The Scorn of the Indolent Rich Proper 9B

 The Scorn of the Indolent Rich

Mark chapter six comes right after chapter five. Now that may seem obvious to us, but we must keep in mind that all chapter and verse designations in the Bible are largely arbitrary and are there only to aid us in studying and analyzing the texts. And that storyteller Mark as editor of the gospel could have placed this story of Jesus going home to teach in his hometown Nazareth, on the Sabbath in some other part of the story, but chose to put it right after several healing stories: 1) healing a man possessed by demons in Gentile territory, 2) a woman who had suffered a flow of blood for twelve years, and 3) the twelve year-old daughter of Jairus, a leader in a synagogue, who was believed by many to be dead. All this involved two trips in a boat across the Sea of Galilee. Many people, Jews and Gentiles alike, were radically amazed at their encounters with Jesus. And yet, as he told the woman, it was not him, but her faith that made her well. Her ragged determination against so many obstacles to try, perhaps as a last resort, to just touch the hem of Jesus’s garment, believing that that may finally grant her some of God’s mercy and relief. Perseverance furthers equals faith, hope, and charity. 

After all of that, storyteller Mark tells us that Jesus goes home to Nazareth, a small village of Jews amidst some Gentile settlements west of the Sea of Galilee. As he goes to the synagogue on the Sabbath, as he has done throughout the first six chapters of Mark, he teaches. People know who he is: the Son of Mary. Again, that may strike us as obvious, but the normal practice would be to say that he was Yeshua ben Joseph, the son of Joseph. Mark, however, has already told one and all in the opening verse of his Good News that this Yeshua is the Son of God. After first being “astounded” at his teaching, it seems the neighbors among whom he grew up are having none of that. Isn’t this, they say, ‘“the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him.”’ This guy is just one of us. Who does he think he is? [i] 

Imagine. After perfect strangers on both sides of the Sea were amazed at his presence among them, and the astonishing fact that he would bring God’s mercy, compassion and love to people as different as a demon possessed man chained up in a tomb, a ritually impure woman with a flow of blood, and an elite community leader like Jairus, the people who know him better than anyone else are offended at whatever it was he was saying that Sabbath morning in his hometown! Perhaps to indicate to those of us pondering these texts just how absurd this is, Jesus shrugs it off as just another day at the office for prophets in Israel throughout the ages, and storyteller Mark offers this hilarious aside: “And he could do no deed of power there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and cured them.” That’s all! He just brought God’s mercy, love and compassion to a few sick people! And now, we are told, it is Jesus who is astounded, we might say radically amazed, at his friend’s and neighbor’s unbelief. 

I believe I can speak for myself and any number of my colleagues in ordained ministry in Christ’s One Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, had we had a Sunday morning like Jesus had in his hometown, we would most likely spend the next week or two commiserating with one another, or making an appointment with the bishop or a spiritual director to figure out what to do next. Not Jesus! He is immediately off to teach in other villages, evidently practicing what he is about to teach his disciples whom he sends off two by two to preach the Good News, giving them authority over unclean spirits, to cast out demons, and bring people to a new sense of wholeness grounded in God’s mercy, love and compassion for one and all. But, if they are to be rebuffed as he had been at home, to shake the dust of their sandals and move on to the next village! A gesture, which later Jewish texts suggest, was customary for Jews returning to the Holy Land from visiting pagan territories so as not to bring back even a particle of “uncleanness” with them. [ii] 

In this instance, it is possible to construe that the disciples would be consigning those communities that had rejected the Good News to the unclean demonic world. Which may sound primitive and even bizarre to us “moderns,” unless we were to understand that for storyteller Mark, demons are often understood as allies of Rome, and diseases as foes that seek to weaken the body of Israel. With this understanding, it is possible to see those in the gospels who are blind or unable to speak as maladies caused by the subjugation to the foreign Empire of Caesar, he who would be God, and of Rome. In this light, Jesus and his disciples can be seen as trying to help others see and speak out against the injustices, lies, and violence of those who would occupy and rule the land of their ancestors. Jesus instructs his disciples to work with urgency to speak out and act on God’s desire for health, wholeness and happiness for all people. [iii] 

As Archbishop Desmond Tutu, in the struggle against just such a brutal and unjust empire of Apartheid often said, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.” 

Or, listen to the psalmist in Psalm 123 who concludes, “Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy, for we have had more than enough of contempt / Too much of the scorn of the indolent rich, and of the derision of the proud.”?  The “indolent rich” often being those who make concessions to and become allies and perpetrators of the empire. Empire, which is never viewed as a good thing in the Bible. Pharaoh, Babylon and many of the kings of Israel are repeatedly chastised by prophets like Jesus, often not ending well for the prophets themselves. Yet, their pronouncements are preserved to inform future generations of what God and his Son, Jesus, expect of those of us who follow Christ in terms of loving our neighbors.   

It does not take much textual analysis or imagination to see where Mark is propelling the story, and its meaning for us today. Jesus demands our urgency in preaching the Good News and caring for others. All others. It does not take much analysis on our part to imagine what Jesus would think of the recent decision to criminalize homelessness by our Supreme Court; rather than treat the causes of homelessness, create more affordable housing, and treat our fellow citizens with the care, mercy, compassion and love Jesus instructs all of us who would be his disciples to do. Like the woman with the flow of blood and Jairus the leader of the synagogue, we need the kind of faith that perseveres over any and all obstacles to freedom, wholeness and healing thru Christ. 

O God, you have taught us to keep all your commandments by loving you and our neighbor: Grant us the grace of your Holy Spirit, that we may be devoted to you with our whole heart, and united to one another with pure affection; for our common life depends on how we treat the least and most vulnerable living beside us. Amen.

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[i] Mark 6:1-13

[ii] Byrne, Brendan, A Costly Freedom (Liturgical Press, Collegeville, MN:2008) p. 111 fn 5

[iii] Swanson, Richard W., Provoking the Gospel of Mark (Pilgrim Press, Cleveland:2005) p.190

Yoga On The Beach: $15

 Yoga On The Beach: $15 

The monetization of Yoga.

The commodification of Meditation.

The weaponizing of holy scriptures. 

Where are we? 

These used to be free.

Passed on from one generation

To the next.

 These practices were

  Rituals

  A way

  A path 

Towards

  Realization

  Awareness

  Inner space

  Authenticity 

From self to selflessness

Rather than a capitulation to Ayn Rand’s

  Self interest

Rather than another commodity to purchase

Rather than another rung on a ladder 

Leading to nowhere

Instead of being here

Instead of being free

  To just be 

-Bethany Beach, 06/22/24

Thoughts while running on the Boardwalk in Bethany early in the morning....

Refuge for All: If not now, when?

 Refuge For All: If not now, when?           

“With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it.” 

At first glance, a series of three parables in Mark chapter 4 might appear to be about seeds, how to sow them, an important reminder that it is the Lord God who does the growing, and then there is the mustard seed. A tiny seed that becomes a great bush or tree in which the birds of the air may take refuge. Refuge. A safe place from the chaos and ravages of the world around us. Shelter from the storms that surround us. From the Latin, refugium: literally, a place to flee to; a place to seek asylum or shelter. The mustard seeds are the Gospel: The Good News of Jesus Christ. 

Speaking of a cedar tree, rather than a mustard seed bush or tree, the prophet Ezekiel imagines that it is the role of the people of God like a cedar to provide refuge: “Under it [the cedar] every kind of bird will live; in the shade of its branches will nest winged creatures of every kind. All the trees of the field shall know that I am the Lord.” [Ezekiel 17:22-24] 

Ezekiel repeats the metaphor in chapter 31: “All the birds of the air made their nests in its boughs; under its branches all the animals of the field gave birth to their young, and in its shade all great nations/peoples lived.”[Ezekiel 31:6]  The word translated nations is goyim, which in Hebrew simply means non-Jews. People different than us. 

There is consensus that Jesus takes the cedar metaphor of Ezekiel a step further in speaking of a  mustard bush instead. Which bush is highly invasive. It knows no boundaries. It is capable of taking over an entire field. In which it is very much like the Holy Spirit, that comes from we know not where, and takes us we know not where. We don’t have to do anything to make God’s kingdom grow – we sow the seeds, we go to sleep, and we awake to its bounteous yield – many refuges for all kind of birds and animals. And people. Every kind of person. 

All of this imagery is meant to help us imagine the nature and character of God’s kingdom, and the role of a godly nation, or the community of Love, the Body of Christ, the Church, among all the other peoples of the Earth: to be a refuge and blessing to all the peoples of the Earth. Amidst the uncertain storms that surround us on all sides, we are being called to be a refuge, a place of safety and asylum, for others – emphatically, all kind of others; all others; no ifs, ands or buts. 

And where do we find ourselves? At the bank on Friday, I learned that the bank will be closed on Wednesday to observe Juneteenth – recalling June 19^th, 1865 when Union General Gordon Granger finally announced the emancipation of the estimated 250,000 slaves in Texas – 900 days after the Emancipation Proclamation went into effect, 61 days after Lee’s surrender, and 24 days after the formal surrender of the Confederate War Department. The result of Granger’s announcement was annual Jubilees, reflecting the Biblical Jubilee years when all land and slaves were freed as a reminder that all of us and all that we have belongs to God. Juneteenth is now a Federal Holiday. And of course, it is controversial among those who claim a desire to maintain “traditional Christian/Biblical values.” Never mind the celebrations are inspired by the Bible itself. [Leviticus 25:8-13] Of course some folks just don’t like Juneteenth, let alone the racial integration of society, and refuse to participate – although getting a day off as a Federal Holiday is often something most will accept. For many families, however, for over 159 years, Juneteenth has been a refuge and an important reminder of God’s desire for all people to be free. 

We also get these parables about offering refuge and safety to all persons during Pride Month for the LGBTQ+ communities throughout the country. The idea for Pride parades and eventually Pride month began after the Stonewall riots in New York City in 1969 – several days of activism seeking LGBTQ+ liberation beginning June 28^th that year.  I’ve know LGBTQ folks who have taken their own lives rather than bear the burden of being hated by so many self-righteous folks. I’ve officiated the wedding of two women, two dear friends and colleagues in proclaiming the Good News of Christ, after being told by my bishop just not to tell him I was going to do it. It is hard to reckon in the 21^st century that this community of loving, creative, productive people continue to suffer shame and humiliation just for being who they are. Seems the Mustard Seed Bush is still not big enough for us all yet. That such hate persists causes me to question whether my 40 plus years of ministry has really helped sow the seeds of safety and freedom for all? 

Then there is a continued war on Women – specifically on their reproductive health rights, but also formal “movements” and graduation speeches seeking to send them back from living productive lives outside the home to the kitchen where they are expected to be compliant baby-making machines. There’s the recent decision not to prohibit Bump Stocks that turn a semi-automatic rifle into a machine gun during the same week that the Parkland School is being torn down, Sandy Hook families are still looking for restitution from Alex Jones’s war on their community, and families in Uvalde, Texas, who are discovering just how many failures there were that led to their school children being slaughtered. There are the thousands of people from Central America who seek safety and asylum from the murderous and autocratic governments we, US Foreign Policy, chose to back decades ago, being routinely turned away with rhetoric that cannot be used in polite society. As Anti-Semitism and Anti-Israel hate rises, there are mobs of people on New York City subways threatening Jews to get off the train “before it’s too late.” 

Against this news of the past week, we hear Jesus join Ezekiel’s call for the proliferation of mustard seed bushes and trees to shelter all those who are in need of refuge and safety. Which is a lot of different kinds of people who look to us to be those people who care; who love our neighbors as we love our selves; who love the God who makes us all in God’s own image. 

The first parable of the Sower Sowing Seeds begins “Hear! Listen”, as in “Hear O Israel, the Lord your God is one; love the Lord your God with all your heart, and all your strength and all your mind.” Jesus tells his disciples “Let those who have ears hear!”; chapter 4 ends, “With many such parables he spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear it.” Evidently some folks have not heard. Or, choose not to listen. Even worse, there are elements across our nation and in our Nation’s capital, who work tirelessly to revoke the rights of different groups of people. All of whom deserve the safety and freedom. All the peoples. People of color. LGBTQ+ people. Women. Children. Refugees. Jews. People just want to live in safety. 

As I listen to Jesus, the words of Martin Niemöller, a German pastor during the Holocaust who was arrested and interned in a concentration camp: First, they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then, they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then, they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me. To which one might add, the words of Rabbi Hillel, if not now when. 

It feels like it is time to scatter lots of mustard seeds!

Where Are We? Proper 5B

 

Where Are We?

“Where are you?” asks the Lord God as he walks through the garden at the time of the evening breeze! Ah, how good that must feel. And yet, disappointing at the seeming absence of the man and the woman he had placed there. As one of the oldest stories in all of the Bible, no one ever reading this has ever thought for a moment that the Lord God has no idea whatsoever where they are. (note to self: Where are you? Is plural, not singular). I imagine those first telling this tale around a campfire before ever committing it to the written Word letting out a not-quite stifled chuckle as they tell the tale. For the question, we must assume, is for the couple, not for God. It is perhaps the most central question in the entire Bible: Where are we? Do we have any idea where we are? 

The comedy continues to unfold. They are hiding, not because they are naked. Not because they have disobeyed and eaten the fruit of the forbidden tree. And what a surprise! The man says, “She made me do it! The woman you gave me, it’s all her fault.” Gee, that’s novel. Where have we ever heard that before? The woman, however, is not much better. Her defense is that the serpent made her do it. If the Lord God is not laughing by now, he must be in tears. Almost as if to go along with the absurdity of it all, God chastises the serpent. Because…well why not. That is easily done, but still does not get to the heart of things. His question has yet to be answered. [i] 

The problem facing the couple in the garden is quite simple really. They have forgotten who they are. The serpent represented that if they ate from the forbidden tree they would become like God. That, of course, is a lie. In this world, many such lies try to seduce us into forgetting just who we are. And whose we are. In the Genesis story, all the way back in chapter 1, we are told that “female and male, we are made in the image of God.” That’s who we are created to be: God’s image, God’s living icons, God’s representatives in this world of tremendous fruitfulness. 

The question, “Where are you?” means to alert us that we left our essential being: we are God’s Beloved. As with his Son, Jesus, God is well pleased with us. Until we hide from God. And forget who we are. And just as importantly, whose we are! Thus, is the beginning of division. The serpent simply reminds us that there are always those wooing us, seducing us, to leave the space and responsibility of our imago Dei, our Belovedness, and to follow an alleged bigger and better dream. 

Yet, what dream can even begin to compete with our God-given tasks to build a friendly world, of friendly folks, beneath a friendly sky?   

God’s “Where are you?” echoes throughout the ages, throughout the Bible, throughout all of time. Indeed, where are we? The psalmist knows what the couple hiding in the garden know: “Out of the depths have I called to you, O Lord; Lord, hear my voice; let your ears consider well the voice of my supplication. If you, Lord, were to note what is done amiss, O Lord, who could stand?” [ii] There we go again. “If, you, O Lord, were to note what is done amiss?” Seriously, we lack any and all biblical imagination if we think for one minute, one second of one minute, God has no idea what has gone amiss amongst us! Despoiling the tree stands in for despoiling the environment, the ecology of God’s creaton. Trees are foundational and essential for life on planet Earth, our fragile, island home. Without trees we could not breathe. Without breath, we have no life. We die.

It is dying, perhaps, that lies at Paul’s concerns with the congregation in Corinth. Like the first couple in Genesis, the Corinthians have grown surly, divisive, dividing themselves into factions – they no longer preach the good news, says Paul, let alone live it. Perhaps ringing in Paul’s ears are those famed words of Jesus, attested in three of the four gospels, and quoted by Abraham Lincoln in a speech after he had received the Republican nomination to be the candidate for the US Senate from Illinois in 1858: “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect the house to fall—but I do expect it will cease to be divided.” [iii] Paul extends the “house” metaphor writing, “So we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure, because we look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen; for what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal. For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”[iv] Despite all division among God’s people, in Christ there is still the hope for a future. A future we cannot see, but can trust it will be here. 

This points to another theme through the entire history of the Bible. For the word for house in New Testament Greek is oiko – the root for such words as oikologos, “ecology” the “house in which we live; and oikonomos, “economy – rules of the household.” The couple in the garden have divided themselves from God. The psalmist feels an intense separation from the love and mercy of the Lord God. The Corinthians have divided the community of Christ into factions, and worse. The Scribes try to drive a wedge, a division, between Jesus and his followers by claiming he is subject to the Prince of Demons. And the narrative is often construed to make us think Jesus is dividing himself against his own family. But that is not what he says or does. For the sake of his Father’s kingdom, he says all who “do the will of God” are included in his own family. A family that came to be only because a young woman named Mary, and an older gentleman named Joseph, accepted the challenge of letting the will of God determine their future. A future that, as Paul has suggested, we cannot yet see, but which will not pass away as so many other of our divisions and allegiances will, but rather is, and always will be, eternal.

Indeed, where are we? Where do we find ourselves fitting into the Dream of God that all divisions shall cease? Where do we find ourselves today? As a people? As a nation? As God’s Beloved Community in this world? A world torn, and re-torn every day by one more division so that some serpent can slither up to us and at worst lead us into temptation, and at best cause us to hide from the steadfast love and mercy of God altogether out of guilt. 

A Prayer from Howard Thurman that seems to sum up the Word of God give to us this day:

Our Father, fresh from the world, with the smell of life upon us, we make an act of prayer in the silence of this place.  Our minds are troubled because the anxieties of our hearts are deep and searching.  We are stifled by the odor of death which envelopes our earth, where in so many places brother fights against brother.  The panic of fear, the torture of insecurity, the ache of hunger, all have fed and rekindled ancient hatreds and long-forgotten memories of old struggles, when the world was young and Thy children were but dimly aware of Thy Presence in the midst.  For all this, we seek forgiveness.  There is no one of us without guilt and, before Thee, we confess our sins: we are proud and arrogant; we are selfish and greedy; we have harbored in our hearts and minds much that makes for bitterness, hatred and revenge. 

While we wait in Thy Presence, search our spirits and grant to our minds the guidance and the wisdom that will teach us the way to take, without which there can be no peace and no confidence anywhere.  Teach us how to put at the disposal of Thy Purposes of Peace the fruits of our industry, the products of our minds, the vast wealth of our land and the resources of our spirit.  Grant unto us the courage to follow the illumination of this hour to the end that we shall not lead death to any man’s door; but rather may we strengthen the hands of all in high places, and in common tasks seek to build a friendly world, of friendly men & women, beneath a friendly sky.  This is the simple desire of our hearts which we share with Thee in thanksgiving and confidence. [v] Amen.

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[i] Genesis 3:8-15

[ii] Psalm 30

[iii] Mark 3:25; Matthew 12:25; Luke 11:17; Illinois Republican State Convention, Springfield, Illinois June 16, 1858

[iv] 2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1

[v] Thurman, Howard, The Centering Moment (Friends United Press, Richmond, IN: 2007)

Radical Amazement Part 2 Proper 4B

 Radical Amazement Part 2

Each morning, I get up, I stretch, I get out and drive to my outdoor gym about five miles up the road. I cross the old B&O train tracks into Historic Sykesville, the oldest continuous-running track in America. Some mornings, however, the lights are flashing, and an early morning train rumbles through. Often it will be a long line of coal hoppers filled up over the top, car after car after car, headed to south Baltimore from where it gets shipped out around the world. 

Not long ago, in the early 20^th century we thought The Milky Way was the entire universe, until Edwin Hubble photographed the Andromeda galaxy, 2.5 million light years away. Since then, we have captured images up to 12, 13, almost 14 million light years away. Light that stretched all those billion of years ago still traveling to where we can see it. I once read that to imagine how many stars are in the known universe, to think of these coal hopper cars passing by at the rate of one per second, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Instead of coal they are filled with grains of sand. If each grain of sand represents a star, it would take three years for all the hoppers to pass by to represent the stars of the universe. That’s just one way of trying to grasp just how vast the still expanding universe is, in which our Milky Way is just one of millions of galaxies. [i] 

How do we even to begin to respond to information like this; images that have become part of our day-to day reality? With “Radical Amazement,” says Judy Cannato in her book of the same name. A phrase, she writes, that comes to us from the late Jewish scholar Abraham Joshua Heschel, who said “that wonder or radical amazement is the chief characteristic of a religious attitude toward life and the proper response to our experience of the divine.” [ii] 

Take the boy Samuel who is “ministering to the Lord” with the elder and failing prophet Eli. [iii] We are told that Eli’s vision is dimming. The Word of the Lord no longer comes to him, largely because his sons were blaspheming the Lord. They would not get to take up their father’s important role in the community of God’s people. It is nighttime and the boy Samuel is asleep. Suddenly he is awakened, “Samuel, Samuel.” He jumps up, cries, “Here am I,” and goes to wake up Eli. Eli says go back to sleep. I did not call you. They are sleeping in the Temple, where the Ark of the covenant resides! It happens again. The boy is sent back to bed again. The third time Eli understands what is up. “Go back to sleep, and if the voice calls you again, it is the Lord. Respond, ‘Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.’” Sure enough, the fourth time Samuel says, “Speak, Lord, your servant is listening.” The boy learns that the house of Eli is finished. 

Samuel does not want to tell Eli what the Lord had said, but Eli insists that he must, or suffer an even worse fate than he himself is going to. Samuel tells him everything. Eli confirms that this is the Word and will of the Lord. From that moment on, the Lord was with Samuel, letting no word from the boy “fall to the ground.” As he grew into this prophetic role, he was known to be a trustworthy prophet of the Lord. Try to imagine the wonder. Try to imagine the radical amazement for that young boy! Who learns from Eli that we are to listen, not speak. We are to invite the Lord to speak. For when we listen to the Lord, we too will be radically amazed! 

Centuries later, Jesus’s disciples are gathering a meal from an open field. The custom in Israel, by commandment of the Lord, was not to harvest the corners of a field, nor harvest two rows along the road, so that travelers, resident aliens, and wayfarers passing through the land might grab a bite to eat. This is where the expression, “Don’t cut the corners,” comes from. It is the Sabbath – a day of rest. Some Pharisees, doctors of the Law, stewards of God’s commandments, take note and want to know why Jesus allows them to gather the grains for a meal. Jesus, demonstrating his command of Holy Writ, reminds them that when David and his companions were hungry, he went into the Temple, took the bread of the Presence of God, which was only for the Temple priests, and shared it with his friends. Jesus then declares, “The Sabbath was made for humankind, not humankind for the Sabbath. And guess what else? I am the Lord of the Sabbath!” [iv] But that’s not all. Jesus and his companions enter a synagogue where there is a man with a withered hand. Ha! Think the Pharisees. If he heals him, we can accuse him of working on the Sabbath! Not even God works on the Sabbath! But Jesus does nothing. He simply asks the man to stretch out his hand. And he does! No doubt everyone but the Pharisees were radically amazed. No one more so than the man himself! He just stretched out his own hand! The Pharisees say nothing, but go off to join with some Herodians to plan how they might put an end to this man from Galilee. 

Then there is Paul, writing to the church in Corinth, a people who have become so full of themselves, somehow thinking that now that they are baptized they are better than anyone else. Paul reminds them, “It is not about us! It is not about you! It’s about Jesus. We proclaim Jesus, not ourselves, not the church, but Jesus! For it is the God who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,” who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.’” The God who set the vast and ever-expanding universe in motion gives us light so that we might shine, shine, shine God’s steadfast love upon others. All others! [v]

 Then Paul writes, “…this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be made visible in our bodies. For while we live, we are always being given up to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus may be made visible in our mortal flesh. So, death is at work in us, but life in you.” Thus, Servant Ministry, which is to be the outward focus and work of the Church, is born. Accepting God’s Light is meant to transform us into radically amazing servants of all God’s people, no matter who, no matter what. 

Finally, once again, there is Psalm 139. A psalm like no other. The psalmist asks for nothing, but simply expresses radical amazement at just how close God is to us from before time, before Creation to the present. The God who says, “Let there be light to shine in the darkness,” is with us, by us, and literally, writes the psalmist, woven into us from the very moment that sparked the Big Bang, throwing out a whirlwind of stars, like grains of sand in hopper cars cast to the far reaches of a universe we are only beginning to explore and understand. It is a known fact that ever fiber of our being, mind, body, and soul, is formed of stardust from those stars that have already died billions of years ago. We are those people who carry the life and light of that very first light into the future, empowering us to serve others, to serve the Lord, to listen for the Lord’s voice calling us to be his people. Like Samuel, like the man in the synagogue, we are called to stretch out our hands to others. This ought to be cause for our total and radical amazement every single moment of every single day of our lives, says Abraham Joshua Heschel!

May the Lord God, his Son, and his Holy Spirit open our ears to hear his Word this day.

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[i] Cannato, Judy, Radical Amazement, (Sorin Books, Notre Dame, IN: 2006), p.8

[ii] Ibid p.10

[iii] 1 Samuel 3:1-10(11-20)

[iv] Mark 2:23-3:6

[v] 2 Corinthians 4:5-12

We Work From Home! Ascension 2024

 

We Work From Home   Ascension 2024 

The Feast of the Ascension –forty-days after Easter, when we celebrate, as some wag put it, “the day Jesus began work from home.” As true as that may be, it would also seem to miss the main point of Ascension as a Church Celebration. As we might note, storyteller Luke gives us two versions of the story, one at the end of the gospel, and the other as the opening of volume two, the Book of the Acts of the Apostles. He does this, no doubt, so that we, you, me, any and all of us who are listening closely may notice that the story does not really have much if anything to do with Jesus’s departure from this fragile Earth our island home. It’s about those first disciples becoming apostles – those who are sent - to be witnesses as friends of Jesus. 

That is, they are to be witnesses to the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, and to be those friends of Jesus who continue to do the things he does, “and greater things than these”! So it is, that the end of Luke’s Gospel account begins with him reminding them “that everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and the psalms must be fulfilled.” He then proceeds to remind them what that means in practical terms: to love God, to love our neighbor as we love God, as God loves us and forgives us, and as we love ourselves. And oh yes! To love our enemies and those who don’t like us. Finally, they are to remain in the city, that is Jerusalem. 

“While he was blessing them, he withdrew from them and was carried up into heaven. And they worshiped him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy; and they were continually in the temple blessing God.” [Luke 24:44-53] That is, they did what he asked them to do, while awaiting a further anointing by the Holy Spirit ten days later on the Israelite festival of Pentecost. 

Then comes volume two. The title of that book tells us all we need to know: The Book of the Acts of the Apostles. It is a book filled with stories of just how they were baptized by the Holy Spirit, and the many things they did as witnesses and apostles. In Acts, storyteller Luke goes on to say that Jesus told them to fan out across the ancient world: “be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." [Acts 1:1-11] It’s important to remember that the Samaritans firmly believed their region of the land, their temple, and their understanding of what God asks of us to be the way, the truth and the life. Surely those early apostles were hesitant to go to Samaria. There was no love shared by Samaritans and Israelites. 

No doubt, it ought to strike us as challenging as well, to hear we are expected to reach out to those most unlike ourselves. That is, Jesus calls for a vast expansion of just who these neighbors we are meant to love as God loves us is to include. This remains our greatest challenge as Christ’s Body, the Church: to leave our comfort zone on Sunday mornings to fulfill what it means to follow Christ rarely fits into our daily to-do list. To often we have other interests, other priorities. 

The same was true on that day of Ascension as the disciples quickly change the topic: are you now going to restore the kingdom of Israel? No longer interested in what they are called to do, what can you do for us, they say. I don’t think we can begin to fully understand just how disappointing this would be for Jesus to hear. He is all about the kingdom of God his Father wants to be our future, and instead we want to go back to the way things used to be. Jesus shows great restraint and patience. Rather than chastise them for not getting just what he has been preparing them to do, he simply reminds them of their mission, blesses them, as he ascends out of their sight on a cloud. 

As they stand gazing up into the heavens there can be no doubt that like their companions James and John had demanded, they would rather go with Jesus to sit at his right-hand and his left-hand in God’s household of steadfast love and forgiveness. Why can’t we just get away from it all and go with him they think? In all fairness, most of us, if not all of us, feel that way from time to time. How great would it be to get away from it all! As Woody Guthrie famously sang during the Dust Bowl years, sometimes we feel like “I ain’t got no home in this world anymore.” The world as we once knew it, or at least how we think it had been, has simply moved on without us. Like the disciples, we stand gazing up at the heavens, yearning to return to the past. In truth, those days were never as good as we would like to think. At least nowhere near anything like the kingdom of God Jesus calls not only to embrace, but to actively bring to others – especially to those utterly unlike ourselves. 

Enter stage right, two men in white robes who are suddenly standing beside us asking the pivotal question in Luke’s story of Ascension: "Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up toward heaven?” Followers of Jesus, his Body, the Church, why are you standing around gazing up into the heavens? Wish you were somewhere else? Wish you could just leave this place and be carried away and disappear among the clouds? Do you want to go back to the days of old? Why, indeed! 

At the end of the day, the story Luke tells is all about us. Like the disciples, we are meant to stay where we are in our Jerusalem. God’s kingdom is not somewhere else. It is meant to be planted, unfold, and grow right here and right now. If this world no longer feels like home, Jesus calls us to follow him to make the world new in the image of God’s kingdom. To make it the home that God has intended all along – a friendly place, with friendly folks, beneath a friendly sky. 

A friend once said, “All sickness is homesickness.” The African bishop, the Blessed Augustine, wrote in his confessions, “Our hearts are restless until we find our home in Thee.” This is where the kingdom of God’s steadfast love is meant to take hold and grow into our real home: in our hearts. Our true home. Christians are fond of saying that Pentecost is the birthday of the Church – the Church that is meant to be the first outpost of God’s kingdom for which Jesus gave his all. But the true birth of the Church is on that fortieth day after the resurrection as he leaves us on our own to continue the work he does, and greater things than these. Everything necessary for the birth of God’s kingdom has been given to us in Christ. As he leaves to work from home, he trusts us to continue to remake this world into a new kind of kingdom, a new kind of home for all. 

Christ says, “I came to serve others, not to be served.” His true home is in our hearts and in the things we do and say. Our acts as apostles. The real truth is that he never really leaves us. We simply forget he is here. “I am with you always, to the end of the age,” he says. [Matthew 28:20] He does not leave us altogether, but he does entrust us to continue the work of taking his Father’s kingdom to the ends of the earth, serving others as he served all others. Serving the Christ that is in all creation from the beginning: Christ in every person, every creature, every rock, river, tree, flower, and ocean. When our home is in Christ, wherever we are, we work from home. Just like he does! Amen.

Filled With the Joy of God's Love Easter 6B

 

Filled With the Joy of God’s Love  Easter 6B

We hear echoes of Maundy Thursday with John’s focus on foot-washing and an astonishing new commandment to love one another as Jesus has loved us. We also hear echoes of Pentecost, with the depiction of an equally astonishing and unexpected outburst of the Holy Spirit amongst Gentiles, who were, up until that moment, considered the quintessential outsiders. As Jesus said one night to Nicodemus, like the wind, the spirit comes from we know not where, and goes we know not where – and it astonishes us right where we are when it comes! 

We are still at the Last Supper in John. After washing everyone’s feet, Jesus commissions the disciples saying, “You are no longer servants, rather you are my friends.” It is possible to mistake this as admission to an exclusive club with new rights and privileges. We are friends of Jesus, too, we might say. Look at us and be jealous, we might think – if not aloud, at least to ourselves. Yet, to do so misses the two-edged sword that is the Word of God – the Word that was with God, the Word that was God, the Word at the beginning. 

This friendship with Jesus means to fold us into the Body of Christ, the Christ who comes to dwell among us as one who serves, not one to be served. To serve others with God’s steadfast love for all humanity. To seek and serve Christ in all others. We are to serve all, not some, not many, surely not a few, but all others, loving our neighbor as ourselves – as we would like to be served. 

It ought to strike us, if it has not already, the astonishing irony of John’s story of the Last Supper. Jesus commissions us to be his friends so that his “joy may be in [us], and so [our] joy may be complete,” overflowing from our lives into the lives of others – all others. Jesus is filled with joy despite the fact John tells us, “Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart from this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end” (John 13:1). And yet he remains filled with joy, commissioning those who wish to follow him to go into the world as those who wish to serve others, not be served by others. Such love for one another, such seeking to serve Christ in all persons, is the source of the same joy that fills the Risen Christ; this is an astonishing assertion as he steadfastly walks out of that supper, one step at a time, to carry his cross to Calvary, Golgotha, the Place of the Skull. 

It’s as if, in those final moments with those who are now to be his friends, Jesus has embodied the Psalmist’s call: “Sing to the Lord a new song, for he has done marvelous things…. Shout with joy to the Lord, all you lands; lift up your voice, rejoice, and sing…. Let the sea make a noise and all that is in it, the lands and those who dwell therein. Let the rivers clap their hands, and let the hills ring out with joy before the Lord, when he comes to judge the earth.” Jesus imagines a new world unfolding from the events that are to follow that Last Supper. Jesus imagines his friends will now continue in the midst of God’s work: not only the judgment of the world, with all its foibles, problems, and troubles but also the renewal and repair of a broken world, as we become the Body of Christ, bringing his joy of service to others as a new reality for all people! Sing to the Lord a new song, indeed! 

If this strikes us as astonishing beyond all knowing and all possibility, today’s Word means to remind us that these first friends of Jesus were astonished as well. We hear about Peter, who, prior to the events of today’s reading, has had a perplexing vision of what singing to the Lord a new song was to be about. As he is praying, he is hungry. The Lord shows him a vision of all manner of creatures to eat that are not Kosher and says, “Get up, Peter; kill and eat.” Peter says three times, “No, I have never eaten such things.” We are meant to remember that this is Peter, who had denied even knowing Jesus three times. Peter, whom Jesus asks three times, “Do you love me?” Peter who says, “Yes, Lord, you know I love you.” Peter, to whom Jesus says, “Tend my sheep, feed my flock, seek and serve me in all people!” 

As Peter emerges from this vision, Cornelius, a centurion, sends men to bring him to his home, where Peter is faced with a house filled with Gentiles, those quintessential outsiders, who want to hear about the Word that had come to dwell among us, with God’s steadfast love for all creation. They want to hear of the God to whom even the hills and the rivers and the seas and the lands and all who dwell therein want to sing a new song, a joy-filled song! They long to hear and join the song that declares a renewed world that fears the Lord and desires to enter into his new command to love one another, even as Jesus did, marching toward pain. 

Peter begins to speak, and lo and behold! The same spirit that had come upon the disciples in an upper room on Pentecost, that same spirit that turned them into evangelists who could speak about God’s steadfast love in Christ Jesus in ways that people from all corners of the earth could understand, that same spirit showed up! Peter begins, “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every people anyone who fears him and practices righteousness is acceptable to him. You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ—he is Lord of all.” 

And then it happens. The Holy Spirit comes upon these quintessential outsiders, and suddenly they, too, are extolling God in ways that anyone could understand! Peter and his Jewish, Christ-following friends of Jesus stare in disbelief. So that’s what the vision was all about, he must have been thinking. These are not just words I am speaking. God really, truly does not show any partiality whatsoever! And so, what could they do, but baptize this house filled with Gentiles? They would spend the next few days together, filled with the joy of Jesus, with God’s steadfast love for all persons: male and female, Jew and Roman, slave and free. All divisions would need to cease because the repair of the broken world had begun! 

God’s Word on this day means to ask us: Do we accept Jesus’ invitation to become his friends? Do we wish to be served, like the people of this age? Or do we wish to serve? Do we wish to serve even those who are most unlike us, as Peter and the friends of Jesus do? Are we ready to be as astonished as they were that day in the centurion’s house to discover that God loves even those most unlike us in every single way? Do we wish to be filled to overflowing with the joy of Jesus, a joy that seeks and serves the Christ in others, all others, no matter what? 

Of course, we do! We are those people, like the writer of the First Letter of John, who know the pervasive reality of God’s love in Christ Jesus, who, though he was leaving this world to return to the household of God’s steadfast love, has made us his friends. We have been made new. We are those people who seek to sing a new song to the Lord our God. We seek to join the chorus of all creation who joyfully sing of the transforming love of God in Christ Jesus. We are those people who have seen and believed the transforming love of God in the death and resurrection of his Son. Alleluia! Christ is Risen! The Lord is risen, indeed! Alleluia!