Cracked Open

Christmas Eve 2016

Holy Storytelling

Tonight we hear the Christmas story from two different perspectives: Luke and Matthew… from the shepherd and the magi.  I invite you to consider how the stories each have a different focus, but moreso, what it is that each of them tells us about the good news of the coming of Jesus Christ.

Gospel 1: Luke 2

1 In those days a decree went out from Emperor Augustus that all the world should be registered. 2 This was the first registration and was taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. 3 All went to their own towns to be registered. 4 Joseph also went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to the city of David called Bethlehem, because he was descended from the house and family of David. 5 He went to be registered with Mary, to whom he was engaged and who was expecting a child. 6 While they were there, the time came for her to deliver her child. 7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in bands of cloth, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. 8 In that region there were shepherds living in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night. 9 Then an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. 10 But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: 11 to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. 12 This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger." 13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host, praising God and saying, 14 "Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!" 15 When the angels had left them and gone into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go now to Bethlehem and see this thing that has taken place, which the Lord has made known to us." 16 So they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the child lying in the manger. 17 When they saw this, they made known what had been told them about this child; 18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds told them. 19 But Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart. 20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them.

Gospel 2: Matthew 2

2 In the time of King Herod, after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, 2 asking, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star at its rising, and have come to pay him homage.” 3 When King Herod heard this, he was frightened, and all Jerusalem with him; 4 and calling together all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Messiah was to be born. 5 They told him, “In Bethlehem of Judea; for so it has been written by the prophet:

6 ‘And you, Bethlehem, in the land of Judah,

    are by no means least among the rulers of Judah;

for from you shall come a ruler

    who is to shepherd my people Israel.’”

7 Then Herod secretly called for the wise men and learned from them the exact time when the star had appeared. 8 Then he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, “Go and search diligently for the child; and when you have found him, bring me word so that I may also go and pay him homage.” 9 When they had heard the king, they set out; and there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. 10 When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. 11 On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

13 Now after they had left, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Get up, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you; for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” 14 Then Joseph got up, took the child and his mother by night, and went to Egypt, 15 and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet, “Out of Egypt I have called my son.”

16 When Herod saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, he was infuriated, and he sent and killed all the children in and around Bethlehem who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had learned from the wise men. 17 Then was fulfilled what had been spoken through the prophet Jeremiah:

18 “A voice was heard in Ramah,

    wailing and loud lamentation,

Rachel weeping for her children;

    she refused to be consoled, because they are no more.”

Grace to you and Peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

The children had set up the crèche in their sanctuary.  It was one of those beautiful ceramic sets, probably Italian, and the children had carefully carried the pieces over the stone floor of the cathedral.  The Mary, the Joseph, the Shepherds, the sheep and cattle and oxen.  This was one of those times where they even put the Magi in place early, all of them facing towards the manger, anticipating the coming Christ.  On the night of Christmas Eve, finally, after watching the empty manger for days, the shepherds and wisemen were getting their due.  Finally, in comes the child carrying the baby Jesus… and on his way to the scene, baby Jesus slipped from the small hands, falling to the stone floor.  The cracking sound, the gasp.  And baby Jesus’ head came off. 

The beautiful manger scene, with the light of the room glancing off that white porcelain, awaiting Jesus on Christmas Eve…. was broken.  Cracked open to reveal the gasping and faltering that we encounter in the Christmas Story.

Cracked open to reveal what we know, and what we don’t know.  Cracked open to reveal the pain of the world.

One wonders about those cracks. 

When we read these two stories side by side, one with shepherds, one with wise men, both telling of the wonderful news of Jesus’ birth.  We hear these two perspectives, one with ordinary laborers doing the good work of daily bread for themselves and the owners of those sheep, the other with bizarre sages from a far off land bringing a message of political upheaval, both stories revealing cosmic intervention.  We see cracks in the story that leave open questions for us and reveal brokenness, spaces, gaps where the story lets us wonder… what is God doing here? 

In Luke’s telling of the story, Mary is expecting a child.  Mary, the story tells us, was an unwed pregnant young woman.  Probably 14 or 15 years old. You all knew that already.  But there are some big cracks in the story on either side of that birth.  Anyone who has ever visited a baby in a hospital, or had a baby of your own, know there is a lot of story to be told around a birth.  How did the labor start?  How long was it?  How difficult?  And most of all, was anyone’s life in danger at any point? A very young woman like Mary would have brought more concern to labor and delivery, just as it would today.  The sacrifice she made was to risk her life to bring this child into the world.  Were there midwives attending?  We can only hope she wasn’t alone.  Where was her family?  And really, people saw a 9-month pregnant young woman and no one was willing to give up their bedroom?  Really?  Really. 

The story leaves out most of the domestic details, which leads us to wonder about them.   Especially when we are faithful people seeking a story that resonates with our own experience.  And through these cracks we wonder.  We may never have been shepherds, but we have been mothers and fathers.  Yet, the Shepherds themselves are focal because they represent us all.  The shepherds are the common folk who hear the good news!  The shepherds are, fantastically, the ones who come and see, and go and tell.  The shepherds show us that the story is for us and told through us.  If you come here seeking a story tonight because the realities of life for you are about relationships and love and kindness and mercy.  Even if the church is a struggle for you because Christianity seems preoccupied with institutions and meaningless rituals and abstract doctrines[i].  This is a story with cracks.  A story about you and me, about an unwed mother and her baby, about a guy who does the noble, foolish thing of marrying a young woman who has a baby that is not his own.  About the common people of the day, even those at the bottom rung of the social ladder being entrusted with the most important job – to tell of God’s wondrous work in the world.

In Matthew’s gospel, there are a lot of cracks around those Magi.  They can seem like such an unexpected imposition on the story!  (Especially if we only ever read Luke on Christmas Eve.)  We wonder how those magi found him?  What was this miraculous star?  Such a story is this that even Thursday on NPR they were talking about what phenomena this star might have been, planets aligned, comet bursts…?[ii]  What was so strange as to lead men to travel from their home country to a foreign place seeking a newborn king?  It’s no wonder they ended up in the story with their wonderings and wanderings like ours – wandering into Herod’s court, specifically.  Naturally!  The epicenter of power is where one would go to find a baby king.  But instead of finding him, the magi unintentionally set off the alarm.  Herod the puppet king fears the threat of this new king to his own power, and along with the chief priests and scribes, murderous intentions lurk.  It is a foreboding scene, anticipating the political turmoil that will end Jesus’ life.

It almost ends right there.  The whole story of God’s great work and intervention for us almost stops with the magi finding him.  For as they tip off Herod, any hope that this time it would be different is abolished.  Any hope that our infant king might win the world over with his tiny fingers and soft skin and cuddly packaging.  Any hope that our God might simply melt our hearts into good behavior evaporates.  Even God coming to earth does not stop conflict and political maneuvering, and acts of terror. 

We watch Rachel lamenting in Ramadah once again.  Crack, the perfect story breaks away from the “Perfect” we pretend is real. The cracks in these stories, the pieces that have fallen out of the memory of history, connect like threads when we remember that Rachel, Jacob’s wife, died here in Bethlehem, in childbirth.  This can make us all the more grateful for Mary’s safety, and aware of the danger she was in.  Rachel had longed for children, and upon her second child’s birth, she paid with her life for a son that she would never nurse or raise.  Her pain of longing for children becomes pain of loss of children here when Herod’s evil slaughters the innocents.  The story makes it hard to ignore the pain of our modern-day Syria, and the loss of its children.  Acute this week, when we stumble across film of a room full of children who have died, being marked with the sign of the cross on their foreheads.  With this holy story of unjust death due to Christ’s birth, we commend them to God.  And we wonder at the story when Jesus survives childhood only because he is allowed safe-haven as a refugee in Egypt.  We wonder what the story asks us to do with refugees fleeing violence like our Lord…?

The cracks left by the storytellers, allow us to see the world as it is.  Cracked and broken.  Hurting and begging for healing.  For wholeness. For peace.

And there is one more thing that the storytellers, with all these open cracks, lead us into infinite wonder.

It is into this world the savior comes.

This cracked and broken world, where the beautiful things entrusted to us regularly need to be put back together.  Where the porcelain baby Jesus has glue around his neck.

This world where the gift you gave to your family member was met with a forced smile and longing for a stronger relationship.  The world where the empty space in your heart remains for the one you have lost, if not an empty chair at the table.  This world where we let innocent children be massacred.

We can wonder over the beauty of God’s response. 

God comes to be with us.  God CHOOSES to come into this busted up world.  Over and over and over and over and over and over again.  God chooses to be BORN.  In BETHLEHEM.  The place where Rachel wept and Mary pondered.  The place from which Jesus fled, and shepherds ran to the manger.  The place where Shepherds and Magi told Everyone the good news, every day people and kings in their palaces. That Christ, our savior is born.  God has come to us, and is coming to us, and will come to us.  Through every cracked open life who longs for love.  God is there.  God is HERE.  Come to be with us in every crack, filling it with the bond of love, filling it with the glue of community.  Putting us together, over and over again, broken and cracked pieces fit together into the one Body of Christ. 

Amen.

---

[i] Sam Wells 2009 Christmas Eve Sermon Duke Chapel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDkinPZZD4U

[ii][ii] NPR http://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2016/12/21/506395770/the-star-of-bethlehem-and-the-magi-myth-or-reality

Visiting the Islamic Society of Greater Worcester

Hello Friends!

I have had a few of you express interest in our visit to the local mosque yesterday.

It was beautiful.  Beautiful.  I am very sorry I didn't take more pictures for you to see what beauty is captured by people from different places sitting around one table.  Talking about their common American pride, their children, their different faiths in one ancient Abrahamic tradition.

I had gotten in touch with the lay leadership of the mosque by email a few weeks back.  I told them that I was beginning an adult forum in my congregation to talk about Islam, which prompted me to reach out.  In the short number of years I have been in this area, I have not yet had the pleasure of getting to know any Moslems.  Their immediate reply was to invite me to come visit, and to bring some friends.

Two weeks later, there we were around one table.

As Steven and I walked up to the building, we were greeted by teens and children enjoying the beautiful day in the parking lot.  The entryway held shoe cubbies and shoes of all shapes and sizes.  We found our way into a large carpeted room, our feet padding quietly across the floor to meet the padding feet of our hosts, eager to greet us.  Eight men and two women welcomed us with bright eyes, warm smiles and handshakes.  We sat down around a large table and talked about Bethlehem and our class on Islam being a blind-leading-the-blind kind of experience.  They offered to come help us!  We talked about our common religious heritage through creation to Abraham. We talked about the different ways we understand Jesus and other messengers of God. We were invited to observe one of their daily prayers and I admitted to some holy-envy for their communal commitment to the daily ritual of prayer.  We were grateful to be in one another’s presence so recently after the election, over which they expressed concern about the Islamaphobia that has been encouraged, especially for people in other parts of the country, and they affirmed the blessing of the timing of our meeting for them.  They even expressed that they feel it is important to engage in the political leadership of their communities, state and nation and how proud and blessed we all are to be a part of a democracy with the freedom of religion.

And it was easy.  To be together, to celebrate how much we have in common, to feed the curiosity that God put in each of us, and to wish we had brought our children, that they might know and grow in friendship with children from another religion and with skin tones different from their own.

It was easy.  And it was beautiful.

Moving through Fear.

20161106

After Pentecost 24

Isaiah 6:1-8

The Sacred Story from the book of Isaiah:

Isaiah: 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. Seraphs 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. And one called to another and said: 

Seraph: Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory.

Isaiah: The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. And 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!” Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: 

Seraph: Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.

Isaiah: Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, 

Lord: Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?

Isaiah: And I said, “Here am I; send me!”

Word of God, Word of Life. 

Congregation: Thanks be to God. 

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

Grace to you and peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. 

Fear. 

And it is real.  And it is valid.  Fear that you can’t cover your mortgage this month.  Fear that people have been given public permission by someone who will hold the highest office to demean women.  Fear that our families are tearing apart under political divide. Fear that President-Elect Trump will say something foolish and our international relationships will be strained or worse.  Fear of being one medical disaster away from financial ruin.  Fear that our friends who are brown, black, LGBTQ or Muslim will experience more psychological and actual threats on their life than they are already experiencing.  Fear that we are impotent to do anything about any of it.

These are real and valid fears. Democrats and Republicans alike are fearful.  Of different things maybe, but too many of us on both sides of the political divide have been overtaken by it.  Fear is the enemy.  Not democrats, not republicans.  Not independents, and not abstainers.

Dear friends who are afraid: You are loved, by God, by me, and by many, many, many people who will work to the death for love, compassion, inclusion and embrace of all our needs and all our diversity. Bless you. I will pray for you and all the fears you feel.

What does the Sacred Story have to say about this?  What does God have to say about this? 

Today we hear of Isaiah.  He is a prophet, much like Samuel, the man we heard about a few weeks ago who told David it wasn’t his job to build the temple.  Prophets are in the business of telling us what God says, and what jobs God has to give us.  And before they can do that, they themselves have to hear from God.  Like Isaiah does today. 

Isaiah has a vision.  It’s possible that he is in the temple, in the holy of holies, the place where only certain priests could enter to encounter God.  God’s strength is felt powerfully there, where the ark, the throne of God now resides.  But Isaiah’s vision allows him to see the power of God beyond what he can access in that central temple room.  God’s power is magnified and telescoped for Isaiah all at once. He sees the enormity of God, whose robe’s edge brushes into the temple and fills it completely. 

Isaiah is unexpectedly before God, and in the holy presence, Isaiah suddenly knows his own unworthiness – he says he is “unclean.”  Isaiah is full of fear.  He has found himself in the court of the most high God with nothing to offer.  The God who has made all life, and holds it all in the palm of his hand.  The God who gives life and takes away.  Isaiah fears because his life is surely nothing of value to this God.  Isaiah fears because he has no ability to make himself right and pure by God’s standards.  Isaiah fears because he knows precisely how poorly his whole nation is at following God’s commands, these people with unclean lips.

Reasonable fears.  Real and valid fears, that finding ourselves in the midst of God’s glory, we would experience as well. No matter who had won the election on Tuesday. 

The God of the galaxies and the ladybugs holds all of creation in the balance.  Giving us the gift of fear to know when we are near the edge.  When things are not right, not in line with God’s intentions for us.  

Yet, what is the first thing that is said often when angels show up on earth?  Do Not Be Afraid. 

In today’s story, rather than words, the angel responds to Isaiah’s fear by dispelling the reason for the fear.  Isaiah, the angel seems to be saying with the action of the coal.  Do not be paralyzed by your fear.  God has equipped you.  You are able to serve.  

Because what happens next?

God asks “Whom Shall I Send?”

And Isaiah is ready. 

Whether we are red, blue or purple, we too are made ready…through Christ, our purifier.

Christ is found in today’s scriptures in the equipping.  Christ came to die that our sin might be blotted out as the coal did for Isaiah.  Christ came to show us how God works in the world so that we might show up and work with God, rather than against him.  A little fear, when we have something big and new happening is an appropriate human response.  But God gives us what we need to not stay paralyzed by it.

No, we can go forth to speak the truth, as Isaiah is called to do.  We can go forth to tell the good news of God’s love in our actions.  In standing shoulder to shoulder with any who will speak against suffering, poor working conditions, unfair wages, predatory consumerism, abusive religion, or bullying of those who look or worship differently than we do.  

God has something for you to do, for us to do together. Prayerfully, keeping ourselves exposed to and listening for Christ in the sacred story and in our neighbor, we move through fear and into love for our neighbor.

Adult study today begins a new series, “My Neighbor is a Muslim.”  I hope you will all join us.  This is going to be a discovery of the faith of Islam and a conversation about the relationship between Islam and Christianity.  /This is an opportunity to move through fear.  We may be afraid of people who are Muslim, or of their religion.  We may fear an Islamic attack on American soil, yet know very little about the motivations behind such attacks or what the Muslims that live in our communities think about it.  There are lots of ways we can and will stand up for Christ in response to this week’s raucous election.  Here is an appropriate place for a faith community to start.  Later today I will be visiting the Worcester Islamic Society and speaking with two gentlemen in hopes of building a relationship with them.  And maybe finding a way to involve us all in interfaith dialogue.  But before we do that, it is respectful and helpful to learn something together about the conversation we might have.  Is God calling you to this today?  If so, the conversation will be happening just down the hall.

Let us pray,

God, we stand in awe of you, too often filled with fear because of things happening around us.  Give us strength to listen carefully to each other and to those we do not yet know.  Help us to listen with hearts open, and without fear.  For you say to us, “Be not afraid” and “Come, follow me.”  

Amen. 

For our sacred space today we will be blessing your hands as a sign of your baptismal calling to work God’s justice and peace in the world.  Please visit me at the font for an individual blessing and prayer. 

On the Presidential Election of 2016

Let us pray...

God of grace, you have entrusted us to steward this world and sometimes we wonder what the heck you were thinking.  This election has created fear and anxiety.  Enter our hearts.  Give us love for those who oppose us, and whom we oppose.  Give us clarity of purpose and drive to make political change for Your Good.  Thank you for the promise that you work all things together for good.  Help us to live in that promise today, and in the coming years.

Amen.

Friends on all sides of this election:

Those who voted for Trump, please let the Clinton supporters grieve. Though I know most of you voted for him because you want a huge change in federal politics, there are still very real divisive and hateful words said by the man who will now be our President. Please stand together against those words and ideas. If you are serious about Unity, gloating gets you nowhere. Find ways for our country to change that does not injure people who are LGBTQ, Latino/a, black, immigrants, refugees or Muslims. Your American Dream is OUR American Dream.

Those who voted for Hilary, I know it is too early for Unity. Just grieve. But when you have raged, cried, worried and denied it out, it is time to Love our Neighbor. And that means loving the one you don't like right now. Insulting your neighbor's intelligence gets us nowhere. Loving does not mean agreement. Loving does not mean going along with something you think is wrong. LOVE is about Justice. If you are a Christian, the Bible will help you understand justice. It will soon be time to be together with people of all political stripes to find solutions to real problems. To listen, listen, listen. To work hard to make real, helpful Change. 

If this was a change election, let the change begin.

Freedom Food

 Listen here. 

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After Pentecost 20
World Communion Sunday

Psalm 149
Exodus 12:1-13; 13:1-8  ‘It is because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt.’

May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.
Grace to you and peace from our lord and savior, Jesus Christ.
Either we have here a very particular, micro-managing God, or this is a very, very, very special meal.
It is so special, in fact, I had a hard time coming up with a secular equivalent.  Is it Thanksgiving? With turkey and mashed potatoes and remembering to be grateful to God and our forefathers?  Well, some of that is in there…
Is it like Christmas? Where, at least in some households, everything must be “just right” with traditions steeped in everything from the ornaments on the tree, to the hors d’oeuvres, to the candy dish. A bit…
Is it a New Year’s celebration with the recommitments, celebratory drinks and the joy of the fresh and new? There is something there too…
The trouble with either of these comparisons is that this meal contains in it a power that fails to come across in simply words. In fact, if you ever experience a seder or Passover meal with Jewish friends, you know that the words there are not just spoken, but are enacted with the eating.  The bitter herbs, the flatbread, the egg, the lamb… each food symbolizes a specific action and promise of God.  Each course of the meal is intended to more than remember, but to relive!  To relive the great gift that God gave the family of Joseph, Jacob, Sarah and Eve - the family called Israel.  You see, the whole point of the Passover story is that the people, through this meal, were freed from slavery.
I want to show you a trailer of a movie that is coming out soon, it’s called “The Birth of a Nation.”  You may have heard about it.  It tells the story of Nat Turner, a former slave in America that leads a liberation movement in 1831 to free African-Americans. This trailer gives us a glimpse into what slavery in America is like.  And from the Biblical description, we can assume it isn’t all that different across time, culture and place for the Israelites. 
[watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIlUerVomDE]
‘It is because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt.’ – the last verse of our reading today.
It is because the Lord freed us from this wretched slavery, Says Israel.  Now of course, American slavery and Egyptian slavery are very different historical time periods, but the subjugation, the treatment, the pain of one group of people above another, is the same.
I imagine this meal being eaten on the underground railroad.  The bread that could not rise, the bitter herbs of hardship, the wine of freedom.
There is nothing easy about this meal.
For when a people lives enslaved, their hope is on freedom.  //
How did they get here? Last we heard, the Israelites were receiving promises from God and faithfully watching them be fulfilled, and now they are slaves in Egypt?
Joseph’s brothers and their wives grew to be a family that overwhelmed the Pharoah, the king, of Egypt.  The pharaoh forgot.  He forgot that it was this family who had given Egypt life through Joseph.  He forgot that it was God who had told the Egyptians about the famine before it came and gave Joseph the wisdom to understand and prepare.  The pharaoh forgot that these people came to Egypt as guests, as brothers and sisters of one humanity.  Pharoah, worried about his own security, forgot their common humanity.  He made slaves of them.  And so the people cried out to God.  They cried out against the harsh treatment.  They cried out against the bondage.  They cried out when a whole generation of their children were killed by Pharoah.  They cried out to God to free them.
And God did.
And to this day, when Passover is celebrated, the people Ask “How is this night different from all other nights?” and answer, “We remember this night how God led us out of Egypt and through the Red Sea.”  It is not those people back then, but “us” (the practicing Jews) now who God led.  Past and present are joined together.  They say: We were slaves, but have been set free by the God who loves us.
See, it’s more than just remembering… it’s more than Thanksgiving or Christmas or New Years.  If I had to pick a meal it comes closest to, I would choose Holy Communion.  Appropriate, as today is World Communion Sunday where we celebrate our union with the body of Christ around the world.
For while the Jewish tradition is in itself right and holy.  We who have been grafted in by Jesus Christ have also been given a meal to remember – a meal to never forget.  We do it each week, rather than each year for a 7 day celebration of Passover.  It is how we are “grafted in” to use Paul’s biblical language, to the Jewish family.  We too have been slaves and been freed by Jesus…
In fact, we might ask even today… How is this morning different from all mornings?
Answer: This is the morning Christ rose from the dead.
This is the morning Christ had victory over death for our sake.  Christ became the sacrificial lamb, our hope for survival in the midst of the bondage of evil.
In Communion, as in the Passover, we celebrate and thank God for the great gift God has given us: Freedom.
It’s not just words, it’s an enactment.  The bread and wine are Christ’s body and blood.  Christ is truly here once again.  Past and present joined together.
You may remember, it was at the Passover meal that Jesus gave us the sacrament of communion.  It was on a night that his very life was threatened.  And for the sake of us all, Christ’s self-sacrifing action gave us all the gift of a new exodus.  Christ, being God, laid his own life down so that we might be free.
So, as always with God’s Word, these stories give us a choice.  We can receive the gift of freedom offered here.  At this table, in bread and wine.  Or we can refuse the gift, believing we are free already.  We can, in our fantasy of freedom, concern ourselves more with our own security and risk the real threat that in so choosing, we may, like Pharaoh, forget our common humanity.
Both the Passover and Holy Communion are meals to enact our freedom.  To remember who we are and whose we are.  We are not of the world, but in it we live as God’s people.  We are a freedom people, called to share the good news with the world: Christ has freed us!
God has freed you!
It is because of what the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt…
It is because of what the Lord did for me when he died and rose again…
It is because I am God’s alone, and no one else’s.  I stand to proclaim that God’s freedom is for all.
Will you pray with me
We whisper the word, and we shout the word,
FREEDOM!
Sometimes it’s ours, sometimes someone else’s
FREEDOM!
We love the sound of it ringing in our ears.
FREEDOM!
God, you are Love
Free us from fear of being hurt,
so that we might freely love!
Jesus, you are our Hope
Free us from despair …,
so that we might freely hope,
Spirit, you are Truth
Free us from lies about ourselves
so that we might freely live.
Love, Hope and Truth,
We come. We worship.  We are free.
Amen.

God, use my power for good!

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.
Grace to you and peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

As we tell the Sacred Story this fall from Genesis to Jesus, we often make big jumps.  Today we have leapt from Abraham and Sarah to their great-grandson’s story: Joseph.  Israel, Joseph’s father and Abraham’s grandson, has become the namesake of the entire family.    Israel, a man you may know better as Jacob, was the one who caused some serious family issues by stealing his brother’s birthright.  He was loved more by his mother, his father loving more his brother.  So it’s no surprise, really, that he continued those family “issues” with his own sons, loving a younger more than the older.   In fact, reading this story, reminds us of the first story we heard about the first two people God made and the garden paradise from which they were evicted.  When we humans gained the power of knowledge of not just good, but also evil, we learned destruction. We cannot unknow what we have known.  The power Israel has to love is unevenly distributed. Now that we have learned to play favorites, now that we have learned to cheat, steal and lie… the story continues.

Scene 1

Narrator: Now Israel loved Joseph more than any other of his children, because he was the son of his old age; and he had made him a long robe with sleeves. But when his brothers saw that their father loved him more than all his brothers, they hated him, and could not speak peaceably to him. Once Joseph had a dream, and when he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more. He said to them,
Joseph: Listen to this dream that I dreamed. There we were, binding sheaves in the field. Suddenly my sheaf rose and stood upright; then your sheaves gathered around it, and bowed down to my sheaf.
Narrator: His brothers said to him,
Brothers: Are you indeed to reign over us? Are you indeed to have dominion over us?
Narrator: So they hated him even more because of his dreams and his words.


Just like all humanity, from the beginning of time: your parents mess you up.  I can see it happening with my own kids: eek.  When the words that come out of their mouths sound an awful lot like the ones that have fallen from my lips in my less-gracious moments.  From the ad-am and the eve, through the faithfully doubtful like Abraham, through the broken family of Israel, comes what none of us can escape: original sin.

We have chosen the path of knowledge of both good and evil, for having just goodness is never enough for us.  And so we live, in this hurting world, with the power to heal, and the power to break.  And the dangerous destructive patterns in the human family leave no one innocent.  Even Joseph, given a great power of knowledge through dreams, he had to learn to use it.  To be a steward of the gifts God had given him.  17 year old Joseph is foolish and boastful.  And, sadly, Joseph’s brothers had little patience for him to grow his power of knowledge into the full maturity of wisdom.

Scene 2

Narrator: So [Israel] said to [Joseph],
Israel: Go now, see if it is well with your brothers and with the flock; and bring word back to me.  […]
Narrator: So Joseph went after his brothers, and found them at Dothan. They saw him from a distance, and before he came near to them, they conspired to kill him. They said to one another,
Brothers: Here comes this dreamer. Come now, let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits; then we shall say that a wild animal has devoured him, and we shall see what will become of his dreams.
Narrator: But when Reuben heard it, he delivered him out of their hands, saying,
Reuben: Let us not take his life.
Narrator: Reuben said to them,
Reuben: Shed no blood; throw him into this pit here in the wilderness, but lay no hand on him —
Narrator: —that he, [Reuben] might rescue him out of their hand and restore him to his father.


I have to wonder what Israel was thinking, sending Joseph after his older, stronger, jealous brothers like that.  Did he not see what was happening?  Did he not see the hate that was brewing inside his own family? Sometimes it is harder to see in our own families...  Where is God in this mess?

Joseph was not the only one given powerful gifts by God.  Reuben has been given the gift of compassion, or maybe just the gift of self-preservation and maturity.  Here is God’s power, in love.  Reuben he sees that Joseph’s death does not solve the brother’s envy.  Their violence will not be redemptive.  The story tells us, from Cain and Able to Joseph and Rueben: violence is never redemptive.  Whatever Joseph’s flaws, be he boastful, power-hungry or simply immature, he will not be of service to God if devoured by wild animals, or wild brothers.

Rueben, the eldest of 12 brothers, is about 33. While the others brothers are in their twenties.  The elder Reuben cannot quite control the mob mentality of his desperate, fearful and frustrated brothers.  They are a part of a wealthy family, relatively speaking, and there will be enough land for each of their tribes, but this is not enough.  They long for the affection, or at least equity of their father.  Reuben uses the moral compass he has been given and uses the power he does have stop the brothers from killing Joseph.  He gives them all a second chance.  A chance at a life where reconciliation is possible, with this brother they cannot see as worthy now.

Even this hurting and broken family, God works.  And Reuben helps us to begin to ask the question this story shapes for us: How am I going to use my God-given power for good today?

Scene 3

Narrator: Then Judah said to his brothers,
Judah: What profit is it if we kill our brother and conceal his blood? Come, let us sell him to the Ishmaelites, and not lay our hands on him, for he is our brother, our own flesh.
Narrator: And his brothers agreed. When some Midianite traders passed by, they drew Joseph up, lifting him out of the pit, and sold him to the Ishmaelites for twenty pieces of silver. And they took Joseph to Egypt. When Reuben returned to the pit and saw that Joseph was not in the pit, he tore his clothes. He returned to his brothers, and said,
Reuben: The boy is gone; and I, where can I turn?
Narrator: Then they took Joseph’s robe, slaughtered a goat, and dipped the robe in the blood. They had the long robe with sleeves taken to their father, and they said,
Brothers: This we have found; see now whether it is your son’s robe or not.
Narrator: He recognized it, and said,
Israel: It is my son’s robe! A wild animal has devoured him; Joseph is without doubt torn to pieces.
Narrator: Then Jacob tore his garments, and put sackcloth on his loins, and mourned for his son many days.


Reuben’s plan did not work out.  He was not able to save Joseph the way he had hoped.  But God uses his act of salvation for another good.  A greater good the brothers cannot yet see, and certainly do not intend.  The brothers who are saved from killing a man, are still enslaved to their sin.  They sell him.  Human trafficking.  As an issue, it certainly has resonance for us today, when we hear about young men and women are kept against their will, often for cheap labor, sometimes for prostitution.  We read articles online about how to spot human trafficking at truck stops, and awareness campaigns that encourage us to call the authorities if we see a person, usually a young girl, who is spoken for rather than speak.  Who is kept hidden or isolated.  Who is given a tattoo to mark her ownership.
From human trafficking in Joseph’s world to ours; from deception and envy that hurts and denies the full humanity of our brothers and sisters.  We weep with Jacob, who is Israel.  And we who know there is more to the story begin to wonder, “How am I going to use my God-given power for good today?”

Years pass and Joseph faces many adversities, then uses his God-given gift of dream interpretation to rise to be the right-hand man of the Egyptian pharaoh.  Joseph is the steward of Egypt’s great resources, and when a famine hits the land, Joseph, warned by a dream, has prepared for it.  Joseph now has more than knowledge given in dreams, this has given him great power, as he predicted, and he has grown into the wisdom to go with it.  He is now giving away food to those who need it, and the brothers come see him, desperate to survive they leave the promised land for Egypt.

The family is reunited in Egypt, living together there to be able to eat and live – for Joseph saves them when they were on the brink of death.  Not only the brothers, but their father, Israel, too.  Jacob, sons, wives, children, all of them move to Egypt and are reunited with Joseph joyfully.

Joseph cares for them for many years before Israel dies. But the brothers still think about that day when they sold him into slavery.  When they used their power for harm, overcome by the knowledge of evil that had enslaved them, the knowledge that leads to deceit, envy and malice.

Scene 4

Narrator: [Many years passed, and Israel died an old man.] Realizing that their father was dead, Joseph’s brothers said,
Brother: What if Joseph still bears a grudge against us and pays us back in full for all the wrong that we did to him?
Narrator: So they approached Joseph, saying,
Brothers: Your father gave this instruction before he died, ‘Say to Joseph: I beg you, forgive the crime of your brothers and the wrong they did in harming you.’ Now therefore please forgive the crime of the servants of the God of your father.
Narrator: Joseph wept when they spoke to him. Then his brothers also wept, fell down before him, and said,
Brothers: We are here as your slaves.
Narrator: But Joseph said to them,
Joseph: Do not be afraid! Am I in the place of God? Even though you intended to do harm to me, God intended it for good, in order to preserve a numerous people, as he is doing today. So have no fear; I myself will provide for you and your little ones.
Narrator: In this way he reassured them, speaking kindly to them.


They ask for his forgiveness.  They are still trapped in the knowledge that cannot be unknown.  They know they did him harm.  Joseph, though he knows it too, though he can never unknow the pain it caused him to be sold into slavery by his brothers.  He is not trapped by it.  He has given up holding tight to what is evil, to hold tight to what is good.

Joseph hears their burdened hearts crying out.  Crying out, even with a lie about their father!  They ask for forgiveness even as they lie!  In their brokenness, Joseph hears them.  He asks, Am I in the place of God?  And the question goes unanswered.  Because the question can go both ways.  IN one way, Yes.  Yes, Joseph, you are in a place like God’s.  You have the power to enslave the brothers as they did to you.  You have the power they give you when they ask for forgiveness.  Your response holds great power to free them or to keep them in bondage to sin.  But also No, of course, Joseph knows he is not God, it is God who forgives, it is God who can release us from our bondage to sin and the burden of evil in our lives.  It is God who brings redemption to the fallen, who redeems us for goodness and love.

Joseph knows this God well, for when Joseph found himself in the midst of the knowledge of evil, regardless of who was to blame for that, Joseph holds fast to the knowledge of good… God has redeemed.  Even this.  God has redeemed even the brother’s death wish.  God has redeemed his brother’s selling him into slavery.  God has redeemed the power they used for evil and out of it pulled good after good after good.  For when God made this world, God said it was good.  And when God’s creation suffers famine, God used Joseph’s powerful gifts to alleviate the suffering.

In this story, God is telling us, God is working all the power of the universe for good.  And God is asking us, How would you like to come along?  Ask yourself, How am I going to let God use my power for good today?

There is a little chant that is used in the church, often with youth and young adults.  But will you try it with me?  “God is good.  All the time.  All the time.  God is good. “

From Paul’s letter to the Romans, and God’s Word for us:
28 We know that all things work together for good[d] for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. 29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn within a large family.[e]

Come, let us be conformed to the image of his Son, for we are called according to God’s purpose… that God might use all our power to work together for the good God is already doing.
Amen.

Abram and the In Between

Image by Steven Thomason
http://www.stevethomason.net/2016/09/16/visual-guide-abrahams-story-genesis-12-15/ 

Listen Here.

Genesis 15:1-6
After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.”
But Abram said, “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” And Abram said, “You have given me no offspring, and so a slave born in my house is to be my heir.” But the word of the Lord came to him, “This man shall not be your heir; no one but your very own issue shall be your heir.” He brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” And he believed the Lord; and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness.

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.
Grace to you and peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Last week we began the Narrative Lectionary, the series of Bible stories that we will tell each Sunday that tell the Sacred Story from Genesis to Jesus.  It’s a good chance for us to reconsider anything we think we know about these old stories and characters.  Maybe the last time you heard from them was in Sunday School as a child, or maybe you have picked up a bit here and there, but never considered how they build on each other and why these are the stories God chose to tell us.  Why these are our Sacred Stories we have kept for generations upon generations.

Well, today we get to consider Abram.  Abram/Abraham is the man whom we share with the two other major faiths of the world: Islam and Judaism.  He is our common ancestor.  You probably have heard of him as Abraham.  God gives him that name a bit later in the story, one of the many times that God reassures Abram that, yes, indeed, God is good for his promises.

And it’s no wonder Abram asks the question, he and his wife, Sarai/Sarah, are old already, and have not yet had one child, much less many.

[ppt by Steve Thomasen]

Abram’s story points us to those times in our own lives when we are standing, looking up at the sky, asking God, Why?

Why must the world be so broken?  Why must our politicians be so disappointing?  Why must there be wars and refugees and abused children?  Why must our children die violently?  Why must we be brother against brother? Why is my body failing me?  Why can’t I have the child I so hoped for?
We stand, our arms raised toward heaven, asking God to answer us.

And in the questioning, the disappointment, the hurt… is there not a deep-seated belief in us that the world could be, and in fact, should be, different?

When we stand before God demanding an answer… do we expose the hope that we have for a world that is more whole and more loving?

“What do we do with that?  How are we called to live in the gap between the promise and the fulfillment?”[1]

What is our part to play?

This Sacred Story we have begun is hurtling through time at a rapid pace, from the story of creation last week, past Noah and Babel and straight to Abram today, next week we will leap over Jacob who becomes Israel, straight to his 11th son of 12, Joseph.  Each Sacred Story pointing to God working in this broken world to bring glimmers of wholeness and healing.  Each story pointing the way to a God who, over and over again, has No Reservations when it comes to us.  The One God who has claimed us as stars in the sky; has named us as beloved children of Abraham through baptism.  Our God who promises us we are blessed to be a blessing.

What is our part to play?

What vision has God cast for us, as God showed Abram in those stars?

What does the God of No Reservations intend us to do with this hope we have revealed in the questioning, and the crying out, and the doubt we have expressed to him? Between the hope and the doubt, we live, between the promise and the fulfillment.

Standing in the between together we seek God’s vision for us as a community.  We have already expressed it in our mission, vision and values – printed on the back cover of the liturgy booklet.  We are getting a Strategy ready for you to see on Oct 2nd to give us action steps to move further into God’s vision for us.  And all of this is a discernment process – where you are needed.  With your questions and your crying out and your doubts.

For as those things reveal our hope for a better world.  Our addressing them to God reals our trust in the God who made us.  So that, like Adam and Eve last week, though we too often choose our own will over God’s will, there is a seed planted deep within us.  A seed of hope that comes from knowing God’s future for us will look much different than what we can do for ourselves.

May we question, cry out, doubt, and trust that future together. For this is the Faith God gave to Abraham.  And, by God’s mercy, to us.

Amen.

[1] From POP resources on Narrative Lectionary Holly Welch, Facebook group: Narrative Lectionary.

No Reservations: Telling the Sacred Story from Genesis to Jesus

Listen Here.

Genesis 2:4b-7, 15-17; 3:1-8 (NRSV)
These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created. In the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, when no plant of the field was yet in the earth and no herb of the field had yet sprung up—for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was no one to till the ground; but a stream would rise from the earth, and water the whole face of the ground— then the Lord God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being. The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.
And the Lord God commanded the man, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.”
Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God say, ‘You shall not eat from any tree in the garden’?” The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; but God said, ‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die.’” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves. They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden at the time of the evening breeze, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.
Grace to you and peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

When I was a teenager, I remember saying “If God doesn’t intend me to become a mother someday, then he’s playing some kind of cruel joke.”  Looking back from the other side, having been blessed with the astoundingly rewarding and amazingly difficult job of parenting – twice, I was struck when I read again the beginning of the sacred story that in life, here are things you cannot un-know.

When I said that as a teenager, I did not know what it would be like to be awoken every two hours by a hungry baby, looking only to me for nourishment.  I did not know what it would be like to have a little piece of my heart separate from me in this person, but always pulled back to me when in need.  I did not know the joy and ache of watching a small person grow up in front of my eyes, reflecting back to me all my best – and worst – qualities.  And one I knew these things… there was no going back.

Labor and delivery is by far the best example.  I spent more than 9 months preparing for labor, seeking all the knowledge I could about what it meant – in nitty, gritty, real-life terms – to bring a new life into the world.  I wanted to know every possible way I could make my first birth healthy and whole – and I was blessed that it all turned out that way.  But there is nothing like birth to awaken us to our sense that we do not, in fact, know everything.  We can seek the best information and the best experiences of others and the best providers who we have the most trust with… but in the end… there was no way I was going to know the reality of birth until I actually went through it myself. Until they handed me that 9#7oz real live person and I said (and I quote) “It’s a baby!”

What exactly did I think I had been preparing for?

But once they handed that real live baby to me, it was no longer wondering or wishing… I knew he was ours.  And there was no going back.

This fall, our theme is “No Reservations.”  And as we begin at the beginning again today, we see humans who seem to have had a lot of reservations once they taste the bittersweet fruit and feel the difficult, vulnerable, anxious knowing that you cannot unknow.  They who had no reservations about picking the fruit, no reservations about grasping at being like God.

After the face, Eve and Adam are a little like new parents, freaked out at the knowledge that a part of them is no longer protect, no longer covered.  Their nakedness.  Their innocence.  Their lack of knowledge has been exposed.

They have gained what they wished, they know more now than they did before, they know they are not God, and they can never be God, but they are forever in bondage to wanting to try.  Their knowledge has left them feeling ashamed.  For when the human beings begin to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge, they show us the pattern we all live and breathe and cannot escape.  We have a way of choosing our own control over trusting God.  Our desire to know better than God what is good for us… leads us all straight out of the garden and the life lived solely for and with God.  Yes, we call it sin.  But it is less a willful act of destruction or immorality, and far more a life of denying God’s goodness and power in favor of our own devices, wherever they might lead us.

This is not a condemnation of curiosity or knowledge in our world today.  I am confident that Adam and Eve could have learned much in the garden about the creation God had made, the intricate balance of ecosystems and the generative life of fruit trees, of wild grains and all plants that feed us.
But it is a clear description, and even a story of grief over the choice that humans always make.  The choice to seek to “know,” to have all the information for ourselves, over the choice to trust the God who made us.

What God does next is to explain the consequences of their actions: serpents become snakes, women have pain in childbirth, men must till the ground for sustenance…life choosing oneself over God will be hard.  There is no going back, no reserved spot for them in the Garden of Eden. Eve was right, their entire existence and understanding of life died there with that choice.

But God.  God tells a different story.  God says, no, there is no place reserved for you here any longer… BUT (And when God is talking consequences, you know there is always a “But”)…
But there is still life.  There is still grace.  God does not scrap them and start all over… I mean, if you were God, would you?  No, God has No Reservations when it comes to us.  And this is the beginning of the beginning of THAT story.  God is the one who has No Reservations.

God gave them clothing and a new way of living.  God did not destroy his creation.  God looked at them, choosing to live away from him with what I imagine could be characterized as anger and grief, but God still loved them.

God has no reservations loving Adam and Eve, and all of creation.  The sacred story reminds us that God gives us life and breath and plants and animals and ecosystems and curiosity and knowledge.  Yes, even knowledge!  We grasp for knowledge of our own situation, not wanting to live innocently, wanting to grapple with truth and reality.  God adds to our knowledge and equips us to live independently from the utopian garden.  Even after our rejection, God has no reservations gifting us with what we need for this mortal life.

And even more, when God sends Christ the king, to host us at his table, we don’t need a reservation either.  In God’s kingdom, there are no reservations needed.  The table is open to everyone.  All are invited, all are embraced, even us who have chosen to walk away from God, are invited back, even with all our newfound knowledge.  Even when we think we know better.  Even when we have lost our innocence.  Especially when we feel vulnerable and exposed.  God accompanies us in this difficult life, with no reservations.
Thanks be to God!
Amen.

The Warrior Arm Gets Wet

Origin of photo unknown.  Found on Pintrest.   
Project Semi-colon is not directly related to this sermon,but it's very cool.  
All Warriors need the water of life!

GOSPEL   Luke 10:38-42
The Holy Gospel according to St. Luke…
25 Now large crowds were traveling with him; and he turned and said to them, 26 "Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. 27 Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple.
28 For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, 30 saying, "This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.' 31 Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? 32 If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace.
33 So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions.
The gospel of the Lord.

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

Grace to you and peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

At the beginning of his book, Giving to God, Mark Allen Powell tells a story about a community in what is now France/Belgium who was converted to Christianity.  They had a strange ritual.  During baptism, which was by immersion in a river, like we never do, the person being baptized would hold one arm high up in the air, so that it did not get submerged the way the rest of his body did.  It was usually men that did this, though some women may have too, and it was almost always the right arm.  A visiting priest or missionary would have found the practice very strange, this was not something that would have been seen elsewhere.  Why do you think they did it?  

Maybe you guessed, especially if you are on Council and you have read Powell’s book.  The arm held up in the air was the fighting arm.  Should the warrior come up against an enemy, and though he was a Christian and knew that Jesus had said “pray for your enemies” and “love your neighbor”, he thought he would still be able to use that arm to kill his enemy.  For it was unpurified in the waters of baptism.  It could still act on the old adam or eve sinful impulse without guilt that he (or she) was being unfaithful to the gospel. 

What do you think of that?

Completely ridiculous!  Who thinks that holding one’s arms out of the baptismal waters reserves it for actions contrary to the gospel?  To God’s Word, the God by whom we have been adopted and to whom we have pledged our hearts and lives?  

Certainly, I imagine that’s what God thinks of it.  I am confident that the act of baptism is not for 99.9% of us, but rather for every last drop. 

Yet when I think of all the things the gospel asks me to do: prioritize God above my family, carry heavy burdens of pain – and not just my own, but others in my community too!, letting go of my own desperate grasp at comfort by surrounding myself with more and more things – just so I can drown in them.  

I wouldn’t mind leaving my bank account or financial plans on the dry banks of that baptismal river.  Or maybe my desire to feel better than other people, more competent, more perfect.  I wouldn’t mind leaving my family relationships or that seed of bitterness leftover from old wrongs held up out of the waters.  It sure would be easier to leave those parts nice and dry, and just let my soul that is heading to heaven be the only part of me that gets truly wet.  

But Thank God, it doesn’t work that way.  Because if I get to hold back part of myself, what part of God’s blessings do I expect to not receive?  That’s not like God.  Our God doesn’t have a bunch of conditions: you must do this or that or follow these rules to be a good person.  God takes the people we are, good, bad or awful, and re-births us.  Holds onto us like a newborn baby, unable to do anything for him or herself, and God does it all.  God gives us air and water and heaven and earth.  God gives us life and new starts, and coming clean again and again and again.

  

It is only in that context.  Knowing ALL of THAT.  That we read this scripture today:

28 For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? 29 Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, 30 saying, "This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.' 31 Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? 32 If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. 

Jesus effectively says, when God claims you, he gets all of you.  NO turning back.  Would you like that gift? That blessing?  That comfort to be in God’s arms?  Of course!  I would!  So be careful, following Jesus, following God’s ways, will lead to great gifts, but they won’t always be the gifts you think you want or need.  God’s ways encompass your whole life and being, God’s peace pervades every anxiety you could possibly have.  God’s way of working is that you lay down your whole, entire, life, warrior arm and all. 

Last Sunday night about 25 people lost their homes due to the fires in Southbridge.  Most of them lost everything.  And not in the waters of baptism, but in the flames of the burning rooms they had rented.  There were 12-15 people who were renting single rooms in the Main Street building.  There were another three households in the Benefit building. 

Hearing that, after remembering how God works.  It’s pretty easy to know what we do next.  We find a way for our brothers and sisters in humanity to be sheltered, clothed and fed and back up on their feet again.  

So this week several clergy of the area met with the Red Cross, and the Town Manager and a couple of Town Counselors joined us as well.  We came up with a plan: 

The first thing people need are new homes.  So if you are a realtor or a landlord or know how to get in touch with inexpensive rentals in Southbridge or one of the neighboring towns, you are needed.  Christ is calling you.  In order to get into those homes, most of these people will need help with first/last/security deposits.  So cash donations are being collected through a special fund that Catholic Charities has generously offered to host.  A group of pastors will help to determine how the money gets distributed.  100% of those donations will go directly to the residents who are victims of these two fires. 

People also need all the basic living needs: clothing, toiletries, and most of all food.  They are mostly living in hotels right now, so cooking is difficult.  Therefore, after much debate, it was determined that rather than try to provide meals, what would be most beneficial would be gift cards to restaurants or grocery stores or big box pharmacies or places where packaged food and personal items are available.  These will be distributed through Catholic Charities in Southbridge as well.  

Finally, Bethlehem’s closet has become the hub for clothing distribution.  We have had just one family who was able to take us up on this so far, but I hope others will come as soon as they have a more stable place to live.  And certainly there will be an influx of clothing donations.  When people here about our great ministry, they just want to help!

So, here we go, once again, going all in for God’s mission in the world.  Evil in the world never stops, even the evil that looks like house fires and warrior arms.  But God never stops either.  And God invites us to go along for the ride, spreading love and peace to all our neighbors, showing God’s presence for them in the world.  

It doesn’t matter if your forehead is the only part the water drips on; God has every ounce of you soaking wet with the promises of new life, freedom and courage. 

Amen.

God's Party People

GOSPEL  Luke 14:1, 7-14
The Holy Gospel according to St. Luke…

1On one occasion when Jesus was going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to eat a meal on the sabbath, they were watching him closely.
…  7When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, he told them a parable. 8“When you are CALLED by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honor, in case someone more distinguished than you has been CALLED by your host; 9and the host who CALLED both of you may come and say to you, ‘Give this person your place,’ and then in disgrace you would start to take the lowest place. 10But when you are CALLED, go and sit down at the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher’; then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at the table with you. 11For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”
  12He said also to the one who had CALLED him, “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not CALL your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may CALL you in return, and you would be repaid. 13But when you give a banquet, CALL the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. 14And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

The gospel of the Lord. Praise to you O Christ.

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

Grace to you and peace from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
When was the last time you threw a party?  Maybe it was a big bash for a graduation or a birthday or anniversary?  Or maybe it was a backyard barbeque with a few neighbors.  Take a few seconds and remember that party…  What kind of prep went into it?  Decorations?  Yardwork? Cleaning?  Food?  What kind of love and care did you pour into that event to make it enjoyable for the people who were coming over?  How did you invite people?  Emails? Phone calls?  Paper invites?  Knocking on their door?

You know, we are party people.  God is big on parties.

The last two weeks, we tried to throw a party here at Bethlehem.  We set up our tents in the parking lot of the Andrew J. Petro State pool over in Southbridge, we got tables, chairs and signs to be sure people could find us.  We made tickets to the pool available for any kids who came to our lunch party.  And we even bought T-Shirts so we could show our unity and pride as Jesus-people with our Episcopalian, UCC and Federated friends.  We tried to throw a Jesus-party.  The kind he tells us to throw here in this scripture story: where everyone is invited to the table, even people we don’t know, even people who are hungry and tired and weary and different than us.

It was an experiment.  And it worked on many levels: town leadership, coordination with the school who offered to provide the meals, YMCA and with our fellow congregations to coordinate hosts at the tables for meals and crafts.  But, whether it is good or bad, we don’t usually judge our parties by how many people helped make it happen, we judge it by how many showed up!  And our attendance was 14, 20, 6 & 8.  Not what we hoped the first week.

And so here I stand today, listening to Jesus, eating my own dose of humble pie for trying to sit at the head table rather than sitting where I should have started, with the people who need food.

If I had started there, I might have realized that the people who need the food have eaten these same meals for 8 weeks before we show up on the scene and eating it again is just not that appealing.  If I had started there, I might have seen how our flyer that went out to every active program earlier in the summer still can’t speak the invitation to those who don’t read English.  If I had started there I would have spoken to people in the neighborhood more than I spoke to people in leadership in the town. Because I am sure they could tell me what it is they need more than anyone else.
It was a noble effort and a worthwhile experiment, because I learned something, and I hope by sharing this all with you, we will all learn something about how to do the ministry to which Jesus calls us.
And that is the key word: Call.  When I studied the gospel this week with my fellow pastors I learned that the word translated “Invite,” as it is printed in the NRSV, and in your bulletin, might more accurately be translated “Call.”  And that word is used no less than 8 times in this short passage.  A word that would be used when God calls a prophet to speak God’s word to the people, or when Jesus called the disciples to follow him. Jesus is encouraging us to call out to the people we see in need of him and give a feast!  Not just a luncheon or a dinner, but a Banquet!  Treat these who are not our brothers and sisters and uncles and cousins just yet, treat them as if they are our family and our greatest joy.

The call, the invitation, is about the relationship.  We call out on the street to those we care about, even if we do not yet know them.  We call in to the conversation those whose voices matter most to us.  We call out to those who we want to serve and listen, and care, and become like friends and family, and then we know what kind of service we can do together.

Funny story: the Holy Spirit gave me that chance.  I stopped my car on the street that first Monday to ask teenagers if they wanted to join us the next day: free food, free pool pass… wish I could change that moment.  I almost got out of the car, but I didn’t.  It was 95 degrees outside and I didn’t want to leave the air conditioning.  I rolled my window back up.  But what if I had gotten out of the car?
The ministry to which Jesus calls us is to CALL/Invite First.  Don’t just organize.  Call out to those who might want what we have to offer.  Insist we want to share it.  Insist there is no requirement for getting it.  Insist there is no hidden agenda or payback to come.  Just call out to the teenagers on the street (before we make a plan, in time to make friends) and say: Hey, want some food?  What kind?  Where should we hold this party?  How could we help make it happen?

Then, maybe, we do it together, instead of having a party all alone.  

Because here is the thing… I know you, Bethlehem.  You are serious about your mission: feed, clothe, shelter.  I know, I’ve tried to get you to move towards a mission to kids and families in today’s crazy world… but you won’t have it!  You want to feed, clothe and shelter people!

If we are serious about our mission, and I believe we are, then Jesus is talking directly to us.  How do we be in community with the people we are serving? How do listen first, plan second.  I certainly need your help with this, I tend to do the opposite.  How do we move from “them” to becoming “us” together?  Especially when we struggle to see Southbridge as a town as good as our own.

I have two ways to start listening and getting to know our neighbors today: First, Karen, Michelle and I are trying to learn Spanish.  Let one of us know if you want to join us.  We are seeking a teacher and a time. Second is more immediate: take a moment to invite someone here at Bethlehem for a one on one.  The Council has begun doing this with one another, and I do it all the time with you – now’s your chance to get to know your fellow churchmembers better.  Take 30-45 minutes and take a walk with someone here.  Don’t do it on Sunday morning, but some other time. Ask questions about their life and listen to their story.  Then do it again and they will listen to you… it’s the very important first step in knowing each other and what God calls each and every one of us to.

Maybe we forget, maybe I forgot when it came to this pool lunch ministry – or any of our ministries!…This is all Jesus’ party.  Jesus is the host, we are just acting on his behalf.  Jesus is the one who wants to feed, shelter and clothe, and will with or without us, but there’s no use just sitting around being useless.  Jesus is the one who throws a banquet, giving us everything, even his very own life, his own body, around this table every week.  Remember, we don’t do this stuff to be good people.  We only do this stuff because it’s what God does!  Invites US.  Us who are not divine, to his heavenly table.  God goes out into the streets and calls out to us – Hey You!  Friend!  Can I talk to you?  I have this amazing party I want to throw and I am hoping you can come.  I know you, so I’d like it to be just the way you like it!  Join me!  Let’s celebrate life together – you and me.

Let’s celebrate life with God.  Come to the banquet table to be fed. We are God’s party people and This is our party. Amen.