July 21, 2024 - 16OTB - Who We Say We Are

 16 OTB

July 21, 2024

 

Jeremiah 23:1-6
Psalm 23
Mark 6:30-34, 53-56

Did you notice…Mark 6:30-34…53-56

What’s missing…FEEDING OF THE 5K and Jesus Walking on the WATER

But what we have points us in a particular direction.

 

The first scene…Return from their 1^st mission…success stories 

And Jesus thinks…regroup---not necessarily a vacation…a working retreat!

 

But situation is a bit frenzied …“They had no leisure even to eat”
So they take off by boat …for another shore.

The funny …the crowds…on foot…somehow beat them there.
and then the key phrase: 
“He had great compassion for them, 
because they were like sheep without a shepherd 

The root of the Greek word translated Compassion
inner part of the body…We might say “guts”
Jesus… physically affected…he was churning in his body…with this compassion.

Sheep and Shepherds in the biblical world, always symbolize 
the King/the Leader/the Leadership

So when Jesus sees “Sheep without a Shepherd” it isn’t a bunch of individuals.
He is seeing a whole population…deprived of attention and justice…

 

In the second segment…crowds continue…villages, cities and farms…hoping for healing and restoration.

There will be no deserted place…no retreat;)

What we have is an overwhelming picture of human suffering that follows Jesus.

 

 

The question for us is 
What does this say to me…to us…

---

You probably noticed that we prayed Psalm 23 this morning
“The Lord is my shepherd…”
so the connection is this shepherd and shepherding business 

There are 2 promises or attributes of God that the Psalmist is singing to…
praising…giving thanks for

The first is the promise of Comfort
God, according to the Psalmist…provides for what I most need
When I am in the presence of God 

I feel as if I’m lying down in cool refreshing grass…

And God knows when I’m weary of getting it wrong 

It’s then that God gently nudges me in a better direction…right pathways

That’s the first promise…comfort and guidance

And the second promise is about nourishment and sustenance
This God holds nothing back…there is a spread laid before me
Sounds like a 6-course meal…God won’t let me wither

The Psalm starts politely
THE LORD this, THE LORD that…The Lord is my shepherd
but half way through…It gets intimate
Not ‘The Lord’ anymore…

But YOU…YOU are with me…YOU comfort me…YOU spread a table 

---

Some of you know that I spent several years as a hospital Chaplain.

And Psalm 23 was one of those pious “must have’s in your back pocket”.

just reading psalm 23 to a patient

Or handing out a prayer card printed with the verses!

…that doesn’t do justice to the psalmist or her words. 

The question for me…for us…is…how can I BE Psalm 23.

 

 

So over this past liturgical year

We celebrated God becoming human

The incarnation…At Christmas…And Christ overcoming death at Easter

 

And at Pentecost we celebrated the church-making move from 

Jesus alive and at work in the world
…confronting peoples’ brokenness and suffering

To his followers…his Body…the Church

alive and at work, in the world…in his name

 

So there is no room for arrogance

I am one with every other person
all any of us has is our compassion…the kind that sees and feels and makes our insides churn…

 

I think we know some of the truth of this

When we approach suffering with our own notions of remedy and healing

         We can get into real trouble quick

 

book titled “What NOT TO SAY to a friend with cancer”
I only wish I had read it years earlier!

 

WHEN we meet suffering with our presence and companionship
somehow we share in it.
And this is when we ARE Psalm 23

 

And I think most of us know the truth of this from the receiving side as well
we know the comfort of leaning on someone 
and having it feel like cool refreshing grass. 
That someone who comes alongside us and doesn’t jump to trying to fix things

 

But it’s hard! We get uncomfortable! We like fixing things!

 

Which is why we need all the help we can get. And we get help here…from scripture, and sacrament, and our simple gathering and sharing a meal…or a piece of cake;)

And sometimes we get it from our parents…

Ken and Peggy, I’m sure that’s why your beautiful family has made the trek to this deserted place!

Your married life together, your commitment as parents, and the life you share here and in the community you call home, 

Isn’t that a testimony to embodying Psalm 23 as a way of life?

 

This isn’t just ‘Go and do Good works’

It’s more mysterious
like the prayer of St Teresa of Avila

“Christ has no body but ours” plural…all of us.

“no hands no feet on earth but ours.
“Ours are the eyes with which Christ looks compassion on this world…

That’s a commitment…and a challenge…But it is who we say we are.

June 9, 2024 - 10OTB - Being a 'Will of God' Family

June 9, 2024 
Proper 5 or 10OTB - Mark 3:20-35

 

If you remember

Back in December we began year B of the liturgical calendar

But with Advent, Christmas, Lent and Easter 

we haven’t really had a good stretch of Sundays reading Mark

 

But today begins a 9 week stretch

And since we have been popping in and out of John’s Gospel

And heard from Matthew off and on

It seems appropriate to 

Reacquaint ourselves with this Gospel’s personality;)

 

It is stark and hard and heavy on questions and light on answers

It’s no-nonsense

 

A quick aside about the “unforgiveable sin”

Or “sin against the Holy Spirit”

Jesus is speaking to the Scribes

They see healing and people liberated from demonic possession

They see What can only be good

And they call it the work of one possessed by the power of Evil.

The very possibility of receiving healing mercy is cut off if you call it evil.

 

Did you notice how there are two stories going on in our reading?

This whole section is called a Marcan Sandwhich

It started with the family…the bottom piece of bread

…they have set out to “restrain/seize” him

Then the inside of the sandwich is the controversy with the Scribes and the parable

And then the top bread is the return to the question of family.

 

We are in Chapter 3

Jesus has been healing and casting out demons

To great success

He has called his disciples 

And he has upset the powers that be with his 

Boundary crossing

Rule breaking

behavior 

the atmosphere is tense

 

Has something ever happened in your life

When you just knew 

“this is a BIG deal”

“this is a game changer…and not in a good way”

“my life…as I know it…is over”

 

Its probably not this simple

But, for me, it came about because I was holding on too tight to

---something I knew I just knew was spot on:

·      My plan for my life

·      My dream for my daughters life

·      My certainties about economic policy

·      Or how healthcare should be organized

·      Or how the border ought to be policed

 

Someone said that the sign of growing wisdom 

is having fewer and fewer answers

Not out of disinterest or laziness

But out of coming to know that things look differently

From different perspectives

And I only have my own

 

It sounds a little simplistic

But some of this seems to be at work in our Gospel text 

 

Let’s say that I am one of those Jerusalem Scribes

Now…we’re not just any scribes

We’re heavy hitters

Jerusalem…so like the Vatican;)…or Yale Divinity School

We’re that kind of Scribe

 

Of course…we…all of us Jerusalem heavy-hitters 

We’ve heard about Jesus’ doings

His healings, and teachings, and demon-ousting

But, I mean…on the Sabbath!

AND…on behalf of THOSE people!

 

What he is doing is totally undermining our authority

Right when we are about to publish our 

Much anticipated volume of theological wisdom

Not to mention that we received a hefty advance 

That we spent on some upgrades to the Temple library.

 

This Jesus must be wrong

He simply must be operating under an UNGODLY Power

The power of Beelzabul

Because…Its HIM or US

And it’s NOT us! 

 

Maybe you noticed this small detail

The Jerusalem Scribes have come

Jesus knows why

And the text says:

He called them to him…and spoke to them in parables

 

Parables are not straight up questions or answers
it’s a way of teaching that makes the learner work for it

They need time to soak in 

I might be wrong

But I sense that Jesus is loving them…hoping that they will open themselves to seeing differently.

Mark leaves us hanging

They have received the teaching

Will those scribes walk back to Jerusalem more certain than ever…digging in their heels

OR

Will the parable create a crack in their certainty?

 

Now, let’s say we are part of Jesus’ family…his blood family

 

We’ve been hearing all the buzz too

The healings and exorcisms and compelling teaching

But we’ve also heard that some people

Powerful people…people you don’t want to mess with…

are scandalized by what he is doing

 

We are thinking he is so hyper-focused that he doesn’t notice 

This creeping danger

He isn’t eating…he isn’t’ sleeping…

Why is he not taking precautions?

 

I think we need to protect him

We need to do a little damage control

We need to save him from himself

Not to mention how this is beginning to affect us!

We are’rightfully’ scared of being caught up in all this!

We are ‘rightfully’ scared of being shunned!

 

And what about Jesus’ blood family?

If they overheard Jesus asking those crowded inside the house

“Who is my mother and my brother?”

And then

“Behold…all of you…whoever might do the will of God 

is brother, sister, mother to me”

 

Did they turn around…and start for home full of anger?

Were they startled, confused?

Were they beginning to re-examine their certainties?

… their motivations?

Were they thinking: 

“We thought for sure we were doing the WILL of God”

…were we?

 

The problem as I see it

Is that the “WILL OF GOD” is notoriously tricky to define.

Bottom line for the Jesus of Marks Gospel

Moral perfection is not the goal…nor is it possible

Nobody is a hero in this Gospel

But everyone is loved

Discipleship is tough, hard, demanding

 

And what is Jesus’ answer

In the midst of all these questions and confusion

 

Follow

Just follow

Hang in there and follow

 

Its as easy and as hard as that

 

I am comforted just by bering here

Being here is a sign that we are still following

Through those doors

And onto these pews

And into this family…

 

This…we…are a WILL OF GOD family

Not perfect

But we absolutely belong

 

May 26, 2024 - Holy Trinity Year B

Isaiah 6:1-8
Romans 8:12-17
John 3:1-17

A month or two ago
I gave a homily
And after Morning Prayer ended

Charlie came up to me and said:

“Well…that was…complicated!”

 

And he was right. I was infatuated with my head!

I was putting too much stock in a certain kind of knowing.

 

The feast of the Holy Trinity

Given that it is the only Sunday dedicated to a doctrine

Naturally leans toward the head…toward engaging head kind of knowing

But…

[Thank you Charlie]

Let’s approach this a different way.

 

No solving

No explaining

Instead let’s dig into our own experience

In search of the truth about our Trinitarian God!

 

The first reading from Isaiah

Is his…Isaiah’s call story

The lectionary committee probably chose it 

for its vivid images and other-worldly language 

 

I love that bit about of the hem of God’s robe

Just a piece…a little corner… of his hem would fill the Temple!

Remember…the temple = 25 football fields! 

 

And the Psalm uses Water, Thunder, Wind and Fire to speak of God’s power and might

 

Question:

How many of you have experienced the greatness, and majesty…

The out-of-this worldness of God?

(seriously, raise your hands)

 

The beauty of the natural world does this to us…doesn’t it?

The whole phenomenon of the eclipse

The sheer vastness of an ocean

The perspective from being on top of a mountain and taking in the panorama

A couple of weeks ago I was talking to an old friend who lives outside of Nashville and I could barely hear her for all the cicadas.

After I hung up…I’m wondering, 

How do the Cicadas know when 17 years has passed?
What I learned was that kind of experience

THe life of the humble cicada…pointed to the creativity and awesomeness of God!

 

That’s one way of nibbling around the mystery of God.

 

 

In our reading from Paul’s letter to the Romans

It seems to me that Paul is getting at the other side of Majesty and Awe.

Paul is pointing to God’s closeness and tenderness and companionship

We are adopted by God

Invited to call God “Abba”/Daddy

Paul wants us to hear God saying “You…you…belong to me”

 

How many of us have experienced the closeness…the intimacy of God?

Like you could feel God’s breath on your skin?

A time when God was so near.

 

For me…the sign is tears. I tear up.

Maybe I am deliberately praying…maybe not.

But that companionship

Its that feeling when I am alone but I don’t feel alone.

 

These experiences witness to the fact that we know

We know

Not primarily in our minds

But in our bodies and memories

We know about the majesty and greatness of God

And we know the nearness and friendship of God

 

We have two out of three…one more

Nicodemus

I like Nicodemus…I can relate to Nicodemus

I am befuddled too

 

As John’s gospel unfolds Nicodemus becomes less and less befuddled

It’s as if he needs time to move out of his head

 

The thing I have learned about John’s Gospel is that he poses Nicodemus over and against the woman at the well

They interpret each other

What Nic gets wrong

SHE gets right

 

They both encounter Jesus

But the woman has no barriers

What happened between them changes her life 

And she can’t help but tell everyone she meets

 

And from the Gospel we have

Wait…one more question:

How many of you have experienced the presence of: 

the love…the joy…Of God

In an encounter with another person?

A spouse…lover…friend…stranger???

For some reason it’s the memory of being reconciled with someone I have hurt that comes to mind.

But also…strangers

 

A couple months ago

I was helping out at the food pantry

…some of you might remember this…

But there was a man coming along the line

Collecting his items

And at each stop he gave a gift

He gave me two buckeyes

I’m from OHIO…I know about buckeyes

 

I have those two buckeyes in a little bowl on a side table

I see them every day

 

I think this man wanted to not just receive

But to offer

He wanted the food pantry to be a place of encounter

Which is so much more than a “giveaway”

 

I don’t know but I can see him

And seeing him

Helps me see others

And more specifically 

It helps me see the way God sees

 

 

 

So we have from Isaiah and Psalm --
the transcendence of God

The otherness…the over the top greatness of God

[God the Father]

 

And we have from Paul

The here and now companionship of God

[God the Son]

 

 

So Father

And Son

And

I’m going suggest that when we encounter God through the another person

That is the Holy Spirit at work.

 

So it is important

Without the majesty 

We would have to live without awe and wonder

 

Without tenderness and nearness

we’ll have to walk alone

bearing it all

living as if I don’t need any help

 

without the Holy Spirit

I will fail to see the gifts others have to offer

right before my eyes

 

And all of that matters

All of that grounds

How I live and move and relate

All of that sustains me

 

 

 

 

April 28, 2024 - 5EasterB - Simple AND Hard

5EasterB
1 John 4:7-21
John 15:1-8

ABIDING

Is the theme of the day

 

We heard it in the First letter of John 

As well as in the Gospel 

ABIDE…ABIDING

What does this mean?

 

Chapter 15

We are nearing the end of John’s Gospel

This is the farewell discourse

Jesus is saying goodbye

He is preparing the disciples

offering comfort

AND we hear abide
The vine and the branches abide 

 

And in the 1^st Letter of John

We are hearing

A distillation

A kind of mission statement for Christian living

Abide

 

YOU, ME, ABIDE, ABIDING, LOVE, NEIGHBOR

 

About 10-15 years ago 

hype about Mission Statements

Everyone was writing or rewriting mission statements

My old parish spent a whole month crafting a Mission Statement!

Somehow I was on that committee!

 

What I remember 

a study of mission statements.

Turned out that the most successful corporate mission statements 

were all under 8 words

And one of the most successful 

Was from Disney:

Can you guess?

3 words

MAKE. PEOPLE. HAPPY.

 

Sounds simple

But in fact 

Its tons of work

Takes years

Takes the whole darn organization to live into those words:

Make People Happy

 

Its simple…but HARD

 

That’s what is behind this language in the first letter of John

It a kind of mission statement

 

In verse 1 

We love because God loved us first

God loved us into being

So any time we actually do love our brother/sister

Its God’s doing!

The whole abiding thing is working

 

Its not an automatic

If A then B follows 

Not a cause and effect… kind of thing 

Its dynamic…organic…not a straight line

More circular

It’s a happening

 

God’s love

Finds its PERFECTION

Or its COMPELTION

In how we love one another

 

And this has something to do with ABIDING

 

I don’t know much about Vineyards

And vinedressers

And pruning for fruitfulness

 

But I do know that what Jesus is talking about 

In the Gospel

Is a promise 

He is promising his LIFE to his disciples 

And from them to us

 

I think if there had been such a thing as heart surgery

In the first century

Jesus might have used that image 

instead of the whole vine and branches business

 

How many of you…
Stents, heart valves, Cath Lab, Heart attack???

I thought so;)

 

… over the past couple of weeks 3 people in my sphere of relationships

Have experienced cardiac events

 

I bet we are all more familiar with Stents and heart surgery 
than we are with vines, vineyards and pruning;). 

 

Being attached to the vine speaks to sharing nutrients…sharing life

But think about those clogged up arteries 

Blood is being constricted, cut off 

Blood = Life…life blood… 

And the surgeon borrows another artery
from a place in the body where it can be spared

And hooks it up to bypass the clog

Like a perimeter highway around a big city

 

And the heart and the rest of the body

Re-establish their abiding rhythm

 

What is the beating heart all by itself?

It is perfected

When it reaches our eyes…so we can see

And feet…so we can walk

And hands so we can touch

And muscles so we can embrace

 

God’s love (the heart of the matter…the vine)

is perfected when it gives life to the body (the branches)

when that body…

when our bodies…

see, walk, touch, embrace
the world lovingly
lovingly…because it is God’s life blood we are talking about

 

We have a lot of memories stuffed up here

And I have been noticing

That there has been a kind or natural cataloguing going on

The weightier ones seem to get more accessible

And the lighter ones recede until I just can’t recall them at all.

So that when I say

“I just can’t remember anything anymore”

That’s not quite true

Some things…maybe only a few… are becoming very vivid

 

Mid 70’s Dad story

 

Looking back now

I can say with some certainty

that this was my parents’ Mission Statement
8 words:

“HERE, home, is a safe/loving/forgiving place”

 

IT’s simple…but hard.

 

Maybe part of why this memory is so vivid

Is because I later connected it to my parents faith 

and then to mine

 

After hearing all this Love/God/Abiding business

Over and over again

I began to trust that at the heart of it all

These were mission statements

I wanted to attach myself to

 

 

Coming here

Praying these particular prayers

Proclaiming these particular lessons

Singing these particular hymns

Standing together 

Forming a body

as we do these things

 

IT quite literally FEELS

like a mission statement

One that is both simple and hard

 

God is Love

Abide in that love

Perfecting it…in loving others

 

Simple and hard

 

The YOU

in our Gospel reading is plural

We don’t fly solo

We are supported be each other

…and that mysterious body we call the People of God

 

5 days ago

I got home from Dad’s 

That the tables have turned

Its my mission now

…to be a safe, loving, undemanding presence to him as he slips away

Little by little.

 

It actually felt like he was ABIDING in me.

 

 

One way to bring this

Beyond lofty abstraction

Is to ask a few simple questions

Ask ourselves individually and also ask ourselves as a community:

Who will I/We invite into that abiding place…

Who will I/We invite into that best part of myself…that best part of us

That part

That flows with the life of God

The part that rests in the communion of the Holy Spirit

The part nourished by love of neighbor (…by you)

 

Who will I/we offer safety, and forgiveness, and compassion to

in actions that are the fruit of all that love?