Author: Rosemary Lovelace

Proper 12C – George Yandell

The people Jesus brought into his fellowship were young – some were likely teenagers. If you do a search on life expectancy in the Roman Empire in Jesus’ day it will tell you most people did not live much past the age of 25. John Dominic Crossan cites estimates that in Jesus’ day and place the life expectancy for most was very short. “Probably a third of live births were dead before they reached the age of six. By sixteen about 60% of those live births would have died, 75% by age 26, and 90% by age 46. Very few people reached their 60’s.” [Crossan quoted in Jesus the Village Psychiatrist, p. 62, Donald Capps, Westminster John Knox Press, 2008]

Why is that? Poverty and malnourishment made people susceptible to illness, children more so. Young children were often not regarded with affection because parents expected few children to live past infancy. They were expendable. So when Jesus speaks of loving and giving good gifts to children, he is cutting against the grain of the prevailing culture. Children growing up in Galilee were susceptible to the fears their parents tried to keep at bay. Yet the youth and young adults who walked with Jesus were already among the few survivors among their peers. They would have tasted death and the fear of death regularly, especially in the fears of their parents.

Jesus offered remarkable potential­­­­ — for kids to grow strong even when their deepest fears have been triggered — is exactly what Jesus offers his disciples when they ask to be taught to pray.

Jesus led his closest disciples in a way that gave them God’s own love. Jesus’ way of laughing, walking, crying, teaching and living with them opened their hearts to God in a way no one else ever had. 

Those close to Jesus were the ones who had been divorced from their faith and their culture because of the professions they had, their parentage, the sins they’d committed, and their decision to seek and follow Jesus. They had left their families behind and become members of the band of Rabbi Jesus. They had been scorned by their religious leaders and told they were unworthy of God’s love. Matthew because he was a tax collector. The women, because they dared to sit at the dinner table with men who didn’t own them. Peter, John, James and others, fishermen and tradesmen, because they worked on the Sabbath and didn’t keep the laws on cleanliness and diet.

The close friends of Jesus watched him as he withdrew regularly and prayed to God. They marveled at the peace and strength he drew from his devotions. So they asked Jesus, “Teach us to pray, just as John the baptizer taught his disciples.”

Jesus relied, “When you pray, you should say this prayer.” [You may follow along in the prayer book p. 364 as I offer an alternative translation of the words in Luke.]

“Daddy, your name be revered. Impose your imperial rule. Provide us with the bread we need day by day. Forgive us our sins, since we too forgive everyone in debt to us. And please don’t subject us to test after test.”[From The Five Gospels What Did Jesus Really Say? The Jesus Seminar, p. 326, 1993]

The prayer in this simple form is a serene statement of the absolute and immediate access to God that Jesus and his movement proclaim. This prayer is so simple anyone can remember it. And it was a tremendously radical statement about how to speak to God. I suspect when other supposedly orthodox Jews heard the disciples pray this prayer, they wanted to lash out at the pray-ers.

Jesus opened the arms of God’s love so wide, God could embrace everyone. Jesus broke the authority of religious leaders to dictate how, when and where devout people could pray. He displaced the ‘holy ones’ who told worshippers they were unworthy to speak to God without them to speak for them. He made God portable- God doesn’t need to be worshipped only in temples or synagogues.  He healed the divorces his friends had suffered from their God. All leading from these 5 simple sentences.

The prayer book version of the Lord’s Prayer we use most frequently follows the version in the gospel of Matthew more closely than this version from Luke. But Luke carries some very subtle differences worth noting. 

First, we may simply address God as Daddy. Each of us can heed this invitation from Jesus- speak to God like talking to your own parent.

Second, ask God for God’s ways to be known and done in our world. When we ask God to impose God’s own ruler-ship, we live turned toward God in all our daily actions. And when a group of people lives toward God, selfishness and greed diminish while love grows.

Third, rely on God for our daily needs to be met, our bread to be given day by day. Jesus means for us to rely on God, and trust in God in all things. What freedom Jesus intends all his followers to know! How many of you, if you ceased all worry about tomorrow- if you could quit all anxious thoughts and actions- wouldn’t you be free? Jesus tells us to pray for that freedom.

Fourth, ask God to forgive your sins, as we forgive the debts of those who ask us. The words here in Luke may be the most radical of the Lord’s Prayer. Jesus’ words here specifically pertain to debts of money owed and forgiven. So he tells his disciples to act with charity in business dealings, because we ask God to forgive us so much more- our sins against God’s other children.

And fifth, ask God to relieve us from ceaseless testing. That’s what the religion of Jesus’ day had set up- unless believers met test after test under the strict law of the Pharisees, they would be cast out. Jesus invites his disciples to ask God to free them from such oppression- to live in love, rather than fear of failure. Jesus knows that God is a daddy who loves all equally. God doesn’t desire God’s people to live in fear of testing, rather in the joy of loving as God loves. When God’s children need correction, their continual prayers for forgiveness, and God’s loving acceptance of them are the only tests they need pass.

Jesus imbeds the prayer with this assurance to his disciples: “Ask and it will be given to you; search and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”

Notice: all the petitions are in the plural- “give us, not give ME.” Jesus is clearly offering communal participation, not just individual requests.

So the prayer is the body of disciples asking, seeking, knocking at the door.

“Daddy, your kingdom come- Impose your imperial rule.” And then in spare words Jesus offers three petitions to transform our lives and our communities. “Give us bread every day; forgive our sins as we forgive; don’t bring us to the time of trial.”

Jesus healed his disciples’ divorce from God. He offers to bridge our distance from God. All we need do is pray together and privately as he taught, then live the prayer we pray. We need no mediators, no temple, no priest or bishop to bring us into God’s embrace. God hears and responds every time we ask. Jesus promised the same shortly before he was killed- he said, “I am with you always, even to the end of the ages.” The prayer he taught is all we need to recall his promise and his presence. Live the prayer, and we live in his presence all our days.

6th Sunday after Pentecost – Byron Tindall

We have good examples of the rule of hospitality from ancient Israel in two of the lessons appointed for today.

The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, edited by George Buttrick, defines the rule this way. “The main practices stem from nomadic life when public inns were a rarity and every stranger a potential enemy. Hospitality was discharged more from fear and for protection than from generosity…. Moreover, the host never knew when he himself would be dependent on others. The guest was treated with respect and honor and was provided with provender for his animals, water for his feet, rest and a sumptuous feast. He enjoyed protection, even if he were an enemy, for three days and 36 hours after eating with the host…”

The lesson from Genesis concerning Abraham is a perfect example of this tradition. This incident in the life of Abraham raises at least one question for me. Why didn’t Abraham realize the importance of the three visitors when they suddenly appeared near him at the entrance of his tent? After all, he would have seen them approaching the tent long before they were near him. Abraham simply didn’t recognize who the messengers were.

This visit of Jesus to Mary and Martha is reported only in Luke’s Gospel. Luke does not name the village, but the author of the Gospel According to Saint John said that Mary and Martha were residents of Bethany. Was this the first time Jesus visited Mary and Martha in Martha’s home? We don’t know. If it were the first time, I rather imagine that they had heard of their visitor. If it happened to be a subsequent visit, the sisters would have been honored to have him in their home.

Regardless of whether or not it was the first time Jesus dropped in to see them, they, especially Martha, as mistress of the house, would have felt obligated to treat Jesus with the respect he was due as a visitor, even though by this time, inns were available. Martha was duty-bound to provide a meal for her visitor or visitors.

According to Luke, the event took place shortly after Jesus told the parable of the Good Samaritan in response to a question from a lawyer. The disciples were with Jesus at the time, and they accompanied him on his way.

Luke switches to the singular when he reported that Martha welcomed him into her home. What about the disciples? Where did they go? At any rate, Luke wrote that Mary “sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying.” To whom was Jesus speaking? I seriously doubt that it was just to Mary.

At any rate, Martha was busy preparing a festive meal. Was she getting ready to serve three people? Were 10 to 15 expected to enjoy the meal? We simply don’t know.

About this time, Martha, feeling somewhat overwhelmed by the task at hand, went in to complain to Jesus about the lack of assistance from Mary.

“Tell her to get her lazy self in here and help me,” Martha seems to have been feeling. “Why am I being left with all the preparation and work?”

Jesus attempted to calm Martha down by telling her she was, as we might say today, sweating the small stuff.

As important as it was for Martha to be a good and generous hostess, Mary, Jesus told Martha, has chosen what is far more important. In this instance, Mary chose to listen to the Incarnate God rather than busy herself with helping prepare a meal for such an important guest. Mary and Martha very well may not have known who Jesus actually was.

We humans tend to become, or at least attempt to become, what humanity deems to be important.

Consider how much money Madison Avenue has spent this century alone attempting to influence the American public as to what’s important. The biggest and fastest cars make a macho man. The hour-glass figure and the latest fashions are what’s important for the American female. Unless you have the latest electronic gadgets from the multi-billion-dollar companies, you’re a living dinosaur.

The quest for success in whatever the chosen profession happens to be is also thrust upon us from many sources at an early age. The road to success is the most important thing in an adult’s life, according to the mores of contemporary society. No matter how you travel that road, no matter how many of your fellow human beings you destroy in the process, the important thing is to reach the pinnacle of your chosen profession, some seem to think.

Then there’s the thirst for power. Obtain it no matter the cost, no matter who gets hurt or destroyed in the process. And then you can thumb your nose at whomever you wish with impunity.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not against the successful businessperson who has arrived at that position so long as that person keeps in mind who it is we are supposed to be following.

Martha had her chance to listen and learn from Jesus, but she chose to follow what convention told her was important. I think she made a bad choice. Mary ignored Martha’s need for help, as important as that need was at the time. Mary made the correct choice under the circumstances, in my opinion.

We are all faced with making choices throughout our lives. Sometimes, we make the good choice. At other times, we move off in the wrong direction.

The exchange between Jesus and the lawyer in the lesson from Saint Luke’s Gospel is full of ways to keep in mind when we are forced to make choices.

“Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ He said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ He answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.’”

The prophet Micah had some pretty good advice as well.

“He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”

Abraham didn’t not recognize who it was that was speaking to him. If we listen to these three pieces of scripture taken from Genesis, Micah and Luke and let them influence our decision making, we too, like Mary, will have “chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away….”

Pentecost V – By Ted Hackett

Today’s Gospel is …may be… along with the Prodigal Son….the best known of all the Parables in the New Testament…

   Hospitals, Homeless centers…our own medical facility…which was

   started by Holy Family folks…are named after the Good Samaritan…

     There is even a “Good Samaritan Law.” It says that a doctor or

     anyone who jumps in and tries to help a sick person when there is no

     other help, cannot be sued if the person dies.

Now, this title “The Good Samaritan” was a name given to this story by later Christians…it is not in the Greek manuscripts…people did not use such aids to reading back then….

   And this title may be misleading as we shall see.

     Let’s go back and look at this story……

        A story that Jesus probably told…

          It has his fingerprints all over it!

O.K…..a certain Jewish Lawyer asks Jesus what he must do to get into the kingdom of God…

   Jesus answers: “What do the Rabbi’s teach?”

      Answer: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength

     and mind; and your neighbor as your self.”

       This summary of Torah…Jewish Law…was formulated a hundred

        years before Jesus by Rabbi Hillel and had become standard

       Jewish teaching….

            So the Lawer had got it right.

                 But if you think about it…

                      It doesn’t really answer the Question.

                                       You still have to figure out who the neighbor is.

                                The guy next door?

                                       The Folks in your Church?. ..or who think like you? 

                                       Or everybody in the world”

Wow!…that’s quite an assignment!…loving Putin?

     But instead of simply answering…Jesus tells one of his stories.

          A good Jew was going down the mountain from

          Jerusalem…Perhaps from visiting the Temple.

               And he is mugged by a gang of Highwaymen….

                     There were lots of them in Palestine.

                          They leave him half dead and bleeding.

Well…here comes a Priest back from his rotation at the Temple. He sees the guy…and ignores him.

     Next comes a Levite…that’s like a Deacon….

          He sees the poor victim….and ducks to the other side of the road

           and leaves him.

               Jesus’ Jewish audience would shake their heads and say: “that’s

               the selfish clergy for you! What do you expect?”

                    Now comes along a Samaritan….

Now let’s take a minute and talk about Samaritans.

     Jews absolutely hated them….

          They despised them…

               They were heretics from what used to be the Northern Kingdom.

                     They had seceded from the south….and had adulterated

                     Jewish religion…

                         And so they were….worse than Gentiles…filthy, unclean!

                              A Jew didn’t talk to one

                                   Much less touch one

                                         And the feeling was mutual!

So back to our story…

     The Samaritan comes along and sees the poor beat-up guy…

          And feels pity for him….

               The Greek w ord Luke uses is splangizomai…..

               which literally means:

                     “He was moved in the guts!”

So the Samaritan goes over to him and pours wine in his wounds and then olive oil….

     The alcohol in the wine disinfects…the oil soothes…

          And he puts the poor guy’s arm around his shoulders and half

          carries him to an inn maybe half a mile away…

               He checks the guy in…pays in advance and says: “Take care of

               him, give him what he needs and I’ll pay you any balance when I

               come back.”

Now….consider a couple of things.

     Pretend you are a Jew in Jesus’ time and culture.

          First of all…you would be shocked that a Samaritan

          would do all this.

               What he did is not only more than the corrupt clergy did….

               but more than most of the audience knows they would do!

Now….consider the guy who was mugged….

     He’s good Jew ….

          And here is a Samaritan….

               He expects him to say something like:

               “You got what you deserve, you stuck up Jew-scum!” And maybe

               kick him!

                     But instead, he gets taken care of in the best way possible.

                          He is literally at the mercy of  a contemptible enemy!

                               Absolutely dependent on someone he hates

                               for his very life…..

                                   And he has no choice but to accept his mercy!

It’s like like being tenderly cared for…having your life saved…by an Isis fighter, when you expect to have him slit your throat. 

     Are you grateful? Or are you so humiliated, so angry about your

     situation….your shame at being helpless…

          Of your dependence on someone…especially someone you

          hate…. That all you can feel is shame and anger?

Now there are really a couple of issues here in this story.

     The first is the obvious one…the one the Lawyer

     asked: “What must I do to get into the Kingdom of God?”

          If we take the parable as an answer to that question, it must be

          something like: “Find the most despicable people you can line up,

          then, love and take care of them.”

               Good luck with that!

                    But we need to recognize that Jesus’ parables are not so much

                    about prescriptions as they are flash pictures of the Kingdom

                    of God. They are like mirrors to see ourselves. 

                         In the Kingdom, Jesus says, we will all take care of and be

                         cared for by the people we despise now.

                              I realized a few years ago that when I started to pray for

                              a Bishop who I despised because he lied to me…

                                   When I prayed for him…

                                        Which was very hard and not very sincere when I

                                        started…

                                        Then it turned out… somehow…

                                        my anger melted….

                                                         And I found myself feeling sorry for him!

The second issue is: What do you do…how do you respond…when someone you despise does something important for you? 

     This may not happen often but it is a radical version of a more

     common issue….

          What does despising someone…do to us?

For one thing….it takes a lot of energy…

     It’s kind of like a cell phone tht has a hidden program running on

     it…under the stuff we see.

          We don’t know it’s there, but then we realize our charge is being

          exhausted.

               Despising someone, we actually become less able to love 

               anyone…

                    And….and we can even become toxic    to others.

                         We call it “nursing a grudge”…

                              And it spills over into every corner of our lives. 

                                   Still we often cherish it… nurse it….resist

                                   giving it up…

                                        We even relish it.

And this parable asks: “How does that fit with the Kingdom of God?”

     Or, in other words, How does this event on the road down from     

     Jerusalem… affect the Samaritan?

          And how does it affect the injured Jew?

               How does it fit them for the moment when Christ’s love will be

               all in all?

                    You know..Heaven will include a lot of people we don’t trust…

                         A lot of people we dislike….

                              And some we really despise.

                                   That could be really….

                                        Uncomfortable!

For the Samaritan…

     This may have been difficult…

          Jews were the enemy…

               But when he saw that hurt man….

                    His guts moved….

                         Somehow his inherited Samaritan hatred of Jews was thin

                         enough to allow feelings for someone who was hurt…

                              That his empathy for a fellow human being overrode his

                              cultural mistrust and hatred.

                                   In that moment of pity…

                                        That moment when he knew a

                                        hurt brother human and acted….

In that moment…he became a bearer of God’s reign…

     He became a kind of Sacrament…

          Like Jesus himself…

               A Sacrament of God….

                    An ordinary person…

                         In that moment….

                              Overcoming his inherited

                              fear and hatred….

                                    Fit to enter the all-consuming love which

                                    is God’s promised Reign….

                                         The Kingdom of God        

                                         And he became the bearer of God’s love

                                         and forgiveness.

He became a kind of walking Sacrament….

     so with each of us…

          Both the Samaritan in who overcomes his fear and hatred…

               And the wounded Jew in us who must give up his pride!

                    Such is God’s Kingdom…                          And it is our destiny!

Independence Day Propers – George Yandell

In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence. It proclaimed the independence of the United States of America from Great Britain and its king. The declaration came 442 days after the first volleys of the American Revolution were fired at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts and marked an ideological expansion of the conflict that would eventually encourage France’s intervention on behalf of the Patriots.

After the war, the colonies had to determine how they would create a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.” The “United States in Congress Assembled” in 1787 then sitting in New York City, forwarded the new Constitution to the states. Each state legislature was to call elections for a “Federal Convention” to ratify the new Constitution. Eleven ratified in 1787 or 1788. The Congress of the Confederation certified eleven states to begin the new government, and called the states to hold elections to begin operation. It then dissolved itself on March 4, 1789, the day the first session of the Congress of the United States began. George Washington was inaugurated as President two months later.

Some wags say the founding parents who created the constitution walked across the street to Christ Church and then created the constitution of the Protestant Episcopal Church. Not exactly historically accurate. What did lead up to the organizing of the Episcopal Church?  

By the beginning of the revolutionary war, many Anglican clergy had already departed back to England. And of course there were no bishops in the colonies. The congregations in the colonies had been supported in large part by societies in England. Support from those venues was curtailed before the end of the war. Most sources of income were lost, and the Church was in a depressed condition. 

The Protestant Episcopal Church faced the daunting task of organizing 13 independent state church bodies into a national church federation after the revolutionary war. General conventions were held in 1785, 1786, and 1789- the church constitution was completed at the 1789 General Convention at Christ Church in Philadelphia on October 2, 1789. (Christ Church had been founded in 1694 by Anglican missionaries.) That constitution paralleled in many ways the federal democracy of American civil government. The church was organized at first by states rather than by dioceses, and governed by a bi-cameral legislative body. In the 1789 convention the delegates met for the first time as the House of Bishops and House of Deputies. The brand new Episcopal Book of Common Prayer was presented and accepted in that last convention meeting in Philadelphia. (If you want specific details, you can turn to p. 9 in the prayer book and read the three pages telling how our prayer book was adapted from the Church of England Book of Common Prayer.) Do you see how much the Episcopal Church relied on the founding parents of the country in creating a unique way of bonding disparate parishes into a national Church? [This paragraph adapted from Holy Women, Holy Men, p. 452, 2010, published by the Church Pension Fund.]

The lessons and prayers for our Independence day were first appointed for a national observance in the proposed prayer book of 1786. They were deleted by the General Convention of 1789, primarily because of Bp. William White’s intervening. Bp. White was the first and fourth Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church of the United States (1789; 1795–1836), and the first bishop of the Diocese of Pennsylvania (1787–1836). Though he himself supported the American Revolution, he felt that the required observance was inappropriate, since the majority of the Episcopal clergy had been loyal to the British crown. It was not until the revision of the prayer book of 1928 (which many of us grew up with) that provision was again made for the Church to observe Independence Day. [ibid]

Flash forward to the war of 1812.  Francis Scott Key was a respected young lawyer living in Georgetown just west of where the modern-day Key Bridge crosses the Potomac River. But after war broke out in 1812 over Britain’s attempts to regulate American shipping and other activities while Britain was at war with France, all was not tranquil in Georgetown. The British had entered Chesapeake Bay on August 19th, 1814, and by the evening of the 24th of August, the British had invaded and captured Washington. They set fire to the Capitol and the White House, the flames visible 40 miles away in Baltimore.

President James Madison, his wife Dolly and his Cabinet had already fled to a safer location. Such was their haste to leave that they had had to rip the Stuart portrait of George Washington from the walls without its frame!

In the days following the attack on Washington, the American forces prepared for the British assault on Baltimore (population 40,000) that they knew would come by both land and sea. Word soon reached Francis Scott Key that the British had carried off an elderly and much loved town physician of Upper Marlboro, Dr. William Beanes. He was being held on the British flagship TONNANT. The townsfolk feared that Dr. Beanes would be hanged. They asked Francis Scott Key for his help. He agreed and arranged to have Col. John Skinner, an American agent for prisoner exchange, to accompany him.

On the morning of September 3rd, he and Col. Skinner set sail from Baltimore aboard a sloop flying a flag of truce approved by President Madison. On the 7th they boarded the British flagship to confer with Gen. Ross and Adm. Alexander Cochrane. At first they refused to release Dr. Beanes. But Key and Skinner produced a pouch of letters written by wounded British prisoners praising the care they were receiving from the Americans, among them Dr. Beanes. The British officers relented but would not release the three Americans immediately because they had seen and heard too much of the preparations for the attack on Baltimore. They were placed under guard, first aboard the H.M.S. Surprise, then onto the sloop and forced to wait out the battle behind the British fleet.

At the star-shaped Fort McHenry, the commander, Maj. George Armistead, flew an American flag so big that “the British would have no trouble seeing it from a distance”. The flag held 15 stars that measured two feet from point to point. Eight red and seven white stripes, each two feet wide, were cut. It measured 30 by 42 feet.

At 7 a.m. on the morning of September 13, 1814, the British bombardment began, and the flag was ready to meet the enemy. The bombardment continued for 25 hours, the British firing 1,500 bombshells that weighed as much as 220 pounds and carried lighted fuses that would supposedly cause them to explode when they reached their target. From special small boats the British fired new rockets that traced wobbly arcs of red flame across the sky. That evening the bombing stopped, but at about 1 a.m. on September 14th, the British fleet roared to life, lighting the rainy night sky with grotesque fireworks.

Key, Col. Skinner, and Dr. Beanes watched the battle with apprehension. They knew that as long as the shelling continued, Fort McHenry had not surrendered. But, long before daylight there came a sudden and mysterious silence. Judging Baltimore as being too costly a prize, the British officers ordered a retreat.

Waiting in the predawn darkness, Key waited for the sight that would end his anxiety; the joyous sight of Gen. Armistead’s great flag blowing in the breeze. When at last daylight came, the flag was still there! As an amateur poet, Key began to write on the back of a letter he had in his pocket. Sailing back to Baltimore he composed more lines and in his lodgings and finished the poem. Copies were circulated around Baltimore under the title “Defence of Fort M’Henry”. Immediately popular, it remained just one of several patriotic airs until it was finally adopted as our national anthem in 1931.

My connection to Key is through my seminary. Best known for writing The Star Spangled Banner, Francis Scott Key was also one of the founders of Virginia Theological Seminary. It began in a storefront in Old Town Alexandria in 1823 as the ‘School of the Prophets’. (I often ate clams and oysters in the Fish Market, next door to the shop where the seminary began.) In order to ensure the Seminary’s lasting good health, Francis Scott Key set aside one-tenth of all he earned throughout his life for charities, including the Seminary. Upon his death in 1843, the money was disbursed according to his wishes. By including Virginia Seminary in their wills or trusts or by making life income gifts to the Seminary, the members of the Society that bore his name have emulated Francis Scott Key by planning for the Seminary’s financial future. I am a member of that society. When I see the flag, I see it through the eyes of Francis Scott Key. I am pleased that the national flag flies next to the Episcopal Church flag in ours and many Churches across the country. The flags together tell a tale of creating freedom out of conflict, cooperation out of chaos, and peace for all people. They fly those values for not only the USA, but light a path for all nations to follow in their own ways. I am grateful.

Third Sunday after Pentecost – Proper 8C – Bill Harkins

Collect of the Day

Almighty God, you have built your Church upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone: Grant us so to be joined together in unity of spirit by their teaching, that we may be made a holy temple acceptable to you; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Gospel: Luke 9:51-62

When the days drew near for Jesus to be taken up, he set his face to go to Jerusalem. And he sent messengers ahead of him. On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; but they did not receive him, because his face was set toward Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, “Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” But he turned and rebuked them. Then they went on to another village.

As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will follow you wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another he said, “Follow me.” But he said, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” But Jesus said to him, “Let the dead bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.” Another said, “I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus said to him, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

In the Name of the God of Creation, who loves us all…Amen. Good morning, and welcome to Holy Family on this 3^rd Sunday after Pentecost. The readings for today provide us a rich scriptural tapestry with at least one thread in common. In each of these passages we find a journey, and guides—or guidelines—for the road ahead. These guides, and the gift they give, are spirit-filled in nature, and this is the shared narrative. That same Spirit informs, infuses, and empowers the readings, and in turn each of us. Begging the question, who and where are our guideposts in a season in which the world seems to have gone off balance? How might our faith, reason, and tradition assist us? What might it mean to participate in the Body of Christ in this time, and this place, as we face today’s challenges of violence, polarization, and isolation? In the Gospel text we are reminded that our journey with Jesus requires a clarity of commitment and purpose that we may find harrowing, in both the culturally familiar and agricultural senses of the term…that is, to vex or distress, and to turn over and dig into the soil in preparation for planting, growth, and harvest. And, the word “harvest” is instructive, since the OE etymology of the word harrow is “HARWE” from which we also get our word harvest. Jesus’ reminder that while plowing the field to which we have been assigned we cannot look back, even for those tasks which ordinarily require our utmost attention, is harrowing indeed. In the Gospel, Jesus reminds us that “the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head,” and “let the dead bury the dead.” It’s a hard road indeed for those to whom Jesus says, “No one who puts a hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.” These are not slogans likely to be on the recruiting posters for this band of disciples and missionaries, but upon further reflection, we might ask ourselves what these thematic lessons are really about. We know these recruits came from all lines of work, and represented in this and other ways a cross-section of the society, just as those gathered here each week.  Somehow I find this comforting. I paid for college by working summers in a steel mill, mostly with welders. And though I was a bad welder, I came to appreciate their skills. Their patience with me and affection for me allowed me to get a wonderful blue collar education on the way to a transformative liberal arts education. I suspect each of the mostly blue collar disciples with Jesus brought particular gifts and strengths to their missionary work. And that these skills lent themselves to particular forms of ministry. So it is with us. In the passage from 2 Kings, Elijah and Elisha are also on a journey. I find the request from Elisha that he inherit a double share of Elijah’s spirit to be quite touching, and poignant. The mantle that fell as Elijah was taken up—an example of what we psychoanalytically trained theorists call a “transitional object”, kind of like a blanket or stuffed animal to which children become attached—is an outward and visible sign of the grace, and the spirit of and relationship with Elijah—and it  guides Elisha on his journey. The image of Elisha, now empowered by this spirit guide, parting the waters and moving on, is symbolic of what can happen when we are guided by our teachers, mentors, and those whose lives live on in us. Where might we be called to journey, both individually and as a church, particularly in this season of transition for us all? And what and who shall guide us? We may have to give up some things we’d rather not give up, or go places we rather not go. This too can be harrowing in both sense of the term. We might have to become what one of my former professors called “liminal persons,” at home in threshold spaces. We find references to the spaces “in-between” throughout Judeo-Christian writings, by such authors as Martin Buber, Thomas Merton, C.S. Lewis, and James Hollis, a Jungian therapist and author who has said that these in-between spaces are, spiritually and otherwise, the most fruitful places of all: doorways and vestibules; thresholds to transitional passages; deep forest paths; Gothic cathedrals; and foyers, and seasons of our lives having, as they do, a liminal appeal and the magical promise of being called forth into new interaction. In the popular Harry Potter series by JK Rowling Harry journeys to the Hogwarts School by meeting the train at platform number 9 ¾; it is neither nine, nor ten, but rather a space “in between.” Tolkein’s “middle earth” is another such liminal space. Perhaps, dear one’s we are in such a season in our nation, and our church. Perhaps we have what we need, right here among us.

Tuesday I enjoyed sitting in on the Worship Committee meeting with those wonderful souls to whom you have entrusted this aspect of our common lives, and I felt so at home there, as I have always felt here. I was so moved by the gentle grace with which this committee, led by George, Katharine, and Ric, engaged the discussion about how best to keep this sacred space safe in light of recent events, including our sister Episcopal Church in Birmingham. I suspect there were many opinions in the room about gun rights, but the conversation was guided by two unspoken lessons I have learned as a priest, therapist, and through Al-anon. The first is that it is often more important to be in relationship than it is to be right. And the second is that we can, most of the time, love completely without complete understanding. Both of these are Gospel Good News.

After the meeting I went up toward Amicalola Falls to run on the trails, and usher in the summer solstice. The Southern Appalachians are dry these days, all the more so in contrast to our recent visit with family in cool and rainy Montana. Vistas in Montana’s big sky are vast, and everywhere. Here, the forest both obscures, and discloses, and long views are not easily achieved. Running on unfamiliar trails, it is good to have signposts along the way, cairns made of stone, and places to pause, and to rest. In the silences one may hear, and perhaps see, streams unheard before. As Wendell Berry wrote in this liminal and well, harrowing sonnet:

“Sit and be still

until in the time

of no rain you hear

beneath the dry wind’s

commotion in the trees

the sound of flowing

water among the rocks,

a stream unheard before,

and you are where

breathing is prayer.“

~ Wendell Berry, Sabbaths

Perhaps we are called to do likewise—to sit and be still, and listen and look for the transitional spaces in our lives where our gifts and graces might find life, and find it authentically. I have come to believe that there are often two kinds of journeys. The first is like that of Odysseus, the protagonist and hero of The Odyssey. Odysseus wants nothing more than to return to Ithaca, and to Penelope, and all that he knew, and had left, and longed to see again. Everything that happens—the movement of the entire narrative—is in the service of getting back home. Contrast this with, say, the journey of Sarah and Abraham, whose final destination was unknown even to them, and who paradoxically came “home” to a place they had never been before. It is a journey reminiscent of T.S. Eliot’s lovely lines from Little Gidding: “We shall not cease from exploration; and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started, and know the place for the first time.”  In this paradoxical dialectic, only on the condition that Abraham relinquishes almost all that keeps him trapped in his past—and trying to get back to a familiar home—is it possible for him to move into the Promised Land, to go home to a place he has never been. And this is the nature of our summons as Christians, and it is the journey to pastures of wholeness, and abundance in the new normal. Some time ago a friend and colleague died after a courageous, year-long struggle with leukemia. A priest for more than forty years, he was gifted in the areas of ministry he most deeply loved; contemplative prayer, spiritual formation, and liturgy. He was a wise and gentle mentor to those of us younger in “priest years,” and a gift to each parish he served. We were also quite different in terms of our politics, and theology. After several hospital stays, two extensive rounds of chemotherapy, and a joyful but short lived remission, the cancer returned with new vigor. My colleague, in consultation with family and friends, decided to cease all but palliative care, and to die on his own life-giving terms. In one of our last conversations, watching the birds at the feeder on his back porch, he said “I have had so much love.” “Yes,” I replied, there are so many who love you and are grateful for you. I am one of them.” “That may be, “he replied, “but what I mean is that there are so many whom I have loved. I have so much gratitude for the love God has enabled me to give away.” We were quiet for a few minutes, and then he said, “Having made the decision not to continue with treatment has freed me to focus on the quality of my life rather than the longevity of it. It has given me the freedom to see in a new way how much love there has been, is now, and will be. Love is meant to be given away. That is what the Incarnation is all about.” We sat together in silence on his deck, in the early spring sun, with the goldfinches and nuthatches feasting at his birdfeeder. A few days later, he was gone. Among the truths my colleague helped me see was that bondage takes many forms, and we must be courageous in naming them. In the passage from Galatians and from the Gospel for this morning, we hear unequivocally that freedom is for love—and this requires release from any form of bondage that would keep us from giving this love away. Perhaps in our personal lives this may mean embracing the new chapter of life to which we are being invited. Perhaps as a church, it means letting go of business as usual during a season of unprecedented change. Paul emphasizes the work of the Holy Spirit—in the renewal and re-imagination of membership in community, and Jesus calls us to keep our eyes on the prize of life-giving love, in community, and on the fundamental focus of our journey as the Body of Christ in the world. We are rightly suspicious when we are called only to joy. Yes, and even amidst our struggle with various forms of bondage, we can find life-giving possibilities, in conversation with one another, as the Body of Christ in this place, and guided by the Holy Spirit in Her mischief, in love. Amen.

Second Sunday after Pentecost – Byron Tindall

The Second Sunday after Pentecost 43 years ago was on June 17. It was also Fathers’ Day that year and one of the hottest Sundays I ever remember in Boonville, New York. On that day in 1979, the Rt. Rev. Ned Cole, Bishop of Central New York, ordained David R. Mihalyi and me to the priesthood in Trinity Episcopal Church in Boonville.

I tell you all of this because I’m about to do something I promised myself some 44 years ago I’d never do. This sermon is going to be political. I’ve always urged people to vote by saying something to the effect that “if you don’t vote on Tuesday then you have no right to complain on Wednesday.” I’ve never told anyone to vote for a particular candidate from the pulpit.

From Luke’s Gospel for today, we have the statement, “Then all the people of the surrounding country of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them; for they were seized with great fear.” It must be noted that the “all the people” is more than likely part of Luke’s hyperbole, for which he was known to use from time to time.

What was the great fear that seized the residents? Did Jesus instill fear into those to whom he preached and healed? I hardly think so. I think it could possibly have been a fear of violence. The sight of a herd of pigs throwing itself over a bank or cliff into a body of water and drowning seems to me to be a pretty violent act.

Were the Gerasenes afraid of how Jesus might cure someone else? Would that cure be just as violent?

There’s plenty of violence in the Old Testament, too. Just witness the Lesson from First Kings read a few minutes ago.

And there’s certainly more than enough violence to go around today in these United States of America.

I’m writing this almost 2 weeks ago. It’s Monday after the first weekend in June.

A weekend that saw no less than 10 incidents of mass shootings. A mass shooting is defined by Gun Violence Archive as an incident in which 4 or more individuals are killed or injured by gun fire during that event, excluding the one pulling the trigger.

The weekend total included at least a dozen people shot to death and more than 60 injuries, some of which were classified as critical. My source did not list the type weapon used in each case.

Here are the statistics as reported by a major news outlet:

1. Socorro, Texas, five people wounded at a graduation party
2. Summerton, South Carolina, one killed and at least seven others wounded at a graduation party
3. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, two killed and 11 others hit at an entertainment district. A third death may have been one of the shooters.
4. Chattanooga, Tennessee, two killed and 14 wounded at or near a nightclub
5. Phoenix, Arizona, one killed and eight wounded at a strip mall
6. Mesa, Arizona, two killed and two others injured by gunfire
7. Omaha, Nebraska, one killed and three wounded
8. Chesterfield, Virginia, one shot to death and five others wounded
9. Macon, Georgia, one killed and three others wounded
10. Saginaw, Michigan, three shot to death and two wounded.

 All of this came on the heels of the butchering of innocent elementary school children in Texas; the deadly assault on an Oklahoma medical facility, a racist rampage at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, and an attack on a Taiwanese church service in California.

I think enough is enough. Far more than enough.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’m not against guns per se. Actually, I’m a gun owner just like many of you. I enjoy punching holes in paper targets. I even have a replica of a weapon used during the Revolutionary War. I like to fire that thing and smell the black powder. I’m not the most accurate shot with the Brown Bess, but I’ve been known to dispatch copperhead snakes with my old single-shot .22 caliber rifle. I don’t want the poisonous snakes around where we and our dog walk.

Let’s think about the Second Amendment to our Constitution for a minute. If my memory serves me correctly, there were no police departments at that time. And firearms were a lot different. An experienced person living and hunting back then could get off three or possibly four shots a minute.

An assault rifle is rated in the number of rounds fired per second. A handgun with a magazine holding 10 bullets can be emptied in a lot less than a minute.

The House of Representatives passed a law, that among other things, raises the age of someone allowed to purchase an assault-style rifle from 18 to 21 years of age. That law is expected to fail in the U.S. Senate.

Some senators are attempting to work out a compromise that will pass muster in the senate. What is being proposed doesn’t go nearly far enough.

Assault rifles are designed to do one thing and one thing only and that is to kill or maim the target. No citizen of this country of ours has a need whatsoever to own an assault rifle.

The Federal Assault Weapons Ban was enacted in 1994, and it expired in 2004. Repeated attempts to reinstitute the ban have always failed.

It’s way past time for our legislators and congressmen and women to once again ban the ownership of assault weapons by citizens. I doubt many residents of Uvalde, Texas, would disagree with me on this.

Unfortunately in this day and age, all legislative bodies seem to agree on one thing. If the Democrats are for something, then the Republicans are against it, and conversely, if the Republicans support something, then the Democrats are required to oppose it.

How much longer are we going to remain hostage to those who have the authority to eliminate this scourge on our society? How many more massacres is it going to take before congress will stand up to the NRA and the firearms manufacturers who apparently help with the campaign financing of certain members of congress?

Maybe it’s time we the people put into office those candidates who are not beholding to the NRA or arms manufacturers and dealers.

At this point it makes absolutely no difference to me whether that candidate is a Republican or a Democrat; a Liberal or a Conservative so long as he or she stands for a total ban on assault rifles, increasing mental health services for those who probably shouldn’t have a firearm anyway, and requiring far more extensive background checks on those attempting to purchase any gun. That person will get my vote, and I hope and pray that you, too, will join me in getting that person elected.

I’m sure that many of you are familiar with Bob Dylan’s song, “Blowin in the Wind.”

            The last verse is:

            “Yes, and how many times must a man look up

            Before he can see the sky?

            And how many ears must one man have

            Before he can hear people cry?

            Yes, and how many deaths will it take ‘til he knows

            That too many people have died?

            The answer, my friend is blowin in the wind

            The answer is blowin in the wind”            

Maybe, just maybe, the winds of change will start blowing. It’s long overdue.

Trinity Sunday – George Yandell

Preaching on Trinity Sunday makes me feel like the heart attack victim that called for a priest. The priest arrived and moved the gathering crowd aside. He knelt beside her and saw she was too weak to handle confession and absolution, so he asked, “Do you believe in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit?” With great effort, the stricken woman raised herself onto her elbows in the bed and addressed those surrounding her, “Here I lie dying, and the Father is asking me riddles!” (Adapted from a sermon by Lane Denson on Trinity Sunday, 2010.)

Trinity Sunday is the only Sunday each year whose content is theology and doctrine. It was first celebrated on the Sunday after Pentecost in the Church of England by Thomas a Becket in the late 12^th century. Many of us become dazed and confused when correct belief about the Trinity is overblown in importance to many of our fellow Christians. ‘Correct belief’ is no longer relevant to many Christians. I believe they’re right. Believing pales in contrast to doing- doing what Jesus did- being transformed more and more into God’s self.

The Holy Trinity only appears once fully formulated in the NT- in the next-to-last verse of Matthew, called the Great Commission: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” In Hebrew usage, in the name of means ‘in the possession and protection of’.

The Trinity is alluded to in 2 Corin.1:21-22, and Paul uses this benediction at the end of that letter: “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.” I Peter 1:2 addressing disciples in exile in present-day Turkey: “destined by God the father and sanctified by the Spirit to be obedient to Jesus Christ.” Jude 20ff: “beloved, build yourselves up on your most holy faith; pray in the Holy Spirit; Keep yourselves in the love of God; look forward to the mercy our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life.” These are the closest our scriptures come to a formulation of God as three in one. They suggest God presents God’s self to believers in three manifestations, three persons.

In ancient times, the Hebrew people feared seeing God face to face. They were even afraid of seeing Moses with his face unveiled, because his face glowed from being in God’s very presence. Three centuries after Jesus’ resurrection, Church leaders began to wrestle publicly with the nature of God- is God three in one, and if so, how to describe that mystery? The Greek word for ‘face’ (prōsōpon) was front and center in their discussions and arguments. That word means face, presence, person, appearance.

At an early stage in its existence, the Church had to face the question whether the simple expression ‘God’ was sufficient for the new understanding of God that had come about through the revelation of Jesus Christ. The uncertain and hesitant ascribing of the name of ‘God’ to Jesus in the NT may be taken as evidence of the extent to which thinking about God had been influenced by the new revelation in Christ. When the Christians spoke of God, they were thinking of Christ at the same time. (John Macquarrie, In Search of Deity: An Essay in Dialectical Theism, 1984, p. 230) 

Paul was earliest in Christian scripture to say, ‘For us there is one God, the Father, through whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.’ This is one of the earliest attempts to specify the Christian God and to distinguish [the one God] from the many ‘gods’ and ‘lords’ worshipped in other cults..…    Jesus is brought into very close relationship to God the Father, [even as co-creator]. This is because [Jesus] had brought to Christians a new understanding of God so profound that from then on they were determined not to speak of God without reference to Christ, or of Christ without reference to God.  (ibid)  For me, Jesus is the fullest revealing of God’s nature.

Knowing God face to face is a mystical experience for anyone. Seeing the face of God transforms us. This is what the early disciples of Jesus began to know- after his resurrection, seeing Jesus alive after death, looking into his face, they were forever changed. 

Gerald May says being transformed by God is like this: “Closer to us, the mystics say, than our breath. Closer than we are to ourselves, St. John of the Cross says, “We are in God like a stone is in the earth…already in the Center.” There is no way to get any closer to God than we already are. The spiritual life, then, is not about coming closer to God but rather realizing the communion and union that already exists, and always has, and always will, forever.”

If Church-people can become more concerned with encountering the living God face to face, rather than defending their understandings of God, we will have gotten the real importance of the Trinity. God appears to us as God will- the breath/ the spirit of God breathes over and into us, the Creator God gives us life and envelopes us in love, and Jesus leads us into new life, now.

I want to close with what may be the most profound mystical vision in all of the Bible- a vision of God’s intent for all of us. From the second letter of Paul to the Corinthian followers of Jesus.

(2 Corin.3:17 ff). “Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit.” 

God wants to transform you and me from one degree of glory to another, led by God’s Spirit. That’s the Way of Jesus.

Pentecost C – George Yandell

With a rush of a mighty heavenly wind and with holy flames dancing on their heads, the disciples received the gift of God’s own Spirit. On the 50^th day after Easter, God was preparing the tiny band of Jesus’ disciples to go public- to broadcast the incredible news of Jesus’ teaching, his death and resurrection, and ascension. Their witness would be so personal, so profound, that today, Christians are found in every nation, in every culture. What does the news of Jesus mean to diverse people today? And how do we proclaim or stifle His proclamation?

From the collect for Pentecost: “Almighty God, on this day you opened the way of eternal life to every race and nation by the promised gift of your holy spirit: Shed abroad this gift throughout the world by the preaching of the gospel, that it may reach to the ends of the earth.”

Reaching to the ends of the earth- that’s always been God’s desire for the world. In the first account of creation in Genesis 1, God tells the humans God created in God’s own image: “Be fruitful and increase, and fill the whole earth.” After God flooded the world and delivered Noah and his family safe and sound, God again said, “Be fruitful, people the whole earth.” Yet God’s people resisted God’s command to fill the earth. God found instead that Adam’s descendants wanted to live apart from others. They kept clumping up together, resisting the insecure frontiers. They made cities, sheltering themselves from people different from themselves.

One group of people became famous for their homogeneity. They wanted to preserve their closed group for all time: from today’s Hebrew scripture: “All the earth was one language, one set of words. And it happened as they journeyed from the east they found a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to each other, ‘Come, let us bake bricks and burn them hard’; and the brick served them as stone and bitumen served them as mortar. And they said, ‘Come, let us build us a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, that we may make us a name, lest we be scattered over all the earth.’

“And the Lord came down to see the city and tower that the human creatures had built. And the Lord said, ‘As one people with one language for all, if this is what they have begun to do, now on nothing they plot to do will elude them. Come, let us go down and baffle their language there so that they will not understand each other’s language.’ And the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they left off building the city. Therefore it is called Babel, for there the Lord made the language of the whole earth babble. And from there the Lord scattered them over all the earth.” [This translation from The Five Books of Moses by Robert Alter, 2004.]

When I was young, my Sunday School teachers taught an interesting thing- they told me God was punishing the people who built the tower of Babel. How many of you were taught this as a punishment story? That says something interesting about our culture, doesn’t it? But there’s not one mention of punishment for the tower builders; instead, God scatters them out over all the earth: accomplishing what God had intended from the beginning- that the people of God should fill the whole earth, and speak many languages. Something in God loves diversity. God wants the earth filled with many different languages, multiple cultures. God wants the world rich and complex. Yet God’s people always try to confound that richness. They cordon themselves off, shutting out those different from themselves.

Why does God love diversity? Because it’s powerful when people of diverse backgrounds and cultures choose to live together with God. Throughout his earthly ministry, Jesus met with folks out of the mainstream. He even talked to non-Jewish women, something patently forbidden. His parables kept prodding people to see their world through the eyes of heaven: no barriers can keep people from loving one another if they seek God’s love in human relationships. Jesus knew that God’s own power is unleashed when people with profound differences seek the kingdom of God together in the here and now.

And that brings us to Pentecost. Once more the disciples were separated, apart, together. They’d witnessed the crucifixion and resurrection of their friend and rabbi Jesus. They’d been waiting for the coming Counselor Jesus had foretold. They were waiting for God to act. And God did act. The Holy Spirit danced on them all. They received the Spirit on behalf of people everywhere. Peter looking at John saw the fire, felt the Holy wind, and realized John was seeing it on Peter too. The Spirit drove them out into the streets of Jerusalem. They were given words of foreign languages spontaneously- they were bursting in enthusiasm, speaking to Jews from all over the known world. Each was telling the wonderful work of God in raising Jesus. It’s very important to note: the people were not united in one tongue. Rather God’s Spirit confirmed their diversity. God loves it!

I’m convinced God’s original intent, to fill the earth with people who know God’s name, was confirmed once more on Pentecost. For God, the diversity of the many people God created is meant to be the decoration of humankind, not the seed of human division. The many colors, the ethnic traditions, the accents of the tongues from many different regions are rich embellishments. Our idiosyncrasies are the jewels in the crown of humanity. God spoke clearly, in exotic foreign tongues, through the mouths of simple Galilean fishermen- who had been transformed by the Spirit. God confirmed the news once again, “Go into all the world, be fruitful, tell the story of Jesus Christ, and let your own tongues glorify God to all the corners of the world.”

Now the challenge: how to make our diversity in Christ our power? Diversity itself doesn’t create power- it is unity in diversity that yields power. I believe God thrives on rich expressions of unity in diversity. When I served St. James the Less Church in Nashville, I was active in the Madison Ministerial Association. We struggled to attract ministers from all the denominations to the annual community observance at Thanksgiving and during the week of prayer for Christian unity. We couldn’t get the Church of Christ ministers to come. One year one of us said, “Let’s give up on them, save our breath, they’ll never participate.” The 7^th Day Adventist minister quietly said, “We can’t stop trying. We need the people most different from us to complete our understanding of God. And they need us.” I asked him, “How did you come to this knowing?” He replied, “It’s all because of Pentecost- God wants all the diverse people of the world to be filled with God’s spirit, so they can love God and love neighbor as self.” Wow. The Holy Spirit is the unifying clasp on the cloak of faith. That’s the message of Pentecost. There’s a name for that miracle of cohesion against the odds. A name for the world-filling body of Spirit-led people. We call it Church. It is the world’s hope. God rejoices that the Church seeks the Spirit in all things, in all places, bridging the differences that clump us all together and make us fear one another. May the Spirit lead us into God’s world in love, that the whole earth may be filled with the giddy joy of resurrection hope.

Easter 7 C – George Yandell

In the passage from Acts, Paul and his companions continued their stay in the Roman colony of Philippi. As they were going to a place of prayer, they met a slave girl who had a “spirit of divination” (16:16) and whose owners profited from her fortune-telling skills. For several days, the girl followed them about shouting “These men are the slaves of the Most High God, who proclaim to you a way of salvation”. Like the other demonic spirits in the Gospels, this one recognized the saving power of God as proclaimed by Paul and Silas. Paul finally became so annoyed with her constant presence that he exorcized the spirit from the girl in the name of Jesus. Her owners were enraged, because now that the demonic spirit was gone, so were their profits. Thus they dragged Paul and his companion Silas before the magistrates, where they were charged with disturbing the city and advocating unlawful customs. As the crowd joined in the attack, Paul and Silas were flogged and thrown into jail with their feet tethered in stocks.

In the middle of the night, as Paul and Silas were praying and singing, a violent earthquake shook the foundations of the prison. All the locked doors were opened and the prisoners’ chains unfastened. When the jailer in charge awoke and saw this, he was ready to kill himself, as he would be held liable if the prisoners escaped. When Paul assured him that all the prisoners were still there, the jailer fell down in gratitude. He recognized Paul as an agent of God far greater than any he had known, and so he asked “What must I do to be saved? Paul responded, “Believe on the Lord Jesus”. Paul’s message that salvation comes through belief in Jesus is the gospel in its simplest form. Paul and Silas then spoke the “word of the Lord” to the jailer and his household. After the jailer tended the wounds of Paul and Silas, he and his entire family were baptized. They were all invited to a celebratory meal, the eucharist, as the jailer “rejoiced that he had become a believer in God”. 

In its clearest early meaning, believing on or in the Lord Jesus means ‘be-loving’ Jesus. Until around 1000 C.E. people heard the passage as “Salvation comes from loving Jesus in response to his love for us.” So the jailer rejoiced at loving Jesus and the God of creation.

Jesus had promised the disciples that the Father would send the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, to be with them. Paul and Silas were filled with the Spirit, which drove them to love the jailer. The jailer’s life was turned by that love, which Paul said was actually the love of Jesus, resurrected.

The Acts narrative has all the ingredients for a greedy, self-deceiving, status quo society: There is a used slave-girl fortuneteller who thinks that the future is all fated and can be programmed with certitude. There are money-making exploiters, the banker-pimps who use the innocent fortune-teller to generate private wealth. There are the magistrates who use their authority to maintain the status quo and prevent any social “disturbance.” And there’s a prison that is a social statement about power and order that constitutes a threat to any who act “outside the box.”

Into the midst of these “fixtures” of a stable society come the followers of Jesus. They assert an alternative “way of salvation”. The new way of well-being exposes all their old ways as failed frauds. In reaction to such news, the magistrates by decree and the mob by violence try to stop the news of “another way.” But, we are told, “suddenly” all the fixtures of shut-down control are shattered. The text makes no direct connection between the news and the quake. It leads us to imagine that God’s new power is on the move. It’s no wonder that the ones who know, sing and pray, and praise. We praise because we know the prison-houses of fear cannot contain this God who gives “life and breath and all things”. [Adapted from Walter Brueggemann in Sojourners May 2010.] What is most important for us who participate in Church is recalling that Jesus and his followers proclaimed the kingdom of God present now. As Dom Crossan points out from the Lord’s Prayer: heaven is in great shape- it’s on earth where the problems lie. Jesus prayed and we pray that earth will be transformed more and more into heaven’s likeness. It means be-loving Jesus is not just a get-into-heaven-free card. It isn’t a fad to reassure us. Heaven now means being part of the body and caring for all those God places in our path. It means sharing the love of Jesus and the joy of heaven here and now. Be-loving Jesus means proclaiming love in the face of fear. That’s our challenge, that’s our mission- telling those trying to escape this life that it is God’s intent, through Jesus, that we love so well that people experience the joy of heaven now. Life after death takes care of itself. 

Easter 6 C – George Yandell

Xenophobia. X-e-n-o-phobia. “Fear of the strange, the foreign, the different.” Xenophobia rises naturally in humans, it seems. It creates the need for humans to overcome their fears of the differences between them, if they want to co-exist and cooperate with one another. Xenophobia drives the need for “the healing of the nations” in the Revelation to John. Human tendencies to xenophobia drive Jesus to promise in the gospel, “Peace I leave with you, my own peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives.”

I have read science fiction novels by C.J. Cherryh for some time. (The genera now called ‘Speculative Fiction’ by some.) In one 5-book series called “The Chanur Saga”, the characters in far off galaxies are all afraid of one another and they distrust particularly the dark, large, long-snouted, rat-like, tough-skinned beings called “the Kiff”. Brrr. The Kiff smell like ammonia, they are ruthless fighters, and seem always to make off with the prize when either wars or treaties are made. The problem is that every species’ trade routes are being upset by another species- (spider-like methane-breathing creatures- ugh!). The only progress they can make is when they overcome their differences and unite with a common front. But they all have this fear, an incredible fear, of those different from themselves. Even the Kiff fear those they themselves consider less formidable, less threatening. Where their fear comes from I don’t know. They seem to have no reason to fear anyone. 

Good sci fi often serves as prophecy for the secular world. I believe Cherryh’s novels are fables about the here and now.

In Jasper and Atlanta there are clear parallels. We fear those different from us. Every culture of the world has people who are accepted or put down by the prevailing power elite. Often it’s around ethnicity, country of origin or poverty. Sometimes it’s around religion. Fear of the different is contagious. I think the Revelation to John and the gospel offer an alternative way- the way of fearless accepting and loving.

Everything Jesus preached created a bridge to a new domain, a new creation. The new way of Jesus breaks in through self-giving love. Jesus modeled how self-giving love works. The result of his self-giving love is a peace that surpasses the world’s ways. Examples of the new way are like the vision of heaven in the Revelation. “The nations will walk by the light of the glory of God. The leaves of the tree of life are for the healing of the nations.”

The word in Greek for “nations” is “gen’tes”. It translates the Hebrew word which means “the others- Gentiles.” The Hebrew people worked in every aspect of life to keep themselves separate from the ‘gentes.’ Why keep separate? Because the Jews feared non-Jews. They had reason to. Yet their fear kept them isolated. It prevented them accepting many whom God sent to offer them redemption, love and peace.

Hatred rises out of fear. The bombings of the world trade center in New York and the other sites were carried out by people who hate. Their ugly hatred still galvanizes us 21 years later. The horror and outrage they created is still giving rise to an even stronger and wider-spreading hatred—hatred of those who live in the countries where the bombers came from. Hatred has multiplied as a result of their actions. Our fear of one another has grown because hatred has multiplied, and love has become scarce. Evil has won twice, and wins again every time fear spawns more hated.

Why are people in the south, and most Americans, so ready to fear one another? I believe it’s a matter of turf protection. Threats, or the perception of threats to our property, our turf, our security, our beliefs, those threats drive our fears. The need we have to call a piece of turf or a strongly held belief “my own” prepares us to fear incursion. The more our territory is threatened, the stronger grows the insatiable need to have stronger and stronger protections. Anyone who might take away our territory, our stuff, our way of living is judged to be an interloper and thus, an undesirable threat, an enemy.

I believe that we unconsciously project our interior darkness onto those who are most different from us. In fact, the greatest threat to your turf and my turf, our stuff, is disintegration of our culture because of our fear. Jesus once said in the gospel of Luke, “Hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbor’s eye.” Look within you for your own fear, your own sin, and work to drive it out. The mistrust and fear that many of us have of different-skinned people and different-sexed people, people who threaten us because of cultural biases, cultural differences, is really a threat from within us. A fear in each of our hearts, a fear of losing what we have. 

Instead, Jesus intends us to give love away freely. The bridge Jesus builds urges us to approach one another open-handed, open-hearted. What matters is not retribution, but our hearts, turning to love. The heart that opens itself and gives itself in concern for others is not a heart that is defensive, hateful, mistrustful, and bent on driving out those most different from us. This must be the Church’s central message for our culture in this still new millennium. If we can’t learn to trust, if we can’t begin to cross the bridges, rather than building walls, there won’t be a culture left for us.

Jesus knew that evil is ever present, and that the ONLY defense, the only hope for the world was his disciples and their love for one another. The times now demand the same from us- love one another as Jesus loves us. Act your love sacrificially. Open yourself to your neighbor, especially to the one most different from you. Fear only the loss of connection to your loving God.

Loving like this is hard. To equip ourselves to love in self-sacrificing ways, the Church offers these ancient, time-honored practices to us:

*Read the bible and other spirit-renewing works regularly both alone and together- join a small group to study the bible. Come to Sunday school.

*Pray daily for yourself, for your family, friends, for those in distress, for the Church, and for your enemies. Holy Family offers the daily offices online for all of us.

*Come to church regularly, hear the good news preached, confess your short-comings, receive God’s absolution and Holy Communion and go back into your daily places, where the action is, to work for Christ’s new creation of love.

*Tithe- give freely to God through the Church the first-fruits of your life’s work as the beginning of giving your whole self freely to God.

*And enjoy your faith- “faith” in Greek springs from the word same word as “fidelity.” Practicing fidelity in a relationship of love with God and with one another in these ways sets us free. All God requires is for us to be faithful. As long as we are aiming to be full of faith, we’re becoming free. God’s peace then has a chance to gather us as a loving mother gathers her children in her arms.

Even in the face of evil, Jesus offered himself in love. Love practiced through disciplined living toward Christ, allows our fears to subside, our hatred to cease, and our world to be healed, one person at a time. I want to coin a new word- Xenophilia. X-e-n-o-philia. Love of the stranger. From the Greek roots, “xeno”- strange, foreign, different; and “philia”- to love, have affection for. To have brotherly or sisterly affection for, is philia. If we cultivate and practice xenophilia in the face of xenophobia, we know God’s own peace. That’s the fruit of faithful living. It’s what Jesus intends.