Scripture
Luke 2:17-21 (Today’s New International Version, ©2005)
17 When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, 18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. 19 But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. 20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.
21 On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise the child, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he was conceived.
Let us pray: God, go with us as we journey into Your word. Go with us as we are. In the name of Jesus. Amen
Scripture
Luke 2:17-21 (Today’s New International Version, ©2005)
17 When they had seen him, they spread the word concerning what had been told them about this child, 18 and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them. 19 But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. 20 The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.
21 On the eighth day, when it was time to circumcise the child, he was named Jesus, the name the angel had given him before he was conceived.
And when they had seen him, they spread the word. We love a good story! And this was just about the best story around—it had everything, a humble beginning, unexpected heros and heroines, miraculous appearances, great visual effects, and a feel good ending…who could ask for more? So now what?
Here we are, the day after Christmas—so where do we go from here? I believe that our scripture passage today tells us everything we need to know. On Christmas Eves past, we tended to end the story with the great line “But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart”—the lights dimmed, the candles were lit, and “Silent Night” rang out. And we all went home to Santa and stockings, and years ago, to trying to figure out how to put together the toys that seemed like a good idea at the time. But, in reality, these words are just the beginning of the story.
Let’s take one more trip to Bethlehem before we move on this year. These little verses answer my “Now what?” question in 3 very important ways. Let’s look at each of them. First, the shepherds spread the word—they tell the story and all who hear the story are amazed. Mary, on the other hand, keeps the story in her heart—treasures it, and ponders it, perhaps for years to come. And finally, the shepherds return to the fields and glorify God—they give credit for the story where it is due—to God who fulfills the words of the angels in every way.
And so here we have it—tell, treasure and praise. It’s really quite simple... And quite profound. It’s about the priority of story, God’s story, Jesus’ story, Mary’s story, our story. Nothing takes the place of story and it is from story that share our truths with those who need what we have found and harvest what we need from the stories of others.
Here is what I think: I think that we do not celebrate our stories enough. I think that we move so fast that we speed right past the precious stories of our friends, our neighbors, and the strangers who meet us at every turn. Christmas is about story—the importance of story—the importance of remembering.
Hear an age old story from Jewish mysticism. Bal Shem Tov was a beloved rabbi and mystic at the middle of the 18th Century. It came to the time of his dying. He sent for his disciples. He told them, “I have acted as a go-between between you and God. And I am dying. Now when I am gone you must do this for yourselves.” He asked them if they knew the place in the forest where he stood when he went to talk to God. He told them to go there and to stand and call to God. He told them to light the fire as he had taught them and to say the same prayer as he prayed. He said, “Do all this and God will come.”
After he died, the first generation did exactly as Bal Shem Tov had told them and God always came. But by the second generation, the people had forgotten how to light the fire in the way they had been taught. Even so, they stood in the same place and prayed the prayer and God came. By the third generation, the people had forgotten how to light the fire and they forgot how to get to the place in the forest. But, they remembered the prayer. They prayed and God came.
In the fourth generation, everyone had forgotten how to build the fire, no one knew the place in the forest, and the prayer itself could not be recalled. But one person still knew the story about it all, and they told it aloud. And God still came. Now Jewish mysticism may indeed not have the same understanding of God’s revelation that we have today, but the emphasis on story is just the same. And in this focus on stories, we find some basic truths about ourselves.
We are a people of stories. We come together every week and we share where we are in our stories—we are sad, we are at peace, we are frustrated, we are relieved. But one thing remains constant—in the telling of our stories, we are human—reaching out to share who we are and to have who we are received and treasured, if you will, with love and compassion.
This is an interesting week—it is the week between hearing a very, very old story and exploring how that story is going to impact the “newness” of the year ahead. It is a week, where some of us wrestle with resolutions, and while most of us may have given up the formality of resolutions years ago; most of us, in one small or large way or another use this time to at least reflect on how the next year may be better or, at the very least, different. I would suggest that it is a perfect time to reflect on our stories—our stories personal and our stories communal. It is a grand time to hold our stories in our hearts, to treasure them, to ponder them, if you will…to see how our stories have evolved over the last year… and to chose to give God free reign over where our stories will travel in the year to come.
And it is in the end of the story told in our brief scripture story that gives us the clue to where our stories fit with God’s. All these things happened—journey, birth, angels, and shepherds—God came to earth as a tiny baby. At the end of it all, his parents followed faithfully what they had been told was God’s plan. At the time of circumcision, he was named “Jesus” just as the angel said even before he was conceived. Mary and Joseph were faithful, just as God calls us to be faithful to this story and to ours.
My very good friend in New York shares my love for reading and always goes out of her way to send me books that she somehow knows will speak to me. This Christmas was no different—so being the brat that I am, I didn’t wait for Christmas, but opened her present and dove right in. This year’s book is the story of Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson. This is what he has to say about story—God’s story and our place in it: “the Gospel story is our story. We belong right in the center of things, and that is very good news. But we don’t get to stay there. We have to go out in the streets and find all the people who still think they’re not worthy, who still think God couldn’t possibly love them, and bring them inside the temple. We need to learn to run and leap and dance and laugh and sing as one of God’s own and invite others to dance, too.” And he continues, and I continue with him: “As ministers of the Gospel, ordained and lay, we’re all called to make the Gospel story—the Good News—our own and then to take it to people who don’t have the blessing of knowing and believing.”
And so, we move on in the right direction in the year to come. We talk and listen to our stories and to God’s story. Many of you heard the story of Open Circle—of what is happening out there in the Temple every Sunday—months before you came to see for yourself—we have all seen—we have all seen what it looks like when we come together to hear and celebrate God’s story of redemption, acceptance, and healing. We know what it is like to feel the love of God wrap around us and hold us just the way we are. But, our stories do not end here—just like the Christmas story—this is only the beginning! We have work to do—our stories will continue and grow in places we never thought possible. 2011 will be an historic year for each and every one of us and for Open Circle Metropolitan Community Church. Just as we spent all of Advent preparing for God’s first story, let us spend this week and next preparing our hearts and our hands for what is to come. “Emmanuel, Emmanuel, His name is called Emmanuel—God with us, revealed in us—His name is called Emmanuel!” God, You loved us and You came into our world and into our hearts—let us go forth with Your story and with ours. Amen and amen.
Welcome!
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Monday, December 20, 2010
Advent 4--Hope Fulfilled-The Birth of All Things New 12-19-2010
Scripture
John 1:1-14 (Today’s New International Version, )
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The Word was with God in the beginning. Through the Word all things were made; without the Word nothing was made that has been made. In God was life, and that life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from our God, the creator, full of grace and truth.
Let us pray:
Sweet little Jesus Boy they made you be born in a manger.
Sweet little Holy Child—didn’t know who you was.
Didn’t know you’d come to save us Lord, to take our sins away.
Our eyes was blind we couldn’t see, we didn’t know who you was.
Long time ago—you was born, born in a manger low—
Sweet Little Jesus Boy.
The world treat you mean Lord, treat me mean too,
But that’s how things is down here: we don’t know who you is.
You done told us how—we is a tryin’
Master, you done show’d us how, even when you’s dyin’
Just seem like we can’t do right, look how we treated you.
But please sir, forgive us Lord, we didn’t know it was you.
Sweet little Jesus Boy, born long time ago..
Sweet little Holy Child, and we didn’t know who you was.
I first prayed this prayer and sang this song more than 40 years ago, but never did I understand its truth the way I do today. Even so, I’m left with the question “Why?” Why didn’t they know then, and, certainly, why don’t we know now? We had God sending messengers, appearing in dreams; choruses of angels springing from the heavens on the hillside, wise men arriving on the scene, and yet, John says, in our scripture for today: “the world did not recognize Him. He came to that which was His own, but His own did not receive Him.” It kinda makes you wonder—what would it have taken then, and what does it take now? For Christmas, this year, I asked myself, would I have understood, would I have known who Jesus was? Would I have been one of the shepherds kneeling in reverence, or would I have been one of those busy, bustling folk passing by right outside the stall, and missing the wonder of what was going on inside?
And so, this week, I have spent considerable time reflecting on that very question—would I have missed Christmas? Now, let’s be honest, I can’t really know what I would have done or even who I would have been had I lived at the time—I like to think of myself, at the very least, as the Innkeeper—not sure of what was going on, but at least kind enough, to make room for the miracle to unfold. For the openness to miracle is the beginning of Christmas and the beginning of knowing who Jesus is—for your life, and for the world. The innkeeper made a start—the rest was up to God. And is that how miracles happen, even today. Have you ever wondered what the innkeeper thought as these shepherds came and the star shone down? I realize that for some of you, I’m asking you to stretch the limits of reasonable, logical thinking, and you are right, I am doing just that. For miracle also means that we grant some “grace” in the telling of the story—that the miracle is in the event of the birth of the Christ-child, not in the details of the distance from the hills where the shepherds kept watch and whether or not they could have made it to Bethlehem as quickly as the Christmas carols portray. The miracle is in the changing of the hearts of those shepherds—and the very fact that they looked up to see the angels at all. The miracle is that on the busiest night in decades, the innkeeper managed to think of a way to give a young girl a place to give birth.
We want bigness—bright lights, flashing stars, and huge cathedrals. But that is not miracle. The miracle is in the smallest of things. Why, think of the innkeeper. The innkeeper was tired. He had checked in people all day. All he wanted was some rest, tomorrow would be another busy day. And then came a knock. A knock—he had no room—why not just ignore it, they would surely go away. But something stirred in him, something said get up and answer, even though you have nothing left—no rooms and, certainly, no patience. But something stirred and the miracle began.
And, so it is in our lives as well—something stirs and the miracle begins. Let me tell you a story. There was once a painfully shy little girl. She wore coke bottle glasses and she was skinny—making her look very much like a baby bird seeking for its mother or so she was told. She was never very popular, never won a beauty contest or any other contest for that matter. She was terrified of speaking in public and she had no particular social graces and was often ignored. Her biggest claim to fame was that she could read books at lightning speed and could sing a note or two—but not nearly as well as some of the other kids. At 16, she announced to anyone who bothered to listen, that she felt called by God to serve the church. Even her relatives, all of whom truly loved her, thought her a bit “touched” in the head. But God knew better. And God knew, that if that painfully shy, introverted, timid, little girl would listen to the stirrings in her heart that God could and would do the rest. That, my friends, is miracle—miracle that took place over the course of 40 plus years and is still going on this day.
Did the innkeeper ever know the breadth and depth of the miracle that happened in his stable that night? Probably not. He is one of the many characters who appear briefly in the stories in the New Testament and then disappear—never to be heard of again. We don’t know whether or not he followed the life of that baby—more than likely not. But I’d like to believe that he knew that it was important for him to open that door that night and that he felt good for taking that young girl and her husband in. I’d like to think that when he heard the baby cry, that he smiled, knowing he had done a good and grace-filled thing.
So, this week, I invite you to listen to the stirrings in your heart: to write them down perhaps. Share them with someone, share them with God. This year, when Jesus comes again as a baby, be present to the awe and wonder. This year, let us not be among the millions of folks who don’t know who Jesus is—let us be among those who listen to those stirrings of love and gratitude. And, so, it is likely that this week, at least one person, a clerk in a store, the person in front of you in the long check-out line, your neighbor—someone will more than likely ask you if you are ready for Christmas. We have spent the weeks of Advent becoming prepared for Christmas. We have spoken of hope and light—the same light that our Gospel lesson heralds. We talked about the faith and trust of Mary and the joy of the shepherds. We have worked on opening our hearts to the completeness of Christmas. Here is my truth then, this year, I hope that when the question is asked of you, that you will stop a moment, think of what we have spoken of along the way, and say, “why, yes, I am ready for Christmas. This year, I’m really ready, and I’m glad I’m ready!” You’ll probably astound them with your answer, we are so ready to hear “no”. Let’s make it a “yes” Christmas this year. Let us go joyfully into the week saying “yes”! Yes, we are ready, come, Lord, Jesus, come! Amen and amen.
John 1:1-14 (Today’s New International Version, )
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The Word was with God in the beginning. Through the Word all things were made; without the Word nothing was made that has been made. In God was life, and that life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.
The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God— children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.
The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from our God, the creator, full of grace and truth.
Let us pray:
Sweet little Jesus Boy they made you be born in a manger.
Sweet little Holy Child—didn’t know who you was.
Didn’t know you’d come to save us Lord, to take our sins away.
Our eyes was blind we couldn’t see, we didn’t know who you was.
Long time ago—you was born, born in a manger low—
Sweet Little Jesus Boy.
The world treat you mean Lord, treat me mean too,
But that’s how things is down here: we don’t know who you is.
You done told us how—we is a tryin’
Master, you done show’d us how, even when you’s dyin’
Just seem like we can’t do right, look how we treated you.
But please sir, forgive us Lord, we didn’t know it was you.
Sweet little Jesus Boy, born long time ago..
Sweet little Holy Child, and we didn’t know who you was.
I first prayed this prayer and sang this song more than 40 years ago, but never did I understand its truth the way I do today. Even so, I’m left with the question “Why?” Why didn’t they know then, and, certainly, why don’t we know now? We had God sending messengers, appearing in dreams; choruses of angels springing from the heavens on the hillside, wise men arriving on the scene, and yet, John says, in our scripture for today: “the world did not recognize Him. He came to that which was His own, but His own did not receive Him.” It kinda makes you wonder—what would it have taken then, and what does it take now? For Christmas, this year, I asked myself, would I have understood, would I have known who Jesus was? Would I have been one of the shepherds kneeling in reverence, or would I have been one of those busy, bustling folk passing by right outside the stall, and missing the wonder of what was going on inside?
And so, this week, I have spent considerable time reflecting on that very question—would I have missed Christmas? Now, let’s be honest, I can’t really know what I would have done or even who I would have been had I lived at the time—I like to think of myself, at the very least, as the Innkeeper—not sure of what was going on, but at least kind enough, to make room for the miracle to unfold. For the openness to miracle is the beginning of Christmas and the beginning of knowing who Jesus is—for your life, and for the world. The innkeeper made a start—the rest was up to God. And is that how miracles happen, even today. Have you ever wondered what the innkeeper thought as these shepherds came and the star shone down? I realize that for some of you, I’m asking you to stretch the limits of reasonable, logical thinking, and you are right, I am doing just that. For miracle also means that we grant some “grace” in the telling of the story—that the miracle is in the event of the birth of the Christ-child, not in the details of the distance from the hills where the shepherds kept watch and whether or not they could have made it to Bethlehem as quickly as the Christmas carols portray. The miracle is in the changing of the hearts of those shepherds—and the very fact that they looked up to see the angels at all. The miracle is that on the busiest night in decades, the innkeeper managed to think of a way to give a young girl a place to give birth.
We want bigness—bright lights, flashing stars, and huge cathedrals. But that is not miracle. The miracle is in the smallest of things. Why, think of the innkeeper. The innkeeper was tired. He had checked in people all day. All he wanted was some rest, tomorrow would be another busy day. And then came a knock. A knock—he had no room—why not just ignore it, they would surely go away. But something stirred in him, something said get up and answer, even though you have nothing left—no rooms and, certainly, no patience. But something stirred and the miracle began.
And, so it is in our lives as well—something stirs and the miracle begins. Let me tell you a story. There was once a painfully shy little girl. She wore coke bottle glasses and she was skinny—making her look very much like a baby bird seeking for its mother or so she was told. She was never very popular, never won a beauty contest or any other contest for that matter. She was terrified of speaking in public and she had no particular social graces and was often ignored. Her biggest claim to fame was that she could read books at lightning speed and could sing a note or two—but not nearly as well as some of the other kids. At 16, she announced to anyone who bothered to listen, that she felt called by God to serve the church. Even her relatives, all of whom truly loved her, thought her a bit “touched” in the head. But God knew better. And God knew, that if that painfully shy, introverted, timid, little girl would listen to the stirrings in her heart that God could and would do the rest. That, my friends, is miracle—miracle that took place over the course of 40 plus years and is still going on this day.
Did the innkeeper ever know the breadth and depth of the miracle that happened in his stable that night? Probably not. He is one of the many characters who appear briefly in the stories in the New Testament and then disappear—never to be heard of again. We don’t know whether or not he followed the life of that baby—more than likely not. But I’d like to believe that he knew that it was important for him to open that door that night and that he felt good for taking that young girl and her husband in. I’d like to think that when he heard the baby cry, that he smiled, knowing he had done a good and grace-filled thing.
So, this week, I invite you to listen to the stirrings in your heart: to write them down perhaps. Share them with someone, share them with God. This year, when Jesus comes again as a baby, be present to the awe and wonder. This year, let us not be among the millions of folks who don’t know who Jesus is—let us be among those who listen to those stirrings of love and gratitude. And, so, it is likely that this week, at least one person, a clerk in a store, the person in front of you in the long check-out line, your neighbor—someone will more than likely ask you if you are ready for Christmas. We have spent the weeks of Advent becoming prepared for Christmas. We have spoken of hope and light—the same light that our Gospel lesson heralds. We talked about the faith and trust of Mary and the joy of the shepherds. We have worked on opening our hearts to the completeness of Christmas. Here is my truth then, this year, I hope that when the question is asked of you, that you will stop a moment, think of what we have spoken of along the way, and say, “why, yes, I am ready for Christmas. This year, I’m really ready, and I’m glad I’m ready!” You’ll probably astound them with your answer, we are so ready to hear “no”. Let’s make it a “yes” Christmas this year. Let us go joyfully into the week saying “yes”! Yes, we are ready, come, Lord, Jesus, come! Amen and amen.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Advent 3: Hope for All: We Sing with Joy 12-12-2010
Scripture: Luke 2: 1-14 &Matthew 2: 1-9
In those days, Caesar Augustus published a decree ordering a census of the whole Roman world. And so Joseph went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to “the city of David”—Bethlehem, in Judea, because Joseph was of the house and lineage of David; he went to register with Mary, his espoused wife who was pregnant. While they were there, the time came for her delivery. She gave birth to her firstborn, a son; she put him in a simple cloth wrapped like a receiving blanket.
There were shepherds in the area living in the fields and keeping night watch by turns over their flock. The angel of God appeared to them, and the glory of God shone around them; there were very much afraid. The angel said to them, “You have nothing to fear! I come to proclaim good news to you—news of a great joy to be shared by the whole people. Today in David’s city, a savior—the Messiah—has been born to you. Let this be a sign to you; you’ll find an infant wrapped in a simple cloth, lying in a manger.” Suddenly, there was a multitude of the heavenly host with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in high heaven! And on earth, peace to those on whom God’s favor rests.”
After Jesus’ birthd—astrologers from the East arrived in Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the newborn ruler of the Jews” We observed his star at its rising and have come to pay homage.” Herod spoke with them first. After their audience with the ruler, they set out. The star which they had observed at its rising went ahead of them until it came to a standstill over the place where the child lay. They were overjoyed at seeing the star and, upon entering the house, found the child with Mary, his mother. They opened their coffers and presented the child with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.
Let’s go back to our Gospel reading today…
This is the season of joy—joy to the world—blessed joy—baby in a manger joy—shepherds watching sheep joy—joy, joy, joy! But, it’s just possible, if we are really honest, that some of us, some of the time, want very much to walk beside good old Ebeneezer Scrooge and utter bah humbug! Sometimes the need to retreat is a healthy desire to flee the glee, quiet our minds, and turn our thoughts to simpler things. But, sometimes it is more. For some of us, some of the time, the joy is simply too much to bear in a world so full of sorrow and struggle. The shepherds, frightened out of their minds, must have felt some initial resistance to joy-- Good news in the midst of great tribulation…the very embodiment of what I often call “sacred contradictions”. Our lives are full of them and they are intertwined with our relationships, our loves, our passions, our very selves.
For a very long time, while I searched for some sort of cosmic and psychic peace, I simply mis-understood the concept of wholeness and I believe that I am not alone. Taking my cue from my simplistic reading of the many books on holistic spirituality that I devoured in my early attempts to come to terms with my ragged theological journey and work out my relationship with God, I believed that wholeness (or enlightenment, or inner peace) meant that everything simply came together as a whole and “made sense”. The more I searched for that holistic, cosmic harmonic “oneness”, the less I felt the wholeness I desired. And the farther away the very God I sought seemed to be.
Eventually, I ceased my seeking for the narrow kind of wholeness that I had previously viewed as imperative and opened myself up to the calling of God’s “sacred contradictions”. Leaving behind my either/or thinking enabled me to walk maturely into the blessed joy found in both/and awareness. And I believe that scriptures are full of the call of these apparent contradictions.
What then, of these sacred contradictions as we walk through the Advent Season—with Christmas so closely upon us, that we can feel the anticipation of waking up on Christmas morning and gathering with friends and family for a feast of joy! For those of you who bring no sadness, no turmoil, no “mixed feelings”, as we introspective folks like to say, into this season, I say “bless you and bless God for your good fortune”. For the rest of us, I invite you to consider the call to hold these “sacred contradictions” in your heart this Advent and Christmas and allow the Holy Spirit to give you the ability to fully experience all the feelings, thoughts, memories, sorrow, and joy that this season brings. For in doing so, I believe, that our hearts will be more able and willing to bring our whole selves to worship the Christ and receive the blessed joy that God has in store for us.
Embracing sorrow, struggle, and turmoil at this time of seemingly rampant happiness and gaiety seems almost sacrilegious. Kahil Gibran says this about sorrow and joy: “The deeper that sorrow carves into your being the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?” This makes sense to me even in my simplest way of thinking: As I unite my sorrow and my joy in the embracing of both, the sorrow becomes meaningful, the joy becomes more abundant. And the apparent tension between the two disappears in the evolving “sacred contradiction” which leads to joy.
Look at the Christmas story itself—it’s full of these sacred contradictions—calling us to hold two “impossibles” in our minds at once. A virgin gives birth to the Savior of the world; Joseph is expected to love and care for a child who is not his own; shepherds, awakened by heavenly visitors are afraid for their lives and yet, eager to meet and pay homage to this child. Jesus is born in a manger—yet, destined to bring the reign of God’s justice to the earth.
And so I say to you today, embrace your complete experience of this season and the birth of the Savior—the sorrows and the joys, the pain and the gladness, the turmoil and the peace. I want to share a story with you. Last year was my first Christmas Season after a great loss in my life. And all of my sacred contradictions came to life in the three months between October and Christmas and God used every one of these in my own spiritual formation and growth. For me, my moment of truth last year, centered on decorating the Christmas tree. Now Terri and I have separate tasks in holiday decorating—she brings in all the boxes and then admires what I do with the decorations. It works for us and we began our decorating just as we did last year. Terri set up the tree and I decided to let the branches “air out”. A week later, even the dogs weren’t buying my story of why the branches needed air, and I had to come to terms with the fact that I couldn’t bring myself to put the ornaments on the tree. But as I opened myself up to hear the healing that God was holding out for me, I knew that it was time to “do the tree”. And so, I did. In spite of my telling myself that it would be painful to hang the shiny ornaments on the tree, as if each one reflected my then still raw grief back to me, it was a joy to behold when I finished it. Some ‘sacred contradictions’ are easier to hold than others, and yours this year may be mildly difficult or may feel like torture or somewhere in between. Whatever the case, I believe that God will grace with joy and peace your willingness to move from a dichotomous way of thinking that insists that you can only embrace one “truth” at a time to a “let me hold them all in my hands at once” way of being.
Let us return to the angels, to Mary and Joseph, to the shepherds and animals—let us open our hearts to the joy of a baby—not just any baby, but a baby that would bring in the reign of God’s justice and peace. Let us say with the angels, “Glory to God in the highest!” May we all have peace this Christmas season and may joy take us by surprise again and again. Amen and Amen
Reflection Question:
Questions for reflection and study--
1. The distance form Nazareth to Bethlehem was about 70 miles. What would it be like to be Joseph taking that weeklong walk from Nazareth to Bethlehem? For Mary?
2. What, for you, is the significance of the place and circumstances around Jesus’ birth?
3. In reality, shepherds were an outcast group. How do you see “sacred contradictions” working out in the angels’ message to them?
4. The Magi made a long journey to see Jesus. Reflect on your own journey. What have you experienced along the way?
5. Both the shepherds and Magi are fleeting subjects in the story of Jesus’ birth. What impact do you imagine this experience may have had on them?
6. What gifts would you bring or will you bring to Jesus this year?
In those days, Caesar Augustus published a decree ordering a census of the whole Roman world. And so Joseph went from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to “the city of David”—Bethlehem, in Judea, because Joseph was of the house and lineage of David; he went to register with Mary, his espoused wife who was pregnant. While they were there, the time came for her delivery. She gave birth to her firstborn, a son; she put him in a simple cloth wrapped like a receiving blanket.
There were shepherds in the area living in the fields and keeping night watch by turns over their flock. The angel of God appeared to them, and the glory of God shone around them; there were very much afraid. The angel said to them, “You have nothing to fear! I come to proclaim good news to you—news of a great joy to be shared by the whole people. Today in David’s city, a savior—the Messiah—has been born to you. Let this be a sign to you; you’ll find an infant wrapped in a simple cloth, lying in a manger.” Suddenly, there was a multitude of the heavenly host with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in high heaven! And on earth, peace to those on whom God’s favor rests.”
After Jesus’ birthd—astrologers from the East arrived in Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the newborn ruler of the Jews” We observed his star at its rising and have come to pay homage.” Herod spoke with them first. After their audience with the ruler, they set out. The star which they had observed at its rising went ahead of them until it came to a standstill over the place where the child lay. They were overjoyed at seeing the star and, upon entering the house, found the child with Mary, his mother. They opened their coffers and presented the child with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh.
Let’s go back to our Gospel reading today…
This is the season of joy—joy to the world—blessed joy—baby in a manger joy—shepherds watching sheep joy—joy, joy, joy! But, it’s just possible, if we are really honest, that some of us, some of the time, want very much to walk beside good old Ebeneezer Scrooge and utter bah humbug! Sometimes the need to retreat is a healthy desire to flee the glee, quiet our minds, and turn our thoughts to simpler things. But, sometimes it is more. For some of us, some of the time, the joy is simply too much to bear in a world so full of sorrow and struggle. The shepherds, frightened out of their minds, must have felt some initial resistance to joy-- Good news in the midst of great tribulation…the very embodiment of what I often call “sacred contradictions”. Our lives are full of them and they are intertwined with our relationships, our loves, our passions, our very selves.
For a very long time, while I searched for some sort of cosmic and psychic peace, I simply mis-understood the concept of wholeness and I believe that I am not alone. Taking my cue from my simplistic reading of the many books on holistic spirituality that I devoured in my early attempts to come to terms with my ragged theological journey and work out my relationship with God, I believed that wholeness (or enlightenment, or inner peace) meant that everything simply came together as a whole and “made sense”. The more I searched for that holistic, cosmic harmonic “oneness”, the less I felt the wholeness I desired. And the farther away the very God I sought seemed to be.
Eventually, I ceased my seeking for the narrow kind of wholeness that I had previously viewed as imperative and opened myself up to the calling of God’s “sacred contradictions”. Leaving behind my either/or thinking enabled me to walk maturely into the blessed joy found in both/and awareness. And I believe that scriptures are full of the call of these apparent contradictions.
What then, of these sacred contradictions as we walk through the Advent Season—with Christmas so closely upon us, that we can feel the anticipation of waking up on Christmas morning and gathering with friends and family for a feast of joy! For those of you who bring no sadness, no turmoil, no “mixed feelings”, as we introspective folks like to say, into this season, I say “bless you and bless God for your good fortune”. For the rest of us, I invite you to consider the call to hold these “sacred contradictions” in your heart this Advent and Christmas and allow the Holy Spirit to give you the ability to fully experience all the feelings, thoughts, memories, sorrow, and joy that this season brings. For in doing so, I believe, that our hearts will be more able and willing to bring our whole selves to worship the Christ and receive the blessed joy that God has in store for us.
Embracing sorrow, struggle, and turmoil at this time of seemingly rampant happiness and gaiety seems almost sacrilegious. Kahil Gibran says this about sorrow and joy: “The deeper that sorrow carves into your being the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?” This makes sense to me even in my simplest way of thinking: As I unite my sorrow and my joy in the embracing of both, the sorrow becomes meaningful, the joy becomes more abundant. And the apparent tension between the two disappears in the evolving “sacred contradiction” which leads to joy.
Look at the Christmas story itself—it’s full of these sacred contradictions—calling us to hold two “impossibles” in our minds at once. A virgin gives birth to the Savior of the world; Joseph is expected to love and care for a child who is not his own; shepherds, awakened by heavenly visitors are afraid for their lives and yet, eager to meet and pay homage to this child. Jesus is born in a manger—yet, destined to bring the reign of God’s justice to the earth.
And so I say to you today, embrace your complete experience of this season and the birth of the Savior—the sorrows and the joys, the pain and the gladness, the turmoil and the peace. I want to share a story with you. Last year was my first Christmas Season after a great loss in my life. And all of my sacred contradictions came to life in the three months between October and Christmas and God used every one of these in my own spiritual formation and growth. For me, my moment of truth last year, centered on decorating the Christmas tree. Now Terri and I have separate tasks in holiday decorating—she brings in all the boxes and then admires what I do with the decorations. It works for us and we began our decorating just as we did last year. Terri set up the tree and I decided to let the branches “air out”. A week later, even the dogs weren’t buying my story of why the branches needed air, and I had to come to terms with the fact that I couldn’t bring myself to put the ornaments on the tree. But as I opened myself up to hear the healing that God was holding out for me, I knew that it was time to “do the tree”. And so, I did. In spite of my telling myself that it would be painful to hang the shiny ornaments on the tree, as if each one reflected my then still raw grief back to me, it was a joy to behold when I finished it. Some ‘sacred contradictions’ are easier to hold than others, and yours this year may be mildly difficult or may feel like torture or somewhere in between. Whatever the case, I believe that God will grace with joy and peace your willingness to move from a dichotomous way of thinking that insists that you can only embrace one “truth” at a time to a “let me hold them all in my hands at once” way of being.
Let us return to the angels, to Mary and Joseph, to the shepherds and animals—let us open our hearts to the joy of a baby—not just any baby, but a baby that would bring in the reign of God’s justice and peace. Let us say with the angels, “Glory to God in the highest!” May we all have peace this Christmas season and may joy take us by surprise again and again. Amen and Amen
Reflection Question:
Questions for reflection and study--
1. The distance form Nazareth to Bethlehem was about 70 miles. What would it be like to be Joseph taking that weeklong walk from Nazareth to Bethlehem? For Mary?
2. What, for you, is the significance of the place and circumstances around Jesus’ birth?
3. In reality, shepherds were an outcast group. How do you see “sacred contradictions” working out in the angels’ message to them?
4. The Magi made a long journey to see Jesus. Reflect on your own journey. What have you experienced along the way?
5. Both the shepherds and Magi are fleeting subjects in the story of Jesus’ birth. What impact do you imagine this experience may have had on them?
6. What gifts would you bring or will you bring to Jesus this year?
Sunday, December 5, 2010
ADVENT 2: Hope Revealed: Mary Says "Yes"
Scripture: Luke 1: 26-53 (portions) (TNIV)
In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me according to your word.” Then the angel left her.
At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, where she entered Zechariah’s home and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. In a loud voice she exclaimed: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.”
And Mary said:
“My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for God has been mindful of the humble state of this servant.
From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the Mighty One has done great things for me— holy is God’s name.
Whose mercy extends to those who fear, from generation to generation.
God has performed mighty deeds and scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.
God has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble; filled the hungry with good things, but has sent the rich away empty.”
SERMON: HOPE REVEALED: MARY SAYS "YES"
Every time I turn to the song of Mary, I feel a certain honor at being allowed to share in her words of praise and acceptance—what a precious, private moment—almost painful with anticipation. And I experience, every time, a profound awe as I come to preach on these things. Come with me into the life of this simple Hebrew woman—so willing and ready—so wise and so young. Mary has so much to teach us as we prepare our hearts for the birth of the Savior. She is the first to know what God is up to and the first to say “yes” to God’s plan for the world. Here, in her simple song, Mary shows us the primary truth about God’s wonderful gift and the right and grace-filled response that we must make. Here, in this simple prayer, Mary calls us, as only the Mother of our Savior could call us to find ourselves in right relation with the giver of this great gift.
If Mary, when the angel told her of God’s plan, had responded the way we might respond in our busy-busy and somewhat self-centered world today, it might well sound like this. “Really Gabriel, I don’t have time to do this right now. I’m just 16 and I have my life ahead of me. You should find someone who is better suited, someone who wants to be the Mother of God, for goodness’ sake, someone who knows what they are doing. I just don’t think this is going to work out; it doesn’t fit with what I want for my life.” Or, on a more serious note, Mary could have asked God to release her from a fate that would surely render her an outcast, she could have focused on the trauma that was happening to her by saying, “God, please don’t do this to me—no one will stand beside me. This is too hard. It isn’t fair, it hurts too much. Please take this pain away from me.” But Mary did neither of these things. Mary said, “I am God’s servant, may it happen as you have described.” Mary said “yes!”
What does Mary’s song—or the Magnificat as it is called—say to us, today? We sit here, present to our own doubts and fears and we hear the song of the sweet 16-year-old. But Mary did not sing this song to the angel. After the angel left, the scripture tells us that Mary went to visit Elizabeth, her cousin, who was carrying her own child who would become John the Baptizer. Even in the womb, this baby appears to recognize Jesus, in whose name he would later baptize many. Elizabeth is filled with the Holy Spirit and confirms everything the angel told Mary. Sweet community of two women—both called to bear children who would change the world. Mary, not to be distracted, immediately shifts the attention to what God has done in her life. God has remembered her, known her for who she is, remembered that she is a child of God. Mary knows that she has been chosen by God and says, “from now on all generations will call me blessed”. But lest we think that Mary thinks otherwise, she immediately clarifies she is blessed BECAUSE the Mighty one, Yahweh, has done great things for her and she proclaims “holy is God’s name.” Mary does not let us focus on her place or deeds—she constantly points us towards God. In the remainder of her song, she continues this recitation of God’s actions. In part, she states that Yahweh “has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. Yahweh has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. Yahweh has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty.” All of these statements point us toward the need to be in right relation with this God who is doing a new thing, giving a new gift.
Mary places herself in the context of right relationship and accepts the blessing that God bestows on her because of that right relationship. What can we learn from the simple song of Mary about “right relationship” as we use what she is telling us to open our hearts just a little further this week. “God has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.” Could this not mean that the proud are so filled with boastful and selfish thoughts that they cannot think about the truly important things, the deep, substantial thoughts, those that cause us as God’s children to be in right relationship with each other and with God. No, the proud are scattered in their thoughts—disjointed, separated from God and from each other—too busy thinking about themselves to think about anything else.
“God has brought down the rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble”. Mary knows that God is in control and that God’s people will be saved and lifted up when they are humble. Mary continues along the same thought: “God has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty”. When we come before God, hungry for right relationship, knowing that we are dependent on that relationship, God will fill us with good things. The child Mary conceived, Jesus, our Savior, undeniably showed us the extent to which God would go to redeem and liberate us, but His mother, Mary, this young girl from Nazareth, must first show us the meaning of right relationship with God so that we are in a place where we can receive redemption.
Mary had every reason to reject God’s special call. She was young, engaged and had certain social, religious and communal expectations placed on her. As has been pointed out in many sermons, speeches, and writings, the situation Gabriel proposed for Mary would have been, at best, tenuous, and at worst, devastating. Rather than allowing herself to fall into a chasm of despair and doubt, Mary said “let it be according to your word”. Mary made what appears to be an almost instantaneous decision to accept God’s will for her life. In my time in the ministry, I have read many writings and completed several studies on “discerning God’s will for my life”. When I meditate on Mary’s immediate and unconditional “yes” to God’s call, I wonder when it all became so complicated.
Is it that we THINK too much? Need too many answers? Want it all spelled out in four or five easy steps? Madeleine L’Engle, in her brief and beautiful poem After Annunciation gives us this interpretation of Mary’s response:
This is the irrational season
When love blooms bright and wild.
Had Mary been filled with reason
There’d have been no room for the child.
Even so, we grasp tightly what we falsely believe to be ours. What if Mary had held on to the security of her tiny world in Nazareth? What then? Oh, for the grace to be so lost in worship and praise that we can say, as Mary did, “Yes, let it be according to your word”.
We spoke last week of preparing our hearts anew this year. And, if we are to fully receive and celebrate God’s greatest gift in the birth of Jesus Christ again in our lives and our world, we must ponder Mary’s words and learn from her great wisdom.
I want to leave you with another short poem from Madeleine L’Engle. She writes:
This is no time for a child to be born,
With the earth betrayed by war & hate
And a comet slashing the sky to warn
That time runs out & the sun burns late.
This was no time for a child to be born,
In a land in the crushing grip of Rome:
Honour & truth were trampled by scorn—
Yet here did the Saviour make his home.
When is the time for love to be born?
The inn is full on the planet earth,
And by a comet the sky is torn—
Yet Love still takes the risk of birth.
Will you take the risk that Love takes? The risk to be in right relationship with God, to say “yes” to whatever is asked? To discover at the deepest level that this relationship calls us to know at our core that “it is not about us”—that it is about the promise and gift of God—that our relationship with God is itself a gift—that we are blessed to be visited by God regardless of the nature of God’s request of us. Will you find the time this Christmas to proclaim, “My soul glorifies God and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior”?
O come, Lord Jesus, come…we wait in silence and humility for you to be born in our hearts anew. Amen and amen.
Questions for Sermon Circles:
1. Mary’s life is completely changed in one quick moment. Describe a time in your experience, or in the experience of someone you know, when life’s direction was changed by one event of decision.
2. What was the experience like for Mary—what are some of the words in the passage that help you get an idea of what Mary may have been feeling?
3. At the end of the visit from the angel, what does Mary know about the child she is to bear?
4. Mary and Elizabeth form a small but significant community of women who understand what God is doing. What role does community play in our own understanding of God’s will for us?
5. What does Mary’s song (the last paragraph) tell us about the nature of God?
6. What does Mary’s song tell us about the nature of the Gospel?
7. How do you think you would have responded to the visit from the angel? At 14? At midway through your life? Now?
8. What can we learn about responding to God’s call from the way Mary responded?
In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin’s name was Mary. The angel went to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”
Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”
The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come on you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. So the holy one to be born will be called the Son of God. “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May it be to me according to your word.” Then the angel left her.
At that time Mary got ready and hurried to a town in the hill country of Judea, where she entered Zechariah’s home and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit. In a loud voice she exclaimed: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the child you will bear! As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy.”
And Mary said:
“My soul glorifies the Lord and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
for God has been mindful of the humble state of this servant.
From now on all generations will call me blessed, for the Mighty One has done great things for me— holy is God’s name.
Whose mercy extends to those who fear, from generation to generation.
God has performed mighty deeds and scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.
God has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble; filled the hungry with good things, but has sent the rich away empty.”
SERMON: HOPE REVEALED: MARY SAYS "YES"
Every time I turn to the song of Mary, I feel a certain honor at being allowed to share in her words of praise and acceptance—what a precious, private moment—almost painful with anticipation. And I experience, every time, a profound awe as I come to preach on these things. Come with me into the life of this simple Hebrew woman—so willing and ready—so wise and so young. Mary has so much to teach us as we prepare our hearts for the birth of the Savior. She is the first to know what God is up to and the first to say “yes” to God’s plan for the world. Here, in her simple song, Mary shows us the primary truth about God’s wonderful gift and the right and grace-filled response that we must make. Here, in this simple prayer, Mary calls us, as only the Mother of our Savior could call us to find ourselves in right relation with the giver of this great gift.
If Mary, when the angel told her of God’s plan, had responded the way we might respond in our busy-busy and somewhat self-centered world today, it might well sound like this. “Really Gabriel, I don’t have time to do this right now. I’m just 16 and I have my life ahead of me. You should find someone who is better suited, someone who wants to be the Mother of God, for goodness’ sake, someone who knows what they are doing. I just don’t think this is going to work out; it doesn’t fit with what I want for my life.” Or, on a more serious note, Mary could have asked God to release her from a fate that would surely render her an outcast, she could have focused on the trauma that was happening to her by saying, “God, please don’t do this to me—no one will stand beside me. This is too hard. It isn’t fair, it hurts too much. Please take this pain away from me.” But Mary did neither of these things. Mary said, “I am God’s servant, may it happen as you have described.” Mary said “yes!”
What does Mary’s song—or the Magnificat as it is called—say to us, today? We sit here, present to our own doubts and fears and we hear the song of the sweet 16-year-old. But Mary did not sing this song to the angel. After the angel left, the scripture tells us that Mary went to visit Elizabeth, her cousin, who was carrying her own child who would become John the Baptizer. Even in the womb, this baby appears to recognize Jesus, in whose name he would later baptize many. Elizabeth is filled with the Holy Spirit and confirms everything the angel told Mary. Sweet community of two women—both called to bear children who would change the world. Mary, not to be distracted, immediately shifts the attention to what God has done in her life. God has remembered her, known her for who she is, remembered that she is a child of God. Mary knows that she has been chosen by God and says, “from now on all generations will call me blessed”. But lest we think that Mary thinks otherwise, she immediately clarifies she is blessed BECAUSE the Mighty one, Yahweh, has done great things for her and she proclaims “holy is God’s name.” Mary does not let us focus on her place or deeds—she constantly points us towards God. In the remainder of her song, she continues this recitation of God’s actions. In part, she states that Yahweh “has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts. Yahweh has brought down rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble. Yahweh has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty.” All of these statements point us toward the need to be in right relation with this God who is doing a new thing, giving a new gift.
Mary places herself in the context of right relationship and accepts the blessing that God bestows on her because of that right relationship. What can we learn from the simple song of Mary about “right relationship” as we use what she is telling us to open our hearts just a little further this week. “God has scattered those who are proud in their inmost thoughts.” Could this not mean that the proud are so filled with boastful and selfish thoughts that they cannot think about the truly important things, the deep, substantial thoughts, those that cause us as God’s children to be in right relationship with each other and with God. No, the proud are scattered in their thoughts—disjointed, separated from God and from each other—too busy thinking about themselves to think about anything else.
“God has brought down the rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the humble”. Mary knows that God is in control and that God’s people will be saved and lifted up when they are humble. Mary continues along the same thought: “God has filled the hungry with good things but has sent the rich away empty”. When we come before God, hungry for right relationship, knowing that we are dependent on that relationship, God will fill us with good things. The child Mary conceived, Jesus, our Savior, undeniably showed us the extent to which God would go to redeem and liberate us, but His mother, Mary, this young girl from Nazareth, must first show us the meaning of right relationship with God so that we are in a place where we can receive redemption.
Mary had every reason to reject God’s special call. She was young, engaged and had certain social, religious and communal expectations placed on her. As has been pointed out in many sermons, speeches, and writings, the situation Gabriel proposed for Mary would have been, at best, tenuous, and at worst, devastating. Rather than allowing herself to fall into a chasm of despair and doubt, Mary said “let it be according to your word”. Mary made what appears to be an almost instantaneous decision to accept God’s will for her life. In my time in the ministry, I have read many writings and completed several studies on “discerning God’s will for my life”. When I meditate on Mary’s immediate and unconditional “yes” to God’s call, I wonder when it all became so complicated.
Is it that we THINK too much? Need too many answers? Want it all spelled out in four or five easy steps? Madeleine L’Engle, in her brief and beautiful poem After Annunciation gives us this interpretation of Mary’s response:
This is the irrational season
When love blooms bright and wild.
Had Mary been filled with reason
There’d have been no room for the child.
Even so, we grasp tightly what we falsely believe to be ours. What if Mary had held on to the security of her tiny world in Nazareth? What then? Oh, for the grace to be so lost in worship and praise that we can say, as Mary did, “Yes, let it be according to your word”.
We spoke last week of preparing our hearts anew this year. And, if we are to fully receive and celebrate God’s greatest gift in the birth of Jesus Christ again in our lives and our world, we must ponder Mary’s words and learn from her great wisdom.
I want to leave you with another short poem from Madeleine L’Engle. She writes:
This is no time for a child to be born,
With the earth betrayed by war & hate
And a comet slashing the sky to warn
That time runs out & the sun burns late.
This was no time for a child to be born,
In a land in the crushing grip of Rome:
Honour & truth were trampled by scorn—
Yet here did the Saviour make his home.
When is the time for love to be born?
The inn is full on the planet earth,
And by a comet the sky is torn—
Yet Love still takes the risk of birth.
Will you take the risk that Love takes? The risk to be in right relationship with God, to say “yes” to whatever is asked? To discover at the deepest level that this relationship calls us to know at our core that “it is not about us”—that it is about the promise and gift of God—that our relationship with God is itself a gift—that we are blessed to be visited by God regardless of the nature of God’s request of us. Will you find the time this Christmas to proclaim, “My soul glorifies God and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior”?
O come, Lord Jesus, come…we wait in silence and humility for you to be born in our hearts anew. Amen and amen.
Questions for Sermon Circles:
1. Mary’s life is completely changed in one quick moment. Describe a time in your experience, or in the experience of someone you know, when life’s direction was changed by one event of decision.
2. What was the experience like for Mary—what are some of the words in the passage that help you get an idea of what Mary may have been feeling?
3. At the end of the visit from the angel, what does Mary know about the child she is to bear?
4. Mary and Elizabeth form a small but significant community of women who understand what God is doing. What role does community play in our own understanding of God’s will for us?
5. What does Mary’s song (the last paragraph) tell us about the nature of God?
6. What does Mary’s song tell us about the nature of the Gospel?
7. How do you think you would have responded to the visit from the angel? At 14? At midway through your life? Now?
8. What can we learn about responding to God’s call from the way Mary responded?
Monday, November 29, 2010
Advent 1: Hope Prophesied: A Fresh Start 11-28-2010
Our readings today come from the Prophet Isaiah.
In the 9th chapter, the 2nd verse, Isaiah proclaims this: The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned. And in the 6th verse, Isaiah tells us of this light:
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. And, finally, in the 40th chapter, verses 4 and 5, Isaiah sings God’s promise: Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain.
And the glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all people will see it together. For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
I should just tell you up front that I love Christmas—it’s my favorite time of the year, my favorite music and my favorite time to be in church. Memories are good (even when they weren’t) and something happens to my heart—it feels lighter, simpler, more at peace. And so, I love Christmas—I love decorating, though not as much as Terri loves her santa and snowman on motorcycles inflatables which will soon shock our quiet village of Springdale. I even get into cooking and baking—truly amazing since that is not usually high on my list. And I love sitting in the quiet each night simply looking at the Christmas tree. That is when I quiet my heart and drink in all that 58 years of Christmases has taught me. But alas, it is not Christmas, not quite yet. It is Advent—that time when we prepare our hearts for that delicious peace that falls over much, thought definitely not all, of the world somewhere in the midst of Silent Night!
Many of us did not grow up with Advent Wreaths, or waiting until Christmas Eve to sing Christmas carols. Advent feels like a strange, foreign land that somehow separates us from the joyful time that lies ahead. I didn’t think much myself about Advent , being Southern Baptist and all, until I my journey took me to my Episcopalian decade. And there I discovered the mystical, almost magical aspects of Advent that enriched my Christmastime spiritual journey.
Advent will be different here in Open Circle. For those of you who have been here before, you know that my dream is to continue to develop a community and a worship environment where all can be in relationship to God and find “home” with each other. Advent continues that dream as we build our own traditions, some similar to others you have known, and some a wonderful combination of the many kinds of celebrations and memories we bring to this place. And so, I invite you, most of all, to relax and allow yourself to find newness in old traditions and comfort in new.
Our services for Advent and the Christmas season will focus on Hope—the hope that is in the Light of Jesus’ birth. And so, today, we look at the hope that was prophesied by God’s prophet Isaiah. It’s one of the most famous prophesies—referred to in the New Testament and put to music by composers in every century. “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting God, Prince of Peace. Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain. And the glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all people will see it together. For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” This, then is the light for which we wait.
At least one question remains: why did God think that we, those people walking in darkness, needed time to prepare for the birth of a child? I believe that a creative understanding of the Advent Wreath or Candles gives us a good understanding of the purpose of the Wait. If you google Advent wreath, you will get multiple interpretations…I like them all and refuse to suggest that one is better than the next. What we know, is that is we light an additional candle each week, the light will grow—with the passing of time, one light leads to two which leads to three and then four. The exact meaning assigned to each candle must not let us miss the more significant point: It is the LIGHT that increases. I, for one, take great comfort in the knowledge that I will begin to prepare my heart this week, and next week will become more prepared, until finally, God has me where I need to be—fully open and waiting for the joy that comes in the incarnation of the source of Light, God with us, Emmanuel.
When I first started observing Advent along with other aspects of the Christian liturgical year, a few things bothered my somewhat simple mind. If we were now waiting for Jesus, where did He go in between Thanksgiving and Christmas? You laugh, but to my then fairly linear thinking about my Christian journey, it just didn’t make much sense. And much like the light gradually dawning on God’s people, it eventually made sense to me and I began to see Advent as a time to prepare my heart to grow deeper, to let God further in; and to celebrate the growth of the knowledge of God, my deeper experience of God’s grace, and the ever-increasing inkling that I had only begun to learn of the depth and breadth of God’s plan for me. And, so to take a time each year to deliberately plan for the in-breaking of God into my life and my world suddenly made sense. It was about that same time, you will not be surprised to hear, that Christmas itself took on this wonderful meaning and joy for me as well.
One of my favorite Christmas stories is not specifically Christian at all. It is, however, profoundly, spiritual. How the Grinch Stole Christmas gives us a monsterly Grinch who sneaks into the town of Whoville and decides to steal Christmas—and so into each house he slinks and takes everything that has anything to do with Christmas, toys, food, gifts, everything. And yet, on Christmas morning, what does he hear—singing…he hears singing…and he doesn’t like it one bit. And finally, Dr. Suess lets the light dawn; "And he puzzled three hours, till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before! "Maybe Christmas," he thought, "doesn't come from a store. Maybe Christmas perhaps means a little bit more!"
You see, the spirit of the Whos took the Grinch by surprise. And it is that same spirit of hope which takes us by surprise each year as we turn our thoughts to the meaning of Christmas that goes beyond what we piously call the “real meaning” of Christmas. It takes us by surprise because it defies our rational understanding—we don’t get it, unless we want to. And here, my friends, is Advent—Advent for me and, perhaps, Advent for you. Here is Advent where we question our hearts, where we find the “want to”.
And so, it is true that the so-called meaning of Advent is to focus on the coming of our Lord—to purposefully express our anticipation that a new light will dawn in our hearts, our minds, our priorities and our world. There is an old Catholic family Advent prayer that, with a couple of modifications, says it well for us today: “God in heaven,... increase our longing for Christ our Savior and give us the strength to grow in love, that the dawn of His coming may find us rejoicing in His presence and welcoming the light of His truth.”
You see, I have come to believe that if we do not make a decision to do “Advent”, whatever that looks like, to deliberately and purposefully put aside time to prepare for the coming of Christ again this year into our world, we may miss the dawn of His coming and we may be too busy celebrating Christmas to welcome the light of His truth…that God’s surprise of sending the Light of the World in the form of a baby will pass us by.
And so together we pray a version of an Advent Prayer from the late Fr. Henri Nouwen — so appropriate for the beginning of Advent and this season which can be so frantic. May the Lord indeed help us quiet our hearts and listen for God’s voice each day. May we diligently seek to know God’s presence, rather than allowing our anxious thoughts to distract us and may He tune our ears to hear His counsel. Lord Jesus, Ruler of both the light and the darkness, send your Holy Spirit upon our preparations for Christmas. We who have so much to do seek quiet spaces to hear your voice each day. We who are anxious over many things look forward to your coming among us. We who are blessed in so many ways long for the complete joy of your kingdom. We whose hearts are heavy seek the joy of your presence. We are your people, walking in darkness, yet seeking the light. To you we say, “Come Lord Jesus!” Amen and Amen.
In the 9th chapter, the 2nd verse, Isaiah proclaims this: The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned. And in the 6th verse, Isaiah tells us of this light:
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. And, finally, in the 40th chapter, verses 4 and 5, Isaiah sings God’s promise: Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain.
And the glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all people will see it together. For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”
I should just tell you up front that I love Christmas—it’s my favorite time of the year, my favorite music and my favorite time to be in church. Memories are good (even when they weren’t) and something happens to my heart—it feels lighter, simpler, more at peace. And so, I love Christmas—I love decorating, though not as much as Terri loves her santa and snowman on motorcycles inflatables which will soon shock our quiet village of Springdale. I even get into cooking and baking—truly amazing since that is not usually high on my list. And I love sitting in the quiet each night simply looking at the Christmas tree. That is when I quiet my heart and drink in all that 58 years of Christmases has taught me. But alas, it is not Christmas, not quite yet. It is Advent—that time when we prepare our hearts for that delicious peace that falls over much, thought definitely not all, of the world somewhere in the midst of Silent Night!
Many of us did not grow up with Advent Wreaths, or waiting until Christmas Eve to sing Christmas carols. Advent feels like a strange, foreign land that somehow separates us from the joyful time that lies ahead. I didn’t think much myself about Advent , being Southern Baptist and all, until I my journey took me to my Episcopalian decade. And there I discovered the mystical, almost magical aspects of Advent that enriched my Christmastime spiritual journey.
Advent will be different here in Open Circle. For those of you who have been here before, you know that my dream is to continue to develop a community and a worship environment where all can be in relationship to God and find “home” with each other. Advent continues that dream as we build our own traditions, some similar to others you have known, and some a wonderful combination of the many kinds of celebrations and memories we bring to this place. And so, I invite you, most of all, to relax and allow yourself to find newness in old traditions and comfort in new.
Our services for Advent and the Christmas season will focus on Hope—the hope that is in the Light of Jesus’ birth. And so, today, we look at the hope that was prophesied by God’s prophet Isaiah. It’s one of the most famous prophesies—referred to in the New Testament and put to music by composers in every century. “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting God, Prince of Peace. Every valley shall be raised up, every mountain and hill made low; the rough ground shall become level, the rugged places a plain. And the glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all people will see it together. For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.” This, then is the light for which we wait.
At least one question remains: why did God think that we, those people walking in darkness, needed time to prepare for the birth of a child? I believe that a creative understanding of the Advent Wreath or Candles gives us a good understanding of the purpose of the Wait. If you google Advent wreath, you will get multiple interpretations…I like them all and refuse to suggest that one is better than the next. What we know, is that is we light an additional candle each week, the light will grow—with the passing of time, one light leads to two which leads to three and then four. The exact meaning assigned to each candle must not let us miss the more significant point: It is the LIGHT that increases. I, for one, take great comfort in the knowledge that I will begin to prepare my heart this week, and next week will become more prepared, until finally, God has me where I need to be—fully open and waiting for the joy that comes in the incarnation of the source of Light, God with us, Emmanuel.
When I first started observing Advent along with other aspects of the Christian liturgical year, a few things bothered my somewhat simple mind. If we were now waiting for Jesus, where did He go in between Thanksgiving and Christmas? You laugh, but to my then fairly linear thinking about my Christian journey, it just didn’t make much sense. And much like the light gradually dawning on God’s people, it eventually made sense to me and I began to see Advent as a time to prepare my heart to grow deeper, to let God further in; and to celebrate the growth of the knowledge of God, my deeper experience of God’s grace, and the ever-increasing inkling that I had only begun to learn of the depth and breadth of God’s plan for me. And, so to take a time each year to deliberately plan for the in-breaking of God into my life and my world suddenly made sense. It was about that same time, you will not be surprised to hear, that Christmas itself took on this wonderful meaning and joy for me as well.
One of my favorite Christmas stories is not specifically Christian at all. It is, however, profoundly, spiritual. How the Grinch Stole Christmas gives us a monsterly Grinch who sneaks into the town of Whoville and decides to steal Christmas—and so into each house he slinks and takes everything that has anything to do with Christmas, toys, food, gifts, everything. And yet, on Christmas morning, what does he hear—singing…he hears singing…and he doesn’t like it one bit. And finally, Dr. Suess lets the light dawn; "And he puzzled three hours, till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before! "Maybe Christmas," he thought, "doesn't come from a store. Maybe Christmas perhaps means a little bit more!"
You see, the spirit of the Whos took the Grinch by surprise. And it is that same spirit of hope which takes us by surprise each year as we turn our thoughts to the meaning of Christmas that goes beyond what we piously call the “real meaning” of Christmas. It takes us by surprise because it defies our rational understanding—we don’t get it, unless we want to. And here, my friends, is Advent—Advent for me and, perhaps, Advent for you. Here is Advent where we question our hearts, where we find the “want to”.
And so, it is true that the so-called meaning of Advent is to focus on the coming of our Lord—to purposefully express our anticipation that a new light will dawn in our hearts, our minds, our priorities and our world. There is an old Catholic family Advent prayer that, with a couple of modifications, says it well for us today: “God in heaven,... increase our longing for Christ our Savior and give us the strength to grow in love, that the dawn of His coming may find us rejoicing in His presence and welcoming the light of His truth.”
You see, I have come to believe that if we do not make a decision to do “Advent”, whatever that looks like, to deliberately and purposefully put aside time to prepare for the coming of Christ again this year into our world, we may miss the dawn of His coming and we may be too busy celebrating Christmas to welcome the light of His truth…that God’s surprise of sending the Light of the World in the form of a baby will pass us by.
And so together we pray a version of an Advent Prayer from the late Fr. Henri Nouwen — so appropriate for the beginning of Advent and this season which can be so frantic. May the Lord indeed help us quiet our hearts and listen for God’s voice each day. May we diligently seek to know God’s presence, rather than allowing our anxious thoughts to distract us and may He tune our ears to hear His counsel. Lord Jesus, Ruler of both the light and the darkness, send your Holy Spirit upon our preparations for Christmas. We who have so much to do seek quiet spaces to hear your voice each day. We who are anxious over many things look forward to your coming among us. We who are blessed in so many ways long for the complete joy of your kingdom. We whose hearts are heavy seek the joy of your presence. We are your people, walking in darkness, yet seeking the light. To you we say, “Come Lord Jesus!” Amen and Amen.
Monday, November 22, 2010
The Altitude of Gratitude--Thanks (for Everything)! 11-21-2010
Scripture: Matthew 5: 13-16
"You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by everyone.
"You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house.
"Let your light shine on this earth in such a way that all may see your good works, and glorify God, your Creator, who is in heaven.
Happy Thanksgiving--although the stores look more like Christmas and the snowflake street decorations are rapidly being hung everywhere you look. Did you ever wonder why we hang snowflakes in Leesburg? Wouldn’t that be like hanging palm trees in Boston? Anyway, I, for one, am going to hang on to Thanksgiving and refuse to let it get lost in the rush to make it to Christmas. I haven’t always appreciated Thanksgiving like I do now. For years I lived too far from family to make it home for Thanksgiving and so I celebrated Thanksgiving with whichever friend forced me to share their abundance, really preferring to spend a quiet day at home either alone or with my partner, when that was the case. This year, I’m happy to say, feels different. I find myself so profoundly grateful for everything that God is doing in my life and in the life of this church, that I look forward to the celebration and treasure the time we have together to express our thanks on this day.
You may have wondered about the scripture lesson chosen for today—not particularly about gratitude, but perhaps it is. This passage follows the beatitudes in Jesus’ sermon on the mount. Those same beatitudes were our centering meditation today. Many commentators believe that in our passage for today about salt and light Jesus describes our best response to the blessings of life just described in the Beatitudes. And so, what better way to celebrate Thanksgiving, indeed! Jesus tells us of the responsibility that goes along with receiving those blessings. We are all called to this responsibility, all of us who share in the blessings. The salt of the earth and the light of the world—this is who we are called to be.
And here is where we find the altitude of gratitude. We are not called to be merely a part of this world—we are called to a higher calling—we are called to change the world itself by our presence. And you thought, I would never get to the altitude of gratitude—here it is in this higher calling! A calling that places us in a special responsibility to make a difference in our world!
What is salt? When added to food, it both preserves it and gives it taste. Food without salt is considered so bland that millions have been spent by the condiment industry to develop salt substitutes for those who should not eat salt—but those substitutes are just that—never quite the same—mostly pointing out why we need salt in the first place. For centuries, salt was used as a preservative in all kinds of meats and other foods, and indeed still is. We talk about people we admire greatly as the “salt of the earth” and Jesus calls us all to be just that. In gratitude for blessings already received, we return the blessing, we pay it forward, by caring about our earth—we work towards reconciliation where there is discord, we give hope where there is none and we point to the meaning of life at a time when many despair. In other words, we give to life the taste of the blessings that Jesus says are ours when we are part of the reign of God on this earth.
Now I will admit to you that I have a pet peeve, and that pet peeve has to do with well-meaning Christians who focus all their energy on thinking about what it will be like in heaven—I respectfully and lovingly say to them, “You’re missing the point!” Jesus calls us clearly to make a difference in this world. That’s what I like about some of the old hymns—hymns like “I’ll Fly Away!” that we just sang with gusto. “Some glad morning when this life is o’er—I’ll fly away”. When this life is over—not now—not when I am still busy doing God’s work but when my work on this earth is done. So the altitude of gratitude is found in this higher calling—this bringing taste to this world—this transformation of life on this earth from bland sameness to the exciting in-breaking of God’s reign on this earth—this day, this time!
In this same passage, Jesus also calls us to be the light of the world. Some translations render this calling to be the “light for ALL the world”. The metaphor of light is used in both the old and new testaments. We, in the era of bright manufactured lighting have a hard time truly understanding the importance of light—why, if it’s dark, we just flip a switch and, poof, it’s light. But in the ancient world, when the sun went down and the moon was new, it was dark, really dark and so light and the lamp stands on which that light is placed take on a special importance. It is to that level of importance that Jesus challenges us to light the world—not merely shedding additional light—but to shine light into the deepest of darkness, to illuminate those corners where light never shines—to root out injustice from the recesses of our world. Jesus says, with logic that pierces all our excuses for inactivity: No one lights a light and puts it under a basket—no, they light a lamp to give light to the whole house.
Next week we begin Advent—the four weeks before the coming of the Christ child. For those four weeks, we will look together at what it means to “come to the Light”. The prophet Isaiah calls the people of God like this: “Arise, shine, for your light has come!” In the beatitudes we see a God who comforts those who mourn, cares for the weak, and satisfies the needs of the poor and hungry. To be grateful, is to be a light into this same world, where God satisfies our needs. To be grateful, is to work to right the injustice that brings darkness into this world—to be grateful is to be the reign of God on this earth!
How does this get us to Thanksgiving? Walter Brueggemann, once a seminary professor and now a contributor to the writings of the social justice organization, Sojourners, says this about Thanksgiving: “It is characteristic in American Thanksgiving that we look back and remember the pilgrims and God's providential care for them. Lodged next to Advent, Thanksgiving is not only for remembering; it waits and it expects. Faithful gratitude believes that the God who has given good gifts has more good gifts to give. While God’s gifts are welcome, in fact they do disrupt” Bruuggemann challenges us to see that God’s gift of justice and truth interrupt our complacency in the face of worldwide injustice. God’s generosity calls us to face our own self-centeredness and God’s merciful love flies in the face or our own indifference to the rest of the world. One final quote sums it up for those of us who care. Brueggeman says, “God’s gifts amount to an inconvenient reality among us”… He goes on to suggest that God’s gifts remind us that what we think of as “normal”—that is that certain people have, and certain people have not, is not normal at all and that being light in this world demands that we expose just how far from normal those kinds of injustices are within the reign of God’s justice.
Perhaps one of the best thoughts on giving thanks comes from the former Secretary General of the United Nations, Dag Hammarskjold: He said: For all that has been -- thanks!
For all that will be -- yes! Gratitude is the gift of the eternal “yes”—yes to what we have been given and yes to what we have to give. Gratitude, born of the knowledge that we are all interdependent, teaches us that what we do here in this place has the ability to touch those struggling to eat in towns and cities close at hand and far away. Gratitude lends its recognition of the importance of all those who have come before. As proof that the truly great are almost always the most humble, Albert Schweitzer had much to say about gratitude. And he understood that we are to bring light to this world. He also understood that we cannot do it alone. Here is what he said: “At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.”
Say “yes” to gratitude this Thanksgiving! Say “yes” and be the light of the world! Say “yes” and reach out to kindle or re-kindle the light of every person with whom you come in contact. At Thanksgiving and throughout Advent, be the salt that brings God’s love into the world; say “yes” and “yes” and “yes”! Amen and amen and yes!
"You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by everyone.
"You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house.
"Let your light shine on this earth in such a way that all may see your good works, and glorify God, your Creator, who is in heaven.
Happy Thanksgiving--although the stores look more like Christmas and the snowflake street decorations are rapidly being hung everywhere you look. Did you ever wonder why we hang snowflakes in Leesburg? Wouldn’t that be like hanging palm trees in Boston? Anyway, I, for one, am going to hang on to Thanksgiving and refuse to let it get lost in the rush to make it to Christmas. I haven’t always appreciated Thanksgiving like I do now. For years I lived too far from family to make it home for Thanksgiving and so I celebrated Thanksgiving with whichever friend forced me to share their abundance, really preferring to spend a quiet day at home either alone or with my partner, when that was the case. This year, I’m happy to say, feels different. I find myself so profoundly grateful for everything that God is doing in my life and in the life of this church, that I look forward to the celebration and treasure the time we have together to express our thanks on this day.
You may have wondered about the scripture lesson chosen for today—not particularly about gratitude, but perhaps it is. This passage follows the beatitudes in Jesus’ sermon on the mount. Those same beatitudes were our centering meditation today. Many commentators believe that in our passage for today about salt and light Jesus describes our best response to the blessings of life just described in the Beatitudes. And so, what better way to celebrate Thanksgiving, indeed! Jesus tells us of the responsibility that goes along with receiving those blessings. We are all called to this responsibility, all of us who share in the blessings. The salt of the earth and the light of the world—this is who we are called to be.
And here is where we find the altitude of gratitude. We are not called to be merely a part of this world—we are called to a higher calling—we are called to change the world itself by our presence. And you thought, I would never get to the altitude of gratitude—here it is in this higher calling! A calling that places us in a special responsibility to make a difference in our world!
What is salt? When added to food, it both preserves it and gives it taste. Food without salt is considered so bland that millions have been spent by the condiment industry to develop salt substitutes for those who should not eat salt—but those substitutes are just that—never quite the same—mostly pointing out why we need salt in the first place. For centuries, salt was used as a preservative in all kinds of meats and other foods, and indeed still is. We talk about people we admire greatly as the “salt of the earth” and Jesus calls us all to be just that. In gratitude for blessings already received, we return the blessing, we pay it forward, by caring about our earth—we work towards reconciliation where there is discord, we give hope where there is none and we point to the meaning of life at a time when many despair. In other words, we give to life the taste of the blessings that Jesus says are ours when we are part of the reign of God on this earth.
Now I will admit to you that I have a pet peeve, and that pet peeve has to do with well-meaning Christians who focus all their energy on thinking about what it will be like in heaven—I respectfully and lovingly say to them, “You’re missing the point!” Jesus calls us clearly to make a difference in this world. That’s what I like about some of the old hymns—hymns like “I’ll Fly Away!” that we just sang with gusto. “Some glad morning when this life is o’er—I’ll fly away”. When this life is over—not now—not when I am still busy doing God’s work but when my work on this earth is done. So the altitude of gratitude is found in this higher calling—this bringing taste to this world—this transformation of life on this earth from bland sameness to the exciting in-breaking of God’s reign on this earth—this day, this time!
In this same passage, Jesus also calls us to be the light of the world. Some translations render this calling to be the “light for ALL the world”. The metaphor of light is used in both the old and new testaments. We, in the era of bright manufactured lighting have a hard time truly understanding the importance of light—why, if it’s dark, we just flip a switch and, poof, it’s light. But in the ancient world, when the sun went down and the moon was new, it was dark, really dark and so light and the lamp stands on which that light is placed take on a special importance. It is to that level of importance that Jesus challenges us to light the world—not merely shedding additional light—but to shine light into the deepest of darkness, to illuminate those corners where light never shines—to root out injustice from the recesses of our world. Jesus says, with logic that pierces all our excuses for inactivity: No one lights a light and puts it under a basket—no, they light a lamp to give light to the whole house.
Next week we begin Advent—the four weeks before the coming of the Christ child. For those four weeks, we will look together at what it means to “come to the Light”. The prophet Isaiah calls the people of God like this: “Arise, shine, for your light has come!” In the beatitudes we see a God who comforts those who mourn, cares for the weak, and satisfies the needs of the poor and hungry. To be grateful, is to be a light into this same world, where God satisfies our needs. To be grateful, is to work to right the injustice that brings darkness into this world—to be grateful is to be the reign of God on this earth!
How does this get us to Thanksgiving? Walter Brueggemann, once a seminary professor and now a contributor to the writings of the social justice organization, Sojourners, says this about Thanksgiving: “It is characteristic in American Thanksgiving that we look back and remember the pilgrims and God's providential care for them. Lodged next to Advent, Thanksgiving is not only for remembering; it waits and it expects. Faithful gratitude believes that the God who has given good gifts has more good gifts to give. While God’s gifts are welcome, in fact they do disrupt” Bruuggemann challenges us to see that God’s gift of justice and truth interrupt our complacency in the face of worldwide injustice. God’s generosity calls us to face our own self-centeredness and God’s merciful love flies in the face or our own indifference to the rest of the world. One final quote sums it up for those of us who care. Brueggeman says, “God’s gifts amount to an inconvenient reality among us”… He goes on to suggest that God’s gifts remind us that what we think of as “normal”—that is that certain people have, and certain people have not, is not normal at all and that being light in this world demands that we expose just how far from normal those kinds of injustices are within the reign of God’s justice.
Perhaps one of the best thoughts on giving thanks comes from the former Secretary General of the United Nations, Dag Hammarskjold: He said: For all that has been -- thanks!
For all that will be -- yes! Gratitude is the gift of the eternal “yes”—yes to what we have been given and yes to what we have to give. Gratitude, born of the knowledge that we are all interdependent, teaches us that what we do here in this place has the ability to touch those struggling to eat in towns and cities close at hand and far away. Gratitude lends its recognition of the importance of all those who have come before. As proof that the truly great are almost always the most humble, Albert Schweitzer had much to say about gratitude. And he understood that we are to bring light to this world. He also understood that we cannot do it alone. Here is what he said: “At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.”
Say “yes” to gratitude this Thanksgiving! Say “yes” and be the light of the world! Say “yes” and reach out to kindle or re-kindle the light of every person with whom you come in contact. At Thanksgiving and throughout Advent, be the salt that brings God’s love into the world; say “yes” and “yes” and “yes”! Amen and amen and yes!
Friday, November 19, 2010
The Attitude of Gratitude: Thanks (Again)! 11-14-2010
Isaiah 12: 1-6: You will say in that day: I will give thanks to you, O LORD, for though you were angry with me, your anger turned away, and you comforted me. Surely God is my salvation; I will trust, and will not be afraid, for the LORD GOD is my strength and my might; God has become my salvation. With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation. And you will say in that day: Give thanks to the LORD, call on God’s name; make known all the deeds of God among the nations; proclaim that God’s name is exalted. Sing praises to the LORD, for God has done gloriously; let this be known in all the earth. Shout aloud and sing for joy, O royal Zion, for great in your midst is the Holy One of Israel.
I used to think that the surest way to identify someone with gratitude was to know if they wanted to give back. Now I’m beginning to think that the easiest way to know if someone is grateful is to ask them about what they plan to do in the future. I think that, most of the time, we really don’t have the ability to repay folks for what they have done and we certainly don’t have the ability to repay God. So what’s a grateful person to do? According to our prophet, Isaiah, they invest in the future from the wellspring of gratitude for the past.
Last week we talked about learning gratitude—of gaining an aptitude for gratitude. This week in our continuing series, we are looking at what an attitude of gratitude looks like to the naked eye. Plain and simple, the attitude of gratitude results in action—the action of changing the world. Now less you think that Carol has gone all “corny” as the holiday season approaches, let me tell you what I mean.
Gratitude that does not result in action is merely a mental and spiritual exercise. It is about feeling and it is about us. It is a good place to start. It is not a good place to end. Ultimately, gratitude is not about us. Gratitude is about bursting forth from that place of thankfulness to pass on the gospel of God’s radical goodness and love that we experience every time we are truly grateful. And that, my friends, is a gratitude that can’t keep quiet.
This is exactly the point of our scripture this morning. Isaiah 12 is a song of praise to God; and, more importantly, it follows Isaiah 11. After the first 10 chapters of Isaiah where he describes the judgment of God on a sinning Israel, chapter 11 describes what God’s reign of peace will look like. In Isaiah 11, God promises to raise up a new leader, most likely, the messiah. Then Isaiah describes what the reign of God’s justice under the leadership of this new leader will look like. This new reign of God will transform relationships between people and societies and the peace is described symbolically as animals who usually hate each other lie down together in peace. You know, lions and calves, wolves and lambs, cows and bears…and this change will come about because “the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord.” The prophet knows that this change comes about through the work of God’s spirit, but that God’s people, if they are led by the spirit, can bring this change into the world through their very actions. And here is where we hear the prophet say—“At that time you will say; “I will praise you, Lord.” And concludes with, “Let all the world know what God has done. Shouth and sing for joy, those whom God loves, because Yahweh, your God, does great things before your eyes. “
Notice that Isaiah does not say, sit here and enjoy this sense of gratefulness—no, he says “Let the world know!!!” As we receive our ongoing salvation from the well of God’s grace and love with joy, we go forth to spread the news to “the whole world.” Looking forward, not backward, we seek ways to do just that. And so, as God’s people, our attitude of gratitude causes us to pay forward rather than pay back, as we look for adequate ways to say ‘thank you’ to God and to each other.
I suspect that most of you know about the book, movie, and even foundation called “Paying It Forward”. It starts with an assignment to a bunch of junior high students to figure out how to change the world. And one child, Trevor, gets it. Setting out to do good, he encourages others to do good to someone else to repay his kindness; and, in the movie, people do just that. It’s a pyramid of gratitude resulting in small kindnesses which multiply literally exponentially. It’s a simple premise—you do good to three people, each of those people does good to three people, now you are at nine; and each of those nine people do good to 3 people and, almost without trying 27 people’s lives have been impacted. We’ve almost reached the end of my multiplying talents, but you get the point.
This past week, we celebrated Veterans’ Day and as I was praying and thinking on this sermon, I began to think about how veterans paid it forward with their very lives. President John F. Kennedy said this about gratitude: “As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.” This week as we said “thank you” to veterans and those still serving, we live those words by doing good in our own way in the world. We have a lot to learn from veterans, and teachers, and nurses, among others. All of these people pay it forward every day. Out of the veteran’s gratitude for freedom comes the courage to serve. Out of the teacher’s gratitude for knowledge and education comes the ability to lead little and not so little children on the path of learning. Out of our nurses’ gratitude for health and wholeness comes their passion for helping others regain their health.
Each of us, in our own way, pay it forward with our lives, leaving a legacy, if you will. About 2/3 of the way through my 25 year career in child welfare. I made a conscious decision to focus on the legacy that I was leaving behind me knowing that there would come a time when those who had worked for and with me would be doing the primary work. I went out of my way to find young, competent, workers to train and to, hopefully, pass on my passion for helping children and parents that was born from my own gratitude to those adults in my life who had long ago told this little girl that they cared.
We are, here together, doing the same thing, here in Open Circle. Planting a new church is the ultimate legacy leaving. We build not only for ourselves, but we build for future generations of LGBT and other marginalized people who will want and need a place to find the gospel of radical acceptance and extravagant welcome that we already experience every week. And I believe that our passion for building this church body comes from our gratitude for having found such a place. You are a generous and loving congregation—more generous and loving that I have ever experienced—you pay it forward every week. Someday this church will not be planning its first anniversary, it will be planning its twentieth. I want to pause for a moment and let that sink in—20, 30, 40 years and more from now, people, including some, at least a few, of us, will be sitting here celebrating the legacy that this very room full of people left to them. That feels sweet, indeed!
But think with me for a moment about what would happen if we decided to become more conscious and deliberate in our paying forward. Right here, right now! What if I challenge each of you to find three people or families between now and Christmas to deliberately seek out to do good with? That, in itself, will be life-changing for all of us—but here’s the thing—in order to start a movement, you must respond to their thanks with a challenge for them to pay it forward as well. As I told you my math skills are limited, but even by my rough calculations, if the cycle was repeated once every week between now and the end of the year, over 2100 people would be touched by each one of us by our first acts of gratitude. That means if most of us participate, more than 100,000 people will be touched by our initial acts of generosity between now and the dawn of 2011. Think of the power we hold in our hands. Last week, the choir sang “More love, more power, more of You in my life”. This, my friends is that love and power. And so, after praying about it, I have decided to give all of us just such a challenge. We have the power to change the lives of over 100,000 folks in the Lake, Sumter, and Marion county area! And as we share what is happening with each other, we start a revolution of gratitude right here, right now.
And so, my friends, today we put feet and hands to our gratitude. We say thank you for all that we enjoy by walking boldly forward, out of our comfort zones of quiet meditative thanksgiving into the world at large, at least our world at large right where we live. And we call each other to come along with these words: “Let all the world know what God has done!” Amen and amen.
I used to think that the surest way to identify someone with gratitude was to know if they wanted to give back. Now I’m beginning to think that the easiest way to know if someone is grateful is to ask them about what they plan to do in the future. I think that, most of the time, we really don’t have the ability to repay folks for what they have done and we certainly don’t have the ability to repay God. So what’s a grateful person to do? According to our prophet, Isaiah, they invest in the future from the wellspring of gratitude for the past.
Last week we talked about learning gratitude—of gaining an aptitude for gratitude. This week in our continuing series, we are looking at what an attitude of gratitude looks like to the naked eye. Plain and simple, the attitude of gratitude results in action—the action of changing the world. Now less you think that Carol has gone all “corny” as the holiday season approaches, let me tell you what I mean.
Gratitude that does not result in action is merely a mental and spiritual exercise. It is about feeling and it is about us. It is a good place to start. It is not a good place to end. Ultimately, gratitude is not about us. Gratitude is about bursting forth from that place of thankfulness to pass on the gospel of God’s radical goodness and love that we experience every time we are truly grateful. And that, my friends, is a gratitude that can’t keep quiet.
This is exactly the point of our scripture this morning. Isaiah 12 is a song of praise to God; and, more importantly, it follows Isaiah 11. After the first 10 chapters of Isaiah where he describes the judgment of God on a sinning Israel, chapter 11 describes what God’s reign of peace will look like. In Isaiah 11, God promises to raise up a new leader, most likely, the messiah. Then Isaiah describes what the reign of God’s justice under the leadership of this new leader will look like. This new reign of God will transform relationships between people and societies and the peace is described symbolically as animals who usually hate each other lie down together in peace. You know, lions and calves, wolves and lambs, cows and bears…and this change will come about because “the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord.” The prophet knows that this change comes about through the work of God’s spirit, but that God’s people, if they are led by the spirit, can bring this change into the world through their very actions. And here is where we hear the prophet say—“At that time you will say; “I will praise you, Lord.” And concludes with, “Let all the world know what God has done. Shouth and sing for joy, those whom God loves, because Yahweh, your God, does great things before your eyes. “
Notice that Isaiah does not say, sit here and enjoy this sense of gratefulness—no, he says “Let the world know!!!” As we receive our ongoing salvation from the well of God’s grace and love with joy, we go forth to spread the news to “the whole world.” Looking forward, not backward, we seek ways to do just that. And so, as God’s people, our attitude of gratitude causes us to pay forward rather than pay back, as we look for adequate ways to say ‘thank you’ to God and to each other.
I suspect that most of you know about the book, movie, and even foundation called “Paying It Forward”. It starts with an assignment to a bunch of junior high students to figure out how to change the world. And one child, Trevor, gets it. Setting out to do good, he encourages others to do good to someone else to repay his kindness; and, in the movie, people do just that. It’s a pyramid of gratitude resulting in small kindnesses which multiply literally exponentially. It’s a simple premise—you do good to three people, each of those people does good to three people, now you are at nine; and each of those nine people do good to 3 people and, almost without trying 27 people’s lives have been impacted. We’ve almost reached the end of my multiplying talents, but you get the point.
This past week, we celebrated Veterans’ Day and as I was praying and thinking on this sermon, I began to think about how veterans paid it forward with their very lives. President John F. Kennedy said this about gratitude: “As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.” This week as we said “thank you” to veterans and those still serving, we live those words by doing good in our own way in the world. We have a lot to learn from veterans, and teachers, and nurses, among others. All of these people pay it forward every day. Out of the veteran’s gratitude for freedom comes the courage to serve. Out of the teacher’s gratitude for knowledge and education comes the ability to lead little and not so little children on the path of learning. Out of our nurses’ gratitude for health and wholeness comes their passion for helping others regain their health.
Each of us, in our own way, pay it forward with our lives, leaving a legacy, if you will. About 2/3 of the way through my 25 year career in child welfare. I made a conscious decision to focus on the legacy that I was leaving behind me knowing that there would come a time when those who had worked for and with me would be doing the primary work. I went out of my way to find young, competent, workers to train and to, hopefully, pass on my passion for helping children and parents that was born from my own gratitude to those adults in my life who had long ago told this little girl that they cared.
We are, here together, doing the same thing, here in Open Circle. Planting a new church is the ultimate legacy leaving. We build not only for ourselves, but we build for future generations of LGBT and other marginalized people who will want and need a place to find the gospel of radical acceptance and extravagant welcome that we already experience every week. And I believe that our passion for building this church body comes from our gratitude for having found such a place. You are a generous and loving congregation—more generous and loving that I have ever experienced—you pay it forward every week. Someday this church will not be planning its first anniversary, it will be planning its twentieth. I want to pause for a moment and let that sink in—20, 30, 40 years and more from now, people, including some, at least a few, of us, will be sitting here celebrating the legacy that this very room full of people left to them. That feels sweet, indeed!
But think with me for a moment about what would happen if we decided to become more conscious and deliberate in our paying forward. Right here, right now! What if I challenge each of you to find three people or families between now and Christmas to deliberately seek out to do good with? That, in itself, will be life-changing for all of us—but here’s the thing—in order to start a movement, you must respond to their thanks with a challenge for them to pay it forward as well. As I told you my math skills are limited, but even by my rough calculations, if the cycle was repeated once every week between now and the end of the year, over 2100 people would be touched by each one of us by our first acts of gratitude. That means if most of us participate, more than 100,000 people will be touched by our initial acts of generosity between now and the dawn of 2011. Think of the power we hold in our hands. Last week, the choir sang “More love, more power, more of You in my life”. This, my friends is that love and power. And so, after praying about it, I have decided to give all of us just such a challenge. We have the power to change the lives of over 100,000 folks in the Lake, Sumter, and Marion county area! And as we share what is happening with each other, we start a revolution of gratitude right here, right now.
And so, my friends, today we put feet and hands to our gratitude. We say thank you for all that we enjoy by walking boldly forward, out of our comfort zones of quiet meditative thanksgiving into the world at large, at least our world at large right where we live. And we call each other to come along with these words: “Let all the world know what God has done!” Amen and amen.
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
"The Aptitude for Gratitude: Thanks (A lot!)
Reading: John 6: 3-13
Then Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat down with his disciples. The Jewish Passover Festival was near. When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?” He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “It would take almost a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!” Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up, “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?” Jesus said, “have the people sit down.” There was plenty of grass in that place and they sat down (about five thousand men were there). Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the same with the fish. When they had all had enough to eat, he said to his disciples, “Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted.” So they gathered them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten.
Lord, lead us in the way of gratitude—fill our spirits with a longing to thank you and each other for all that graces our lives, indeed for all our life of grace. Amen
Here we are in November—the month traditionally connected to harvest, and coming together to say “thank you” to God and maybe even “thank you” to each other. And every time I think of the season of gratitude, I think of singing songs like “Come ye thankful people, come” or “We gather together” in the old country church I attended as a child and I think of times from my past where 30 some odd relatives would gather round long tables and pass the bowls of mashed potatoes and dressing and green beans canned earlier in the fall from my grandmother’s garden. And I wonder “what happened to the season of gratitude?” With Christmas already upon us in the stores, it seems to get lost between the ghosts of Halloween and the angels of Christmas. But I want to tell you, that the experience of moving to The Villages and starting this church has, quite frankly, completely transformed my commitment to learning the fine art of gratitude and to understanding the role it plays in spiritual and emotional maturity—the blessings generated by gratitude that come and will continue to come as we grow together as people and as a church. To that end, I decided to spend the first three Sundays in November talking about gratitude. This week, I want to look at an aptitude for gratitude or put another way, “how can I learn to be grateful for each moment of my life”? I’m not really sure that many of us are born grateful. And I well remember my mother complaining because her grandchildren failed to write her ‘thank you’ notes when her children (yes, that would include me) were taught better. She was right, I was taught to say “thank you” and to even compose lovely thank you notes—I’m not so sure about the gratitude part, I think that may come with a certain amount of reflection and struggle. By the way, the old country church now masquerades as a small time mega-church and the only time my relatives all come together is when somebody dies. So much for the romantic times gone by—but my own gratitude journey began there and was nurtured there and it continues to reflect that primitive gratitude today.
Let’s look at what Jesus showed the folk about gratitude in today’s scripture. Look at the scene with me—over 5,000 men and since the women and children weren’t even counted, there was more than likely at least twice that many people gathered in that Woodstockian gathering on the hillside. But there was no planning for this gathering—no caterers, or food trucks, no bottles of water, no nothing; oh, and no money to send out for supplies—only one small boy whose caring mother had packed him a lunch for the day. 5 loaves of bread and two fishes—even the disciple who brought the child’s lunch to the attention of Jesus thought it was useless. But Jesus knew better. He knew that in expressing gratitude for the food (he gave thanks) the miracle would occur. And so we have, in this story of amazing proportions, proof that the presence of gratitude radically alters our lives.
Melody Beattie, author of numerous books for those dealing with disastrous childhoods, painful presents, and uncertain aftershocks of trauma and terror says this about gratitude: “Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.”
Would not Jesus agree with her? He knew that the act of gratitude would bring all that was needed to meet the hunger of these many thousand people—in fact, he had them sit down before he even said thanks. That was a daring and dangerous act, an act that said to these people, something good is coming—God is going to deliver what we need—you sit down and be ready for it. We see it as a huge risk—Jesus saw it as the logical thing to do, given that he believed in God’s ability to satisfy our every need. For Jesus, gratitude was both the logical consequence of belief and the very act that brought his belief into being. This is a hard thing for us to grasp. And so, we must learn to equate gratitude with belief in God’s ability to meet our every need and, indeed, we struggle as we learn.
Come with me to that hillside where Jesus moves to the rhythm of God’s constant presence. For Jesus, the presence of God is everywhere—and how do we get there for ourselves? Albert Schweitzer, one of the world’s true saints draws our attention to the need to learn gratitude: “To educate yourself for the feeling of gratitude means to take nothing for granted, but to always seek out and value the kind that will stand behind the action. Nothing that is done for you is a matter of course. Everything originates in a will for the good, which is directed at you.”
What do you think would happen if we learned to be constantly grateful—to see the proof of God’s grace to us—to know that all of earth and heaven was put here for our pleasure? I believe that our lives would be so radically changed that we would see new people in the mirror each morning as we allowed God to teach us more and more about the wonder of God’s love reaching out to provide all that we need.
Sarah Ban Breathnach (pronounced Bon Brannock) may well be the woman who has taught the modern world the most about gratitude. She wrote the NYTimes best seller, Simple Abundance. She is the person who first called us (though the Oprah show and elsewhere) to write 5 things down each day for which we are grateful. This is learning the aptitude for gratitude. She calls us to identify, to celebrate those things we have to be grateful—and promises us that as our willingness to live out this commitment to gratitude is consistent, our recognition of that which inspires our gratitude increases and multiplies. This is her mantra, if you will: "Gratitude is the most passionate transformative force in the cosmos. When we offer thanks to God or to another human being, gratitude gifts us with renewal, reflection, reconnection... every time we remember to say 'thank you' we experience nothing less than Heaven on earth." And so we learn, we learn that God is waiting for our “thank you” just as the earth and those around us are waiting.
Our own Rev. Elder Nancy Wilson calls us to this season of gratitude. She writes: As we approach a very busy season that includes many religious and cultural celebrations, as a person of faith, as a Christian, lesbian and long time minister and member of MCC, I can tell you, I am grateful!
I invite you to make a list of things for which you are thankful: because it is a way to practice the spiritual discipline of giving thanks. This spiritual discipline strengthen us, and shields us against the power of disappointment, loss or discouragement. Gratitude lifts our heads, and connects us to the Power Greater than Ourselves, who we know as the “Spirit of the Living God.”
That Spirit longs to “fall on us today,” and practicing gratitude hastens that fall! Gratitude is fuel for living and for ministering in the midst of the challenges of today. Especially in times of economic hardship or uncertainty, when we may feel helpless or stressed, getting in touch with the things for which we are grateful puts everything in perspective. At least it does for me…”
And so I say to you today: Life is amazing! Celebrate the sky, the stars, the flowers, and the rain. Celebrate the food you have to eat. Be thankful for the body that gives your spirit a place to be at home. Rejoice in the difference you make in the lives of others! Open your hands to receive the love that exists in this very room and elsewhere—love that encircles you with care and compassion. Turn your sighs into expressions of wonder at the beauty of the universe. Seek the aptitude for gratitude. Challenge each other to be grateful—call yourself to a higher place of praise.
When asked what seeking the way of gratitude had taught her, Sarah Ban Breathnach answered: “I don’t limit God anymore!” Let us go forward this day, rejoicing in the ever watchful and caring presence of God in our lives, knowing that living a life of gratitude and trust is the best response we can ever make to God’s gifting in this world. Let us lift the loaves and fishes to the sky, say thank you, and go forth to feed the thousands. Amen and amen!
Then Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat down with his disciples. The Jewish Passover Festival was near. When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward him, he said to Philip, Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?” He asked this only to test him, for he already had in mind what he was going to do. Philip answered him, “It would take almost a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!” Another of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, spoke up, “Here is a boy with five small barley loaves and two small fish, but how far will they go among so many?” Jesus said, “have the people sit down.” There was plenty of grass in that place and they sat down (about five thousand men were there). Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed to those who were seated as much as they wanted. He did the same with the fish. When they had all had enough to eat, he said to his disciples, “Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted.” So they gathered them and filled twelve baskets with the pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten.
Lord, lead us in the way of gratitude—fill our spirits with a longing to thank you and each other for all that graces our lives, indeed for all our life of grace. Amen
Here we are in November—the month traditionally connected to harvest, and coming together to say “thank you” to God and maybe even “thank you” to each other. And every time I think of the season of gratitude, I think of singing songs like “Come ye thankful people, come” or “We gather together” in the old country church I attended as a child and I think of times from my past where 30 some odd relatives would gather round long tables and pass the bowls of mashed potatoes and dressing and green beans canned earlier in the fall from my grandmother’s garden. And I wonder “what happened to the season of gratitude?” With Christmas already upon us in the stores, it seems to get lost between the ghosts of Halloween and the angels of Christmas. But I want to tell you, that the experience of moving to The Villages and starting this church has, quite frankly, completely transformed my commitment to learning the fine art of gratitude and to understanding the role it plays in spiritual and emotional maturity—the blessings generated by gratitude that come and will continue to come as we grow together as people and as a church. To that end, I decided to spend the first three Sundays in November talking about gratitude. This week, I want to look at an aptitude for gratitude or put another way, “how can I learn to be grateful for each moment of my life”? I’m not really sure that many of us are born grateful. And I well remember my mother complaining because her grandchildren failed to write her ‘thank you’ notes when her children (yes, that would include me) were taught better. She was right, I was taught to say “thank you” and to even compose lovely thank you notes—I’m not so sure about the gratitude part, I think that may come with a certain amount of reflection and struggle. By the way, the old country church now masquerades as a small time mega-church and the only time my relatives all come together is when somebody dies. So much for the romantic times gone by—but my own gratitude journey began there and was nurtured there and it continues to reflect that primitive gratitude today.
Let’s look at what Jesus showed the folk about gratitude in today’s scripture. Look at the scene with me—over 5,000 men and since the women and children weren’t even counted, there was more than likely at least twice that many people gathered in that Woodstockian gathering on the hillside. But there was no planning for this gathering—no caterers, or food trucks, no bottles of water, no nothing; oh, and no money to send out for supplies—only one small boy whose caring mother had packed him a lunch for the day. 5 loaves of bread and two fishes—even the disciple who brought the child’s lunch to the attention of Jesus thought it was useless. But Jesus knew better. He knew that in expressing gratitude for the food (he gave thanks) the miracle would occur. And so we have, in this story of amazing proportions, proof that the presence of gratitude radically alters our lives.
Melody Beattie, author of numerous books for those dealing with disastrous childhoods, painful presents, and uncertain aftershocks of trauma and terror says this about gratitude: “Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.”
Would not Jesus agree with her? He knew that the act of gratitude would bring all that was needed to meet the hunger of these many thousand people—in fact, he had them sit down before he even said thanks. That was a daring and dangerous act, an act that said to these people, something good is coming—God is going to deliver what we need—you sit down and be ready for it. We see it as a huge risk—Jesus saw it as the logical thing to do, given that he believed in God’s ability to satisfy our every need. For Jesus, gratitude was both the logical consequence of belief and the very act that brought his belief into being. This is a hard thing for us to grasp. And so, we must learn to equate gratitude with belief in God’s ability to meet our every need and, indeed, we struggle as we learn.
Come with me to that hillside where Jesus moves to the rhythm of God’s constant presence. For Jesus, the presence of God is everywhere—and how do we get there for ourselves? Albert Schweitzer, one of the world’s true saints draws our attention to the need to learn gratitude: “To educate yourself for the feeling of gratitude means to take nothing for granted, but to always seek out and value the kind that will stand behind the action. Nothing that is done for you is a matter of course. Everything originates in a will for the good, which is directed at you.”
What do you think would happen if we learned to be constantly grateful—to see the proof of God’s grace to us—to know that all of earth and heaven was put here for our pleasure? I believe that our lives would be so radically changed that we would see new people in the mirror each morning as we allowed God to teach us more and more about the wonder of God’s love reaching out to provide all that we need.
Sarah Ban Breathnach (pronounced Bon Brannock) may well be the woman who has taught the modern world the most about gratitude. She wrote the NYTimes best seller, Simple Abundance. She is the person who first called us (though the Oprah show and elsewhere) to write 5 things down each day for which we are grateful. This is learning the aptitude for gratitude. She calls us to identify, to celebrate those things we have to be grateful—and promises us that as our willingness to live out this commitment to gratitude is consistent, our recognition of that which inspires our gratitude increases and multiplies. This is her mantra, if you will: "Gratitude is the most passionate transformative force in the cosmos. When we offer thanks to God or to another human being, gratitude gifts us with renewal, reflection, reconnection... every time we remember to say 'thank you' we experience nothing less than Heaven on earth." And so we learn, we learn that God is waiting for our “thank you” just as the earth and those around us are waiting.
Our own Rev. Elder Nancy Wilson calls us to this season of gratitude. She writes: As we approach a very busy season that includes many religious and cultural celebrations, as a person of faith, as a Christian, lesbian and long time minister and member of MCC, I can tell you, I am grateful!
I invite you to make a list of things for which you are thankful: because it is a way to practice the spiritual discipline of giving thanks. This spiritual discipline strengthen us, and shields us against the power of disappointment, loss or discouragement. Gratitude lifts our heads, and connects us to the Power Greater than Ourselves, who we know as the “Spirit of the Living God.”
That Spirit longs to “fall on us today,” and practicing gratitude hastens that fall! Gratitude is fuel for living and for ministering in the midst of the challenges of today. Especially in times of economic hardship or uncertainty, when we may feel helpless or stressed, getting in touch with the things for which we are grateful puts everything in perspective. At least it does for me…”
And so I say to you today: Life is amazing! Celebrate the sky, the stars, the flowers, and the rain. Celebrate the food you have to eat. Be thankful for the body that gives your spirit a place to be at home. Rejoice in the difference you make in the lives of others! Open your hands to receive the love that exists in this very room and elsewhere—love that encircles you with care and compassion. Turn your sighs into expressions of wonder at the beauty of the universe. Seek the aptitude for gratitude. Challenge each other to be grateful—call yourself to a higher place of praise.
When asked what seeking the way of gratitude had taught her, Sarah Ban Breathnach answered: “I don’t limit God anymore!” Let us go forward this day, rejoicing in the ever watchful and caring presence of God in our lives, knowing that living a life of gratitude and trust is the best response we can ever make to God’s gifting in this world. Let us lift the loaves and fishes to the sky, say thank you, and go forth to feed the thousands. Amen and amen!
Sunday, October 31, 2010
One Heart, One Mind: Variety Is The Spice of Life--10-24-10
First, from John 17:20-25
20-23I'm praying not only for them
But also for those who will believe in me
Because of them and their witness about me.
The goal is for all of them to become one heart and mind—
Just as you, Abba God, are in me and I in you,
So they might be one heart and mind with us.
Then the world might believe that you, in fact, sent me.
The same glory you gave me, I gave them,
So they'll be as unified and together as we are—
I in them and you in me.
Then they'll be mature in this oneness,
And give the godless world evidence
That you've sent me and loved them
In the same way you've loved me.
And now from Ephesians 3: 20-21
20-21God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! God does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, the Holy Spirit deeply and gently within us.
One of the great things that happens for me on vacation is that I have the time and desire to just think about things. At other times, I’m running to and fro, with a tight schedule, making sure I don’t forget anything (and that seems to get harder with each passing year) and working hard at keeping all my priorities in line. But two weeks ago, while we were on vacation, at Terri’s request, we spent a couple of days just being. One morning as we were sitting on the patio eating breakfast, God’s spirit broke into my heart. I was actually eating a banana, not a particularly theological pursuit, when out of the blue it dawned on me how incredibly different a banana is from an orange, or a strawberry, or a watermelon, or any other fruit for that matter. I allowed myself to gaze around at the flowers and foliage in the courtyard and began to notice, really notice, the intricate differences between each plant. Suddenly I was in tears and trying to explain to a now somewhat confused partner, how God was speaking to me about the wonder of the variety of creation and how that relates to the incredible bunch of people who make up this glorious church of ours. Now many of you are relatively new to Open Circle and may not really know how Open Circle came to be. But on this day of our first retreat when we want to spend some time envisioning a future for our church, I thought it important to talk a little bit about the dreams that made Open Circle a reality. Now my dream was just one of several that came together in the special way that only God works—and it is poured into the bucket of dreams of many—all of which combine to make Open Circle what you see today.
Just like many of you, there was a time when I had forgotten how to dream—forgotten that God had more in store for me than I could imagine—forgotten that God’s dreams for me were larger than I could ever dream for myself. As God began to speak to me about planting a church here in The Villages (and God used some of you sitting right here to do that), many of the other paths that God had led me on began to take on new meaning and make more sense. You see, planting a church is different from leading an established church and it began to become clear to me that all of my previous work was somehow a part of God’s plan to prepare me to lead in this very special place in a very special way. I have many bananas and oranges and strawberries and even kiwi or two along my way. All different, all planned by God. All united in the purpose of serving God and you here, in this church. And God said, “it is good!”
More importantly, God has placed all of you here, now, in this place with all of your bananas and strawberries and exotic fruit with fancy names and united us here as one body, one mind in Christ Jesus. Now...have you ever wondered why God placed us in a world so full of variety that there are still species of plants and animals that some have not even yet been discovered. Think a minute—even if every fruit looked and tasted like a banana we would still be healthy eating them—but God wanted more than just survival for us—God gave us variety, and that variety, my friends is indeed the spice of life at Open Circle.
I invite you to look around—there are singers and writers, chemists and computer gurus, bookkeepers and teachers and artists. There are young people, older people, moms and dads, grandmothers and grandfathers—maybe even a great-grand or two. There are native Floridians (well, at least a few) and New Yorkers, Midwesterners, and southerners and those from lands other than where we live now. There are golfers, softball players, players of that other incredibly dangerous game with the weird name where you hit a ball with a racquet and run backwards at rapid speeds, swimmers, runners, and those of us who love to watch what the rest of you do. There are those who love football, baseball, basketball or no ball. There are morning people, night people, partyers, and those who like to stay at home. There are Baptists and Pentecostals, Presbyterians and Catholics, Mormans and Buddhists and those who claim no previous faith at all. And God said, “it is good”.
And so, today as we seek to know God’s vision and, therefore, our vision for this church, I invite you to remember that we are not all bananas. But we come together in the way that Jesus calls us together in today’s reading: Jesus says: I'm praying not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me because of them and their witness about me.
The goal is for all of them to become one heart and mind— Just as you, Abba God, are in me and I in you, so they might be one heart and mind with us.” So today, Jesus prays for those of us who are already here that, through us, many will hear the good news of God’s unconditional acceptance and our radical hospitality.
But what is it that unites all of us with our varieties of backgrounds and skills, likes and dislikes, needs and gifts? Well-known businessman, Lee Iaccoa recalls in his autobiography called simply Iacocca, that he once asked the legendary coach Vince Lombardi what it took to make a winning team. Lombardi’s answer is as good for churches as it is for football teams: “there are lots of coaches with good ball clubs who know the fundamentals and have plenty of discipline but still don’t win the game. Then you come to the third ingredient: If you’re going to play together as a team, you’ve got to care for one another. You’ve got to love each other. Each player has to be thinking about the next guy and saying to himself: If I don’t block that man, Paul is going to get his legs broken. I have to do my job well in order that he can do his. “The difference between mediocrity and greatness,” Lombardi said that night, “is the feeling these guys have for each other.” My friends, I am standing here today suggesting to you that it is the feeling that we have one for another, the love we have one for another, that sets us apart and calls us to greatness as a church—as God’s church in this world large and small, here in Lake, Sumter, and Marion counties.
Jesus continues: So they'll be as unified and together as we are—
I in them and you in me. Then they'll be mature in this oneness, And give the godless world—(that is those who do not know of God’s unconditional acceptance and our radical hospitality) evidence that you've sent me and loved them in the same way you've loved me.
As a child of God, my mission has long been to bring the knowledge of God’s unconditional acceptance and redemption to all. By extending compassion, caring, celebration, and welcome to those with whom we come in contact, we embody the unfailing love that that God has for us, and become a grace-filled presence in the lives of those who respond.
At some point in this multi-layered journey, MCC required that I state my personal values that I bring to the task of pastoring this church: We will discussing in the next few hours what values and visions we bring to this church. I thought it might help if you heard an expanded version of what I wrote now almost a year ago. These then are the values on which I base my work with you and my service to God:
• Integrity—the transparency of motive, desire, and commitment—otherwise known as “what you see is what you get”,
• Wholeness—the integration of mind, body, spirit—we are created good as whole people and our sexuality is a beautiful expression of who we are—God’s children,
• Faithfulness—the ability to remain faithful to a person, group of persons, or cause in spite of adversities—and you all have rewarded my faithfulness with a faithfulness to this church that is nothing less than amazing,
• Compassion—the willingness to live “God” in the form which others need instead of remaining merely comfortable in my expressions of God’s love for others, and, finally,
• Inclusion—the commitment to welcome all into my life and faith, stranger and friend alike with no conditions.
And into this faith-filled and welcoming place comes God among us—and so we join with Paul in the closing of his prayer for the Gentiles in Ephesus and us, now in Open Circle: “Now unto God, the God that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power of the Holy Spirit who works in us, here at Open Circle; unto our Holy Creator, be the glory that is made manifest in this church, and in our lives, world without end! Amen and amen!
20-23I'm praying not only for them
But also for those who will believe in me
Because of them and their witness about me.
The goal is for all of them to become one heart and mind—
Just as you, Abba God, are in me and I in you,
So they might be one heart and mind with us.
Then the world might believe that you, in fact, sent me.
The same glory you gave me, I gave them,
So they'll be as unified and together as we are—
I in them and you in me.
Then they'll be mature in this oneness,
And give the godless world evidence
That you've sent me and loved them
In the same way you've loved me.
And now from Ephesians 3: 20-21
20-21God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! God does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, the Holy Spirit deeply and gently within us.
One of the great things that happens for me on vacation is that I have the time and desire to just think about things. At other times, I’m running to and fro, with a tight schedule, making sure I don’t forget anything (and that seems to get harder with each passing year) and working hard at keeping all my priorities in line. But two weeks ago, while we were on vacation, at Terri’s request, we spent a couple of days just being. One morning as we were sitting on the patio eating breakfast, God’s spirit broke into my heart. I was actually eating a banana, not a particularly theological pursuit, when out of the blue it dawned on me how incredibly different a banana is from an orange, or a strawberry, or a watermelon, or any other fruit for that matter. I allowed myself to gaze around at the flowers and foliage in the courtyard and began to notice, really notice, the intricate differences between each plant. Suddenly I was in tears and trying to explain to a now somewhat confused partner, how God was speaking to me about the wonder of the variety of creation and how that relates to the incredible bunch of people who make up this glorious church of ours. Now many of you are relatively new to Open Circle and may not really know how Open Circle came to be. But on this day of our first retreat when we want to spend some time envisioning a future for our church, I thought it important to talk a little bit about the dreams that made Open Circle a reality. Now my dream was just one of several that came together in the special way that only God works—and it is poured into the bucket of dreams of many—all of which combine to make Open Circle what you see today.
Just like many of you, there was a time when I had forgotten how to dream—forgotten that God had more in store for me than I could imagine—forgotten that God’s dreams for me were larger than I could ever dream for myself. As God began to speak to me about planting a church here in The Villages (and God used some of you sitting right here to do that), many of the other paths that God had led me on began to take on new meaning and make more sense. You see, planting a church is different from leading an established church and it began to become clear to me that all of my previous work was somehow a part of God’s plan to prepare me to lead in this very special place in a very special way. I have many bananas and oranges and strawberries and even kiwi or two along my way. All different, all planned by God. All united in the purpose of serving God and you here, in this church. And God said, “it is good!”
More importantly, God has placed all of you here, now, in this place with all of your bananas and strawberries and exotic fruit with fancy names and united us here as one body, one mind in Christ Jesus. Now...have you ever wondered why God placed us in a world so full of variety that there are still species of plants and animals that some have not even yet been discovered. Think a minute—even if every fruit looked and tasted like a banana we would still be healthy eating them—but God wanted more than just survival for us—God gave us variety, and that variety, my friends is indeed the spice of life at Open Circle.
I invite you to look around—there are singers and writers, chemists and computer gurus, bookkeepers and teachers and artists. There are young people, older people, moms and dads, grandmothers and grandfathers—maybe even a great-grand or two. There are native Floridians (well, at least a few) and New Yorkers, Midwesterners, and southerners and those from lands other than where we live now. There are golfers, softball players, players of that other incredibly dangerous game with the weird name where you hit a ball with a racquet and run backwards at rapid speeds, swimmers, runners, and those of us who love to watch what the rest of you do. There are those who love football, baseball, basketball or no ball. There are morning people, night people, partyers, and those who like to stay at home. There are Baptists and Pentecostals, Presbyterians and Catholics, Mormans and Buddhists and those who claim no previous faith at all. And God said, “it is good”.
And so, today as we seek to know God’s vision and, therefore, our vision for this church, I invite you to remember that we are not all bananas. But we come together in the way that Jesus calls us together in today’s reading: Jesus says: I'm praying not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me because of them and their witness about me.
The goal is for all of them to become one heart and mind— Just as you, Abba God, are in me and I in you, so they might be one heart and mind with us.” So today, Jesus prays for those of us who are already here that, through us, many will hear the good news of God’s unconditional acceptance and our radical hospitality.
But what is it that unites all of us with our varieties of backgrounds and skills, likes and dislikes, needs and gifts? Well-known businessman, Lee Iaccoa recalls in his autobiography called simply Iacocca, that he once asked the legendary coach Vince Lombardi what it took to make a winning team. Lombardi’s answer is as good for churches as it is for football teams: “there are lots of coaches with good ball clubs who know the fundamentals and have plenty of discipline but still don’t win the game. Then you come to the third ingredient: If you’re going to play together as a team, you’ve got to care for one another. You’ve got to love each other. Each player has to be thinking about the next guy and saying to himself: If I don’t block that man, Paul is going to get his legs broken. I have to do my job well in order that he can do his. “The difference between mediocrity and greatness,” Lombardi said that night, “is the feeling these guys have for each other.” My friends, I am standing here today suggesting to you that it is the feeling that we have one for another, the love we have one for another, that sets us apart and calls us to greatness as a church—as God’s church in this world large and small, here in Lake, Sumter, and Marion counties.
Jesus continues: So they'll be as unified and together as we are—
I in them and you in me. Then they'll be mature in this oneness, And give the godless world—(that is those who do not know of God’s unconditional acceptance and our radical hospitality) evidence that you've sent me and loved them in the same way you've loved me.
As a child of God, my mission has long been to bring the knowledge of God’s unconditional acceptance and redemption to all. By extending compassion, caring, celebration, and welcome to those with whom we come in contact, we embody the unfailing love that that God has for us, and become a grace-filled presence in the lives of those who respond.
At some point in this multi-layered journey, MCC required that I state my personal values that I bring to the task of pastoring this church: We will discussing in the next few hours what values and visions we bring to this church. I thought it might help if you heard an expanded version of what I wrote now almost a year ago. These then are the values on which I base my work with you and my service to God:
• Integrity—the transparency of motive, desire, and commitment—otherwise known as “what you see is what you get”,
• Wholeness—the integration of mind, body, spirit—we are created good as whole people and our sexuality is a beautiful expression of who we are—God’s children,
• Faithfulness—the ability to remain faithful to a person, group of persons, or cause in spite of adversities—and you all have rewarded my faithfulness with a faithfulness to this church that is nothing less than amazing,
• Compassion—the willingness to live “God” in the form which others need instead of remaining merely comfortable in my expressions of God’s love for others, and, finally,
• Inclusion—the commitment to welcome all into my life and faith, stranger and friend alike with no conditions.
And into this faith-filled and welcoming place comes God among us—and so we join with Paul in the closing of his prayer for the Gentiles in Ephesus and us, now in Open Circle: “Now unto God, the God that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power of the Holy Spirit who works in us, here at Open Circle; unto our Holy Creator, be the glory that is made manifest in this church, and in our lives, world without end! Amen and amen!
Sunday, October 17, 2010
First Things First-Finding Your Mission in Life Preached 10/17/2010
Scripture: Mark 12:28-34 (Today's New International Version)
One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?"
"The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."
"Well said, teacher," the man replied. "You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."
When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.
“Shema Israel!” This is the beginning of the most important Jewish proclamation in scripture. Our devout Jewish friends remind themselves many times each day—every time they pass a Mezuzah (that small holder of these words and the Torah attached to the doors of their houses). If you look by the door to this temple, you will find just such a mezuzah. At one point in my upstate New York journey, I lived right smack in the middle of the Borscht Belt—an area marked with a conglomeration of resorts, camps, and little villages populated every summer by the Jewish families who fled New York City for the peacefulness of the foothills of the NY mountains. By the time I lived there, many of these resorts had fallen on bad times. Mostly they were used for training events and conferences. I remember attending one of these events and walking up and down the halls amazed at the wonderful variety and beauty of these mezuzahs on each door. It was impossible to go in the door to your room without noticing…what a beautiful reminder of our never-changing need to declare who our God is. “ Hear, O Israel: The LORD is our God, the LORD alone. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart.” Jesus knew this commandment well—he was one of the Jewish children who had learned it over time, in the temple, in His home, in the very streets and roads of the lands that he walked as He grew up. And so, when He is asked which commandment is the greatest, Jesus answered, "The first is, 'Hear, O Israel”. Jesus doesn’t stop there, however, He continues: “The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
In its Old Testament setting, the command to love God with all your heart, soul, and strength was accompanied by a promise—the promise of long and good lives. In the second instance, there is no such promise attached because Jesus IS the promise—these words are spoken directly to us, the direct heirs of the Old Testament promise made manifest in Jesus Himself. No more need for promises, the promise has arrived.
And Jesus, the embodiment of this promise, shows us again in this second commandment what really matters in His ministry—love and inclusivity. Now we know that most of the time our traditional outreach tends to bring in more folks that look “just like us”. But Jesus calls us to do more. Churches who respond to this call have developed a practice referred to as “radical hospitality”. Reaching beyond those usually sought for church activities, these churches seek people who otherwise would never come in touch with any faith tradition at all. We know that Jesus modeled this for us in His own ministry—a ministry to the most outcast of the earth. How does this fit with these words of Jesus?
Like it or not, Jesus had a way of putting things in context. The first commandment serves as the backdrop to the second. The second commandment which, according to Jesus, is “like the first” is to “love your neighbor as yourself”. Understanding that we find it difficult to understand how to love God and Jesus gives us the answer before we even formulate the question. We love God by loving our neighbor as ourselves. Oh good, we can all go home now…Not so fast…do we even begin to know what that means?
There is an interesting poem entitled “Outwitted” by Edwin Markham written in the early 20th Century. I believe that a few lines may speak to our dilemma here.
He drew a circle that shut me out—…
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!
What would it look like if every time someone drew a circle that shut us out of their lives, we lovingly drew a circle that enlarged our view and priorities and re-included the very ones who shut us out? I suspect that most of the time when people draw us as individuals or community out of their circles, it is because we have missed what is most important to them to have IN their circles. When we fail to love others or express our love in ways that they cannot hear, we must acknowledge our need to learn to love anew. Mahatma Gandhi challenged us as we think about living the love of God in the world when he said: “There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.” Am I able to accept that for those fundamentally hungry people, that nothing I have to offer them EXCEPT BREAD will do? This is uncommon compassion—granting the priority to the other’s need and setting out to enlarge the circle of what I have to offer to ensure that I can meet the other’s need. This is the love of God, lived in the world—allowing my neighbor to tell me what my ministry and lifework needs to be.
As we enlarge this circle, as we learn to love differently, placing the neighbor’s need as crucial to who we are. And this is, of course, hard—Hear Marge Piercy’s words:
Learning to love differently is hard,
Love with the hands wide open,
Love with the doors banging on their hinges,
The cupboard unlocked…
How do we unlock the cupboards of our hearts and, more importantly, our priorities when it comes to loving our neighbors as ourselves. Uncommon compassion challenges us to redefine who are neighbors are. Uncommon compassion leads us to question how it is that we love? How do we include others in our circle? When Terri and I first started living together (my apologies up front to her for telling this story), I set out to learn those things about her that I would need to know in order to live together well. First of all, I discovered that she is very easy to live with and almost nothing bothers her. However, I also learned that she is, what I thought to be, unusually invested in the state and status of the toothpaste tube; that is, one must always flatten out the tube so that it is ready for the next use. Now I will admit that I was just a teeny bit less committed to that practice than she was. One day, while she was lovingly and quite humorously, I thought, engaging me in yet another conversation about the toothpaste, just to mess with her, I inquired, “Why is it that we can’t compromise on this?” She replied, “We can compromise, you can have your own tube!” It has, of course, become one of “the stories” that we laugh about as it defines who we are in our relationship.
However, while such a story can be funny, the principle of compromise by “each person doing their own thing” is not quite so humorous when applied to the really important things in life and, more importantly, in church. But we do it all the time! Entire denominations and movements were founded on that very principle! I know that I engage in this kind of “get your own toothpaste” thinking when I resist change, when I resist losing those things about our services and ministries that are comfortable for me. I know that I run into others’ “get your own toothpaste” thinking when I suggest change or look for ways to make some of what we do more inviting to those who do not currently feel welcome.
Jesus, on the other hand, would agree with Ghandi, who I quoted a few moments ago. Can we as individuals and as a church, discover what each person is hungry for and appear to them as God? If it is bread, we become filling bread. If it is acceptance, we become unconditional acceptance. If it is belonging, we become a welcoming belonging. Uncommon compassion defined as love and concern that generates acts of welcome and invitation that exceeds what we commonly hold as acceptable will push us as individuals and as a church to experience the radical hospitality that God extends to us and will enable us to open wide the doors of our hearts, souls, and sanctuary to draw a circle around the very persons who shut us out. And so, together we draw our circle larger and larger until every child of God feels welcome in our lives, in our hearts, and in our church.
Amen and Amen.
One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?"
"The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no commandment greater than these."
"Well said, teacher," the man replied. "You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices."
When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.
“Shema Israel!” This is the beginning of the most important Jewish proclamation in scripture. Our devout Jewish friends remind themselves many times each day—every time they pass a Mezuzah (that small holder of these words and the Torah attached to the doors of their houses). If you look by the door to this temple, you will find just such a mezuzah. At one point in my upstate New York journey, I lived right smack in the middle of the Borscht Belt—an area marked with a conglomeration of resorts, camps, and little villages populated every summer by the Jewish families who fled New York City for the peacefulness of the foothills of the NY mountains. By the time I lived there, many of these resorts had fallen on bad times. Mostly they were used for training events and conferences. I remember attending one of these events and walking up and down the halls amazed at the wonderful variety and beauty of these mezuzahs on each door. It was impossible to go in the door to your room without noticing…what a beautiful reminder of our never-changing need to declare who our God is. “ Hear, O Israel: The LORD is our God, the LORD alone. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart.” Jesus knew this commandment well—he was one of the Jewish children who had learned it over time, in the temple, in His home, in the very streets and roads of the lands that he walked as He grew up. And so, when He is asked which commandment is the greatest, Jesus answered, "The first is, 'Hear, O Israel”. Jesus doesn’t stop there, however, He continues: “The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
In its Old Testament setting, the command to love God with all your heart, soul, and strength was accompanied by a promise—the promise of long and good lives. In the second instance, there is no such promise attached because Jesus IS the promise—these words are spoken directly to us, the direct heirs of the Old Testament promise made manifest in Jesus Himself. No more need for promises, the promise has arrived.
And Jesus, the embodiment of this promise, shows us again in this second commandment what really matters in His ministry—love and inclusivity. Now we know that most of the time our traditional outreach tends to bring in more folks that look “just like us”. But Jesus calls us to do more. Churches who respond to this call have developed a practice referred to as “radical hospitality”. Reaching beyond those usually sought for church activities, these churches seek people who otherwise would never come in touch with any faith tradition at all. We know that Jesus modeled this for us in His own ministry—a ministry to the most outcast of the earth. How does this fit with these words of Jesus?
Like it or not, Jesus had a way of putting things in context. The first commandment serves as the backdrop to the second. The second commandment which, according to Jesus, is “like the first” is to “love your neighbor as yourself”. Understanding that we find it difficult to understand how to love God and Jesus gives us the answer before we even formulate the question. We love God by loving our neighbor as ourselves. Oh good, we can all go home now…Not so fast…do we even begin to know what that means?
There is an interesting poem entitled “Outwitted” by Edwin Markham written in the early 20th Century. I believe that a few lines may speak to our dilemma here.
He drew a circle that shut me out—…
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!
What would it look like if every time someone drew a circle that shut us out of their lives, we lovingly drew a circle that enlarged our view and priorities and re-included the very ones who shut us out? I suspect that most of the time when people draw us as individuals or community out of their circles, it is because we have missed what is most important to them to have IN their circles. When we fail to love others or express our love in ways that they cannot hear, we must acknowledge our need to learn to love anew. Mahatma Gandhi challenged us as we think about living the love of God in the world when he said: “There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.” Am I able to accept that for those fundamentally hungry people, that nothing I have to offer them EXCEPT BREAD will do? This is uncommon compassion—granting the priority to the other’s need and setting out to enlarge the circle of what I have to offer to ensure that I can meet the other’s need. This is the love of God, lived in the world—allowing my neighbor to tell me what my ministry and lifework needs to be.
As we enlarge this circle, as we learn to love differently, placing the neighbor’s need as crucial to who we are. And this is, of course, hard—Hear Marge Piercy’s words:
Learning to love differently is hard,
Love with the hands wide open,
Love with the doors banging on their hinges,
The cupboard unlocked…
How do we unlock the cupboards of our hearts and, more importantly, our priorities when it comes to loving our neighbors as ourselves. Uncommon compassion challenges us to redefine who are neighbors are. Uncommon compassion leads us to question how it is that we love? How do we include others in our circle? When Terri and I first started living together (my apologies up front to her for telling this story), I set out to learn those things about her that I would need to know in order to live together well. First of all, I discovered that she is very easy to live with and almost nothing bothers her. However, I also learned that she is, what I thought to be, unusually invested in the state and status of the toothpaste tube; that is, one must always flatten out the tube so that it is ready for the next use. Now I will admit that I was just a teeny bit less committed to that practice than she was. One day, while she was lovingly and quite humorously, I thought, engaging me in yet another conversation about the toothpaste, just to mess with her, I inquired, “Why is it that we can’t compromise on this?” She replied, “We can compromise, you can have your own tube!” It has, of course, become one of “the stories” that we laugh about as it defines who we are in our relationship.
However, while such a story can be funny, the principle of compromise by “each person doing their own thing” is not quite so humorous when applied to the really important things in life and, more importantly, in church. But we do it all the time! Entire denominations and movements were founded on that very principle! I know that I engage in this kind of “get your own toothpaste” thinking when I resist change, when I resist losing those things about our services and ministries that are comfortable for me. I know that I run into others’ “get your own toothpaste” thinking when I suggest change or look for ways to make some of what we do more inviting to those who do not currently feel welcome.
Jesus, on the other hand, would agree with Ghandi, who I quoted a few moments ago. Can we as individuals and as a church, discover what each person is hungry for and appear to them as God? If it is bread, we become filling bread. If it is acceptance, we become unconditional acceptance. If it is belonging, we become a welcoming belonging. Uncommon compassion defined as love and concern that generates acts of welcome and invitation that exceeds what we commonly hold as acceptable will push us as individuals and as a church to experience the radical hospitality that God extends to us and will enable us to open wide the doors of our hearts, souls, and sanctuary to draw a circle around the very persons who shut us out. And so, together we draw our circle larger and larger until every child of God feels welcome in our lives, in our hearts, and in our church.
Amen and Amen.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
"Faith: Building Up Hope, Tearing Down Walls"--sermon preached by Donna Twardowski on October 10, 2010
Luke 17:11-19
The fact that I am standing here today is an example of God’s faith in me, and some constant internal understanding that I continue to grow my faith in God. The road to standing here has been a long one. Trying to find my “purpose” if you will, through other professions and vocations I thought I was supposed to be doing. All the while, in the back of my mind and in the depths of my heart, God knew where I was supposed to be. I suppose on some level I knew that too, but it seemed like an impossible dream.
The lepers in our story for today had an impossible dream as well. In their culture, the Israelites didn’t operate on the germ theory of disease, but they understood something about infectious diseases, and those suspected of leprosy were kept isolated until their disease could be confirmed. They were outcast and labeled unclean. For a Jew to touch a leper, she or he was defiled as much as touching a dead person. In their world view, leprosy was a sign of God’s disfavor. To the rabbis, the cure of a leper was as difficult as raising a person from the dead. In all the history written in the Bible, only two people had been cured of leprosy—Miriam, who had leprosy for seven days as a punishment for speaking against Moses’ leadership (Num 12:9-15), and Naaman, a general of the army of Aram, a heathen from Damascus (2 Kings 5). When Naaman obeyed Elijah’s instruction to wash seven times in the Jordan River, he was healed. The important point about all this is that healing a leper had not been done in Israel for 700 years prior to this parable, and was supposed to indicate the beginning of the Messianic Age (Luke 7:22), that is, when the blind will see, the lame walk, the lepers are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised to life, and the Good News is preached to the poor.
With that as our background, now begins our sermon…..
It was a lonely life living on the edge of the village, dependent upon others for food and clothing, and the colony was fortunate enough to have a barn as shelter from the sun and sand storms. It was even more hurtful being labeled unclean and untouchable when Avisha (Means a gift from God) had no idea why the leprosy had become a part of his being. Feeling pitiful and in need of healing both physically and spiritually, Avisha heard his peers begin to shout, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us.” And Avisha joined his lot and began shouting with them, “”Jesus, Master, have pity on us.” Asking for pity was a daily request; in reality, they were asking for compassion and mercy and anything Jesus could bestow upon them. [As our reading tells us, Jesus gives them more than they ask for.] I wonder when I hear this story, when asking for help, do you have to have even a little amount of faith that your request will be answered?
In response to their pleas, Jesus gives them a direction, “Go show yourselves to the priests.”
Avisha knew the priests according to Jewish law, could declare a person healed of leprosy and fit to re-enter society.
The lepers had gone before to see them and healing hadn’t happened. He didn’t understand why.
This time, however, responding to Jesus, whose fame preceded him, seemed different. There seemed to be a certainty and a power in his voice that was confident it would be a positive outcome.
Luke writes, “As they went, they were made clean.”
It was by doing as Jesus directed, the lepers were healed.
They hadn’t reached the priests yet, and they were healed!
The rabbis hadn’t placed their hands upon them yet, and they were healed!
As they followed directions from Jesus, they were healed!
If they had disbelieved Jesus and laughed at his leadership, they would not have been cured.
They had FAITH and received their healing as a result. Their faith was demonstrated by their actions.
Avisha can’t believe his eyes, his arms are beginning to become softer, his peers’ faces are losing their spots, and they all begin to realize they ARE HEALED! Jumping for joy and running toward the village and the priests, the former lepers keep running…except for Avisha. He falls to his knees and begins weeping.
He weeps because of the realization of a dream, actually the realization of many dreams…
1. that he is healed of his physical condition
2. that he is loved and accepted by Jesus just the way he is; even though he is an
outsider, a Samaritan
3. that his spirit is also healed by God
As he is able, Avisha stands and returns to Jesus. He bows at his feet
and praises God and thanks Jesus for the cure. While he can’t explain to Jesus why the other 9 have not returned to express gratitude, he does understand that his faith has also healed his soul, which is MUCH MUCH more than skin deep.
Troy Perry’s faith, prompted him to begin a new church. 42 years ago this week, yes, for most of us during our lifetimes, Troy Perry had a dream. He however, refused to believe it was impossible. His dream was for a church that would accept all people like him. He had a dream that gay and lesbians, and even gay penecostals , which he was, would be accepted into a worshiping place just as they are, even though others may see them as outsiders.
The first worship service of what would become MCC-Los Angeles, known as the mother church, was held in Troy’s living room and the congregation consisted of one person of color, one Jew and one heterosexual couple. Even on the day of its birth, MCC welcomed everyone! The church has grown so much in so little time. In the grand scheme of things, MCC is less than one tenth the age of the major denominations, and has churches all over the world. In 1996 Troy said what has been the foundation of our denomination and one of my favorite quotes, “Jesus died for our sins, not our sexuality.” That has been the basis for the inclusivity of MCC from the beginning; the integration of our spirituality and sexuality.
The lack of dogma, being told WHAT to believe, has been crucial to the success of MCC as well. It is a Christian church, however an individual’s belief in God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, does not have to fit a prescribed teaching, all views are welcome. [Seems to me it would be arrogant to think we understand who God is, what God wants us to believe, and how to worship the creator of it all!] You don’t have to belong to the MCC church or any church to receive the gifts of the table that are ours in communion. Jesus welcomed all to the table and so do we.
What is important at MCC is that while we may have different beliefs, our values are congruent.
What is important at MCC is that our faith supports building up hope and tearing down walls.
What is important is that we tear down all walls of oppression and hate.
MCC was called the “Church with AIDS” in the 1980s. We lost many young men to the disease, many young clergy as well, and those clergy who were not affected or infected, were performing sometimes a dozen funerals in a week. ..Funerals of church members, funerals of friends, and funerals of family. During that time, MCC served as an example of inclusiveness, gentleness, love and holiness.
Now in 2010, MCC continues to be loving and holy. [That’s why we’re here, amen?] A fellow MCC clergy candidate tells the story of a young man with AIDS who died in his city. While this young man was raised in the Roman Catholic denomination, grew up in the church with his family; that church would not bury him.
His frantic parents came to MCC for the final blessing and memorial service for their son. They were not members, and MCC did not ask what they believed. MCC lived its faith of inclusiveness, love, and compassion, demonstrated and taught to us by Jesus Christ and provided what the family needed. MCC was building up hope for these parents, tearing down walls of injustice in the church.
This young man is essentially like the leper. Not welcomed in the city or the faith community; however, joyfully welcomed by Jesus, graciously welcomed by MCC.
MCC faithfully lives out the values of Jesus, recognizing that just as the leper did not choose his disease, we do not choose our race, gender or sexual preference.
MCC demonstrates its faith by loving those who are outcast from other denominations and believing communities; healing the souls damaged by those who say unless you believe or act this way, you cannot attend church here. OR you can come here, but you can’t be clergy, you can’t be married, you can’t hold your partner’s hand here.
MCC expresses its faith by accepting each of us, just the way we are whether we are rich or poor, male, female, transgendered, questioning, or allies, We are accepted whether we are whole or hurting.
I don’t know about you, but for years I faithfully asked God for a place to worship on Sunday morning…A place where I was accepted for who I was because I did not make the choice about the gender of the person I love. I asked for a place to lift me up as the child of God that I knew I was. I asked for a place where my soul could be still and my spirit could be healed by God. Faithfully God answered (though it took God a few decades)…MCC the social justice church…building up hope, tearing down walls, and restoring faith.
I pray the all those feeling deserted, depressed, and in despair, walk through our doors rather than committing suicide.
I pray we may be the example and disciples of Jesus’ love reaching out into a world to counter hate and discrimination of every kind.
I pray all of us are led to create a life that matters to at least one other on the margins.
Most of all, I pray that all those who feel like lepers will walk through our doors and be healed! May it be so.
The fact that I am standing here today is an example of God’s faith in me, and some constant internal understanding that I continue to grow my faith in God. The road to standing here has been a long one. Trying to find my “purpose” if you will, through other professions and vocations I thought I was supposed to be doing. All the while, in the back of my mind and in the depths of my heart, God knew where I was supposed to be. I suppose on some level I knew that too, but it seemed like an impossible dream.
The lepers in our story for today had an impossible dream as well. In their culture, the Israelites didn’t operate on the germ theory of disease, but they understood something about infectious diseases, and those suspected of leprosy were kept isolated until their disease could be confirmed. They were outcast and labeled unclean. For a Jew to touch a leper, she or he was defiled as much as touching a dead person. In their world view, leprosy was a sign of God’s disfavor. To the rabbis, the cure of a leper was as difficult as raising a person from the dead. In all the history written in the Bible, only two people had been cured of leprosy—Miriam, who had leprosy for seven days as a punishment for speaking against Moses’ leadership (Num 12:9-15), and Naaman, a general of the army of Aram, a heathen from Damascus (2 Kings 5). When Naaman obeyed Elijah’s instruction to wash seven times in the Jordan River, he was healed. The important point about all this is that healing a leper had not been done in Israel for 700 years prior to this parable, and was supposed to indicate the beginning of the Messianic Age (Luke 7:22), that is, when the blind will see, the lame walk, the lepers are cured, the deaf hear, the dead are raised to life, and the Good News is preached to the poor.
With that as our background, now begins our sermon…..
It was a lonely life living on the edge of the village, dependent upon others for food and clothing, and the colony was fortunate enough to have a barn as shelter from the sun and sand storms. It was even more hurtful being labeled unclean and untouchable when Avisha (Means a gift from God) had no idea why the leprosy had become a part of his being. Feeling pitiful and in need of healing both physically and spiritually, Avisha heard his peers begin to shout, “Jesus, Master, have pity on us.” And Avisha joined his lot and began shouting with them, “”Jesus, Master, have pity on us.” Asking for pity was a daily request; in reality, they were asking for compassion and mercy and anything Jesus could bestow upon them. [As our reading tells us, Jesus gives them more than they ask for.] I wonder when I hear this story, when asking for help, do you have to have even a little amount of faith that your request will be answered?
In response to their pleas, Jesus gives them a direction, “Go show yourselves to the priests.”
Avisha knew the priests according to Jewish law, could declare a person healed of leprosy and fit to re-enter society.
The lepers had gone before to see them and healing hadn’t happened. He didn’t understand why.
This time, however, responding to Jesus, whose fame preceded him, seemed different. There seemed to be a certainty and a power in his voice that was confident it would be a positive outcome.
Luke writes, “As they went, they were made clean.”
It was by doing as Jesus directed, the lepers were healed.
They hadn’t reached the priests yet, and they were healed!
The rabbis hadn’t placed their hands upon them yet, and they were healed!
As they followed directions from Jesus, they were healed!
If they had disbelieved Jesus and laughed at his leadership, they would not have been cured.
They had FAITH and received their healing as a result. Their faith was demonstrated by their actions.
Avisha can’t believe his eyes, his arms are beginning to become softer, his peers’ faces are losing their spots, and they all begin to realize they ARE HEALED! Jumping for joy and running toward the village and the priests, the former lepers keep running…except for Avisha. He falls to his knees and begins weeping.
He weeps because of the realization of a dream, actually the realization of many dreams…
1. that he is healed of his physical condition
2. that he is loved and accepted by Jesus just the way he is; even though he is an
outsider, a Samaritan
3. that his spirit is also healed by God
As he is able, Avisha stands and returns to Jesus. He bows at his feet
and praises God and thanks Jesus for the cure. While he can’t explain to Jesus why the other 9 have not returned to express gratitude, he does understand that his faith has also healed his soul, which is MUCH MUCH more than skin deep.
Troy Perry’s faith, prompted him to begin a new church. 42 years ago this week, yes, for most of us during our lifetimes, Troy Perry had a dream. He however, refused to believe it was impossible. His dream was for a church that would accept all people like him. He had a dream that gay and lesbians, and even gay penecostals , which he was, would be accepted into a worshiping place just as they are, even though others may see them as outsiders.
The first worship service of what would become MCC-Los Angeles, known as the mother church, was held in Troy’s living room and the congregation consisted of one person of color, one Jew and one heterosexual couple. Even on the day of its birth, MCC welcomed everyone! The church has grown so much in so little time. In the grand scheme of things, MCC is less than one tenth the age of the major denominations, and has churches all over the world. In 1996 Troy said what has been the foundation of our denomination and one of my favorite quotes, “Jesus died for our sins, not our sexuality.” That has been the basis for the inclusivity of MCC from the beginning; the integration of our spirituality and sexuality.
The lack of dogma, being told WHAT to believe, has been crucial to the success of MCC as well. It is a Christian church, however an individual’s belief in God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, does not have to fit a prescribed teaching, all views are welcome. [Seems to me it would be arrogant to think we understand who God is, what God wants us to believe, and how to worship the creator of it all!] You don’t have to belong to the MCC church or any church to receive the gifts of the table that are ours in communion. Jesus welcomed all to the table and so do we.
What is important at MCC is that while we may have different beliefs, our values are congruent.
What is important at MCC is that our faith supports building up hope and tearing down walls.
What is important is that we tear down all walls of oppression and hate.
MCC was called the “Church with AIDS” in the 1980s. We lost many young men to the disease, many young clergy as well, and those clergy who were not affected or infected, were performing sometimes a dozen funerals in a week. ..Funerals of church members, funerals of friends, and funerals of family. During that time, MCC served as an example of inclusiveness, gentleness, love and holiness.
Now in 2010, MCC continues to be loving and holy. [That’s why we’re here, amen?] A fellow MCC clergy candidate tells the story of a young man with AIDS who died in his city. While this young man was raised in the Roman Catholic denomination, grew up in the church with his family; that church would not bury him.
His frantic parents came to MCC for the final blessing and memorial service for their son. They were not members, and MCC did not ask what they believed. MCC lived its faith of inclusiveness, love, and compassion, demonstrated and taught to us by Jesus Christ and provided what the family needed. MCC was building up hope for these parents, tearing down walls of injustice in the church.
This young man is essentially like the leper. Not welcomed in the city or the faith community; however, joyfully welcomed by Jesus, graciously welcomed by MCC.
MCC faithfully lives out the values of Jesus, recognizing that just as the leper did not choose his disease, we do not choose our race, gender or sexual preference.
MCC demonstrates its faith by loving those who are outcast from other denominations and believing communities; healing the souls damaged by those who say unless you believe or act this way, you cannot attend church here. OR you can come here, but you can’t be clergy, you can’t be married, you can’t hold your partner’s hand here.
MCC expresses its faith by accepting each of us, just the way we are whether we are rich or poor, male, female, transgendered, questioning, or allies, We are accepted whether we are whole or hurting.
I don’t know about you, but for years I faithfully asked God for a place to worship on Sunday morning…A place where I was accepted for who I was because I did not make the choice about the gender of the person I love. I asked for a place to lift me up as the child of God that I knew I was. I asked for a place where my soul could be still and my spirit could be healed by God. Faithfully God answered (though it took God a few decades)…MCC the social justice church…building up hope, tearing down walls, and restoring faith.
I pray the all those feeling deserted, depressed, and in despair, walk through our doors rather than committing suicide.
I pray we may be the example and disciples of Jesus’ love reaching out into a world to counter hate and discrimination of every kind.
I pray all of us are led to create a life that matters to at least one other on the margins.
Most of all, I pray that all those who feel like lepers will walk through our doors and be healed! May it be so.
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