SERMON, December 28, 2008

Isaiah 61:10-62:3; Psalm 148; Luke 2:22-40

Sometime ago, in November I think it was, I was driving into San Francisco at 5:30 in the morning. It was dark. When I left Santa Rosa as far as I could tell it was very dark. I drove over the Golden Gate and took the very first right turn after the bridge and followed my nose along the road that runs along the coast. It was still dark, but when I came down the hill along the coast suddenly the sky was filled by the soft light of the moon—an absolutely enormous moon—a harvest moon. A moon so full that it took my breath away. It was going down over the ocean, and you could just make out the waves in the pale light of this enormous moon. People were stopping their cars all along the beach there. Young people were leaping out with their cell phones to take pictures. Others simply sat and took it all in. It was a holy time—an occasion of praise—of heaven and nature singing. Then the sun finally began to bring its pinkish light to the city, and the moon gradually shrank and faded out of sight. Many of us sat in our cars in silence as the light spread over us. A holy time.

When I got to my meeting later at the Mercy Center in Burlingame—a meeting which really was not about the sun or the moon, I couldn’t help telling everyone about how nature had sung its praises to God that morning. I felt my spirit lifted. I couldn’t keep it to myself. And it turned out one other person there had also been awake and in awe of the beauty of the moment.

Our Psalm this morning is full of praise. Psalm 148 is one of those psalms near the end of the collection, and it just can’t contain it’s praise of God. “Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord from the heavens; praise God from the heights!” By the time it is over, everyone and everything joins in the chorus: from the angels and heavenly hosts, the sun and moon, the shining stars, the waters above the earth, the earth itself, the sea monsters, fire and hail, snow and frost, even the stormy wind, mountains, hills, all the cedars and other trees. The wild animals and cattle, creeping things and flying birds. Even kings and princes and all peoples, old and young, praise God.

Perhaps you too have known the heavens and nature to sing God’s praises. Maybe in the flight of the blue heron, the running of a dog, the leaping of the deer, the slithering of a snake. Perhaps in the beauty of the sunset over the ocean, or it’s rise in the mountains. Perhaps you have heard the praises sung by the wind that blows across the lake, or the warmth of the summer sun on your back. Watching the hawks along the coast I have often thought of their nearly silent chorus of praise as they circle and swoop over the hills and water.

The praises you and I offer are just a part of this larger chorus of praise. Sometimes we forget this I think. Perhaps our current ecological woes stem in part from our forgetfulness about this. This link we have with the rest of God’s creation.

Both Isaiah and Luke are filled with praise too—on this Sunday after Christmas—the time after: when the presents have all been unwrapped, the company on their way home, the lights beginning to dim, and in some homes the trees already coming down. It’s a time of darkness isn’t it? Not long after the winter solstice. You know Christmas—the birth of Christ—wasn’t celebrated in the early church. And when the church did fix a date to the birth—it was fixed in the mid-winter darkness. A time when nature helps us understand the impact of light coming into our darkness. The customs we have of decorating a tree, bringing in garlands, are about bringing nature indoors. Connecting ourselves to the praise perhaps of the trees. At just that time of year when darkness seems to most take over, our tradition celebrates the in-breaking of the light. Small, tiny you might say, but light nevertheless, light that is not overcome by the darkness.

In the face of darkness we proclaim God’s act of love. In the face of darkness Isaiah rejoiced in the Lord God who promises always to bring new life, to clothe us in salvation, and cover us with righteousness. The Lord God says Isaiah will cause righteousness and praise to spring up before all nations. The prophet himself cannot keep silent. Kind of like me that early morning in November. The work and the promises of God are just too much to keep silent about. We simply burst into praise.

On Christmas Eve I filled in as celebrant at the pageant service at my old parish Incarnation in Santa Rosa. It was my first time back after over a year, and what a wonderful way to return—to the singing of Christmas carols, and to the children acting out the well-known story as only they do. Those Christmas carols are all songs of praise. They bring us together as almost nothing else can do. They are part of the fabric of our community. When we go caroling we reach out to those who cannot be with us, and bring them back through song.

Praise is not about buttering up God you know. It’s not about stroking God’s ego. It isn’t about making God feel good about God wonderful self. Nor is it about laying the groundwork for a request that will be made next. Think about it. Praise is a way for us to testify to who God is and what God has done. It’s a way to respond to the gift of grace. It’s a way to express our awe, our amazement, at times our almost stupefied wonder. It’s a way to say who God is and who we are. It acknowledges that it’s God’s world, not our world, not my world. I’m not in charge. It flows out of our thanksgiving. It’s about relationship for sure—ours with God and God’s with us. But it’s not that God needs our praise—its that God’s self, God’s actions, God’s promises, God’s creative energy at work—these simply cause praise to spring up! And, not just from us, remember, but from all the created world. Praise maybe is one of the deepest expressions of who we are. When we give praise we open ourselves to God. We claim the truth of who God is.

You hear echoes of this in the way praise works in our families, at the workplace, all through our daily lives. Real praise, praise that springs up, when we let ourselves utter it—that kind of praise is a gift. It opens us to the other person. To praise someone for who they are, for their kindness, or their accomplishment, for their listening, for their being opens the ways between us. If accepted it opens the other to become more deeply who they can be, and it opens us in the same way. Some of us were raised in families where there was little or no praise. We are uncomfortable giving it and accepting it—letting it sink into our hearts. We have to fight off the early training we got about needing to earn everything—including God’s love. In church as we sing and worship together we practice the art of praise. But perhaps some of you were raised in a families filled with praise and thanksgiving. If so you know in your bones what a gift it is to be reminded that you are worthy—you are a child of God—no matter what. And, if you are a person who praises others easily you know how offering praise opens you to the beauty—the pure gift of others. Praise brings us together.

Simeon and Anna praise God too—for the birth of Jesus. And Simeon’s song of praise is really a song announcing his death. A song of praise at death. Again that darkness and light interwoven. The light shining on the death and through it. His praise of God and God’s actions now releasing him to death. Not that strange really is it? Perhaps you have known someone who died just after Christmas. Who seemed to hang on to life until Christmas and then let go. I’ve seen that more than once in my years of ministry. And Christmastime is often a time of absences-felt. Empty places at the table, loved ones dead, no longer with us. The season can be one of grief and loneliness as well as joy and companionship. That’s how it is.

The people of God devote themselves to praise in just this season of darkness. And we do so in many ways. Singing the carols that tell the story. Christmas pageants, worship, prayers, cards sent, phone calls made, gifts given and received, connections renewed. Letting goes and deaths even: all encompassed in the grace of God come among us in the flesh. To recognize that our praises join together with the praises of all of God’s creation in heaven and on earth is a great gift—it opens us to God, and to each other, including the creatures and the sun and moon and stars. Look for those praises and let your own praises ring out this season. There are still eight more days of Christmas to give praise to God. It’s a spiritual practice vital to our lives all the days of the year.

SERMON, December 7, 2008 2 Advent

Isaiah 40:1-11; 2 Peter 3:8-15; Mark 1:1-8

“The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”

The opening words of the Gospel of Mark—the Gospel we’ll be reading on most Sundays this year.

Just when and where did it begin, this Good News? . . . in creation? with the prophets, like Isaiah whom Mark quotes? with John the Baptist? Mary? Jesus? When and where did the Good News really begin?

And, where and when did it begin for you? Who prepared the way for you to receive the Good News? Your parents, a grandparent, the folks in the church of your childhood, your spouse who brought you to church, a catastrophic event that drew you into worship somewhere? Where did it begin for you—the Good News of Jesus Christ?

It was a shocking first line really to the people of Mark’s day. “good news”—the words used to announce the birth of an emperor to be in the Roman Empire; Christ, the anointed one, the Messiah, the long-awaited one coming in power; Son of God: the words on Roman coins, the claim made by Roman emperors. Just what could this mean?

Even more deeply we notice our surprise that the good news comes first with a call to repentance. Where’s the good news in that? And it’s on the lips of a man who looks and acts like an OT prophet, Elijah most likely, and he’s in the wilderness. The good news comes to the wilderness—that place outside the bounds—to people who are sinners—outside the bounds. What might this mean?

Strange isn’t it how the good news begins with a hearkening back? A remembering. Mark begins by looking back—finding in the old stories the framework for understanding—for beginning to grasp the potential of the new thing—the good news. John the Baptist is like Elijah—he’s doing the work Isaiah described—and he’s reminding us of Malachi another of those old prophets.

We do this—hearken back—remember. It’s natural. How many of you had thoughts of John Kennedy as you watched Barak Obama’s acceptance speech and saw the rapt young faces? How many of you remember Dallas when you saw the bulletproof panels in front of him? Who thinks of the Depression these days, with the loss of jobs data reported out? Remembering the past offers a framework for the new.

Remembering: one of the most precious of the practices of Advent. It’s where the spiritual season calls us to begin. Remembering is essential to keeping a holy advent. It is much of what we do here on a Sunday morning. I’m not talking about nostalgia—so prevalent in our society—remembering the fictitious good old days or the imagined 2 parent-2 child-one dog-one cat nuclear family. No, the remembering we are called to is honest remembering.

Isaiah reminds us that God’s judgment and mercy are intertwined. That’s the kind of remembering that makes me uncomfortable. I’d rather focus only on the mercy. He also reminds me how God’s word is active, moving, creating new beginnings. Has been and will be. In Mark’s gospel too, we remember that the good news begins with repentance. That serious stocktaking of self and community. Not a comfortable beginning. But so essential. How can we re-enter the Isaiah passage without letting ourselves wonder how it is that I today find myself in exile, much as the people Isaiah spoke to. How in my life do I find myself in exile, removed from God and God’s ways? How have I chosen to exile myself? How do we do that everyday as a people, as individuals, as families, as communities? In what ways do I live my days forgetting God? Lapsing into behaving as though I am in charge of my life, independent, able to do it on my own? Spending money and energy on things that bring so little life? How do I live forgetting God’s care for the widow and orphan, the poor and the alien? How do I refuse the love that is offered me? How am I in exile?

John’s invitation to a baptism of repentance is one I need to hear—if I can bring myself to do so. When I dare to sit with the truth of my own chosen exile I need to remember God’s forgiveness and the promise of new life. I need to remember these old stories that assure me that I need not stay trapped in my old ways. Here is your God! says the prophet—bringing new life, feeding, gathering, carrying, leading, forgiving.

Waiting is a second Advent practice. And what could be more foreign to America? What could be more countercultural than waiting? Like the people in exile comforted by Isaiah’s words assuring them of the activity and promise of God, the trustworthiness of God’s word, which stands forever—no matter what, we wait. We wait in the not-yetness of the promise.

Like the folks to whom 2nd Peter’s letter speaks—those who have wondered out loud about the promised return of the Lord—so anticipated by early Christians. Why hasn’t he returned yet? Why is the world still in such a mess? Why the delay? Like them, we wait. We wonder. We echo their doubts. Look at the world in which we find ourselves: the wars, the greed, the economic collapse, the horrific abuses of power we see, the bickering and self-interest of our leaders, the list goes on and on—and it can get pretty personal, when we dare to look within ourselves, at our own families, our workplaces, our own relationships that don’t always exhibit what we might call the fruits of the Spirit. It’s a sorry state of affairs. Why, we wonder, is the world seemingly unchanged? When will God show up?

Guess what? What seems like God’s tardiness is really God’s mercy. Imagine that! 2nd Peter says, God is just giving us time to repent. We who are so enmeshed in the way things are—in the systems of bankruptcy—economic and spiritual—we whose ears are stopped and eyes so often blinded—we’re being given time to turn toward God. We’re being given time to begin while we wait, to live into the promises right in the here and now.

Is it worth waiting for? This Good News. What exactly are we waiting for? Isaiah puts it simply: we wait for God to act. Not in some human solution or effort—we humans can’t be depended on as God can. That’s just how it is. It doesn’t all depend on us—isn’t that a relief? God comes toward us in power and in gentleness and mercy. The authoer of 2nd Peter puts it this way: we await new heavens and a new earth where righteousness is at home. Such poetry! New heavens and a new earth where righteousness is at home. Imagine what that might look like, if you can.

And so it is, that we wait in the not yetness of the promise. In Advent we remember the old stories—the context—so that we can be grasped by them and opened to the new thing God is doing in our day. So it is that in the midst of Afghanistan, Darfur, Zimbabwe, the market’s virulent swings, the lost job, lost home, lost sense of direction, lost soul: we wait. It’s our spiritual practice.

We wait. We remember. We hope. Hope is at the heart of Advent. We wait in hope. Trusting the promises, entrusting ourselves to the truth of these ancient stories and to the Word of God active still today—coming to us, transforming us in the Eucharist, in the hymn, in the community, in the world outside this place, but deeply, most deeply in the remembered stories.

They are counter-cultural, telling us to look for God in the small, the unexpected, away from the centers of power, calling us to open ourselves by beginning with ourselves in repentance and turning. We Americans are known throughout the world as a practical people; hopeful, yes and confident, yes. But our hope and confidence tends largely to be placed in our own selves—our ability to get the job done. At the heart of our faith stories is the message that we need not trust our own selves. This will not be new heavens and a new earth of my own making. This is God’s promise and God’s work. Our work is to remember, wait and hope.

The beginning of the Good News of Jesus Christ, Son of God. Where is that beginning, and when? To think about the beginning, let us consider the end. Mark’s gospel ends with the angel talking to the women at the grave and telling them to return to Galilee where it all began—to tell the Good News. Seemingly they are overcome with awe and run away. We are left not knowing what they do.

So, the question for us is perhaps not where or when the beginning, but how is the beginning in us? in you and me. How do we respond-- open ourselves to the Good News? How might it begin in us today? In what sense perhaps are we living lives that prepare the way?

As we remember, wait, and hope, may the Good News begin in us.

SERMON, November 16, 2008

Zephaniah 1:7, 12-18; 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11; Matthew 25:14-30

Certainly there is enough fear to go around these days without coming to church to hear these judgmental passages from Scripture. I mean we’re wallowing in it—fear, that is.. Every day the news seems more bleak: how stressed we are becoming worrying about whether the job we once thought secure, or the retirement income we thought we could depend on, will be there. Consumers have stopped consuming, stores are closing, companies are asking for bailouts, economies around the world are suffering, the poor around the world are receiving less aid. Our newly elected president faces an unprecedented array of difficult challenges: two wars, economic collapse, frayed international relationships, threats of terrorist attack, nuclear armaments in the hands of unfriendly nations. Good grief, it’s enough to make a person want to curl up in a ball, check out, hide whatever savings you have under the mattress, and stop reading the paper, or watching the news.

And so we have come to church to worship God, hear the good news, and maybe just maybe find some solace. Instead we hear Zephaniah telling us to “Be silent before the Lord because God is about to search us out with lamps lit—for the purpose not of consolation, but of punishment. Woe to those who are complacent in their dregs. (leaning back in their chairs, sipping their Napa Valley wine) and woe to those who say in their hearts, “The Lord will not do good, nor will he do harm. . .” (These are those who look around at their world and find no evidence of God anywhere—their hope, whatever hope they have, is not placed on God.) The images of unrelenting judgment are vivid, neither silver nor gold will be able to save us… God is more than annoyed, and no one will be left standing after the fire of God’s passion. Prophetic oracles of judgment are like this: designed to get our attention and perhaps our repentance.

Paul too describes the visitation of God like a thief in the night. The day of the Lord—judgment day will bring sudden destruction to those who say, “there is peace and security.” It will a time of pain and there will be no escape. And, as if all this weren’t enough, we hear in Matthew’s gospel (that means good news, lest you forget) the scary story of the three slaves who are given huge amounts of money on trust from the landowner Two invest the money and give the master the money plus a profit They are welcomed into joy. The third, poor man, understands the master to be harsh, reaping where he has not sown and gathering where he did not plant (a typical absentee landlord perhaps). In his fear he hides the money given him. His is a self-fulfilling prophecy: he is judged for his own judgment of the master and he’s thrown into outer darkness.

There you have it: the good news for this Sunday. Hard texts. It is hard to hear about judgment in times like these.

I confess to you that I don’t know much about the end-time judgment—or how it will be when Christ returns. We have a multiplicity of biblical texts that describe what those days will be like. There are quite a number of people of faith who focus their lives on that moment. There are countless books interpreting Scripture to tell us just when and how this will happen, and just who will be left behind. I am not, as they say, ”into" that.

What I am into is considering what these scary texts have to say to me and to us in the here and now. How do these texts of judgment speak to us? How do they speak to us with their multiple images, and their vivid metaphors? How do we listen to them when they don’t always agree? When I hear about the man punished it seems for burying the talent, I think of another parable Jesus tells about the man who finds the treasure in the field and buries it until he can earn enough money to buy the field. Burying treasure in and of itself does not seem to be a bad thing. When I hear the words of Zephaniah I am forced to ask myself some rather personal questions about my own faith—about my own understandings of God. I notice in the midst of all of those horrific images of distress and destruction that God is upset because the people (could I be one of them?) have broken their relationship with God; they have not expected anything of God—neither good nor bad—they have lived their day to day lives as though God were not involved—not an actor. They seem to have trusted more in silver and gold as salvation than in God. If I can avoid writing off the whole thing because the images of distress are so great and so repugnant to me—then really, I have to confess there are some things to consider. Do I live my days in expectation of God? God’s presence? God’s action? God’s call? Do I align myself with God’s grace at work in the world? What kind of a life of faith am I really living?

And, as hard as it is to figure out what the meanings of Jesus’ parable might be—and I get stymied here not only by the seemingly harsh judgment against the man who buried the treasure (after all interest earned or collected in not something admired in Jewish tradition) but also by the fact that the absentee landlord system operative in Jesus’ day was one that had its share of harsh masters who took what they did not plant. When these thoughts come to me, and I can just dismiss the whole thing. Ignore it.

But in truth there is one line that gets to me: the line about fear. The man’s fear of the master led him to bury the treasure. He operated his life on the basis of fear. And that’s something I do know about. How fear can paralyze. Can keep me from trusting, much less risking. Oh, sometimes fear might make me lash out in anger and frustration—might lead to my judging and blaming others for the situation I’m in. That’s possible. But fear can also just lead me to stop in my tracks. Be incapable of decision. Incapable of seeing. When I’m afraid I become so self-focused that if Jesus himself walked up to me I’d probably miss him. Fear makes me want to curl up in a fetal position and bury my few remaining savings under the mattress.

St Paul has something to say to us here. He tells us that we are beloved. The beloved of God. We are children of the light and the day—‘God has destined us not for wrath but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Christ died for us he says, whether we are awake or asleep. Think of that. Whether we are alert to the movement of God in our lives or have dozed off—perhaps overcome by fear for a time. God’s purpose is that we would live with Jesus. Be in relationship—withness is what God is all about. Oh, yes, there is judgment. There are those times even before the end times, when that judgment seems to come upon us like a thief in the night. We find ourselves exposed for who we truly are when we least expect it. in the ordinary course of living. Someone says something, asks a questions, we are challenged from out of the blue, and we see how fear has affected us, I notice that I’ve stopped looking for God in my days, I’ve forgotten who I am and who God is. I don’t remember that I am beloved—and that you are too.

It matters deeply how we see God—who we understand God to be—who the God is that we entrust our hearts to. I love this morning’s collect when we pray to “read, mark, and inwardly digest Scripture” because scripture is not that easy to digest. The Bible is a complex book—filled with strange and contradictory stories and different kinds of writings. Zephaniah in just a few chapters after this morning’s reading talks about God’s mercy and saving action. “Sing aloud O Daughter of Zion! . . . I will bring you home.” To live in fear of a vengeful God will result in a half-lived life or even less. Think of how you are when you do things because of fear. Think of how you get tight and clutch and judge and reject and get self-focused. Is that the kind of life to which we are called? Paul tells us we will be judged, but that the days and times of judgment come to us already secure in the truth that we are the beloved of God. Paul trusts the God he knows in Jesus Christ. God who seeks withness. We are made for that with God and with one another. That is what is perhaps revealed most deeply in the judgment. How are we living into the truth of who God is and who we are?

Paul encourages us to keep on encouraging one another: healing, up lifting, strengthening each other with the truth of who we are. I close with a story of how encouragement came to a friend of mine recently.

She is a white woman married to an African American man—she is the mother of two beautiful mixed race children. Watching the gathering at Grant Park as Barak Obama gave his acceptance speech, she was shocked to find herself weeping. Her tears were tears of gratitude and relief—Her shock was that for the first time ever she believed that there was no ceiling that could keep her children down—judge them as “lesser than.” She hadn’t even realized that she’d been carrying this burden: the burden of assuming that her children would always be judged on the basis of their skin—not “on the content of their character”—as Martin Luther King once said. She, who knows as a mother knows, the preciousness, the character and gifts of her children-- for a moment caught a glimpse of a world in which those children would be valued like any others.

Don’t get me wrong: this isn’t about Barak Obama. This is a story about how in the midst of everyday life we can face judgment and be opened to the truth of who God is and who we are. Judgment and encouragement can come at once. It is about how we can learn to entrust ourselves to love instead of fear. Love that simply values each of us for being who we are—no matter our character or our gifts. We come here on a Sunday to present ourselves once again to that love—that truth that longs to set us free.

SERMON, October 12, 2008

Isaiah 25:1-9; Philippians 4:1-9; MT 22:1-14

Here we are. And, I’m wondering if any of you have come this morning worried? If you have fears and concerns that you’ve brought with you? Concerns about your retirement—whether you are retired or only dreaming of it—concerned about your job or perhaps your children’s jobs—their economic security. Concerned that we are heading for a depression. These are worries that have occupied me in the last few days. So, here we are in church. Longing for good news, seeking comfort, strength, and above all hope.

Isaiah sings to us of the almost incredible banquet that the Lord will make for all peoples—that feast of rich food, well-aged wines. God will destroy the shroud cast over all peoples. Imagine that. Surely this is a time when we are coming to know that shroud and how it covers us all. God will swallow up death forever and wipe away all tears. These incredible images and promises are almost more than we can take in—the shroud being so dense, our tears so near the surface. And to the people who first heard these words from Isaiah they must have seemed even more remote—most scholars think this a piece of writing from the time of exile when there was no temple on Mount Zion, and the devastation of society so deep. These would have been hungry people, people filled with loss and suffering.

Don’t you feel the tension when you hear these images? The tension between the promises of God and the realities we see around us in the world? Our current images of devastation, the tears of those who weep in the face of violence and loss around the world, the shroud of mourning that covers our own nation as we listen to the unfolding economic news. It’s hard to give ourselves over to the promises of plenty and harmony and enough for everyone, when the evidence so clearly points to scarcity, division, and deprivation. The images and promise of God’s banquet are hard to hold on to in times like these.

Paul’s Letter to the Philippians comes to a crescendo of peace and joy. “Rejoice in the Lord, always” he says, do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” Another passage filled with joy and promise. These are big words Paul uses here: rejoice, gentleness, peace of God, true, honorable, if there is any excellence, anything worthy of praise, think on these things. It’s an embarrassment of riches you might say, coming our way just as we contemplate loss of riches. God is too much. Too much for Paul to express in words. Too much for us to imagine. Too much.

So if the Good News is a little too much for us, we can turn to the gospel passage! We need to remember the context: Jesus continues his conversation with his opponents, who seek to discredit him. These are folks who think they have all the truth, they are the religious establishment types, who know about God and what God wants. They also know that they are the ones who have got it made—religiously speaking—they do what is right and believe they will enter the kingdom. So Jesus tells this kind of good news—bad news parable. Where God is compared to a King who invited folks to his son’s wedding. This would have been a big deal no matter the size of the kingdom really. The people invited aren’t interested in coming to the party. This is shocking really: in Jesus’ and Matthew’s time the King would have suffered almost unimaginable shame from these rejections. But, he doesn’t respond in anger. He further shames himself really by sending out his servants once again to urge folks to attend, pointing out all the arrangements he’s made, the table is set with the finest linen, the candles ready to be lit, the food rich and plenteous—what a feast. It reminds us of Isaiah’s image of God’s feast. This time while some ignored the invitation, others mistreated his servants, and killed them. Now the king is enraged. His disappointment and rage result from this mistreatment of his servants. You could say that the anger of the King is not the opposite of his love, but because of his love. At any rate he destroys the murderers and burns their city to the ground.

But the party will go on. The King is determined. So he sends other servants out to the edges of the land to bring in whoever they find, good and bad: “Invite everyone you find,” he says. The hall is filled with guests, both good and bad. Well, this would be a nice ending. But no, it isn’t over yet. The King sees the fellow without his wedding robe, and as the guy stammers and stutters, has him thrown out of the party, to the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth—Jesus would have to add that. Weeping and gnashing of teeth. Maybe that’s where we are these days in the outer darkness…

Much scholarly energy has been devoted to this parable. Many understand it as a critique of the self-righteous critics of Jesus—who imagine themselves at the banquet, only to hear themselves described as those who kill the servants of God and get killed themselves. Maybe the burnt to a crisp city is Jerusalem crushed after the rebellion in 70 CE. And maybe the little piece about the man without his wedding robe is a warning to church members, to those who did decide to follow Jesus, that they shouldn’t consider themselves self-righteously. No more so than the others—those who rejected the invitation.

The story is one of comfort and discomfort. If you are like me you are comforted to know that God is intent on having the party, and that it is a great feast, and that the good and the bad are invited. Not so comforting is the fact that the invitation list starts with a small group, and only later is extended to include everyone. Not so comforting is the King’s violent response to the violence inflicted on his servants. And not so comforting is the King’s tossing out of the ill dressed man. Weeping and gnashing of teeth—not comforting at all. It’s disorienting really.

Jesus’ parables are that. Disorienting. And some of them like this one remind us of the otherness of God. The shamelessness of God who aims to party no matter what—aims to feed and celebrate and commit joy with humanity no matter what. The freedom of God to invite whom God invites—no criteria here that we can rely on. God’s freedom is unnerving to us because it leaves us with no easy assurances that things will work out as we want. The invitation to the party is freely given. Pure grace you might say. But clearly we need to accept the invitation—open ourselves to it, let go of whatever might keep us distracted. I have to make room in my life to say yes to the invitation. Saying no is death. That much I can understand. I don’t imagine really God killing me, but I do imagine the death that is mine when I refuse the invitation. I have known that death in my life. When I have chosen to go my own way, do my own thing, make things happen my own way. I have tasted then of death. The ashes perhaps of the city of my life.

The wedding robe? What is it. In the early church the robe was understood to be the baptismal robe. That garment of white put on each newly baptized person as they came up naked out of the water. The water of baptism where they had given themselves over to the transformative love of God. Drowned with Jesus and raised up with him to new life. The robe is a sign of our willingness to live into our baptisms, to remember who I am at my deepest self: marked as Christ’s own forever. Made for an ever deepening relationship with God. Open to an almost constant transformation by grace. Vulnerable to God.

It’s not enough to be at the party. You and I know about this. How we can physically show up, but not be there in our hearts and minds. Not give ourselves over to the party—to the joy. I’ve seen people refuse to be open to joy because they are filled with judgment, or resentment, or just a pure unwillingness to be vulnerable. To join in the party is to be vulnerable—to open yourself to food and drink that you didn’t provide. To let yourself feel joy is a risk—it’s related I think to love. The teenagers dressed in black at the outskirts of the family gathering, the grandparent who won’t speak to his grandchild because she’s failed to meet his expectations, the sister whose jealousy won’t permit her to rejoice at her brother’s success.

Fear and worry can keep us from donning our baptismal robes. So fill us up that there is no room for God’s grace to move. Our faith is that in these days of uncertainty, in this time of concern, God is present. The invitation goes out. Whatever the times, life is a gift that brings us God’s invitation to a deeper relationship. We may in fact be in for hard times, times that may strip us of the non-essentials, make clear to us what we’ve lost track of. We may be in for times that will be painful, times that will challenge us; the days ahead may be days in which we are set free in new ways. Our hope may waver, the images of the banquet seem remote. What clothes will we put on every morning? . . . If we reach for our baptismal robes and dare to let go of fear, we’ll find that God’s life within us is deepening. This is our calling. It seems clear that in the days ahead, things will not be the same—but one thing is the same—God and God’s love for us. God’s invitation to us.

Whatever else you may think about the apostle Paul, he was clearly a man so deeply in touch with God that no matter the circumstance he could say, “The Lord is near.” Indeed, he gives us advice for our time: “Keep on doing the things you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.” “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ.” May we always remember who we are—no matter what.

SERMON, September 28, 2008

Ezekiel 18:1-4, 25-32; Philippians 2:1-13; MT 21:23-32

Ezekiel quotes a well-known proverb of his day, “The parents have eaten sour grapes and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” We who live in or near wine country can perhaps most vividly understand it—can almost feel the skin of the sour grapes on our teeth. It is a saying that reflects a truth we all know—in fact these days, perhaps, we are peculiarly aware of how the sins of the parents are indeed visited on the generations that follow—to the third and fourth generations as it says in the book of Exodus. We have only to think about the cost of the war in Iraq or the coming bailout of financial institutions to realize that our children and their children and maybe even their children will be paying. We also know that we as communities pay the costs of decisions made by those who went before us—in cities, there are poor land use decisions made a generation ago that we now confront the costs of, in churches, people are often faced with cleaning up messes left behind by those who have long since moved on, and in families, sometimes we find young parents determined to raise their children differently than they were raised—occasionally they discover that their attempts to parent against the grain of their own parents results in different but equally disastrous consequences! “The parents have eaten sour grapes and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” Indeed.

Ezekiel speaks on God’s behalf to people who find themselves suffering in exile. They bring out this proverb to explain their situation—and to support their inaction. God has brought judgment on them for the sins of their parents—they are suffering now for the sins of those who went before them. It is clear. “Woe are we!” they say. And there they sit in their misery. Trapped in God’s unjust punishment of the innocent. There is nothing we can do. It is beyond us. We’re caught in something way beyond our capacities to change. It’s not right. it’s unfair, but there it is. Or, rather here it is.

Here it is. Oh, yes. When I look at the world around me I feel a lot like those Israelites sent into exile in Babylonia. I feel like I’m caught up in the machinations of giant forces, and the results of choices made by others for the past umpty ump years are now beginning to come clear. And, it isn’t good news. Without mentioning the environment, the oil crisis, the degradation of our planet—without going into that, we’re in a mess. If you listened to the presidential debates Friday night you couldn’t help but notice. Both candidates talked about the mess we’re in—both criticized the ones who have gone before them. The sins of the parents are being visited on the children.

It can leave you with a sense of helplessness. Really. And it can leave you wanting to blame. Blame the president, blame the congress, blame the SUV-owners, blame the terrorists, blame, blame, blame. If you are like me you fall into that place pretty easily. “The parents have eaten sour grapes and the children’s teeth are set on edge.”

When I’m in that place of suffering—suffering that clearly has been brought on by others, mostly by those who have gone before me—I kind of wallow in my powerlessness. I suffer from what the early monastics called acedia, which according to Webster’s is “the deadly sin of sloth,” or “spiritual torpor and apathy.” I’ve been reading a book by Kathleen Norris, Acedia and Me. I commend it to you. Norris is the author of some other books worth reading: Dakota and The Cloister Walk, to name a couple. Acedia is a condition of not caring. It’s the “whatever” syndrome so prevalent in our culture. Often it is accompanied by the feeling of being overwhelmed, shutting down, and then just not caring. “Whatever!” Norris’ book is a very personal one, describing her marriage, the illness and death of her husband, and her struggle not to let acedia rule her life. In it she also traces some of the history of the condition which is similar to, but not the same as clinical depression. She considers how our own lives have been impacted by our consumer economy, that markets “the good life” as acquisition of material things, and how in insidious ways it has eroded our spirits. She quotes Thomas Merton who in the 1960s said that in a society focused on and “organized for profit and marketing. . . there’s no real freedom. You’re free to choose gimmicks, your brand of TV, your make of a new car. But you are not free not to have a car.” That was Merton in the 60s.

In our world today it is easy to end up caring + about our own perceived needs. Anything else is too much. Even going to the store to shop for an item can be overwhelming—there are so many apparent choices, one can be left incapable of decision. I had that experience not long ago trying to buy a printer for my computer.

Acedia, Norris says, is the primary characteristic of our time. John Buchanan contends that sloth is “not living up to the full potential of our humanity, playing it safe, investing nothing, being cautious, prudent, digging a hole and burying [our treasure].” We know what Jesus had to say about that.

I’ve discovered that retirement can be a particularly acedia-filled state. It can become so self-focused, “I can do what I feel like doing today,” (nothing?). I’m too old, too tired, too angry or despondent, too confused to do anything, take any risk that God might be calling me to. My condition is not unlike that of the Israelites who were mired in their suffering and blaming and unwilling to do anything—convinced that there was nothing to be done. Ezekiel rails at me and them. He tells me that blaming my body, or an unjust God and the generations before me—or the President, or the city council, or Exxon is not what God desires—is not in fact how God’s spirit works in the world. “As I live,” says God. God is a living God, dynamic and at work in the world today, right now, as it is. Mess or no mess, in the midst of suffering, and even acedia. And, here’s the deal. God cares.

God is not interested in visiting the sins of the parents on the children. God is not even interested in keeping score of all the sins you may have committed in the past. All the bad choices you made, all the times you ignored what you knew God wanted of you. No, God is about you and your choosing today. ”Repent then, turn away from all your transgressions.” Stop gazing at your forbearers and all their sins and omissions. Take a look at your own self, and know this. “I have no pleasure in the death of anyone,” says the Lord God. “Turn then, and live.”

It’s about turning to God, and living into God. Living into the fullness of who you were created to be. No matter your age. No matter your history. No matter the history of your people, or your community. No matter the mess we find ourselves in. Turn then, and live.

Jesus echoes the same sentiment, doesn’t he? He holds up the son who said no, and then changed his mind and did what his Father asked of him. He holds up the tax collectors and prostitutes who recognized that John was of God and repented and turned to God. He admonishes the powers that be to open their hearts and minds to God and God’s prophets—stop clutching their positions of power, stop protecting the status quo.

When the Pharisees and elders ask Jesus about his authority—they are seeking to disparage it. They imagine he will tell them who his teacher has been—and that whoever that is, their own authority will be greater. The question they ask is perhaps, ”Who do you listen to, Jesus?” Jesus responds by asking them about how they have acted in response to one they have listened to—John. How have they acted in response. It is easy to sing the hymns, pray the prayers, say the words that we think God wants of us. But, to let God move us to action—to let our lives preach the gospel --that is another matter. I’m better at talking the talk than walking the walk—that’s the truth. The first son in the parable walked the walked, but didn’t talk the talk. The second son talked, but didn’t walk. Jesus is perhaps the third son—the one who talked the talk and walked the walk. He invites us to the same. And promises us the Spirit to move within us and make us into gospel people.

You and I are made for community—for relationship. It is NOT all about me. It isn’t. The God who came among us humbling himself to us, drained himself, poured himself out for us—simply out of love and longing for us. As Paul puts it, remember that “it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”

Acedia is real—how to be set free from it? It’s not about turning inward in self-focus, or turning in blame toward others, but it is about turning. “”Turn then and live, says Yahweh. “Change your minds and believe,” says Jesus. Give your hearts to the God who cares that you live. It’s an everyday practice, this turning. It’s about nurturing the grace that’s been given us. It’s prayer, and worship, it’s doing the dishes, talking to the neighbor, it’s about doing what love asks of us, it’s speaking up when something is wrong, it’s living into your freedom to be God’s people. Every day there are new possibilities, new beginnings offered, new opportunities to reach out beyond ourselves –in doing so we will find that we have become more deeply who we are called to be—and more anchored to the One who loves us and invites us always into new life. _____________________ Kathleen Norris, Acedia and me: A Marriage, Monks, and A Writer’s Life, Riverhead Books: 2008.

SERMON, September 21, 2008

Exodus 16:2-15; Philippians 1:21-30; Matthew 20:1-16

I used to drive out River Road past Guerneville early Sunday mornings to lead worship at St. Andrew’s Mission in Monte Rio. Along the road there is one place where day laborers hang out in front of a convenience store waiting for work. Early in the morning there were always a good number of workers there—by mid-day when I’d be returning there were fewer. The ones who were still there after all those hours of waiting usually looked pretty dejected. I can’t help thinking about them when I hear this parable from Matthew’s gospel. The landowner coming at 5 o’clock and asking the workers there, “Why are you standing here idle all day?” “Because no one has hired us.”

It’s been kind of fashionable to depict these last hired laborers as lazy, good for nothing types who maybe didn’t get out of bed until 3 or so, because they were maybe hung over, and then they finally staggered down to the square with the bright idea that now was the time to find work. But in reality it isn’t really that simple—that the good get hired early and the bad late. Sometimes that can be the case, but often hiring of this kind of worker is more about the power of the employer—the employer’s choosing—than anything else. The poor, those out of work, the unemployed, and certainly the undocumented are at the mercy really of the employers of this world.

I’m struck by this employer—by his persistent efforts to hire workers—to give them the work they are seeking. He begins early in the morning, but he comes back at noon, and then at 3 and then at 5. He never gives up looking for people who want work and giving them work. Giving them purpose in life you might say. It isn’t rational of course, but the parable isn’t really about business practices or even economics as we know it—it’s a story about what the kingdom of heaven—God’s realm—is like. Jesus says God’s realm is like this kind of landowner who goes out to hire everyone who is seeking work.

You and I have probably never stood on the corner hoping against hope that an employer who would actually pay a decent wage and treat us fairly and with respect—would come along and choose us. I can still remember as a child on the playground waiting anxiously to see when and if I’d be chosen for the team. Maybe that experience still echoes in you as well—that waiting to be chosen feeling. As an adult, I’ve applied for work and been turned down, ignored even; I gone through interview processes where the emphasis is always on the needs of the employer. On my qualifications to meet the needs of the employer. Logical. Maybe you’ve had those experiences as well. No one really asks how much you want or need the job, what difference meaningful work might make in your life, what difference it might make to have a sense of purpose or fulfillment in my life. No.

God’s realm is a very different place than our economic system. And in God’s realm there isn’t the worry about if you’ll be chosen. If you show up and want work, you’ll be hired. There’s a place for each of us. That’s different. So indiscriminate of God. No standards really.

And that’s the problem with God and God’s realm. We know this parable and most of us here today don’t much like it. We hear it and who do we identify with? The last hired or the first hired? In my year’s of preaching I’ve found that mostly we identify with the first hired—the “good” guys—the up early, out to the square, ready to work, lunch already packed, work boots on, workers. The ones who know that to get what you deserve you have to deserve what you get. You get paid for what you put into your work. The early bird catches the worm… we all know that. We in fact most of us imagine ourselves to be just that bird. The early one. So we’re outraged at the injustice of the landowner who pays everybody the same. No matter how long they worked they call got paid the same. “IT ISN’T FAIR.” Most of us have been saying that since early childhood as we have come up against the unfairness and inequities of life that are so real. The tragedies that happen to good people, the best woman being passed over for promotion, the man who has given thirty years to the company being laid off just weeks before his retirement. The greedy loan companies and their executives being bailed out of financial disaster. It isn’t fair. And when we rail against the injustices of life, it makes us want a God who is just, who is fair. We want a sovereign who isn’t like most of life as we know it. We want divine fairness. Equity. We want the righteous to earn salvation.

At least that is when we identify ourselves as the righteous. That’s what we want if we are the righteous. The early laborers. We want our just desserts. And we’ll complain if we don’t get them.

Like the Israelites in the desert. We’ll complain to God. This isn’t right. And if we don’t have others to compare ourselves to we’ll compare ourselves to how we once were—or how we remember the good old days. “When we sat by the fleshpots and ate our fill of bread.” Remember those good old days, we had plenty to eat. Forget the slavery and the oppression. God, why have you brought us here to kill us from hunger??? It isn’t fair.

I love the fact that when God answers the complaints of the people by showering them with food, their response is, ”What is it?” What is it. The Hebrew for that question is man-hu which is where our word manna comes from. What is it? Perhaps wonder, but certainly doubt—a lack of trust. God who heard their first moanings in slavery in Egypt, and led them thru the sea, and across the desert, and provided water from the rock, now feeds them—and they don’t know what it is. God feeds them with food they are to collect each day for six days, and collect double on the sixth day, so they can rest on the Sabbath. STOP. Sabbath means stop. They can stop working, collecting their food, and maybe even stop complaining for a day. And while stopped maybe just maybe they’ll remember God the giver. All that they have received from God. Maybe just maybe they’ll stop comparing, stop asking for fairness and rejoice in abundance. Maybe the Sabbath stop will bring them to their senses that way. Maybe.

So here we are—and think about our day today—the financial markets going nuts, the financial system a mess, talk of recession, depression, bail outs that our grandchildren’s children may yet have a chance to pay for… and deep down I suspect we want to cry out, ”It isn’t fair!” And, of course, it isn’t.

The good news is that God isn’t either. Fair that is. God’s realm isn’t about equity and fairness. It isn’t about earning and deserving. And, that I suspect is the hardest part for us to accept about God’s realm. The hardest news and the best news ever. It’s the best news ever when you and I find ourselves at the end of the line. The last picked for the kickball team, and the last workers standing there more out of habit than anything—hardly any hope left that we’ll be chosen. That’s when the incredible lengths God goes to—God’s amazing persistence seeking us out to choose us—that’s when God’s lack of standards and unending generosity is incredible good news. A fair God really isn’t what we want when we take a Sabbath. When we stop to think about it: A fair God won’t help me when I came late to the square because I had to get my kids to school first, or take care of my mother who is ill, or stop to help my neighbor in crisis. A fair God won’t be enough to help me when I just plain haven’t been chosen. Haven’t measured up to the standards for hiring.

I’ve heard original sin defined as the sin of comparison. And whther that’s true of not, you can see how comparison in this story results in envy. You and I know about envy—tight, pernicious, eats you up inside envy. Makes you forget that what you have is gift. Envy keeps you so tight you can give thanks. Can’t remember that you have anything to be thankful for. Envy keeps your diminished eyes on the other person and off the envelope full of cash you have in your hand. Like the Israelites who forgot all that God had given them—had their eyes on their past memories so much that when food came they said, ”What is it?”

God’s realm is like getting chosen for the baseball team when you can’t even catch a ball. It’s like getting picked for the debate team when you can hardly mumble your name in front of an audience. It’s like being paid like Bill Gates for greeting customers at WalMart. It’s like staggering into the bathroom at 5 am,looking in the mirror and seeing someone precious and beautiful who is beloved by God—no matter what. It’s like abundance and generosity and inclusion beyond our wildest imagination. It isn’t fair. It just isn’t. Thank God for that.

SERMON, September 7, 2008

Exodus 12.1-14; Romans 13. 8-14; Matthew 18:15-20

A man lies near death in a hospital bed alone—no relatives, no children, no friends beside him. A priest enters the room to offer prayers. She’s been called by an out-of-town niece who asks that someone visit him because none of his children, none of his family will. They have suffered too much, been too abused by him, to rejected, too humiliated to go near him. Even on his death bed he is not safe.

A woman comes to her priest because she finds herself unable to forgive her son-in-law who has beaten his wife repeatedly and rejected her family. She knows that as a Christian she is called to forgive, but finds that she just cannot.

In a congregation one of the most active members is known for her acidic tongue, her judgment of others, her way of cutting them down. People avoid her, but no one confronts her because it’s common knowledge that if you do, you’ll likely get your own share of hard words.

These are real instances of the brokenness we all know within our families and communities. I mention no names—and none of these people belong to this congregation—but of course you may know them, or someone like them, or you might actually be one of them—and so might I. Forgiveness and reconciliation are at the heart of the gospel—at the heart of God—and yet we struggle to accept—to receive God’s forgiveness, and sometimes find ourselves unable to forgive others, or we find it almost impossible to acknowledge our own truth and repent—turn away from our destructive patterns of living. Our lives are often characterized by division as much as unity, by hurt as much as healing, and our society that emphasizes our individuality rather than our connections exacerbates these realities. There is a lot of confusion about forgiveness and reconciliation—even in the church.

For some of us, texts like this one seem so foreign to what we know say, about church life, that we tend to dismiss them. Ignore them as unrealistic, and ignore the truth they have for us in our own time. On the other hand, this text from Matthew, has been used in some situations to judge and shame and reject. And, it’s a text that has sometimes been used by powerful “church authorities” against the least powerful. When that happens, those in power have forgotten the context of the passage. This series of teachings in Matthew started with Jesus’ answer to the question his disciples asked, ”Who is the greatest in the kingdom?” His answer was about the little children, about humility, about power being used on behalf of the least. Right in front of this morning’s passage is the one about the lost sheep and the shepherd who goes out to search for the one who has strayed; if he finds him, he rejoices.

When we take it in its context this is a radical and hard teaching. It doesn’t settle easily. It suggests actions we’d often rather not take. For Jesus sin isn’t just a private matter. And that goes against the American grain—the grain of our individualistic society where mostly we don’t like to think about sin at all—and when we do—we tend to think of it as something private. Maybe injurious to another person—as for example in someone unfaithful in their marriage. Or, someone stealing from another person. Murder, robbery, rape, it doesn’t matter -- mostly we think of sin as involving just two people. The perpetrator and the victim.

But it’s clear that Jesus doesn’t see it that way. If someone sins (and many of the early texts don’t say “against you”—just “sins”) you are to go to them and speak the truth to them about what has happened. If the person listens, then says Jesus “you have regained that one.” The relationship which had been fractured by sin is repaired. This is the goal. Restoration of relationship.

It makes you wonder really how many relationships torn apart by someone’s action or inaction—how many relationships like that could be repaired by taking the time and having the courage to speak to the person. “Speak the truth in love,” as Paul puts it. In our society today though mostly we don’t take the time or courage to do that. Often we shrug our shoulders and go on with it—steering clear of the person, or complaining to others—but not confronting him or her. “Whatever.”

Without going through all the steps here in this little compendium of how to deal with sin in the congregation, let’s just say that the premise of the whole thing is that sin has consequences within the community—it ripples out. Because Jesus is among us—because in church we have come together in his name—because of Jesus—we know that our calling is to open ourselves to God’s forgiveness enfleshed in him. Insofar as we can bring ourselves to accept that forgiveness—it transforms us into people through whom forgiveness can flow. In community we are called to cooperate with God’s forgiveness so freely given—and in doing that we help create a space in which God’s grace can move and reconcile and make new.

Yesterday I went to my granddaughter’s soccer game. She’s 8 and this year her team of girls is playing for the first time on a big field. Big to them at least. There is a lot of space on that field—and the girls are just beginning to understand soccer—and how they have to spread out, create space, keep moving, passing the ball, back and forth and from side to side, opening up possibilities for creative engagement you might say. It was fun to watch them. Sometimes they’d get all bunched up and once they ended up in a kind of pig pile—but they’re beginning to get it—the spaciousness of the game. I think of this call to us to participate in God’s reconciling grace in these terms. More like soccer than football for example.

Jesus’ vision is so expansive that it upsets business as usual. You know the tit for tat or eye for an eye, or getting your just desserts tight kind of thinking that so pervades our lives. Judging one another as hopeless cases. Writing each other off. Survival of the fittest. Distancing ourselves from the other. These are such narrow and confining ways to live.

Jesus’ way is spacious open to new possibilities, and it’s rather messy. Things are neater when we just don’t bother. When we don’t care enough to speak the truth to one another in love. When we just pick a pew as far away as we can manage from the one whose behavior has cut off relationship. It’s neater all right. But living together that way doesn’t make sense in God’s kingdom. It isn’t living together. It doesn’t get down to the nitty gritty of life. Down to living in relationship.

There are lots of false notions about forgiveness. Forgiveness is NOT about glossing over an injury, “It really wasn’t that important,.” It’s not about going back to an abuser for more abuse. It’s not about willing ourselves to feel forgiving to forgiven. It’s not about pardon from the legal consequences of an offense. You and I know there are some wounds so deep that maybe they cannot be forgiven in this life. Certainly there are some reconciliations that won’t happen. Reconciliation takes action from everyone involved. There has to be truth spoken and acknowledged. There has to be deep listening. Letting go. There has to be some turning, some openness to change, to amendment of life for reconciliation to happen—for that deep mending of relationship to occur.

Forgiveness then is a way of life. It is about letting go, releasing old wounds and injustices; it’s a path toward the restoration of peace and of relationship. it begins in truth. It finds its center in God. It is a way of life. The God we worship is the One who acts not to give us our just desserts, but to restore relationship, bring life out of death. Because we gather in Jesus’ name we are called into the transforming life of forgiven-ness. You and I know that there is no one in this room who has not needed forgiveness, has not been transformed by it, made new, been restored to relationship through it. No one.

Living more deeply into our own forgiveness is not always easy. It’s hard to confront another person in love. Hard to speak the truth with the aim of bringing about restored relationship. It’s hard to recognize that when we take the risk to do that we might be creating the space needed for God’s grace to make new—a space perhaps where the other, or others involved, can find new life.

We are made for relationship. Real relationship—the one where folks love and hurt each other, where they listen deeply and not at all, where they care and complain, where they agree and disagree. Messy isn’t it? Jesus came among us not to teach us a course in conflict management, but to invite us on a path that is much more spacious—costly yes, but it is the path that leads to real unity and wholeness, and always to new life.

SERMON, August 24, 2008

Exodus 1.8-2.10; Matthew 16.13-20

Some time back at the close of an evening service I went about the church extinguishing candles, and discovered a woman lying asleep in the back pew. I very gently woke her up, by touching her lightly on the arm and telling her that the service was over and she would have to leave. She sat up, angry with me, and said, “You should treat me with respect.” I thought I had. She said, “Do you know who I am?” I said, “Yes,” because I had seen her around town and around the church. But I realized as the word came out of my mouth, that really, I had no idea who she was. I’d seen her, I could describe her looks, I’d had a couple of brief conversations with her, I knew only a few things about her. I even knew how some other people described her, who they thought she was. But, the truth is that I did not know who she was.

Who do people say that I am? Jesus asks his friends. This is an important question, isn’t it? Because our relationships with others often hinge on who they think we are. Their understandings of who we are, their judgments, their conclusions. We see this in that great story we heard this morning from Exodus. The Israelites who had been viewed as welcomed guests during the time of Joseph and the Pharaoh he worked for—are now viewed by the current Pharaoh as dangerous, aliens to be feared, and controlled. In fact, the Pharaoh decides to make slaves of them—use them as forced labor. He imagines a future when they might rise up to fight against the Egyptians do he tries to make sure they won’t multiply by having the Hebrew midwives kill the male babies. Kind of silly really. The things we do when we make our judgments. . .

The story is filled with irony. And so much of the action hinges on these judgments the powers that be make about who the Israelites are—and who of them is dangerous. The Pharaoh ignores the girl babies, ignores the women really—and they are the ones who do him in. These two midwives Shiprah and Puah go down in biblical history as perhaps the first examples of civil disobedience, we have. Midwives are all about assisting birth, saving lives—they are not about killing. So they lie to the Pharaoh and say they just keep getting to the birthing too late. Because of their refusal to go along with the edict of the ruling power, Moses is born. His mother hides him as long as she can, and then puts him in that little basket and sends him down the Nile—she hopes to life rather than death. When the daughter of the Pharaoh sees the baby she has compassion and rescues him. She knows full well that he is a Hebrew child—but her compassion cannot be contained within the bounds set by her own father. Then in a hilarious finale, through the suggestion of his sister, the Pharaoh’s daughter hires Moses’ own mother to nurse him. What a great story! I can’t help but smile every time I read it.

It’s a story about how beneath the radar so to speak—off the grid—God is at work in the actions, the courage, the wile, of those unnoticed by the powers that be. Somehow God’s grace is operating in the midst of oppression. Small acts to preserve life, to undermine the death-dealing ways of the Pharaoh make all the difference. Surprise! The least likely group of powerless people came together to change history. Two midwives, a mother, a sister, and a daughter—Hebrew and Egyptian. A conspiracy of the unnoticed, the unknown. Definitely not headline material, nonetheless: God’s creative energy at work in the world.

The story echoes with our Gospel story this morning. Just as the Pharoah’s choice to identify the Israelites as dangerous aliens, and the women as not worthy of attention was crucial in the unfolding of that story—so too the answer to Jesus’ questions were vital to the story of the early church community. “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” Jesus says referring to himself. Who do they say I am?

Interesting how the disciples answer with a list of dead people. Dead prophets. John the Baptist, only recently dead at Herod’s hand. Elijah, the wonder worker, miracle worker, the one who heard the still small voice, carried up to heaven on a chariot. Jeremiah, and other prophets. Clearly people see Jesus as a prophet. And that must mean they see in him the creative energy of God at work—energy that cannot be stopped by the powers that be. The job of the prophet is to speak or enact the truth of God and thus enable it to move in the world. By uttering the words of god the Hebrew prophets in a sense unleashed God’s words on the world—brought them to life. Whatever else people make of Jesus they see in him that same unstoppable creative power of God at work. In their own day. In their time. In their midst.

“Who do you say that I am?” Uh, oh. I was afraid that might be coming next. Where the rubber meets the road. So much easier to report what others think and say. I imagine a pregnant pause here in the text. . . a bit of silence. No one speaks. . . . Then Peter as is often case, blurts out “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God!” There it is. Spoken out loud. Again I imagine a silence. The words hang there perhaps.

The Messiah—which means the anointed one. The oiled one, the one on whom God’s favor and call rests. Kings were anointed—as a sign of their chosen-ness by God. And to be honest, in Jesus’ day and even in Matthew’s day there were differing opinions about the Messiah—whether he would be a king, a warrior, a prophet—whether he would free his people from the Romans, or what. No one could be sure.

So we can’t be sure what Peter had in mind when those words came out of his mouth. Although we can’t help thinking that the same creative energizing power of God “the living God” that we heard about in the story of the midwives is present in Jesus—and Peter knows it. And he identifies Jesus as the Messiah. The anointed one—one full of divinity. One identified in a way as we are at baptism when we are marked with oil and proclaimed as Christ’s own forever. That is who we are. Jesus was God’s own beloved son forever. In his deepest being that is who he is.

Jesus tells Peter that he is right, but that this truth has come to him, not from the judgments of the world, but from God. This recognition of who Jesus is—is not something apparently that any person strolling by making typical judgments about folks—about who is important and who isn’t, who is dangerous and to be avoided, and who isn’t, who is worthy of notice and who isn’t—this recognition probably wouldn’t come to a person operating according to those standards of judgment. Like the Pharaoh misjudging the Israelites and the women—those ways of thinking won’t lead you to know who Jesus is. It takes a leap of faith maybe, the gift of insight, the eyes to see beneath the surface of things, the heart to risk loving God in the small, in the surprising, in the upside-downness of life. That’s what it takes.

Jesus tells his friends not to tell anyone. Not to talk about who he is with others. I suspect that’s because even though Peter has said the words, has identified who Jesus is, he still doesn’t really have much of a clue what those words mean. He hasn’t yet learned what kind of a Messiah Jesus is. How the Son of the Living God will live, and die, and rise to new life, how he will be present God-with-us no matter what. He hasn’t much of a clue—in spite of the miracles and the teaching, and the journeying with, he still has a lot to learn, a lot to grow into.

It’s in that growing up and growing into the truth of who Jesus is that Peter will be formed and transformed, and live out his life of faith. The same is true for each of us—and for us a community. Most of us can answer the question of who others say Jesus is. A great teacher, a prophet, a moral example, perhaps—or maybe even someone not worth considering. Maybe that. None of those answers touches on the creative energizing grace of the Living God so tangible in the story from Exodus and in Jesus’ own life.

The central question for us is of course, who do you, who do we say that Jesus is. What kind of a Messiah is he to us, today, right now. In the lives we lead. In the country we live in. In the world we are a part of. How do we find the Messiah among us? Do we encounter the creative energy of the Living God at work in our lives? in our families? at our workplaces? Perhaps in surprising ways, perhaps in little ways, perhaps in the lives of people that don’t make the headlines. Perhaps in folks who quietly say no to oppression—to deathliness. People who take risks, entrusting themselves to the grace of the living God.

Often when I officiate at weddings of young couples I think about the adventure they commit themselves to as they take their vows. The adventure of getting to know who they are marrying, and who they are themselves. it’s all about relationship. It takes time and commitment. It takes attentiveness and openness. And, always, even after many years, there is mystery—some un-knownness.

The Messiah, the Son of the Living God, beckons and invites us to an adventure: to know him and the God who lives within him. Like Peter, we too are on the road. We are still learning who Jesus is—and who we are and are becoming as followers of his. This is our calling. To enter this relationship with the expectation that it will take us to surprising places; it will transform us. . . we too will live as channels of that creative living grace. AMEN.

SERMON, August 17, 2008

Isaiah 56:1, 6-8; Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32; Matthew 15:21-28

In this morning’s wonderful passage from Isaiah we hear of the radical inclusivity of God. How the people who themselves were the outcasts—exiled from their land, sent away to live under the thumb of their oppressors—these people will be gathered up and brought home. Shockingly they learn that the God who is gathering them together is also gathering up those who are outcasts in their own society—the eunuchs and the foreigners. God who gathers the outcasts of Israel will gather others to them besides.

Who among us here this morning has not felt like an outcast? Is there anyone here who has not at one time or another felt out of it? Not a good fit? Not part of the in-group? Not powerful? Not a member of the club? Even among the folks you’d judge from appearances to be totally comfortable in their belonging—in their status as members of the group—there are usually a surprising number of people who feel like they don’t fit. Who find themselves being judged and left outside in one way or another. Many people experience this even in their family of origin. More than a few people have told me they didn’t fit in their own family. Others of us have experienced rejection or ridicule as children. Outcast because of one thing or another—clothing, looks, address, relations, language, color of skin, national origin. Children can be incredibly good at making outcasts of one another.

There is a level at which the message of Isaiah about God the gatherer is very good news indeed for each one of us. God’s grace seemingly has no limit: you and I are included. When we turn to God, there is welcome.

Paul in this morning’s snippet from his Letter to the Romans deals with the same issue. He’s concerned with how it is that the gospel of Jesus, first offered to the Jews, is now being offered to the Gentiles. How can it be that God could be at work even in those who have rejected Jesus? He says that God has not rejected the Jews, but uses their rejection of Christ as the Messiah to extend the good news to outsiders. Again that gathering up of God. He reminds us that we shouldn’t presume to think too highly of ourselves either—for in the mystery of God’s mercy there is mercy enough for every one. Even those who persecute the faithful are beloved by God. God’s gift of love is irrevocable—steadfast and radically inclusive.

We’ve heard this good news before—and no doubt it comforts us greatly when we think about our own desire and longing to be part of God’s family. God’s love given will not be withdrawn—no matter what. But, the little story about Jesus and the Canaanite woman should give us pause. It’s a hard story with deep implications for us as followers of Christ. Accepting the radical inclusive grace of God for ourselves and our loved ones is easy, but accepting it for the ones we judge and reject is not so easy. Indeed. You can see how hard it is just by taking a quick look at the state of our Anglican communion these days. It’s not just the “conservatives” judging the “liberals” and wanting to put them out (us that would be), but “liberals” can be just as judgmental, drawing their own lines in the sand.

The picture we get of Jesus in the story of his encounter with the Canaanite woman is not very pretty. He’s in Gentile country, and this woman shouts at him, demanding mercy—a healing for her daughter. Matthew tells us she’s a Canaanite—the Canaanites as such didn’t even exist in Jesus’ day or Matthew’s day. They had been subjugated by the Israelites. When the Israelites entered the promised land their enemies were the Canaanites. Calling her a Canaanite woman takes us back to history and to the enmity between the two groups. Jesus ignores her. He doesn’t answer her at all. The disciples want to be rid of her. Not only is she a Canaanite, but she’s rude, and shameful really. As a woman she should have been represented socially by a man—not addressing Jesus on her own—much less shouting at him. The whole thing must have been distasteful to them. “Send her away,” they say.

Basically he tells her he wasn’t sent for the likes of her—his ministry is to his own people. She doesn’t leave, instead she kneels before him and echoes Peter’s request as he began to sink in the water, “Lord, help me.”

He rebuffs her again, inferring that she is a dog. A term used by his people to describe her people. Oh, a housedog, perhaps, a pet. Nonetheless there is not much to be gained by trying to soften this exchange. He’s rejecting her. She’s beyond the pale. Beyond the reach of his interest and concern. Not worthy to receive food meant for the children of the household—the Israelites.

But, she is dogged in her pursuit. You have to say that for her. “Even the dogs get the crumbs,” she says. I’m not asking for a lot. Just a few crumbs. That will be more than enough. The food on the master’s table, in her way of viewing it, is not limited. Its abundance is such that even a crumb can change a life.

And, here’s the moment of truth: Jesus sees her for who she is. His heart cracks open. His upbringing collapses. His unexamined prejudices dissolve. His deafness to her cries is overcome. His cultural default position is radically changed. Someone he ignored has become a real person. A person of faith. He celebrates that, “Woman, great is your faith!” No Canaanite before it now. “Woman, great is your faith!” “Let it be done for you as you wish.” Peter’s little faith. Her great faith. Hard to ignore.

I can’t help but think of that great Old Testament story when Abraham argued with God demanding that God be God. That God live up to the highest standards of godness. Remember that one. . . “God would you desist from punishing the community, if 50 good people were found there? 40? 30? 20? What about 10? And God came around.

Hearing how Jesus came around to a new understanding of God’s radical inclusive love can be unsettling. Some of us were raised to think of Jesus as all knowing and all wise from birth. But in this little story we get a picture of a very human Jesus, learning from this Canaanite woman. Learning about God and about his own mission.

The Bible has many stories of strangers, foreigners, people you wouldn’t expect having faith—entrusting their lives to God. Most often they challenge those on the inside. God’s inclusion of others is never easy. Paul wouldn’t have written his letters if it were. There seems to be something inside us that wants to draw limits, wants to keep someone outside, wants to know who we are by defining ourselves against some other—some outside other.

But God’s activity is about gathering—about reminding us that there is more than enough for all. And it isn’t about tolerance, and certainly not about indifference, and never about the “whatever” so prevalent in our culture. It’s about engaging one another, about letting ourselves be challenged, about listening, paying attention, about letting grace begin to soften our hearts, erode our fences, open us up. It’s about getting to know the one who is other. This is hard.

It’s hard because everyone of us, like Jesus, lives in a culture, a society, a family, and very one of us has inherited or developed prejudices that are largely unexamined. I learned something about this in my own life as an adult when I reflected back on my early upbringing in the deep South. It is hard indeed to break free from stereotypes and fears handed on from our grandparents and parents. It’s hard to escape from “the way things have always been.” And, of course, the South carries its unique history and reputation of racial discrimination. But it isn’t just the South’s reality. All of us bear burdens of race, class and other pretty much never discussed prejudices. Think of the realities in so many of our families that we don’t talk about out loud: mental illness, alcoholism, domestic abuse. We too have our outcasts. . . And, there is almost always a Canaanite woman coming toward us.

Not long ago a friend of mine, who is gay, told me that she has left the Episcopal Church and joined the Metropolitan Community Church where she lives. “I love the Episcopal Church. I was raised in it. I know the liturgy and the music and I love both. But I want to be part of a faith community that doesn’t just tolerate me, but celebrates me.”

Isn’t that something we all long for? In our heart of hearts? To worship God and know God’s love and to experience that love in a community that knows us and honestly celebrates who each of us is.Isn’t that the kind of community we are meant to become? Isn’t that what our meal—our holy communion—represents? “Woman, great is your faith!” “Man, great is your faith,” says Jesus. Hear those words addressed to you. Let them enter your heart. Let them move you and change you, and open you to that abundant radical inclusive love of God. Not just for you. . . but for all the outcasts of the world.

SERMON, August 10, 2008

Matthew 14:22-33

Have any of you been watching the Olympics? I’ve been thinking about them and about sports in our country. Watching some of the Olympics the other night I thought about a recent Giants game I went to—we took the ferry across the bay to the stadium and watched the Padres beat the Giants—a not uncommon occurrence. While I was there I thought about all the sports I have watched in my life—as a fan, and as a parent too. All those boys’ soccer games my sons played in. And the soccer games I watched growing up in Latin America. Then there was that one year when I actually served as coach of a boys high school soccer team. I was teaching English as a Second language and there was no regular coach at the school who would coach a soccer team—the emphasis then being on other sports. My students longed to play soccer and so I agreed to coach them. This was a joke on one level—I knew nothing about coaching. They coached themselves, but I was at every game to support them—and because they had a coach the team was official! They did very well too, I might add.

Watching sports and even coaching sports is very different than playing sports. When I stretch my memory back far enough I can remember when I played—basketball was my sport—and I loved playing. I loved the movement of my body, learning the skills, learning the game, working with teammates, the thrill of a great shot, the strategizing--all of it. This Olympics all eyes are on Michael Phelps the American swimming phenomenon—going after 8 gold medals—and actually thought to have a chance to get them. He’s got a body made for racing—his body shape and chemistry give him certain advantages most swimmers don’t have. And he’s been practicing, preparing for the Olympics all his life. Four years ago he won 5 or 6 gold medals, and now he’s back bigger, stronger, and more determined. I read an article in the NYT about him, and his extremely arduous training regime. The article ended with a very short interview between the reporter and the swimmer. Phelps really had very little to say about his swimming—other than “It’s what I do.” The watching of it, the talking about it are very very different from the doing. Very.

Our gospel lesson this morning is a familiar one. Jesus walking on water. Just after the feeding of the thousands the disciples are sent by him in their boat across the sea to the other side. And off they go while he goes up the mountain to pray. To have some much needed time alone with God. The wind comes up and the boat drifts further and further from the shore—buffeted. But apparently the men aren’t frightened until they see Jesus coming toward them on the water. They are terrified and think he’s a ghost.

There are so many ways to enter this story. It’s mysterious and multi-layered. Only a god can walk on water—water representing the forces of chaos barely contained in the creation and thought to be always possible of eruption . . . to walk on water is to show power over those forces. The drama of the scene has been portrayed in countless paintings. . . Jesus’ words, “Take heart (have courage) It is I.” harken back to God’s response to Moses’ question, “What’s your name?” “I am,” says Yahweh. Powerful stuff, and no wonder the men draw back in fear. I would.

In fact when I am honest I not only would, but I do. Draw back in surprise and fear at the approach of Jesus. Think of it. Think how it is for us, in the boat buffeted by the winds, tipsy on the chaos of our world. It’s overwhelming so often this world of ours. The sense that things are out of control. That the powers of chaos are taking over. The evidence is all around me: violence, wars, greed, lies and deception, the destruction of our world—our physical world—the broken fabric of our communities—the constant message that we are under attack by terrorists. I could go on and on. So could you. It’s hard when I’m focused on these realities to believe that Jesus could be present, could in fact be coming toward me on the waters of chaos. Could be urging me to have courage and not let my fears overwhelm me. There is much to fear in our world today, and we hear the message that we should live in fear from so many quarters. I’m so practiced at living in fear that I respond in fear even when the One who comes tells me to let go of fear! It’s ironic.

Peter represents those who aren’t really sure that this One who comes is Jesus. He offers a test: “If it is you, command me to come to you on the water.” What is he thinking? I wonder. Does his heart yearn to live as Jesus does—so one with his divine self that wind, water, storm, calm, are all of a piece, not to be feared. Or, does he long to be a star? to be one who “walks on water” as the saying has devolved into our own common usage? Or is he really vacillating in his understanding, in his acceptance of Jesus? We can only imagine.

Jesus responds with a simple, “Come.” And Peter does and we know by heart the rest of the story—how he walks on water toward Jesus until as Matthew tells us he ”noticed the strong wind,” and began to sink, crying out, “Lord, save me.” And, Jesus whose name means “he saves,” reaches out and catches him. “You of little faith, why did you doubt?” And they get into the boat and the wind ceases. Those in the boat worship Jesus as the Son of God.

It could be as so many have said that this story was told to remind us to keep our eyes on Jesus, trust in him, so that we can walk on water—do amazing things. It could be that Peter’s little faith can carry him only so far before he starts to drown. Or, it could be that Peter’s faith was little in that he wasn’t sure the One coming toward him in the storm was Jesus. It could be that.

I think many of us get stuck there. We look at the world in which we live—the global world, this nation of ours, our own community, even our own families—and if truth be known we aren’t entirely sure that Jesus is with us—walking toward us in the storm—walking on the water—God with us, still at work creating order out of chaos. We have little faith. We get stuck in the boat, often as spectators, caught in our fear and our little faithliness. My ears can get so stopped with fear that I don’t even hear the words, “Take heart. It is I; do not be afraid.” Have courage, I am with you, you need not let your fear control you.

It’s easy to get so overwhelmed by the discord in our world that we are immobilized. We watch sports, watch life, but never think to play our part—never imagine that we might have a part. Never imagine that we are not alone, no matter what things look like. What is more frightening, the world as it is? Or, the fact of God’s presence in that very world?

If God is with us in the storm then surely God offers me a different way to live. To open myself to God-with-us, means to open myself to that same divine relationship that so filled Jesus. Take heart! Open my heart to receive the one who comes. To begin to live more and more from that relationship, with those eyes, those understandings, that freedom . . .

I was struck this past week that in John Edward’s belated confession of his extra-marital relationship how he said in effect that during his campaign he began to feel that he was special. A special person endowed with special gifts and prerogatives—one who in common parlance perhaps could “walk on water.”

Nothing could be further from the meaning of this story. God with us is not about any one of us being specially endowed. God with us is about all of us being accompanied, held in loving arms, being invited to come into the chaos trusting not in our own skills or water wings, but in the presence of the one who calls us. Our daily work is perhaps first and foremost to attune our ears to recognize his call, and to focus our eyes to see him in the mist—to grow to know him so well that our little faith is strengthened and we go out to greet him, and begin to live in the assurance of his presence—no matter what. I suspect that none of us here is a Michael Phelps; nevertheless, we are called to life not as spectators, but to the fullness of life—of living. We are not alone. AMEN

SERMON, July 20, 2008 10 Pentecost

Romans 8:12-25; Matthew 13:24-30

Perhaps you know someone who is adopted or an adoptive parent; perhaps you yourself were adopted or an adoptive parent. Not long ago a friend told me the story of how he’d accompanied his daughter on a trip to China to complete the adoption of the little girl who is now his granddaughter. He told me of their log trip there, the paperwork, the bureaucracy, their anxiety in dealing with the authorities and all the details, and their great joy when finally the three of them boarded the place to come home.

You don’t have to go to China to adopt a child of course; our world is filled with children in need of parents, yearning to be adopted, to become a part of a loving family, to know the security of belonging.

Paul addresses the Gentile church in Rome and us. He uses the metaphor of adoption to underscore our relationship with God in Christ. He tells us that we who are led by the Spirit are children of God, and like children are heirs of God—recipients of the gifts of that relationship—members of the family. When we cry “Abba Father!” he says it is God’s Spirit with our spirit that reveals that who we are most deeply, most surely, are God’s children. God’s love for us—desire for us—longing for us to be united—is echoed in the lengths to which adoptive parents go to adopt a child—the journeying, the sacrificing, the giving, the opening of self, of heart, of arms—are all a faint but vivid echo of God in Christ Jesus come among us. We can’t help but hear those baptismal words Jesus heard as he came up out of the waters of the Jordan, “You are my son, the beloved, with you I am well pleased.”

It is vital that we know who we are and whose we are because we live in in between times. Paul looks around and sees a world filled with pain and division. There is a sense that things are askew. There is suffering. not everyone says “yes” to their adoption. People continue to seek after their own self-focused ways. They forget who they are.It is a time like that which Jesus describes in his little parable about the weeds and the wheat. The in between time: the wheat is in the ground and growing, but the weeds are there mixed in with the wheat.

Paul reminds us that we are a part of something larger. We are a part of God’s creation. We are creatures of God. And our longing for adoption, our longing to live fully into our true selves as children of God is matched by the groaning of creation. We groan together.

God knows that whatever this meant in Paul’s day, today this groaning creation in bondage to decay, subjected to futility is agonizing to hear. It has become a roar. We live in a time when we have become acutely aware of our own complicity in the pain and the groaning of creation—the groaning of God’s creation—at least in this little corner of it we call earth. The biblical narrative suggests that the fall—the story told as humans in the garden eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil—however we interpret that story—has ramifications throughout creation. It affects not just humanity but the other creatures and the created order itself. Perhaps today we have some insight about the story we lacked before. perhaps today we see how we humans have misunderstood our calling, misunderstood our identity, forgotten our connection to the rest of creation—forgotten our own creatureliness. Perhaps we have misunderstood our identity as creatures made in the image of God. Perhaps we have misunderstood dominion to mean domination. We have wandered far from our calling to be caretakers: to care for God’s creation as God would care for it. We have lived as though creation were made for us, and not for God.

To remember who we are is to remember that we are part of God’s creation—is to remember not only God’s words in the story of creation: “It is good,” but also to hold to the vision of God’s peaceable kingdom described in Isaiah 11: The creatures and the created world we know living together in harmony, glorifying God.

Paul says that creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God. One translation puts it that creation waits “on tiptoe” for that revealing—for that time when we grow into the fullness of the people we were created to be—for that time when we live into our baptismal identity.

These are hard things to think about. Especially perhaps for us: we in the West who have enjoyed the benefits of these ways of living that we now know have come at a cost: a high cost to creation, to the other creatures that inhabit the earth with us. I was in the Seattle area recently and drove through a beautiful park-like forested area where the corporate offices of one of the big lumber companies are. Then I was driven to the Mt. Rainier National Forest and passed through miles and miles of once forested areas—stripped bare. I could hear the groaning of creation and my own groans too. . . I preach these words to you and they are written on paper. My home is built of wood. I know these things. This is real. I’d prefer not to think of it. Not to listen to the groans. There is a part of me that prefers not to consider what I need to give up to help with the repair. There is a part of me that prefers not to consider the changes I need to make to reorient my ways to God’s ways—to become more deeply God’s child. I’d prefer not to suffer with Christ—not to endure the suffering of the present time for the glory to be revealed.

But creation groans and I cannot stop my ears to it. In truth we groan along with it, and long to be set free. Paul suggests that these are the groans of birthing: birth pangs. He tells us that as we live with these first fruits of the Spirit we live in hope: hope for things unseen, unimaginable perhaps. We put our trust in God, in the Spirit of God already at work in us and in creation and we live into hope.

God the creator is still at work—bringing new life—setting us free to become who we were created to be—the God who goes to any length to adopt us, to make us heirs, is at work in the midst of our groans. You and I are a part of God’s creation—a creation made not for us—but for the glory of God. That glory will be revealed. AMEN. Painting: The Garden of Eden by Roelandt Savery, Antwerp