The Ekklesia Project

Jacob, Despite Jacob

2011-07-08T05:14:00.000-07:00

by Jake Wilson
In Preaching and Reading the Lectionary: A Three-Dimensional Approach to the Liturgical Year, O. Wesley Allen Jr. advocates for a what he calls a cumulative preaching strategy that focuses more on the sweep of a year’s worth of preaching than any one particular sermon. As Allen explains “all pastors know (or at least hope), deep in their hearts, that the great power of preaching lies less in the individual sermon and more in the cumulative effect of preaching week in and week out to the same congregation, to the same community of believers, doubters and seekers…sermons offered Sunday after Sunday, month after month, year after year weave together to have an immeasurable cumulative influence on individuals’ and the congregation’s understanding of God, self, and the world.” (ix) To that end, Allen examines the patterns of the lectionary and the way the lectionary can be used a whole year at a time.
Viewed from this cumulative perspective, this week’s reading from Genesis continues a story in progress. During the second Sunday of Pentecost we find ourselves climbing Mount Moriah with Abraham and Isaac wondering how the covenantal promise of Genesis 15 will survive the command that Abraham sacrifice his son Isaac. In the 3rd week of Pentecost the lectionary continues the story of the covenantal promise of God as we move from the near death of Isaac in Genesis 22 to Genesis 24 where Isaac marries Rebekah. Through their life together the promise will continue its slow march through history. Following their marriage, the lectionary leaps forward twenty years bringing us quickly to the birth of Esau and Jacob with a story that foreshadows the rocky road this covenantal promise will have to travel. Next week in Genesis 28:13-15 God will confirm the continuation of the promise through Jacob despite the means through which he has procured the family birth right and blessing. In these varied and seemingly ad hoc selections, God and God’s covenant with Abraham remain the central theme that runs throughout.

The genealogical data of vss. 19-20 serve to alert the reader to the truth that in Genesis 25.19 we join a story in progress. By reminding us of the family and place of origin of both Isaac and his wife Rebekah the text gives us our first hint that this is the story of God’s promise to Abraham. The promise runs into trouble immediately. In vs. 21a twenty years have passed since the marriage of Isaac and Rebekah and their inability to produce an heir introduces our first source of tension into the reading. Isaac prays for Rebekah and an heir and the tension is seemingly relieved by vs. 21b when God responds to Isaac’s prayer. “And the LORD granted his prayer and his wife Rebekah conceived.” However, this pregnancy does not resolve the sense of anxiety about the future but actually serves to heighten the conflict in the text as we find that the pregnancy is troubled. As the babies jostle within her Rebekah finds herself in nearly unbearable living conditions and so she cries out to the LORD, “If it is to be this way, why do I live?” Rebekah’s prayer is answered by God but not in the way we might expect.

God’s response to Rebekah reveals that Rebekah and her twin boys have been swept up into the larger story of the faithfulness of God to God’s own promises. Rebekah prays about her pained and troubled pregnancy. Rebekah’s pain is answered not with personal words of love and grace that we might expect from a ‘nice’ God who exists primarily to encourage us in times of trial. Rather than respond with words of assurance that all will be well, the LORD tells Rebekah that her troubled pregnancy is just the beginning of the conflict that her family will face. Here we see that the continuation of the promise is larger than any one person or personal trial. Rebekah and Isaac, Jacob and Esau have been swept up into the larger drama of salvation history, a drama that will include entire nations (the tensions between Israel and Edom are foreshadowed here) and influence all of creation history.

The remaining verses tell us only the barest details of the personality of each of the twin boys. Their differences are highlighted in vss. 27-28 along with the contrasting affections of their two parents. Beginning in vs. 29 the text recounts to us the puzzling story of Esau trading away his birth right. The brevity with which the story is told is striking. Very little text is given to explanation. Rather the text simply recounts the events as they happened. This odd transaction leaves the reader with many questions. We wonder just how hungry Esau had to be to trade away his birthright. Was he truly starving? Why wouldn’t Jacob offer some stew to his brother? Did Jacob mislead Esau as to the contents of the stew? We are not privileged to such information because the text is simply not concerned with any of these questions.

Perhaps even more surprising is the lack of moral commentary. Save for vs. 34b “So Esau despised his birthright” no moral judgments are made about the event or the character of either brother. This is not an Aesop’s Fable that can be boiled down to a lesson on living well. This is not a morality tale with commentary on Jacob’s sleazy dealings with his dim witted high school jock of a brother. Put differently, the story is not about either brother or the odd deal they strike. The text is not concerned with condemning them or exhorting us. Rather we are shown the path of the promise from Isaac to Jacob rather than his older brother Esau.

The content of this birthright is not given in the text and the blessing of Isaac has yet to be given to Jacob (the promise is not passed on explicitly until 27.27-29 and 29.1-5). Nevertheless, the reader is not left wondering what has taken place. The promise of God to Abraham, the promise of a land and a people, continues through the children of Isaac and Rebekah. Further the word of the LORD for Rebekah (“Two nations are in your womb…”) begins to mature in a way that highlights the difficult path that the promise has yet to travel. In next week’s reading, God confirms the birthright and the blessing that will be bestowed upon Jacob leaving no doubt that God will use Jacob to further God’s covenant with Abraham.

The text is rich with preaching possibilities, some better than others. One could envision a sermon on ‘The power of a praying marriage” or “Dealing with sibling rivalry in a Christian household.” By utilizing a cumulative preaching strategy, the preacher can avoid trivializing the text by focusing on the God who makes promises that take generations to come to fruition. This week, as last week, and next week, allow the faithfulness of God and God’s promises to be the good news for which the people of God are longing.

(Mis)Remembered Words

2011-06-27T19:24:00.000-07:00

by Brian Volck
Zechariah 9:9-10; Matthew 11:25-30

In an October 13, 1813 letter to his former political rival, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson described his work on a short book, The Philosophy of Jesus of Nazareth. This was Jefferson’s own distillation of gospel texts, in which he meant to include, “the very words only of Jesus,” while eliminating all elements Jefferson deemed irrational. Jefferson assumed the parts he found superstitious were simply the result of ignorant men who misremembered or misunderstood Jesus’ “pure principles.”

When he was done with his editing, Jefferson wrote, “There will be found remaining the most sublime and benevolent code of morals which has ever been offered to man. I have performed this operation for my own use, by cutting verse by verse out of the printed book, and arranging the matter which is evidently his, and which is as easily distinguishable as diamonds in a dunghill.”

He later completed The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, a unified narrative of Jesus’ life cut from the New Testament with all mention of miracles, angels, prophecy and resurrection edited out. Jefferson privately shared his compilation with friends, but declined to have it published in his lifetime.

***************

A quarter century earlier, Jefferson, living in Paris, received unsettling news from a certain William Smith. A recently-suppressed uprising in Massachusetts (Shay’s Rebellion) incited by a profound financial crisis had encouraged a group of notable American men to propose a stronger national government than that which the Articles of Confederation provided. In a November 13, 1787 letter to Smith, Jefferson vehemently disagreed with this response, writing, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. It is its natural manure.”

These words have been remembered and quoted many times since, in support of varied causes, some quite disturbing. When Timothy McVeigh was arrested shortly after the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah building in Oklahoma City, he wore a T shirt with Jefferson’s “tree of liberty” words printed on the back. McVeigh later expressed regret that children died in his attack, saying, “…that’s a lot of collateral damage,” but he’s also quoted as saying, “I am sorry these people had to lose their lives, but that's the nature of the beast. It's understood going in what the human toll will be.”

****************

Seventeen centuries before that, someone wrote down the remembered words of a Galilean peasant: “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to little ones.” The speaker of those words was executed, his blood refreshing a rather different tree than either Jefferson or McVeigh had in mind.

Search the gospels for the word “liberty” and you’ll find only one reference in Luke, when Jesus reads in the synagogue at Nazareth from the book of Isaiah. The freedom Jesus preaches is, as today’s gospel puts it, a yoke.

Easy? Yes.

Light? Yes.

But still a burden, a cross taken up.

Self-described followers of Jesus have been rejecting his burden and misusing his words from the moment the gospels were written – perhaps even before. The one who submitted to our violence and thereby triumphed over death has had his words tendentiously edited and misquoted countless times, often in service to later versions of the same violent powers that killed him.

****************

In the sixth century before Christ, Zechariah, a Hebrew prophet whose name means “God has remembered,” wrote:

See, your king shall come to you;
a just savior is he,
meek, and riding on an ass,
on a colt, the foal of an ass.
He shall banish the chariot from Ephraim,
and the horse from Jerusalem;
the warrior’s bow shall be banished,
and he shall proclaim peace to the nations.

Christians can’t help but read this with Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem in mind. Do we remember, though, the subversive image of a king riding the beast of “the little ones,” entering a city without weapons or show of force? Are we willing to take up the costly grace granted by so humble a monarch? Do we embody his vulnerable humility, or do we edit these words at our convenience?

This weekend, amid the fireworks and flags, what words will you remember and embody? Which will you misquote, misuse, or edit away?

Here I Am

2011-06-20T15:51:00.000-07:00

by Janice Love
Pentecost 2, Year 2 (Sunday, June 26, 2011): Genesis 22: 1-14, Psalm 13, Romans 6: 12-23, Matthew 10: 40-42

Here we are. The latest Advent to Easter cycles of the Christian seasons have now been rounded out by the great gift of the Spirit at Pentecost, the formation of the church and time to reflect on the Trinitarian God we worship. The church, now equipped with everything it needs to proclaim to the world Christ, crucified and risen, begins the long season after Pentecost of ever deepening discipleship. And what a story we have to start off with – Genesis 22!

To be honest, this is a story I have skirted somewhat with my almost 8 year old son. Maybe because it hits a little too close to home, he being a long awaited (13 years) child. How do I tell him of a God who demands of Abraham the sacrifice of his beloved son, Isaac, as a way to test him? Ah, perhaps there is the rub – the sovereignty of this God we worship who can and will demand, command and test. Now, to be really honest, this is a story I skirt with myself too (I did not read the texts ahead of volunteering to write the reflection for this coming Sunday). A sovereign God of this magnitude is more than a little scary. I am with this story suddenly aware of my creatureliness and of the beloved relationships I hold dear and of the demands of discipleship.

The text is clearly framed by three addresses to Abraham and by his thrice repeated response of, “Here I am.” Now, if we are careful readers of the biblical text we should be girding ourselves for what is to come after Abraham’s first response of “Here I am.” to the calling of his name by the Almighty. Being called by God usually entails the assigning of a difficult, if not seemingly impossible, task. Read the stories, all the way through, of the calling of Moses, of Samuel, of Jeremiah, of Isaiah, of Jonah, of Jesus. Rather than boldly singing Here I Am, Lord (also known as I, the Lord of Sea and Sky written by Daniel Schutte, 1981) we might do better to stand in silent fear and trembling. As Brueggemann points out, the first step in faith, “as Kierkegaard has shown, drives us to dread before the self is yielded to God.” (Genesis, Interpretation, p189)

As Christians looking back on this story, there is another pattern that should be evident to us – Good Friday begins here immediately for Abraham after his “Here I am.” in the awful task assigned to him by God. Here it is not God who comforts in the midst of life’s storms, here it is God who brings the storm. There is something that God needs to know. Everything that God is up to depends on finding out what needs to be known. Can Abraham be trusted? Where does Abraham’s deepest allegiances lie?

Psalm 13 captures what might be the interior agony of Abraham, though what we witness in the Genesis text hints only of the last two verses: But I trusted in your steadfast love; my heart shall rejoice in your salvation. I will sing to the LORD, because he has dealt bountifully with me. Notice the future tense…my heart shall rejoice, I will sing…Abraham’s Holy Saturday walk with his son and other young men is a remarkable one. That small word, “So”, full of ache, thrusts us along with Abraham, Isaac and the young men on this unforeseen journey into the distance, towards a mountain where the future awaits. Upon arriving, even before his second, “Here I am.” in response to Isaac’s calling of his name, Abraham states his trust in God’s promises aloud to the young men that both he and Isaac, “we”, shall return from making their offering of worship to God. To the young men, ignorant of the dreadful command given to him, Abraham’s comment is a statement of the obvious. The message here is meant for YHWH – “I trust You, are You listening?” Abraham’s answer to Isaac’s perceptive question of where the lamb is for the burnt-offering, an answer we the readers climactically await, restates his trust in God’s provision – for the offering, for the promises God has made, for the future. Except that all Abraham knows at this point is that the lamb on offer is his own beloved son. Here is the crux of discipleship. Our calling is not one of knowing completely how God’s future will be made manifest. A careful reader will understand though that it will be in a surprising, unexpected Way.

But it is not only Abraham who is being tested in this story. Will God keep God’s promises? Is this YHWH deserving of such trust and service and worship? With Abraham’s third “Here I am.” Sunday arrives and God provides as Abraham has trusted God would, though not without enduring the wounds of Good Friday.

We, as Christ’s church in the world, are the inheritors of this story, of the promises of God - which now include the defeat of death and the promise of resurrection - and the trust (and therefore obedience) of Abraham – and Jesus. As Paul enjoins the church in Rome and in turn the church in North America, present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life (Romans 6:13b). We will find our way forward into God’s future by trusting in the promises of God, not the promises of our nations, of our technology or science or politics. We worship and trust in a God who provides the Way forward, who brings life from death. Hallelujah.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a story, thank God, to tell my son.

Family Ties

2011-06-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

by Jenny Williams
Genesis 1:1-2:4a; Matthew 28:16-20

One of our church members, Sally, is serving a sentence in a regional jail. She joined our church on Pentecost last year, and though she had been baptized as a child, had never been brought up in church. She’s had very little Christian formation, so she set out to use her incarceration to engage in an intense study of the Bible. The growth that she is experiencing during this time is phenomenal. As they say in my neck of the woods, “The Holy Spirit has really gotten hold of her.”

When I visited her this week, in a very excited voice she said to me right off the bat, “I finally understand what family is all about!” She went on to tell me that a woman in her family, Kelly, just discovered that man she had always known as her father was not indeed her biological father.   This discovery completely rocked Kelly’s world. In despair, Kelly asked Shawn in one of their visits, “Will you still be my family member?”

Sally told Kelly that family is not defined biologically and of course she would still love her and claim her as family.

Our church has engaged in a letter-writing campaign of sorts to Sally throughout her stay in jail.    In the seven weeks since she has been in jail, she has received a stack of cards and letters 12 inches high. They have come from our church members, members of the church her husband grew up in, and friends of the members of both churches. In addition to letters, people have been sending little inspirational snippets or a prayer or scripture. She has been astonished that Christians she did not even know would care enough to write to her.

Sally told me that her new understanding of family came from the way our congregation had supported her through her jail time. She said that she always had thought of family as her husband and son. When she heard the term “church family” she dismissed it as sentimental. Now, she explained, she knows that she has true brothers and sisters in the church.

Ever since seminary, the thing in the creation story which has jumped out at me is the fact that God said, “Let us create humankind in our image.” When this verse comes after five days of God’s joy-filled activity of speaking things into existence, we realize that we are God’s creative endeavor. And we are made in the image of a God who is Three and yet One. We are created by the God whose very being is community, thus being created for communion with God and with others.

We are spoken into existence through the Word, and find our place in the family through the grace of God extended to us in baptism, learning, and obedience.

Holy, holy, holy! Lord God Almighty! God in three persons, blessed Trinity.

“What’s Up”

2011-06-11T20:28:00.000-07:00

An Ascension Sermon by Ed Searcy
(please note Ed’s diagnosis and pray for him) 
Ephesians 1:15-23; Luke 24:44-53

“I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, and for this reason I do not cease to give thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers” (Eph. 1:15-16). Sometimes Paul is frustrated with the church. Sometimes he is exasperated with the church. Sometimes he is just plain mad at the church. But not always. When Paul prays for the little church in Ephesus he is filled with gratitude for a congregation that trusts its life to Jesus and, as a result, has an abundance of love for one another. I know what it is to be filled with gratitude for a congregation that trusts its life to Jesus and, so, is marked by love and affection for one another. Three weeks ago, when the doctors confirmed their suspicions and told me that I have multiple myeloma, I was shocked and sad and grateful.

The gratitude was, and is, threefold. I found myself realizing how thankful I am for a strong and beautiful family, for a wonderful country in which I am blessed with incredible medical care and for you, for all of you. I thought “I am so grateful that I am the minister at University Hill Congregation. I know how much faith and love there is in our life together. Everything is going to be all right.” Since then you have showered me with affection, concern, prayers and support. I am the recipient of an outpouring of love. This is the odd discovery of being told that you have incurable cancer. Wonderful news accompanies the terrible news. It turns out that the church is not a problem, not an anachronism, not out of touch. It turns out that the church is precious. It turns out that, for those with eyes to see and ears to hear, the kingdom of God is as close as hearing that life will end sooner rather than later. Faced with the news of our mortality we realize that being together today is a gift to be cherished and received with gratitude. “And for this reason I do not cease to give thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers.”

Before continuing to pray with Paul let me catch you up on my current medical diagnosis, prognosis and treatment plan. I have been diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a chronic incurable cancer of the plasma cells. It was discovered inadvertently when I had a prostate biopsy in March that showed no prostate cancer but did reveal sticky proteins called amyloids which can be caused by multiple myeloma. Since the diagnosis was confirmed I have had numerous tests and medical appointments in order to determine the stage of the disease and the best course of treatment. This week I received the good news that I have stage one - early stage - multiple myeloma. This means that no apparent damage has yet been done to my bones or organs. It means that, given my age and good health, the prognosis for the future is of a manageable chronic condition for a number of years. I will have to be cautious about infections and illnesses due to a weakened immune system. I cannot carry heavy objects due to weakened bones. But I can live a relatively normal life and continue to be your minister. Along the way I will receive medical treatments to help to manage the disease. The first of those treatments is expected to be a stem cell transplant in which my own stem cells are harvested before chemotherapy is used to eradicate the myeloma from my body. Then my stem cells are given back to me in order to help my body rebuild its immune system. This procedure will most likely take place in August and will result in a three month period of recovery before returning to work. I should have more certainty about the scheduling of the treatment in three weeks time. During the month of June our Session, Stewards and Ministry and Personnel Committee will be putting a plan in place so that ministry will be provided when I am away receiving medical treatments. All things considered, the news today is good news.  

We have been given a gift. We have been told that we don’t have forever. We can see that there is an end in sight. But we have also been told that the end is not yet here. We have been told that we have the gift of time together. And, looking around, we can see that we have the gift of one another. We can see that we don’t have to wait for the day when the church is finally all that we had hoped for and dreamed of. Today is that day. So is tomorrow. You have been asking me what you can do to help. You have offered to support me and to care for me in so many ways. When I think of how you can care for me and for my soul I find myself joining in Paul’s prayer for the church in Ephesus: “I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened, you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance among the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power” (Eph. 1:17-19). Looking ahead I find myself praying that this be a time in which we grow in wisdom and come to understand more fully the hope to which we have been called. Instead of being shadowed by darkness and despair I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened and that you may discover the riches of God’s glorious inheritance among the saints and the immeasurable greatness of his power for those who trust in the God revealed in Jesus Christ. I do not believe that this diagnosis means that my life is coming to a sad and tragic conclusion. I intend that these next years be the culmination of my ministry, a time in which we taste the fruit of the patient cultivation of Christian community. I am filled with hope that God’s power will give us energy and courage for what is to come. When I think of what you can do to support and care for me I find myself praying that you will grow in your commitment to our life together and to one another. I am not the only person here who is mortal. I am not the only one with trouble - medical or otherwise. The only difference now is that it is evident to everyone that I, like you, have reason for ache and grief. It encourages me to know that I am not alone. My energy, my courage, my hope increases when you are here in worship and when you are present for one another in mutual care. That is what I pray for.  

But on what basis can we pray like this? In the face of such trouble how can we offer prayers of deep gratitude and then boldly intercede with God for the power we need for the coming days? That is precisely the question that Paul proceeds to answer in this elongated prayer become sermon that spans nine verses in the letter to the Ephesians. In English these verses take up four sentences. One to offer a prayer of gratitude. One to say a prayer of intercession. And two sentences to say why we dare to pray in this way. But Paul writes in Greek and manages to keep on talking through one impossibly long sentence. He has so much to say that he just keeps saying it: “God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the age to come. And he has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills all in all” (Eph 1:20-23).  

This is a theological mouthful: Jesus the crucified, rejected, down-trodden Jew now seated on high at God’s right hand; far above all rule, authority, power and dominion; his name now above every name ever known; all things under his feet; he - not the minister or the Moderator or the Pope - the head over all things in the church; the church which is his body and which is the fullness of him who fills all in all. This text is to be read in the church twice a year: once on Christ the King Sunday - the last Sunday of the Christian Year - and once on the Feast of the Ascension which always lands on a Thursday, forty days after Easter. Yes, I know, today is neither of those days. For many years we did not mark the Feast of the Ascension. To be honest, it was convenient that the ascension does not fall on a Sunday because the ascension can be an embarrassment for the church in the modern world. There it is in Luke - the resurrected body of Jesus carried up into heaven (Lk. 24:44-53). When asked to explain the science behind such a physical ascension to a heaven that evidently exists somewhere above us the church has no equations that prove the physics. So we have tended to avoid mentioning the ascension. But avoidance is rarely a good strategy. Better that we host the testimony of the witnesses who say that the risen Jesus has ascended to God. We do not need to be able to make sense of it in order to receive this news. We need to receive the news and then wait until the ascension begins to make sense of our life together. Which is to say that the ascension of Jesus is not a matter of physics. After all, we are already talking about something that no one has ever seen before - a resurrected body. The ascension is not a matter of physics but of meta-physics. It is a theological ascension. The ascension is the way in which the church has come to understand the cosmic results of the resurrection.  

Paul says that we dare to pray for “the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power” because “God put this power to work in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places.” The resurrection and the ascension reveal that the God who came in weakness to suffer with the poor and lowly, to bring eternal life to the rejected and mortal is the God whose power is strong enough to overcome death and to place Jesus above every known and unknown power figure and power structure. There is not one ruler or authority or power or dominion who is higher up the cosmic ladder than this Jesus who was rejected by the powers that be. Paul uses the word “all” five times in these two sentences. He wants there to be no misunderstanding. Not some things or even many things but all things are under Jesus’ feet. The spiritual demons that bedevil you - the depression, the anxiety, the compulsions and addictions, the insecurity, the arrogance, the trauma and more are all less powerful than Jesus Christ. The social challenges that confront us and seem beyond our capacity to reform, redeem, rehabilitate - these, too, are weaker than the power revealed in Jesus. It is the reason that the civil rights marchers could sing “We shall overcome” with such confidence. They could not possibly have overcome the forces of segregation and racism on their own. It was not simply their collective will power that would overcome against impossible odds - against the police and the state, against the klan and the mobs. The freedom riders and marchers trusted that one day they would overcome because God has put all things under Jesus’ feet. In Jesus Christ God has already overcome.   

Yes, God has already overcome. Overcome death and despair. Overcome denial and defeat and division. In Jesus God has overcome all things. Overcome multiple myeloma. Overcome the uncertainty of our future together. Overcome our confusion and shock and fear. Overcome the grief that will be a companion on this pilgrimage. We are the grateful recipients of this news and of God’s power. We do not face today or tomorrow on our own. Our life together draws its energy and vitality from the immeasurable greatness of God’s power. This spiritual strength bears fruit among us in a joyful faith, a living hope and a suffering love. We shall overcome whatever trials and tribulations we will face because of the God who in Jesus Christ daily supplies us with an extraordinary reservoir of faith, hope and love. “And for this reason I do not cease to give thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers.”

Ed says that this “blog is the place where I will continue to scribble about life in ministry while living with multiple myeloma. If others are asking how I am doing or you are wondering I'll try to keep things up to date there.”

A Quieter Pentecost

2011-06-06T20:21:00.000-07:00

by Brian Volck
Acts 2:1-11(or 2-21); 1 Corinthians 12: 3-13; John 20:19-23

The Catholic Church’s Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA) is, ideally, a process lasting many months, during which unbaptized catechumens and baptized but unconfirmed candidates learn from and discern with sponsors and other members of the church community they hope to become part of. My home parish takes this seriously. While the rite is meant to lead to reception into the church at the Easter Vigil, there’s no rushing, no shortcuts, no simply going with the flow. The rigor and probing reflection often make me wish I hadn’t completed my own initiation so young.

From Easter to Ascension, newly-received members (called neophytes, which means “new living things”) wear their white robes each Sunday at liturgy. Like all of us, though far more visibly, they are engaged in mystagogy, forever entering the bottomless mystery of Christ and his people. On Ascension Day, after the readings have been broken open in the homily and just before the neophytes publicly set aside their white garments, one of their number is invited to share some thoughts on his or her experience.

This year, we heard a young father speak from his heart, an unsentimental, moving tale of loss and groping toward the light. What struck me most was his fearlessness in sharing both heartbreak and joy. The details are not so important, except that he took special note of the moment at the Vigil when the gathered community prayed for him and the others, chanting “Veni, Sancti Spiritus,” “Come, Holy Spirit.” I remember being there that night, chanting and praying for them all, and it was a blessing to recall that grace-filled moment.

When he finished his remarks, the presiding priest stepped out towards the congregation, turned, and addressed him: “Look at the table; all its gifts are yours. Look around you at this building; this is your home. Look at these people; this is your community, welcoming you.”

And I thought, “Yes, for you, for me, and for all of us,”: his story, mine and those of my neighbors, gathered together.

It wasn’t Pentecost when these things happened; there was no sudden rush of wind, no fire, no three thousand new members. Still, it had the marks of Pentecost: new life, “Come, Holy Spirit,” a story entered and shared, absence of fear, heart speaking to heart, a gathered people. Pentecost is often called the birthday of the Church, a reminder that God’s gathered people shares a history so much larger than our individual biographies.

This side of the grave, few of us will be visited by tongued fire; few will speak to a polyglot crowd and be understood by all. But our quieter Pentecosts are no less transforming.

How and when has the Spirit led you to newness?

How and with whom are you, too, called into the bottomless mystery?

Gospel Sequel

2011-05-31T21:03:00.000-07:00

by Doug Lee
Ascension Sunday
Acts 1:1-11; Ephesians 1:15-23; Luke 24:44-53

“Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?”

While last month’s headline grabbing prediction of Jesus’ return, the rescue of believers from the earth to heaven, and the onset of tribulation for an unbelieving world (now revised to October) belongs to an extremist Camp(ing), the basic eschatological question underlies much of American Christianity.

The apostles’ question sounds contemporary two millennia later as believers gaze heavenward and count down until the end of the world, while others with a less definite timetable still await a rapture.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the divide, scoffing at such expectations is easy, especially after announced deadlines pass. Jesus’ own response resounds as an all-too-obvious rebuke to Rapture-enraptured Christians: “It is not for you to know the times that the Father has set by his own authority.”

But what if the apostles’ question wasn’t as screwy as we might assume? What if Jesus was only rejecting their need to know and not the underlying question about the kingdom?

True, their question refers to an earthly kingdom for Israel and not a heavenly destination. But in either case, the imminent unfolding of cataclysmic events leaves little rationale for the Church.

If Jesus’ answer is an outright “no”, as we prone to hear it, then we are left on our own to figure out what in the world Jesus is doing. If now is not the time, then where is Jesus and what is he doing post-Resurrection? We don’t know the proper ending to the Easter story. Our impatience with a lack of easy answers so often leads us to assume that, if there is no clear timetable, it is our responsibility to take matters into our own hands and bring about the kingdom. Human efforts, including violence, and the crushing burden of human failure are our lot.

But Luke offers us a third option. Unlike the other gospel writers who end their narratives with varied accounts of Jesus’ resurrection, Luke writes a sequel.

Most modern sequels represent an unfortunate lack of creativity. They bring back popular characters, put them into new situations, and try to recapture the chemistry of the original. Rarely do they live up to their predecessors because they lack any compelling reason for their existence (other than wringing more cash out of audiences).

But Luke, who launches his second volume with the apostles’ (supposed) bad question and Jesus’ (assumed) rejection, authors a worthy sequel of epic proportions. And, curiously, Luke is also the only gospel writer to depict the ascension, not once but twice, as if to underscore its importance.

More than a heavenly lift-off foreshadowing how believers will be snatched up to heaven, the ascension for Luke signals the reign of Christ begun now, in the middle of history, and not merely reserved for some future time. The Church has rationale in the present.

The ascension heralds the exaltation of Jesus in the middle of a story that begins in the realm of King Herod (Luke 1) and ends under Caesar’s nose (Acts 28). The Church is a political entity, as the members of a new polity.

The ascension gives time, space, and rationale for the Church to be the Church.

Everywhere the believers go they are accused of turning the world upside down because they announce the reign of another king named Jesus (Acts 17:6-7).

But it is not the story of the Church bringing the kingdom to fruition or reforming society. It is a story of the Church gasping for breath as she runs to catch up to what the Spirit of Jesus is doing in the world. The apostles appoint a twelfth to fill the slot abandoned by Judas, but the Spirit is less interested in maintaining structures than in deluging the Church with power. Dozing Peter requires a thrice-repeated vision to wake up to the fact that Gentiles are now part of the family of God. The Spirit of Jesus redirects Paul from evangelizing Asia and gives him a vision of a man from Macedonia, who, just to keep Paul on his toes, turns out to be a woman named Lydia!

This second volume begins with a word about “all that Jesus began to do and teach”. A sequel is necessary because the story’s hero has still many more acts remaining to accomplish. After Easter, what compels Luke is still Jesus. Even post-Resurrection, the central character in this drama is still Jesus. Even if he is for the most part unseen, Jesus is not far away but is somewhere just off-stage directing the action. Luke’s sequel is not Acts of the Apostles but Acts of the Ascended Jesus.

Christ the King has work for the Church to do, and supplies power from heaven for this work. The way of the Kingdom has been fully vindicated. In the ascension, the Church sees Christ enthroned above—still enfleshed and authorizing fleshly obedience to way of the Kingdom, the way of suffering love that announces good news to the poor and release for the captives.

Luke writes a gospel sequel because Jesus is still acting and teaching. The question is not when Jesus is returning but whether we will learn to catch up to what he is doing now and to look outward instead of heavenward. Luke’s sequel narrates a story that the Spirit of Jesus beckons us to join as He completes our conversion and our witness.

The Close-at-Hand God

2011-05-25T17:42:00.000-07:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
Sixth Sunday of Easter
Psalm 66:8-20; 1 Peter 3:13-22; John 14:15-21

“On that day you will know that I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you.” John 14:20

For several weeks now the doomsday prophecy of one Harold Camping has been on the minds of many. First, it was the shared anticipation as the projected date got closer—and the requisite jokes about being left behind. Then it was the (no-surprise) failure of the prediction which resulted in . . . more jokes about being left behind.

Attempts to counter Camping’s misguided views consisted mostly of pointing to passages in the New Testament which speak to the unknowability of the “day or hour” of the Lord’s return. But such proof-texting did little to challenge the core flaw of rapture theology—its fundamental misreading of biblical eschatology. Within the last few days, thankfully, thoughtful essays have appeared which have noted that “tribulation” is a past and present reality, not a future horror for the damned, and that matter—bodies, earth, the stuff of life—matters deeply to the God who restores and makes all things new. I also penned some thoughts (shameless plug alert) on the connections between eschatological time and the exquisite new French film Of Gods and Men.

Central to rapture theology and even to some of the first responses to it is the belief that God is far removed from Creation—a distant judge whose ways and will are inscrutable; a moody tyrant-king continually disappointed in his subjects; a cosmic hothead always ready to pounce on unsuspecting evildoers. It’s this kind of god who will preside over the rapture’s doom and devastation. No wonder Camping’s predictions boosted the recruitment efforts of atheist and agnostic organizations around the country.

The appointed lessons for this Sunday, the sixth of Eastertide, offer a vision of God and God’s relationship to the world that couldn’t be more different. The gospel reading from St. John, a continuation of last Sunday’s text, has Jesus speaking words of assurance to his anxious disciples who must have surely felt that the end of the world was near. Jesus begins by charging them to keep his commandments but, because this is John’s gospel, we know that he is not so much ordering adherence to a set of moral edicts as he is enjoining his followers to love (John 13:34).

Their task is to bear witness to the love that has been in their midst—not to retreat from the world or to condemn the world to divine wrath but to love it as God loves it, to immerse themselves fully in it, to be a community that mirrors the very life of the Godhead. (This pericope is as Trinitarian as anything in the New Testament). To do this, they will need an advocate—a good lawyer, if we take the Greek literally, the “Spirit of truth” who will abide with and in the disciples. No remote, inscrutable, unpredictable deity here—only the intimacy of human-divine relationship that comes as a gift to the grieving and bewildered.

In 1 Peter, as in many of the epistles, we get on-the-ground advice about how to negotiate the realities we will face when we dare to love as God loves, when we claim the immediacy of our good God over the caprice of the distant sky-god. We will likely suffer, Peter tells us straight-up, for “doing good,” for our “good conduct in Christ.” But we are not to fear since, in Christ, we have been “brought to God” and saved through baptism. And in contrast to the cold exclusiveness of rapture theology, we learn that no one is outside the bounds of God’s intimate embrace: Christ’s salvation reaches even to the dead (3:19).

And, finally, it’s the day’s Psalm that gives us the words of praise for the good gift of God’s faithful, loving presence in our lives—even in the midst of suffering: “For you, O God, have tested us; you have tried us as silver is tried . . . you let people ride over our heads; we went through fire and through water; yet you have brought us out to a spacious place” (66:10-12).

A “spacious place” in the here and now which is not about the rapture but is, thanks be to God, rapturous indeed.

Preparing for Departure

2011-05-19T18:57:00.000-07:00

by Jake Wilson
This week’s lectionary reading leads us into the farewell discourse (John 13.31-17.26) as Jesus prepares the disciples for his departure. It can seem a little disorienting to follow up a month’s worth of post-resurrection appearances with Jesus preparing his disciples for his looming death on the cross.

After all, for the last several weeks we have celebrate that Jesus is alive and on the loose, appearing in locked rooms, in gardens and on the road to Emmaus. However, the day of Ascension is fast approaching and the lectionary readings of the next two weeks use the farewell discourse to prepare us for the Ascension of the resurrected Christ.

On the eve of their last supper together, as Jesus prepared his disciples for his death, the question looming over the young Jesus movement was how to respond to Jesus’ absence. The disciples had followed Jesus through every small town and village from Samaria to Jerusalem. But how do you follow a missing Lord? How could they carry on after his death? Jesus begins to answer this question with words of assurance and comfort. “Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me.” These words have become a standard in pastoral care. At funerals and death beds, in the face of floods, tornados and hurricanes, Christians have turned to these words for comfort, and with good reason as they are clearly intended to offer peace in a time of fear and doubt.

The source of the peace and encouragement offered is found in Jesus’ promise that his departure has a purpose. Though they can and will be troubled by the absence of their Lord, this departure is purposeful rather than tragic. Jesus is leaving to prepare a place specifically for his followers. The place is not geographical or symbolic and we can be relatively sure that the disciples did not dream of mansions in the sky. Rather Jesus promises “dwelling places” that is places to live with God. The promise that Jesus offers is a way to life with God, a place to dwell in the presence of the Father.

As a word of further encouragement, Jesus assures the disciples “And you know the way to the place where I am going.” In response to this offer of assurance, Thomas’ question “How can we know the way?” serves as the platform for Jesus’ sixth “I am” statement. “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” It’s here that Jesus most fully answers the question at the heart of the farewell discourse, the question of how the followers of Jesus will carry on. In response to Jesus departure, they must follow the way.

The ‘I am’ formula indicates that the way that Jesus refers to is not a geographical path or a way of life, but rather a person. And yet it is also a way of life. The way of Jesus is a way of life with God the Father lived so perfectly by the Son that it is inseparable from his identity. Thomas claims that the disciples do not know the way, but they should. Since the call of Philip and Nathan (1.43) they have followed the way, they have walked beside him, they have witnessed the way in Galilee, Capernaum, Samaria, and Jerusalem. Jesus is the way to the Father, “No one comes to the father except through me.” We may be reminded here of the previous ‘I am’ statement from John 10.7-10 “I am the gate.” Just as Jesus is the gate through whom we find safe pasture, here he is the way to the life with God promised as dwelling places in the Fathers’ household. However, Jesus is more than the way to the Father; he is also the way of the Father made incarnate amidst the brokenness of this world.

That Jesus is the way of the Father is made explicit in vs. 7 “If you know me, you will know my Father also.” The relationship between God the Father and Jesus is reiterated through Jesus’ response to Philip’s question “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me?” Jesus is not just the way to God but rather is the self-revelation of God.

Vs. 12 offers the final aspect of Jesus’ answer to the implied question of how we might follow a missing savior. “Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works that these, because I am going to the Father.” This promise does not mean that the disciples will be able to heal twice as effectively as Jesus or walk on water even further. While deeds of power and healing certainly do mark the followers of Jesus after the day of Pentecost, this is only part of the way that they must continue to follow Jesus. The way forward is to follow the way of the Father made incarnate. Put differently, the life of the disciples after Jesus’ death must be patterned after the way of his life before, into and through his death.

Continuing the theme of comfort and encouragement, the lectionary offers us the account of Stephen’s death as a promise that following this way is indeed possible. Acts 7:55-60 brings us the last Stephen’s story which began with his appointment to serve in Acts. 6.1-7.

Acts 6.8 tells us that Stephen embodied the power that Jesus promised his disciples in John 14.12 by saying “Stephen, full of grace and power, did great wonders and signs among the people.” It was not without reason that the way of the Father made present in this world led Jesus to a cross. Through Stephen we see that embodying the way of the Father in a broken world will meet resistance.

However, Stephens’ martyrdom offers him the opportunity to imitate the way of Christ, assuring us that such a life is possible. In Acts 7.59 Stephen offers his spirit to Jesus echoing Jesus’ words from the cross (Luke 23.46). Again in vs. 60 Stephen prays for his persecutors following the way of Jesus from the cross (Luke 23.34). This non-identical repetition models the way forward, a way marked by love, forgiveness, obedience, and witness. In short, Stephen lives before us the way of the one who said “I am the way, and the truth, and the life.”

Jesus’ response to Thomas makes his question seem foolish. And yet it’s a question with which the church continues to struggle. What is the way forward? The lectionary offers us Stephen as an example, and yet, the life and witness of Stephen can seem foreign to us. Stephen’s willingness to serve, his unflinching testimony before a violent crowd, his response to hatred and his willingness to follow in the way of Christ offer us a way that we often hesitate to take.

The United Methodist Church, like most mainline denominations, is struggling to find its way in a constantly changing world. In 2008 the Council of Bishops commissioned “Call to Action” committee with all the accompanying sub committees, reports, memos and conference calls. The Committee commissioned two secular firms to poll United Methodists, process data and recommend a way forward. I suspect Jesus received these efforts with the same disappointment that he felt at Thomas’ question. The way forward will not be found in market research, or television advertisements boasting of our ‘Open hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors: The people of the United Methodist Church.” We should already know the way because the way took flesh and dwelt among us. We do know the way because of the witness of saints and martyrs like Stephen. As we prepare to transition from the joy of Easter to the spread of the Gospel following the Ascension let us stand on the promise that by the powerful name of Jesus (vs. 13) we may yet be counted among them.

Followers

2011-05-10T21:38:00.000-07:00

by Janice Love
Easter 4: Acts 2:42-47, Psalm 23, 1 Peter 2: 19-25, John 10: 1-10

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers…All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need. Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of all the people…

So – what the hell happened? Luke’s description of the early church, after the disciples’ baptism in the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and Peter’s surprisingly fearless sermon, is certainly a rosy one. Where is this church, because I want to go there?!

Perhaps Paul’s account of the struggles at the church in Corinth better match our own experience of the church in North America. Paul’s eloquence in his reflections on the cross of Christ, on his resurrection and on Christian love shine sharply, like the clarity of light before an approaching storm, amidst the sordid reality of Corinth’s church.

Was the early church at Jerusalem ever as Luke describes it? There is little doubt that the event at Pentecost was a radical moment, transforming cowering disciples into bold apostles willing to risk and indeed give up their lives for the sake of practicing and sharing the gospel. Could it be that in the glow of its baptism in the Spirit, the church got it right to begin with? Is it a case that inevitably once the rose faded we were left with thorns to contend with? Or is it a case of our wanting to take control of the process again, like in the garden at the beginning? Is Chesterton right that the Way of Christ has been found difficult and therefore left untried?

Or is Luke describing what he perceives is Christ’s hope for his church – the way we are to be together for the sake of the world so loved? This is after all where Paul is encouraging the flock at Corinth to go (even if Luke’s description was written after Paul’s). And it is this text that reached out two thousand years later to animate a congregation I was a part of on the secular rim of the Pacific Northwest, seeking to discern what a church is to be. It is here we rediscovered the ancient five marks of the church: kerygyma (proclamation), leiturgia (worship/prayer), koinonia (fellowship), diakonia (service) and didache (training). We marvelled at the way the marks intertwined with one another and found them to be trustworthy guides to who we were called to be. They now form the foundations of the conversations the church has with itself and others. It is, at least, a firm beginning post Christendom for relearning who we are to be.

The other texts for this fourth Sunday in Easter, traditionally Good Shepherd Sunday, lead us to the Way forward into God’s future as glimpsed in the Acts text. Psalm 23 is written from the perspective of the sheep. It can remind the church that it is not the shepherd but rather the company of those who recognize our need for and follow the shepherd that is Christ. We must be willing to be led. And the direction we are led is into Good Friday, through the valley of the shadow of death, into the suffering of the world, through the crucified gate that is Christ. In our baptism we give up our self-determination, our striving after power and control and agree to become like sheep, listening only to the voice of our crucified and risen Shepherd

(John 10:1-10). Or perhaps we do not so much choose to become like sheep as we recognize that we are sheep. Which is not really a compliment. Sheep are vulnerable, easily led astray and, given the chance, will overeat to the point of death. Sheep inherently need a shepherd. In choosing Christ as our Shepherd in baptism we choose to become part of the company of followers who do not return abuse with abuse, who do not threaten when made to suffer, who entrust ourselves to the one who judges justly (1 Peter 2:23). Because our Shepherd has gone before us and is with us we are called to fear no evil, going where others fear to trend, following where Jesus is leading us (because it is not about what Jesus would do but about what Jesus is doing), nourished by the bread of his body and the wine of his blood.

May it be so, for the glory of God.

What’s goin’ on?

2011-05-04T21:34:00.000-07:00

by Jenny Williams
Luke 24:13-35

“Are you the only person who doesn’t know what’s been going on for the past few days?” Apparently Jesus had not been reading Facebook. Or listening to NPR. Or reading the newspaper.

Seriously—how could this guy not know what’s been happening? In the last few days the whole world has been in an uproar over the death of one man. Some people thought he should be killed. Others mourned his loss. Others didn’t know what to think.

Sound familiar? One man, killed at the hands of the government, whom many religious people were glad to see murdered.

The death of Osama bin Laden has dominated discourse over the past week. In the wake of his death, some people are throwing parties, some are ready to break out the duct tape and plastic sheeting, and the rest of us are watching the world go mad. Again.

Jesus asks the two disciples to explain “what things” have been happening in Jerusalem. They get most of it right, and even offer a nice little testimony, but they have missed the Scriptural connection that Jesus has been trying to lay out for them all along. He starts back at the beginning, with Moses and the prophets and interprets—again—the words of Scripture. He has to re-narrate their framework, even though they were the ones closest to him while he was living.

While there have been many faithful and articulate reflections on the events of May 1, it’s the on-the-ground comments from Christians that I find most interesting—the posts on Facebook which fall under the category of “I know what the Bible says about murder, but…” It seems to me that disciples these days are still walking down the Emmaus road. We’ve heard the words of Scripture, but in the midst of a host of emotions running high, we can’t bring them to bear upon our lives, can’t quite get them to connect with what’s going on. Having heard those words over and over again, they should be worked deep down into the soil of our souls, yet we can so easily dismiss them with one little conjunction.

So it’s probably good that we are still on the road to Emmaus, because the road ends at the dinner table. That’s where God, in God’s infinite wisdom, decided that we could take the Word into us, if hearing the Word didn’t do the trick. God made flesh made bread and wine.

“He said to me, O mortal, eat what is offered to you; eat this scroll, and go, speak to the house of Israel. So I opened my mouth, and he gave me the scroll to eat. He said to me, Mortal, eat this scroll that I give you and fill your stomach with it. Then I ate it; and in my mouth it was as sweet as honey.” (Ezekiel 3:1-3)

My friend tells me that the Rev. Dr. Bill Turner has said, “Christians do not rejoice at the death of murderers. Christians rejoice at the death of saints." As we gather around the table with the communion of saints, may we let the Eucharist remind us of the right things for which we ought to give thanks. Let us rejoice at the sacrificial love of the One who offered to let himself be broken for us instead of rejoicing that the American military has broken another.

Seeing the Lord

2011-04-25T21:10:00.000-07:00

by Kyle Childress
John 20:19-31

The Gospel Lesson the Second Sunday of Easter is always John 20:19-31 and the story of Thomas missing out on seeing the risen Christ that Easter evening. When told, by the other disciples, that they had seen the Lord, Thomas says, “I won’t believe it until I can touch his scars.” A week later he made sure he was present with the community of disciples, and sure enough he saw the Lord.

Thomas did not see the risen Lord the first time, because the resurrection of Christ makes no sense apart from the community of his disciples.

Early in the movie The Big Lebowski, Walter is talking to Dude. Donny, their other close friend, keeps trying to interrupt and ask a question. Walter dismisses Donny with a line that has become famous, “Shut-up Donny, you’re out of your element.” (Or something like that.) In other words, when you’re out of your element, what you say doesn’t make sense.

In John 20, the resurrection of Jesus didn’t make sense to Thomas because Thomas was out of his element. His element was the community of disciples of Jesus gathered in worship and prayer. Since he was not with them, he missed Christ, and resurrection made no sense to him.

Apart from in-the-flesh people living the resurrection out, it makes no sense. Apart from a worshiping and disciple-making community, explanations of the resurrection make no sense. They are out of their element or, as Rick Lischer says, they are immaterial. (see Richard Lischer, “We Have Seen the Lord,” Christian Century, March 17, 1999).

So, if the resurrection of Jesus only makes sense within the people seeking to embody this resurrection, how do we see it? How do we see the Lord? Theologian Marianne Sawicki defines the church as the community of those who have the competency to recognize Jesus as the Risen Lord. We specialize in seeing, discerning the Risen Christ (Seeing the Lord, Augsburg Fortress, 1994, p. 6).

All four of the Gospels are full of incompetent witnesses. The disciples themselves are terribly incompetent. Every time you turn around they misunderstand Jesus. They can’t figure out what he’s talking about. On Easter, they are especially incompetent; it is as if they remember nothing of what Jesus told them before. They are confused, afraid, running over one another, and of course, not recognizing the resurrected Jesus when he talks to them. In Luke, two disciples leave Jerusalem and head home to Emmaus and do not know the risen Lord walking beside them. And here in John, Thomas is incompetent in understanding what the resurrection is about.

Yet they all have this in common. As long as they keep talking with this One, keep showing up and dialoguing with Jesus, then their darkness breaks into dawn and they see the Risen Lord. They become competent witnesses.

William Faulkner was once asked how he would counsel those who read The Sound and the Fury once or twice but still didn’t get it. “Read it three times,” he said.

Sometimes we have to keep at it in order to get it. We keep talking, keep showing up in worship, keep praying, keep singing hymns, keep forgiving and receiving forgiveness, keep feeding the hungry and giving a cup of cool water in his name, keep practicing the Way of Jesus and we too will see the Risen Jesus.

By our continuing dialogue with Jesus, we are trained and taught by him in how to see him. It is as if the scales slowly fall from our eyes, and one day we look up and we recognize the Risen Christ in ways and places we never had before. He was in front of our noses the whole time.

That is why the only witnesses to the Resurrection were the disciples, and not Herod, not Pilate, nor the soldiers who were right there guarding the tomb. Only the disciples who had been trained by Jesus to learn to recognize him and when they remembered and practiced what Jesus taught them, they then recognized the Lord.

Why Do You Weep?

2011-04-22T10:23:00.000-07:00

by Ragan Sutterfield
Jeremiah 31:1-6; Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24; Colossians 3:1-4; John 20:1-18

“Why do you weep?” That seems to be the central question of the Gospel reading this Easter Sunday.   It is the question the angels ask of Mary when she looks into the tomb; it is the question the resurrected Christ asks when he finds Mary in the garden and she mistakes him for the gardener.

When the other disciples, Peter and John, came to see that the tomb was empty, they left—satisfied with the reality they thought they understood—Jesus was gone, his body taken, one more event in a series of tragedies that had seen their hopes for a new reality gone.   But Mary remained with the question—she stayed with the empty tomb, the trace of the Lord she still loved, the death she didn’t claim to understand. It is by staying that she is present for the questioning of her perception—“Woman, why do you weep?”

It is a question that means everything—it is a question that indicates an event that’s about to happen, that will smash open what seemed to happen and let it fade against the reality of what happened—Christ overcame death with love. “Woman, why do you weep?”

Behind the question is the victory of God, the triumph of love, the faithfulness of a God who says, in our Old Testament reading, “I have loved you with an everlasting love.” (Jeremiah 31.3) Mary should be saying with the Psalmist “O give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his steadfast love endures for ever!” (118:1) But Mary has not yet recognized what has happened—she has not seen the angels for who they are or Jesus for who he is.

In her beautiful essay, “Psalm Eight,” Marilynne Robinson reflects on John’s account of the resurrection and points us to the profound reality of Mary’s lack of recognition—that she lost Jesus in the ordinariness with which he appeared, that she mistook him for the gardener. Jesus did not appear, after he overcame death and conquered with love, as a god like Lord Krishna, finally revealing himself behind the mask of humanity.   The resurrected Christ comes in plain clothes—a gardener, a stranger traveling the road to Emmaus, a man offering fishing tips and a warm fire on the beach. “It seems to me,” Robinson writes, “that the narrative, in its most dazzling vision of holiness, commends to us beauty of an altogether higher order than spectacle, that being mere commonplace, ineffable humanity.” Christ does not light up in some flash or grand show of smoke as he might in a Hollywood revelation—he is revealed in the glory of man.

Mary’s recognition comes when Christ calls her name. “Mary!” We can imagine the tone—the sweet call to attention—listen, look, God is with you, love has overcome. The reality of what has happened sinks in and overcomes. There is the temptation, like that of the transfiguration, to dwell with the recognition, but Jesus tells her to go and tell the other disciples that he is going to be with “my Father and your Father, to my God and your God”--a difference no longer. And so Mary goes and becomes the first person to proclaim the Gospel.

Reading John 20:1-18 I am left wondering—how do we recognize the resurrection? How do we move with Mary from the emptiness of disappointment to the beautiful realization of a new reality? Much of it is surely a matter of waiting, of sitting by the empty tomb until we recognize why it is empty. This could mean accepting our humiliations, our limits, the sorrows that haunt us that we cannot solve. And then, when we hear our name called we must follow Mary’s response—“Rabbouni!” Teacher! In that response our relationship is restored—we become once again students learning how to be human from the Master who made us, the new Adam who rose after the rest of one Sabbath and walked in the morning garden as God had walked in Eden.

The Way Down

2011-04-11T19:59:00.000-07:00

by Brian Volck
Matthew 2:1-11; Isaiah 50:4-7(8,9); Phillipians 2: (5)6-11; Matthew 16:14-27:66

“I will bury Jesus (in) myself.”
-From The Saint Matthew Passion, BWV 244; Part 2, No.65

I’m not qualified to judge the theological soundness of that old saw, “God draws straight with crooked lines.” We know that Palm Sunday’s readings are a push into the arcing current of a great river. We know the river flows toward the unimaginable Paschal triumph. But the readings today have one and only one direction: down.

Jesus enters Jerusalem triumphantly, in a procession rich with political significance befitting a messiah, save for the public relations gaffe of riding a donkey rather than a military charger. But as soon as the cloaks are retrieved and the branches trampled beyond recognition, the triumph goes awry, spinning precipitously toward complete disaster.

In a matter of days, he will give his back to those who beat him, his flint-like face to those who pluck his beard. Those who care about law and order know what to do with his kind: he will be tortured, publicly vilified, executed.

He will suffer horribly.

He will die in shame.

We want to pass over this, we want to arrive at – and rest in – Easter. But there’s no way there except descent. The one way up is down.

There’s no way to enter the fullness of the kingdom except through utter emptiness. The one way to exaltation is kenosis.

There's no way to hear fully (ob-audire) the Good News except through obedience (ob-audire) to the point of death. The womb of resurrection is the cross. The door to freedom is marked with blood.

Fragile humans frantically search for another route. The self, the flesh, the ego – call it what you will – wants to build up, protecting the fragments of meaning it has shored against its ruin. We fear the blood on the lintel is ours entirely.

We seek any way out but down. The way down means submitting to the uncertainty (from our point of view) of God’s will. It means loss of control, a way of unknowing. It means transformation in loneliness and darkness so complete it resembles death.

Irony upon irony, we would rather stay as we are and be destroyed than be transformed and live. Be careful what you wish for.

Fragile churches and congregations also claw, terrified, for another escape. We long to build up, protecting the ruins of what we assume to be certain. We refuse to imagine God’s triumph in our communal failure.

The way down for our churches means surrendering honor and embracing faithfulness, surrendering growth and embracing discipleship, surrendering power and embracing service. But we would rather have our churches wither in spasms of desperate retrenchment or trendy irrelevance than be transformed into the living Body of Christ. Ask and you shall receive.

We want to rejoice in Easter without the Passion, but there’s no other way there –for each of us and for our churches. We’re not granted certainty – that’s why, presumably, we must live by faith – but we do have an examplar, a shepherd, a guide: “Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped.”

He suffered. He died. He was buried. According to the Apostle’s Creed (drawing on, among other sources, Acts 2 and 1 Peter 3-4.), He descended to hell (descendit ad inferos). And on the third day (a day we can’t yet see)...

Come, let us follow him.

Snorting at Death

2011-04-06T21:51:00.000-07:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
Fifth Sunday in Lent
Ezekiel 37:1-14; Psalm 130; Romans 8:1-11; John 11:1-45

The texts for this Sunday leave no doubt about where the Lenten journey will end. A week before Palm/Passion Sunday and the start of Holy Week and it’s not the scent of spring flowers in the air but death--as shrouded, four-days-dead Lazarus is stinking up the place. Dry bones are on Ezekiel’s mind—brittle, rattling remains beyond the stages of rot and stench. “Our hope is lost,” the people in exile say, “we are cut off completely” (37:11). The Psalm, too, the de Profundis, commonly read at funerals or included in settings of the requiem mass, acknowledges the depths of human despair and hopelessness.

These are not unfamiliar themes to us. This has been a springtime of death—tens of thousands who have perished in Japan; violent deaths on the streets of Libya, Afghanistan, Congo, and Ivory Coast—to name only a few of the world’s dark places haunted (and hunted, it seems) by death. So mortality is not mere metaphor here. This is about stinking corpses, dried up bones, prayers of anguish and desperation. This is where the Lenten journey will end.

When Jesus arrives at the home of Lazarus he finds that “many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them about their brother (11:19).” There is much weeping, as there usually is when a loved one dies. Some in the crowd were likely professional mourners whose job was to give dramatic, ritual expression to a family’s grief—vocalizations that would raise the emotional pitch of the gathering and provide cathartic release for the bereaved. It must have been quite a sound.

So much so that we learn that Jesus is “greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved” (11:33). The Greek, though, suggests something more primitive—animalistic, even (enebrimēsato): that Jesus snorted like a horse. English translations generally miss this quality of character in Jesus as he makes his way through the crowd to the tomb of Lazarus: he is agitated, irritated, vexed.

Why?

We know that Jesus is not in despair at the death of his friend. The Jesus of John’s gospel knows all things—he knew that he would find Lazarus dead; he knew that he would call him forth and raise him up. Martha and Mary have shown great faith in the midst of their grief—he cannot feel sorry for them. It’s also unlikely that he pities the mourners whose emotions are for hire, not for real.

In John’s gospel, Jesus is Word, Bread, Light, Life. In John’s story of the raising of Lazarus he is “the resurrection and the life” (11:25). Death is undone—its stinking reality in a cave two miles outside of Jerusalem stirs Jesus’ passion; he is indignant in its presence; intolerant of its temporary power. He snorts like a horse and hot tears stream down his face. The stone is rolled away. Lazarus is called forth and raised up.

This dramatic story in John’s gospel prefigures, rather straightforwardly, Jesus’ own death, entombment, and resurrection. (Though Lazarus is not resurrected here—poor guy, he had to die again). This Lenten journey is leading toward death. There are more weeping women to come; a body to enshroud; a tomb to secure.

But death will not have the last word. On this Lord’s Day when the air is thick with the stench of death, we still acknowledge the “little Easter” that every Sunday is and we anticipate the great Feast of the Resurrection. Soon another stone will be rolled away and, snorting at death, the one who consoled a grieving sister with the words “I am the resurrection and the life” will be called forth and raised up. And in his life we will find our own. Thanks be to God.

Internalizing what Externals Mean

2011-03-30T18:12:00.000-07:00

by Jake Wilson
1 Samuel 16:1-13

We live in a culture obsessed with appearance. Tanning beds promise us sun-kissed bodies year round. Moleskine notebooks remind others of how creative we are and our designer eye wear helps us not only to see but to be seen. In this image obsessed culture we are tempted to continually modify the external, often in an effort to avoid the work of tending to the inner life which cannot be so easily dressed up.

God, however, is not so easily distracted by the temptation of the external. This episode in the life of God’s people is a brilliant example of the declaration God made to Isaiah “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” says the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55.8-9)

As we see in 1 Samuel 16, the election of David is not dependent on a skillful political machine managing his image or his deft use of talking points. In fact David is completely silent in the text. Rather it is the LORD who speaks. And the LORD speaks decisively for David, “Rise and anoint him for this is the one.” What this anointing means and how this election will play out is yet to be seen. We bring to this text our fascination with the David who will play the harp, slay the giant, live on the run and dance before the Ark of the Covenant. However none of that has happened yet. In fact, as the text presents him, David is almost a non-factor in his own election. Rather than achieving his fame through military victory (“Saul has killed his thousands, and David his ten thousands.” 1 Sam. 18.7) David receives the Holy Spirit. This anointing with oil and the Holy Spirit come to David as a gift independent of his past and empowering his future. Much like the radical break between Genesis 11 and the election of Abram in Genesis 12, God has made a decisive break with Saul and embraced a new future for both God’s people and the nations.

According to the text this new beginning comes as a recognition of the state of David’s heart. In 1 Sam. 13.14 we are told that God has chosen a new leader, “a man after His own heart.” When Samuel is tempted to reward the external (“He looked on Eliab and thought, ‘Surely the LORD’s anointed is now before the LORD”) he is reminded that “The LORD does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the LORD looks on the heart.” David’s election comes as a gift not based on his external achievements or appearance but rather as an acknowledgement of the desires of his heart.

This text is well suited to the inner journey of Lent. In a culture obsessed with the external, Lent offers us the time and space to reconsider the state of our own hearts. This is hard work because the terrain of our inner life is marked by the brokenness of anger, pride, depression, betrayal, addiction and all of the other trials that assault the Christian both internally and externally. All of us enter into the season of Lent heart broken in one sense or another. For this reason the preacher my profitably pair this text with a service of spiritual and physical healing that includes anointing with oil. As David was anointed with oil, “the Holy Spirit fell mightily upon him.” That same Spirit is active in the Church today piercing our external charade and beckoning us to care for our inner life. As we are anointed with oil the Spirit of God is offered freely to us through the gifts of creation for both physical and spiritual healing. In a time when we are constantly being tempted to ‘Re-Think Church’ by addressing our parking lots and small group systems this week we have the opportunity to be reminded that the LORD looks upon the heart. By God’s grace may ours be found tuned to sing God’s praise.

Engaging Jesus

2011-03-22T03:45:00.000-07:00

by Doug Lee
John 4:5-42

How long does it take to know someone truly? A year, a decade, a lifetime? Whether working alongside someone, putting in the hard work of committed friendship, or sharing the blessings and labors of marriage, we can be confident that we can know a person’s identity, aims, and motivations with the passage of time.

Yet after two millennia, can we be so certain that we know Jesus?

Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan woman is yet another story from John’s gospel that punctures our certainty that we have Jesus triangulated. We may feel as if we know Jesus after generations of slotting him in our christological taxonomies, tradition, and piety. But time and again, Jesus eludes our fully apprehending him.

Last week Nicodemus approached Jesus and began by uttering those deadly words, “We know that you are….” As that conversation progresses, it is clear that this doctor of the faith remains in the dark when it comes to Jesus.

In similar fashion, the Samaritan woman finds herself blinking in incomprehension at every turn of her conversation with the man sitting by Jacob’s well.

What is this man doing at my well? Drawing water is women’s work.

Why is this Jew initiating conversation and even asking to drink from my bucket? Jews consider us to be contaminated mongrel scum.

How can he claim to offer me water? He has no bucket.

What proceeds is a two-person comedy sketch because the woman consistently misses the deeper meaning of Jesus’ words. This alone should be sufficient warning about the level of our comprehension of Jesus.

Still, this unnamed woman demonstrates greater capacity to engage with Jesus than Nicodemus. Where that seminary-trained insider begins with “We know…”, it is the woman’s not knowing that allows Jesus to define who he is on his terms. Her verbal volleyball with Jesus does not come to a fruitless end, unlike Nicodemus’ earlier interaction. Instead, each exchange results in her having an ever higher estimation of her conversation partner. She addresses Jesus as “Sir” (twice), then “prophet”, and then floats a tentative “Messiah”. What seems crucial is her willingness to play ball even after the interaction ceases to be theoretical discourse about social barriers and religious differences. When Jesus says, “Go, call your husband,” it gets personal and meddlesome. But rather than telling Jesus off for sticking his nose in her business, she sticks with Jesus, even if it is only one step forward, two steps sideways. Even and especially in her shame and disgrace, she finds Jesus engaging her.

And perhaps “engagement” captures what is going on here. When she hurries off to tell her neighbors about this traveler and they invite him to stay with them, it sinks in. To those steeped in the Scriptures, John’s account of Jesus by the well conjures up powerful echoes of other occasions when a man meets a woman by the well. Invariably, wedding bells resound.

It is by a well that Moses encounters Zipporah, Abraham’s servant (on Isaac’s behalf) meets Rebekah, and Jacob gazes upon Rachel. In all three stories, the man travels a great distance and meets a woman by a well. In all three, the woman hurries home to tell her community about the traveler, and he is invited to stay. All three stories end with a betrothal.

But can this be a betrothal story? The Samaritan woman appears distinctly unqualified given that she has previously been married five times and is cohabiting with a sixth man. To suggest that Jesus seeks a bride also sounds ludicrous.

Unless we allow Jesus to define who he is and not insist with Nicodemus that “we know.”

The gospel of John has already shown Jesus assuming the role of the bridegroom by providing wine for the wedding at Cana. And just before this, John the Baptist refers to Jesus as the bridegroom whose arrival gladdens his heart. At Jacob’s well, Jesus seeks a bride.

But Jesus is a bridegroom beyond the expectations of romantic piety. The conclusion of the story is not just about one person coming to passionate faith. Jesus is not the man of the woman’s dreams, even her religious ones.
The fact that she leaves behind her water jar demonstrates that Jesus so exceeds her desires and expectations that they must be abandoned like old wineskins. She heads back to her community no longer afraid to face her disgrace. “Come and see,” she says, and becomes the first evangelist since Philip sought out Nathanael. Her testimony spurs the community to ask Jesus to abide with them. And following the pattern of the other betrothal stories, the identity of the traveler is revealed in the end. The Samaritan community confesses, “We know that this is truly the Savior of the world.”

Who is the bride? It is a community who has found themselves addressed and known by Jesus. The woman testifies, “Come and see a man who told me everything I have ever done!” We don’t know Jesus so much as Jesus knows us. He demonstrates his love by naming our failures (concrete and not hypothetical) and yet offering us living water to satisfy our souls. Experiencing this love frees us to begin to see him as he is.

The marriage proposal is not merely to the “unchurched” Samaritans but the thoroughly “churched” disciples who are just as bewildered. Here too is invitation to know Jesus and be wedded to him, for the disciples glimpse Jesus as they would have before because they see him love these despised Samaritans. When Jesus gets a hold of folks we thought we knew, we see Jesus and them anew. We must discard old scripts if we are to know Jesus and one another truly.

God’s mighty love for the world is shown in the gift of living water, the life of the Spirit. It is the precious gift given by one who knows the Samaritan woman’s thirst and our own. One of the great ironies in John’s gospel is that the source of living water is also the one who cries out, “I thirst,” as he hangs on the cross. Truly, Jesus is the Savior of the world.

Being Born From Above

2011-03-14T17:27:00.000-07:00

by Janice Love
Lent 2: Genesis 12:1-4a, Psalm 121, Romans 4:1-5, 13-17, John 3:1-17

Through rain, desert, wind and snow
Abraham and Sarah had to go
even though they nothing know.
- Oskar Sundmark, 11 years

Even though they nothing know. This is what it means to trust in the God we see revealed in Jesus, what it means to be Christian - to drop our nets, pick up our cross and follow Christ. Or as Soren Kierkegaard puts it: “To be joyful out on 70,000 fathoms of water, many, many miles from all human help – yes, that is something great! To swim in the shallows in the company of waders is not the religious.”

It goes against our instinct though, as dying does, to blindly go as an individual or as a church where God might send us. Especially in a culture that likes to encourage careful decision making, planning, saving for retirement (okay, yes, I am an instinctual planner that likes to have some sense of control, which is why I don’t like to fly in airplanes where I can’t even see the pilot – does he/she really know what they are doing?!). But it is what we do know, or think we know, that often impedes our vision and, therefore, our actions.

Jesus’ ministry in the gospel of John begins with a bang – an incredible miracle of water turned to wine followed by the overturning of the tables of merchants in the courtyard of the Temple. Nicodemus (whose name means “victory of the people”), a Pharisee, then comes to Jesus in secret, at night. He comes to this rabble-rouser in the cover of darkness, not to be seen, and he meets his God in the darkness of his unknowing. It is the performing of signs that has brought Nicodemus to Jesus, though we have just been told that Jesus does not entrust himself to those who believe because of the signs he is doing. Nicodemus refers to Jesus as “a teacher who has come from God”.

Then, in six verses (vs.3-8) the word “born” is used eight times. Birth is a painful and messy business. To be a newborn is to be in a place of complete dependence, of complete unknowing, of complete openness to formative forces. This is, in essence, the story of the catechetical formation of Nicodemus – the invitation to see in a new way, that he might be able to see the Kingdom of God.

If signs have brought Nicodemus to Jesus, Jesus offers him a sign that is sure to surprise him - the entrance to the kingdom of God is in the shape of a cross. Jesus makes reference to a story that Nicodemus is sure to know, that of the bronze serpent that Moses puts on a pole so that the people bitten by snakes as punishment for their faithlessness might look upon it and be healed (Numbers 21: 4-9). The snake was a powerful symbol of death but also of life and healing. Looking at Jesus on the cross is the healing power that Jesus brings to save the world. Belief in Jesus is not assenting to a statement about Jesus, it is allowing our life to be formed by the cross. It is a willingness to bear the burdens of others, to enter into the wave of suffering which crosses our path, to risk rejection for the sake of others. The promise of this life is the Kingdom – life lived in the presence of God, “eternal life.”

Nicodemus appears twice more in John’s gospel. In chapter 7 (vs.45-52) we find him risking rejection by defending Jesus. By chapter 19 (vs. 39-42) Nicodemus joins Joseph of Arimathea in burying Jesus, bringing an extravagantly exaggerated 100 pounds of myrrh and aloes to anoint his beloved body. This action is far beyond what would be expected for the burial of a “teacher who has come from God”, this is an act of worship of the God “who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.” The catechetical transformation of Nicodemus’ seeing, his knowing, has taken root and blossomed. This is a story of such hope for the 21st century North American church whose tables are being overturned. Seeking Christ in our admitted unknowing and humbly gazing upon our crucified Lord must always be our starting point.

God Abstracted

2011-03-07T18:22:00.000-08:00

by Kyle Childress
Matthew 4:1-11

Lent begins with Jesus fresh from the waters of his baptism, being led by the Spirit into the wilderness. At baptism, Jesus is reminded that he is called as God’s anointed, the Messiah. But what kind of messiah is he going to be? It is in the wilderness, where everything is stripped away, in prayer and fasting that Jesus seeks to clarify who he is and what he is going to do.

Satan, the Great Deceiver, shows up to steer Jesus away from God’s call upon him and uses three of the greatest temptations for those who want to change this world: economics/money – turning stones to bread; religion – spectacular religion which will make the crowds want to follow you anywhere; and politics – to get the power to make things turn out the way you want.

Jesus resists each temptation. It is not that Jesus is opposed to economics, politics, or religion. In fact, in his ministry, Jesus does talk – often – about economics, the dangers of wealth, and the particular care God has for the poor. And, the Jesus Movement is religious but instead of a Broadway production Jesus took a towel and a wash basin and washed feet. And no doubt, Jesus is political; but it is not the politics of Satan, Republicans, Democrats, or the Tea Party. It is the politics of Jesus, a different kind of politics.

Jesus makes a distinction between actions which seem, at first, almost identical with some of the things Jesus does later. But there is a big difference. God is the difference. Satan specifically tempts Jesus to do these things without God. Without God, economics, religion, and politics can be twisted into something that is the opposite of God’s intentions.

Part of the method of temptation is that Satan quotes the Bible to Jesus. Throughout the narrative all kinds of Bible quoting is going on. Satan quotes Scripture to Jesus and Jesus turns around and quotes it back to him. But here is the question: If the Bible is the Word of God and it is always the Word of God, why doesn’t Jesus do what it says?

Yet Jesus resists and does not do what the Bible says. Why? Well, because Satan is quoting the Bible. The Evil One is taking the Bible and twisting it, abusing it for his own ends, therefore, Jesus was correct in resisting it. How and who uses the Bible makes a difference in how it is heard. In one case it might be God’s Word and in another it might not. Whether the Bible is God’s Word or not depends on who the speaker is and who the hearer is. It depends on context, purpose, motivation, and so on.

Satan takes the Bible and seeks to decontextualize it. He is saying that the Bible is good in and of itself. It has authority and power whether God is connected to it or not. The Evil One is perfectly happy for us to have the Bible and use the Bible, just as long as we leave God out of it. In this sense, we might say that Satan is a good modernist. As modernists ourselves, we love to remove things from their history, their context, their cultural baggage, and then try to examine them as “pristine, pure, and objective.” When anyone brings into an argument history or culture or someone’s personal or religious view, we immediately dismiss it as irrelevant, “Well, that’s just your opinion,” we say. We seek the unvarnished truth. Objective truth. As Joe Friday used to say on Dragnet, “Just the facts, Ma’am.”

Yet what happens is that when we decontextualize, when we make abstractions, we can then give the abstraction any meaning we want. Literary critic Stanley Fish, in his book The Trouble With Principle, talks about this using the example from several years ago of the Rodney King trial in Los Angeles. Remember Rodney King was beaten by five or six Los Angeles police officers and it was all caught on an amateur photographer’s video. When the verdict was announced, many folks around the country were shocked at the acquittal of the officers. We could all see what had happened with our own eyes!

Fish says that the defense lawyers explained that they did two things: 1) They slowed the film down so that each frame was isolated and stood by itself. 2) They then asked questions that treated each frozen frame as if everything in the case hung on it and it alone. Is this blow an instance of excessive force? Is this blow intended to kill or maim? In this way, the event as a whole disappeared and was replaced by a series of discontinuous moments. Looking only at the individual frames cut off from the context that gave them meaning, the jury could not say of any of them that this particular blow did grievous harm to Rodney King (p. 309).

Remove it from its context. Ignore the big picture. Push aside history and then we can twist it to mean whatever we want. And that is what Satan did with the Bible. Take a verse out of context, remove it from who said it and why it was said and to whom it was said and you can make it suit your own needs. Satan did the same thing with the temptations. We can be involved in economics, religion, and politics, just make sure God is left out. As far as the Evil One is concerned, you can quote the Bible, do social action, and even put the Ten Commandments in the courthouse and the schoolhouse, just keep the God we know in Jesus Christ out.

Valley Girls (and Guys)

2011-03-03T19:23:00.000-08:00

by Jenny Williams
Exodus 24:12-18; Psalm 99; 2 Peter 1:16-21; Matthew 17:1-9

Growing up just north of Los Angeles, I was hyper-aware of the San Fernando Valley. Neither suburban nor Hollywood-cool, the Valley boasted its own style of dress and peculiar language. Like, fer shure. Living in the Valley had its difficulties: stop-and-go freeway traffic during many hours of the day and an oppressive layer of smog bearing down upon the residents most of the year.

Our denomination had nine summer camps scattered all over southern California, and all of them were located in the mountains. Kids from that Valley and the one I grew up in (the San Gabriel Valley) could get away for a week to find God and a little fresh air. We hiked among towering pines, sat on rocks to sing songs around a fire, and when we did give in to sleep, did so in log cabins. Lasting relationships were forged for campers, both among themselves and between them and God.

We’ve all heard (and possibly preached) plenty of sermons on Transfiguration Sunday which point fingers at Peter’s booth-building malady, which use God’s booming “Listen to him!” as to legitimize all the stuff in the Sermon on the Mount that we’ve just preached on, and which inform us that at some point we have to get off that mountain to go back to the valley and do all the work that Jesus told us to do. I don’t need to hear that sermon. My life is lived in the valley: classes to prepare, people to visit, sermons to write, streams to swim up. Being reared in the United Methodist Church, I’m super-committed to works of mercy. I want to talk to the church about what we need to DO, how we can be engaged in social justice, and how this will be a witness to the world.

Those of us who find ourselves deeply engaged with valley life need to balance the ecclesial concern about who we are with a willingness to linger with the great I AM. Now don’t get me wrong: I don’t shy away from the works of piety. I begin each morning with an extended time of Scripture reading and prayer. I journal. I retreat. I’m part of an accountable discipleship group. But sometimes, when I get out of whack and let the busy-ness of the everyday Christian life overtake me, I reduce those practices to items on a to-do list. I’m sure some of you know what I’m talking about. So the word from the psalm jumps out at me: “Extol the Lord our God, and worship at his holy mountain.”

This year I hear God saying to us valley girls and guys, “It’s okay to leave the valley to come up on the mountain for awhile!” Certainly we can see God at work in the valley, but that work is sustained by the seeing of the brilliance of Christ and the hearing of God’s voice. For some, it’s harder to go up on the mountain than it is to go the way of the cross.

What it is, and is not, to be an EP Endorser

2011-02-26T08:02:00.000-08:00

by Brent Laytham
Early on, we said that The Ekklesia Project was a "school for subversive friendship," an opportunity to discover friends you didn't know you had who were busy letting Jesus turn the world right-side up (dethroning the powers in the process). That was in 2000. Now, thanks to Web2.0 social media, it appears that discovering 'friends' is as easy as clicking "accept" whenever Facebook invites me to. I've accumulated 180 'friends' that way, some of whom I actually know.

Facebook friending has its advantages. I can see pictures of friends who live far away, feel a bit more connected with persons that I care about, even stalk my teenage children. But it isn't the kind of relationship that could be described as a school for subversive friendship. Why? Because it doesn't really ask much of me. Subversive friendships, on the other hand, can truly rock our world, since they are built on the chief cornerstone (Ephesians 2:20). So I thank God that we didn't choose to call associating with EP 'friending,' because that demands too little.

On the other hand, I thank God we didn't call it 'becoming a member'-that would imply too much. I'm not a member of EP, and neither is anyone else. Recognizing that 'member' is church talk, we consciously chose not to name our relationship in ecclesial terms. 'Member' means Christ has claimed us in baptism to belong to his body, the church. Because we are committed to the "unity and solidarity" of the church, we consciously avoid rivalistic language. We are a network of support, a gathering of friends, a project that is for the church by recognizing clearly that it is not the church.

So within EP we neither 'friend' nor join. Instead, we endorse-we name what claims us, a vision of God, Christ, church and shalom. Because this is about being claimed by God and one another, we have from the beginning asked some things of one another: truthfulness, prayer, fasting and tangible support.

Over the next months, we will be rediscovering the significance of endorsing the Ekklesia Project through newsletter articles, our blog, and Facebook (it's not all bad). Our goal is to work toward an invitation to endorse or re-endorse EP this summer. Please join the conversation.

The Economics of Anxiety

2011-02-23T16:51:00.000-08:00

by Debra D. Murphy
Eighth Sunday After Epiphany
Isaiah 49:8-16; Psalm 131; 1 Corinthians 4:1-5; Matthew 6:24-34

One of the steadfast realities of following the lectionary is the predictable rhythm of its three-year cycle of readings. Preparing a sermon for Baptism of the Lord Sunday in 2011? You might go back to your files from 2008 to see what text(s) you focused on, what themes prevailed, what prayers and hymns were chosen for worship. You might—depending on your congregation’s current needs and challenges—revisit, rework, recycle, as it were, the riches of the lectionary cycle.

But because Easter is so late this year—a day short of the latest date possible—there was no eighth Sunday After Epiphany in 2008 or 2005 or 2002. In fact, the factors that determine the date of the Church's prime moveable feast are so unusual this year that an eighth Sunday after Epiphany is an astronomical and liturgical rarity. This means that, with a longer stretch of Sundays between Epiphany and Lent, we take in much more of the Sermon on the Mount, Year A’s appointed reading for the Sundays after Epiphany. And this week’s portion from Matthew 6—rare in the Sunday cycle but familiar in our hearing—couldn’t be more timely.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?” (6:25).

Worry characterizes our age. If you’re not worrying—contemporary logic seems to suggest—you’re not paying attention. The news that bombards us daily is packaged and presented with an often faux-urgency meant to exploit our fears and our already-frazzled nerves. We are an anxious people living in anxious times—or so the politicians and pundits tell us.

But it isn’t generic worry that Jesus admonishes against in the Sermon on the Mount. His is not advice for the self-improvement-seeking crowd. Indeed, the crowds gathered on the hillside to hear this unusual exhortation are told that the source of their anxiety is economic—that they are prone to worry because they are preoccupied with security and acquisition. Strive instead, Jesus preaches, “for the kingdom of God and his righteousness” (6:33). Kingdom economics is not about acquiring and accumulating but about shedding stuff and sharing with others; it’s not about security but about learning to live out of control.

This week we’ve watched crowds gather in Madison, Wisconsin to voice their disagreement with proposed economic policies that would affect public employees’ wages, benefits, and collective-bargaining rights. Supporters of these policies (and the governor who initiated them) have made their voices heard as well. There are principled stands and reasonable objections on both sides of this contentious issue, but these are rarely given air time since media moguls know that what sells, what increases ratings and revenues and contributes to our culture of worry and fear, is an old-fashioned, good-versus-evil, political throw-down.

The economics of the Kingdom seem absurd in light of this debate. The radical sharing and redistribution of wealth that the early Christians practiced (Acts 2:44-45) shaped a people given to gratitude and generosity, not anxiety. The refusal to obsess about food and drink and clothing—the basic necessities of life—made it possible to practice true gospel hospitality: does my neighbor (even my enemy) have enough to eat, drink, and wear?

This Sunday’s lection from Isaiah reminds us of what makes gratitude and generosity possible and why worry is an affront to the God who blesses and saves: “In a time of favor I have answered you, on a day of salvation I have helped you; I have kept you and given you as a covenant to the people” (49:8).

And finally the Psalter reading this week—like the Psalms generally—speaks to the dilemma of our divided hearts: anxiety threatens to overtake us even as we desire to be a people “calmed and quieted” in our souls (131:2). It is this kind of raw honesty, confessed together in the worshiping assembly on this rare Eighth Sunday After Epiphany, that can give us the courage to “hope in the LORD from this time on and forevermore” (131:3), and to do what Jesus asks: refuse to serve wealth and live anxious lives and strive instead for the kingdom of God and his righteousness.

Realist of Grace

2011-02-15T19:40:00.000-08:00

by Brian Volck
Leviticus 19:1-2, 9-18; 1 Corinthians 3:16-23; Matthew 5:38-48

“Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” Jesus commands. That’s nowhere near as rosy and naïve as the bumper sticker I once came across, in a boutique full of inspirational art and Buddhist tchotckes, that read: “Love your enemies and you won’t have any.”

There once was at time that I, too, believed I could change the world and others by wishing or willing it so. I was fortunate to unlearn that nonsense before I caused too much harm.

Jesus is far more realistic than we give him credit. The only certainty in Jesus’ command is that we will have enemies. There’s no reassurance that our love will transform them, improve our earthly status, or end wars. We are simply told to love and pray for adversaries so that we “…may be children of (our) heavenly Father.”

Even if we interpret the preceding verses (5:38-42) as social historians of the Mediterranean world suggest (i.e. reframing insults and oppression in ways that assert our human dignity), the path of nonresistant love is rarely painless. It is, in point of fact, often lethal. Remember that Jesus is raised in triumph after we tortured and killed him.

But what’s realistic about a command like, “ Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect?” (It’s no wonder many prefer Luke’s rendering (6:36): “Be merciful just as your Father is merciful.”)

But the Greek teleioi is far richer than the English “perfect.” The Greek word suggests wholeness, completion, holiness. We should be prepared for this by today’s reading from Leviticus: God tells Moses, just before we are instructed to love neighbor as self, “Be holy, for I, the Lord, your God, am holy.”

We can’t wish ourselves into being holy, whole, or perfect, any more than we can wish our enemies into loving us. It’s not a matter of sentimental inspiration, mind over matter, or karma. We become teleioi not because we earn it, but because God is teleios. Jesus’ realism does not rely on power, will or mind. Jesus is the ultimate realist because he is the realist of God’s grace.

Reality Hunger

2011-02-09T21:00:00.000-08:00

by Ragan Sutterfield
Deuteronomy 30:15-20; Psalm 119:1-8; Matthew 5:21-37

Reality hunger. I read a book by that title last summer and the title, more than the book, describes what many of us are feeling these days. We long for the concrete, the real, the hard surfaced world against all of the abstractions of the Economy, of the powers and institutions that seem to dictate our lives without our understanding the what and who and why of their existence. And yet, we must understand that this abstraction is a choice, that our hunger goes unsatiated because we continue to eat the high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated fare of the convenience stores lining the interstate through nowhere and to nowhere. Call them the temple foods of false gods—cheap, convenient, subsidized lies that seem like the real stuff, but leave us sick and unhealthy.

“If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God…by loving the Lord your God, walking in his ways, and observing his commandments, decrees, and ordinances, then you shall live and become numerous, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to possesses.” The path toward reality seems clear cut. God is providing a way forward that will form our lives into patterns that will go with the grain of the universe. And as the passage from Deuteronomy says, “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.” Our life in or out of reality will be shown clearly, eventually, by the testament of heaven and earth—in its flourishing or in its uproar. “Happy are they whose way is blameless…Happy are they who observe his decrees.”

But how do we taste the reality we hunger for when all we have eaten is filler and a chemist’s tricks on our taste buds? We must learn to taste again, we must have the moral education of flavor. This is what Jesus is addressing in the Sermon on the Mount; this is why he says that anger is as bad as murder and lust as bad as adultery. He is delivering a flavor education that teaches the difference between fresh ground chuck roast and “proprietary beef filler.” Jesus is trying to show us the difference between do-gooding and goodness, between the morality of “I didn’t _______” and the morality of “I am.”

In Wendell Berry’s classic book The Unsettling of America he says that the ecological crisis is a crisis of character. It is difficult to deny that claim and yet our world seems bent on not murdering, not committing adultery, not adding more than economically necessary to our carbon footprint. Our character goes unchanged, we remain in the base animality of the “flesh”, we have not left our lives open for God to live through us. Life or death, blessings and curses—heaven and earth witness against us.

Still the Crucified

2011-02-03T05:00:00.000-08:00

by Doug Lee
Isaiah 58:1-9a; 1 Corinthians 2:1-16; Matthew 5:13-20

When I came to you, brothers and sisters, I did not come proclaiming the mystery of God to you in lofty words or wisdom. For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and him crucified.

Paul’s description of his preaching is enough to stop any preacher in her or his tracks.
It is certainly enough to stop this one.

What do I regard as essential in my preaching? Do I rely on sounding scholarly or worldly wise? Do I trust in having something new and captivating to say?

What goal am I aiming at as I prepare my message? Is it to be identified as a powerful and effective speaker? Is to gain the esteem of my hearers and burnish my reputation?

What kind of gospel do my preparation and style of delivery (and not just my actual words) testify to?

Is it a gospel of anxious striving, of certainty and self-confidence? Is it a message of professionalism and accomplishment?

More generally, Paul’s words raise questions about the way Church performs her ministry in the world. Jesus’ descriptions of the Church as the salt of the earth and the light of the world in the Sermon on the Mount have inspired believers to take up great missionary works. These are forceful images of the Church “making a difference” in the world. In the soil of American optimism, Christians has excelled in envisioning a gospel of triumph and acclaim. Our ministries aim at “making the biggest bang for the buck.” Nearly a century of unquestioned American supremacy in the world has encouraged us to believe that anything worth doing is worth doing big and loud.

But Paul insists that the inescapable starting point of gospel ministry is the cross. And we wouldn’t dare argue with Paul. But the apostle pushes the cross as the one and only starting point for all proclamation and mission past even where other New Testament writers would. Paul’s letters testify that his assertion about knowing nothing except Jesus Christ crucified is not stretching the truth too far. His writings make little mention of Jesus’ life and ministry prior to the crucifixion. Where we and the authors of the gospels would derive our knowledge of Jesus, the Church, and her mission from Christ’s authoritative teaching and miraculous signs, Paul seems genuinely to believe that all anyone needs to know about Christ begins with the cross. Everything else finds its source and coherence there. Christian character finds its source there. Mission finds its beginning there. Our preaching finds its content there. Human sexuality and wealth find their purpose there. Reading the wide range of topics Paul takes up in his letters to the Corinthians is enough for us to see that the cross is the lens through which Paul sees every facet of existence.

And were this not enough, the cross also defines the continuing contours of the Church and her message. In our American triumphalism, we can easily assume that Easter erases the shame and the horror of the crucifixion. The weakness of the cross was only momentary and can therefore be cast off in favor of the triumph of Resurrection. We can graduate from crucifixion humiliation to resurrection victory. However, Paul does not use the simple past tense to refer to Jesus Christ the “crucified”, as if that were just a phase in the life of Christ that is over and done with. Paul utilizes a verb tense that asserts a past event that has continuing force into the present. For Paul, the risen and glorified Jesus Christ is still the crucified. The weakness of the cross continues to define who our Lord is. When resurrected Jesus appeared to the disciples (and presumably Paul himself), he still bore his wounds and showed them not merely as proofs that he died a shameful, disfiguring death but now as proofs of God’s glory and power triumphing in weakness and shame. If the Son of God can freely show proofs of his humiliation publicly even on this side of Easter, then what have we to fear? If Paul can put the words “crucified” and “the Lord of glory” into the same sentence (v. 8), then what deadly event can God not redeem?

The Church’s preaching and mission do not live by her capacity to put inadequacy and failure behind her. But by beginning and continuing on in weakness, the Church shines forth as the light of the world. Our salty distinctiveness does not result from becoming a forceful or accomplished community, but precisely in our capacity to remain in the blessing God pours out on the poor in spirit, the meek, and those reviled because of Christ.

As John Stott so clearly puts it, “We have a weak message (Christ crucified), proclaimed by weak preachers (full of fear and trembling), received by weak hearers (the socially despised). For God chose a weak instrument (Paul), to bring a weak message (the cross) to weak people (the Corinthian working class). But through this triple weakness the power of God was—and still is—displayed.”

Repent: The Kingdom Is Near

2011-01-20T04:10:00.000-08:00

by Janice Love
Epiphany 3: Isaiah 9:1-4, Psalm 27:1, 4-9, I Corinthians 1:10-18, Matthew 4:12-23

Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near. ~Matthew 4:17b

And so it begins. The history of the world shifts, never to be the same again.

For over ten years now I have had the joy of being part of the Christian Seasons calendar team based out of University Hill congregation in Vancouver, BC. In a Wednesday meeting with me in 2000, Rev. Ed Searcy, in reflecting on his D.Min. studies on the engagement of Christian faith and North American culture, wondered why we as Christians did not yet have our “own” calendar, similar to how there was a Jewish calendar, etc. I was immediately struck by the thought that this was an idea whose time had come.

By Saturday, when we were to celebrate our first Christian New Year’s (on the eve of the first Sunday in Advent) as a congregation, I had the first form of the calendar done. The gift of the Christian Year is by no means new but the physical format of this calendar was. The calendar is organized by the Christian Year so that it begins with Advent and each calendar page turns with the beginning of a new season. The January to December months can of course be found within it but they are not the primary organizing principle – that is the life, death, resurrection of Christ Jesus and the gift of the church.

This year we received the rewarding news that in taking a copy of the Christian Seasons Calendar with her to Bangladesh, Dr. Emily R. Brink of the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship, found an interested audience for it. One fellow rejoiced in his discovery, as a fairly new convert to Christianity, that he had inherited a rich tradition of Christian festivals that would help him to live out his new identity in Christ through out the year. In these tumultuous times for the church in North America I firmly believe that the Christian seasons are a gift and an invaluable tool for reminding us who and whose we are.

It is important, however, to do some reflection together on what seasons we emphasize, the obvious example being the excessive celebration of Christmas and the too moderate celebration of the Resurrection. In hosting the texts this last week for the upcoming third Sunday in Epiphany, I have been struck with the conviction that the church would do well to accentuate this day with a high holy feast. We could call it ‘The Feast of the Unforeseen Way.’ This is the day the Revised Common Lectionary marks the beginning of Jesus’ human/divine ministry here on earth and there are surprising turns taken and rather astonishing decisions made throughout the text.

Matthew 4, verse 12 begins with the continued threat of extinguishment that has haunted Jesus since his birth according to Matthew’s gospel. His cousin, John is arrested and Jesus responds to this news by withdrawing to Galilee, moving away from the political limelight. He has earlier already rejected the path of seeking political office as the means to God’s end, an unexpected move for the expected Messiah. No, instead Jesus heads into darkness, into the Galilee of the Gentiles where the people walk and sit in darkness.
The land of Zebulun and Naphtali (sons of Jacob and tribes of Israel), located between the Sea of Galilee and the Mediterranean, is an “impure” area populated by many considered unclean. In the settling of the land as outlined in Judges, these two tribes were among a number who lived among the Canaanites of that area. It was in this territory, the shadow of death, that Saul and his three sons, including David’s beloved friend Jonathan, were killed. Zebulun and Naphtali were annexed by the Assyrians in 733 BC (2 Kings 15:29), the bringing into contempt mentioned in Isaiah 9:1.

It is from here that the light of the world begins to shine forth. When we are in darkness, especially if the only thing we can claim to know is that we are in darkness, it is easier to see the light. We are drawn to it. We instinctively, humbly know our need for it. Jesus moves in those places where it isn’t all figured out. It is where we do not know that we are more likely to encounter this Christ. This is hopeful news for the church in North America as it undergoes a time of plucking up and pulling down.

But Jesus knows that teaching, healing and proclaiming God’s good news are inherently political acts that will eventually get him into trouble with those who want the status quo of the darkness to be maintained. In Reverberations of Faith, Walter Brueggemann defines the Day of the Lord as “a technical term in Israel’s vocabulary of hope that anticipates a moment when an act of power and self-assertion will fully and decisively establish YHWH’s rule.” (p.45). We glimpse in Sunday’s readings the Way Jesus has chosen – unexpected, unforeseen – that begin the act of power and self-assertion that is not an act of power or self-assertion by the world’s definition. The Way whose trajectory ends in self-emptying and the “foolishness of the cross” which is the power of God (I Cor. 1:18).

Jesus continues with the unexpected as he calls a third of his core group of disciples from their fishing on the Sea of Galilee. Not chosen to continue studying with the Rabbi at the end of their formal schooling, they have returned to the family business of fishing. Then Jesus, by passing the traditional processes, calls them to fish for people. Having been invited to participate in something they thought they could not in any formal way, they immediately follow. Their expectations, however, will be turned upside down – they, and we, are in the hands of the living God now.

Sunday marks the beginning of Jesus’ ministry with all its unexpectedness. It is in Jesus that we discover the kingdom of heaven has come near. Its alternative rhythm is one we must mark, celebrate and live together.

Truth Dazzles Gradually

2011-01-12T05:11:00.000-08:00

by Kyle Childress
John 1: 29-42

At age 51, Noah Adams, a host on National Public Radio, abruptly decided he had to have a piano so he invested in a new Steinway upright – a financial commitment that provided extra incentive to practice.

Adams tells this delightful story of his first year of learning to play the piano in his book, Piano Lessons. Yet learning to play was a daunting task, particularly given his already demanding schedule. He found it difficult and frustrating; he couldn’t simply sit down and make the beautiful music he wanted. There were scales to learn, and basic rhythms to be mastered. Initially, he decided against going to a teacher, trying such shortcuts as a “Miracle Piano Teaching System” on the computer. A friend’s warning proved to be prophetic: “You might be learning music with that computer, but you’re not learning how to play.”

Eventually, Adams signed up for an intensive ten-day music camp. He discovered that there is no substitute for regular, disciplined practice and the tutelage of teachers. By the end of the first year, his frustrations began to recede. He actually desired time for practice. He had become initiated into the art of piano playing. He also learned to appreciate the craft of making and caring for pianos, as well as the importance of the history of pianos and great pianists – classical, jazz, blues, even rock-and-roll.
Just as Adams decided to take up the piano as an adult, so many adults these days are deciding to seek out the church. Some had childhood lessons in being a Christian, but left the church for many years.

Others taking up the church have had very little exposure to the Christian faith, searching, sometimes unaware of what exactly they are hoping to find. Add to this mixture of folks looking into taking lessons in being Christian are young people and teenagers plus the many of us who have been in church for a number of years but are still asking questions and seeking answers; still taking lessons, in other words. Indeed the journey of being Christian never ends.

One temptation is to look for shortcuts, a “Miracle Christian Teaching System” on a computer. Or we look to the equivalent of the Cliff Notes of following Jesus or perhaps the movie version. Being good consumers we’re always looking for the quick answer, the instant result, delivered fast, efficiently and inspirationally, so if we can find a church that delivers Jesus in fast-food doses then all the better.

However, there is no substitute for the slow, sometimes painful growth that comes through disciplined habits of practice shaped by the crucified and risen Christ. One does not become an excellent piano player, painter, dancer, carpenter, or baseball player overnight; neither does one learn to become a Christian overnight. We can’t know Jesus, the Incarnate Son of God, in five quick easy lessons accompanied by an inspirational DVD. One needs teachers and mentors and a community of friends, and one needs to practice over a long period of time.

The first words spoken by Jesus in the gospel according to John are, “What are you looking for?” He is talking to two disciples of John the Baptist. And they respond in what sounds like a strange way,
“Teacher, where are you staying?”

What they are looking for, what they seek, is not so much the information of the teacher, otherwise Jesus could have handed them his book or directed them to his website. No, they want to know him.

The word we translate as “staying” refers to the source of one’s life and meaning. So when these two disciples ask Jesus, “Where are you staying?” they are asking, “What is it that sustains you? What power do you have? Where do you remain? Where do you live? How do you live? Who are you really?” It’s the same word used in John later, over in chapter 15, when we are told we are to abide in Christ. Abiding, staying, remaining, residing, dwelling – they all take time.

Jesus says encouragingly, “Come and see.” Then John tells us, “They came and saw where he was staying, and they remained with him that day.” Here, in a simple and understated way, John gives us the essence of Christian discipleship. Discipleship is not primarily getting information or receiving the “right” answer; it is moving into the “house” with Jesus. It is living with Jesus Christ. And to live with Jesus takes time and community.

Emily Dickinson wrote, “Tell all the Truth but tell it slant- /… The Truth must dazzle gradually/ Or every man be blind.” There are some things, and Truth is one of them, that can be understood rightly only if we understand them over time. The very essence of Truth is that it can only be known slowly, in bits and pieces that are chewed on, meditated on, reflected over, talked about, practiced and then practiced some more with others living with the same Truth.

Gradually, as we come to know the Truth of Jesus Christ, we may be dazzled.

Voice lessons

2011-01-06T04:07:00.000-08:00

by Jenny Williams
Psalm 29; Matthew 3:13-17

It’s no wonder that parts of the Church used to observe Christmas, Epiphany, and the Baptism of the Lord as part of one unified and extended celebration. There’s a lot of revelation going on there. Christ’s identity is revealed to shepherds, wise men, John the Baptist, and those gathered on the banks of the Jordan.

The revelation continues on the Sundays after the Epiphany. God appeals to our senses. Whereas Ragan talked about seeing last week, this week we hear the Father’s voice tell us that the guy coming up out of the dirty sin-water is his Son.

God’s voice speaks creation into existence and a Word into flesh. If you’re left with any doubt about the power of that voice, read Psalm 29, which includes my favorite Scriptural alliteration: “The voice of the Lord flashes forth flames of fire.” (How fun to say and sing in the Psalter!)

In the lectionary weeks to come, the voice of the Father will issue forth from the Son’s mouth, inviting us (John 1:39 and Matthew 4:19), knowing us (John 1:42), and continuing to reveal to us the Way (Matthew 5-7). We’ll hear Jesus’s voice for five weeks as we dwell on the words of the Sermon on the Mount:

“Jesus began to speak and taught them, saying…”
“You have heard it said…but I say to you…”
“yet I tell you…”

The words of this sermon have at times unfortunately been reduced to “impossible rules to live by.” More than one preacher or exegete has tried to dismiss Jesus’ words as archaic, context-bound, meant only for individuals and not for the church, or so impossibly difficult to carry out that surely they only have spiritual meaning for us.

Lest we forget that hard word of that sermon is good news preached to us by none other than God Incarnate, the story of the Transfiguration gives us a verbal reminder.   The Father speaks directly to humanity again: “This is my beloved Son. Listen to him!” This announcement, a mirror of the words spoken at Jesus’ baptism and a wonderful bookend to the liturgical season, forces those who dismiss Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount to come to terms with the reality of the revelation of God to the world. That revelation happens not only on mountaintops and riverbanks, but in persecutions, poverty, marriages, offerings, and among panhandlers—in short, living out the Sermon on the Mount. To those who are striving to live the Way, this announcement gives assurance, comfort and hope.

God has spoken to the world…and looks to us to speak as well.

After the vision of the shiny Jesus fades, Jesus warns the disciples to not tell anyone about this vision until after he has been resurrected. If they were good Protestants, they were relieved by this; they had a reprieve before they had to tell anybody about Jesus. Not for long, though. Jesus’s command presumes that there will be a time when they will be expected to tell, share, and invite. We’re in that time—a time where our actions need to be accompanied by invitation.

We who don’t feel equipped to tell, share, and invite might want to join in the petition presented in the hymn “Word of God, Come Down on Earth”:

Word that caused blind eyes to see,
speak and heal our mortal blindness;
deaf we are, our healer be,
loose our tongues to tell your kindness.”

May our tongues be loosened…end employed.

God Made Visible

2010-12-30T19:39:00.000-08:00

by Ragan Sutterfield
John 1:1-18; Matthew 2:1-12

What makes God visible? That was the question that struck me reading the lectionary passages for this week.

This is one of those rare weeks in which the Episcopal Church (my tradition) varies its readings from the standard Revised Common Lectionary, so I read both the gospel readings from John 1 and Matthew 2:1-12 (Episcopal). Reading both was instructive because both are about God being made visible.

In John 1:18 we read, “No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father's heart, who has made him known.” This comes after we are told of the light coming into the world, a light that makes God visible by dwelling with us and making us children of the light with “grace upon grace.”

In Matthew 2:1-12 we read about the wise men from the East who are guided by a star, a sign that leads them to the light of the Christ Child. Here God is made visible through a star that guides the wise men to Him. Herod, who does not see the star, who has not had God made visible to him, has to rely on brutal violence to fight what he cannot see as he kills the children of Bethlehem.

So what makes God visible? Our eyes must be opened; our vision must be corrected so that the blur that we were once unable to comprehend becomes clear. This comes not so much with theological corrective lenses as it does with a community that helps us to see God, a community through which God reveals himself. The teachers of such a community might not be the ones we expect.

Reading the lectionary this week reminded me of a scene from Andrei Tarkovsky’s film Nostalghia. The film is a beautiful reflection on homesickness and one of the key characters is a mad man with apocalyptic visions who steers the protagonist toward faith. Toward the end of the film this man makes a speech in a plaza where the insane and crippled and broken have gathered to listen. It is a moving and profound vision of the kingdom of God.

Dominico gives a raving speech, where wisdom mixes with madness. “We must mix the so-called sick with the so-called healthy,” he says. It’s the so-called healthy, he says, who have destroyed the world. “What kind of world is this where a mad man has to tell you to be ashamed of yourselves?”

This is a world where the mad must tell us to be ashamed of ourselves, it is a world where, as Jean Vanier has said, the disabled will heal the “able.”

Throughout advent we have waited for the light to come, for God to be revealed. We are now in the season of Christmas. God has come. God is here. God has been made visible. How will we see him? Where will we see him? Who will show us?

Herod Rules

2010-12-23T05:06:00.000-08:00

by Brian Volck
Matthew 2:13-23

If, as the late Raymond Brown was fond of saying, the infancy accounts in Matthew and Luke are “the gospel in miniature,” then this Sunday’s gospel may be read as Matthew’s preview of the passion and resurrection. As with the passion accounts, we go astray if we read ourselves into this story in ways that are too easy, too comforting. If we don’t find something of ourselves in the person of Herod the Great, we’re cutting ourselves far too much slack.

Historical accounts of Herod the Great suggest a ruler wily enough to switch allegiances just in time and pragmatic enough to execute his own children when politics demanded. An Idumaean rather than ethnically Jewish, he was nonetheless named “King of the Jews” by the Roman Senate while in exile.
After reclaiming his throne – with help from his Roman connections – Herod settled down to the business of governance. He built cities and fortresses, including the famous Masada, improved water supply to Jerusalem, and, most famously, rebuilt the Second Temple. You might even call his agenda “progressive,” even if his methods were rather rough.

Yet most today remember him as the man who ordered the slaughter of the innocents, a plot which, Matthew says, the infant Jesus barely escaped. Joseph – the human hero of Matthew’s infancy account – follows the dream angel’s command and takes Jesus to Egypt, the place of Israel’s historical bondage. When death at last defeats Herod, Jesus appears, alive, with his family in the Galilean backwater of Nazareth.

Herod, of course, knew nothing of the crucified and risen Jesus. If his bloody response to a new threat from Bethlehem is historically accurate – the “slaughter of the innocents” is unique to Matthew; not even Flavius Josephus, who otherwise doesn’t shy from dishing dirt on Herod, mentions it – then he surely understood himself as acting out of political necessity, protecting his position and the progress he brought his kingdom.

W. H. Auden, in his Christmas oratorio, For the Time Being, presents Herod in this way, worried that an infant, believed by some to be God Incarnate, threatens to destroy the reason, idealism and justice he has labored to advance:

Naturally this cannot be allowed to happen. Civilization must be saved even if this means sending for the military, as I suppose it does. How dreary. Why is it that in the end civilization always has to call in these professional tidiers to whom it is all one whether it be Pythagoras or a homicidal lunatic that they are instructed to exterminate? 0 dear, why couldn’t this wretched infant be born somewhere else? Why can’t people be sensible? I don’t want to be horrid.

Herod’s problem, in the end, is that no god worthy of the name would be so disrespectful of his progressive agenda, nor so foolish as to become truly human, and therefore vulnerable:

…for me personally at this moment it would mean that God had given me the power to destroy Himself. I refuse to be taken in. He could not play such a practical joke. Why should he dislike me so? I’ve worked like a slave. Ask anyone you like. I’ve read all the official documents without skipping. I’ve taken elocution lessons. I’ve hardly ever taken bribes. How dare He allow me to decide? I’ve tried to be good. I brush my teeth every night. I haven’t had sex for a month. I object. I’m a liberal. I want everyone to be happy. I wish I had never been born.

Auden had his reasons for portraying Herod, who wouldn’t be mistaken for a liberal, progressive, or conservative today, in this way. Yet I suspect all of us, in our own way, have trouble with an incarnate, vulnerable God who invites us to turn our life projects upside down and follow him to an uncertain end. We’ve all worked so hard, meant so well, sacrificed so much to trade away what we have coming for something so flimsy as faith. We all know Herod’s motivation, if not his power, from the inside.

Now that Christmas is here, how will you live in light of the vulnerable Incarnation? How much of your agenda will you part with to follow “Jesus the Savior…come for to die?”

A Small Part in a Great Story

2010-12-16T23:44:00.000-08:00

by Jake Wilson
Isaiah 7:10-26; Matthew 1:18-25

By Matthew 1:18, Matthew has already named Jesus as the Messiah several times. Indeed, Matthew’s genealogy is constructed to show that the son of Joseph and Mary is also the Messiah. Reading the birth narrative in light of the genealogy helps us remember that what we encounter in this particular birth is the continuing of the story of God’s covenantal love for his chosen people, and indeed all the world. The birth of the Messiah comes as the fulfillment of God’s promises to Abraham and David as well as in the wake of the sad history of the murder of Uriah and the deportation to Babylon. The genealogy reminds us that the birth of the Messiah is part of the history of God’s action with and for God’s broken people.

The birth account then, like the genealogy, stresses God’s prior action and the response of God’s people. As we enter Matthew 1:18-25, several significant events have already taken place. Joseph and Mary are already engaged. Mary is already pregnant. Joseph already knows that Mary is carrying a child not his own, and he has already decided what to do. All of this is recounted in a sparse two verses. In this way, Matthew’s account lacks the flair of Luke’s birth narrative. There is no startling visit from the angel Gabriel, no Magnificat. Perhaps most significantly, we lose Mary’s beautiful self-offering found in Luke 1:38: “Here I am the servant of the Lord, let it be with me according to your word.” In light of Mary’s radical openness to God and her willingness to obey, it is common to recognize Mary as the first disciple and the mother of the Church. This claim is much harder to construct from Matthew’s account of the birth, where Mary has no speaking lines and her actions of reception and obedience have already been accomplished.

Where Matthew leaves Mary silent, however, Joseph (who also has no speaking lines) takes on a more prominent role as a righteous man of faith. Joseph is addressed by an angel, and though he never speaks, his actions embody Mary’s, “Here I am….” In obedience, Joseph changes his plan to send Mary away and names the child as instructed by the angel. Later in Matthew’s story, Joseph again hears from the angel of the Lord and once more responds with obedience as the family flees to Egypt.

If Luke offers us a picture of Mary as the mother of the Church, Matthew offers us Joseph as its earthly father, a righteous man who mirrors Mary’s obedience and willingness to respond to God’s mysterious ways with both faith and action.

Matthew’s economy in his treatment of both Mary and Joseph stresses to the reader what we already discern through the genealogy, namely that the coming of Jesus the Messiah is not a human achievement but the continuation of God’s covenantal love. Matthew calls upon the prophet Isaiah to tie the birth of this particular child to the history of God's people, a history populated by prophets who pointed with eager expectation to this event. By the time we meet Mary and Joseph in Matthew’s gospel, the event of the Incarnation is well under way. What remains is not for them to enable or establish the grounds for such an action, but rather to respond to God’s prevenient self-giving with obedience and faith.

On this the last Sunday before Christmas day, the preacher lifts up the prevenient self-giving of God in the event of the Incarnation. This is an event to which we can respond with openness or hostility, but an event that is not dependent upon our response. Rather it is the fulfillment of the long history of God's steadfast love.

Advent Outdoors

2010-12-08T18:03:00.000-08:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
Third Sunday of Advent
Isaiah 35:1-10; Psalm 146: 5-10 or Luke 1:47-55; James 5:7-10; Matthew 11:2-11

The haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes. Isaiah 35:7b

Wendell Berry observes that it’s not enough appreciated how much an outdoor book the Bible is. For many, such an insight serves mainly to underwrite the idea that we can worship God best in nature’s environs: mountaintops, seashores, golf courses. But I think that Berry is on to something else, as are the appointed texts for the season of Advent generally and for the third Sunday especially.

The Advent scriptures are relentlessly eschatological: preoccupied with consummation and completion, concerned with all things, at long last, being set to right. This in itself is a jolt to our culturally-conditioned piety – our understanding and embrace of Advent as the countdown to Christmas and all that.

Even more of a challenge, perhaps, is the particular vision of Advent’s eschaton: transformed landscapes (blooming deserts, water in the wilderness); the glory and majesty of forests and mountains (Lebanon, Carmel, Sharon). Eschatology here is topographical, earthy, local. It is, at heart, about the renewal of creation. Christ’s second Advent portends not the sweeping of souls up into the clouds but heaven come to earth. It’s land reform, people.

But it’s people reform, too: blind eyes opened, deafness cured, lepers healed, the dead raised. It is justice executed: food for the hungry, prisoners set free, the rich sent away empty. It is good news, at long last, for the poor.

And you need the grown-up Jesus for this. The Advent scriptures are not about a baby. It isn’t until Christmas Eve that we read the familiar, beloved birth narrative. And even on Christmas Day – the Feast of the Nativity – the primary liturgical text is not the one about shepherds and angels but rather John’s brainy prologue: “In the beginning was the Word,” the Logos who became flesh and “moved into the neighborhood,” as The Message translation has it.

And the neighborhood is undergoing a makeover, a complete overhaul, in fact. This week Isaiah and Mary foretell this, the Psalmist celebrates it, and James and Jesus preach it – each of them in their way summoning us to our part: to be bearers of the good news, agents of healing and transformation, participants in the holy, adventurous work of bringing heaven to earth.

“The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad.” Advent takes us out of ourselves and outside to a world groaning in travail – a world in ecological crisis, billions of its inhabitants suffering grievously and needlessly, longing for shalom. If we respond to the summons, we’re promised in Isaiah that this “Holy Way” is so blessed that “not even fools shall go astray.” That’s a pretty compelling promise for fools like us: in the shared work of healing and transformation our own salvation is found.

The Politics of Hope: American and Apocalyptic

2010-12-01T22:42:00.000-08:00

by Doug Lee
Isaiah 11:1-10; Romans 15:4-13; Matthew 3:1-12

It wasn’t surprising on that November night two years ago when people poured out onto the streets of our San Francisco neighborhood cheering and beating pots and pans after the media called the election for Barack Obama. What was surprising was the way that Obama’s election resounded in many corners of the country far less blue than this Left Coast City. Not since the 1960s had both Virginia and North Carolina gone Democratic.

No matter one’s view of Obama then or now, the fact of his election revealed a welling up of desire for the healing of centuries-old divides in race and politics. It highlighted the longing of many Americans for someone who could transcend the politics of entrenched despair and usher in a different way of relating, a politics of hope.

Two years later, it’s clear that a politics fueled only by hope in American optimism and virtue cannot come close to surmounting fundamental human divisions animated by greed and suspicion. Human rulers, even ones committed to civility and reflection, do not possess the authority or skill to mend these deep rifts. Two years later, the longings remain, but now submerged, muted and dormant.

While these longings may have been misplaced, Advent tells us that they were far from wrong. Advent tells us that such longings are ancient and decidedly fitting for the people of God.

Into a similarly barren political and moral landscape, Isaiah prophesies a new day for a royal line sputtering along on the fumes of a promise made long ago. David’s lineage has long been bankrupt of legitimacy. Yet Isaiah dreams God’s dream of a righteous ruler born of Jesse, one who will defend the vulnerable against the predatory ways of the wicked and enact the Lord’s justice and truth. The coming king will not yield to the manipulations of the powerful or cater to those who contribute the most to the party’s campaign coffers. Empowered with the Spirit’s discernment, he will speak forth justice for those without social or economic leverage.

But Isaiah’s dream of a new day doesn’t end here. So just and true is the coming king’s rule that it rectifies not only the realm of human relations but the entire created order as well! There is peace among species that have been at each other’s throats since Genesis 3:

The wolf shall live with the lamb,
The leopard shall lie down with the kid,
The calf and the lion and the fatling together,
And a little child shall lead them.
The cow and the bear shall graze,
Their young shall lie down together;
And the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain;
For the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

When God’s appointed ruler is enthroned, all creation is brought into such loving communion that even the most carnivorous predator will learn to be a vegan and enjoy it!

This may sound like a pipe dream. But Paul the Apostle declares that this ancient dream has come to fruition. The day of hope has come, for Jesse’s root has risen to rule the Gentiles (Romans 15:12). While Isaiah sees only the eventual emergence of the coming king (“he shall stand”), the Greek translation cited by Paul signals something far more startling. It employs the word regularly utilized for “resurrection” and thus ignites Paul’s proclamation that Christ’s rising from the dead actualizes apocalyptic day of hope. “The Lord of our longing has conquered the night,” declares the lyrics of the Catholic hymn City of God. God has fulfilled the longing of Israel and the nations, and so Paul proclaims Christ as Lord of the nations to those who live under the nose of that Roman pretender, Caesar.

But this is far from revolutionary ideology or political theory. For Paul, all politics is local.

Therefore, the politics of hope begin at home, in the church, and around the table. The weak and the strong shall sit together at table and not devour each other with their condescension and condemnation. They can now eat together without qualms about each other’s dietary restrictions or voting affiliations.

Under Caesar and American liberalism, the best humanity can hope for is to maintain a sham unity enforced by power. When we bump up against intractable differences, the most we can practice is a tolerance that allows us to coexist but at a safe distance from one another. “Peace” is won through enforced division.

But under the reign of the coming king, the people of God are liberated from merely tolerating each other, from practicing that forced cordiality that plagues too many of our relationships in the church, and from mouthing that nonsense that we are all the same on the inside.

Christ did not die for generic people; he died as a servant of the circumcised and to fulfill God’s promises to the Hebrew people. Christ did not live at a safe distance from others so that everyone could go on pleasing themselves; he denied himself so that the Gentiles might be grafted and join a redeemed Israel in praising God with one voice. Therefore, we welcome one another as Christ has welcomed us. We see that we could never be whole without each other, even in—and because of—our differences. We disturb the powers, liberal and imperial, when people who have no business eating together share one table. Our little welcomes are deeply interpersonal and vastly public, political, and apocalyptic at the same time. Paul’s politics of hope is practiced in the near and now.

May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant us to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, so that together we may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

The Son of Man Is Coming

2010-11-27T18:05:00.000-08:00

by Janice Love
First Sunday of Advent: Isaiah 2: 1-5, Psalm 122, Romans 13: 11-14, Matthew 24: 36-44

And so we begin the waiting…again. Paul writes, “For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near.” We are two thousand years nearer now and still we wait, surrounded yet by too much night. My husband likes to take the time to talk with our 7 year old son about the resurrection – that day of glory when Christ will come again and make all things new. The other night, out of the blue, Jameson’s last words before falling asleep were, “I hope the resurrection happens soon (to which I replied, “Amen”) – while I’m alive…that would be neat.” And I was struck with how much was caught up in that word “neat” – all the hopes and fears of all the years. As the dark maw of cholera devours people in Haiti, as abnormal amounts of rain drowns people and crops in too many places, as corruption cripples and crumbles the foundations of nations, I am inclined to shout to Jesus, “would you hurry up and get here already!”

We North Americans have a hard time waiting, for anything. If pushing a button does not bring about near instantaneous results we begin to feel our stress and frustration levels rise. I have noticed in the last few years how Halloween has become a month long celebration that slips almost seamlessly into the putting up of Christmas decorations (here in Canada we celebrate Thanksgiving early in October). What is the point of waiting if you can have it all now?! The reality, of course, is that we can’t have it all now. For God’s own reasons we must wait yet for the Parousia. Herein lies the gift that is Advent. A time set aside to practice waiting, to get clear about what we are waiting for. And it begins with waking up to the trouble we are all in.

A colleague of mine wrote an insightful and very helpful piece a few years ago, entitled “Advent Begins with Trouble” (by Rev. Dr. Edwin Searcy in Sanctifying Time). In it he redirects our attention from the complex concepts of hope, peace, joy and love made too easily into “four safe platitudes” to the Advent lectionary texts. Paying close attention to these texts, hosting them as we would welcome strangers, revels the deep “ache and grief that cries out for a saviour.” This is the tough part about waking up, especially if we are just pretending to be asleep. The beginning texts of the Advent season embody the spirit of the Psalms where we cry out our need for God. And just like so many of those Psalms, in Advent we look to when God has answered in the past so that we might live in hope for the present, anticipating the arrival of God’s promised future. As Ed reminds us in his piece, “the root word for ‘wait’ in both Hebrew and Latin also means ‘hope’”.

We live between the times of Jesus’ arrivals. In Advent we prepare to look back to a babe born in occupied territory, both hunted and overlooked, the promise that God is with us and we look ahead to Jesus full return. In wonder we realize that we too are a part of the story of what God is up to for the sake of the world. We have a part to play, if only a supporting role. We can choose to live honorably as in the day – the day that Jesus has inaugurated with his life, death and resurrection. We can put on the Lord Jesus Christ, for the Son of Man is coming – and at an unexpected hour too. It will be neat, Jameson, really neat.

Kyrie eleison,
Come soon, Lord Jesus!

The Crucified King

2010-11-17T20:44:00.000-08:00

by Brian Volck
Colossians 1:12-20; Luke 23:33-43

At George Washington’s first inaugural in New York City (following an election in which he received every electoral vote), some in the audience wondered if the former colonies had simply exchanged George III for George the First. President Washington, however, had no truck with domestic monarchists. Throughout his presidency, he maintained a careful balance of pomp and the common touch, willingly leaving office after his second term.

By the 1860s, however, Washington – both war hero and president – was the only historical figure capable of unifying a violently fractured nation-state. In 1865, accordingly, Constantino Brumidi painted an immense fresco above the US Capitol Rotunda, The Apotheosis of Washington, elevating the first president beyond monarchy to the status of a god.

At the center, Washington sits in heavenly glory, flanked by Liberty and Victory. Thirteen maidens dance about this trinity, surrounded in turn by personifications of American prowess. The nearest of these to Washington is War, dressed as Armed Liberty, and brandishing a sword against tyranny, kings, and the schismatic Jefferson Davis.

In the century and a half since Brumidi painted his fresco, some nations have learned subtler ways to celebrate the state’s mystical power as savior and protector. President Obama’s 2009 Nobel Prize acceptance speech followed the contemporary formula, condemning religious violence while accepting the tragic necessity of secular wars in which Americans spill blood out of “enlightened self-interest.”

America is a land of equals, we’re told, with no use for kings, Elvis excluded. Perhaps that’s why the last Sunday in the liturgical calendar, “Christ the King” (although the name is often neutered for various reasons to “The Reign of Christ”), carries, for me at least, the lingering scent of treason. There’s something un-American about the whole idea. Christians bow before a monarch who is killed rather than kills, promiscuously mingles justice and mercy, and suggests that the most serious matters aren’t about “life and death,” after all, but “death and resurrection.” Where’s the enlightened self interest in that?

The readings this Sunday present this king, “image of the invisible God, (and) firstborn of all creation,” nailed to a torture device between two common thieves. What’s more, he promises one of those thieves Paradise. That’s no way to run a kingdom, much less a universe.

And we, the king’s subjects, wear a cross, instrument of his violent death, on necklaces and chains. A cross leads our processions, adorns our walls, takes pride of place in our churches. It’s like commemorating Abraham Lincoln with miniature Deringers.

And what’s more, we’re supposed to emulate this king, to pick up our own crosses and follow him, presumably to the point of forgiving the guilty.

Only lunatics would do such a thing – lunatics like Dom Christian de Cherge’, one of the seven Trappist monks kidnapped and killed during the Algerian Civil War. Though the so-called Armed Islamist Group claimed responsibility for the kidnappings and murders, the exact circumstances of the monks’ deaths remains unclear. Only their heads were recovered.

Dom Christian knew such a grisly death was possible, perhaps even likely, in the increasingly dangerous environment where these Trappists lived as witnesses to Christ, servants to the people as their Lord served them. In anticipation, he wrote a “testament,” to be opened in just such an event. It began:

“If it should happen one day—and it could be today—that I become a victim of the terrorism which now seems ready to encompass all the foreigners in Algeria, I would like my community, my Church, my family, to remember that my life was given to God and to this country. To accept that the One Master of all life was not a stranger to this brutal departure. I would like them to pray for me: how worthy would I be found of such an offering?”

In the last paragraph of his testament, Dom Christian directly addressed his then and still unknown murderer:

“And also you, the friend of my final moment, who would not be aware of what you were doing. Yes, I also say this thank you and this adieu to you, in whom I see the face of God. And may we find each other, happy good thieves, in Paradise, if it pleases God, the Father of us both.”

I never want to face anything like Dom Christian’s test of fidelity to the Crucified King. I almost certainly never will. I expect my trials will be vastly more manageable and infinitely less painful. Yet I tremble at the thought of witnessing even a hundredth portion of Dom Christian’s forgiveness and acceptance toward the several who annoy me and rouse my passions. That, however, is where we are called to go, bearing our considerably lighter and all but invisible crosses in witness to our king.

Perhaps if mortal danger were closer, more obvious, we would be better people. Maybe, but I doubt it. Between the Fall and the Eschaton, obedience to the nonviolent Messiah is unnatural at best. In this confused and confusing time, when the Kingdom is both present and not yet, little is clear save our bottomless need for grace. On this feast of the Crucified King, remember to pray for one another, servants of the Servant.

Oscar Romero on Christ’s Kingship

2010-11-16T20:32:00.000-08:00

Written by Tobias Winright
November 2010 (Reign of Christ Sunday, Proper 29)

In view of this Sunday’s focus on the reign of Christ, I find some words from Archbishop Oscar Romero to be appropriate:

“The human race of the twentieth century
has climbed to the moon,
has uncovered the secret of the atom,
and what else may it not discover?

The Lord’s command is fulfilled:
Subdue the earth!
But the absolute human dominion over the earth
Will be what is proclaimed today:
bringing all things of heaven and earth together
in Christ.

Then humanity hallowed will put under God’s reign
this world, which is now the slave of sin,
and set it at the feet of Christ,
and Christ at the feet of God.

This is the bringing together that was God’s design
before the world existed.
And when History comes to its end,
this will be God’s fulfillment:

Christ,
the sum of all things.
All that history has been,
all that we do ourselves,
good or bad,
will be measured by God’s design;
and there will remain only those who have labored
to put things under Christ’s rule.

All that has tried to rebel against God’s plan in Christ
is false.
It will not last;
It will be for history’s waste heap. (July 15, 1979)
---

Christ is presented to us as the shepherd king,
king and shepherd of all the world’s peoples,
of all of history.

He holds the key to history’s outcome
And to the crises of its peoples…
It is for us, hierarchy and people, to proclaim
the eternal, sole, and universal kingship of Christ
and to bring it about
that all peoples, families, and persons submit to him.

His is not a despotic regime,
but a regime of love…. (July 22, 1979)

From Oscar Romero, The Violence of Love, compiled and translated by James R. Brockman, SJ (The Plough Publishing House, 1998), pp. 148-150.

Got Conflict?

2010-11-11T04:40:00.000-08:00

by Jenny Williams
Isaiah 12; 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13; Luke 21:5-19

Tired of congregational conflict?

Recently I had to work with a utility company on behalf of a woman whom our church was assisting financially. The woman was getting nowhere with the company, so I tried to help her with the process. It took eight calls to them before I could speak with a supervisor who would hear my concerns and rectify the billing problems the customer had. In the first five calls, five different customer service representatives each told me different information about how the woman’s situation.

One told me everything was paid up. Another told me that the customer had a $500 balance. Another told me they’d ask the back office to research the issue, and I could call back in 2-3 days for an answer. I did, and I was told that that timeline was wrong; it would take 5-7 days for the research to be completed. After that time had passed, I called back. That representative told me the timeline was wrong; it would take 4-6 weeks. By the time I got to the supervisor, who was very kind and understanding, I suggested to her that some training was needed to improve consistency among the representatives. She sighed and explained that in the last year, not only had they fired the original company to whom they outsourced the customer service calls and then hired a new company, the utility company had also begun to use a new computer system. Balances paid during certain months were not credited to customers’ accounts, past due and termination notices were sent out incorrectly, and the new employees didn’t have much training to handle any of it. I felt so sorry for her and said so. She said brightly, “I’ve just learned that there are never problems; there are only opportunities. And every morning I come to work, I am faced with all sorts of opportunities.”

Jesus tells us in Luke 21 that if we are faithful to the way of life he’s set before us, there will be some serious ramifications. The part where we are hauled off to the civil authorities isn’t anything new to EP endorsers and like-minded Christians. We are aware that some of the ways Christ calls us to live will come into direct conflict with the state. If you have any questions about that, read Acts.

But the part where he talks about faithful Christ-followers being “handed over to the synagogues” gives us pause. If we follow Jesus, the people of God—the church—might get upset? Yeah.

This may shock you (note sarcasm), but even congregations might get upset when a ministry of the church aims to reach out to the same kind of people whom Jesus reached out to. This upset can cause arguing, division, and all sort of congregational chaos. These battles can be exhausting. And depressing. But when Christians are called on the carpet for extending grace or assistance to sinful people, Luke’s Jesus tells us to see this kind of confrontation as an “opportunity”—an opportunity to testify. Ugh. When I am in the middle of those kinds of conflicts, what I want to say out loud is, “I’m hurt. I’m tired. I’m frustrated. Can’t we all just get along?” But what Jesus says is “Keep your eyes open. That’s the time to talk about God’s goodness.”    Perhaps he uses legal language to call our attention to our own sinfulness in the midst of conflict: don’t prepare your defense in advance. You mean, don’t prepare a speech in advance about how right I am to follow Jesus? That might make me self-defensive and point to my arrogant self-righteousness? Ouch. We are instead instructed to keep our eyes open for the opportunity to speak, and when the time comes, let God give us the words. Perhaps if God gives us the words and the wisdom, when we are challenged because of the ministries in which we engage, we’ll talk about God and not ourselves.

Brothers and sisters, do not be weary in doing what is right. (2 Thessalonians 3:13) When the time comes for the confrontation, may we be able to take a deep breath and say to ourselves, “Surely it is God who saves me. I will trust in him and not be afraid. For the Lord is my stronghold and my sure defense, and He will be my Savior.”   And then, may we be able to speak to our challengers words of God’s goodness and grace.

All the Saints

2010-11-03T20:01:00.000-07:00

by Jake Wilson
Luke 21:27-40

Last week, Tobias Winright reminded us that October 30th was the feast of St. Marcellus who was martyred because of his refusal to participate in the idolatry of the Roman Empire. From very early on the Church understood the importance of remembering and celebrating those who had departed to be with the Lord. However, over her two thousand year history, the Church has gathered far too many saints to give each their own feast day. Thus, while we still celebrate the most exemplary of the departed, we also set aside All Saints Day to remember the faithfulness of those every day saints who have gone before us. All Saints Day falls on the first of November, but at the level of the local church it is typically celebrated on the first Sunday of November. For this year’s celebration of All Saints the lectionary offers us a discussion of the resurrection from the Gospel of Luke.

The reading for the day follows Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem and his cleansing of the Temple. These two actions were symbolically powerful and almost immediately the questions started as others attempted to understand what they have just witnessed. Questions arose about Jesus’ relationship to John the Baptist, his connections to David and his loyalty to Caesar.

It is within this complex of questions that the Sadducees approach Jesus with a question about resurrection. The catalyst for the question comes from Deuteronomy 25:5-10. According to the Law, for the sake of perpetuating the family line, a brother would be legally required to provide off spring to his deceased brother’s widow. It is worth our noting that the command, and thus the drive behind the Sadducees question, is concerned with progeny not marriage. The issue here is not Genesis 2.24 “and the two shall become one flesh” but rather Genesis 1.28 “Be fruitful and multiply.” Jesus’ reply points out that in wondering about family lineage, the Sadducees are asking the wrong kinds of questions. This particular law’s emphasis on child bearing helps us to see that the Sadducees are focusing on creation rather than new creation. Jesus’ answer reveals this flaw by pressing the distinction between those who live in this age and those who live in the next. “Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage but those who are worthy of a place in that age…”

One of the primary differences is that those who live in the age to come “cannot die anymore.” That these “children of the resurrection” cannot die minimizes the concern of continuing the family name through producing heirs. Jesus then turns to his own biblical text to drive home his point that those who live in the age to come, live in the age to come. In Exodus 3:6, God names himself as “The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had all three clearly passed from this current age. Yet since God who is the God of the living, indentifies himself by a reference to them, they must be living. Or as Jesus puts it, “Now he is God not of the dead, but of the living; for to him all of them are alive.” They are then living in the new age as “children of the resurrection.”

The text ends with the Sadducees feigning understanding “for they no longer dared to ask him another question.” We are left in a similar position. Jesus gives us much to ponder. As the Church approaches All Saints Day a great many will turn their thoughts to the meaning of words like heaven, eternal life, and resurrection. What we are shown through this passage is that this new age, the age of resurrection will be radically different from our current age. It will be a time and place in which sin and death neither reign nor exist, a possibility so foreign to our lives that much like the Sadducees, we can hardly find the right questions to ask. Far from explaining the resurrection, Jesus helps us to see just how far God’s ways are above our own.

This new age, is the inheritance of all who have faith in Jesus Christ, not just Abraham or Marcellus but also our friends, parents, neighbors and enemies. The celebration of All Saints is not just a celebration of their earthly lives, as remarkable as they may have been. As the text shows, to focus on the everyday material of life in this age is to miss the point. Instead, we celebrate their life with God today and forever more, recognizing that the God who raised Jesus from the dead is not only the God of Abraham, Jacob and Isaac, but also the God of Marcellus, Frank, Joel, Susan and the countless others who live with God eternally.

In Memory of Saint Marcellus

2010-10-30T05:01:00.000-07:00

by Tobias Winright(Feast of Saint Marcellus)

This week the Jesuit Catholic magazine, America, posted video clips of US soldiers talking about conscience in the military. Pacifist and just war Christians respectively should support both conscientious objection and selective conscientious objection. While the former is legally recognized in the US at this time, the latter ought to be also, especially if such a stance is rooted in deeply held theological and philosophical beliefs and practices, too.

Thinking about this today reminded me that October 30th is the Feast of Saint Marcellus, who was martyred on this date in 298 C.E. for refusing to continue to serve in Caesar's army. Marcellus was a centurion, or captain, in the Roman legion of Trajan, which was stationed at Tangier in North Africa at the time. During the celebration of the emperor's birthday by the soldiers, Marcellus stood up and declared in front of the company, “I serve Jesus Christ the everlasting King.” In addition to his confession of faith, Marcellus cast aside his soldier's belt, with its sword, and his staff, which was a sign of his authority as a centurion. “With this,” he added, “I cease to serve your emperors, and I disdain to worship your wooden and stone gods, who are deaf and dumb idols.”

Indeed, one of the primary reasons that Christians during the first few centuries refused military service had to do with the idolatry associated with being in the Roman army. The festivities and sacrifices attached to the birthday party for the emperor thus occasioned Marcellus’ coming out of the closet as a Christian who cannot sin against his Lord Jesus by participating in idolatrous activities toward Caesar. “If such be the conditions of service that men are compelled to sacrifice to the gods and emperors,” Marcellus boldly stated, “then behold, I throw away the staff and belt; I renounce the standards and refuse to serve.”

The soldiers who witnessed his conscientious objection to continued service in the military quickly placed him under arrest and reported him to Anastasius Fortunatus, prefect of the legion. In their eyes his action was blasphemous and treasonous. After appearing before Anastasius Fortunatus and reiterating his allegiance to Jesus Christ, Marcellus was taken before Aurelius Agricolanus, the vicar to the prefect of the praetorium guard.

When asked by Agricolanus whether he had said these things, Marcellus answered, “I said it.” And when Agricolanus inquired about what madness provoked him to declare his allegiance to Christ, Marcellus replied, “There is no madness in those who fear the Lord.” When then questioned about why he cast aside his arms, Marcellus simply explained, “For it is not fitting for a Christian man who serves Christ the Lord to serve human powers.” Afterwards, Marcellus was sentenced to death and executed by beheading.

This account of Marcellus' martyrdom first came to my attention a decade-and-a-half ago while I was working on my Ph.D. at the University of Notre Dame. I served as a graduate assistant for Professor John Howard Yoder, the Mennonite theologian, helping him with his course on Christian Attitudes Toward War, Peace, and Revolution. The story of Marcellus was required reading for his students, and Yoder felt that it was important to let them also know that Notre Dame has a Marcellus connection. Indeed, he asked me to find more information and documentation in the archives about this.

Unbeknownst to many of the Fighting Irish at Notre Dame, Marcellus is one of three saints whose bones are under the altar in the Sacred Heart Basilica on the Notre Dame campus. The founder of Notre Dame, Father Edward Sorin, C.S.C., had Marcellus’ relics, including either his skull or a fragment of it, transported across the Atlantic and placed at the base of the altar.

In 1996 Yoder encouraged some of his colleagues and students to brainstorm about how Notre Dame could honor the saint in 1998, the 17th centennial of his martyrdom. However, after Yoder's untimely death in December of 1997, nothing materialized with regard to Marcellus at Notre Dame until Michael Baxter revived the Catholic Peace Fellowship, which issues an annual Marcellus Award to someone who takes a public stand for conscience when it comes to war and peace.

In view of the unjustified wars of our day, St. Marcellus, pray for us.

Humble Pie*

2010-10-20T16:21:00.000-07:00

by Janice Love
Joel 2: 23-32, Psalm 65, 2 Timothy 4: 6-8, 16-18, Luke 18: 9-14

About 15 years ago my husband and I began to notice a disturbing trend in the denomination in which we were both raised – the practice of eliminating the prayer of confession from the worship service, essentially making confession a non-practice. The reasons seemed to be caught up in the rejection of the idea of judgment and of not wanting to make people, especially seekers, feel bad. Thankfully there were other Christians that continued to steward the practice because we were in great need of it when we realized what our participation in Native Residential Schools in Canada had unleashed upon innocent children.

Worse perhaps is the reason the prayer of confession was eliminated from our current congregation’s (of a different denomination) new worship service – to save on chronological time. Especially concerning here is that the new service was designed to be more appealing to younger folk, with the introduction of drums and electric guitars. I don’t know about you but when I was a youth, admittedly a goody-two shoes youth, I had trouble conceiving of my need for confession – did I really do anything wrong enough to warrant confessing? That was before I had any idea of the sticky web of corporate sin in which we are all enmeshed. It is one of the great gifts of the church to pass on this practice of confession that it might weekly confront us with the truth. I shudder when it is absent.

Now if any of you are thinking that your tradition would never conceive of eliminating the prayer of confession, then the gospel text from Luke this coming Sunday is for you (and, of course, for me). It is apparent from the texts that preface this reading and the one that immediately follows (18: 15-17) that Jesus is not addressing outsiders but rather insiders – folk who are already part of his wider group of disciples. You could say he is addressing the “early, Early Church”. There is irony in Jesus’ choice of a Pharisee to illustrate his point regarding those who trust in themselves if the reaction amongst any in the crowd then or reading this text now is to think to themselves, ‘Well, thankfully I’m (we’re) not like that Pharisee!’

Humility is a tricky thing. The word derives from the Latin word humilis meaning “lowly”. It literally means ‘on the ground’, from humus or ‘earth.’ This is the truth of who we are – humble, human, humus. Perhaps the key to humility for the church is the relational aspect emphasized in Jesus’ parable. The Pharisee has done everything correctly (there is no question about that) but remains, unbeknownst to himself, unjustified before God because he is trusting in his own actions. The tax collector has come to the realization that his actions have been wrong and now stands in a corner, beating his breast and throwing himself on the merciful actions of God. The Pharisee is not seeking a relationship with God and is unaware of his utter dependence on God’s grace, the tax collector is. I would encourage you all (all you all) to add the next three verses onto this lectionary text as it beautifully illustrates Jesus’ point. Infants are completely dependant on their parents for life – completely. This is how Jesus calls us to be dependant on God. If we can live here, on the ground, we are so much closer to God’s kingdom. I have found it eminently refreshing, and relaxing, to be around humble folk – folk who know themselves to have made mistakes, who know their reliance on God’s grace, all of which seems to free me to be the same.

This is highly counter cultural stuff for us North Americans. We are so accomplishment orientated (which also helps to feed our accumulation habits). This text is unlikely to sell any seats in the pew to the enculturated and that may also apply to many of us already in one of those seats. These accomplishment and accumulation orientations are so ingrained in us that their transformation seems almost hopeless. I take a certain measure of delight in the observation that our belly buttons are ontological reminders that there is no such thing as a self-made person. All of us have had to rely on others in order to live. All of us rely on God as our Creator (so exquisitely expressed in the first two readings from Joel and Psalm 65) and on Jesus as our Saviour as we stand before God. This is where the Church must live, for the sake of the world God so loves because it is here that we learn to confess our true joy in the steadfast love of God.

* the term ‘humble pie’ (1830s) came from ‘umble pie’ (1640s) which was a pie made from ‘umbles’ – edible inner parts of an animal, especially deer, which was considered a low class food [from the Online Etymology Dictionary found at www.etymonline.com]; somehow I think Luke would like this association with humility given how often Jesus ate with those who were dispossessed.

Learning, Knowing, Doing, Being

2010-10-14T17:52:00.000-07:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
Twenty-First Sunday After Pentecost
Psalm 119:97-104; 2 Timothy 3:14-4:5; Luke 18:1-8

Last week the Pew Research Center made big news when its latest poll revealed that religious people don't know much about religion. (Atheists, though, according to the survey, are pretty savvy). Over the weekend, New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof offered his own pop quiz, which, according to my unscientific calculations (counting the number of Facebook confessions), a whole lot of people flunked.

This news is instructive as far as it goes. Having spent a good deal of time thinking, reading, writing, and teaching about Christian formation and catechesis, I'm not surprised that life-long church-goers know so little about the history and development, the context and content of the Christian tradition. Not that it's really their fault. When I teach, say, the history of Methodism or the liturgical year to lay people, they can't get enough of it. They wonder where this stuff has been all their lives. Clergy don't teach or preach it much; Sunday School is about other things, sadly.

But the point of this kind of learning is not merely to transfer useful data from the knowledgeable to the uninformed. Mastery of material is not the name of the game - discipleship is. It matters, of course, that Christians know what pre-Constantinian Christianity was like or that the gospels were written decades after the time of Jesus, but not as a measure of fact-collecting competency. Rather, as the writer of 2 Timothy insists, "proficiency" in such matters is for the purpose of being "equipped for every good work" (3:17). It's for doing stuff - living a certain way, being a particular (and peculiar) kind of people.

This Sunday's passage from 2 Timothy is often cited by those who want to close off debate about complex matters of scriptural authority and doctrinal content - who see religion fundamentally as a set of fixed propositions to be assented to. Because it's a letter, 2 Timothy has the kind of didactic vibe that lends itself to this kind of reductive reading. (Sort of like the pastoral epistles, with their hortatory restrictions on women, trumping the gospels' -- and Paul's -- clear message of women's leadership in the early Jesus movement).

But the emphasis here is clearly on "learning, believing, and knowing" (3:14) as a "training in righteousness" (3:16). Discipleship is not about just knowing but about living the strange truth of the upside-down kingdom of God, even when others turn from listening and "wander away to myths" (4:4). It's about "good work," says the writer, but it's also about hard work - about practicing a distinctive way of life which sometimes only makes you odd and out of step but other times costs you dearly.

In this week's Psalm there's a slightly different twist on the knowledge-content of faith - on its "laws, commandments, decrees, precepts, ordinances, and words." The Psalmist delights in the law for its own sake, for its intrinsic beauty and goodness and power. Instead of using doctrine as a litmus test for determining orthodoxy or as a weapon to beat down those who are not keeping it satisfactorily, the Psalmist gushes, "Oh, how I love your law!" What he "knows" about God offers the possibility for connection and communion, for life itself. It’s not mere knowledge for the head; it's life-giving water that soothes and heals and satisfies.

If this law comes down from a great high judge, the gospel lesson in Luke reveals a bit of what this arbiter of justice is like. Jesus tells a parable of "a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people" (18:2). A persistent widow kept coming to him asking for justice against her opponent. For awhile the judge refused but later, "so that she may not wear me out by continually coming" (18:5), he relented and gave in to her demands. God is like this, says Jesus. Not in mirroring the judge's laziness and indifference but in granting justice to those who cry out. But God is also not like the unjust judge for God's justice is swift (18:7).

These eight verses in Luke are framed by a concern for the uncertainty of the coming days. Speaking to the anxious in deeply anxious times, they constitute an encouraging word: "to pray always and not to lose heart" (18:1). But prayer is not mere private speech. It is not the half-hearted mumblings of the not-quite committed. Prayer in anxious times is like the persistent widow seeking justice: challenging the abuse of power – cruelty, corruption, laziness, indifference – even when it seems hopeless, when it's inconvenient or humiliating or mind-numbingly boring. Prayer is work: it's learning by doing, knowing by being.

We know this because Jesus concludes the parable by posing this question: "When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" This question wasn’t in the Pew Center poll or on Kristof’s quiz. But its answer might be the most important one of all.

Unchained Word

2010-10-06T22:05:00.000-07:00

by Brian Volck
2 Kings 5; 2 Timothy 2:8-13; Luke 17:11-19

Mark’s Jesus is in a hurry, John’s Jesus is in control, and Matthew’s Jesus does parables. Luke’s Jesus forever crosses borders. This time, the border lies between the boondocks of Galilee and the enemy’s homeland, Samaria.

Nathanael – or any right-thinking first century Palestinian Jew – needn’t ask if anything good comes from Samaria. One might as well spout nonsense about a “good Samaritan,” or a “good Al Qaeda.”

This week, the border also divides clean from unclean. Unlike the encounter in Luke 5, this text doesn’t mention Jesus touching lepers, but the precedent’s set, he’s in unclean territory already, and now there are ten of them.

When they beg for mercy, Jesus says, “Go and show yourselves to the priests." One of the ten, it turns out, is a Samaritan, whose reception by priests might be compared to CIA headquarters welcoming Osama bin Laden.

It just so happens that, as the ten leave, all are cured. Nine continue on their way, presumably to see priests who will declare them clean and welcome them back into community – a community in which, at the time, Samaritans had no place. The Samaritan turns back and makes a spectacle of himself, like a Holy Roller in a church of smells and bells.

“Where are the other nine?” Jesus wonders, “Why just this foreigner?” Then comes an offhanded punch line about the Samaritan’s faith making him well. It makes one wonder if the other nine are well too, or are they merely clean?

Like Naaman in this weeks’ first reading, it’s the outsider, the one from across the border who’s not only cured, but shows gratitude for an act of pure grace. (Read further in 2 Kings 5 for Gehazi’s counterexample.)  
Jesus is always crossing borders, breaking the rules, messing with the order of things. He meets with tax collectors and sinners, touches lepers, greets Samaritans, enters women’s homes. The Word isn’t chained by borders, categories, or convention. In the end, even death itself can’t chain Him.  
In an uncertain world like first century Judea or twenty-first century America, Jesus is dangerous. What if everyone started welcoming foreigners, ate with sinners, preached grace and gratitude? Paul did just that and lost his head. Francis of Assisi (whose feast was this past Monday) embraced a leper and preached peace to the Sultan, and died visibly wounded.

Isn’t that precisely what happens when the Word’s not chained, borders aren’t policed, categories aren’t enforced? Isn’t that why we killed Jesus in the first place? Isn’t that why we crucify him still?

Proper 21: Not Enough For Everyone’s Greed

2010-09-22T21:06:00.000-07:00

by Ragan Sutterfield
Am 6:1, 4-7; Ps 146; 1 Tim 6:11-16; Lk 16:19-31

When I read passages like those in this week’s lectionary I find myself saying, not unlike the Pharisee in Luke 18, “God, I am thankful I’m not wealthy.” Of course, not withstanding the fact that I am quite comfortable and generally don’t go wanting for what I need, these scripture passages invite us into something much deeper than the matter of money; something that will challenge our way of living no matter the contents of our bank account. The lectionary passages this week invite us to a reorientation toward a life of radical dependence. Money is of course a major obstacle toward the realization of this dependence, but other resources such as degrees or physical ability or social status could just as well be stumbling blocks against living in the reality that God feeds us when we are hungry, vindicates us when injustice is done to us (Ps. 146:6).

In Amos 6:1a,4-7 we find a description of those living in lavish comfort without concern for the plight of their people and community. Their carelessness is purely negative and consumptive, focused on personal pleasure without realizing the connectedness of their lives to those around them. They have not looked at the problems of their community and lamented them, seeking to right the wrongs. Instead they have ignored these evils in order to more fully enjoy themselves. Of course, they can only ignore the problems of their community at their own peril, “the ruin of Joseph” will soon be their own ruin and the prophet warns them appropriately that they will be the first to go into exile, cut off from their place and community because they have chosen to be cut off from their place and community in its time of need.

In the Epistle to Timothy we find a similar tone: “There is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it, but if we have food and clothing, we will be content with these. But those who want to be rich fall into temptation and are trapped by many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction.” The godly must be content with gifts of God and put their resources into the building up of the community. The problem isn’t so much with wealth per se, but with an interest in maintaining it. It is doubtful that someone truly pursuing Christ could maintain their wealth, given their constant generosity and concern for the needs of those around them.

Jesus’ parable of the rich man and Lazarus provides a stark view into the reality of maintaining wealth without concern for the well being of our neighbors. The nameless rich man is told that he received his reward while he was living while Lazarus did not. I am reminded here of Gandhi’s statement that there is enough in the world for everyone’s need, just not enough for everyone’s greed. If the rich man had lived in simple dependence on God’s abundant gifts he would have had plenty for his own needs and to share with Lazarus. Instead, the rich man ensured his own comfort by taking more than was needed, relying on the security of his grain bins and economic power rather than God.

As folks like Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove have done so well to remind us, there is a different kind of economic order available to us that doesn’t require the minimal deposit for an IRA. To join we must simply live in the truth that what we have is not ours and live in the freedom of this dependence by sharing in God’s love and care for the divine neighborhood of which we are intimately a part.

Dives’ Sin of Omission

2010-09-22T20:56:00.000-07:00

by Tobias Winright
Scripture Reflection: Catholic Lectionary (Am 6:1, 4-7; Ps 146; 1 Tim 6:11-16; Lk 16:19-31)

In my “Poverty, Wealth, and Justice” course, students still read Jonathan Kozol’s 1995 bestseller, Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation, which includes the author’s interviews with children in Mott Haven, one of the poorest neighborhoods in the South Bronx. It is striking how many of these kids bring up theology in their reflections, including David: “’Evil exists,’ he says, not flinching at the word. ‘I believe that what the rich have done to the poor people in this city is something that a preacher could call evil. Somebody has power. Pretending that they don’t so they don’t need to use it to help people—that is my idea of evil’” (23). Nearly a decade-and-a-half later, according to 2009 census data, one in five children in the U.S. continue to struggle below the poverty line. At the same time, New York Times op-ed writer Paul Krugman observes how America’s rich are raging about having to pay taxes, because “a belligerent sense of entitlement has taken hold: it’s their money, and they have the right to keep it." If any of these wealthy Americans also consider themselves to be Christians, this attitude stands in stark contrast to the theological meaning of the offering during Christian worship, which reminds us that all we are and all we have is from God—and that we are called to be good stewards, for the sake of others, of what we have.

In the Catholic Mass, we often recite a prayer, confessing our sin, for “what I have done and what I have failed to do.” Jesus’ story about the rich man (tradition has called him Dives, Latin for “rich man”) and the poor man, Lazarus, has to do with the rich man’s sin of omission. Dives did not maliciously do anything to harm Lazarus. Rather, Dives, who had more than he needed, neglected to make sure that Lazarus’ needs were satisfied. Jesus’ parable is a word of warning, much like that of the eighth century Judean prophet to Northern Israel, Amos, who denounced not only the wealthier people’s luxurious lifestyle at the expense of the poor but also their mere lack of concern for them. According to Psalm 146, God “executes justice for the oppressed…gives food to the hungry… sets the prisoners free…upholds the orphan and the widow.” That is how the rulers of Israel were expected to be and act as well, and Jesus’ echoing of this passage at the beginning of his ministry in Luke’s Gospel (4:18-19, but also found in Isaiah 61) offers a model for how Christians ought to think about justice (not charity) in connection with wealth and poverty. Moreover, as the author of 1 Timothy emphasizes, Jesus Christ is the “only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords.” It’s not our money to which we are entitled, as if we can merit our (economic) salvation. If we are seeking, by the grace of God, to “pursue righteousness [and] godliness” (1 Tim 6:11), I see no room for this talk of “entitlement” and the “right to keep” our money.

When Kozol tells Mrs. Washington, David’s mother, about a rich New York lawyer who said “They’re being killed by personal income taxes,” she replied, “There’s killing and there’s killing….I don’t think the man you talked to knows what ‘killing’ means” (110). A rich woman once told St. Vincent, “The poor frighten me.” To which he answered, “The poor are frightening, as frightening as God’s justice” (quoted on 186). I know this stuff won’t preach well in many churches, but there it is.

Redeeming Shrewdness

2010-09-16T05:20:00.000-07:00

by Doug Lee
Luke 16:1-13b

Eugene Peterson observes that the story of the dishonest manager ranks as our least favorite of Jesus’ parables. What is there to cozy up to in a story where cheating goes unpunished and cunning is seemingly commended? Are we to use money to buy friends the way we buy objects for consumption?

Can Jesus truly be recommending such scandalous behavior?

But the scandal we hate in this story is precisely the scandal we love in the immediately preceding parable. Artificially separated by a chapter divide, the parable of the dishonest manager is actually meant to be heard alongside the parable of the lost son, most beloved of all the parables.

Both deal with underlings who squander wealth and violate a covenantal relationship. Both trust-breakers experience a moment of clarity that allows them to see their true condition. Both of these dubious characters hatch schemes to regain some measure of lost dignity. But both stories stupefy their hearers with the foolishly gracious response of the one in authority. Ignoring by-the-book justice and the insufficiently-gracious scheme proposed by the prodigal, the father will not have a slave but a beloved son. Similarly, the master responds to his manager not as a Bernie Madoff-class swindler but as a praiseworthy financial officer who has at last exhibited acumen instead of dullness. And both parables resound with implications and possibilities by leaving their hearers to supply their endings.

Juxtaposing the beloved scandal of Luke 15 with the stomach-turning scandal in Luke 16 strengthens and clarifies both. The outrage we feel in the second story can refurbish the surprise we have lost in hearing the father’s response to the prodigal. And the grace we so readily see in the father’s embrace of his son must be extended to the master’s commendation of the manager.

What is Jesus’ aim in telling these stories? What is the common thread that runs throughout, even to the story about another rich man and Lazarus at the end of Luke 16?

Jesus’ consistent vision of salvation in Luke’s gospel is one in which good news is proclaimed to the poor and the rich are judged for their dullness to the inbreaking of God’s good future.

It was a riveting moment for our congregation when our friend and Nigerian theologian Sunday Agang delivered a pointed assessment: “Your wealth persecutes you.” He said this in most sympathetic way possible, yet it was jarring nonetheless. His assertion paralleled Jesus’ declaration of woe to the rich (6:24-26), a lament over the deathliness that riches bring.

To be more truthful about all of this, Jesus laments the lifelessness that our riches bring. If you have the time and access to be able to read this blog, then you, like me, qualify as one of the very rich in terms of the whole world.

Still more to the point, Jesus’ message to us who are wealthy is that our riches divide us from the poor. The rich man knows nothing of Lazarus, who sleeps at his doorstep. Wealth hinders the have’s from showing hospitality to the have not’s.

But the persistent way that Jesus interacts with the rich is not merely to condemn but to save. Jesus’ appeal in the Luke 15 parables is for the older brother/Pharisees to rejoice in Jesus’ embrace of the younger brother/sinners. His desire in Luke 16 is for the rich/Pharisees to exhibit the same shrewdness as the manager, who finds scandalous grace by using temporal wealth to build eternal friendship. When Jesus employs “shrewdness” in this and other parables (“wisdom” in Matthew 7:24; 25:1ff), the word applies to those who have grasped their position at the inbreaking of the Kingdom and take clear action.

Luke’s Jesus has a lot to say about the destructive power of riches. But what if all his attention on wealth is not ultimately to condemn the rich but to evangelize us? What if hearing Jesus rightly means not handwringing but our conversion? What if Jesus’ message is not just good news for the poor but also good news for the rich?

The manager wins the commendation of his master by avoiding rationalization for his misconduct and using “what belongs to another” to build relationship. It is no coincidence that the shrewd manager does so by forgiving debts in a way that resonates with Jesus’ Jubilee campaign (4:18-19; 6:32-36; 11:4).

We receive God’s commendation instead of condemnation by employing His wealth to build relationship with the poor. We who are rich are to see our needy brothers and sisters as those who are ahead of us in hearing the gospel. Indeed, we are the needy ones who are to hunger for the blessing and joy of the Kingdom shared among our poorer brothers and sisters in our own communities and other parts of the world.

The Church is to be characterized not by greater effectiveness or more stringent disciplines, but by the scandalous generosity of God. The parable’s open conclusion beckons us to complete the story by entering into friendship with the poor. Then we will be able to hear Jesus’ hard words about Mammon as good news for the poor and good news for ourselves too.

Signs, Sheep, and Shepherds

2010-09-07T20:14:00.000-07:00

by Kyle Childress
Luke 15:1-10

Our church’s logo is a shepherd’s staff, based upon the parable of the lost sheep, along with Psalm 23 and the Good Shepherd of John 10. We’ve had this shepherd’s staff with our congregation’s name written beside it out front on our sign since 1979 and it is on our letterhead, Sunday order of worship, and website. This shepherd’s staff is a constant reminder to us and to others of our vocation – who we hope to be and are called to be. More than that, it always reminds us who God is.

Our congregation began in 1968 as a gathering for lost sheep, black sheep, burned-out and beaten-up sheep, with a few old goats thrown in, as well. A lot of us were lost, but here, by the grace of the Loving Shepherd, we’ve been found. Furthermore, because of our own experiences, we have sought to make this congregation a body, or flock, where other lost sheep can find a home.

This is no small thing in today’s world. Surrounded by global capitalism, mass-marketing, big-box retailers, mega-churches with their large-scale-industrial-mass-production of Christians, and an all-too-common assumption that one needs to “get big or get out,” our church and others like us swim against a raging torrent. Shaped by Luke 15's story of the lost sheep, we believe in searching for each and every missing sheep and bringing it home; not the most efficient use of our time, not the most cost-effective, but it’s who and what we’re called to do. And when you’re the one sheep who has been lost, it is a life or death issue.

Last week at a wedding reception I had a conversation with a very talented and brilliant young woman, raised in our church, formed in part by that shepherd’s staff sign, who now teaches in the public schools of New Orleans. She teaches there because she says, “I’m called to be there.” She was telling me of the extraordinary challenges faced by the teachers and students in her part of the city and how each and every student counts. “There is an enormous difference between having 20 students or 19 students in class. When you have 19, you’re constantly worried over that missing 20th, and do all you can to find them.”

Wendell Berry’s writings are soaked in these parables found in Luke 15. His short story “Watch with Me” is a kind of extended meditation on a community watching out for a lost member with mental health problems (“Nightlife” is the nickname bestowed upon him), or as the other characters in the story put it, he had “a spell” come over him. They watch him and keep him safe until he is himself again. Toward the end of the story, still under the spell, Nightlife is in a barn, surrounded by friends who have been trying to keep him safe and he begins to preach on this very parable of the lost sheep. Berry writes, “Though Christ, in speaking this parable, asked his hearers to think of the shepherd, Nightlife understood it entirely from the viewpoint of the lost sheep, who could imagine fully the condition of being lost and even the hope of rescue, but could not imagine rescue itself.”

“’Oh, it’s a dark place, my brethren,’ Nightlife said. ‘It’s a dark place where the lost sheep tries to find his way, and can’t. The slopes is steep and the footing hard. The ground is rough and stumbly and dark, and overgrowed with bushes and briars, a hilly and hollery place. And the shepherd comes a-looking and a-calling to his lost sheep, and the sheep knows the shepherd’s voice and he wants to go to it, but he can’t find the path, and he can’t make it.’”

“The others knew that Nightlife knew what he was talking about. They knew he was telling what it was to be him. And they were moved.”

Luke 15 begins with the Religious Authorities murmuring that Jesus receives sinners and eats with them because, “The tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him,” and it is in response to their murmuring that Jesus tells these parables. But I wonder, in the first place, if the sinners were drawn to Jesus because he could imagine fully the condition of being lost? The very reason he was the Good Shepherd was because he understood entirely the viewpoint of the lost sheep and he understood them because he received them and ate with them.

Contrast Jesus and the Good Shepherd way of seeing with what John tells us about the high priest Caiaphas when he said, “Don’t you understand that it is better for you to have one man die for the people than to have the whole nation destroyed?” (John 11:50). In other words, Caiaphas and his kind say, sometimes it is okay, even necessary, to sacrifice someone or something for some greater cause: the company bottom-line, freedom and democracy, victory, efficiency, a brighter future, and on and on.

In this world of Caiaphases, the church is called to be a Good Shepherd people. And when we are faithful to our calling, then we become a sign pointing to the Kingdom of Jesus Christ, the Lord and Shepherd of us all.

Buckle Your Seatbelt

2010-09-02T21:46:00.000-07:00

by Jenny Williams
Luke 14:25-33

Over 60% of teenagers admit to having texted while driving.
Someone is injured in a car crash every 14 seconds.
Car accidents are the leading cause of acquired disability nationwide.

The risks of traveling by automobile are tremendous, and yet most people drive or ride daily. Why would we do such a thing?

We have decided to get in the car because we have more important things to do than live in fear of the road. We have to shop for groceries. We have to take the kids to school. We have to get to work.

In Luke 14, Jesus issues a disclaimer about the risks involved in following him. It’s not even hidden in the fine print. It’s right out in public before the crowds, like a warning sign on a roller coaster: do not ride if you are pregnant, have back problems, or a heart condition. But whereas the amusement park posts those signs in their own best interests, Jesus’ warning is in the best interest of those who are considering following him. He warns us that submitting ourselves to His lordship could mean division in our families. And in a move at the end of the lection which nearly gives us whiplash, Jesus tells us that following him means we have to part with our stuff.

It’s risky business, indeed, striking at the heart of two institutions prized by Americans—family and ownership.

The sacraments may give would-be disciples some insight as to why Jesus would choose to announce these two risks in particular. We might have to hate our family of origin? Yep, following Jesus could create that division. But through God’s grace and the application of water, you’re welcomed into a whole new family, loaded with brothers and sisters who love Jesus, too.

We have to give up all our stuff? Yep, but people who eat around the same table know that God calls us to participate in the weird financial arrangements of economic sharing. Your stuff won’t be yours any longer, but you’ll know that the people with whom you eat will have what they need.

So you have to be willing to part with things and people—dear and cherished things and people—to follow Jesus. But the sacraments remind us that our loss does not go uncompensated. Surrounded by our dinner companions at Christ’s table, we know we’ll never be wanting for what we need. Because of our baptism and place in God’s church, we will always have family. Even in loss, there is security. Even in the crosses we carry, there is new life.

Jesus, however, is not only looking out for us in his disclaimer. He’s looking out for the integrity of the good news. If you begin building a tower only to have to halt construction half-way because you ran out of money, you’re going to have an unfinished spectacle on your property for all the neighbors to behold…and laugh at. If you don’t think about the cost of discipleship in advance but enter the journey anyway, people are going to ridicule you when you give up. And your giving up will compromise your living testimony to our Holy and Powerful God. The loss of the saltiness of the salt of the earth affects more than the salt itself.

So given these risks, why on God’s green earth (as my mother used to say) would anyone decide to get in the car with Jesus? Because we have decided that we have more important things to do than to live in fear of the risks. We have people to feed and work to do. Just buckle your seatbelt. It’s going to be a wild ride.

Jeremiah and Park 51

2010-08-27T16:04:00.000-07:00

by Jake Wilson
Jeremiah 2.1-13; Psalm 81

Over the last few weeks, the media has been abuzz with the news of Park 51, a proposed Muslim cultural center and mosque just a few blocks from ‘Ground Zero’ the site of the national catastrophe of September 11, 2001. The planned mosque has been met with a firestorm of opposition. Demonstrators have gathered along the proposed site to guard the memory of a national tragedy. The demonstrators frequently invoke Ground Zero as sacred ground and chant their protests while holding signs asking ‘Have you forgotten?’

Others have argued that those who would use the mosque have a right to public prayer and worship and that allowing Park 51 to go forward would be a celebration of freedom and thus an appropriate memorial for those who died in the 9/11 attacks. For our purposes, choosing a side is not as important as recognizing what both groups seem to have understood, namely, that memory matters.

As the subscription of the book of Jeremiah (Jer. 1.1-3) tells us, Jeremiah was engaged in his prophetic work from the thirteenth year of the reign of King Josiah (627 B.C.E.) to shortly after the Babylonian exile and destruction of the Temple (587 B.C.E.). These were tumultuous times for the southern kingdom of Judah. This time period takes us through Judah’s first conflict with Babylon, into the first exile (597 B.C.E.) and through the destruction of the Temple.

Jeremiah’s prophetic work was carried out into and through a time of national crisis. Jeremiah 2.4-13 falls within a larger section which works to show that these events were not strictly the result of political forces but were rather acts of judgment carried out against God’s people by God (Jer. 2.1-6.30).

When we turn to the text of Jer. 2.4-13 we find that part of God’s judgment stems from a failure of memory. Verses 4 and 5 open with a generalized statement of Israel’s apostasy as “they went far from me and went after worthless things.” In verse 6 the nature of Israel’s unfaithfulness is stated more directly as “They did not say ‘Where is the LORD who brought us up from the land of Egypt…’.” With this Jeremiah invokes the memory of the Exodus events and God’s mighty deeds of the past.

This line of judgment continues in verses 7 and 8 where we find that God’s people failed to recall the God who lead them through the wilderness, through “a land of deserts and pits.” Further, the failed to remember the God who gave them a “plentiful land” and the priests failed to recall the gift of the Law.

In their essay, “Memory, Community, and the Reasons for Living: Reflections on Suicide and Euthanasia,” Stanley Hauerwas and Richard Bondi point to the findings of historians of religion that “in primitive cultures, the greatest transgressions a person can make are those that challenge or deny the sustaining story of their community.” This is especially true when to deny the story is to deny the God whose story it is.

This is precisely what has happened in the forgetfulness of God’s people. The Exodus event (along with other key events named by Jeremiah such as the wilderness wanderings and the gift of the Law) are determinative for both the character of God and God’s people. A failure to recall the mighty deeds of God serves as an outright denial of God, one that leaves his people liable to judgment. Further, such forgetfulness deprives them of the very resource they need in order to be sustained through the time of judgment-the memory of God’s salvific actions on their behalf.

Hauerwas and Bondi go on to say that a thick account of memory differs from simply remembering past events. “The kind of memory that truly shapes and guides a community is the kind that keeps past events in mind in a way that draws guidance from them for the future.” This is exactly what we find in this week’s readings from Jeremiah and Psalm 81. In both texts the memory of God’s actions in the Exodus events are called to mind to serve as judgment for the present and the promise of restoration for the future. Thus Jeremiah’s words of judgment also serve as a means of grace to God’s people in as much as they help God’s people remember “the LORD your God who…” has worked so hard to bless them.

In times of crisis, our memories matter. There is a reason that nearly every funeral visitation will find friends and family sharing memories of the deceased and finding comfort therein. In the same way, birthdays and anniversaries are about much more than cake and ice cream. Our memories help us to remember who we are and how we got to where we are. More importantly, they can help us remember the God who has claimed us.

This is certainly the sense in which both Jeremiah and Psalm 81 call to mind God’s mighty deeds of the past. This week the preacher will help the church remember “The LORD your God who…” has intervened in the lives of each of the parishioners personally as well as acting in the life of the congregation as a whole. Most importantly, the preacher will help the congregation discern the way that God’s mighty deeds culminate in the resurrection of Jesus Christ and continue in the on-going work of the Holy Spirit.

Being Grounded

2010-08-23T21:43:00.000-07:00

by Tobias Winright
Scripture Reflection: Sir 3:17-29; Ps 68:4-11; Heb 12:18-24; Lk 14:1-14

When I was a child, getting “grounded” was a form of discipline imposed on me by my parents. From my perspective then, it was something to try to avoid. However, both the book of Sirach (which Jesus, son of Eleazar, says was written by his grandfather Jesus Ben Sira) and the Gospel of Luke emphasize the importance of being “grounded,” though admittedly in another sense of the word. That is, as New Testament scholar Barbara E. Reid, O.P. has noted, these two readings convey proverbial wisdom about the virtue of humility, which is “earthy” or “grounded” wisdom (humility is derived from the Latin humilis, which is derived from humus). During dinner at the house of “a leader of the Pharisees,” Jesus noted the seating arrangements whereby persons occupied “the places of honor, which is the opposite of what they ought to do. “But when you are invited, go and sit down at the lowest place…. For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted” (14:10-11). Here Jesus echoes Sirach, “The greater you are, the more you must humble yourself…” (3:18). Rather than endeavoring to climb the social ladder by sitting with people of higher status, it is better to be grounded by spending time with “the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind” (14:13), seeing from their perspective and identifying with them.

Curiously, in most of the books occupying my office shelf about Christian ethics and character, the virtue of humility is rarely mentioned or treated. Usually, if it is addressed, humility has to do with what medieval theologians referred to as docta ignorantia, a “learned ignorance,” involving knowing the limits of our knowledge. Marquette University’s Daniel C. Maguire thus notes, “Noonday clarity is not available at dusk, and there are many dusks in matters moral”(Ethics: A Complete Method for Moral Choice, 75). Here humility is about making careful, well-grounded (to the extent possible) moral judgments rather than certain pronouncements from on high that “close the door on subsequent discussion” (91). On the other hand, Duke University’s Stanley Hauerwas warns, “Pretension and presumptuousness…cannot be defeated by false humility. Rather, our task is to be what we were made to be at Pentecost: a people so formed by the Spirit that our humility is but a reflection of our confidence in God’s sure work,” which is “most fully manifest on a cross” and as such serves as a check against temptations to pride, self-righteousness, and self-aggrandizement (The Hauerwas Reader, 149).

For his part, Boston College’s James F. Keenan, S.J., criticizes the “equally self-serving presumptuous belief that we all merit salvation because we are so good” (Moral Wisdom: Lessons & Texts from the Catholic Tradition, 167). The virtue of humility helps counter such presumption. It is not self-deprecation, “but rather the virtue for knowing the place of one’s power in God’s world” (168). It trains us to exercise the power that God has given us in this world. “The more we practice humility, the more we understand the power that we, as leaders, are called to exercise” (169). In this connection, Keenan raises the specter of “the recent crisis” in the Catholic church, and he rightly, I think, calls for improved instruction and formation from the church’s leaders on “the ethical exercise of power” informed by the virtue of humility. In the words of Sirach, “The mind of the intelligent appreciates proverbs, and an attentive ear is the desire of the wise” (3:29). The one who has ears, let them hear—and may they be grounded.

Gather Us In

2010-08-19T20:16:00.000-07:00

by Tobias Winright
Scripture Reflection (Catholic Lectionary): Is 66: 18-21; Ps 117; Heb 12:5-7, 11-13 ; Lk 13:22-30

The processional hymn for my wedding eight years ago was “Gather Us In,” written by Saint Louis Jesuit Marty Haugen. It’s always been a favorite for my wife and me. “Gather us in, the lost and forsaken; gather us in, the blind and the lame.”

E pluribus unum (“out of many, one”) originally was a central theme of the Hebrew Scriptures and the Christian New Testament. According to scholar Gerhard Lohfink, the “gathering” of the scattered is a key biblical term for the event of salvation. As Depaul University theologian William T. Cavanaugh puts it, “Salvation in the Old Testament is not about individuals trying to gain admittance to a place called heaven after death; it is about gathering people in communion, thereby restoring the good creation that sin and violence have torn apart…, [and the] theme of gathering does not change in the New Testament; the only change is that the promises of the Old Testament are said to be fulfilled in Jesus Christ.”

Hence, Isaiah’s vision of a new age wherein God comes “to gather all nations and tongues; and they shall come and shall see my glory, and I will set a sign among them.” Just as God will “create new heavens and a new earth” (Is 65:17), so too shall there be a new people. Likewise, Psalm 117 calls on “all you nations” to praise the LORD for God’s hesed, or steadfast love, which is supposed to be manifested by the people as neighbor love. The epistle to the Hebrews refers to how God is “the Father of spirits,” which means God is the source of all humankind’s spiritual being.

Being part of a community, whether of the people of Israel or the people known as Christ’s body, the church, is a journey, or a process, though. It involves practice and discipline, as the author of Hebrews emphasizes, employing the verb gymnazo (“gymnastic”) in verse 11 for our “working out” so as to grow in the likeness of Christ. Such a relationship is not cheap or easy; it involves discipleship, so as to share, or participate, in God’s holiness. This is why Jesus says, “Strive to enter through the narrow door; for many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able.”

In Luke’s gospel, the invitation to participate in this new community is universal; however, not everyone who thinks they’re “in” really is. The owner of the house will say, “I do not know where you come from.” Instead, “people will come from east and west, from north and south, and will eat in the kingdom of God.” Those who are admitted through the door to the ultimate banquet will include many who are not, as well as some who are, expected. The common thread running throughout these readings is that God's salvation essentially involves hospitality, compassion, and justice for all peoples--including, unexpectedly, those who are “other.”

As the hymn I mention above puts it, “Give us to drink the wine of compassion; give us to eat the bread that is you; nourish us well and teach us to fashion lives that are holy and hearts that are true.”

Consecrated

2010-08-18T04:55:00.000-07:00

by Janice Love
Jeremiah 1: 4-10, Psalm 71: 1-6, Hebrews 12: 18-29, Luke 13: 10-17

God is on the move in the texts for this coming Sunday. In Jeremiah we find God calling, commanding, reassuring. In Hebrews there is a whole lot of shaking going on, “so that what cannot be shaken may remain.” Luke finds Jesus healing and shaming. We are about half way through the longest season of our Christian year, the Season After Pentecost. It is the season when the church, having marked the life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus and its calling by the gift of the Holy Spirit - we have now, in other words, all that we need to be Christ’s Body in and for the world – is to be about its ever deepening discipleship. This part of this long season, however, at least in the Northern Hemisphere, coincides with the dog days of summer. Perhaps the wake up call in these texts is perfect timing. God will do what God will do. God is up to what God is up to.

As Walter Brueggemann observes in his close reading of the Jeremiah text (see his Journey to the Common Good) it has been four hundred years since the priest Abiathar was banished by Solomon to his estate in Anathoth. For four hundred years Abiathar’s priestly descendants have watched from 5 km northeast of Jerusalem as Solomon and then many of his successors rebuilt Egypt in Israel – the Egypt of slavery, of scarcity, of entitlement by those in power. Now Jeremiah, descendant of Abiathar, is consecrated, set apart by and for God, to return to Jerusalem with words of warning and ending.

And a terrible ending it was. God’s kairos moment is grounded in the reality of our chronological time. Called as a boy, Jeremiah speaks the word of the LORD for forty years to the ending of the kings of Judah, the ending of an elitist social order that no longer served God and to the captivity of Jerusalem by the Babylonians. This is a hard calling. If we continue to read to the end of chapter one we get a better sense of the tremendous task set before Jeremiah. Verse 14 is blunt about what is to happen. This is similar to the callings of Samuel and Isaiah, both of whom are charged with difficult duties which we never quite get to within the parameters of the lectionary readings (do we really know what we are saying as we blithely sing Here I Am, Lord?). There is girding of loins that will be needed (v 17) as Jeremiah will face unavoidable opposition, death threats and attempted murder included.

Jeremiah is given little choice in the matter. He is known and consecrated by God even before he is born. He is told point blank what will happen to him if he does not carry out God’s calling: Do not break down before them, or I will break you before them. (v 17b). But what Jeremiah is given is what he will need to complete his calling: an intimate knowledge of God, God’s presence with him, the words he will need to declare, the strength of “a fortified city, an iron pillar, and a bronze wall” (v 18) and a small group of loyal friends.

As the church, the Body of Christ in the world, we are the company of the consecrated. Called to follow by Jesus and baptized with the Holy Spirit, we too are given challenging work – to love our enemies, to take up our cross, to enter into the suffering of the world, to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen. And we too are told what will happen if we do not carry out our calling: Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven; but whoever denies me before others, I also will deny before my Father in heaven. (Matthew 10: 32-33). But, like Jeremiah, God has given us everything we need to do what is asked of us – the Word made flesh, the presence of the Holy Spirit, the gift of our fellowship, one with another, the receiving of a kingdom that cannot be shaken (not a kingdom we have to build but a kingdom we get to give thanks for and participate in).

We will need these gifts as the church moves through the present kairos time of endings and new beginnings which Brian Volck wrote of in regard to last Sunday’s readings. The end of Christendom, even as we celebrate the freedom this brings to the church, will and is resulting in a backlash against Christianity. What more will happen as our particular Christian identity claims and transforms us and calls us to proclaim what God is up to more boldly in the public square? We will need all of the gifts God has given us so that our children might continue to sing:

For you, O Lord, are my hope,
my trust, O LORD, from my youth.
(Psalm 71: 1-6)

And the Wind Began to Howl

2010-08-11T20:36:00.000-07:00

by Brian Volck
Revised Common Lectionary Readings: Isaiah 5:1-7; Hebrews 11:29-12:2; Luke 12:49-56

“So let us not talk falsely now; the hour is getting late.”
-- From “All Along the Watchtower,” by Bob Dylan

Christendom’s demise is a gift to the church. No longer responsible for underwriting the ruling entities of the world, nor longer required to “make nice” with the principalities, no longer dutifully excusing the violence of power politics, the church can at long last resume the serious business of being the church.

Playing church is, of course, far easier than being it. But, barring a powerfully rejuvenated alliance of accommodated Christianity and American nationalism, reasons to pretend should grow increasingly rare. The benefits of claiming default Christian identity have disappeared in many parts of the United States. Even the assumed American requirement that Presidents endorse “strong beliefs vaguely held or vague beliefs strongly held,” has nearly run its course.

The wall of the vineyard is broken; the hedge is devoured.

This may mean far fewer church weddings for couples lacking religious commitment, fewer baptisms motivated by cultural rather than confessional reasons, and fewer public appeals to a housebroken god who apparently wants us to have the things we already want.

It may not mean, at least for some time, an end to Christian nationalism. It may not mean the end of having to distinguish the confessing church from the accommodated. It may not mean the end of apologizing to non-Christian inquirers for the words and actions of other, so-called Christians.

But a church less entangled with other allegiances will not necessarily be a peaceful, happy place. It will almost certainly bring an increased cost of discipleship, an end to cheap grace.

When baptism no longer comes with lifelong membership discounts, church will require sustained commitment and tangible sacrifice. When Christianity is no longer defined by a tame and bourgeois God, country, and family values, families will increasingly be theaters of conflict rather than havens in a heartless world. When the peace of Christ no longer merits condescending lip service, the gospel, proclaimed and lived, will just as often sow division as unity.

A cloud rises in the West; a south wind blows.

Embodying the Word

2010-08-11T20:27:00.000-07:00

by Tobias Winright
Catholic Lectionary Readings: Rv 11:19; 12:1-10; Ps 45:10-16; 1 Cor 15:20-27; Lk 1:39-56

Moral theology, which is also known today as Christian or theological ethics, seeks to help Christians answer two fundamental questions: 1) Who ought we as a community and as individual Christians be? 2) What ought we as a community and individuals do? The first question has to do with the kind of character and virtues we ought to have; the second has to do with how we ought to make decisions and ought to act.

Paul’s letter to the Christian community in Corinth says, “Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Cor 15:20). Catholic ethicists Russell B. Connors, Jr. and Patrick T. McCormick note that this theological claim is the heart of our faith, which “affirms that we have experienced redemption as embodied spirits, and that the power of God’s redemptive grace permeates every dimension of our lives….”

Christianity is not only about spirituality, but discipleship – a way of life, of being and behaving in this world. This pertains to all spheres of life, from family to work, politics to recreation, and education to economics. Mary’s Magnificat from Luke’s gospel does not merely refer to some spiritual truth. When Mary sings that God “has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts,” and the Savior “has brought down the powerful from their thrones… lifted up the lowly… filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty” (Lk 1 51-53), she announces a new way of being community inaugurated with the impending birth of her son, Jesus.

As the “Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World” put it, “This split between the faith which many profess and their daily lives deserves to be counted among the more serious errors of our age” (no. 43). When we are blessed to “Go forth in peace, to love and serve the Lord” at the end of the Mass, let’s really mean it when we say “Thanks be to God” and allow God’s grace to enable us to embody Christ’s love.

What Are You Afraid Of?

2010-08-03T20:55:00.000-07:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
Eleventh Sunday After Pentecost
Isaiah 1:1, 10-20; Luke 12:32-40

The gospel writer, Luke, has a habit of prefacing good news with the exhortation “Do not be afraid.” This seems a bit odd since we’re more likely to think that it’s the delivery of bad news which requires a little no-fear pep talk. But over and over Luke’s pronouncements about God’s generous ways of working in the world—about the good news of the kingdom—are preceded by the words “Do not be afraid”:

“Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.”
“Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all people.”

In this week’s reading from Luke 12, it’s Jesus, not an angel, who says “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”

Why tell your hearers not to be afraid when the news is so happy?

Perhaps it’s because Luke (and Jesus) know that this good news is also disturbing news, unsettling of the status quo, and—fallen creatures that we are—we often prefer our old, familiar, dead-end ways. When Jesus says “Sell your possessions, and give alms” (immediately after telling us not to fear), he pinpoints the source of much of our anxiety: our possessions give us comfort, a sense of security, whether they are objects we’ve acquired or personal accomplishments that define our self-worth. To give up such stuff is a fearful thing indeed.

But the kingdom that God is pleased to give us isn’t about hoarding treasure for ourselves or for our loved ones or for our future (“Sell your 401K, and give alms”). It’s a way of life and living characterized by giving ourselves away for others, over and over again. “Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out,” Jesus says.

The book of Isaiah opens with dire warnings for those unwilling to do this, those caught up in empty ritual—“solemn assemblies with iniquity”—whose “hands are full of blood.” Here we can perhaps make something of a connection between fear and violence. Luke’s repetitive, rhetorical preface to the gospel’s good news—“Do not be afraid”—reminds us that fear, unchecked, can lead to the worst forms of oppression, intimidation, and brutality.

The prophet Isaiah tells the people that such evil is at work “even though you make many prayers.” On behalf of Yahweh he gives the necessary instructions: “Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your doings before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow.”

But the people of Judah and Jerusalem surely didn’t think they were evil. They offered what they thought was proper worship. They kept the appointed festivals. They were dutiful, disciplined, attentive to protocol and propriety. We so readily see their hollow devotion and their disobedience. But can we recognize our own?

The grace that God offers—evident in Isaiah and in Luke—is that judgment is always tempered with mercy. We need not fear because the One who speaks to his “little flock” is the Shepherd who guides and feeds, who leads and supplies, giving us all that we need to bear witness to his kingdom. He tells us to “be dressed for action and have [our] lamps lit.” Yet he himself is the light for our path and the source of all our striving.

The words this week that startle and unsettle need to be taken seriously—Isaiah wasn’t kidding around and neither was Jesus. The good news of God’s way of working in the world is also disturbing news. But the words need not undo us. Do not be afraid. “For it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.”

Thanks be to God.

Supporting the Troops?

2010-07-26T19:30:00.000-07:00

Craig Watts, pastor of Royal Palm Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Coral Springs, Florida and co-moderator for the Disciples Peace Fellowship, asks important questions for pacifists and Just War theorists.

by Craig M. Watts
In a recent conversation about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan I found myself echoing the words often spoken by antiwar folk: “I oppose the war but I support the troops.” My conversation partner was quick to respond, “You really don’t.” I replied, “So, you don’t think it’s possible to be supportive of the troops and stand against the way that are being misused in this war?” He answered, “Perhaps that’s possible for some people. But you’re a pacifist. Even in the best of circumstances you don’t support the troops. You may support the soldiers as men and women but not as troops.”

I had to concede his point. I don’t support the troops as troops. Since I oppose, not just the war in Iraq but war altogether, I oppose the very purpose of the troops. While I do believe they are being abused as troops by placing them in an unjust war, I believe they are being abused as people – and abusive of people – when fighting any war. I simply can’t square the purpose of troops with the purpose of Christians as taught by Jesus, and so I believe no Christian should be part of the troops.

Still what does it mean to “support” these men and women in the armed forces? The language of support is often used but the meaning is less than clear. A ribbon decal on a car bumper is trivial as an expression of support. Surely there are some who have supported the troops in substantial ways: providing body armor, visiting injured veterans in VA hospitals, helping the children and families of soldiers, etc. I’m not convinced these expressions of support are incompatible with opposing the Iraq war or standing against all war for that matter.

Many who insist that they support the troops often mean they affirm the efforts and sacrifices of the troops. These supporters want to bolster and preserve the morale of the troops. Even if misgivings about the rightness of the war sometimes stir within these supporters, they believe nothing should be done to compromise the resolve and focus of the soldiers in a time of war. Consequently, for them supporting the troops and supporting the war can’t very well be separated. Further, those who oppose the war are viewed as unsupportive to the troops. First, because it will likely be discouraging to soldiers to see folks back home protesting the very endeavor they are sweating and dying for. Second, because if questions about the justness of the cause infiltrate the hearts of the soldiers they are unlikely to continue fighting with single-minded conviction.

Sacrifice and courage are commendable. However, sacrifice for an unjust cause is tragic and regrettable. Offering morale boosting support for troops who are sacrificing for an unjust cause is inexcusable. Such a sacrifice is misdirected. We can and should, I believe, honor the well-meaning intention of the troops who are making sacrifices. However, the particular expression and direction of their efforts deserves opposition. Their sacrifices are being dishonored by a government that has put them in the service of an unworthy venture that should never have been entered into in the first place. Any support that would encourage them to continue down the misbegotten path the government has placed them on lacks wisdom.

So what kind of support should be extended to men and women participating in this war? Prayer is an appropriate first response. Certainly prayers should be offered for the safety of those who are in places filled with hazard. But physical well-being should not be the only focus. Prayers should also be offered for the preservation of their emotional health and their moral sensitivity. In the heat of conflict, acts are sometimes performed and condoned by soldiers that later can cause deep pain to their conscience. The inward woundedness of soldiers who have been on the stage of deadly conflict can be as serious as injuries caused by bullets or bombs. Offering a listening ear can be a meaningful way to offer support to those who have returned home. When opportunity and resources allow, support groups for returning soldiers and their families can be provided. Speaking up on behalf of expanding government sponsored veteran’s services is an important way to extend support. Numerous other things can be done.

Support of men and women in the military must not be seen as the exclusive province of those who support the war in Iraq or any other war. And the distinction between supporting the people who have fought in the war and support for fighting the war should be made sharp and clear. Any attempt to confuse the two should be renounced.

Ask And It Will Be Given

2010-07-21T20:17:00.000-07:00

by Ragan Sutterfield
Genesis 18: 20-32; Psalm 138; Colossians 2:6-15; Luke 11:1-13

I heard a lecture by the philosopher Dallas Willard once in which he said that he believes that God wants to fulfill all of our desires and give us everything we want. Of course, he said, there must be much work of transformation on the wanter before this can happen. I am reminded of this as I read the Gospel for this week in which Jesus gives his disciples a prayer that will come to define their way of life and tells them, “Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.”

This is a radical opening for relationship, a possibility for fulfillment and actualization beyond anything else. And what is it that is given for this asking? The parallel passage to Luke 11:5-13 in Matthew 7:9-11 says that our Father in heaven will “give good things to those who ask him.” But Luke doesn’t say that the gift awaiting the asker will be “good things,” but rather the Holy Spirit.

The two gospels are not as in conflict here as they might seem because the Holy Spirit is not simply a “good thing,” but the grounding and possibility of “good things.” The Holy Spirit is what makes possible the transformation of the wanter.

Jesus tells us that a good parent will not “give a snake instead of a fish” when a child asks for a fish. Our problem is that often we ask for a snake when what we should have asked for, what will truly fulfill the desire that precedes the request, is a fish. It is only by living “our lives in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith” (Colossians 2:6-7) that we will want what is truly good and good for us. Of course as Colossians goes on to tell us, this transformation is only made possible through the burial and new life of baptism and the cross of Christ (2:12-14)—formational realities.

The prayer of the Our Father that Jesus gives at the beginning of Luke 11 also has this formational nature—making possible the asking that comes next. As Robert Karris, OFM points out in The New Jerome Biblical Commentary this giving of a distinctive form of prayer “was the mark of a religious community…Jesus’ bequest of the Our Father to his disciples will not only teach them how to pray, but especially how to live and act as his followers.”

Both Luke and Colossians would indicate that the Christian practices of common prayer, baptism, Eucharist, etc. are not merely nice traditions, but key formational practices, formational practices that will help us speak and ask in truth so that we can truly get what we want (with that want free of the competing, mendacious formation that comes from the “rulers and authorities” that Christ disarmed with the cross (Col. 2:15)).

When we are formed by and with the Church into the body of Christ we will be able to say with the Psalmist, “When I called, you answered me” (Ps. 138:4a) and we will be able to pray with Abraham that our cities be preserved for the sake of the righteous remnant (Genesis 18:20-32).

Knowing the One Thing

2010-07-14T20:58:00.000-07:00

by Kyle Childress
Amos 8: 1-12; Luke 10: 38-42

Luke tells us that Jesus goes to the home of Mary and Martha. They welcome him into their home and Martha gets busy doing the many things a good hostess does: preparing food, setting the table, straightening the room, picking up the newspapers that have piled up, and on and on. Meanwhile sister Mary sits in front of Jesus listening to what he has to say. Martha, understandably frustrated says, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister just sits there while I do all the work? Tell her to get up and help!” Jesus replies, “Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things: there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part …”

Several years ago I attended a national meeting of about two hundred clergy from around the country and representing various church traditions across the ecumenical spectrum. In preparation we were asked to name what we considered the major obstacles to our church members’ growth as disciples. Without a close second, church members’ busy-ness was easily agreed upon by clergy as the number one problem keeping them from growing in Christ.

Charles Campbell in his book, The Word Before the Powers, says that one of the strategies of the principalities and powers use to accomplish their deadly purposes is diversion. The powers will do almost anything to keep us diverted from noticing what they’re doing as well as diverting us from knowing God (p. 37). Entertainment and busy-ness are two primary ways we are diverted and distracted. We become too busy to notice or care about anything beyond our daily routines, and therefore we become more fully captive to the powers.

And if this is true of lay-people, it is also true of clergy. The most common exchange of greetings between clergy seems to be, “How are you?” and the reply usually is, “Busy.” Our busy-ness in running the institutional church keeps us distracted from knowing God and discerning the work of the powers and we end up becoming “burned-out.”

Eugene Peterson said that although we all go through periods when we’re busier than at other times, overall our lives should be have an integrity about them; integrated in such a way that we are not running frenetically all of the time. We are too busy, he says, because we are vain. We want to appear important. Significant. And the crowded schedule and the heavy demands on my time are proof that I am important. We live in a society that says busy-ness is proof of importance so we do the same.

Secondly, Peterson says, that we are too busy because we are lazy. We let others decide what we will do instead of deciding ourselves. C. S. Lewis used to say that only lazy people work hard. By lazily abdicating what is important we let others decide what we do with our time and we end up doing everything but what is essential.

The prophet Amos says that the people can’t wait for church to be over so they can get back to their business of exploitation of the poor; they can’t wait for Sunday to end and Monday to begin. Have they been distracted so long from God and the work of the powers that their distractions have become their obsessions?

So who are we and what are we to do? Jesus says that Mary knew the one thing most needful as she sat at his feet and listened to him. Jesus did not say we’re not to work; after all, Luke just told us the Parable of the Good Samaritan where Jesus says, “Go and do likewise.” But with his face turned to Jerusalem, Jesus is acutely aware of the central importance of who he is and what he has to say, as well as how distractions keep us from hearing him and following him.

Peterson reminds us of the scene in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick, in which a whaleboat is being rowed through rough seas and wind and salt spray chasing the great white whale. Sailors are laboring fiercely; rowing the oars, everyone in the boat is intently focused on the task of catching and harpooning the Great White, Moby Dick. The big story is the larger than life conflict between good and evil, sea monster versus the morally outraged and deranged man, Captain Ahab and the captain shouts encouragement to his men to row faster and faster; then he threatens them and berates them to get them to row faster and faster. Yet, in the front of the boat is one man who does nothing. He is just sitting there. He doesn’t hold an oar no matter how much the captain yells and no matter how much help the men need he does not pitch in to help. This man does not even break a sweat. No shouting, in fact he is completely silent with all of the crashing and cursing around him. This man is the harpooner, quiet, poised, waiting. And Melville writes this sentence, “To insure the greatest efficiency in the dart, the harpooners of this world must start to their feet out of idleness, and not out of toil.”

What a great sentence. This harpooner knows who he is and he knows what is essential and what is not. He does not get entangled in what would get in the way of what is important. And he can only do the important by sitting in preparation. Sitting makes all of his other activity possible.

Melville’s sentence brings to mind the Psalmist. Psalm 46:10, “Be still, and know that I am God.” And Isaiah 30:15, “In returning and rest you shall be saved; in quietness and in trust shall be your strength.” Perhaps there is a connection in knowing and spending focused restful time with Christ and in Christ and our ability to “go and do likewise” in serving the needy? Without the one thing most needful in Jesus, we not only become frenetically busy, but worse, we become pawns of the powers in exploiting and oppressing people who are poor.

Whose Word is It Anyway?

2010-07-10T20:23:00.000-07:00

by Jenny Williams
Amos 7:7-17

In late summer 2004, I was approached by the Chair of the Democractic Party in the county in which I lived to offer a prayer at an upcoming appearance of John Edwards, then-Vice-Presidential candidate and pre-fall media darling. I received this phone call just weeks after returning to full-time pastoral ministry from maternity leave. I hemmed and hawed in response to her invitation, explaining that I was still trying to figure out each day how to get a shower, tend to pastoral duties, and be my son’s main food source. She was shocked at my lack of enthusiasm. Even though we had never met and she did not know me, she exclaimed, “I thought you would be honored to do it!” Truth be told, I faced the prospect with dread. The maternity issues were only part of my concerns. I knew I would have to speak the truth.

The Ekklesia Project has spent a lot of time in the past week considering the importance of words. Words matter. Our life begins with a divine Word who walked among us. Proclaiming that word requires both humility and courage.

Words got Amos into trouble. The Lord told Amos to prophesy to the people of his own country and heritage. The Lord’s words would not be pleasing to them as they were not the smooth words of a blessing of the status quo. They were jagged words, critical words about not measuring up. Amaziah, chaplain to the king of Israel, knew these were troublesome words and certainly not the kind that should be uttered in the king’s beautiful state-funded sanctuary. (“Constantinianism on a stick!” Stanely Hauerwas would say.)

Amaziah approached the king with a conveniently altered version of the Lord’s word to Amos—a version that did not include any mention of the issues for which Israel (and thereby the government) was being criticized. Rather Amaziah reported only that Amos was speaking of an impending punishment for Israel.

Then Amaziah confronted Amos, presumably under the pretense of guarding Amos’ best interests. Amos not only rejected Amaziah’s instruction to leave Bethel but corrected his deceptive spin. The words which Amos had spoken were not Amos’ words, but were the Lord’s. Amos reports, “The LORD took me from following the flock…the LORD said to me, ‘Go prophesy,’…Now therefore hear the word of the LORD.”

Will Willimon used to say that when a parishioner came to him with a complaint about Sunday’s sermon, he’d reply, “Don’t be mad at me! Be mad at Luke [or Mark, Matthew, John or Paul]! I’m just telling you what HE said!”

Gathering my courage, I did accept the invitation to pray at the rally. I wrote out my prayer in advance, knowing that I would be incredibly nervous about speaking the truth before Empire. After the Pledge of Allegiance, I was asked to come forward. I prayed — a longer prayer than they expected and certainly not rah-rah. My prayer was supposed to be a blessing of the event, I suppose. I never know why secular organizations insist on an “invocation.” I really don’t think most of those gatherings want or expect the Holy Spirit to show up.

In my prayer I recalled ancient Israel’s desire for Leaders; the fallenness of the people of God and their leaders; and the fallenness of leaders of modern-day nations. I prayed that God would enable them to admit when they had made mistakes. I asked God to help them be Christ-like leaders, and to help us be Christ-like in our support of leaders, which included our responsibility to hold them accountable. I don’t remember what else I prayed. But I did pray in the name of Jesus Christ. The room was strangely silent after I finished, so I suppose the organizers must have been grateful that my prayer was followed by some loud patriotic music to usher in Mr. Edwards.

A pastor’s job is to proclaim the Word of the Lord. The enfleshed, crucified, and resurrected Lord. But the proclamation of the Word does not only come from the mouths of pastors. It is proclaimed each time bodies gather to protest the School of the Americas, or mountaintop removal, or bulldozers who make way for settlements in the West Bank. Proclamation in word and deed is scary business.

When this calling sets us before the State, we have a choice. If we choose the way of Amaziah, we choose the way of mistakenly believing that we stand or fall on our own words — which is to choose the way of ignorance and perhaps privilege if you’re really smooth. If we choose the way of Amos, we choose the way of remembering that we stand only on The Word, knowing that it is not our own but it is the one spoken into existence before the ages. It may not be smooth, but it is true.

Three Funerals and a Wedding

2010-06-30T05:06:00.000-07:00

by Doug Lee
Galatians 6:7-16

Maple syrup has no business running off my pancakes into the sausage links. Sweet and spicy don’t belong together. It’s a violation of the natural order of things.

This was my settled culinary worldview until something unexpected happened on a visit to Mexico City. At the mercado, my family ordered a heaping cup of sweet, succulent mango. But because we had crossed the border, the mango slices came with a liberal dusting of chili powder. Mango with chili sounded like an unnatural combination. But after we tried it, we couldn’t get enough of it. The union of spicy and sweet created something new and beautiful: a bold, vibrant flavor standing out from the drab palette of tastes we were accustomed to.

We’re used to Paul speaking of the cross as the center of his theology: “May I never boast of anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ….” The cross has become conventional for us, our theological “meat and potatoes.” But what we may not be used to is the bold and vibrant way that Paul speaks of the cross intersecting with realities we would normally keep separate.

Paul applies crucifixion language to himself almost as often as he uses it of Christ: “…by which the world has been crucified to me, and I have been crucified to the world.” In Paul’s way of looking at the world, we not only look back in time at Christ’s death to find our identity; somehow we also share in Christ’s death in the present. Paul said earlier, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me” (2:19-20).

And if this were not enough, Paul also speaks about the crucifixion of the world. In the death of Christ, the old world itself has died, along with its old ways of death and bondage.

Craig Koester says, “Three deaths have occurred: Christ died, the world died, Paul died.” All of the old antagonisms and their bitterness stored up for generations: dead. All of the old ways of measuring ourselves and one another: dead. All of the fleshly definitions of who is in and who is out: dead.

But if the cross represents three deaths, it also heralds a new beginning. Christ died, Paul died, the world died. But God raised Christ, and He will bring that triumphant reversal to fulfillment in every other sphere. Because Christ is risen, we, together with creation, will be raised to new life. Paul’s gospel heralds nothing less than a total overturning until all things are made new. “For neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything; but a new creation is everything!” In the new creation, Christ and his people will be united as groom married to his bride. Christ’s people are not merely Israel of the flesh, the Hebrew people, but they will be “his peoples” (Revelation 21:3), a vast community reconciled in the cross across all fleshly divisions and raised to resurrection life in Christ.

Three deaths have occurred. But in the end, Christ, his people, and a new creation will be married, sharing resurrection life, together in perfect communion.

So earth-shattering, so cataclysmic is the event of the cross that Paul understands that Christ has taken us over the border into a new land in which unimaginable things are possible and bold, new flavors are to be tasted. In this new land, all the reference points we have lived by have been torn down. The old boundary of circumcised and uncircumcised has been obliterated. Paul’s storehouse of spiritual accolades (like ours) is so much barnyard manure. There is no more living off the past because the past is rotting and the life of the future is erupting if we have eyes to see it.

Because of this, those things that didn’t seem to go together in the old regime are now brought together. Suffering and joy can flow together. Weakness is no longer to be avoided; it is the only thing Paul longs to boast of.

For us, life in the new state of affairs may appear highly abstract because we hear Paul say, “I was crucified with Christ.” Christ died, I died, end of story. But what he actually says is “I have been crucified with Christ.” The cataclysmic event begun at Golgotha isn’t over. It is being carried out in an ongoing way in and through Paul and now us. In some sense, he is saying, “I am crucified with Christ”. When Paul says, “The world has been crucified to me, and I to the world,” it means that Paul daily reaffirms severing his allegiance to all powers apart from Christ. Everyday he regards their threats and promises as having no potency. Being crucified with Christ and to the world is an ongoing life-style. Paul’s suffering is his ongoing participation in the reality of cross and new creation.

On this Independence Day, we who have been crucified with Christ would do well to allow Paul’s bold way of speaking of the cross to shatter our definitions of who is in and who is out, who belongs to our community and who doesn’t. Identities based on law and immigration status have expired because Christ has taken us over the border.

Freedom and Obedience

2010-06-23T20:32:00.000-07:00

by Jake Wilson
Galatians 5:1, 13-26

In Bound to be Free: Evangelical Catholic Engagements in Ecclesiology, Ethics, and Ecumenism Reinhard Hütter notes that speech about freedom often confuses different types of freedom. The freedom of autonomy differs from political freedom which differs still from Christian freedom. Hütter structures his book around three different modes of being free: free to be Church, free to live with God, and free to speak ecumenically. This week, as the congregation hears Paul proclaim “For freedom Christ has set us free” the preacher will do well to help the congregation discover that Paul is boasting of the freedom to be Church.

The Lectionary Epistle reading offers us an amalgamation of verses from Galatians that begins in chapter 5 verse 1, skips 11 verses, and resumes in verse 13. The first verse of chapter 5 is treated variously by different translations and commentaries as either the climax of Paul’s argument against the agitators or the beginning of an ethical exhortation to live out the implications of Paul’s argument (compare for example the different treatments this verse receives in the NRSV and the NIV). The latter seems to be the leaning of the Lectionary given that it separates 5.1 from the preceding verses, skips over 5.2-12 and begins again with Paul’s instructions that the Galatians become servants to one another through love. However, we should be wary of separating 5.1 from the preceding arguments. Without the proper context, and especially with this reading coming so close to the 4th of July holiday the congregation will be tempted to hear Paul speaking of freedom as autonomy or democracy rather than the freedom to be Church.

The first verse of chapter 5 works well as both the climax of the preceding argument and a transition toward life freed to be Church. As the climax to the preceding argument we can see that the freedom that Christ has won for us is freedom from slavery to sin, the elemental spirits of the world (4.3), and the Law (4.9-10; 4.24). Taken as the end of Paul’s larger argument (3.1-4.31) against the necessity of observing the Law, Paul’s opening declaration helps us to name that from which we have been freed.

However, the freedom that Christ has won for us is not a purely negative freedom. The agitators were more than likely arguing that apart from the observance of the Law these new Galatian converts were being left with no moral guidance, no markers or directions for their communal life. Despite their deep misunderstandings of the Gospel, these ancient agitators did at least recognize that freedom as autonomy (self-law) could be dangerously destructive to life in community. Paul anticipates this line of argument and responds (“But I say!”) in verses 13-26. This is where 5.1 can be fruitfully considered an introduction to verses 13-26 as Paul’s discourse on life in the Spirit shows us the freedom for which we have been set free.

That Christ has set us free to be Church can be seen in Paul’s contrast between the works of the flesh and the fruits of the Spirit. In verse 13 Paul explicitly states that the freedom Christ has won for us is not freedom for self-indulgence. Paul goes on to list the works of the flesh which include idolatry, hatred, and discord among others. All of these works of the flesh are destructive to life in community and the freedom to be Church. When Paul concludes with a warning that those who engage in such actions will not inherit the Kingdom of God, it can be read not so much a threat of punishment for such actions but rather as a statement of the obvious. Life in the Kingdom of God cannot be sustained by the acts of the sinful nature. There is simply no place for envy, ambition or hatred in the Kingdom to which the Church points.

In contrast to the destructive works of flesh, the freedom to be Church is sustained by the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Love, joy, peace, patience…these are the marks of individuals and communities who live in the freedom that only God can offer. That these gifts are fruits and not works reminds us that they are cultivated in us by the Holy Spirit and not achieved through our own efforts.

Within the Church freedom and obedience are bound together. In the case of our reading from Galatians, freedom to be Church is bound to our being obedient to the on-going work of the Holy Spirit.

The Church is to be that community that is led by the Holy Spirit as evidenced by love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Paul ends this section of the letter with the impassioned plea “If we live by the Spirit, let us also be guided by the Spirit.” This week may the people of God hear that a life guided by the Spirit is indeed bound to be free.

Zealous for the Lord

2010-06-15T20:28:00.000-07:00

by Janice Love
I Kings 19:1-15a, Psalm 42 & 43, Galatians 3:23-29, Luke 8:26-39

I admit to admiration for Elijah’s zeal for the LORD, though perhaps not always for his methods. His dedication to Yahweh is absolute. He is on the run for his life now because of it, feeling alone and exhausted; tired of the compromises with idols, evil and the powers that be which Israel continues to make. But Yahweh, thank God, has not given up on us yet…

In my life of service in and for the church thus far, I have come to a profound appreciation for Baptism. The renunciations and vows are deep and powerful and grace filled and not to be taken lightly. There is the much needed reminder that we are one in, and only in, Christ Jesus and not a collection of individuals. This is God on God’s terms, not my own. I have recently begun to make Baptism books for the persons baptized in our congregation. The books contain a page for those witnesses present to sign, a place for photos taken, the Apostle’s Creed, the vows undertaken (I will, with God’s help) and a quote from the Galatians text for this coming Sunday:

As many of you as were baptized into Christ
have clothed yourselves with Christ.
There is no longer Jew or Greek,
there is no longer slave or free,
there is no longer male and female;
for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.
(Galatians 3: 27-28)

…have clothed yourselves with Christ.

This is an intriguing metaphor to reflect on. As we teach our children with patience and much (much) practice to dress their bodies – the tag goes in the back, make sure your zipper is done up, put that lace through this loop – for protection and dignity, so we are called to teach them, through what we do as church, with patience and much practice, that in our Baptism we become clothed with Christ…

In Sunday’s gospel text we encounter a man who runs around naked, whose neighbourhood is death, whose only company a legion of demons. His people try to help, keeping him in chains but the demons make him break them, driving him to run wild in the wild. He is in so much trouble that only God can get him out of it…so much trouble. Jesus, having just commanded nature in the calming of the storm out on the lake to the astonishment and wonderings of the disciples, “Who then is this…?”, commands the demons to come out of the man. The demons shout out the answer to the disciples’ previous question…Jesus, Son of the Most High God.

We put this on; it goes this way: it is Christ who commands – nature, the unnatural, us. This protects us from following the commands of that which would lead us in the paths of death.

The man, whose name we never learn, is healed, made whole, restored in relationship with others, clothed and sits at the feet of Christ.

We put this on; it goes this way: it is Christ who enters without hesitation into suffering, who heals and transforms. We are the company of folk, of all kinds, who sit at the feet of Christ, healed and made whole. This makes us not afraid to enter the suffering of the world too.

There is much speech that occurs in this text. Commands and declarations made, begging, witnessing, and finally, proclaiming. There is no guarantee that the witnessing and proclamation will be well received. Here, in contrast to the reception given Jesus’ actions in Luke 7 (vs.16), fear and fear alone results – keeping this guy around might just not be good for business. But Jesus does not give up on them and leaves behind a most devoted witness and proclaimer, the healed man himself, who at the end makes an even greater declaration as to who Christ is: when instructed to declare how much God has done for him, he declares how much Jesus has done for him.

We put this on; it goes this way: Christ Jesus is the good news that the suffering world aches and longs for, like that thirsty deer we saw last Sunday making its way down to the lake for a much needed drink on a hot, dry day. Jesus calls us to be zealous, grace filled proclaimers of this good news and puts us where he needs us to be.

We are to put on Christ as easily as we put on our clothes in the morning and go out in the dignity, love and grace that affords us for the glory of God and for the sake of the suffering world God so loves.

Wrath and Mercy, Law and Grace

2010-06-07T22:23:00.000-07:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
Third Sunday After Pentecost – 13 June 2010
1 Kings 21:1-21a; Psalm 5:1-8; Galatians 2:15-21; Luke 7:36-8:3 (Revised Common Lectionary)

The readings for this Sunday, taken all together, create some unsettling tensions.

The passage from 1 Kings recounts the refusal of Naboth the Jezreelite to sell his vineyard to his neighbor, King Ahab. When the king goes home to sulk about this, his wife Jezebel takes charge and soon enough a property dispute has led to a crime scene: Naboth is wrongly defamed and summarily executed. Ahab gets his vineyard after all.

Psalm 5 reads something like Naboth’s own prayer from beyond the grave in which he petitions Yahweh to “give heed to my sighing . . . for you are not a God who delights in wickedness . . . you destroy those who speak lies” (vv. 1, 4, 6). Back in 1 Kings, the shocking story does indeed conclude with a chilling warning delivered to Ahab by the prophet Elijah: “I will bring disaster on you” (v. 21a).

Over and against these Old Testament texts (to put the matter contentiously), are the readings from Galatians and Luke. In the gospel lesson, another woman takes center stage: the “sinner” who disrupts a dinner party at the home of Simon the Pharisee by weeping at Jesus’ feet, bathing his feet with her tears, drying them, kissing them, and anointing them with ointment. Through the centuries this unnamed woman has been interpreted as something of a Jezebel: a “loose” woman with a past and no sense of her proper place.

When the host objects to the woman’s behavior (he’s the only one to do so in Luke’s version of the story; the other three gospels describe the scene differently), Jesus defends her. He admires her hospitality and commends her “great love” (v. 47). And whatever sins she has committed he forgives forthwith, sending her out in peace.

A surface reading of the Galatians text can reinforce old, unchecked tendencies that pit the Old Testament’s alleged preoccupation with sin, judgment, and the wrath of God against the New’s purported emphasis on grace, love, and forgiveness. Some have imagined that Paul, in his testy epistle to the disciples at Galatia (and in other letters), renounces the whole of Israel’s scripture and tradition along with the particular practice of circumcising Gentile converts. But Paul is no supersessionist. For him, the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth constitute a continuation of Israel’s life with God. Paul’s theology is less doctrinal than narratival: he locates the Church within the story of Israel’s election, judgment, and redemption. The old divisions do not hold; law versus grace turns out to be a false fight.

On its own, the story of Ahab, Naboth, and Jezebel offers an instructive word about the abuses of institutional power and the legitimate grievances of those who are powerless—a word that couldn’t be more timely in this era of corporate greed and irresponsibility. But the lectionary asks us to read 1 Kings in concert with Luke 7. It juxtaposes the stories of two sinful women—one whose sins are left unnamed; the other’s all too vividly reported. It asks us to consider harsh judgment: both Elijah’s condemnation of “what is evil in the sight of the LORD” and Jesus’ stinging rebuke of Simon’s lack of generosity and hospitality. And it shows us, through Jesus’ words and actions and Paul’s reading of Scripture and the Cross, that Jesus sides with the sinner every time. Every sinner.

The readings for this Sunday, taken all together, create some unsettling tensions. But they are worth our time and attention and may tell us something about how wrath and mercy, law and grace, are—for those who claim the name “Christian”—always of a piece.

All Things Shining

2010-06-01T18:05:00.000-07:00

by Brian Volck
Revised Common Lectionary, Second Sunday after Pentecost: 1 Kings 17: 8-16, 17-24; Luke 7:11-17 / Catholic Lectionary, Feast of Corpus Christi: Genesis 14:18-20, Luke 9:11-17

Ordinary time. Words not crafted to stir the soul. “Ordinary” here, of course, refers to the numbering of Sundays outside of festal and penitential seasons, but that’s far too abstract to make up for its dull connotations. Even in times of sadness, we may feel new life in Easter season. It’s far more difficult when spring is past.

The liturgical color for Ordinary Time is green. Green for life, growth, renewal. Focusing on the ordinary, the Humean predicament of “one damn thing after another,” it’s easy – perhaps inevitable – to miss how life’s greenness marks our lives as cottonwoods in the desert line a river or tap an aquifer.

I suspect it’s always been the case, but steady bad news makes it difficult to ignore the mess we’ve made of the ordinary. No longer content merely to sacrifice the lives of our children or the tops of mountains for the material comforts of a fossil-fueled economy, we lay waste oceans – over an already designated “dead zone” – in ways our words have yet to capture. Less a “spill” than a “spew,” less an “accident” than a predictable event, the baleful consequences of extractive science are made, not for the first or last time, visible.

Our earthly governments grow more frayed, polarized, impotent. Great changes are underway, changes which elected leaders seem oblivious to or willfully ignorant of.   Perhaps there have been times of more uncivil and counterproductive political discourse, but that’s cold comfort amid the ongoing shouting matches over empty coffers, failing institutions, and alleged fixes that largely draw on proven failures.

The church, too, is in ruins. Need I number its many failings?

It’s hard to see, then, how Sunday’s readings respond to the mess we’ve made of the ordinary. The Revised Common Lectionary tells of individual healing: Elijah raising the widow’s son, Jesus doing likewise in Nain. The Catholic Lectionary, marking the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ, features meals: Melchizedek’s enigmatic offering and Jesus feeding five thousand. All the stories join human basics (life, food) and glorifying God; healing presence as doxology.

None of the protagonists, Jesus included, offer comprehensive plans, manifestos, or political platforms. Attending to the ordinary world in its brokenness, they glorify the Father through and with their response. There’s neither division nor opposition here; responding to the broken ordinary and praising God are inseparable as the mingled waters of great tributaries downstream from their confluence.

In Terrence Malick’s luminous 1998 movie, The Thin Red Line, a frightened recruit, Private Train, wonders if the human suffering and natural brokenness he sees everywhere in Guadalcanal signify,”…an avenging power in nature? Not one power, but two?”

At movie’s end, he knows he’s lived through more suffering and brokenness than most ever will and resolves to live better. Among his fellow soldiers he again wonders, ‘Where is it that we were together? Who were you that I lived with? The brother. The friend. Darkness, light. Strife and love. Are they the workings of one mind? The features of the same face?”

The films final words are his, spoken – to whom remains unclear – as the green island where suffering and death reigned disappears in the boat’s wake: “Oh, my soul! Let me be in you now. Look out through my eyes. Look out at the things you made. All things shining.”

Has Private Train found waters where the broken ordinary and God’s glory flow together? Malick’s too fine an artist to make it clear. At the heart of his artistry, Malick juxtaposes profoundly evocative showing with a paucity of explicit telling.

After 2000 years of Christianity, we often read the gospels more as explicit telling rather than evocative showing. I’m not arguing for relativism or an “anything goes” interpretative strategy. I’m merely reminding Christians of the artistry at Scripture’s heart. Which is more powerful: telling us to meet others in their need and to give God praise, or showing us Melchizedek, Elijah, and the Word Incarnate simultaneously meeting ordinary human need and praising the Father?

Perhaps this is the challenge of Ordinary Time: through grace, to meet and heal the broken world in precisely the same gesture as we glorify God, to be fully alive in the world God has made and we have marred, to find, even in our brokenness, all things shining.

Trinity Sunday

2010-05-27T20:13:00.000-07:00

by Ragan Sutterfield
Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31; Romans 5:1-5; John 16:12-15

I must admit, I am not very comfortable with spirits. God the Father, God the Son—these are concrete realities that show up on mountaintops, write on stone tablets, and die on wooden crosses. But the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Truth, the Spirit of Wisdom? I have a hard time understanding.

Thankfully I don’t have to understand—the Spirit itself brings that. As Jesus says in the Gospel reading, the Spirit “will guide you in all truth.” But as he goes on to say, this truth is not a truth that the Spirit has on its own—it is a truth that comes from the Father and the Son—it is a truth held in the consensus and community of the Trinity that we worship.

I find it striking that in all three of our readings for this Sunday—Proverbs, Romans, John—the Spirit comes to a community. In Proverbs the Spirit of Wisdom cries out “To you, o people, I call, and my cry is to all that live.” In Romans, Paul speaks of faith by which “we are justified” and speaks of the love of God having been “poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.”

In the same way Jesus speaks to the disciples about the coming of the spirit using the plural you.

The Spirit is then something that we don’t know on our own—the Spirit is a member of the Trinitarian community that joins with us as the community of the church.

In this way the spirit is saved from the abstraction that can come with that word. I am not lost in a “spirituality,” a choose-your-own-adventure religion that speaks to the personality of my individual heart. With a Holy Spirit—a spirit that is set apart and sets us apart—I am required to under go the baptism of the Church before anything else. Only then can I join with Paul in welcoming the “Spirit that has been given to us.”

Soldiers of Conscience

2010-05-24T19:29:00.000-07:00

by Brian Volck
Whatever your stance on war, here are some contemporary voices to consider, voices much closer to the reality of killing than most of us. For those who wish to learn more about the documentary, visit the website.

Seventh Sunday of Easter

2010-05-11T21:36:00.001-07:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
John 17:20-26

[Two lectionary posts this week: one for the Seventh Sunday of Easter and one for Ascension Sunday (reposted from May 2009)]

"I ask not only on behalf of these, but also on behalf of those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one." (John 17:20-21a).

It seems there’s not much talk of ecumenism these days—not in books, not on blogs, not even in and among churches. Maybe that’s because forty years of dogged efforts at dialogue and mutual understanding have borne some real fruit: Calvinists are far less suspicious of Catholics than they used to be and vice versa; Methodists and Lutherans are now in full communion with one another.

Of course, the ecclesial traditions most vested in the ecumenical movement are now among those experiencing significant decline, and the growing churches—Pentecostal, non-denominational, “emergent” of this or that variety—don’t seem to place the same high premium on bridge-building and cross-over conversations. So maybe it’s too soon to say “mission accomplished” when it comes to Church unity.

Of course it is. Jesus’ prayer in this week’s Gospel reading is a stinging reminder of his Body’s continued disunity. But what can and should be said about this obstinate, obvious reality? How does one preach this familiar text in ways that signal urgency but not despair, that convey the gravity of the situation while also offering a word of hope? I have no idea.

But here are a few thoughts . . .

(1) The oneness for which Jesus prayed is rooted not in human achievement but in the life of the triune God. The unity between the Father and Son, which is their mutual self-giving (perichoresis) in the Spirit, is the same love by which the ekklesia exists (“As you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us”). As Dietrich Bonhoeffer put it: “Christian unity is not an ideal which we must realize [actualize]; it is rather a reality created by God in Christ in which we may participate.”

(2) The unity of the Church does not subsist invisibly through “faith” or by assent to propositions, but is to be visible and material. The reason for the oneness is “that the world may believe that you have sent me.” Unity is shared witness not intellectual agreement.

(3) It is the Eucharist that constitutes this unifying witness in the world. Through the sacramental gifts of Christ’s body and blood, the community receives itself—it becomes the body of Christ, blessed, broken, and shared. As the Great Thanksgiving says, we are made “one with Christ, one with each other, and one in ministry to all the world.” In this act the Church is united across time and distinctions between the global and the local are collapsed, for in every local assembly is the whole body—“the world in a wafer,” as Bill Cavanaugh has said. The Church is here and now, there and then, the visible body of its Lord. And this visible body does not express or evince the Church’s unity; it is the Church’s unity.

But the Church is divided. Still. John probably included Jesus’ prayer in his Gospel because of doctrinal strife in his own community. Discord then and now. Yet while the scandal of disunity persists, Jesus prays for us still. This is the good news. But it does not relieve us of our responsibility to practice the unity that is God’s and that is God’s gift to us. How will Christ’s body, divided by differences both petty and consequential, receive this gift and bear visible, material witness to God’s own life and love?

Ascension Sunday

2010-05-11T21:34:00.000-07:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
Acts 1:1-11; Psalm 47; Ephesians 1:15-23; Luke 24:44-53

St. Augustine considered the Feast of the Ascension the crown of all Christian festivals. Today we may give it an obligatory nod as we make our way liturgically from Easter to Pentecost, but we’re often not quite sure what to do with it exegetically, theologically, pastorally. The clunky literalism routinely inspired by the Luke-Acts vision of the ascension—Jesus rocketing upward into space—is not a little perplexing.

Whatever historical event lies behind the Luke-Acts narratives of Jesus’ ascension into heaven—and the fact that the two accounts differ in important ways might be a clue that a surface-literal reading is not what the author had in mind—a couple of things stand out: the centrality of worship and the reimagining of “all rule and authority and power and dominion.”
Tom Wright points out that Luke’s gospel ends, as it began, in the Temple at Jerusalem. “Worship of the living God,” Wright says, “is at the heart of Luke’s vision of the Christian life.” Jesus’ ascension into heaven, then, is not “beam me up, Scotty” science fiction, but rather that which makes possible the Church’s existence. Because Jesus is not here, the Church can be, must be—the Church is constituted as and empowered to be his worshiping, witnessing body here and now. (Douglas Farrow makes this point by insisting that the Church exists “by its mysterious union with one whose life, though lived for the world, involves a genuine break with it.”)

In this week’s Epistle reading, the writer prays that the Ephesian Christians might be given “a spirit of wisdom and revelation” as they come to know the resurrected and exalted Christ whose name “is above every name” and whose fullness “fills all in all.” Christ’s resurrection from the dead and ascension to the right hand of God have now “made him the head over all things for the church.” Here, again, Christ and the Church exist in mysterious union; how could the head be separate from the body?

For many, this claim about “the immeasurable greatness” of Christ’s power (and thus the immeasurable greatness of the Church’s power) stirs fears of triumphalism. It evokes uneasy memories of the Church’s exercise of power in ways that have oppressed and tyrannized. (A desire to hold at bay such fears and anxieties may be one reason that the Feast of the Ascension is no longer considered the crown of all Christian festivals).

While not triumphalist, this claim is ultimately political, for the ascension of Jesus to the right hand of God transforms how we understand “all rule and authority and power and dominion.” The Ascension creates a body politic—the Church. Yet we know that the politics of the risen and ascended Jesus, and necessarily the politics of his Church, are not the politics of this world—they are not the politics of division, of one-upmanship, of scarcity and despair, of fear and death.

In order to better grasp the biblical vision of Ascension politics, it’s instructive to heed Luke’s subtle suggestion in this last chapter to go back to where his gospel began. When the risen Jesus “opened their minds to understand the scriptures,” we can’t help recalling the first time Jesus opened the scrolls in his hometown synagogue at the start of his public ministry: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” This is what the politics of Jesus looks like and Jesus, now ascended, entrusts this work to us.

Soon enough we will celebrate the Spirit of the Lord as it descended on the people at Pentecost. For now, though, the ascended Jesus bids us, as his body alive and present here and now, to be about the Spirit’s ongoing work so that, with the eyes of our hearts enlightened, we may know what is the hope to which he has called us—a hope made visible, tangible, practical in a world without hope.

Courage to be Whole

2010-05-05T04:16:00.000-07:00

by Kyle Childress
John 5: 1-9

Jesus is in Jerusalem and he goes by the Pool of Bethesda. This pool, fed by an underground spring, is down, off of the street, and is surrounded by porticoes offering some shade and shelter. Legend said that on occasion an angel would trouble the waters of the pool and the first person into the water would be healed. Hence, the pool and the surrounding area had become the gathering place for anyone and everyone with some sort of sickness, but especially the blind, the lame, and the paralyzed. All gathered watching the surface of the water for the smallest sign of the rippling of the waves. A small bubbling from the underground spring or even a slight breeze could cause a stampede of invalids trying to be the first into the water.

And Jesus asks this man lying over to one side, “Do you want to be made whole?”

“No thanks, I think I’ll just stay here on my pallet and wait for the waters to ripple. I’ve been here 38 years and I know what to expect and I know all of the other people nearby. True, I’m probably not going to get better, but – you know – I’ve gotten used to being here, so thanks all the same, Jesus but I’ll just lie here.”

Do we fear the cure more than the illness? Bill Coffin said that if it is hell to be guilty, it’s certainly scarier to be responsible – response-able – able to respond to God’s call, able to respond to the word and love of Jesus. When we cease being a victim – “I can’t get to the water Jesus; there’s always someone else who gets there first” – and start being responsible then our legs are strong enough for us to walk beside others who are in pain and need help. Our arms are empowered to embrace our enemies and the outcasts. We no longer make excuses; instead we walk forward to new life in Jesus Christ and go to work serving, healing, hoping, and living a life of joy and fullness.

Charles Campbell, in his outstanding book, The Word Before the Powers, wonders that if one of the ways the Principalities and Powers, the Systems of Domination, keep us under their thumb is by keeping us busy, tired, and diverted. We become numbed to the call of Jesus Christ to serve God and serve the hurting because we don’t have time. We come home after work and collapse in front of the TV until it is time to go to bed and repeat the process all over again. Weekends are when we want to get out of town or do something else. So we live life to the minimum. And we say we want change when we actually want to remain the same – but we want to feel better about it.

We know that to get up and follow Jesus will involve us in people’s lives in ways we’re not sure we want, because to be whole means to be re-membered, re-connected with God and with God’s people and God’s creation. No more isolation. No more living my own private life where no one bothers me. To be whole means to get off of the couch and get involved. It means to work our tails off, often doing behind the scenes work that is tedious and overlooked. We know that to walk out of the door and say, “Here, am I Jesus! Send me!” is an invitation to maybe getting crucified like Jesus. As Dan Berrigan has said, “If you’re going to follow Jesus, you had better look good on wood, because that is where you’ll end up.” We know all of that, so maybe our couches and our pallets don’t look so bad.

No wonder so many churches are still on the pallet. No wonder so many of us are reticent about being made whole. And no wonder we have neither the courage nor the will nor the energy to say, “No!” to the many ways the Powers grind us all down. No wonder we are reluctant to say “Yes!” to Jesus Christ and the embodiment of his Abundant Life.

Well, in our story, this man has the guts to be whole. He takes a deep breath and nods to Jesus, “Yes, I want to be whole, healed and well. I know it will take time Jesus. I know it will take work and lots of unlearning old pain-filled habits accumulated over 38 years, and learning new habits. I know it is not going to be easy, but yes, Jesus, make me a whole person.”

And Jesus does. No questions asked. No stipulations. No checking to see if he is truly deserving or not. Jesus just heals him. Grace. And the man picks up his mat and walks out of the door to new life. To wholeness.

Apocalypse of Love

2010-04-28T20:40:00.000-07:00

by Brian Volck
Revelation 21:1-6; John 13: 31-35

“Behold,” says the One who sits on the throne, “I make all things new.” God dwells with humanity. Tears, pain and mourning are no more. It sounds wonderful. Sign me up.

“I give you a new commandment,” says Jesus to the Eleven: “love one another...as I have loved you.” What lovely and inspiring words.

Take time, though, to read the fine print: “This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” Loving one another hasn’t been Christianity’s strong suit, however much we talk about it.

There has never been a time in Christian history since Luke wrote Acts where the people were of one heart and mind. Christian divisions have rarely been civil. Many have been deadly. It’s not terribly persuasive to lecture others on the necessity of love when our hands drip fresh blood.

I don’t need to recite the long history of Christian divisions, nor need I outline the ugly divisions within our separated traditions today. You know them as well as I.

We’ve made a horrible mess of God’s household, the oikoumene. I don’t wish to disparage decades of earnest and difficult work, but Christian ecumenism today remains more promise than reality. It’s far easier to cancel anathemas than to reconcile ways of living. Call the latter costly ecumenism, and pray for that.

In The Brothers Karamazov, Father Zossima warns “Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams.” Love, like peace, is difficult. Ask someone who has been married more than twenty years. Mutual subordination is not a natural practice. People who claim their marriage has always been happy either lie or feebly conceal an uneasy hegemony.

I don’t know how to love you as Christ loves us. If you do, please clue me in.

In the mean time, what’s to be done with this new commandment? Commandments aren’t issued for default behaviors. You can blame biology or the Fall, but lying, sexual betrayal, killing, and covetousness are quintessentially human. Perhaps I can learn, through a lifetime’s effort, how not to harm my neighbor, but don’t ask me to do the impossible and love him, too.

The more I reflect on this new commandment, the more I apprehend it apocalyptically, a revelation of something already here, yet hidden from human sight. If you ask why I love my wife, I’ll give you dozens of reasons, none of which truly answers your question. In the end, I love by faith and grace; not by sight, knowledge or certainty.

Pray for that faith and grace in all things. Pray that your neighbor will show you how such faith, such grace is lived. Pray for the apocalypse of love.

In Unity We Lift Our Song

2010-04-22T10:40:00.000-07:00

by Jenny Willams
John 10:22-30; Revelation 7:9-17

One of the many blessings in my life has been the gift of church music. I grew up in a family who valued music and in a church that valued music. Because I was reared in a high steeple church, I was privileged to be exposed at a young age to string ensembles, handbell choirs, professional singers, and an organist who is a professor of organ music in a prestigious university music program.

When life took me away from home, I got to experience other kinds of church music. I served a church in North Carolina which had a teenage show choir and a men’s quartet who sang southern gospel music. I served a church in a small town in West Virginia whose pianist played every hymn in a gleeful, upbeat bluegrass style. I visited a Melkite church in Zababdeh in the West Bank, who sang their entire liturgy a capella.

These experiences contribute, I’m sure, to why the future depicted in John’s vision sounds so glorious to me: countless numbers of disciples from all nations, tribes, peoples, and languages will join together in perpetual worship, singing glorious praises to the triune God.

That they are singing is, I think, significant. There is no Heavenly Muzak playing in the throne room, no recordings of babbling brooks or birdsong to calm the masses. The people are not listening to song—they are making music, putting their bodies into their life of praise.

I owe my love of church music to the people who taught me to sing. I’m grateful for my parents and grandparents, with whom I saw in the pew during my childhood, and who heeded John Wesley’s direction to “sing lustily and with a good courage.” I’m grateful for Rae, a church member who was my piano teacher and also directed our church’s children’s choir. I can still remember her hand movements that, as she taught us Natalie Sleeth anthems, indicated we should try to adjust our pitch lower or higher. I’m grateful for Miss Nute, a church member who was the director of the choral programs at my public high school. She urged us on in excellence in a capella pieces and somehow got away with teaching sacred music to the choir. I’m grateful for Diane, the director of the African-American gospel choir at my college. She patiently taught us white kids who were in the choir to learn how to express our faith more freely in song than we were used to.

I learned to sing because of the people whose voices I could listen to and try to follow. Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me.” (John 10:27) We only can sing the song of life because we are learning it from the one who was there when the music began. To learn how to sing it ourselves, we have to follow him.

We who learned to sing in the context of church choirs know that while singing is a craft that requires personal attention, the goal of our individual efforts is to join well with others in a corporate endeavor. We take our different gifts, our different voices, and make music together. We have to follow not only the director but listen to each other to make beautiful music. The singing of the heavenly throng is unified by their focus on the triune God. What makes the music of both the earthly and heavenly multitudes possible is the voice of the Lord. We can only sing together because he leads us.

On earth, the sheep hear His voice.
In heaven, the Lamb hears ours.

To God and to the Lamb, we will sing!

Struck Blind on the Damascus Road

2010-04-15T19:04:00.000-07:00

by Jake Wilson
Acts 9.1-20

The conversion of Saul provides us with the New Testament example of a conversion experience. Saul’s transformation from a persecutor of the Lord to an Apostle continues to serve as a word of hope to the sin soaked conscience of those who feel that truly their failings are too great to be forgiven. The story of Saul’s conversion gives narrative power to the concept of being “born again” from John 3 or becoming a “new creation” from 2 Corinthians 5.

The power of this experience transformed the murderous Saul and immeasurably impacted the Christian faith. Indeed powerful personal experiences of God have dramatically altered the direction of ‘the Way’ more than once. Remember that Luther shuddered under the righteousness of God until he came to understand the true meaning of the phrase, at which time he said “I felt that I was altogether born again, and had entered paradise itself through open gates.” We can also call to mind the conversion experience of John Wesley who claimed his heart was strangely warmed and recorded in his journal “I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation, and assurance was given me that he had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death.” (Italics original)

That we live in a cultural age in which rampant individualism is one of the primary forces working against the witness of the Church should not cause us to completely abandon the langue of a conversion experience. Powerful personal encounters with the risen Christ do occur as Luther and Wesley help us remember. Still, if we are to proclaim the Gospel responsibly in our current cultural climate the preacher must temper the language of individual experience with a much thicker understanding of conversion. Fortunately, the text takes us in just such a direction.

For example, Saul’s conversion marks a change of communities. The text indicates this in a number of ways. Fruitful contrast may be drawn between ‘The Way’ of vs.2 and ‘his way’ of vs.3 (ESV; The TNIV reads ‘his journey’). Saul is on his way, with orders from the leaders of one community, before his direction is changed and he joins The Way where he receives a new brother and is initiated into a new community through the laying on of hands, receiving the Holy Spirit and baptism.

While Saul’s conversion does represent a powerful personal experience, this personal encounter is not for Saul’s sake but for the healing of the nations. As Jesus makes clear in vs.15, Saul is to become God’s Apostle to the Gentiles. The power of this encounter is not Saul’s inner experience but God’s determination to see that “at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth.” (Phil. 2.9-11)

It is also important to note that Saul’s conversion is not a heroic individual decision. The language of asking Jesus to become one’s “personal Lord and Savior” is completely foreign to this encounter. This was not Saul’s choice. Rather he was struck down by Jesus, calling to mind the words of Hebrews 10.31 “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”

In Live to Tell: Evangelism for a Postmodern Age, Brad Kallenberg offers a definition of conversion as “the change of one’s social identity, the acquisition of a new conceptual language, and the shifting of one’s paradigm.” (32) All three of these aspects are present in the text. Saul’s social identity changes as he moves from one community to another. He begins to learn a new language as he confesses Jesus as Lord even before he understands what such a confession might mean. And his paradigm is radically altered as he comes to see that the Jesus who was once a failed messiah is truly the Son of God (vs. 20). All of this stems from the power of this road to Damascus experience. Nevertheless the significance of the event, as would eventually be the case with Luther, Wesley and countless others, transcends Saul’s individual experience.

Speaking Out

2010-04-09T18:05:00.000-07:00

by Mark Ryan
Our readings for this week show both the irrepressible quality of the good news about what God has done for Israel in Jesus Christ (Acts 5) and why that is so—that is the divine origin of the irrepressibility (John 20:19-31).

To begin with the scene in Acts 5:27, the text asks us to imagine a dramatic conflict where the revelation of God comes crashing up against the conventions—ideologies, really—that hold societies in place. “Did you not hear our orders?” asks the High Priest, with the implied further query, “don’t you know it is we who are responsible for common sense and good order around Jerusalem?” That those representing ideology and good sense are the leaders of the Israel ought to trouble all of us who claim that our Christianity is central to our identity. Religious ideology here is more pointedly opposing itself to God’s plan than any mere secular kind. Perhaps we can imagine another form of conversation more common today with equally satanic results: “C’mon, you guys are good Christians who love the Church. Do you really think it’s appropriate to cause such a stir?” If Peter was somehow the vehicle of Satan in earlier text (Mark 8), here his reply is as frank as piercing in its truth: “We must obey God rather than men.” Perhaps unlike his rebuke of Jesus in Mark for failing to conform to his expectations for a messiah king, when he talks here it is clear that his speech has the character of witness. In fact, he seems to recognize that it is not his talk merely but that very spirit God breathed onto them.

This act of speaking out of witness, and the revolutionary political implications it carries reminds me of how the politics of liberalism has made a more restrained, even coerced speech, its end. However noble intentions, philosophers like Jurgen Habermas have sought to find the “transcendental conditions” of our practices of arguing in order to show us the rules that govern our talk. On the one hand, this is better than some accounts of the grounds of human ethics and politics for it avoids the solipsistic self of some earlier accounts. However, one notes in these traditions a great desire to place limits on speech, and especially what can be said “reasonably.” In the end, they fall in love with, well, conventionalisms. It should have been no surprise that such an account of speaking should have led a leading philosopher like John Rawls, at least in his early work, to suggest that religious persons had to domesticate their speech by translating it according to strict standards before entering the political conversation.

How different is the Logos of God in the New Testament and the speech of those chosen to continue its work by speaking! One recalls earlier attempts to silence God’s Word, such as the occasion of Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem. If you put a cork in one outlet it pops up in another, perhaps the political version of wac-a-mole.

Now, as our Trinitarian theology hopes to make clear, the death and resurrection of Jesus is God’s speech foremost and not our own. But the crazy thing is that we are called somehow to take part in speaking God’s Word. “We are witnesses of these things, as is the holy Spirit that God has given to those who obey him.” What could it mean to be called, as members of the Church, to take part in God’s speaking of the Gospel of Christ? To answer this, it is a great resource that Peter’s refusal to stop speaking out comes in the same chapter of Acts that gives us an extraordinarily vivid depiction of what Gerhard Lohfink calls the vita apostolica, the living-and-being together of the disciples. As Lohfink notes, the newness of this community represented in the way they newly become completely dependent on and responsible for one another is an integral part of Easter’s reality. The complete dependence of this community on the Holy Spirit for its identity, its life, is what the text seeks to highlight for us when it tells us of what happened to Ananias and Sapphira. “Why,” Peter asks Sapphira, “did you agree to test the Spirit of the Lord?” (Acts 5:9)

If it is only in the light of God’s own Spirit in us that we can explain the honesty and courage that accompany the speech of the disciples, we must also acknowledge that their revolutionary speech had a home in a revolutionary polity, the community whose source is Jesus’ breathing out of his Spirit. Perhaps when our own speech as Christians becomes halting and hesitant, we should remind ourselves that we need a speech therapist. Our texts suggest that only the life of the ekklesia can play speech therapist when we want to re-learn how to utter God’s logos after him.

Grounded Hope

2010-04-01T22:48:00.000-07:00

by Debra Dean Murphy
Psalm 118: 1-2, 14-24; John 20:1-18

Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” (John 20:15)

Let us not mock God with metaphor, / analogy, sidestepping transcendence; / making of the event a parable, a sign painted in the / faded credulity of earlier ages: / let us walk through the door. (Seven Stanzas at Easter by John Updike)

John the Evangelist sets the resurrection story in a garden, grounding Easter’s hope in, well, the ground. “The tree of life,” Vigen Guroian observes, “still stands in the midst of the garden.” No pie in the sky here; Easter is earth tended, mended and renewed, and a body alive again.

John Updike the poet reminds us that our hope lies not in nature’s rhythms of birth, death, and new life (comforting as they may be), nor in traditions handed down from learned teacher to disciples, but in the scandal and embarrassment of a resurrected body:

It was not as the flowers,
each soft Spring recurrent;
it was not as His Spirit in the mouths and fuddled
eyes of the eleven apostles;
it was as His Flesh: ours.

“Ours,” Updike says, not “mine.” The hope of resurrection is not that of Plato’s singular immortal soul; it is not the promise of a post-mortem spiritual existence in a far-off heavenly realm. The hope of resurrection is that the material creation in all its fullness participates—now partially, then perfectly—in newness of life, in communion with the Source of all that is. Heaven and earth are joined, through the mystery of Jesus’ rising from the dead, in the shalom of God.

The disobedience that occurred in the first garden was the burden Jesus bore in Gethsemane’s garden. In Easter’s garden, the burden has been rolled away. His broken body, now restored, makes of us a body, his body: “it was as His Flesh: ours.” And through the gifts of the good earth, grain and grape, harvested by human hands, we take, bless, break, and share his body, becoming what we already are.

We are grounded in this hope, nurtured by these gifts, sustained for the work and witness we are called to: go and tell; be and do; live mindfully, patiently, peaceably in the joy of the resurrection. “This,” we profess this day with the Psalmist, “is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.”

Insurrection Sunday

2010-03-25T20:43:00.000-07:00

by Ragan Sutterfield
Luke 19:28-40; Isaiah 50:4-9a; Psalm 31:9-16; Luke 22:14-23:56

“For I hear the whispering of many—
terror all around!—
as they scheme together against me,
as they plot to take my life.”

These verses from Psalm 31 are a proper preface to Palm Sunday. This is the Sunday not so much of children waving palms with hosannas as it is the beginning of a drama that will end in execution, murder, and suicide. This is the beginning of the end of the key conflict between the kingdom of God and the empire of the world.

The crowd has it right when they proclaim, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heaven.” But we should not take from this that Christ is coming in peace, at least not of the kind maintained by the empire until its legitimacy is threatened—the peace of stasis, peace without conflict. Christ is entering Jerusalem for peace, and violence, unrest and insurrection are the sure signs that the kingdom of peace is threatening a world bent on coercion and injustice. Christ’s response to this violence is to take the downward path toward death—the path of humiliation for the sake of righteousness.

Humiliation is a common theme in the lectionary readings for this Palm Sunday. In Philippians Paul calls us to have the “same mind” as a savior who “humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross.” In Isaiah the one who sustains “the weary with a word” does not hide his “face from insult and spitting.” Then we have Jesus entering Jerusalem in triumph with the first gospel reading and hanging on the cross by the second.

Paul calls us to follow this path of humiliation and so we must ask, how do we enter on this downward path?

From Psalm 31 to Isaiah to the Gospel, humiliation is the result of righteousness and obedience. We should take away from this that if we are to be righteous, if we are to follow the ways of Christ rather than the competing ideologies of our age, there are going to be times when the world will humiliate us (Sojourners recent attack from Glen Beck?).

But in all of the readings for this week we also see that in our humiliation, as in our humility, we must be radically dependent upon God. In this radical dependence we die and let our life carry on in God—let God become our body and breath. We follow the Psalmist saying, “I trust in you, O Lord; / I say, ‘Your are my God.’/ My times are in your hand.”

This Palm Sunday as many of us march around our churches waving palms, remember that these will be the ashes representing our death when they are burned for Ash Wednesday—that if we follow Christ into Jerusalem humiliation and death will follow. This Sunday is the beginning of the radically new insurrection of the Gospel—an insurrection that begins with humiliation, moves to “death—even death on a cross,” and ends with God’s faithful deliverance and resurrection.