Cynicism

January 15th, 2012

The 2nd Sunday after the Epiphany

John 1:43-51

O Lord, you have taught us that without love whatever we do is worth nothing; Send your Holy Spirit and pour into our hearts your greatest gift, which is love, the true bond of peace and of all virtue, without which whoever lives is accounted dead before you. Grant this for the sake of your only Son Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen [BCP, 216]. “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” There is a certain cynical, jaded tone to Nathaniel’s comment that reminds me of the cynicism of Humphrey Bogart’s Rick in the movie Casablanca. Rick’s cynicism is like a protective scab for a broken heart. Despite his bitter attitude, you know that Rick remains a romantic at heart and ultimately will do what is right. There is a cosmopolitan sophistication to his cynicism that at first seems attractive. He isn’t someone who will be easily fooled. He’s too smart for that. But you also sense the limits of his cynicism; how it keeps him from being fully present, fully alive. Instead of being an asset, it’s a liability. Today we are well aware of the limits of cynicism. In a post-modern culture that celebrates a cynical attitude towards everything, there is little personal commitment and all truth feels relative. There are local truths but few if any Capital T Truths. A detached ironic attitude is the default mode for today’s hipster, what was once a unique trait to Rick has become a commonplace. Such cynical detachment far from being attractive breeds boredom and complacency. Instead of working to better the world, time hangs heavily and one seeks distractions to make it pass more quickly.

I’m not sure how cynicism has become a default attitude in our society. Perhaps it’s a consequence of the popularization of the Theory of Relativity, or a consequence of the loss of idealism after the assignations of President Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr., or the bitterness that followed Vietnam and Watergate. In terms of the history of philosophy it’s interesting how cynicism has changed from a basically positive stoic attitude towards life in the ancient world, an indifference to suffering similar to Buddhism, to today’s negative indifference to anything and everything. Modern cynicism is a parasitic belief that feeds off of the beliefs of others but offers nothing in their place. “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” “Can anything good come out of Christianity?” quickly leads to “Is anything good?” It’s hard to combat cynicism; it’s like trying to stand on quicksand. You feel like yours words are meaningless and falling into a void. But instead of responding directly to cynical words you might respond as Philip and Jesus do in the Gospel this morning. When Nathaniel asks, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” Philip doesn’t argue back. He just says “Come and see.” He doesn’t try to convince Nathaniel that he Philip is right. He honors Nathaniel’s position and invites Nathaniel to make up his own mind. Come and see. In a similar fashion, instead of arguing for the truth of our faith in Christ, invite someone to come to Church with you or take them to the soup kitchen on Saturday. Come and see, it’s all the evangelism that we need to do. It’s not our job to make people Christian, that’s the role of the Holy Spirit. Our job is just to issue the invitation, Come and see. God will do the rest.

And that’s what we see happen with Jesus and Nathaniel. Instead of berating Nathaniel for his cynicism, Jesus commends him for being without guile. Instead of being upset that Nathaniel dissed his hometown, Jesus sees behind his cynicism to a desire for the Messiah to really come. Jesus appeals to Nathaniel’s hope instead of his disappointment. He then reveals to Nathaniel the depths to which God knows him when he says that he saw him under the fig tree. The fig tree was both a traditional place of study for a rabbi and also a symbol of the Law. Jesus knows that Nathaniel is a person of faith despite his cynical comment.

Might we make the same assumption today about people today? Instead of assuming their cynicism is permanent, appeal to the desire for Capital T Truth and extend an invitation to Come and see, to experience Jesus in worship, to experience Jesus in outreach. Christianity has always had its cultural despisers, people who belittle the faith or see it as simple and unsophisticated. Wherever the Church has existed, people have wondered if anything good can come out of Nazareth? The simplest and best response is to invite them to come and see. Jesus will do the rest. Amen.

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Something Happened

January 8th, 2012

The 1st Sunday after the Epiphany: The Baptism of our Lord

Mark 4:1-11

Almighty God, by our baptism into the death and resurrection of your Son Jesus Christ, you turn us from the old life of sin: Grant that we, being reborn to new life in him, may live in righteousness and holiness all our days; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen [BCP, 254].It was a grey day, not so much cloudy as hazy. Everything was distinct though; colors seemed richer, whiter, blacker, more blue than normal. He wasn’t sure why He came. He just felt drawn to be here like the other people. From a distance He watched as they entered into the Jordan to be baptized by John. There was a strong sense of anticipation in the air. You could feel the hunger, the longing for a better world, for a chance to start over, for God to come and set things straight once and for all. At the same time, you knew the authorities would soon put an end to this; they weren’t going to allow the obvious dissatisfaction with the way things are to continue like this with such large crowds. John was a powerful preacher. He sounded just like Isaiah or one of the prophets of old. You could here the voice of the Father in his words, in his actions. John was dressed just like Elijah. He seemed at home here in the wilderness. Looking for God here in the desert instead of the Temple. The trees and bushes by the river seemed so green against the red brown of the rocks. The breeze rustled the leaves and you could hear the river itself flowing, continuously moving past, washing away the regrets, the old hurts and longings, the feelings of betrayal and failure. You sensed the healing that was happening. Truly John was doing God’s work here in the desert, far from the Temple. He couldn’t say why, but He felt drawn to enter the water, to be one with the people. His heart ached for them. He could feel their pain. Their hurts. Their longings. Slowly, deliberately He got into line and waited his turn. The line moved quickly and before He knew it, it was his turn. He entered the water and approached John. John reached out his arm and started automatically to ask him if He repented of his sins and then he stopped. He started at him directly and paused. Looking into John’s eyes, He nodded and started to descend into the water.

The water was so clear and so cold. He closed his eyes and felt the fingers of death grab him. He sensed that He was being pulled down into Sheol. He could feel the silence of death; He sensed the absence of the Father, of the Spirit. He shuddered and felt the weight of sin upon himself. For the first time He knew the isolation, the loneliness, the despair of life without God. It was less than a minute but it felt like a lifetime, an eternity. He felt John pulling him up, up, up away from the darkness, the silence, the absence that was clinging to him, pulling down like seaweed into the very depths of chaos itself. With a shudder, He came up out of the water, gasping for air.

What happened next, He never could fully explain, but the moment never left him. He glanced up and it was as if the sky itself was torn apart and He could see into heaven itself. He sensed the Father’s eternal love for him. He sensed the Father’s love for all the people here, for all the people in the world, for all people throughout eternity. Time itself seemed to stop. He was on earth but he was also in heaven. He saw the Holy Spirit descending, like a dove, so gently but with such purpose. As He felt the Spirit envelope him, He knew the time had come for him to start his ministry. This was the moment He was waiting for, the moment that He was born for. He knew his vocation. He knew what lay ahead. He could see the cross. He could see that death itself was waiting for him. Waiting to keep him in the darkness forever, but now all was light. He felt warmed by the Spirit and then He heard the words that blessed him and sustained throughout the rest of his life: “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” He knew that nothing could ever separate him from the love of God, not even death itself. It was these words that would sustain him in his ministry when He was tired or discouraged. It was these words that He hung on to when He hung on the cross and felt abandoned by the Father. Even in the absence of God, when the Spirit left him there to die, carrying the sins of the whole world, He knew the Father was well pleased. He knew He was doing the work of God.

As He got out the world, the world itself seemed electrified, charged with the presence of the Holy Spirit. Every leaf was perfect, shining with the glory of God who created and sustained it out of love. Everything was alive with this love. He felt elated but also traumatized. The cold grasp of death, of sin would haunt him for the rest of his life. His work was to put death to death. It was time to begin his ministry. He thought of Adam and Eve, of the joy of being with them in the garden. How simple and good life is with God at the center of one’s life. He thought about all the people who would follow his footsteps and how He would be with them in the water as they were baptized. Never again would death reign unchallenged. Death’s days were numbered. It was time now to face Satan and so He left the Jordan and journeyed deeper into the wilderness. Savoring his Father’s words and longing to please Him forever. Amen.

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Apre’s vous

January 1st, 2012

The Holy Name

Philippians 2:9-13 & Luke 2:15-21

O God, who wonderfully created, and yet more wonderfully restored, the dignity of human nature: Grant that we may share the divine life of him who humbled himself to share our humanity, you Son Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen [BCP, 214].

Today is the feast of the Holy Name, in an earlier time we commemorated the circumcision of Jesus, but today we discreetly refer to his being named Jesus. In the Gospel, I love the image of Mary treasuring in her heart the words that the shepherds shared with her about her son Jesus. Today I want to ponder with Mary about the name of Jesus. The Greek term for ‘to treasure’ means to preserve and keep in good condition. Mary kept and honored the name of Jesus; just as we do in the Lord’s Prayer when we say “hallowed be thy Name.” And as Paul writes in Philippians, “at the name of Jesus, every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth.” Jesus is a translation of the Aramaic Yeshua, or Joshua from the Hebrew yasha. Yasha means salvation. We are use to thinking of salvation in terms of the Greek meaning of healing or wholeness. But the Hebrew meaning of salvation means making room or roominess. God creates space for us. There is a sense of wideness and expanse. There is freedom from constriction and confinement. Salvation from the Egyptians brought us into the space, the roominess of the Promised Land. I love this idea when you think of Jesus at the end of his life in John’s Gospel telling the disciples that he was going to prepare a place for them in his Father’s house [John 14:2]. Jesus was literally fulfilling the meaning of his name: both saving us and preparing a place for us. In Jesus’ name itself we have a whole history and theology of salvation.

In the Jewish mystical theology of the Kabbalah there is the idea of Tsimtsum. Because God fills all in all, God must make space for creation itself to exist. This contraction is called tsimtsum. God holds his breath, he withdraws to make room for us. I believe it is the same idea in the hymn to Jesus in Philippians in this morning’s reading:

Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross [2:5-8, NRSV].

In emptying himself Christ Jesus was making space for us. Instead of coming in the glory of God whose holiness and splendor would overwhelm us, Jesus chose to come as a human being. He created space for us to exist, for us to choose to follow him. Here is the very mystery of Christmas, the Son of God emptying himself of his glory to be born a human being. It is this very emptying that saves us, that makes room for us. Throughout his life, Jesus modeled this emptying in his humility and gentleness. Jesus always directed the center of attention on to the people he was talking to. In the presence of Jesus, you know that you are the center of his attention, that God focuses and cares about you.

And so how do we honor the Name of Jesus? As we start the New Year how will we make room for others? The philosopher I studied in graduate school, Emmanuel Lévinas suggested that all ethics is summarized in the expression “after you.” When we hold the door for someone we are putting them before ourselves, we are physically realizing the meaning of salvation, of making room for others. Since we are created in the image and likeness of God, we express this image of God in learning not to live for ourselves alone but for God and others. When we learn to empty ourselves, we are following in the steps of Christ himself. Life becomes more precious and joyous. The emptiness and longing we feel for meaning in our lives is filled with love as we show love to others, as we say, “After you.” We are set free by Jesus from all the things that we use to fill our lives, to escape boredom or the distractedness or restlessness that plagues us. We are set free from our addictions, from all the empty idols that we use to fill our hearts. Jesus makes room in our lives for God.

God longs for us to make room for the Holy Spirit in our hearts, in our lives. As we celebrate the mystery of Christ dwelling with us, we are called to dwell in Christ. The Name of Jesus reminds us that God saves us and that has God has come to dwell with us, so Jesus has made room for us to dwell in God. We are secure in our place in God. God surrounds us and protects us; God orders our world and is at the very center of our being. At Christmas we celebrate God becoming human so that we might become like God.

In this new year, we, like Mary, can treasure and ponder these things in our heart: How Jesus saves us by making room for us in his heart and yearns for us to do the same with him. In Jesus’ Holy Name, amen.

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Thin Places

December 24th, 2011

The Feast of the Nativity

Christmas Eve 2011

Luke 2:1-20

A Christmas Eve Prayer in the Celtic Tradition

©R.J. Boland, Christmas 1999

For unto us a Child is born.

Unto us a Son is given.

Don’t pass by me

The light burns bright in the window tonight,

Christ is passing by.

The cattle are restless in the byre tonight,

Christ is passing by.

The shepherds are watching in the fields tonight,

Christ is passing by.

The inn is crowded with travelers tonight,

Christ is passing by.

Stop for a moment, Lord, hear my plea,

Fill an empty heart,

Don’t pass by me.

http://www.diocese-kcsj.org/_docs/A_Christmas_Eve_Prayer_in_the_Celtic_Tradition.pdf

Used with kind permission of Bishop Boland

“There is a Celtic saying that heaven and earth are only three feet apart, but in the thin places that distance is even smaller.” http://www.explorefaith.org/mystery/mysteryThinPlaces.html

I love the Celtic idea of thin places, “places where the veil that separates heaven and earth is lifted and you can glimpse the glory of God” [ibid.]. I think of Jacob’s ladder in the middle of the desert, of Moses on Mt. Sinai, or the Transfiguration of Jesus, of holy places like Iona and Lindisfarne or the Trappist monastery, Holy Cross Abbey, in Berryville, Virginia. Or one of my favorite moments, when we dim the lights on this holy night and sing together Silent night, holy night. Christmas is a season of thin places and times. We think of past Christmases and loved ones who have gone before us into heaven, we journey out into the night to catch a glimpse of the glory of God, to hear with the shepherds the heavenly chorus of angels proclaim the glory of God in the highest and peace on earth. Like the Magi, we come to pay homage to the baby born to be king of the whole world. In a word we are hungry for the holy, hungry for the glory of God, even just a glimpse to warm our hearts and carry us back out into the darkness.

We all are so blessed. Most of us aren’t hungry, or worrying about where we will find shelter tonight. Doors aren’t closed in our faces. Most of us have family and friends. And yet here we are because our hearts are hungry. Hungry for something we may not be able to name. There is a restlessness, a boredom in our souls. We long for a sense of purpose, a deeper meaning for our life. As St. Augustine so beautifully put it, “our hearts are restless till they rest in thee.” We are hungry for God. Only God can fill the emptiness, the longing in our hearts. We are made for the love of God and it is this love that we seek tonight.

For on this night, we celebrate the light of Christ as we long to receive this gift of God’s love. And this is the mystery of Christmas that Christ was born this night out of love for you. I begin with you. Your heart is a thin place where God longs to dwell. Tonight is about you and for you. We are here tonight because we are loved; we are valued; we are of tremendous importance to God. Know that God loves you and cares for you. On this holy night, God risks everything to be born amongst us, as one of us. The creator of the entire cosmos chooses to be born a helpless babe, to win our hearts, our love. Out of love, Jesus is born. He risks our rejection, our fear, our contempt, even our indifference to him. Ultimately he risks his life for us, in order to close the gap between us and God. This is the mystery of tonight, that God has become human so that we can become one again with God. Jesus is God choosing to be born as a human being, as a baby and trusting that we, you and I will care for him, will learn to love him and follow him back to the Kingdom of God.

Christmas occurs whenever we allow Jesus to be born in our hearts. Whether it’s tonight or sometime in the past, or even tomorrow. We don’t have to journey to Bethlehem to find God; God has already come to find us. Honor the longing you feel for God, let the Holy Spirit fill your heart with the peace and love of God. Tonight receive the gift of God’s love, discover the purpose and meaning of life in this indescribable love that yearns for us. Out of joy, God has created this marvelous cosmos, this incredible world and God has made us to be part of the joy, part of the celebration of the goodness of life. We may not feel that we are worthy of this love; we may be consumed with guilt and regrets; in the depths of our being, we may feel unlovable, but know this fact that God loves you.

Don’t pass by me

The light burns bright in the window tonight,

Christ is passing by.

The cattle are restless in the byre tonight,

Christ is passing by.

The shepherds are watching in the fields tonight,

Christ is passing by.

The inn is crowded with travelers tonight,

Christ is passing by.

Stop for a moment, Lord, hear my plea,

Fill an empty heart,

Don’t pass by me.

Amen.

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Saying Yes to the Word

December 18th, 2011

The Fourth Sunday of Advent

Luke 1:26-38

Father in heaven, by your grace the virgin mother of your incarnate Son was blessed in bearing him, but still more blessed in keeping your word: Grant us who honor the exaltation of her lowliness to follow the example of her devotion to your will; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen [BCP, 240].

At one time or another, I think all of us have marveled at the grace and courage of Mary to say yes to God and allow herself to be the mother of Jesus. We know so little about her beyond this conversation with the angel Gabriel. She visits her relative Elizabeth and she is present in the background for most of Jesus’ ministry, most famously at the wedding at Cana and for his death in Jerusalem. Legend has her traveling with John the beloved disciple to Ephesus in Turkey where she died in a modest two room stone house on the top of a hill outside the ancient city. I visited this house and tried to imagine Mary and John there and I wondered what Mary thought about her Son and her life as the Mother of God.

Unlike many of the other people in the New Testament, Mary remains an enigmatic cipher. We can imagine the impetuousness of Peter; the bluster of James and John the sons of Zebedee; the single mindedness of Paul our patron saint. We can even marvel at the intellectual and verbal brilliance of Jesus and his parables. But Mary is a mystery. She reminds me of a silent screen film goddess. She is beautiful and you wonder what her voice would sound like. I think her silence in the Gospels is deliberate. Not as a patriarchal attempt to silence the feminine voice, but rather Mary is the template, the model for all Christians. We are to imagine ourselves as Mary and how we will allow the Word of God to grow in us and change our lives. In Mary, we see what it means to say yes to Jesus and we are invited to put ourselves in the place of Mary. Like Mary, we witness and ponder the events in Jesus’ life and seek to understand how we are to follow him.

Another legend about Mary has her being raised in the Temple where she weaves curtains for the sanctuary. But I think the intent of this legend is for us to realize not just how Mary is a temple for our Lord but how we also are called to be temples of the holy Spirit, to allow Christ to be born in our lives and to dwell in our hearts. How do we say yes to God’s word? I want to suggest one simple way would be for us to commit ourselves to reading the Bible next year. I’m not talking about studying the Bible, but literally just reading the Bible as if it were another book. To take the time and just read it. I know that the Bible can be confusing and it’s easy to get sidetracked in the details, but there is no better way of hearing God’s voice amidst all the voices of our culture than to just read the Bible. The rabbis talk about scripture as a love letter from God and it is in this manner that I am suggesting that we read. I will be sending out a letter this week with details about this Bible Challenge, but it’s really just a simple plea for us to follow Mary’s example and say yes to the Word of God.

As you just read you will be amazed at how God can you these words to speak directly to us. From the creation of the world to its end, God chooses to communicate with us through these words. But if we don’t know the whole story of our salvation, it’s hard for us to imagine ourselves in this story. The lectionary that we use each Sunday is a marvelous way to read the Gospels and hear the story of Jesus. But the lectionary itself presupposes that we know the whole story, the whole Bible. But few of us know the whole story. We assume the Bible is too hard to understand. We discount our own ability to hear the word of God in our own lives. We start with good intentions and then give up once we hit the liturgical desert of Leviticus and all its rules of worship or the genealogies of who begat whom for paragraphs on end. But you can skim these parts; it still counts as reading the whole Bible. I think a more difficult issue is that many of us have lost the habit of reading a book. We have grown accustomed to skimming articles on the Internet or our smart phones and slowly we are losing our ability to concentrate and read for prolong periods of time. Hence the importance of our committing to read the Bible as a book. Reading increases not only our comprehension but also helps us learn how to meditate and contemplate. Reading the Bible will help you learn how to pray, as you ask what is God saying to me? What does God want me to do? So I hope you will accept the Bible Challenge and like Mary say yes to the Word of God. Amen.

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The Art of Prophecy

December 11th, 2011

Third Sunday of Advent (B)

John 1:6-8, 19-28

Father in heaven, who at the baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan proclaimed him your beloved Son and anointed him with the Holy Spirit: Grant that all who are baptized into his Name may keep the covenant they have made, and boldly confess him as Lord and Savior; who with you and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, one God, in glory everlasting. Amen [BCP, 214].

I want to continue the Gospel reading to verse 34 [NRSV]:

The next day he saw Jesus coming towards him and declared, ‘Here is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! This is he of whom I said, “After me comes a man who ranks ahead of me because he was before me.” I myself did not know him; but I came baptizing with water for this reason, that he might be revealed to Israel.’ And John testified, ‘I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it remained on him. I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, “He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.” And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.’In four weeks we will celebrate the Baptism of Jesus by John but I want to focus this morning on just one term in verse 31, the term in Greek is phaneroo, which is translated here as revealed. Phaneroo means “to make manifest or visible or known what has been hidden or unknown, to manifest, whether by words, or deeds, or in any other way” [from http://www.searchgodsword.org/lex/grk/view.cgi?number=5319, the use of phaneroo is from the blog: http://inaspaciousplace.wordpress.com/2011/12/05/seeing-what-cant-be-seen-john-124-34/]. This term is a perfect description of John the Baptist’s ministry as a prophet. He helps us see Jesus as the long awaited savior of Israel and the messiah who will baptize us with the Holy Spirit. John came as a witness to the light of the world. When questioned about himself he skillfully deflected the questions, instead continually pointing to the one to come. Using the prophet Isaiah he quoted the prediction of the coming of the messiah. But he denied that he was the messiah. The attention is on Jesus, not himself.

At first it’s hard to reconcile this humility of John with the image we have of him as a ranting madman in the desert railing against the powers that be and preaching a baptism of repentance for everyone since we have all fallen short of the glory of God. But when you realize that John, like Mary, has already said yes to Jesus you can see that he has already stepped out of this world into the kingdom of God. He no longer defines himself by the world’s standards; his identity comes out of his relationship with Jesus. This is what baptism signifies: dying to the ways of the world and being born again as a disciple of Jesus. John the Baptist spent his life helping others to see the truth that he knew. John could see the light of God’s kingdom, the glory of God that surrounds us and he spent his life helping others to see the light, to see Jesus as their savior, their messiah.

Now I think it’s safe to say that John the Baptist is one of the last persons we would chose to follow in our own ministries. He’s not an easy saint like Francis of Assisi who blessed the animals or the Blessed Virgin Mary who gently said yes to God. John is rough and prickly, out there in the desert eating honey and locusts and railing against the sinfulness of the world. We don’t easily see ourselves in the street preacher mode, and yet at each baptism we promise to “proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ.” I believe that John can show us how to be an evangelist without having to enter into the desert or find a busy street corner.

The famous theologian Karl Barth often advised young theologians “to take your Bible and take your newspaper, and read both. But interpret newspapers from your Bible”

[http://libweb.ptsem.edu /collections/barth/faq/quotes.aspx?menu=296&subText=468]. In his own fashion this is exactly what John the Baptist did. Everything was seen from the viewpoint of the Gospel. Like John can discover our identity in Jesus and learn to see the world from the perspective of God’s kingdom. And then we can share this vision of the light with others. We are called to reveal Christ by our words and example. Our lives should radiate the glow of God’s glory, the light of Christ that dispels the darkness and celebrates the goodness of God and the creation. We are called to interpret the world from the perspective of God’s love made known in Jesus.

In the darkness of December in the Northern Hemisphere, as the world hurries to celebrate Christmas, John reminds us to slow down and look for the light of Christ in our midst. Be more deliberate and find times to celebrate this light, this glory of God. In the midst of your preparations, prepare your heart. Stop and say thank you to God. Give thanks for the sales people helping you; pray for your fellow shoppers, pause and listen for the Holy Spirit. Create a desert space, a space apart in the midst of all the activity to be with Jesus. The peacefulness and gentleness that will emanate from you will help others to perceive the light and remember the one for whom we are awaiting, the one who defines our identity and fills us with joy and anticipation of his return in glory, Jesus the Christ. Amen.

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Getting Started

December 4th, 2011

The Second Sunday of AdventMark 1:1-8

Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning: Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen [BCP, 236].

“Call me Ishmael.” - Herman Melville, Moby-Dick (1851);

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.” - Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (1859);

“In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since”. - F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (1925);

“I am an invisible man.” - Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (1952) and

“A screaming comes across the sky.” - Thomas Pynchon, Gravity’s Rainbow (1973)

A memorable first line opens the world of a novel and let’s you enter into the lives of its characters. I can’t tell you how many hours I spent staring at that typewriter as an undergraduate trying to write a paper due the next morning. I didn’t become comfortable with writing and enjoying it until seminary. In college, I dreaded writing papers with all the angst and foreboding of a French existentialist contemplating the act of committing oneself on the white nothingness of the empty page. Fortunately, I have a more joyful view of life today. Even though I still write my sermons on Saturday night, I no longer indulge in writer’s block, but just get down to the task of writing. And yet, that first sentence is always the hardest. How to start, how to begin? Where do you start?

Imagine Mark’s situation as he wrote the first Gospel. How to tell the Good News about Jesus? We think his Gospel was written around the late 60s or early 70’s. It had been close to forty years after the resurrection and the end times hadn’t yet come. Jesus still had not returned in glory. The Romans had been fighting the Jewish people and would soon if they hadn’t already destroy the Temple and level the city of Jerusalem. The rabbis had evicted the Christians out of the synagogues accusing them of being heretics. The emperor Nero had outlawed Christianity and burned Christians as convenient scapegoats for the fire that destroyed Rome. Persecuted by the Empire, outlawed by your brothers and sisters in the faith of the God of Israel, preaching that Jesus is the long awaited Messiah, but he still hasn’t returned and worse of all those who personally knew Jesus are now dying. The first generation of believers was going quickly, how to share the faith in Jesus with a world that was hostile to it? Where do you start? How do you begin?

And so I imagine Mark sitting down at his typewriter and just typing the question itself as a statement: “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” There’s already a lot of information in this heading, this beginning. The first term is the word Beginning; Mark is implying that a new age is starting. We have entered into a new paradigm, a new reality with Jesus. It sounds as if Mark is writing a biography of a Roman emperor because that’s what gospels were originally, news from the Emperor and it implied an amnesty on his accession, hence the good news. It would take the Church at least three centuries to spell out the meaning of the terms the Son of God. While it’s harder for us today to start with the divinity of Jesus, that was a given in Mark’s time. The emperor himself was considered a divine being, for Gentiles, it was easy to believe in Jesus’ divinity, but much harder to believe that he was also a human being like us. Mark probably wrote for a Gentile audience since he wrote in Koine Greek, but Greek than was the international equivalent of English today. It was the common tongue for commerce and trade.

But now what should he say? Where does he start the story of the Good News about this Jesus? We think that Mark wrote the very first Gospel. Unlike the other Gospel writers, he doesn’t start with a genealogy to prove Jesus’ credentials as the Messiah, the Son of David, the way that Matthew will. Nor is there any birth story about Mary and Jesus. Nor any birth story about John the Baptist as Luke will start his orderly account of events to Theophilus. Nor will he echo the beginning of the Bible itself and creation that starts in the beginning as John will when he equates Jesus with the Word of God. No, Mark in his laconic and direct fashion starts with the ministry of John the Baptist. He introduces John by citing from Isaiah and Malachi and describing John in terms of Elijah, the prophet who was to return before the Messiah himself. We immediately see John the Baptist as Elijah and we await the appearance of Jesus. Jesus will appear in the 9th verse of this first chapter. Mark will waste no time in getting Jesus on stage. But again why start with John the Baptist? What is he trying to tell us with this beginning? Quite simply, I think that Mark is sharing with us how he came to believe in Jesus through his experience of repentance. You’re not looking for a Messiah or a Savior unless you are lost. It is that experience of being lost and then found that comprises most accounts of salvation, of coming to belief in Jesus as your Lord and Savior. None of us want to admit that we are sinners, that we have fallen short of the glory of God, but once you experience God’s love for you, you see how little you are of deserving, let alone receiving this love. And yet God loves us. If we don’t repent, if we don’t turn back to God, then we won’t receive or need the good news about Jesus. The good news about Jesus makes repentance possible and necessary. It is the first step that we take back to God, but it is a step that we can take because God has already come to us and given us the gift of hope, the good news of Jesus. Through his Gospel, Mark is recounting his faith story and why he believes that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God. What he has done is what happens hundreds of times a day as people come to faith in Jesus. They hear the Gospel as good news for them and they change their lives because of Jesus. It is what happens in a twelve step program as people share their story of addiction not so people will become addicts, but so people will be able to hear their own story and receive the gift of hope.

We read Mark’s Gospel and the other Gospels and Paul’s Letters so that we can grow in faith and in our understanding of how Jesus is God’s answer to the problems of life. But many people won’t read the Bible; instead they will look at us and listen to our story of how we came to believe in Jesus and why it matters. I have brought this typewriter in today, because each one of us is called to share the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. How will you tell your story? Where will you begin? In Christ’s Name, amen.

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Seven Tips for the Apocalypse

November 27th, 2011

The 1St Sunday of Advent

Mark 13:24-37?

O God, by whom the meek are guided in judgment, and light rises up in darkness for the godly: Grant us, in all our doubts and uncertainties, the grace to ask what you would have us to do, that your Spirit of wisdom may save us from all false choices, and that in your light we may see light, and in your straight path may not stumble; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen [BCP, 832].

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This morning as we start a new Church year we begin with the end of all time that Jesus describes in the Little Apocalypse of Mark’s Gospel. Advent is a season of waiting: waiting for the end time and a re-enactment of the waiting for the first coming of the Messiah, which is Christmas. Advent is like a 3-D movie but without the special glasses. Jesus stands out both in the foreground of history as he is born of the Virgin Mary in Bethlehem and as the King of kings in the background as he fills the sky with the glory of God at the end of time. We find ourselves in the between times, between the first Christmas and the last days of creation.

As Episcopalians we tend not to focus on the end times and so we are a little confused by the popular vocabulary of pre- or post-Millennial, the rapture, tribulation, Gog and Magog, and so on. We just know that it will be bad, that there’s nothing we can do about it and so it’s easier not to think about it. But as a public service this morning I want to offer you Seven Tips for the Apocalypse:

Be Prepared. I know we don’t know when it will come, but we still can live each day as though today may be the day. Commit yourself to God today and seek to do God’s will; if Jesus shows up, you’ll be set. If not, you’re better prepared to live as a Christian tomorrow.

Be Skeptical. Lots of people think they know the date of the last day. But since Jesus himself doesn’t know; how can they? Instead be prepared, live today in the presence of God; but don’t sell your house or cash in your IRA, you’ll probably need them tomorrow. Be wary of preachers who want all your assets. Jesus warns us that many people will claim to be the Messiah. When Jesus returns he will return in glory, there will be no question about who is the true Messiah, we all will know.

Travel Light. Jesus sent his disciples out to preach with just the clothes on their backs. He warns us to travel light at the end of time: ‘So when you see the desolating sacrilege standing in the holy place, as was spoken of by the prophet Daniel (let the reader understand), then those in Judea must flee to the mountains; someone on the housetop must not go down to take what is in the house; someone in the field must not turn back to get a coat [Mt: 24:15-18, NRSV]. We all have too much stuff already, why are we buying more? We can’t take it with us, so learn to travel light and share the rest of the stuff with those without.

Keep Watch. Keep alert. Keep awake. We must always be looking for signs of God. Through prayer and reading of the Bible, we develop the ability to read the world from the perspective of God. We look for signs of God’s presence in events like the fall of the Berlin Wall and we lament God’s absence in the Shoah. But always we are looking towards God. The focus isn’t upon ourselves, but upon Christ. What are the signs of the End times? Wars and rumors of wars, the sun and moon darkened, stars falling from the sky. But what about pepper spray at Wal-Mart on Black Friday? Surely somebody lost sight of Jesus in their Christmas shopping. Which is the fifth point.

Focus on Jesus. We need to stay focused on Jesus and what God wants us to do. It’s easy to be caught up in the consumerism of Christmas, but Advent reminds us to slow down and look for Jesus in what we are doing. Bake cookies with Jesus, write Christmas Cards with Him, spend sometime with an elderly neighbor, visit the sick, find ways of keeping Christ in Christmas.

Share the love. We are made for love and for that love to grow we need to share it with others. Tell others that you love them. Tell them today. The most important messages from 9/11 were the phone calls that said, “I love you.” Don’t wait until the last day, say it today.

Don’t worry, be happy. Actually not happy, but joyful. Live today with the joy that God created it with. Life is beautiful and messy, happy and sad, boring and exciting, but above all it is good. Enjoy your life, live it for God. And before you know it, Jesus will be back. In his Name, Amen.

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Christ the King Do you See?

November 20th, 2011

A: 29 Matthew 21:35-46

O God, who created all peoples in your image, we thank you for the wonderful diversity of this world. Enrich our lives by ever-widening circles of fellowship, and show us your presence in those who differ most from us, until our knowledge of your love is made perfect in our love for all your children; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen [BCP, 840].

Did you know that you may know more than you are aware of? Oftentimes we know something without being able to explain how we know it. During World War II, the British employed plane spotters whose job was to quickly and accurately identify German bombers from British aircraft. There were only a few spotters who were able to do it and the government asked them to train others. But they didn’t know how it was that they could do it. They couldn’t explain their ability. They saw the right answer without knowing how. The solution was to have them mentor others and train them with trail-and-error feedback until the trainees were able to do it themselves. [from http://discovermagazine.com/2011/sep/18-your-brain-knows-lot-more-than-you-realize/article_view?b_start:int=1&-C=]

Sometimes I think this is why Jesus taught his disciples with parables. He was aware of the presence of God all around him and yet others didn’t seem to see it or to be aware of it. Through parables and mentoring, Jesus taught his disciples to see God at work in the world around them at all times and in all places. In the parable this morning, he shows how we minister directly to God when we care for the poor, the hungry, the sick and those in prison. Without knowing it when we helped the least among us we were helping Christ himself. This parable encourages us to minister to the poor in the Name of Jesus but it also encourages us to realize that when we are down and out that Jesus will minister to us through others. God is always here, though we may not be directly aware of it. Through his parables, Jesus mentored and taught his disciples and still today he teaches us how to see God.

There are three primary ways that Jesus teaches us to know and see God. The first is the Church itself. As a community of believers, we mentor each other in worship, prayer and outreach. We learn from others how to care for others in Christ’s Name and we experience the grace and glory of God through this work. Through the saints in our midst we learn to think and act like Jesus himself. In worship, we learn to offer ourselves back to God in gratitude and thanksgiving. We find ourselves doing the work God assigned us in the Garden of Eden, of tending this creation and giving it back to God in thanksgiving.

The second way is through reading the Bible. The Bible is the story of our salvation. From the beginning of creation to its culmination in the City of God here on earth, we discover the pattern and way of life with God. As we read the Bible we learn to discern God’s presence not just in history but in our own lives. We learn to read through the words to enter into the presence of the Word, Jesus himself. If you’ve ever been with a child learning how to read, it’s a magical moment when suddenly it clicks and the child begins reading by him or herself. Suddenly they aren’t random letters on a page, but a story to be entered into. Something similar happens as we faithfully read the Bible, we discover that God is with us in the reading; the Holy Spirit leads us into the mind of God and shapes our thinking to God’s. It’s no longer a book about other people’s experience of God, but rather a way of being with God here and now.

The third way is through the Holy Eucharist. On the night before he died for us, Jesus took the bread, gave thanks for it, broke it and gave it to his disciples saying, “This is my body, do this in remembrance of me.” In the same way, he took the cup of wine and said, “This is my blood which is shed for you, drink this in remembrance of me.” Each week we offer to God this bread and wine, and we receive them back as the body and blood of Jesus. We receive God into our bodies, so that we might see that God always dwells with us and that we dwell with God. Without being able to say how, we are aware that God is here. God is caring for us and feeding us with this bread and this wine.

In these ways and others, Jesus gives us a sacramental view of life. We learn to perceive the holiness of all human beings, not just in the saints of God who are aglow with the love of God, but we also learn to perceive the holiness of all those whom we might easily overlook or forget. We learn the truth that we all are created in the image and likeness of God. That Jesus is present in the face of every human being. And once we begin to perceive this truth, the next step is easy: to proclaim that Jesus is King of kings and Lord of lords. We see not only that God created everything, but through the Holy Spirit everything can be a sacrament of God’s love. The Kingdom of God is all around us and Jesus reigns over it all. Once we know that Jesus is King, we see all of creation shining with the glory of God. In Christ’s Name. Amen.

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Be Not Afraid

November 13th, 2011

22 Sunday after PentecostA28: 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 & Matthew 25:14-30

O Lord, mercifully receive the prayers of your people who call upon you, and grant that they may know and understand what things they ought to do, and also may have grace and power faithfully to accomplish them; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen [BCP, 231].

The deadpan comedian Stephen Wright has a wonderful quip that conveys the gist of this morning’s Gospel: “I started out with nothing. I still have most of it.”

Jesus today sounds like a commentator against the Occupy Wall Street movement. It looks like the top 1% will get richer and the other 99%, the poor, will get poorer. Like most of Jesus’ parables, there are several ways to interpret this story. We can hear it as a story of God’s generosity. The sums entrusted to the servants are of a staggering amount. A talent is worth about 15 years wages for a day worker, so calculated at a minimum wage of $7.25 an hour for 2080 hours a year times 15 years, one talent is worth $226,200. So the man with five talents had an equivalent final sum of $2,262,000, the man with two talents had almost a million dollars, $904,800. And the man with one talent who played it save, in the end lost the $226,200 he hid. God has given us this marvelous creation and left us to use our gifts as we see fit. In the end, we will be judged by how we have used our talents to the glory of God. Have we tried and risked our lives in service to God and others? Have we sensed the glory and wonder of life and lived it fully, enjoying and celebrating God’s generosity?

Or have we lived in fear and hidden our talents and dreaded the day of reckoning? Like an ungrateful child, complaining that he or she didn’t ask to be born so how can you expect them to clean their room or do the dishes? How can God expect us to double God’s investment in us? It’s not fair. The man with one talent justifies his actions by complaining about his master being a harsh man who reaps where he hasn’t sown, but the master doesn’t let him off the hook. If he knew this then he should have at least put the money in a bank and gained interest. And this is the marvelous thing that Jesus does with this parable; he helps us to see how we stand in judgment upon God both in our actions and our words. Do we fear the Day of Judgment because we know how far we have fallen short of the glory of God or do we resent the fact that God will judge us at all? Do we think God is a harsh and unfair master who will find a way to punish us or do we see God as a loving parent who generously entrusts us with his property and expects us to succeed beyond our wildest imagination? How we see God influences the outcome. If we trust God, then we will succeed. If we resent God, then we will fail. But the judgment isn’t God’s judgment on us but the consequence of our own judgment, our own decisions. It seems like each of us replays the scene in the Garden of Eden when we decide to put ourselves in the place of God and then find ourselves alone and fearful.

I don’t need to preach on fear. We know all the ways of being afraid, of not taking chances, of playing it safe. We think that we aren’t capable, that others are better than us, that it’s better to be safe than sorry. So we bury our talent, living in dread of the Day of Judgment but secure in the knowledge that surely no one can fault us for playing it safe, for being prudent. How can God expect us to risk losing all that we’ve been entrusted with? What kind of God is that? And yet, that’s exactly the type of God God is. Our God creates the world out of sheer joy and abundance and then gives it freely to us. It’s up to us how we will live, how we will care and share the blessings of this life. God trusts to do what is right. God expects that we will double our talents. God believes in us, even when we have trouble believing in ourselves. That’s who our God is. God wants us to take risks.

In the parable, we see the master giving talents according to the ability of each servant. In the same way, God has given each one of us special gifts and talents to use for the building of the kingdom of God. Therefore we can encourage each other to discover our gifts and to use them to the glory of God. As we grow in confidence, we also grow in faith. We discover how God risks everything out of love for us and God encourages us to return this love as abundantly and extravagantly as God loves us. Instead of focusing on what we can’t do, we need to remember what God has done and what God can do through us. We may have trouble in believing in ourselves, but if God can, then we can too. We can encourage each other to take risks out of love. Is there something God is calling you to do, but you don’t quite believe that you can do it? Is there someone you need to help or to forgive or apologize to? Instead of automatically assuming you can’t do it, instead of listening to your fears, trust God. Ask God to help you use your talents to God’s glory and then risk it for God’s sake.

None of us have started with nothing. We have each and every one of us been blessed with the gift of love, from family, from friends, from God. And it is this gift that we have been entrusted to double to the glory of God. In Christ’s Name, Amen.

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