’t expect to hear God ask, “Who shall we send?” But when he heard that, he didn’t hesitate. He didn’t dither or worry or start looking for that comfortable pillow. He said “Here am I. I will go.”
When we find ourselves in God’s presence may we respond in the same way that Isaiah did. May we approach with awe, with fear and trembling and love and trust. May we stand before God with humility, knowing that we are no better or worse than anyone else in God’s eyes. And may we offer ourselves to serve God’s people in what ever way God asks. And most of all, let us keep in mind God’s words to us through Isaiah – the priest turned prophet – “Behold, I will do a new thing in you.”
I will do a new thing in you, I will do a new thing in you,
Whatever you ask for, whatever you pray for,
Nothing will be denied,
Says the Lord.
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. 2Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. 3And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.” 4The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke.
5And I said: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” 6Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. 7The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” 8Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I;
This is Trinity Sunday, when in many churches around the world preachers are doing their best to define and discuss the Holy Trinity. It’s an intimidating task, and every year when it comes around I flash back to a day in my first student minister position. I was working in a retirement community and spent a good deal of time ministering to the staff. One day one of the housekeepers asked me to join her on coffee break, and then asked if I could please explain exactly how God could be three different people at the same time before she had to go back to work. Well, I knew there was no way in the world I could do this – theologians have been writing books on the subject since about the year 400 and they haven’t been able to make it clear yet. We’re not even really supposed to understand it. As Thomas Acquinas said “We know that God is, not what God is.” Her coffee break lasted just about the same amount of time that a sermon does, and I am no better able to explain this great mystery in 15 minutes now than I was then.
One thing I think I understand about the different persons of God is that we hear God in different ways. God chooses different means to break into our lives, to get our attention, and the way we hear it has something to do with the way each of us understands God.
Look at Isaiah, for example. His focus in life was God, creator and sustainer, law giver and judge, Lord and bridegroom of Israel. So when he heard God speak, he heard from the Lord of the Universe, mighty Yahweh on the throne of heaven, surrounded by the heavenly host.
Isaiah wasn’t always a prophet. He was a priest in Jerusalem. His job was to make sure worship went the way it was supposed to, to preside over the various rituals in the temple, to make sacrifices in the proper way, to make sure the offerings were distributed among the poor fairly – in a lot of ways his job was pretty much like my job.
His job was also to take care that only the worthy came close to God – to protect the Holy of the Holies from anyone who wasn’t supposed to be in there. Only the priests were allowed behind the curtain to the place where the Ark of the Covenant was kept and then only after rigorous cleansing rituals to make sure they were acceptable. It wasn’t that they believed God lived in the temple, exactly, any more than we believe that God lives in this building. The Holy of the Holies within the temple was more like the place God rested his feet while sitting on the heavenly throne – but even getting near the place where God’s feet touched the earth was too wonderful and holy for ordinary people. Isaiah no doubt expected that his life would keep on going the way it had been, and then, he had this vision. He found himself in the presence of God. He was in God’s actual presence within the temple, surrounded by wonderful beings and heavenly music and the most marvelous incense. And of course he panicked. “I’m not worthy. What am I doing here?” No doubt he thought he was going to die immediately, for scripture told him no one can see the glory of God and live. Even Moses only got a glimpse of the back of God, and that while he was hiding behind a rock. And Isaiah certainly wasn’t Moses. He was just a priest and he knew that he was no better than the people he served. He knew that no matter how many cleansing rituals he went through, the bottom line was that he was just as impure as any other person. But a seraph brought a live coal from the altar, which cleansed his lips and his soul, so that he could not just hear God’s word, but so he would be able to speak it to others. And when God said “Who will go to our people?” Isaiah said “I’m here. I’ll go.”
I wonder if Isaiah would be so anxious to volunteer if he realized just how hard it was going to be to get anyone to listen to him, if he realized how much pain this new job was going to bring into his life. Because what happened here is that Isaiah’s job changed. Isaiah was now a prophet. From now on, instead of making sure everything kept going the nice comfortable way it had been going, he was supposed to bring people to change. He was supposed to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted. He was supposed to shake people out of complacency and teach them how to change their world, to shape it according to God’s will rather than according to their own desires. He was supposed to bring God’s word to the people and bring the needs of the people to God. He was to be the conduit between God and Israel. From now on he would fight against the status quo instead of working to maintain it.
I don’t know what Isaiah normally felt walking into the temple before this momentous. Did he see it as “the office” or was it always a special place? I don’t know if he found leading the worship services exhilarating or whether it was just a job. Or whether his response was like mine – varied according to a whole host of causes. Sometimes when I come in on Sunday morning I am just so focused on making sure the sound system is turned on, and checking to see that everything is where it’s supposed to be, and discovering broken things that it just doesn’t feel very worshipful in here. And sometimes, when I wander over in the middle of the week for no particular reason it is as if God is here waiting for me. Sometimes when I pray I’m just kind of going through the motions and sometimes it is an overwhelming experience. Very often during worship I feel like a stage manager, trying to make sure things happen in a timely manner, in the proper order and in such a way that the congregation feels like they have been in worship. And sometimes the prayers and hymns and readings get to me the way I would hope they get to everyone else. And you know that sometimes the sermons take on a life of their own, when the Spirit decides to say what I don’t know how to.
On this occasion, however, Isaiah knew he was in the presence of God. He felt the power, heard the voices, smelled the smoke – all of it was overpowering. He was overwhelmed with awe, realizing that he was in the presence of the Creator and Sustainer of the universe. He was filled with humility. He was no longer the high-ranking priest of the Temple. In God’s presence he was just a man with all the same failings other people had. And he became willing to offer himself in service, to carry God’s word to God’s children, to do whatever God asked him to do and go where ever God asked him to go. It wouldn’t be for quite some time that God would say to Isaiah ‘Behold, I am about to do a new thing.” But clearly, God was doing a new thing in Isaiah’s life on this day, because from this day forward Isaiah will be an entirely different person.
The thing about God is that we never really know what to expect. God has a way of breaking through, of coming into our lives in amazing ways, unexpected ways. We find ourselves going about our lives in the same old way, expecting to find God in the same old places and suddenly it’s not like that at all. Suddenly God’s presence is real and different and frightening, and we find ourselves compelled to change in ways we would never have considered before. We find ourselves doing things we never would have considered.
God has a way of changing the things that make us most comfortable, and then waiting to see how long it takes us to move on with a new thing. Isaiah was comfortable as a priest. He knew what to do next, he knew all the rituals and the methods of sacrifice and to divide up the lambs and such between the temple and the poor. He figured he’d spend his life doing the same old, same old, just like his father and his father before him.
Yesterday I got a phone call from someone who said, “God’s not there! What do I do?” Just the day before she had told me that God was like a big pillow that she hugged close to herself at night to keep her safe and comfortable. But yesterday when she reached for that pillow it wasn’t there. I know that God didn’t go away, but I think maybe God is letting her know that it’s time for her to give up that safe, comfortable pillow and let God lead her into a new way of being. For many, church is that comfortable pillow. We’re used to things going in a particular way on Sunday mornings. We’re used to the bills getting paid and the office being open and repairs getting done. And when that changes, or looks like it might change, it gets scary. One local congregation had a meeting this week to talk about what to do now that they had lost a substantial portion of their income. Some panicked and said, “God’s not there. Our pillow has disappeared.” And others said “Have faith. God will do a new thing in us. We just don’t know what it is yet.”
We really don’t know what God will ask of us next. We can be fairly certain it will be outside our comfort zone. Isaiah didn’t expect to find himself in God’s actual presence. And he didn’t expect to hear God ask, “Who shall we send?” But when he heard that, he didn’t hesitate. He didn’t dither or worry or start looking for that comfortable pillow. He said “Here am I. I will go.”
When we find ourselves in God’s presence may we respond in the same way that Isaiah did. May we approach with awe, with fear and trembling and love and trust. May we stand before God with humility, knowing that we are no better or worse than anyone else in God’s eyes. And may we offer ourselves to serve God’s people in what ever way God asks. And most of all, let us keep in mind God’s words to us through Isaiah – the priest turned prophet – “Behold, I will do a new thing in you.”
I will do a new thing in you, I will do a new thing in you,
Whatever you ask for, whatever you pray for,
Nothing will be denied,
Says the Lord.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Every Time I Feel the Spirit
Romans 8:18-27
18I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. 19For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; 20for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; 23and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. 24For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? 25But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
26Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. 27And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
Pentecost is my favorite church holiday. It’s the day when the church was really born – the day that 120 disciples were given the ability to speak the good news so that everyone could understand. It is also the anniversary of my first sermon as your pastor. I had spent two weeks carefully crafting a sermon, agonizing over every word. But when I woke up on the morning of Pentecost 2003 I realized that what I really needed to do was throw that sermon away and speak of my hopes for our future together. Every Pentecost since then I’ve had the same experience. I have something prepared and I wake up with something entirely different in my heart – usually something that doesn’t lend itself well to being written into a manuscript. I wonder sometimes why I even go through the motions of writing for this Sunday, when I believe that whatever I write will end up in the trash on the day. Chances are excellent that what is written here is not what will end up being preached.
On Pentecost the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples for the first time, opening their hearts and minds, moving and working in them, leading them to do things they’d never considered before. They’d had to wait for 40 days after Jesus ascended into heaven, and they weren’t sure how long they would have to wait or even exactly what they were waiting for. As we all know, people just don’t wait very well. We’re not all that good at being patient and living in the moment. We’re always looking forward to the next thing that’s supposed to happen and anxious for it to get here. If we’re doing something new we want to see results right away, and are disappointed if nothing seems to change when we’ve only been doing the new thing a short time.
According to this portion of the letter Paul wrote to the church in Rome about 25 years later, the entirety of creation was eagerly waiting for change to come. All of the world was groaning in labor pains, heavy with anticipation for the day when everyone and everything will be free from the bondage of our past and ushered into a new way of being in Christ. It had become clear to him that Christ was not returning immediately as they had all believed, and that everyone and everything was going to have to wait for that time to come. And so he spoke of the difficulty of waiting for change to happen, when the change was something as eagerly anticipated as the transformation of the entire world into God’s kingdom on earth. Almost 2,000 years later, we’re still waiting.
On Thursday evening twenty-some church leaders, teachers and theologians from a dozen or so different denominations were gathered at the Claremont School of Theology to discuss Contemporary Theology for Social Action in Churches Today. The audience asked a number of tough questions which the forum participants then addressed.
There were a few things they said that really struck me. Sort of examples of what the Kingdom looks like when it is being lived. One spoke about Incarnational Compassion – not a feeling but action. Compassion that is embodied and acted upon person to person. For example, the Anglicans in Palestine operate schools and hospitals open to all, regardless of religion, culture, language – if someone has a need, they will be served. Another reminded us that we are all related through Jesus Christ. We don’t have to like each other in order to work together as was proven by the many who showed up to help in aftermath of Katrina and every natural disaster. And yet another said that, since we can all work together to serve God’s children in times of crisis then we can work together always. One even quoted Rodney King, asking plaintively, “Can’t we all just get along?”
Another reminded us that laws do not equal justice. True justice is always a result of love.
One challenged us to do ministry in places we do not want to go. She was talking specifically about prison and military chaplaincy, but we each have a place we don’t want to go. What would it mean to us to do ministry in that place?
They spoke about new ways of being church, and of doing church. Ways to reach those who somehow are not drawn to our churches, but want to be. They talked about technology and education and ways of being Christians in a world that seems not to care about other people or the environment, a world that puts laws before justice.
It seems to me that this is the same kind of world Jesus did his ministry in, the same kind of world the disciples preached to, and the same kind of world Paul traveled through and warned the new churches against. And that world is still waiting, groaning in labor pains, for the change that is to come – what ever form that change is going to take. We have hope for the future even though we have no idea what that future is going to look like. We do know that the world will not change, justice will not prevail, because laws are passed, or because the rationale and logic for making change is inescapable. The world can only change as hearts are changed through faith, and that is the work of the Spirit. So we wait, and we pray, and we carry the Good News. We teach about the justice that love brings. We speak of God’s purpose in the world, which is always shalom, peace and care for each other. And we try to act always with love and care, so that we can help make those changes that bring God’s glory into the world.
God is waiting, as patiently as only God can wait, for each of us to hear the words, “Behold, I am about to do a new thing . . . . through you.” God is waiting for each one of us to become open to the Spirit so that we can learn what new thing God is going to do through us. The Spirit shows up at unexpected times and moves us in unexpected ways, and it is up to us to listen for what she has to say, whether those words come as a still small voice or a shout. Let us seek and find the quiet center of our selves that we might hear the Spirit of God telling us about the new thing that God will do . . . through us.
18I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. 19For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; 20for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; 23and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. 24For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? 25But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
26Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. 27And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.
Pentecost is my favorite church holiday. It’s the day when the church was really born – the day that 120 disciples were given the ability to speak the good news so that everyone could understand. It is also the anniversary of my first sermon as your pastor. I had spent two weeks carefully crafting a sermon, agonizing over every word. But when I woke up on the morning of Pentecost 2003 I realized that what I really needed to do was throw that sermon away and speak of my hopes for our future together. Every Pentecost since then I’ve had the same experience. I have something prepared and I wake up with something entirely different in my heart – usually something that doesn’t lend itself well to being written into a manuscript. I wonder sometimes why I even go through the motions of writing for this Sunday, when I believe that whatever I write will end up in the trash on the day. Chances are excellent that what is written here is not what will end up being preached.
On Pentecost the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples for the first time, opening their hearts and minds, moving and working in them, leading them to do things they’d never considered before. They’d had to wait for 40 days after Jesus ascended into heaven, and they weren’t sure how long they would have to wait or even exactly what they were waiting for. As we all know, people just don’t wait very well. We’re not all that good at being patient and living in the moment. We’re always looking forward to the next thing that’s supposed to happen and anxious for it to get here. If we’re doing something new we want to see results right away, and are disappointed if nothing seems to change when we’ve only been doing the new thing a short time.
According to this portion of the letter Paul wrote to the church in Rome about 25 years later, the entirety of creation was eagerly waiting for change to come. All of the world was groaning in labor pains, heavy with anticipation for the day when everyone and everything will be free from the bondage of our past and ushered into a new way of being in Christ. It had become clear to him that Christ was not returning immediately as they had all believed, and that everyone and everything was going to have to wait for that time to come. And so he spoke of the difficulty of waiting for change to happen, when the change was something as eagerly anticipated as the transformation of the entire world into God’s kingdom on earth. Almost 2,000 years later, we’re still waiting.
On Thursday evening twenty-some church leaders, teachers and theologians from a dozen or so different denominations were gathered at the Claremont School of Theology to discuss Contemporary Theology for Social Action in Churches Today. The audience asked a number of tough questions which the forum participants then addressed.
There were a few things they said that really struck me. Sort of examples of what the Kingdom looks like when it is being lived. One spoke about Incarnational Compassion – not a feeling but action. Compassion that is embodied and acted upon person to person. For example, the Anglicans in Palestine operate schools and hospitals open to all, regardless of religion, culture, language – if someone has a need, they will be served. Another reminded us that we are all related through Jesus Christ. We don’t have to like each other in order to work together as was proven by the many who showed up to help in aftermath of Katrina and every natural disaster. And yet another said that, since we can all work together to serve God’s children in times of crisis then we can work together always. One even quoted Rodney King, asking plaintively, “Can’t we all just get along?”
Another reminded us that laws do not equal justice. True justice is always a result of love.
One challenged us to do ministry in places we do not want to go. She was talking specifically about prison and military chaplaincy, but we each have a place we don’t want to go. What would it mean to us to do ministry in that place?
They spoke about new ways of being church, and of doing church. Ways to reach those who somehow are not drawn to our churches, but want to be. They talked about technology and education and ways of being Christians in a world that seems not to care about other people or the environment, a world that puts laws before justice.
It seems to me that this is the same kind of world Jesus did his ministry in, the same kind of world the disciples preached to, and the same kind of world Paul traveled through and warned the new churches against. And that world is still waiting, groaning in labor pains, for the change that is to come – what ever form that change is going to take. We have hope for the future even though we have no idea what that future is going to look like. We do know that the world will not change, justice will not prevail, because laws are passed, or because the rationale and logic for making change is inescapable. The world can only change as hearts are changed through faith, and that is the work of the Spirit. So we wait, and we pray, and we carry the Good News. We teach about the justice that love brings. We speak of God’s purpose in the world, which is always shalom, peace and care for each other. And we try to act always with love and care, so that we can help make those changes that bring God’s glory into the world.
God is waiting, as patiently as only God can wait, for each of us to hear the words, “Behold, I am about to do a new thing . . . . through you.” God is waiting for each one of us to become open to the Spirit so that we can learn what new thing God is going to do through us. The Spirit shows up at unexpected times and moves us in unexpected ways, and it is up to us to listen for what she has to say, whether those words come as a still small voice or a shout. Let us seek and find the quiet center of our selves that we might hear the Spirit of God telling us about the new thing that God will do . . . through us.
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