August 28, 2022
Pentecost 12 – Ted Hackett
Today’s Gospel is about getting God’s approval…
About how you qualify for the Kingdom of God because the coming
Kingdom of God was the main concern of Jesus and the early Church.
The humble man gets rewarded by getting a more prestigious seat…
There are two issues in most Gospel stories.
Humility and charity…
In these readings…these are the markers of a Christian.
Now that shouldn’t be news to any of us….
We know that for over 2,000 years Christians have been struggling to be
humble, charitable and…loving…
With very, very mixed success…
Which is why confession, repentance and forgiveness are so
important in our Christian journey…
Not new news…
But there is something else in this Gospel reading that we also find familiar…
So familiar that we may not notice…
August 21, 2022
Proper 16C – George Yandell
When I was in seminary, Professor Charlie Price remarked in a theology class that he had been phoned by a 7th Day Adventist pastor on a Saturday afternoon years before, as he was preparing his Sunday sermon. “Rev. Price,” the pastor asked him, “Why do you Episcopalians worship on Sunday? Don’t you know Saturday is the Sabbath Day?” Charlie said he stormed back at the pastor, “We worship on Sundays because it’s the Day of the Lord’s Resurrection!” and slammed down the phone. The pastor and Charlie were both right – Saturday is still the Sabbath, and we worship on Sundays because every Sunday celebrates Easter.
When I was a boy, blue laws were still in force throughout the south. Of course, blue laws were enforced on Sundays, not the Sabbath, Saturday. It meant that most of the distractions of shopping and working were stopped for a day, and our energies were focused around home or the community or the church. I miss the feeling and the results of the blue laws. I think the whole community ceasing the normal flow of work and business caused us to appreciate more the point of the other days of the week – that everything we did for those 6 days was to benefit the community and fellow citizens, not just ourselves.
Jesus taught in synagogues on the Sabbath. He performed 7 miraculous Sabbath miracles, as recounted in the gospels. Each time he healed on the Sabbath, Jesus restored the Sabbath to be a benefit for humankind against any distortions of human religious traditions. Jesus maintained that it was certainly lawful to do good on the Sabbath. It was God’s will since the beginning of creation that the Sabbath have the purpose of serving humankind,
August 14, 2022
Proper 15c[RCL]: The Rev. Frank F. Wilson
Isaiah 5:1-7; Psalm 80:1-2;8-18; Heb 11:29-12:2; Luke12:49-56
Wind and Rain and Fire May Not Always Be The Enemy We Think
Teresa of Avila was a 16th century nun, mystic, and social activist. It seems that while on a mission of mercy, the good nun came to a stream that had to be forged were she to make her destination. To wit, she sternly encouraged her reluctant donkey to enter the stream so as to cross it. About halfway across, the donkey either rebelled or was startled but for whatever reason bucked the good Sister Teresa right off its back headlong into the cold, running water. Breathless, and shivering, and flailing about as she was trying to right herself in the cold, running, waist deep water, sister Teresa looked up to heaven and yelled, “Do you ALWAYS treat your friends like this?!
Getting no answer from God, she made her way to the muddy bank, and as she was struggling to drag herself out of the stream and up the bank, she was overheard to mumble, “Well, no wonder you have so few of them.”
I confess to sometimes feeling something like that as I imagine you probably do as well.
Well, today we encounter texts that reveal a God, and reveal a Jesus, who is not always the God of peace; the God of comfort. Not always the God of ever present mercy. Today’s text reminds us that sometimes we feel like we serve a God who is fully capable of giving us a good dunking.
August 7, 2022
Proper 14, Year “C”: The Rev. Frank F. Wilson
Isaiah 11, 10-20; Psalm 50: 30:1-8, 23-24; Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16, Luke 12:32-40
Believing in Advance What Only Makes Sense in Reverse
I open this morning with a little lesson in African wildlife. In particular, I speak of the African impala. It is a type of antelope, and it is an amazing animal. An African impala can jump as high as ten feet and can leap forward as far as 30 feet or more. Yet, quite interestingly, zoo keepers have discovered that a solid wall no more than three feet high can serve as a secure enclosure for impala. This is because an impala just will not jump over an obstacle if they cannot see the ground on the other side – that is to say, cannot see where their feet will land.
In other words, an impala has no faith.
Faith is a very little word. Only five little letters long. But it is a word of great significance in the lives of Christian people. After all, we sometimes even refer to ourselves as “a people of faith.” Yet faith is a word very much misunderstood by those who stand outside of the community of faith. Faith is a word, a concept, that can be difficult even for those of us who claim it as something like the epicenter of our lived lives.
The writer of the Letter to the Hebrews has a lot to say about this matter of faith.